So I just finished writing something so impossibly sweet that I swear all my teeth just rotted in my head from it.  And since I have to write floranna's fic for help_haiti  (and her request is full of lovely angst) I need to get myself in a darker writing groove.  To further this goal, I’m watching Criminal Minds, and I’m asking you guys to send me your darkest, most angst producing prompts for Avatar: The Last Airbender.  Comment with up to five, and I’ll guarantee you at least one commentfic.  I’ll probably answer with more, knowing me.  weirdlet  and floranna  get seven requests and a guarantee of two fics, because I spawned a wild AU in weirdlet ’s head, that she has been writing delightfully twisted installments for, and because I delayed writing Floranna’s promised fic to work on my novel.

Please no rape or sexually explicit requests.  I’m a big believer that there needs to be more gen darkfic in fandom.

Ganked from avocado_love .

The Will of a God

“I thought I told you if you ever slept with a man who could not beat you in fair combat you would suffer my wrath!” the war god thundered his bloody gaze falling on the scrawny form of the man beside her. The flames from the god’s sword miraculously didn’t set the pillows on fire, but she could feel them burn where the blade touched her neck.

Her new boyfriend stared wide eyed at the shining terror standing at the foot of the bed.

She didn’t even bother pulling up the sheet and winked. “Our Scrabble matches are very combative.”



Author's Note:  So it's a stupid, misogynistic, melodramatic trope, so I feel compelled to spoof.

I am offering to write a 2000 word fic in either the Avatar: the Last Airbender or Harry Potter fandom for help_haiti, a fandom auction to benefit the relief effort in Haiti.  My offering can be found here  Starting bid is $15.00.  If you've ever wanted me to write something in either fandom, here's your chance to get that by doing something good.  Bidding ends January 20th at noon EST, so hurry up.

My trip to my twin nephews wasn’t nearly as amusing this year as last, mostly because I left Yo-yo at home and I slept through whatever witticisms my mom provided on the way there.  Put me in a car anymore and don’t have me drive, and half an hour in, I’m out cold.  And so, most of the humor was provided not by adults, but by the stars of the show.

About halfway through, those stars started getting just a little testy and started wondering why these weird adult people were invading their home.

FISH: I’m here because I’m your aunt!
THING TWO: *stares at the not at all fun woman who spent the week sleeping on his couch* Why are you my aunt?
FISH: Because I’m your daddy’s sister.
THING TWO: Daddy doesn’t have a sister.  He has Thing One and Thing Two.  *death glare*
FISH: Eheheheh, okay!  *flees*

Yeah, he didn’t take that well.

BROTHER: Well he has to learn that the world doesn’t revolve around him.  Everyone does.
SISTER-IN-LAW: He’s three, genius.
MOM: It’s a process.
BROTHER: Everybody but me, that is.

I occasionally claim to be smart.  I lie.

FISH: And Grandan’s your Grandan because he’s your daddy’s daddy, and he’s my daddy too!.
THING ONE: *cuddles deeper into my lap* You’re too old to have a daddy.

I just learned all the facts of life on this vacation, didn’t I.

We showed up when the holidays were in full swing, and my brother and my sister-in-law aren’t Jewish.  I got a present!  Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking more specifically.

Now, only my brother would get me a cookbook for Christmas and then expect me to cook a great big French dinner the next day for a thank you.  My-sister-in law certainly wouldn’t, you should have seen her face when she imagined the state her kitchen would be in when I was through with it.

But, because I’m a domestic goddess, I pulled it off with a chicken fricassée with wine and cream sauce on a bed of white rice with steamed broccoli, and the left over wine I didn’t use in the sauce.  And a side dish of glowers.

Her kitchen was pristine when I left it, in case you were wondering.

Since the few people who commented said they'd like to see these, here goes.

Summery: A vampire  has a craving to explain the facts of life to anyone who'll listen.
Disclaimer: I don't need no stinkin' disclaimer, it's original!  I claim, I claim!


( Discrete Young Ladies )

Disclaimer: If I owned Avatar the Last Airbender, It would would have scared children senseless.
Summery: Koh the Face Stealer steals a new face.

Author's Note: Written for the atlaland  secret santa exchange, giftee chameleon_pete .

( Glass Faces )

Would anyone who reads this blog be interested in reading some of my original fiction short stories?

In keeping with the not very funny tone of my blog the last few posts, I have news.  Cat, who you might know from his crazy adventures with me and terrible sense of humor, recorded here on this blog, is offering commissions, and for the first time is offering to do fannish commissions.  In his own words, he will draw Snape fucking the Giant Squid if you so ask.  Why is he doing something so wildly out of character?  His girlfriend's house burned down, and gentleman that he is, he's throwing himself into helping her rebuild financially from the disaster.

A sample of his work is below, and if you click on any of the images, the full size piece will come up





His deviantArt page is here.  The commissions are cheep, the guy's reliable, and you'd be doing a good deed.  And, I will throw in a drabble for anyone commissioning a piece from Cat on any topic the commissioner desires, so long as it's either original fiction, Harry Potter, or Avatar the Last Airbender.  I will also throw in a 1000 word story in either of my two fandoms for anyone who commissions three pieces from him.

Or, you know, if you don't commission something, the ghosts of artwork unmade will creep into your room and devour you in the night.  Your choice.

I actually feel kind of sorry for Ginny.

Drabble: Family

Ron let his sister stay there with her face against his shoulder and didn't push her away.

"It's just hard, you know?" she mumbled.  "He's in love with the family, not me."

His ears burned red, and he had no idea what to do, so he hugged her.

He held her until the shadows in the room changed direction.  "I have to get home," she hiccuped.

He let her go.  "Yuck, you got snot on my sleeve."

"What?  No I didn't!"

"Yes you did," he jabbed his finger at a trail of wet, "right there!"

Ginny cracked a wan grin.

Tonight is the last night of Hanukkah, and at this time of year, at this odd unimportant footnote in the Jewish ceremonial calender that gets so much press, I feel an obligation to say something Jewish, whatever that means.  You’d think I’d pick Yom Kippur, the most important Jewish holiday from a religious standpoint, or Passover, the great holiday of Jewish identity and the struggle for freedom.  If any holiday was made for activism, that one is.  I don’t even like what Hanukkah stands for.  It stands for the punishment of crypto-Jews, fanaticism, and a pure, orthodox forced compliance with Jewish law.  It stands for two equally intolerant sides in a war fighting until one gets its way.  I prefer to ignore all that in favor of the lights and chasing away the darkness, and spending time at the synagogue with other Jews.

There’s something magical about being at the synagogue, even when I’m not there for learning or services, or anything particularly meaningful.  Everyone I talk to there is going to be Jewish.  These are people who in this at least are like me.  I don’t have to constantly worry that someone there is going to say something stupid about how much Christianity and Judaism have in common and then list something that Jews don’t believe.  I don’t have to smile as another person assumes I’m Christian or treats me like a senile grandparent when they find out I’m not.  It’s very restful.

This time of year, I feel the most Jewish.  It’s not Hanukkah that makes me feel this way, but Christmas.  This time of year, every time I walk out of my house or turn on the television, or open my mail, I’m bombarded with reminders that I don’t belong.  I’m reminded that I’m different, and all of a sudden, I start to need that restful presence of other Jews.

Most of the year, it’s occasional surprise reminders, little things, sometimes offensive, sometimes not, but this time of year, it’s constant.  Everyone’s whipped into a frenzy over a holiday I don’t celebrate, a holiday that in the United States is more a mass cultural event than an expression of religious devotion.

I know the words to all of the popular Christmas carols, and a lot of unpopular ones as well.  I know every detail of how Christmas is celebrated in most American homes, and all of the local customs of New Mexico, where I live.  I know the stories and history behind most of these customs as well.  I have to.  The information is thrown at me.  But no one has to know my celebrations or have any real idea of the stories behind my holiday.

There’s nothing wrong with this.  My feelings of profound isolation aren’t the fault of anyone’s bad behavior, and I’m not asking, or even wishing this mass celebration would go away.  Culture is about community, about a shared way of believing and acting.  Otherwise, it isn’t culture; it’s personal quirks, and in a country where almost everyone is either Christian or the product of a Christian cultural background, it’s right and good that Christian holidays should be celebrated in this exuberant public manner.

But the reason Hanukkah is celebrated the way it is now, in the United States is that on some level, we Jews, as a community want to be more like the gentiles, to tie ourselves tighter into this culture in which we find ourselves, to feel a little less foreign in our homelands.

When I hear WASPs say they have no culture (usually as a sulky response to being told they’re not allowed to play with someone else’s culture) I wonder what they think I’m emulating then.  If decorating in a certain way, singing proscribed songs, sharing the same stories, eating holiday foods, and turning everything inside out for a shared holiday isn’t culture, I don’t know what is.  But all of this is invisible, because it’s “normal”.  It’s what “everyone” does, so when I don’t, I’m obviously not normal, but “exotic”.

Except when I’m not exotic, I’m just a grinch.  Even when my culture, my religion is used, they say this.  The church that hosts the twelve step meeting for which I babysit has a star of David for the Magi to follow because “Just as the star led the way for the Magi to the baby Jesus, Judaism led the way to Christianity”.  That’s what they think of my religion.  I’m sure they’re trying to be inclusive, but really, they can’t figure out what to do with the idiot Jews who haven’t gotten on board with the whole Jesus business like they were supposed to.  But when I say something, I’m the one being offensive.  I’m the one ruining the fun.  It makes me wonder about the sanity of people who honestly think there’s a war against Christmas.  They must really think their opponents are ineffective.  Don’t they notice the constant shaming of people who don’t celebrate Christmas?  Of course they don’t; they’re not being shamed.  Don’t they notice the constant barrage of Christmas everything?

I guess not.

I feel most Jewish right now, because I feel least gentile.  It’s no one’s fault, no one’s to blame, but please forgive me if I seem a bit sullen, and retreat to the synagogue, and don’t invite you over for latkes.

There’s a little blowup right now in certain parts of the Jewish community, and what are minor barely religious holidays of small segments of the population for except airing those small segments’ dirty laundry for the rest of the world to see?

Anyway, the commotion is about the new American Girl doll, Rebecca Rubin, the Jewish doll.  According to segments of the Jewish community, she doesn’t look Jewish enough because of her light eyes and light wavy hair.


Judaism is an odd thing, being part religion, part community, and part ethnicity.  Just the other day, when a fellow Jew realized I was Jewish, she greeted me as a cousin, not just as a coreligionist.  And most people hold in their heads a picture of what Jews are supposed to look like.  For many people, including many jews who have internalized the stereotype, this picture includes dark curly hair, olive skin, dark eyes, and a big hooked nose.

I’m not about to deny the power of this picture. When I wanted to create a character for a novel who would be “Jewish” (I use the quotations because it’s a secondary world fantasy novel) I even invoked this deliberately, giving her dark curly hair, and a hooked nose.  Nor am I going to deny that aspects of this stereotype have been used to stigmatize Jews in the past.  The racialization of Judaism is an ugly thing.

However, while being Jewish is partly an ethnic determination, Jewishness isn’t one ethnicity but a group of them.  Even were I to set aside the Mizrahim and the Sephardim, Indian Jews, Ethiopian Jews, Chinese Jews, the Teimanim, and a dozen or more other Jewish ethnicities (sorry guys) and focus only on the Ashkenazim, the European Jews, that both the common stereotype of Jewishness and Rebecca are supposed to represent, we’re nothing like as universal as the stereotype would suggest.

I’m blonde.  I have pale skin and grey-green eyes and wavy hair.  When I went to the synagogue on Friday night this week, I saw a lot of hair like mine, and a lot of eyes like mine.  In middle school, of the six Jews in my year, three of us had blond hair, one of us had dark brown hair, and two of us had light brown hair.  Four of us had light eyes, and only two of us had curly hair.  Are we less Jewish because we don’t fit the stereotype?

And the stereotype is an artifact of the racialization of Judaism done by anti-Semites.  Our evil was in the blood, and you could tell who we were by our looks.  I remember exactly what all of the Jews in my middle school class looked like the way I do because my teachers made a point of it.  While we studied the Holocaust, my teachers had all of the Jewish kids stand up to show how little we looked like the stereotype.  The fact that we as a people have internalized this stereotype to such a degree that we even, in whatever small way have come to measure our own Jewishness against it is outright sickening.

Rebecca’s hair is the same kind of hair my friend from high school who introduced me to French horn klezmer has (It’s a weird animal, French horn klezmer, but she played the French horn, so there you go).  Her skin is the same tone as an ex-boyfriend of mine who led the Seder dinner for me when I didn’t feel up to it after cooking all day.  And her eyes?  Those are mine.

This Hanukkah, I’m getting a miniature Rebecca doll.  It’s so rare to see a representation of Jewishness that looks like me, that I can see my face in.  I have the Ashkenazi features, the round eyes, thick eyebrows, and hooked nose, and still, they never look like me.  This time, one does, and all the Jews who got to look like the representations for so long are up in arms.  What they don’t realize is, when they say she doesn’t look Jewish enough, what they’re really saying is I’m not Jewish enough.

Hanukkah Sameach everybody.

I do on occasion venture into the adult section of the library, almost entirely on recommendations, true, but it does happen. So, since I normally love Guy Gavriel Kay, and I gave him one of my few negative reviews a while back, and my library finally got Ysabel, it’s only been out for TWO YEARS (yeah, that’s like nothing for my library, but, come on, it’s me and a book) I decided I’d review it.

Ned Marriner isn’t sure what he thinks about Provence, but he really likes getting out of school for a while. His father, a famous photographer and his crew are making a book, and between scouting out places for his father to shoot and buying history papers off exchange students, he starts to discover something about his family’s past, and the fabric of history. When the parties to an ancient love triangle come back to haunt the present, Ned and his friends have to race against them to save one of their own...

( Melanie wasn't his love, or anything totally stupid like that, but you didn't have to be in love with someone to fight for them. )

Well, I still want The Lions of Al-Rassan back, but in the mean time, Ysabel can consol me.

Someday I will stop regaling you, dear readers with my myriad physical complaints, but today I have a broken foot, and it’s green.  At least I don’t have to lug my books around campus on crutches...

As I had to withdraw...

Because I’m sick...

Oh well, I’ll be back next semester, and until then, I’m burning through Netflix’s library and the recommendation list I have been granted in the comments of my recent post on disability and fandom (Thank you all!).

As it turns out, I broke my foot just in time to not quite miss having to help clean out our freezer, damn stupid luck. 

My family functions on a seniority system, and Grammy had already had it up to here with the freezer, and so while we were trying to figure out what we wanted to keep, she had me picking through all of the mystery items to see what they were.  I was less than enthused.  She stopped at the first item, though, my horrible luck conquered her objections.

GRAMMY: I need you to see what’s inside this.
FISH: ...
MYSTERY BAG: *Leers sinisterly* How ya doin’?
FISH: Um, no, you.
GRAMMY: It’s your parents’ freezer.
FISH: You, daughter, responsible, for Mom.

As far as I’m concerned, that’s a lot to be responsible for.

GRAMMY: Overruled.
MYSTERY BAG: What, are you scared?
FISH: *Snatches mystery bag* No!
GRAMMY: *Stares*
FISH: *Eats own tongue*
GRAMMY: *Leans over to find granddaughter clutching pet bird that died a year ago and who we obviously never buried*

Seriously.  My mom laughed at me.

I got to feel like a little kid again in the best way, as I was completely useless as kitchen help on Thanksgiving, not even casted yet, and therefore got to sit in front of the television and watch the parade and the dog show.  And I got to sit at the head of the table so I could rest my foot on an ottoman, which Yo-yo commandeered as his own.

Stop.  Don’t.

Ty Lee’s father’s feet were as light as hers, and when she was little, she watched him hesitate, and draw them down, and keep his steps even, but didn’t know why.

Stop.  Don’t.

Around her, her sisters followed his lead, and gazed at the sky with wistful smiles, and never left the ground, at least not where anyone could see.

Stop. Don’t.

Her mother always gave her father a puzzled look when he said that.

Stop.  Don’t.

But Ty Lee dreamed she could fly and woke up sure she could.  The air would never have let her fall.

Author's Note: So I've seen some fics lately where Zuko's the Avatar, and this is my take on that.  I suppose background is just that Aang froze to death instead of just freezing (sorry Aang),  the Water Avatar was born in the foggy swamp and never knew what she was, and the Earth Avatar died in childhood.  Still, as far as anyone knows, the Avatar disappeared a hundred years ago, and Zuko is scarred and banished as in canon.  This takes place at the same time as in canon, Aang would have been getting out of the ice.

Banner

The ship bucked and groaned with the storm.  His blanket curled up around his neck, Zuko dozed fitfully.

With a great lurch, the ship bounced off an iceberg, and Zuko toppled off his bed.  In that half-second before he hit, he exhaled, and the air hit the floor like a jet.  Before he even had time to think, he found himself rolling safely back onto his bed.

Zuko stared at the insignia on the far wall, momentarily transfixed, and experimentally twisted towards it.  A great gust sent it flapping against the wall, and Zuko closed his eyes in misery.

Author's Note: So the other day, I gave Iroh a really silly drabble.  This counterbalences that.  Poor Iroh; a Dragon's work is never done.

Harmless Old Man

The tea streamed into the porcelain cup, but the man sitting behind wasn’t really there for the tea.  Iroh could always tell which ones were there to gawk at the Dragon of the West, to see their old nightmare gentled and humble and safe.

But that was alright, because he wasn’t really there for the tea either.

The Dai Li trickled back into the city with the multitudes, and the Earth King’s new power crouched unsteadily on his shoulders, restlessly waiting for someone to pluck it away, but no one tried.  No one dared rouse the Dragon of the West.

Teabending

Bumi’s bending was really getting out of hand.

The table lurched between Iroh and Pakku, hurling their tea out of their cups and their pai sho tiles onto the quaking ground.  Desperately, Iroh shoved all of his weight onto it to steady it, but the damage was already done.  “Awww.”

Rolling his eyes, Pakku bent the tea back into the cups.

“You bend tea?”

“I’m a master waterbender; of course I can bend tea!”

“I know, I just never put it together before!”  Suddenly, firebending wasn’t... He wished he was a waterbender.

Until Pakku froze his tea in its cup.

Time Flies

“I learned to bend water in vines at the side of my mother and father,” the young woman held her head high, hands balled into determined fists, “I mastered earthbending when I was seventeen.  The Fire Lord herself taught me.  I am twenty years old, and one element away from becoming a fully realized avatar.  I’m ready.”

The temple elder cocked her head and stared at her sideways, pulling her wizened, scrawny, shriveled body up to cartwheel and flip down to her.  “But do you think you can fly?”

All of her bravado spilled away behind a little girl’s grin.

Author's Note: Oh come on, we all know the next Avatar's going to be from the swamp.  Yes, that temple elder is Ty-Lee, and in my head, the current fire lord for this is Zuko's granddaughter.

Shipper on Deck

“Zuko!”  Toph exclaimed, “You should date Katara!”

Suddenly all of the ways the waterbender could kill him flashed through his mind.  “No!”

“Awww.”

~*~

“Teo, you should date Katara.”

He rolled his wheels backwards quickly.  “Ummm... I don’t think...”

“Coward.”

~*~

“Haru, you have to date Katara.”

“Toph!”  He jumped and whirled around in surprise.  “But there’s this Kyoshi warrior girl-”

She hit him.  “Why!”

~*~

“That’s it!” Toph yelled, and dragged Aang to her, planting a solid kiss squarely on his lips.

“I’m with Katara!” he sprang out of her reach.

“Ugh,” she growled, pounding the wall and shattering it. “I know!”

Author's note: In which Katara is an unlikely Katherine in Toph's production of The Taming of the Shrew.

Disclaimer: If I owned Avatar the Last Airbender, I'd sell it and go back to writing fanfiction. It's a disease.

Summery: After Katara leaves the Northern Water Tribe, Pakku must confront the changes she has wrought.
Pairings: hints of Kanna/Pakku, mostly gen


( Whistling up a Storm )