Notes and Other Ramblings
Notes on "We are Nowhere and it's Now"
The words "happy ending" and Joss Whedon are not...ever...synonymous. This first story is an attempt to remedy that sorry fact. The premise is simple: Mal and Inara give a romantic relationship a shot. Unlike most romantic endings in the Whedonverse, we're left with hope that these two crazy kids just might make things work. There's a rather obvious but hopefully appropriate navigation metaphor, some dancing, and maybe even some actual kissing involved, wherein neither party is unconscious.
Take that, Joss.
-- inara223
Notes on "A Kiss Across the Ocean Blue"
I don't know about anyone else, but to me, the ending of "Heart of Gold" is akin to having one's heart ripped out and sufficiently stomped upon. Mal is so close to letting some truths out, but alas, it's not to be and Inara leaves Serenity.
But what if Mal actually got those words out? This fic takes place in an AU where Mal asks Inara quite directly not to leave his boat, and was inspired by Inara's question to Mal posed in a deleted scene from the film Serenity:
Mal: Why did you leave?
Inara: Why didn't you ask me not to?
The actual words Mal uses in the fic may seem familiar; that's because they are taken directly from Mal's speech to the empty galley in Those Left Behind, just after leaving Inara at the Training House. Here, he says them to the person they're meant for, and she's faced with a very big choice to make. Hopefully the right one.
-- inara223
Notes on "All of Our Scars"
I had forgotten until I started going back through all our notes, but I wrote this one a few months after my dog, Rex, died. I mention it because it was going downstairs to feed my other dog, Worf, and realizing we'd used up all that was left of Rex's kibble that gave me the idea for the drabble. I had a real feeling of, He's gone, he's gone and he's not coming back and his stuff is gone, too; setting Mal up to do the same seemed a good way to tell the story of how Inara had come to be gone.
The whole thing, actually, was meant to be very elegiac and mournful; we wanted this to be the traditional death-mix, where the relationship and the hope of what it could mean to Mal is what died.
-- lostcointoss
Notes on "Drowning, Caught in the Fire"
I'm not really sure what to write in the notes for this particular fic. The trouble is, it was so hard to write, and there were so many things I was trying to incorporate, that I worry if I start to talk about it, I won't stop. inara223 and 2x2 were on the receiving end of a few emails about various drafts of this, and they can attest to the length of the essays I sent them under the guise of "notes."
So I'll just say this: the darkness in Mal is what fascinates me most about him, and playing with it--with his control over it and it over him--is interesting to me. I will also say that Chuck Palahniuk played a large role in inspiring the third and final rewrite.
-- lostcointoss
Full text versions of the poems from "Drowning"
"A Terre," Wilfred Owen
(Being the philosophy of many Soldiers.)
Sit on the bed; I'm blind, and three parts shell,
Be careful; can't shake hands now; never shall.
Both arms have mutinied against me -- brutes.
My fingers fidget like ten idle brats.
I tried to peg out soldierly -- no use!
One dies of war like any old disease.
This bandage feels like pennies on my eyes.
I have my medals? -- Discs to make eyes close.
My glorious ribbons? -- Ripped from my own back
In scarlet shreds. (That's for your poetry book.)
A short life and a merry one, my brick!
We used to say we'd hate to live dead old, --
Yet now . . . I'd willingly be puffy, bald,
And patriotic. Buffers catch from boys
At least the jokes hurled at them. I suppose
Little I'd ever teach a son, but hitting,
Shooting, war, hunting, all the arts of hurting.
Well, that's what I learnt, -- that, and making money.
Your fifty years ahead seem none too many?
Tell me how long I've got? God! For one year
To help myself to nothing more than air!
One Spring! Is one too good to spare, too long?
Spring wind would work its own way to my lung,
And grow me legs as quick as lilac-shoots.
My servant's lamed, but listen how he shouts!
When I'm lugged out, he'll still be good for that.
Here in this mummy-case, you know, I've thought
How well I might have swept his floors for ever,
I'd ask no night off when the bustle's over,
Enjoying so the dirt. Who's prejudiced
Against a grimed hand when his own's quite dust,
Less live than specks that in the sun-shafts turn,
Less warm than dust that mixes with arms' tan?
I'd love to be a sweep, now, black as Town,
Yes, or a muckman. Must I be his load?
O Life, Life, let me breathe, -- a dug-out rat!
Not worse than ours the existences rats lead --
Nosing along at night down some safe vat,
They find a shell-proof home before they rot.
Dead men may envy living mites in cheese,
Or good germs even. Microbes have their joys,
And subdivide, and never come to death,
Certainly flowers have the easiest time on earth.
"I shall be one with nature, herb, and stone."
Shelley would tell me. Shelley would be stunned;
The dullest Tommy hugs that fancy now.
"Pushing up daisies," is their creed, you know.
To grain, then, go my fat, to buds my sap,
For all the usefulness there is in soap.
D'you think the Boche will ever stew man-soup?
Some day, no doubt, if . . .
Friend, be very sure
I shall be better off with plants that share
More peaceably the meadow and the shower.
Soft rains will touch me, -- as they could touch once,
And nothing but the sun shall make me ware.
Your guns may crash around me. I'll not hear;
Or, if I wince, I shall not know I wince.
Don't take my soul's poor comfort for your jest.
Soldiers may grow a soul when turned to fronds,
But here the thing's best left at home with friends.
My soul's a little grief, grappling your chest,
To climb your throat on sobs; easily chased
On other sighs and wiped by fresher winds.
Carry my crying spirit till it's weaned
To do without what blood remained these wounds.
"La Belle Dame sans Merci," John Keats
(1819 Version)
Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.
Oh what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
So haggard and so woe-begone?
The squirrel's granary is full,
And the harvest's done.
I see a lily on thy brow,
With anguish moist and fever-dew,
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
Fast withereth too.
I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful - a faery's child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.
I made a garland for her head,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She looked at me as she did love,
And made sweet moan.
I set her on my pacing steed,
And nothing else saw all day long,
For sidelong would she bend, and sing
A faery's song.
She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild, and manna-dew,
And sure in language strange she said -
'I love thee true'.
She took me to her elfin grot,
And there she wept and sighed full sore,
And there I shut her wild wild eyes
With kisses four.
And there she lulled me asleep
And there I dreamed - Ah! woe betide! -
The latest dream I ever dreamt
On the cold hill side.
I saw pale kings and princes too,
Pale warriors, death-pale were they all;
They cried - 'La Belle Dame sans Merci
Hath thee in thrall!'
I saw their starved lips in the gloam,
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke and found me here,
On the cold hill's side.
And this is why I sojourn here
Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.
Notes on "Space is Colder" (drabble)
I'm not gonna lie: the purpose of this drabble was to try to cause as much emotional duress as possible. We felt it was the "Joss" thing to do. (See also: "Shells," "A Holes in the World," "The Body," "Seeing Red," and on, and on.)
This is set after Serenity, and it assumes a (somewhat happy) romantic relationship between Mal and Inara has been established. It's intentionally vague, but the idea is they've been together long enough for Inara to think of Mal's bunk as "theirs."
Anyway. I have little else to add, but I feel I should mention, since I've been called on it before, something about having Inara call Mal, "Malcolm." I just think she would, okay? It's like a thing with me. Don't even ask. I don't freaking know.
-- lostcointoss