“Hungry Like the Wolf”, End notes
[ Endnotes posted 22 Aug 2018 ]
Since this is a remix, what prompted the direction this story took in differing from the original?
I don’t actually remember. My best guess would be that I just looked at the original story and thought, Hey, here’s a canonical supernatural woman that Xander hasn’t met yet! And, of course, we all know what happens when he actually meets them …
Is there any particular significance to the title?
It was serviceable, no more. Song title (as I generally try to do with remixes), reference to Nina’s nature, it didn’t really seem to need to go any further than that.
What is the thing I like most about this story? the thing I like least, or about which I feel most doubtful?
Liked most overall, the matter-of-factness with which Xander and Nina dealt with each other while she was in the cage. This was not a normal situation … but for the two of them, by now, it wasn’t that much outside normal, and they addressed it straight-on without unnecessary drama.
Liked most as in single incident? Xander’s lecture to the Watcher trainees. In a way it was a substantial digression from the main story, and I genuinely considered excising it … but it served to show something of where he was in his personal development at that time, and I decided that did indeed serve the story, so it stayed. (If I had cut it, I would have found a way to use it elsewhere, even if I’d had to build an entire story around it.)
Liked least … I’ve generally left the Season 8+ comic series out of things; despite Joss’s having declared them canon, it simply never felt that way to me. Setting Part 3 in Orvieto (to which I also referred in “ An’ Foolish Notion”, but that was an Independent story) was simultaneously a sly nudge toward insider knowledge and a potentially uncomfortable element. It wound up working, I believe, but there still remains just the least trace of uneasiness.
Is there anything I think I could have done better, or might do differently if I had it to do over?
I was actually conscious of a number of weaknesses in this story when I first produced it, and so spent considerable time in polishing and reinforcement and reassessment and more polishing. The only thing that even occurs to me … I hadn’t really thought of it before now, but the general context of Nina’s appearances in A:tS indicates the possibility that she might have been a couple of years older than Xander. I could have made use of that if I had thought of it, but I didn’t and so I didn’t.
Do I have any plans to follow up on this story, or to use the character(s) or situation in a subsequent fic?
No real follow-up plans, and this story doesn’t have as many internal links to other stories as I’ve seen elsewhere. Kraken wraiths (mentioned in this fic) had been previously referenced clear back in “ Morning’s Echo”, and would be again in “ the Other Night I Dreamt of Knives”; Kinue, here mentioned, had been briefly profiled in “ Precious Cargo” and referenced in passing in “ Zero-Sum Game”; and, Xander’s time in the shepherd’s hut and his use of a prosthetic eye (in Part 3) had already been covered in “ Learning Curve”. That’s about as far as it’s ever likely to go.
Any observations to add at the end?
Nothing in particular. This was a fun little story with some good moments. It brought me pleasure and continues to do so. Doesn’t get much better than that.