Comments | rokhal: SPN fic: Stop Hitting Yourself 3/3

rokhal

SPN fic: Stop Hitting Yourself 3/3

May 05, 2012 17:50

Title: Stop Hitting Yourself
Chapter: 3/3, The Hunt At The Mine
Characters: John, Dean, and Sammy Winchester; Sam Grisham
Pairing: none
Rating: T
Length: 20k
Warnings: Shamelessly ripping off Sam Raimi movies, bad taste
Disclaimer: Fanfic! It's a fanfic!

( Saturday, they headed north at dawn to plant the hex bags around the perimeter of the mine in Wyoming... )

spn-dean, spn-au, spn-sam, spn-john, pg-13, spn-preseries, spn-casefic, fic-stop hitting yourself, fanfic-spn, spn-gen

Comments 38

monicawoe May 6 2012, 03:11:06 UTC

This is SO brilliant. I just whipped through all 3 chapters in one sitting. Incredibly well written, and this :
Like human, but better: like a top-bloodline, performance show human, like a thing in a custom human chassis.
I think that may be one of the best sentences I've ever read.

Thanks for writing an AWESOME story!

(also I love the older Sam Raimi movies- especially the Evil Dead series, so yay to the references!)

rokhal May 6 2012, 03:37:09 UTC

Plots are hard. I'm glad to hear this worked.

Well, Sam is specially bred. As a custom human chassis. I mean, you know there's a reason Sam and Dean are so arrestingly good-looking and through their twenties and beyond retain the healing capacity of four-year-olds!

Thanks so much for reviewing, and I'm glad you liked it!

honeylocusttree May 6 2012, 04:12:05 UTC

Man, I love me some deranged, badass, hugely terrifying Sam so much. And him taking out his self-hatred on his younger self? I just read this with a huge grin on my face. I went back and read bits as I was still working my way through it. Whyyyy isn't it longer?

I also really liked the 'performance show human' bit. I love it when Sam's ridiculous physique is something creepy and even horrifying. And his rage was so real and genuinely animalistic and even frightening in that scene. The suspense was real. I was very caught up in the storytelling. There's been such a dearth of good fic lately and this made up for all of it.

In conclusion, I'm reading this again tomorrow.

rokhal May 6 2012, 05:28:22 UTC

If you're concerned about a dearth of good fic, read the latest from Minviendha. Especially the Sam and Cas one. Holy crap.
http://ficviendha.livejournal.com/122408.html#cutid1

Would it be hugely annoying if I said the long version of this fic was too awesome to be born? As in, I don't have the lady-balls to write anything longer. This was pretty long for me.

I'm glad my Sam was terrifying enough to you. I've still got that image of Sam stalking through a basement with a machete that's got bits of human scalp stuck to the blade bouncing around my head from that reunion fic of yours.

As for the "performance show human" line -- I'm a dog person. It shows up in my imagery a lot, usually out-of-context, with results like this. I'm lucky didn't sound silly, I guess.

I'm so glad you liked this!

honeylocusttree May 6 2012, 12:19:30 UTC

I woke up this morning (as I read this right before bed) going, "I wanna be there at the moment at Stanford or wherever that Sam looks in the mirror and sees Grisham looking back. Younger, thinner, more innocent, yeah, but it's still *him*."

It really was probably the perfect length--any longer and some of the tension would've got lost. Anyway Sam acting out his self-hatred well never get old to me.

rokhal May 6 2012, 15:33:37 UTC

Yeah, I'd love to be a fly on that wall. I think buzz-cuts are in Sammy's future. Maybe a beard.

4422shini May 6 2012, 04:25:09 UTC

Wow, this is so intense! I love how you had everything from teen!Sam's POV. You wrote a frustrated and adolescent Sam well, and a psychotic future!Sam excellently. John's fierce protectiveness of Sam is awesome, love him stepping up to the plate (we don't see enough of this in fic!). Well done!

rokhal May 6 2012, 05:42:18 UTC

Thanks so much! Doing it from Sammy's eyes was a lot of fun because I got to play around with a phase of Sam we don't get to meet all that often, it's automatic outside POV on future!Sam who we usually see more from the inside or from Dean's eyes, and it filters all John's actions through the lens of Sam's ignorance. My pet theory on the John vs Sam tensions was that John kept lying to someone who was at least as smart as he was, and Sam didn't like being lied to.

I like John. I think he did a lot of crazy and shady things, but many of them could be explained by this constant gibbering in the back of his head, "Something wants Sammy. Something killed Mary and it wanted to prove a point about Sammy. Sammy. Oh, God, no, not Sammy. When is it coming back?"

phorenice May 6 2012, 10:30:39 UTC

I like John. I think he did a lot of crazy and shady things, but many of them could be explained by this constant gibbering in the back of his head, "Something wants Sammy. Something killed Mary and it wanted to prove a point about Sammy. Sammy. Oh, God, no, not Sammy. When is it coming back?"
You! Get out of my head! That's exactly how I see John. With the addition that his need to know crap was pretty damn stupid and counter-productive in this regard. But hindsight's 20/20 and I'm sure he thought he was doing the right thing.

Also, I thought I just posted a comment to the fic, but it doesn't show up. Strange...

rokhal May 6 2012, 15:59:26 UTC

Comment? Where? Where'd it go? Aw, man. Thanks anyway.

When you think about it, John was pretty much right about everything: all Sam's friends were evil, Sam's destiny was a fate worse than death, Dean had better keep the Impala clean and shiny or the world might end... If you keep track of the facts and maintain a positive bias, it's pretty clear he was trying. Great minds think alike, is what I'm saying.

Thread 7

cloudox May 6 2012, 05:30:22 UTC

Oh my god this is just so fucking good, I have never read anything like this before, I love it! Do you have an AO3?

rokhal May 6 2012, 05:47:04 UTC

Wow, thanks! I'm glad you liked it. Look around the BigBangs and especially some longer fics on Fanfiction.net and you can find way better stories with way crazier premises.

No, no AO3. I like FFnet and LJ, though.

cloudox May 7 2012, 00:57:54 UTC

Hey now, don't sell yourself short!! Haha, trust me I've looked and searched and this is definitely unique and very easy to read. You got their characteristics really well and it's especially hard to find John in stories anymore. Is your ff.net acct name the same as Lj? I find it easier to keep track of authors on AO3 and FF.net than here, LJ hate me when it comes to memories haha. I can't wait to read more supernatural fics from you!!

rokhal May 7 2012, 02:01:27 UTC

Yeah, same handle on FFnet. (Stop it, you're making me blush.)

tifaching May 6 2012, 16:19:45 UTC

"Come in too fast too hard, and Sam would get smacked down, but a softer, circuitous approach could wear down most reasonable people's defenses." Good to see future Sam retained some of young Sam's approach to things.

I loved your characterizations of all of them. I also am of the opinion that John did his best under terrible circumstances and I think that really came through here.

Fantastic.

rokhal May 6 2012, 17:24:02 UTC

Good to see future Sam retained some of young Sam's approach to things. People change as we grow up -- but we're still working with the same parts, so a lot stays the same.

I think John did his best, but his best unfortunately included driving Sammy absolutely up the wall. I'm glad this came through. Thanks so much!