RatCreature's Journal

I forgot to rec one XMFC AU yesterday:

Engine of Creation series, by Regann. Slash, Charles/Erik. WIP (ca. 77,000 words so far in currently two completed stories)
This is a space travel AU that mixes XMFC with elements from Andromeda, plus some alpha-omega dynamics. I'm really enjoying the action-adventure and team here, and Moira as ship AI is great.

And now to the non-XMFC AU recs:

due South

Sheepskin, by theleaveswant. Het, Diefenbaker/Francesca. (ca. 7,400 words)
This has a really cool premise, i.e. that Diefenbaker is a lycanthrope who is a human once a month, and a wolf the rest of the time.

Eagle of the Ninth

Dealing with the Consequences, by nemo_r. Slash, Marcus/Esca, Marcus/Esca/Seal Prince. (ca. 61,160 words)
In this AU Marcus and Esca don't kill the Seal Prince, but capture him.

Merlin

Loaded March, by Footloose. Slash, Merlin/Arthur. (ca. 490,420 words; the series is a WIP, the individual stories are complete)
This is a modern AU in which they are soldiers, but with magic still existing. I actually haven't gotten around to reading the last novel-length part, but I liked the worldbuilding and the action-adventure iirc overall.

Let Us Dare, by kianspo. Slash, Merlin/Arthur. (ca. 29,500 words)
In this AU Uther died instead of Ygraine when Arthur was born. I enjoyed how canon adventures where mixed into this different Camelot.

SGA

Deprivation, by mikes_grrl. Slash, John Sheppard/Rodney McKay. (ca. 9,300 words)
This is a Conversion AU where John doesn't recover completely. As everyone knows I have a really soft spot for Bug!John, and this is a good one of the genre, with nice alien details.

Suits

The New Deal, by Closer. Gen. (ca. 33,500 words)
In this AU Harvey and Mike meet earlier than in canon. Harvey is still a student and Mike a teenage runaway.

I got a Steampunk AU story that included so many of my favorite things: atmospheric descriptions and hints of background story and worldbuilding, both Erik and Charles using their powers, with Erik being all competent while stealing a dirigible, plus Charles/Erik sex that works for my mindcontrol kink. (And the unfortunate typo in "canon" in the header is not indicative at all of the spelling competence of story, so do not let that deter you.)

So go read: The Case of the Missing Dirigible, or a Romance of Chance Meetings

I've posted five Merlin fanart recs in August over at fanart_recs, and I'm going to rec X-Men this month, and have just posted the first there.

Others are reccing Black Rock Shooter, Doctor Who, due South, Harry Potter, Naruto, One Piece, Stargate Atlantis, and Stargate SG-1 this month. I think close to its one year anniversary the comm is doing pretty well. Much is due to a core group of members reccing repeatedly (notably I have posted over 50), so I guess it would be more sustainable if more reccers could be attracted, but there have been well over 400 recs, so on average if you subscribed you got at least one fanart rec per day.

...but this Charles/Erik vid by Tizumis is hilarious.

I've been giving Noah the antibiotics since Saturday now, and even though the dose was so much larger than the last time I gave this, he seems to be okay with it. Unfortunately his breathing is still quite labored, so no fabulous improvement so far, but he doesn't look quite so wretched. It's nothing definite, but for a few days he just looked worse than now. Maybe I'm imagining things, but sometimes, even with no clear sickness signs (like like insufficient grooming, apathy, loose of appetite), a rat I know will just look "unwell" to me.

Anyway, Noah seems more lively, so I hope that the antibiotic is helping him. BTW, getting 1 ml of medication into a rat's mouth is not easy. I can't do it in one squeeze from the syringe because it's more than his mouth will hold, and will just spill, even if I manage to force the syringe into his mouth, and he gets more uncooperative with the proceedings for the second half. At least this antibiotics doesn't taste as bad as Baytril, so if some spills on his fur around the mouth he licks it up instead of frantically wiping and trying to spit it out. So I figure enough of it gets swallowed.

I still haven't managed to make Tumblr work properly with my Firefox, and some of the navigation is just cryptic. Like it took me a while to find out that the weird corner animation effect on the posts in my dashboard is the permalink I can get that way. Seriously, why didn't they mark the permalink as saying permalink or something more visible than a tiny animation effect that you can activate by hovering? I moused all over posts to find a link area, it was like one of those point-and-click room escape games, where you have to find an active pixel to get an action.

But I am starting to see the appeal of just getting a bunch of pictures. I'm seeing some neat stuff I would have otherwise missed, like this picture of Michael Fassbender wearing an Uncanny X-Men t-shirt that says "Magneto Triumphant!" (eta: though on a second look I think this may be photoshopped; still fun though). Also, if I followed more Sherlock comms or used twitter I probably would have seen it elsewhere, but I saw a link to that tweet from Mark Gatiss from the Sherlock filming that they had to abort a scene early because of approaching looters. o.O!

To finish on a better note, this is very pretty XMFC fanart with Charles and Erik pin-up posters (they are not naked, the art is SFW) by loobeeinthesky which I also first saw on Tumblr, but I'm linking to the LJ post, because I still like that better.

It's been months since my last AU recs update, so quite a number have accumulated.

Highlander

Shades and Echoes, by auberus. Slash, Duncan/Methos. WIP
I liked the premise here that Duncan and Methos meet earlier in Methos' time in the Watchers. Not least because I like Methos & Watchers stories, and also there just aren't enough stories with Don Salzer still alive. Unfortunately this may have been abandoned because the last update was in 2009. OTOH the interval between chapter 11 and 12 was almost a year, and I've seen longer hiatuses before. Still, not the most likely candidate to be finished soon.

And Then Some, by Loch Ness. Slash and het, Duncan/Methos, Duncan/Amanda, Methos/OFC, Methos/OMC. (ca. 138,000 words)
In this AU Methos and Duncan have their first encounter during WWII.

Lord of the Rings

A Bit of Rope, by Aiwendiel. Gen. WIP (ca. 355,000 words so far)
In this AU Gandalf doesn't fall in Moria, and thsi leads the Fellowship eventually down a darker part. This surprised me a bit at first from a divergence that seems is not something going worse, yet the events are plausible and gripping.

Bond of Honor, by Meri. Slash, Éomer/Haldir. (ca. 25,500 words)
Considering that I have almost no interest in either Éomer nor Haldir I was a bit surprised that the story drew me in. But I do like the "accidental bond" trope, which these two have to cope with here as a side effect of a healing, especially when it comes with a culture clash as it does here.

Old Man Willow, by Nath. Gen. (ca. 1,200 words)
This is a short but creepy and surprisingly plausible scenario of what might have happened if Old Man Willow had been seduced by the One Ring and trapped the hobbits to get it. I really enjoyed the unusual perspective.

The Long Road Home, by Scribblesinink. Het, Boromir/OFC. (ca. 95,500 words)
This is one of the many Boromir-survives AUs, but a good one. I liked it as post Ringwar story dealing with the aftermath, and the original characters are engaging, but don't detract from the main interest in Boromir, Faramir and Aragorn.

Sanctuary

The Road Not Taken, by Penknife. Het and slash, James/John/Helen, Helen/Nikola. (ca. 4,000 words)
This has the cool premise that the energy creature possession goes differently, and John Druitt doesn't become Jack the Ripper.

Sherlock

The Republic of Heaven, by blind_author. Slash, Sherlock/John. WIP
This is meshes His Dark Materials with Sherlock, and incorporates a bit more of the HDM worldbuilding than just dæmons.

Gone Is My Past, by cyerus. Gen, John Watson, Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock Holmes. (ca. 8,000 words)
In this story John used to be a bomb detection dog who was turned into a human. I was recced this when I asked on kink-finders for stories featuring forced human-animal-hybridisation, and though this is rather the reverse, it pushed the the same kink of non-consensual body modification angst and h/c for me. And of course dog!John pushes certain D/s buttons too.

Show Me How to Stop Running, by etothepii. Slash, Sherlock/John. (ca. 12,400 words)
As anyone following my recs knows, I love werewolf AUs. In this John gets bitten by a werewolf in Afghanistan and comes back to London where he meets werewolf!Sherlock.

You Call Me Like the Moon, by etothepii. Gen, John Watson, Sherlock Holmes. (ca. 3,000 words)
Another werewolf!John AU by the same author as the one above but a different scenario, in that John was a werewolf before Afghanistan and Sherlock isn't, and worldbuilding for the lycanthropy is different too.

Star Trek Reboot

This Place at the Crossroads, by alpha_hydra. Slash and het, Kirk/Spock, Scotty/Uhura. (ca. 33,600 words)
I loved the worldbuilding and AU scenario of this AU. The premise here is that humans weren't among the founders of the Federation, and Earth's warp capability delayed compared to canon, but that Starfleet eventually sends observers, because they are close and Earth is in a contested (with non-Federation) region.

Extra-curricular Activities and its sequel Academic Matters, by Amanda Warrington. Slash, Kirk/Spock. (both ca. 15,500 words)
In this AU Kirk and Spock meet and become a couple earlier at the Academy, and the sequel then explores how his academic hearing and the Nero events would play out.

Aurora, by kianspo. Pre-slash, Kirk/Spock. WIP
A "Spock is raised on Earth with Kirk" AU, which is a trope I love, and so far this is done well. Unfortunately it hasn't been updated recently.

Streetlight People, by ladyblahblah. Slash, Kirk/Spock. (ca. 54,400 words)
This has a great mix of angst and slowly developing friendship and romance. And I liked that this uses the prostitution trope without plodding the well worn "Pretty Woman" rescue/redemption path, even though Kirk eventually quits the (legal) sex work.

Supernatural

House of Burden, by Maygin. Gen. (ca. 76,600 words)
In this AU the fire never happened, and only Sam finds out about the supernatural because of his visions.

When the Badger Grows Horns, by San Antonio Rose. Gen. (ca. 25,800 words)
The premise of this AU is "what if John Winchester was Diné?" and what made this most interesting for me was to see Sam and Dean with more extended family to fall back on and fewer rifts between them.

White Collar

Always Starts the Same, with a Boy and a Girl, by lightgetsin. Slash and het, Neal/Peter/Elizabeth. (ca. 21,500 words)
In this AU Elizabeth met Neal first rather than Peter, and things turn out differently for them. This quite charming and had a nice symmetry to canon without being too contrived.

X-Men: First Class

Limited Release, by Anon. Slash, Charles/Erik, Alex/Hank. WIP
This is a fusion with White Collar in which Erik is a mutant in the FBI and Alex is a mutant criminal, released to help him hunt for Shaw. It doesn't try to match up with the White Collar scenario completely, because it is very much about mutants rather than con artists, but the world building is great.

Any Measure of Peace, by manic_intent. Slash, Charles/Erik. (ca. 19,400 words)
The beach scene at the end goes differently in that the Americans and Soviets do not try to blow up the mutants. I enjoyed how it introduced Fury and Weapon X here as government factions into the plot, and how Charles injury happened later on.

Time to Grow, by zarah5. Slash, Charles/Erik. (ca. 21,000 words)
This is another fix-it for the ending of the XMFC movie, in that Erik sends Azazel back to evacuate Charles to a hospital which leads to a better outcome of the injury and eventually also gives more opportunity for reconciliation between Charles and Erik. And I really enjoyed the latter aspect of the fix-it, and how they mend ideological fences, but I'm somewhat ambiguous that it also erased Charles disability at the same time.

When You Are Done, by Jujuberry136. Gen. (ca. 27,140 words)
Criminal Minds/Supernatural
This is the sequel to The Time Has Come to Be Gone, that I recced in the past, and just as much fun. I liked the casefile, and that there was some comic relief mixed with the horror.

Crooked Line, by miss_zedem. Slash, Charlie Eppes/John Sheppard, Charlie/Colby. (ca. 8,600 words)
Numb3rs/SGA
This is set during The Return for SGA, but its premise is that there was a relationship between John and Charlie in the past and they are meeting again for a temporary reunion. I really liked that this was low on the relationship angst and drama, yet not a PWP either.

Better Know an Alien, by Salieri. Gen. (ca. 1,200 words)
The Colbert Report/Farscape
This was simply hilarious.

Rebuild the Bridges in Your Mind, by st_aurafina. Gen, Greg House, Robert Chase, with implied Chase/Cameron and Chase/Jason Stryker. (ca. 25,600 words)
House/X-Men Movieverse
In this Chase is mutant. It's a really solid crossover that makes House mesh well with the X-Men universe.

Nothing Like Billy, by Embroiderama. Het, Ellen Harvelle/Fox Mulder. (ca. 2,622 words)
Supernatural/The X-Files
There isn't much plot beyond the sex in this crossover, but there was enough characterization and a plausible reason for their meeting to not have the story feel arbitrary.

Leapin Lizards, by Gwendolyn Grace. Gen, Sam Winchester, Dean Winchester, Sam Beckett, Al Calavicci. (ca. 18,560 words)
Quantum Leap/Supernatural
Sam Beckett leaps into John Winchester when Dean and Sam were still children. There is a good case story, and Beckett has to deal with finding out that the supernatural is real, and handle two young Winchesters.

With a Bang, by Mink. Gen, Alec, Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester. (ca. 42,000 words)
Dark Angel/Supernatural
This is a good action-adventure, and I liked how the shows' mythologies were meshed, even though I'm not that into the whole breeding cult arc of DA season two. Also Alec, Sam and Dean together are just fun to watch.

Curiosities (ca. 4,045 words) and Stutter (ca. 1,500 words), by Penknife. Slash, Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier, Tom Riddle, Lily Potter, Sirius Black.
Harry Potter/X-Men
Recently Penknife offered to write timestamp fic, and I noticed that I never recced the original crossover for which I requested a timestamp. Anyway, in the first Erik Lehnsherr encounters Tom Riddle in 1950, the timestamp is set during the first Voldemort war/the Marauders era, and both are interesting and well worth reading.

Brothers in Arms, by SylvanWitch. Gen, Dean Winchester, Derek Reese. (ca. 2,440 words)
Supernatural/Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
Dean runs into Derek while hunting, and somehow these two shows just go together like chocolate and hazelnuts.

What Kind of Day Has It Been?, by Victoria P. Gen, Dean Winchester, Sam Winchester, Kermit and the Muppet Show ensemble. (ca. 3,300 words)
Muppet Show/Supernatural
I love Muppet crossovers (felt rules! *g*), and this one made me laugh a lot.

AU recs

Stargate: Atlantis

Push and its sequel Pull, by jane_elliot. Slash Rodney McKay/John Sheppard. (ca. 39,000 words and 27,000 words)
It's somewhat like a Harlequin romance story. Rodney, who works at the SGC, has an accident with Sheppard, who lives on the streets as result from his severe PTSD and dishonorable discharge, which circumstances are slowly revealed through the story. Then friendship and romance follow with a fair but not overwhelming amount of angst.

Unidentified, by the_drifter. Slash Rodney McKay/John Sheppard. (ca. 30,000 words)
Everybody recced this already, but it a really good present-day (no Stargate) amnesia AU, in which Rodney looses his memory suddenly without explanation, and we see him (re-)discovering and to some extent redefining himself and his relationships to friends and family through Sheppard's POV.

Harry Potter

The If Sieve, by Cathy (crawfords_lover). Slash, Harry/Draco. (ca. 36,000 words)
Draco goes through potential alternative universes with a pensieve-like device, exploring what would have happened if he (or Harry) made different decisions. It's a cool magical device and the scenarios are HP fandom staples, but handled in an original way, often with not quite the expected outcome.

X-Men Movieverse

Forgotten, by cyndrarae. Slash, Scott/Logan. (ca. 2,450 words)
In this AU Scott survives X3 but has amnesia, and Logan eventually finds him. Also it is hookerfic, so you get two fannish tropes in one, which in this case is definitely a good thing, since they go great together with Scott angst.

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Crossover Recs

Untitled, by siriaeve. Gen, Aiden Ford, Ronon Dex, Rodney McKay, John Sheppard, and the Endless. (ca. 750 words)
Sandman/Stargate: SG-1/Stargate: Atlantis
It's a "Five Things" type story in which SGA and SG-1 characters meet the Endless, and while each vignette is short, they are also gorgeous.

Some good crossovers I've read recently...

1967 Plymouth GTX Convertible, Black., by basingstoke. Slash, Dean/Gunn, Angel, Sam. (ca. 2,100 words)
Angel/Supernatural
This one is just a lot of fun. They first meet over anti-zombie supplies, there's banter, Sam and Angel are playing euchre... also Dean/Gunn!

Charm City by hth_the_first. Slash, Sam/Tim. (ca. 7,630 words)
Homicide: Life on the Streets/Supernatural
I've only watched Homicide sporadically, but the relationships here between Sam and Dean as well as Tim and Sam really pulled me in.

Today's Tom Sawyer (1/2) and (2/2), by ladyjanelly. Gen, Sam and Ben. (ca. 5,000 words)
Dark Angel/Supernatural
In 2009 Sam runs across Ben, just after the X5 children escaped from Manticore.

The People You Meet, by mandysbitch. Slash, Chris Keller/Rodney McKay. (ca. 8,300 words)
Oz/Stargate Atlantis
I rarely read crossovers when I just know one of the sources, but I followed a rec somewhere, and the story pulled me in. I have never actually watched any episode of Oz (so I can't judge Keller's characterization), but I think it is pre-series for Oz as well as for SGA. Anyway, it starts when Rodney gets robbed by Keller, and things get more complicated from there at a fast pace.

Case X-1743: Unresolved. by minisinoo. Het, Mulder/Scully, Jean/Scott. (ca. 24,500 words)
The X-Files/X-Men Movieverse
While still working on the X-Files Mulder and Scully investigate the incident at Scott's high school when his powers first manifested. Years later Mulder notices Scott during Jean's tv appearance and they meet again. The plot is mostly just about getting the characters together, but I really liked how the universes meshed here.

Untitled SGA/Traders series, by Sealie (jimandblair). Gen, John, Rodney, Carson, Grant.
Stargate Atlantis/Traders
This one is still a WIP, but so far I'm really enjoying it. It's a good take on the "Rodney and Grant are related" premise.

The Monster in the Closet, by Shaye (fourteenlines). Het, Rodney/Kaylee. (ca. 3,200 words)
Firefly/Stargate Atlantis
Rodney and Kaylee meet as prisoners of the Reavers, so it is rather dark.

Don't Mention the Wookies by sheafrotherdon. Slash, McKay/Sheppard. (ca 1,400 words)
Stargate Atlantis/Star Wars
I waffled a bit whether this really counts as a real crossover, but I found its slightly wacky premise cute and funny, and it is definitely crossover-ish, so I included it in this rec set anyway.