Random crappy things

[KarotsaMused]

Ever write a dumb, go-nowhere fiction but post it because in there somewhere is a message you like?

I had one of those moments! Check it *pimps*

Author: KarotsaMused
Title: Anticlimax
Fandom: Saiyuki
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Gojyo's mouth, spoilers
Summary: Burial Era, set right about after "Boiling Point", in which Hakkai witnesses a fight, Gojyo tries to delve, and there's an incredibly craptacular ending which I think suits my purpose quite well...

URL: www.fanfiction.net/s/2269117/1/

^^;; There may be questions, and that's kinda why I'm putting it up. A string of tense Burial stuff may be in the works, though, just 'cause it's kinda fun to do. Hakkai and Gojyo not being entirely nice to one another, not knowing each other very well. It's a concept I like.

[treneka]

Hurray for dumb, go-nowhere fiction. I will warn you, however, that if you write enough of it, you'll suddenly discover it going somewhere and yourself along for the ride. *grins*

Anyway, regarding your burial arc stuff, I'm really enjoying it. I like the edginess (sp?) of Gojyo testing the waters of his new roommate's psyche even as Hakkai learns both to be himself and to relate that self to his host. So many authors seem to assume an immediate rapport and understanding between these two, and I like the more "realistic" idea that there was none. Real guys, when getting to know each other, almost never seem to fall into the "friendship at first sight," for all that "drinking buddy afs," "sports pal afs," and "car/computer/other tech toy appreciation comrade afs" are pretty common. The idea that baring their souls to each other is not something Hakkai and Gojyo can do right away is both attractively "gritty" for lack of a better word, and a good emphasis to the point that Hakkai is not Gonou.

This last I bring up because it seems to me that Gonou shared his secrets very readily with Gojyo. He offered his secrets up both for shock value and because he was a man with nothing left to lose - no secrets left to keep. In Gonou's mind, I think perhaps Gojyo was something akin to a Shinigami; his ferryman on the last journey he ever expected to take. To find him a real flesh and blood person, not going away must have come as a shock...and I like how you handle it.

[KarotsaMused]

^^;; Go-nowheres always lead somewhere. The trick is not to let them grab you...

Oh, and by the way... I LOVE YOU. YOU GET IT. The Gonou thing. So many people completely miss that Gonou and Hakkai aren't the same, and you actually understand the reasons why. I especially love your Shinigami metaphor - so true, so true.

And, well, I'm just sick of people spilling their guts for the sake of advancing a plot or hopping into bed together. There's always a toll taken when someone relives an unpleasant experience, or even the factors that led up to it.
They lived together for THREE YEARS. I bet it took 'em every freakin' DAY to learn one another. Especially, as you said so rightly, when Hakkai had to learn about himself first. Everything Gojyo knew about Gonou besides facts went completely out the window when Hakkai moved in - new name, new person, new face.

All this burial stuff is a warm-up for me. Hakkai and Gojyo getting to know each other, I mean. I've got to do it before I really get into the meat of my AU - in which Gojyo does not save Gonou's life, and the two don't even meet until Hakkai's firm and settled. To know you think I'm going in the right direction, even for canon burial era, is pretty reassuring on the precipice of a scary bit of recharacterisation. XP

[sorchafyre]

Why on earth would you think this is a 'go-nowhere' story? Alright, maybe being a one-shot writer myself has skewed my perceptions, but there's plenty in this story.

We see that Gojyo is *smart*, just perhaps not that eloquent. "Something like that’s gotta be so big you just want to scream it. You know?... So how’d you deal with something that big?”... the thing you want to talk about but can’t or won’t and words aren’t enough. If you aren’t fighting her or fucking her, how’d you manage?”" Inimitable Gojyo style. He *gets* it alright, he really, deeply, perhaps even intiutively slices right down to a truth... and then doesn't know how to either leave it alone or communicate other than through his own desperate metaphors.

We see that Hakkai, while almost Sherlock Holmes-perceptive, can't divorce his reasoning past the filters of Gonou's experience. His deductions are less about the two combatants (and one suspects, the observant mistress) than they are a verbal exploration of how he is supposed to percieve things now that he is different.

And oh, yes, the last line. "...and wishing despite the redhead’s actions that Gojyo had not learned to respect him." How tantalizingly enigmatic. That almost *begs* to be read with preconceptions. Depending on your bent it could be read as two polar opposite longings. (go ahead, insert 'bent' joke here) 'had not learned to respect him' so that Hakkai wouldn't care about losing that respect and thus could talk freely, or 'had not learned to respect him' so that Gojyo now has expectations of Hakkai continuing to talk openly and he would rather not.

And the amazingly stand out, stop-me-in-my-tracks phrase: "...the background hum of Life Goes On." Oh, so deliciously phrased, a true gem of a line.

Sorry, I must respectfully disagree, there's some "only mildly interesting" in parts, but no crappiness.

[Karot being lazy]

Your interpretation is spot-on, I think, and yet I wonder how you see so much in stuff I just pop off the top of my head. *rubs back of neck* Lucky shot, I guess?

The one place where your idea differs from the original intent of my writing is in your interpretation of the final phrase. While your words are quite valid (and got me thinking for a good twenty minutes before I started to write this), my original intent was that Hakkai almost desperately wanted to continue the conversation, to draw words out of Gojyo to sort of even things out.
Gojyo has learned to respect him - learned that rainy nights are Hakkai's alone-time, and that if Gojyo should disturb him he'll be greeted with a glassy smile and a polite but firm order to get the hell out. He knows the moods Hakkai can enter (after all, this is far before the journey itself and thus the scar, aha, is still at its worst in terms of pain) and respects that the guy needs to work some things out without Gojyo hanging on his shoulder and forcing him to talk.

And yet talking is a good thing. As Tren said, Gonou was so much more open with Gojyo, and I wonder sometimes if Hakkai misses the I-have-nothing-to-lose about their original relationship, or at least his side of it. Gojyo was attentive and unjudging and so kind to Gonou because...Gonou was quite easily Gojyo's property for the duration of his coma and became something for Gojyo that he never consciously wanted to become.
Gonou and Hakkai...they have different rules in Gojyo's head - he's made a distinction between them, through Hakkai's forced change in mannerism and the more subtle shifts that come with a rejuvenated will to live (and the following will to privacy and perpetuation). I think that's what Gojyo has learned to respect. And the way I like to think of Hakkai is perhaps sort of resentful, because when Gojyo stands back and lets Hakkai hold things in, Gojyo does so as well. The last thing Hakkai needs is to be alone with his preconceptions and his battered conscience.

Then again, read it as you will - the way you've taken it (or ways, should I say?) is interesting enough.

I feel my readers give me too much credit sometimes.

[KarotsaMused]

Um.

*wiggles hands in air* HWUUUU!

The predecessor to Anticlimax won the 42 Days contest! XD For some reason that's really cool.

[narrizan]

hello there i sort a got lost and found myself here....and maybe this is kind of unorthodox, and blatant as well but could you please tell me what you think of the following....it would mean a lot to me. as i peg you as my guide to all things gojyo!

www.fanfiction.net/s/2386008/1/
www.fanfiction.net/s/2392313/1/

also really you are truly one of the main reasons any of my fics are up. i would not have dared otherwise! ^_^ thank you so much.

eek! i apologise too...as i hope this doesn't come across as stalking....well if you're really worried i am half a world away! and it is (sadly) too expensive for me to visit.

also i have just re-read "anticlimax" coincidentally BEFORE i found this thread/forum...so it's kind of weird in a nice way i think!

[KarotsaMused]

*pet pet* Zan, you don't know how much your reviews and commentary already mean to me - your reviews are unexpected and wonderful surprises during the days between fiction updates. Honestly? I'm flattered ^^;;
I'm going to check out and review your fictions now, dear. I'm glad you're posting and writing and doing what you love, and I am not worried about you at all. You're just honest and lovely, nothing wrong with that. ^^

[narrizan]

thanks for the r&r...i thought i would have ended up wrtiting lots of hakkai centric fics...but as it turns out i started a lot of them have ended up ....... the way they have. and "A study" was only supposed to be a one shot and then I added the Gojyo chap. which was what i wanted your opinion on. so now I have been requested to do the rest of the group as well although i am thinking about it ooh its really hard....

i don't think i have enough of a handle on sanzo, and goku is never as cut and dried as he seems. and like i have all these cobwebs of ideas but as i said cobwebs and as soon as i reach out for them they disappear into the dust.

so how do you deal with ideas that are good but seem to be just out of reach? umm does that makes sense?...and does this come under random crappy things!

once again thanks and much love!

[KarotsaMused]

Heh. The only character I really think I understand is Gojyo. Which is why I felt comfortable taking on something like "If" so long as it remained Sha-centric. I'm branching into Gonou territory now, though, so it's tender ground. Same thing with any fic that involves the characters you don't think you can handle.
The only thing I can really suggest you do is study. Rewatch the series, reread the manga, develop your ideas on how Sanzo would think and react, and always keep in mind his motives and history, all of the things that have shaped him. I've done that enough with Gojyo that it's second nature, and Hakkai's becoming that way with me as well.
As for Goku, I can only recommend that you think like a five hundred year old child. The wisdom that comes from indiscriminate, unconditional love and the hardness that comes from imprisonment. A big bundle of hurt ignored. Heh. You can only write Goku as you're writing him. He's reactionary and inciting all at once. No two Goku interpretations are quite alike so you do have some free reign with him.

Heh. I just kind of work on my ideas until they're solid. You know? Hash 'em out with people on IM or LJ and just fight them into existence. It's gotten to the point where if something isn't working, I always go to Opti or Treneka or Rune for assistance. Someone else who gets it can help you nail things down. Even if your idea is like "Bunnies! And a stick of licorice!" Sooner or later you'll figure it out.
Do not despair. Harr. Every once in a while the bits of the puzzle fall into place and you'll come up with something you like. If you're inspired, just go with it and write.
Nine times of ten, my one-shots start out as an "ooh" and develop themselves as they go. Feverish was just supposed to be about Gojyo walking around barefoot in the snow. And then Hakkai made pancakes, the brat.

Stories write themselves. Stop worrying and let it happen. And if it's not happening, work it out with someone you trust.

[narrizan]

*hugs* to you. i so love your words of advice. 'cos they really help...
many thanks.
lol

zan