The Work-in-Progress Meme!

[eponymous_rose]

Okay. This is something I've concocted primarily because I want confirmation that I'm not the only one with a folder full of half-finished fiction on my desktop that might never get written at this rate. So here you are! The Work-in-Progress Meme! When you see this, post a little weensy excerpt from as many random works-in-progress as you can find lying around. Who knows? Maybe inspiration will burst forth and do something, um, inspiration-y. Yes. I know I went "when on Earth did I write this" several times. And that's always fun. I really am convinced that somebody's been messing around with my computer and uploading their stuff, though, because I have zero recollection of a good portion of this. Especially the older stuff.

Doctor Who Stuff

Family of Blood uber-long recap that will probably remain unfinished:

• Martha and Smith are running together, with Joan trailing somewhat behind. This is familiar; muscle memory. It’s speaking a dead planet’s name with unfamiliar lips.

Assorted Early Drafts of the Wanderer Fantasy:

• He touches the sky of Gallifrey and sees it burn.
• "D'you mean to say that if I've misjudged the standards of censorship on a news programme, we could just... disappear?"
• He was lying, then - he hated it when he couldn't tell.

Ficathon:

• They're halfway to anywhere and about three weeks from yesterday when Rose finds the book.

House Stuff (ooh, it's been too long!)

 Short Stuff that may or may not have have seen the light of day, since my memory's wonky on the subject:

• After Wisconsin, New Jersey seemed foreign enough.
• The door closes on the final movement of his hand to the pocket where the Vicodin lives and he knows that this, at least, is better than any music he could ever play.
• Of course, it would be far easier to resign herself to complete indifference if miserably introspective evenings like this one didn't come up so often.
• It's not yet another facet of his absorption in his job, either, as delving fanatically into cold case histories is a process which, he finds, always ends in histrionics.
• "It's pointless," House scoffs without missing a beat. Wilson raises his glass in silent acquiescence. He can relate.
• When Greg House was sixteen years old, his parents bought him a Polaroid camera in the vain hope that he'd attach himself to the new gadget and stop antagonizing everyone he'd ever met. [Note: Now, this one sounds interesting, and I've got the page-long fragment topped up with a mot juste from Sherlock Holmes: "You see, but you do not observe." But I haven't the faintest idea where I was going with it, and I've left it partway through a sentence at the end. So, um, yeah.]

Original Stuff (yes, it does happen)

The Surreal Mystery Super-Project that's barely progressed beyond the planning stages in the last six years:

• Over the past three months, two weeks, and five days, Chris Forger had discovered that his mind was a shitty place to loiter.

Sherlock Holmes (new crack!fic hasn't yet made it to paper/computer screen, and neither has the Hiatus!fic, so you're left with the half-started short story collection of doom. I keep having Holmes make amazing deductions, and Watson's all "Well, I was with you until you pulled her name out of thin air" and I realize that I don't know how he did it, either. Heehee.)

Miscellany:

• His eyes meet mine and I see in them the hope of miracles.
• "It does want some organization." / "It wants only a few stray banana peels to become a rubbish heap!"
• He paused, then fished out a waistcoat from beneath the component parts of a newspaper, a long coil of rope, and what appeared to be a woman's corset.
• Holmes never failed to assure me that the restaurant we patronized so frequently was a highly respectable establishment, but I always noted the bullet pocks in the doorway and the large men at the bar with some trepidation.
• Mrs. Hudson frowned, deepening the fine lines on her face which I knew to be directly attribuable to my fellow-lodger.
• As I stared out the window, it seemed to me that the wind carried with it the faint strains of a violin sonata.
• Memory is capricious and serves its master in ways most unexpected.
• "All of my potential clients must have sprouted wings and flown off together," he muttered.
• Je devrais être celui qui la réconfortait, qui jouait le rôle de mari tenace en face de ce tueur indicible qui la volait la vie sans laisser de traces… [Note: Um. Yes. I forgot I was doing the French thing.]
• Holmes often refers to me as a man of action, but it is with shame that I recall huddling in the snow for several long minutes, listening to the oppressive silence broken only by my heavy breathing.
• I heard something suspiciously like a snigger from Holmes, who was still crouched over his chemicals.
• "A rather clumsy assassination, all told." [Note: This is from a fun little idea. I might pick this one up again if I can calm the spastic writing down a bit.]
• "But art in deduction lies only in the ability to recognize and reproduce the distinct artistry of crime." [Note: This one's so close to being finished that I'm amazed I haven't posted it somewhere by now. Hm.]
• "If, of course, this isn't merely one of your soliloquies, in which case I may as well be in the next room."

Whew. That was fun. I should go to bed now.

Comments

[scarletsherlock.livejournal.com]

He paused, then fished out a waistcoat from beneath the component parts of a newspaper, a long coil of rope, and what appeared to be a woman's corset.

haHA! I wanna see this.

And I am SO doing this when I get home from work today.

[imsanehonest.livejournal.com]

Over the past three months, two weeks, and five days, Chris Forger had discovered that his mind was a shitty place to loiter.

That story seems like a ridiculous amount of fun. *giggle*

[eponymous-rose.livejournal.com]

It involves a slightly-bonkers seventy-year-old reporter-slash-little-old-lady who's following a bunch of pencil-pushing desk sergeants around and trying to convince them that women have been disappearing from the neighbourhood.

And, in the way of little old ladies everywhere, she's right.

Characters include the grumpy and potty-mouthed Chris Forger, who is very much not dealing well with his rough divorce and, oh, his partner's recent murder. But he's got a thirteen-year-old son to keep him sane. Or not.

Because he's not yet been psych-cleared to work the streets again, he winds up paired with the flamboyant Clarence who-has-a-last-name-I've-forgotten, who's basically been assigned to permanent desk-jockeying for reasons unknown, and together they start following up on the names of victims a serial rapist has started disclosing in jail, fifteen years after the fact.

The victims, of course, have all disappeared.

And, um, yeah. I fiddle around with it from time to time, and I think it could be a heckuva lot of fun to work with. Maybe I should pick it up again. *ponders*

[imsanehonest.livejournal.com]

AMAZING.

Yeah, basically, I want to read that. Should it ever be finished through magical means, I reserve the right to demand an advanced copy! *nod*

[eponymous-rose.livejournal.com]

*salutes* Right-o!

Alas, it's been in the planning stages for six years now, at least, and the plot hasn't advanced beyond what I've written there. Heehee.

[imsanehonest.livejournal.com]

...

Let me dream!

*imagines getting advanced copy, etc.*

[eponymous-rose.livejournal.com]

Well, I've come back to projects after longer than six years, before!

Um. Wait.

I haven't, actually. But it seems like the sort of thing I might do. *thumbs up*

[curuchamion.livejournal.com]

LOL at your Holmes pulling deductions out of thin air!

(Me, I've never tried to write Holmes!fic because it would be all totally useless but perfectly well-founded deductions and no plot. I'm slightly obsessed with making Holmesian deductions IRL, yes precious.)