ADMIN: The Apocalypse Challenge

[cesperanza.livejournal.com]

This is the way the world ends.

Our favorite whacked-out girl, pearl_o, once said, "You know what fandom really needs? Stories about everybody dying in five or ten years of an influenza pandemic!!! Something like: 'In 2010, the world gets struck with influenza on the scale of 1918 or so' and then people all write that story."

We're not going to limit this challenge to the flu, or nuclear war, or some kind of science-fiction Big Brother government taking over--though hey, please, I hope somebody writes these. We're also not going to limit this to 2010: if you want to, say, set the characters in 1914 or 1939 or some other historically terrifying date for real, you knock yourself out. We're not even going to define "apocalypse" for you--if you choose to do not the big bombs exploding kind but the small, emotionally significant kind of world-ending, please go ahead. Feel free to metaphorize.

Most of all, write 'em happy or sad as you please (and yes, that's right, I don't expect all the apocalypse stories to result in unhappy endings! The end of the world can be a party, or an opportunity for heroism, or something to escape from...etc.)

It's January 22nd by my watch; stories will be due February 5th at midnight eastern.

Edited to add: I have been reminded, and I agree--could we please have deathfic warnings, please? Or use your common sense, if you don't want to be specific (which I totally understand)--if part of the thrill of the story is "upsetting material", say, "Hey, this story has upsetting material in it" or something like that, to give a head's up to them that wants it. Thanks!

Comments

[pearl-o.livejournal.com]

eeeeeeeeeee, AWESOME.

[mondschein1.livejournal.com]

Oh.

My.

God.

Your icon. Your ICON.

...can I be five years old and watching Sesame Street now?

[bohemian--storm.livejournal.com]

I am in love with this challenge.

I'll ignore school work in order to do this. :D

[grey853.livejournal.com]

Could I kindly request that the challenge stories include warnings? I really hate deathfic of any kind so if it's all about dying, then I want to give it a miss. If there's no dying, then I'd like to read it.

[cesperanza.livejournal.com]

Yep! Absolutely!--*goes to amend challenge*

[moosesal.livejournal.com]

Are crossover fics allowed in this community?

[cesperanza.livejournal.com]

Yes, so long as the story is primarily DS-centric.

[moosesal.livejournal.com]

Sweet. Apocolypse always makes me think Buffyverse. Of course, now that I've asked I probably won't get anything written. But we'll see. Thanks.

[morgandawn.livejournal.com]

heeee. I cannot wait to read some of this. I love 'end of the world' fic (no surprise - points to: http://www.morgandawn.com/longway1.htm

[cesperanza.livejournal.com]

You know, I DID think of you, Long Way Home is TOTALLY our extant masterpiece in this genre. That and--god, I can't remember who wrote it, and it sounds like it should be terrible but I liked it, about how war breaks out between Canada and the US and Ray K keeps Margaret Thatcher in his attic like Anne Frank. Now THAT was a cracked out story, but it broke my heart, seriously.

[kaneko.livejournal.com]

I love you THIS MUCH.

[sage]

Here's a suggestion for your file, from a conversation tonight with china_shop:

A paint challenge -- painting, painters, paintings, watercolors, acrylics, oils, tempera, fingerpaint, modelpaint, housepaint, consulate-paint, six-coats-of-black-enamel-on-the-GTO-paint, any kind of paint.

I'd also include fingernail polish, face paint (Due South needs more mimes!), Frannie's art class, and Turnbull's portrait of the Queen. :D

[cesperanza.livejournal.com]

Got it--thanks! Great suggestions!

[mondschein1.livejournal.com]

Oh oh oh! I thought of a possible challenge and I am very excited!

How about a Pedagogy Challenge? Like -- I dunno, Fraser teaching RayK how to survive in the middle of the tundra, for one. RayV teaching Frannie how to deal with mean people making fun of her. Welsh teaching RayV or RayK how to cope with the less salubrious side of police work. Dysfunctional daddies attempting to teach kids something about Life. Stuff like that.

[cesperanza.livejournal.com]

Oh rock--love it!

[pearl-o.livejournal.com]

I would be way amused by an undercover assignment challenge -- I mean, even apart from the two Rays' big ones in canon, we have Fraser as a female Catholic school teacher, Ray Kowalski as a baseball player, Ray Vecchio and Fraser as used car salesmen, Ray Kowalski and Fraser as Great Lakes shipmen. There are tons of weird wacky scenarios they could find themselves in.