TEAM WHIMSY: Day 3, "I Am a Man Upon the Land"

[china_shop]

Title: I Am a Man Upon the Land
Author: Stars (simplystars)
Team: Whimsy
Prompt: "This is the third time I tried to tell her - she won't listen!"
Pairing(s): Fraser/Kowalski
Length: 13,000 words
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: None.
Summary: Fraser tells Ray a story. Ray doesn't like the ending. They live happily ever after.
Author's Notes: Infinite thanks to kernezelda, who encourages me to write even when she has no idea what I'm writing about – without her, this story would not have been written. Much gratitude and appreciation to zabira, torra, catwalksalone, lamentables, and etcetera_cat for insightful comments and all sorts of help, and to all the Whimsical members of my team and the mods for general awesomeness and support.

Once you've read the story, please take a moment to vote in the poll below. Ratings go from 1 (low) to 9 (high), so all you need to do is enter a single number in that range into each text entry box. You'll be able to see the Genre information in the header above.

More details about the voting procedure can be found here.

I Am a Man Upon the Land

[Poll #1250876]

Comments

[akamine_chan]

I think a lot of us have a weakness for selkies...*g*

So, the things I loved about this:

The slow building of this story, the gentle, measured pace of it. I loved the language, the faltering of Ray and Fraser's duet, their incomprehension of it. The calmness of Fraser's voice - aware of everything Ray is to him but unsure of how to keep him.

Fraser had made the mistake of answering Ray's question, when he had asked what Fraser and Dief were arguing about; for the next hour Fraser had been subjected to a fond, lengthy reminiscence over Junk Foods Ray and Dief Had Known, Loved, and Eaten.

and

Curled up at Fraser's side, just like one of the sled dogs, Ray fit perfectly into the spaces and planes of Fraser's body. His knees nudged Fraser's hip; sock-clad toes rested in the snug hollow beneath Fraser's knee.

and the innate-Rayness of:

Ray rolled his eyes and scooted around to flop down beside Fraser. "You tell me. One minute you're one crazy Mountie mofo streaking your way across the Arctic, the next you're a furry with fish breath. And like a split-second after that, you were history."

I loved the lyricism and voice of the selkie's tale - like a fairy-tale but not.

This phrase absolutely gutted me: He was alone, and he was lonely. Before the Man came, he would sometimes cry out his loneliness in mournful, guttural barks, but still the other seals ignored him.

This was not one, but two beautiful stories and I loved them both.

Wonderful job.

[akamine_chan]

And you! I can't believe you weren't satisfied with this. It's so amazingly beautiful, stars, and it's one of my favorites from this match.

*hugs you*

[simplystars.livejournal.com]

Eeee! I don't know that it was that I wasn't satisfied with it (though after exchanging emails with Nos there are some things I would tinker with, probably) but by deadline I was just so out of my head I had no idea what I'd actually written. :-p

I only had time to read it through entirely, umm, I think twice before I had to send the final draft - and one of those times was final beta. But more on that later next week. I'm just glad I survived and it didn't entirely suck it's all over. &hearts

YAY FIC MATCH! \everybody/