Title: Rubber Shoes in Motion
Author: f1onagher
Rating: T
Genre: Alt!power/AU
Status: In-Progress
Pairings: None
Summary: Victoria centric AU, crossover with Red Alert 2
Link: spacebattles

So, this is a refreshing one. Concept is this, Fleur never died and with it, neither did the New Wave movement. Story starts 2 years before canon and New Wave is huge, having teams in many cities.

Victoria is the one person in the family who does not have powers and that has created a rift between her and her family, with her acting out immensely, partly due to being spoiled and partly for understandable reasons, such as her views on the movement and how it influences everyone's behaviour for the worst.

So, we have an interesting AU setting with a different landscape in capes and how various characters and groups are different for it. Victoria is engaging and her powerset, that being a tinker with the tech tree of the Red Alert 2 Soviet side are pretty fun.

Best part is, no Taylor, at least so far and I kinda hope she stays out of this one.

Apparently it was on hiatus for nearly a year but it got an update on Christmas, so, maybe we'll see more now.

I quite liked that the AU was more far reaching and gave us an interesting new playing field rather "just" have Taylor trigger with a different power.

 

El-Ahrairah 2.1 is up.

 

Title: Company Girl
Author: Fencer
Rating: T
Genre: AU (canon powers, different canon situation)
Status: In-Progress
Pairings: None
Summary: In the wake of the Leviathan attack the Black Company comes to Brockton Bay to offer aid, recruit new members, and pick up a bounty. They bring with them a new and bloody take on the cape game. Mercenary Taylor.
Link: Sufficient Velocity

I know we have a few Black Company fans on DLP, like Aekiel, and this seems fun enough. Still in its beginning stages and it has already shades of the new element being so much superior to the canon threats but hey, it's the Black Company and the idea seems fun.

So, yeah, for those who wanted this crossover, here you go.

 

Just smashed through some of the recs on here.

Really enjoyed I, Grega fair bit. Narrative is funny, characters are a heap of fun (best Dinah I've ever read. Everyone else is fun too - even Emma) and the situations he gets put in are fun enough. Enjoying the Winged_One chapter too.

El-Ahrairah works a lot better than I expected. Not sure how much longer it'll stay interesting, but for the moment, looking forward to more chapters. Not quite Agent of Cauldron in terms of characterisation, but still a fun take on Cauldron.

Rubber Shoes in Motion was more refreshing than anything else. Has the feel of a lot of other Taylor Tinker fics, except with Victoria as the main character. That along with a whole heap of other changes to the current state of Brockton Bay, along with a bunch of new characters, led to a pretty interesting story so far.

Alexis has a pretty promising first chapter.

Couldn't really get into Resonance or Bug Girl at all.

 

Burnout is really fucking good. Damn shame it's only a one shot cause it had a bunch of stuff it could continue on.

 

Yeah, it was pretty good. If they woke up the next morning and Taylor looked into the mirror only to find Victoria's face and body looking back at her, I think it would have been funnier. Not that I think it should have gone Skitter/Panacea necessarily, just more opportunities for hangover!horror, and Amy's total inability to return Taylor back to normal. So there's a drunk Glory Girl with curly auburn hair (because that's all Amy could manage).

 

Wow. Haven't been that impressed with a Worm one-shot since The Girls Who Can't Unplug. Loved Amy and Taylor's friendship, felt very genuine. Would love to see that concept as a full on story.

And your idea would have made it amazingly hilarious, Heather_Sinclair.

 

Chapter 2.5 of Parental Guidance always makes me crack up, especially the "I don't know how they work" part.. Whenever I read it, I laugh. The fic is silly, crack-ish, juvenile and stupid, but it's entertaining. On the same level as The Techno Queen to me, well, kinda.

Burnout was okay, didn't love it though. Taylor seemed generic and the whole alcohol thing seemed to be just there. And for a one-shot it repeated itself quite often, Taylor got hammered, Amy heals her and makes a crack about her liver. Dunno, expected a bit more out of it.

That said, Heather's idea would have improved this story drastically and I did like the Amy Taylor relationship when it didn't revolve around Taylor's liver and drinking problem.

A Dusty Silk Costume is okay, I got a bit of the feels when we learned her daughters name but the rest was interesting, if a bit predictable. Would have liked to see this continue. Seems to me, all the truly interesting stuff has yet to come but we cut off at the set up phase. Would like it as a longer story but as a one shot, it leaves me wanting too much, without satisfying me with what is already there. Still, worth reading.

I love Nursing a Grudge, love the situation, love this complex balance with Madison and the scope of the story. Wish more stories would explore canon like this instead of just going alt power Taylor. Taylor taking care of one of her bullies this way? That's super fascinating. Should probably be in the library but I'm not sure the author got the voices down correctly. Then again, has been some time since I last read Worm canon proper and I might just be influenced by too many shitty alt power Taylors.

 

This is wrong. This isn't the canon S9 arc, it diverges in one big way. I'm reading it now, impressed so far.

 

Unbreakable is really good. The character voices were slightly off, but it wasn't nearly bad enough to break my immersion. Someone let me know if it updates, will you?

A Dirty Silk costume was OK at best. The author isn't really the best at writing dialogue.

 

Hm, agree with this. I didn't really buy Taylor's character, even allowing for years of change. I felt like the author told me things about her instead of showing them, and Stan's right, the dialogue is... weird. It's not clunky, exactly, but they definitely don't talk like real people. Pretty bleh.

---------- Post automerged at 08:24 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:57 PM ----------

Burnout is pretty good. Automatic -1 for you're/your and it's/its conflation, and it's pretty rough overall, but it's got the one thing that keeps people reading: voice. When it was over I wanted it to keep going, so.

 

I like how Memetic me is shaping up - It makes sure to focus on what made Worm so interesting: The characters, not the powers. Looking forward to seeing how everything will unfold.

 

I know nothing about The Black Company, but I loved Company Girl. 5/5. If the author can establish a plot once they leave BB, it should go in the library.

El-Ahrairah was also pretty good. I really don't see much a future for the fic though. Like most alt power stories, I think this one will end when the author is done pointing out all the ways she can use her power.

 

Title: Going Native
Author: Dartz
Rating: N/A
Genre: SI/AU
Status: In-Progress
Pairings: None
Summary: So you think you know exactly how to Michael Allen your way around the Worm-verse if you ever were magicked to that fictional universe as a real person? You think you can type out all the important facts and facoids from memory and build a timeline to create a path-to-victory of your very own? You know that you can be ruthless as necessary because these are all fictional people any way? Sixteen year old Ian would like to tell you to go fuck yourself.

SB: Link
SV: Link

As the author says the more appropriate (and former working) title for this was Insecurity, a play on the famous Worm story by Ack Security! in which the author avatar munchins from a simple security guard at Winslow to an eponymous cape after being tinkered with by [redacted]. The author of this story (Going Native) posits the question of how someone would really react to being dumped into a sad crap fic world such as Worm and uses in-universe dynamics to move his character to Brockton Bay in a short period before canon begins.

Positives:

• Realistic reactions
• Taylor hates him
• Glory Girl's aura
• Behaves like teenager
• Trigger event
• Bullshit powers! + reaction to powers

Cons:

• Very nervous\scared to break continuity
• A lot of set up already in place so we get told not shown
• Bullshit powers!

All in all I found it a good read even if the author avatar was a bit of a downer. I enjoyed the way the writer deliberately sidestepped some events but would hope that some of the later parts of the chapters available indicate that he will get involved in one way or another soon.

I also want to make special note of the Glory Girl and Panacea interactions here which for the first time made me feel actually sympathetic for Amy Dallon and understand her character a bit better.

 

Really liked Going Native.

The main character is kept relevant by being keeping him at Winslow, but at the same time he's having fun doing his own thing rather than sticking his nose too much in places it doesn't belong. Him trying to live his life as a background character is still fun enough, because his friends are cool and there's enough happening with his little "cheating on tests" business plot that feel natural and interesting.

You as the reader, really do feel that pressure of knowing exactly what's going to be happen and feeling powerless to stop it. Particularly when you're afraid that changing everything could cause a butterfly effect that makes it worse. After all, Taylor did manage to beat most of the bad guys in the end.

Even the way he deals with Sophia. A nobody in the grand scheme of things. He is really at her mercy to some extent. He has her identity, but that's too much of a thing to hold against her. Sophia still has the upper hand in most of their conversations.

There's also enough little interactions with other charactesr that keep the plot moving.

Overall, I'm actually really liking the pace and hope to see this turn out into a lengthy, full fleshed out story. Will be interesting to see how it turns out when he does enter the cape scene because that could be a make or break.



Also, while we mentioned Ack's fic Security, for some reason I really enjoy his spin off fic I, Panacea. Basically, Security somehow wakes up in the back of Amy's head after the bank robbery, and tries to convince her to team up with the Undersiders and all that. It hits a whole bunch of bad tropes, but somehow, it still ends up pretty fun, easy to get into and I get all excited whenever I see an update. It's still a guilty pleasure, but worth checking out.

And you don't actually need to read Security to understand the fic.

 

> gets referred to DLP as a good place for intelligent feedback and fic reviews
> registers and sees my first fic, Alexis, mentioned on last couple pages

Well. That was a surprise. Getting a comment on any of the sites I posted it on is surprising enough, given it's my first real attempt at writing something long-form. Having people talk about it on a site I've never even heard of? That's an even weirder feeling. But it's a warm and fuzzy one.

Glad to see people liked the first chapter.

In addition to AO3, it's also on FFnet, and I'll be making a thread for it on SB, SV, and QQ, once I have another chapter or two done. Cover all my bases. Weirdly, I know quite a few people who only have accounts on one of those sites, and refuse to visit the others, and can't give any reasons for it.

Thanks for the post. A Grey World, a web-serial, is a street-level vigilante story about a girl who was made in a vat. Orphan Black, a TV show, is about a woman discovering she is a clone, and getting thrown into a conspiracy while trying to protect her family, and her 'sisters'.

I've removed the "inspired by xxx and xxx" bit from the summary. Feels a little dishonest, as several elements from both series will appear in Alexis, but even if they're probably not going to be big surprises, I'd rather avoid people guessing at future plot points based on knowledge of those series.

This is pretty accurate so far as A Grey World. I read it during my post-Worm high, when I was hunting for some other good web serials, and that may have affected how much I enjoyed it. But I've always been a sucker for the whole "unpowered vigilante" angle (and the MC may as well be unpowered when people put "weak bones" in her list of abilities ).

Taylor's abilities are similar to Alexis' (yes, the title is partially a nod). But "taken from there" is incorrect, otherwise I'd have listed it as a crossover. There are big differences, and things will change the further the story goes along.

Thanks to Vira, Nemrut, and Jarik for the comments, too. I'll endeavour to keep it interesting. Though I can promise to avoid the majority (if not all) of the usual trappings of Worm fanfic.

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Anyway, here's a rec from me. Hope I gave enough detail, used the right formatting, etc.

Title: On Missing Limbs
Author: fallacies (author of Straight-Edge)
Rating: T
Genre: AU, crossover with Metal Gear Solid V
Status: Complete at 35k words.
Pairings: None.
Links: SB, SV, FFnet.
Summary: "Three months*after she was found in her locker, Taylor Hebert wakes up in a hospital room. A sequence of short scenes, meant largely to be humorous."

Basically, Taylor Hebert as Big Boss.

Pros:

• Technically sound. The actual writing quite impressed me. Dialogue is tight, internal narration isn't angsty, description is succinct.
• Author did his research. Both in regards to MGS lore and the science/physics/maths behind some of the things that happen and how stuff works. May go a little overboard with the technical jargon at times, though.
• An interesting choice of character partnerships, with Armsmaster and Dragon taking Taylor under their wings after she decides to be an independent. And their relationship (or what little we see of it) is pretty well done.
• Complete.

Cons:

• Not really a story, as the author has stated. Plot jumps around a lot, pretty disconnected.
• Crossover elements go overboard. It's more like a fusion. If you don't know the MGS story (I don't), you might have trouble following at times, and some of the elements are kinda shoehorned (like D-Dog, who is only in maybe two chapters, and how he and Taylor work together doesn't really make sense).
• It is a full-on MGS cross, so it has some of those silly moments and things that characterise the series, like cardboard boxes giving Taylor a stranger rating when she's inside one.

I really enjoyed it, though. I'd give it a 3/5, or maybe 3.5. Would have to reread it.

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Incidentally, /r/WormFanfic has finished its "Best of 2015" thing that Halt mentioned. Results are here, if anyone's interested. They're pretty skewed though, as the voting system was heavily flawed. I gave my thoughts on the results in a comment here, and I'd be interested to see what you guys think about the placements.