Wtf: Fic Recs, (2 for The Walking Dead + 1 for Castle)

[black_sluggard]

Regular readers of my journal are probably aware that I'm fond of zombies. That said, while I am a very huge fan of AMC's The Walking Dead I haven't really done much looking into that fandom here on LJ. Today as I was washing my life down the tubes, I discovered twd_kinkmeme, which seems to be marvelously active. I spent most of the day looking through the first couple rounds of prompting. While many of them were very good, two in particular deserve plugging and rec like whoa.

This Time Tomorrow and Once Bitten, Twice Died, both by cider_sky, totally kicked my ass.

The first has sort of an unusual premise (but I totally love the shit out of those when they work). It is more or less a fix-it for is the episode Pretty Much Already Dead. The fun thing is it uses a Groundhog's Day-esque time-loop to do it, allowing Daryl a chance (or, you know, a couple hundred chances) to rewrite a specific tragic event in the survivors' lives.

The second fic might just be the most awesome thing in the history of very awesome things. I've been wanting to see something similar to this for a very, very long time. I think I even talked about it in some comment on one of my other zombie fics. This fic is pretty much everything I could have ever asked to find in an exploration of the premise.

In it, Daryl is bitten, which the everyone in the group knows equals Game Over. However, he wakes up three days after his fever still very much alive. No one is really sure what it means or how to deal with it. Cue confusion, fear, isolation...all of which only grow as it becomes clear that his brush with undeath hasn't left Daryl entirely unchanged. I love how well this fic explores the group dynamic, the way things change between Daryl and each of the characters.

Sentient zombies (or in this case near-zombies) are just...beyond fascinating. I mean, the idea of having something so unusual, and terrifying happen to you and being aware of it—of being forced to adapt to something so wrong and fundamentally unnatural—completely draws me.

I mean, we all know that's just because I'm a sicko with a fetish for emotional distress, but still.

While I'm on the subject of sentient zombies, I should probably also pimp Being Alternatively Alive, by rinkle, which I ran into on sharp_teeth months ago, and should definitely have shared before now. It's a Castle fic, though unlike 99.9% of the fic I read in that fandom, it's Caskett (though really only about as much as the show is).

This time it's Beckett getting tossed the zombie-ball in the wake of last season's Knockout, only unlike my Life AU the world at large is not aware of the existence of the undead. For the most part, this is a good thing, as most of the time people who interact with her aren't even aware anything is wrong.

The important part is to remember to breathe...

Sadly I don't think the author intends to develop the world farther than this, so a warning for an ambiguous ending.

Comments

[adja999.livejournal.com]

Oh, Alternatively Alive's concept was awesome! It reminded me of your fic so much!

Hey. I dunno if you noticed. I worte a ficlet earlier today and it made me think of you. :P

[black_sluggard]

lol Just read. Hilarious. XD