Rec: The Very Model

[aralias.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much for having me. Please give some of my obscure canon choices a chance. It may lead you down the road to a side of Who fandom you've not considered that is actually brilliant.

Today, I was planning on reccing a completely different Neveralarch story, and then I saw this one right below the moderately sensible choice I'd been planning, and I thought 'nobody knows what Gallifrey is or wants Age of Sail AUs of it', but... well, the other choice was more Doctor/Master and probably not as brilliant as this. So-

Story: The Very Model
Author: neveralarch
Rating: Teen
Word Count: 10070
Author's Summary: Being the tale of how Admiral Romana kept her job, how Rear-Admiral Braxiatel fought off the empire's enemies, how Leela of the Sevateem gained an audience with the Admirality, and how Captain Narvin was irritated by just about everyone. (A Gallifrey/Age of Sail fusion, where most of the characters are still Time Lords, even though that doesn't make much sense when they're on wooden ships.)
Characters/Pairings: Romana II, Leela, Braxiatel, Narvin, K-9s, and various other Gallifrey people who aren't on Teaspoon

Recced because: Reasons I love this fic that hopefully apply to more people who aren't me:

a) Age of Sail is a particular vice of mine. If you are fond of this genre, but haven't heard Gallifrey - give it a try.
b) I particularly like Age of Sail fics in which Romana is a headstrong admiral who beats people up with buckets, and Leela is a pirate. (A small category, alas). Other characters are also treated very well - K-9 is Age of Sail-ified most brilliantly, and Brax is sort of trying to take over the navy and Narvin is trying to play by the rules and is so angry that nobody else will.
b2) It is a true ensemble fic.
c) The narrative voice is consistently hilarious. And so is the dialogue.
d) For all that it is an Age of Sail AU, it is also a brilliant Gallifrey-type plot that you can actually get wrapped up in. Do you like intrigue and backstabbing? Yes. Great. Read this fic.

---

"Crew!" [Romana] shouted. "Citizens of Gallifrey! Do not let this megalomaniacal, profiteering, shadow of a seaman use you like this. We can still fight!"

"Stop embarrassing yourself," said Darkel. "Quietly, please, before you give us all a headache."

It was at that moment that Mr. Nighn leapt out of the unsympathetic masses, his sword drawn and his expressionless face somehow contriving to snarl.

"You see?" said Romana, in triumph. "I have supporters, even now!"

"He is one man," said Darkel. She waved a few crew members forward, each of them drawing their own swords.

"But his strength is the strength of ten, because he is righteous!" said Romana.

"Inaccurate, Lady Admiral," said Nighn. "My strength is only one comma three times the average strength on the crew."

"Shut up, Mr. Nighn," said Romana.

Comments

[eve11]

A ha ha; I've never listened to Gallifrey audios but I always enjoy the fic :D

[aralias.livejournal.com]

that is very good to know - and good to have out here in a public place. asking people to read fic for stuff they haven't heard is a sort of weird suggestion to make, really, as fic is all about having already engaged with the source material... but with gallifrey... maybe there's enough of a crossover with doctor who and doctor who's values. i don't know. i do think gallifrey is very good, though, and the fic unlike the CDs is free!

[a-phoenixdragon.livejournal.com]

I have thoroughly enjoyed all of your recs this week!! Thank you, thank you!!

*Happy!Hugs*

[aralias.livejournal.com]

thank you for being so enthusiastic and commenting on so many!

[neveralarch]

Thanks for the rec :) I also wish the category of Age of Sail fics where Romana beats people up with buckets was larger.

[aralias.livejournal.com]

indeed, indeed. i was vaguely planning to rec the one with the email group, btw, which i'm sure would have raked you in some more comments. i'll rec that one next time (and before that i was going to rec your thomas blood one, which i'm expect, judging by the laws of calufrax, would have gained about as many comments as this rec, but which i thought was deserving).

but then i loved this one too much! and i do feel bad for people who aren't doctor/master when it's my watch. also... i assume doctor/master people have already read the fic i want to rec.

[neveralarch]

Haha, good to know. Only about 1/8 of the people who start reading the Thomas Blood fic on teaspoon make it all the way to the end (hopefully just because it's long, not because they get mad or anything), so I wouldn't have expected many comments either. But a rec is like one giant comment that also is in public (or, like, more public than normal comments)! So it is especially appreciated.

If that makes sense. I'm a bit tired.

[aralias.livejournal.com]

that is good :) i like your way of thinking about calufrax. and i'm only sorry my rec was a bit... all over the place for this one. and that i used 'i'm' in my comment reply to you.

this is probably not the place to have this discussion - but all my multi-chaptered fics have a massive drop off too... and in fact i do assume it's people deciding theydidn't want to read this sort of thing after all. and it makes me assume that a similar number of people click on all fic and then go 'argh, what? no.' never mind. i read to the end - and liked exceeds expression very much.

[nonelvis]

The massive dropoff you're seeing is at least partially due to the way Teaspoon counts hits -- any view of the TOC counts as a view of chapter 1, so chapter 1 typically has a very inflated hit count.