She's creepy and she's kooky, mysterious and... something that
rhymes with kooky. Um, she's Ladonna. She likes knives, and
stories that go BOOM right in the brain.

And then there's "Wanderlust":

Another Alex story, in which the past is confronted in wood and
asphalt, and nobody gets out unscathed. Road story and love
story and origins story, all in one neat, deeply searing package.

I read this story and thought myself known, all at once.

Let it creep into your soul and feed there.

*

Could any X-Files rec list be complete without torch? I think
not. But, you know, the least I can do is rec something that
I'm pretty sure less than 3 dozen people have. If you haven't
read Ghosts yet, that's *your* problem.

So. The series starts with "Witness Tree":

And continues from there to break my heart over and over
with the simple fact that sometimes you get what you
want, what you *need*, far too late.

Plausible and hurtful and infinitely descriptive. You go wherever
torch *wants* you to go, and then you're stuck there until
she sends you someplace else.

Each of these is like a small packet of photographs, hand
delivered and exquisitely developed. Read. Enjoy.

*Feel*.

Love on the torch, for she is a goddess of cranky, a maven
of language, and one hot sexy mama.

*

Oh, the Spike, the Spike, how I love to love the Spike...

And "The Place of Dead Roads"

And yes, honey, it makes perfect sense to me, it always has. The
hell of not being, of standing still forever and ever. Knowing the
answer is 'no,' and that it's forever. *Forever*, if you can dig
that.

I sure as fuck don't want to.

But read.

And now to yet another Dark Horse of a writer in Jessica
Harris. I tell you, her and Dawn Pares are a couple of the most
talented writers in a handful of fandoms, and nobody ever *talks*
about them. It's a scandal.

Jessica's an absolute dear, with a wide, bright smile and a
deeply twisted soul. I luf her.

First up we have "The Land of the Living":

This is a story that I absolutely, positively did *not* want to read.
I tend to have a dislike for stories that take characters I love
and hurt them over an extended period of time. Dammit, only *I'm*
allowed to do that!

And... let's see... how not to spoil this. Um.

This is, perhaps, one of the finest views of slow, creeping death
I've ever seen. Maybe... I don't know. Maybe because of all the *life*
here. I mean, these are real people, off-screen and being their
flawed, frightened, angry, loving, sweet selves and, in the end...
Life really does go on, even without our help.

Lingering ache.

And oh. Oh. "Bulletins From Bedlam":

One of my favorite kind of X-Files love stories, in which
everybody's too ridiculously befucked to do anything but *cleave*
to each other desperately, and whisper things only they can
even begin to *think* they understand. Huh. I hadn't meant this
to be an XF-o-rama, but eh. Whaddaya gonna do?

In any case, this is one of those things I reread endlessly,
with hopeless want and a sense of rightness and, dammit, I
want my own Mulder for whom to endanger my life and sanity.

<< Call me a sentimental fool, but I love him this way. Face
smudged, clothes torn and dirty, eyes that make the rest of the
team step back when he looks at them. They're scared, hell, *I'm*
scared, and I bet we'll all be smelling this greasy pork-fat smoke for
the rest of our lives, but when Mulder raises the binoculars his hands
are perfectly steady, and I feel my heart turn over in my chest.
>>

Oh, yeah, baby. My kind of love.

And the last line... I can't even describe how the last line
makes me feel. Chhrrrrowwl.

*

Sometimes I feel pretty damned spacey. Maybe it's the illness,
maybe it's the meds, maybe it's just that, sometime during the
night, I poured my spirit out of my third eye and it won't come
back.

Like some annoyingly playful puppy that's slipped the leash, and
oy, what a pain in the ass *that* is. So, in any case, I need
help coming back. And nothing lures a wayward spirit back home
like a huge, huge helping of raw emotion, so...

Here's a few things to help smack y'all back down to earth:

First up, a couple from Pretty Pretty Pares, a lovely
young woman who helped put the fannish chains around my ankles
back in the spring of '98, and who steadfastly refuses to fall in
love with me. I try not to hold it against her, because if I fell
on her in a vengeful rage I wouldn't get stories like "C.O."

A bit of what-if, before the X-Files became what it was, before
Walter Skinner and Melvin Frohike became their ultimate selves.
Dawn gives us an infinitely affecting look at the raw clay of
wounded young people. Guaranteed to make you ache, and wish.

And then, of course, there's the riveting "Other People"

I've read this story a dozen times and a dozen different
incarnations. A look at the episode _Monday_ that actually pays
off on the pain and terror the episode only hinted at. This *is*
Pam Driscoll, and every failing moment, and every mind-numbing
eternity, and... well, Pares is an awesome writer. You just may
end up with your own thousand yard stare after this one.

*

S! M! U! T! You know what it means to me!

Smut!

Smut!

SMUT!

Um, yes. Well.

When I was but a young slashbabe, and the world was new, I just
knew that a *real* slash story had to have smut in it. (If you're
just a young slashbabe -- trust me, this isn't true.) I mean, NC-17
meant adult, right?

Meant you weren't just fucking around with your BSOs.

Well, I've learned better since then, but I don't regret my
assumption. It forced me to learn to write smut, after all, and
I patterned my early efforts on the work of those people who
most made me ruin my underwear.

Starting with!

Anna!

Oh, Anna, A. Leigh-Anne Childe, wild creature of obscure language!
Dense poetry! Thick, satisfying hunks of fiction, complete with
plenty to disturb. Something tells me I'm going to have a lot
of recs in this category.

Fuck, in this *section*.

Let us begin with "The Night Visitor," shall we?

XF Oh, I've got some scary Spanish dudes singing about death, and it's
got just the rhythm for me to be dancing in my seat.

And rhythm is... necessary. Just ask Krycek and Skinner, and something
that just shouldn't happen, but does anyway.

"Mm," Skinner grunted abstractedly. He handled the nape
of Krycek's neck, ran his thumb up a line of tendon behind one
ear. Dark hair, too soft for such a hard man, filled Skinner's hand
as he lifted it to the curve of skull in which this creature resided,
his life's fire coiled like a nest of restless snakes within. What
were his thoughts like? Like generations of vipers, short-lived but
breeding and replicating themselves in the way of cells and habits?

Knotted, unknowable, a serpentine entwinement of drives  and dreams.
It was perhaps too susceptible of him to wonder, too close to
caring- -Skinner knew this, and yet curiosity itched at him. It was
as if he possessed a psychic nose that sniffed the scent of
disappointed need, of the bitter ash left behind after a thorough
betrayal. Whatever the powers that be had done to their tool, Alex
Krycek, Skinner suspected it could have been avoided, if only. And
this was the rotten heart of the truth.

And:

Alex's hips trembled, already straining to shove. Who could
have guessed that Walter Skinner would condescend to blow him? In
their half dozen times together, he'd only lowered himself to the
job--literally and figuratively--no more than twice. After so much
passed time and dirty water under the bridge, it was extraordinary
that he'd accepted Alex's visit at all, let alone joined him for an
old-times-sake buddy fuck.

*Thank you, Jesus*, thought Alex dizzily. It felt so damn good,
rich water upwelling inside him after a shriveling, soul-scorching
drought, when he had felt so bone-dry of feeling and humanity that
only stubbornness had stayed his gun hand from the final act of
self-obliteration. So fucking sweet to have a man go down on you, to
*want* to.

"Ah, Christ--don't--yes, don't--"

"Don't stop?" Skinner asked goadingly, after removing his
 mouth.

Do I really need to say more? This is a vivid, scary thing with
deep red slashes of emotion. I want to protect them, and I want to
leave them in this little box forever, or until they tear each other
to shreds.

And you know, "With The Night" is even hotter.

"Doesn't matter--it's a recent addiction." Alex smiled fractionally,
almost unaware of his curving lips. Charm was bred in the bones,
offhand, steeped in acid. "Worrying again, Walter? Seeing headlines?
Bureau VIP and Toyboy Found Slain in Gay Love Nest--"

"When I'm slain I won't be around to worry about something like
that."

Alex's eyelids lowered a notch. "Mm. Tough guy." He nudged his head
in and carefully nipped at Skinner's lower lip, then opened him up
with the wet point of his tongue. Down at hip-level, his cock throbbed
in sympathetic greed.

I have no idea how many times I've read these, and I get the feeling
that at least a few of y'all will wind up feeling the same way.

And *while* we're at Anna's page, you must not, *must* not leave
without reading The Story.

In A Dark Time: Sleepless

Dark and moody dangerzone of the story, the kind of thing you read
with your hand over your eyes because, while not *precisely* horror,
the story has the sort of intensity of drama that can feel a lot
like terror sometimes. Lingering, expressive tale.

Plus. Well.

The sex.

Anna can write a twelve-page sex scene and hit nothing but high
notes all the way through.

Anna can ratchet everything up until you are *there*, trapped there,
helpless to read and whimper and hey!

*Both* hands on the keyboard, missy.

My, my, my, my.

Do *not* ignore the Interlude.

*

And then there was this lucky person named Misha who had a
birthday back in '97, for which torch gave her "Something Wicked."

Or, as I like to think of it: "Humina"

A story in which everybody gets almost exactly what they need,
so much so that this pairing has been forever burned onto my
brain. Yes, of *course* Methos and Krycek belong together. More
on that later, I think.

But we're still in torchland, and it's a happyland, full of good
things to eat and interesting places to go and interesting games to
play, like "Russian Roulette."

This has what was one my favorite sex scenes for a long, long time.
Hey, it won a Whammy. Guess why?

<<Krycek's tongue was playing with Mulder's fingertip, a series of
small liquid caresses that flowed into his veins and pulled the tide of
his blood down to slam in a heavy wave through his crotch. Involuntarily
he tightened his hold around Krycek's throat, and found his finger
sucked more deeply into the man's hot and startlingly greedy mouth.
 >>

*mmph*

One more for now:

"Say, do any of you guys know how to"

And I do, oh you better believe I... Oh, um. Yes. Heh. Aural
voyeurism and Scully, and Mulder, and an OFC that makes me
want a sequel for. Um. Purely literary reasons.

Heh.

<< "Scully," he heard himself as if from a distance, "is everything
under control?"

She moaned. >>

Funny and hot, and my, my, my.

*

Who else?

Well, there was Maria M., but her stories, sadly are no longer
available on the net. Moment of silence, please.

*

Hokay. And then there's my darling, my lovely, my angel, my
Pretty Pretty Pares.

Update: Still not in love with me.

Ah well.

Pretty Pretty... she has a gift for making the mundane sublime,
for using language like some desperately elaborate and equally
desperately wonderful sex toy. The words just *are*. And
"Mercy" started it all for me.

Trunk of a car? Hunh? Well, she makes it work, and it's harsh,
and it's painful, and it's blisteringly hot. Still works just as
well as it did a couple of years ago, still makes my scalp
sweat, as all good Mulder and Krycek stories should.
 
 

So, there comes a time in every Te's life where she just wants
a good fic, no matter what the fandom, no matter what the plot --
or lack thereof.

And I start with Mairead Triste, the Cimmerian I first met
when she sent me a draft of "The Quality of Mercy," which is
good, dark M/K that made my earlier, weaker incarnation quail
and run away.

You shouldn't.

*

Cody Nelson, legend, fab writer, and all around cool chica. We
loves her, we does.

*Especially* when she writes wankfic. Will this be a wankfic
rec list? It's possible, possible. What can I say? This stuff
gives me a happy right where I like it best and um. Yes.

Well. "One Hand"

Post _Red and the Black_ musing in another of a long string
of shabby motel rooms. Aches and pains and the feeling of
*age*. These are men we're talking about, and they're getting
older, and it's only inevitable.

Which is kinda how I see this story. Inevitable.

*

Did you know the Spike is awesome? Haven't you been *reading*
my recs?

Another old favorite in "I Do Not Want What I Haven't
Got."

Fuck yeah, baby. In which a young not/agent greets Washington
D.C. in his own special way, and still can't help getting lost.
Tragically hot.

*

Hal, glorious Hal. Bringing the extreme to the possibilities,
making the Te *ever* so happy. Yes.

One of the people who pushed my nose into f/f and made me love
it with stories like "Folk Remedy."

Ahem.

Lovely imagery, Hal's usual sly humor, and just a touch of
Oh, my.

Just enough that this is one of my most fond favorites, and
um. Bedtime reading.

*

And like a good flogging, Pretty Pretty Pares is there. Does she
love me? No. Will that stop me from pressing my suit? No!

Because she writes things like "The Sad Ballad of Mary Sue's Blues."

Is it meta? Is it scary? Is it *painfully accurate*? My Lord, yes, and
you better believe she took some *serious* flack for this one. I
wanted to hide and I wanted to cheer.

Should be required reading somehow, I swear, just... wow. Kita's
tough, but Pretty Pretty is an old campaigner. She bringeth the pain and
maketh you to like it. Um. Yes.

And I can't find the other story of hers I want to rec yet, so it
will just have to be with the waiting.

*

How do you solve a problem like Viridian? Well, I've always -- mostly
jokingly -- suggested her Bobbyverse was just a lovely instruction
manual in prose. Beatings, rapes, darkness, knives, love... And that's
*before* we get to the M/K!

"Addictions" and "Turnabout" are two wonderfully different looks at some
dusty summer pain and revelations, intensely sexy, deeply disturbing, and my,
does it ever linger. I'm one of many who have begged and pleaded her for
more of this universe, despite knowing what it took out of her to write them.

<sigh>

I'm a bad, rude Te.

*

So, of course, *immediately* after posting the updates I realized
that I'd forgotten to rec *several* stories that I'd noted to
myself. I have no memory. None.

Thankfully, I have many wondrous friends (Sometimes I'm sure I'm
the richest girl on the planet) who remind me what I love.

And who I love.

Nonie!

Nonie!

She's gorgeous, she's wonderful, she's surly and cute and round and
sweet and scary and we *luf* her. And not least because she writes
things like "Dover Beach."

And damn her anyway for reminding me why I liked the X-Files. Make
sure you read the sequel, too. This story is chock full of prickly,
paranoid, brilliant, needy, violent Mulder and cold, deadly, loving and
efficient Krycek. Remember them?

You know, the ones you almost never see anymore?

You've got your plot, your excitement, your powerful UST and your
RST that just ups the tension. *Wonderful* original characters and
wow. Just wow.

This one'll stick to your ribs.

While you're there, *don't* forget to read "Lone Primate."

This one just ripped my heart out and stomped on it and ground it
in salt and fried it and served it with a lovely salad of young fresh
greens dashed with a light vinaigrette and. Um.

Well, it's *sad*. Wrenchingly so. It goes right to the heart of why
Lonely Krycek is such a fucking *tragedy*. Whether he deserves it or
 not, this is his true punishment.

And if you've ever faced three a.m. truly alone you will understand.
A lingerer, this, and still makes me *ache*.

Oh, and "Goldengrove Unleaving," which showcases the deep, dark
poetry in Nonie's soul. This story... well, let me quote:

I'd left plenty of bodies in places like this. Usually a few feet down, of
course. And I'd always thought it a mean and narrow grave, deprived of due
ceremony and mourners. But now-- Oh Mulder, I wanted to leave you there.
Let the trees bury you in gold and stand bare-branched over you in
mourning. Even the flies and animals would be better than that cold and
empty handling that men would give you.

Just... I can't describe it. *Feel* it. Read the story, damn you.