Otter's Rock

Title: Survivors
Author: beatrice_otter
Fandom: Doctor Who/Stargate: Atlantis
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: some violence
Spoilers: early season 4 SGA, season 3 New Who
Word Count: 7,402
Written For: Tali (aworldinside) for the Multiverse 5000 (multiverse2004)
Betad by: lilbakht
Summary: The Doctor doesn’t know why he’s here, but he knows it’s not an ordinary stop.

( “This is all just a misunderstanding,” the Doctor protested )

Is there anyone who would be able to beta an Atlantis/Doctor Who crossover, and get it back to me tomorrow if I sent it to them today? It mostly needs help with plot and characterization, and a double check to see if I'm being too wordy.

It's for the Multiverse 5000, and it's due the 30th. I can get the first draft done, but it doesn't feel like it's "clicked," to me. I don't know if it just needs some polishing or if there's something that needs to be fixed. Or if I'm being a nervous writer panicking over a deadline.

Go check out all the lovely stories in remixredux08. Here is part one of my list of recs:

Desert Glass (Ordinary Time remix). In his years on Tatooine, Obi-Wan finds he has a lot to learn. Lyric, painful, but full of life.

Lucid Diamond Sky (the Misogynistic Lash cut-up). Two's company, three's a crowd. Doctor Who, the Master/Lucy.

More of the Stars and Sea (The Three Meals Remix). Stargate: Atlantis, Teyla and Radek. They were merely colleagues who dined together from time to time. Strangers on the cusp of becoming friends.

Copper and Moonlight (The Mimi & Rodolfo Remix). B:tVS, a beautiful, heartbreaking look at Giles after Becoming.

She Bangs the Drums (Losing, Losing, Lost Remix). Doctor Who, the year that wasn't. Lucy's tragedy is that she loves him.

Reverb (Three Toasters, One Dead Body, and Ellen Tigh Walk into a Bar Remix). BSG, written for me! Outside in the distance a wildcat did growl. Two riders were approaching, the wind began to howl. Spoilers for Crossroads II.

I Have Become (Death) (The J.Robert Oppenheimer Remix). Babylon 5, Lyta Alexander and the Telepath War. You never forget your first. Or your last. Lyta Alexander would know.

Hush-A-Bye Baby (The Blackberry Remix). BtVS, Dawn and Drusilla. At night, the dark-haired girl without a name glowed at her through eddies of green light.

Enemies & Friends (The “Ogron, Ogron, Ogron” Remix). Sarah Jane Adventures/Doctor Who. In which there are Ogrons and Sarah Jane Smith struggles to figure out what the hell is going on. Starring Sarah Jane Smith, Vislor Turlough, Luke Smith, Maria Jackson, Clyde Langer, K9 Mark IV, Mister Smith, Ian Chesterton, Barbara Wright, Ianto Jones, Jack Harkness, Ace, Chrissie Jackson and Lots And Lots Of Ogrons.

The Art of Memory (Bold and Lonely Remix). Doctor Who. The Doctor's a hard man to forget.

Five Pay Phones Buffy Almost Called Giles From. BtVS, the summer she ran away.

Some Mother's Son (The A-Z Remix). Stargate: Atlantis, pre-series. Mothers are fonder than fathers of their children because they are more certain they are their own.

The Great Bikini Incident (The Key to Time Remix). Doctor Who/BtVS. Dawn’s suspicious of the three electricity inspectors outside her sister’s Rome apartment.

There's going to be an all-girl recon team! Headed by Dax from DS9! OMGYAY isn't that awsome!!11!!eleventy!

Please, please please please, tell me there is some glimmer of a reason for this besides someone wanted to put more women on the show. I mean, I'm all for having lots of strong women characters ... but there's got to be a reason for it in the plot. And an all-female team? I can find no logical, in-universe reason for it. Not considering the higher ratio of men to women on Atlantis, combined with its relatively small population, a relatively small amount of whom are on regular gate teams. There are more men in the military and more men in the sciences and engineering, both very realistic real-world skews; I may not like them (particularly the sciences one, as there's actually some reason besides prejudice for the military skew--there's still a lot of prejudice, but not exclusively so), but they are facts of life in the real world. One of the reasons I like Stargate is that it deals with a "real world" that could be ours. This ... this just feels like a Hollywood publicity stunt.

If they're only there to be an all-girl team, I hope they're there to be strong female characters, not Atlantis' answer to Seven of Nine. And I really hope they don't take away from Teyla and Ronon's screen time. (Sheppard and McKay get enough screen time we don't really have to worry about them.)

Total Words Written: 5k
Percent of minimum wordcount: 1/8
Time left: 3.5 months

Favorite bit so far: Marshall stared at her, feeling gut-punched. “Those are my men out there risking their lives, Elizabeth.” His voice grated out, low and harsh. “Mine. I picked them for this mission, each and every one of them. I trained them. I planned the tactics, I chose which one to use. I ordered them into the field. You’ve been—” he forced himself not to say off playing happy families—“overseeing the whole Expedition and establishing diplomatic ties. You don’t even know all of their names. So don’t you dare think I don’t care what happens to them.” He held her gaze until her eyes dropped.

Progress made on non-sgabigbang writing projects (i.e. Multiverse, fic prompts, and my ongoing SR fic): none this week.

Panic over sgabigbang has been soothed away by the realization that the completed fic isn't due for four months, which means it only requires an average of 340 words per day to achieve the 40k words total. (This assumes the length of the piece will be around 40k words and that it won't balloon out to be something bigger--it's been so long since I've tried something this long that I don't have a good idea how many words my idea will take up.)

Currently at 2k words and counting.

Because I've been trying to get there since last night, and keep getting "Sorry, there are no results for “http://www.gateworld.net”. As of last night the Alpha Site was up, though with no details on what was going on, but now I'm getting Sorry, there are no results for “http://www.gateworldalphasite.com/”