sb_fag_ends | Negotiating Narwhals

Entry tags:

Negotiating Narwhals

Happy New Year to all!

Of course I couldn't resist the narwhal prompt. So I quickly had to whip something up, because the rest of the month I will probably have zero time for fannish activities.

Prompt: The Nosy Narwhal Negotiation
Medium: Art

The narwhal photograph is by Paul Nicklen (source).

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Yesssss. Narwhal Spuffy is officially a thing. I am well-pleased. :)

This is brilliant. And look at all those narwhals in the background. Is that part of the image 'real'?

ETA: I noticed you linked the source... wow. That's amazing. I never realized they congregated like that. Fandom: fun and educational!

Edited 2016-01-02 07:25 (UTC)

Thank you! The photograph was brilliant to begin with, I didn't have to do much to "improve" it. And I completely agree about the "fun and educational"!

HAHAHAHAH....

Glad you enjoyed this! Narwhal!Spike and narwhal!Buffy seem to have a good time too:-)

And ever since I saw

xclaire_delunex's fabulous Eskimo!Willow icon
http://whedon-elite.livejournal.com/463434.html
I've been imaging Willow as intrepid arctic explorer coming across Spuffy and Angel Narwhals - or penguins - or something....and I'll just crawl back under the rock whence I came with my crazy fantasies.

Edited 2016-01-04 05:54 (UTC)

Oh, not so crazy at all! There is a lot of penguin AU Spuffy fic. And a tiny bit of narwhal AU too. Adding Willow as arctic explorer is not that big of a step!

I'm very familiar with the penguin AU but there's other narwhale AU?

Yes,

shapinglight wrote a delightful little narwhal!Spike story in response to one of the prompts in the comment party this summer; you can find it in her LJ too (sorry, can't give you the link right now). I don't think we've seen Buffy as a narwhal yet though.

The thing about narwhal!AU - narwhals are gorgeous and strange creatures - I mean, that tusk seems downright ancient, and I'm pretty sure these are the real unicorns, but do they make sounds? Penguins make funny sounds - or at least they do in fanfic. How do narwhals communicate in such a way that writers can take advantage of?

It's weird to think that penguin!AU was a response to the epic mindfuckery of S8 comics. Now Spuffy is canon in S10, if anyone is reaching for the animal AU's right now I'd think it would be the Bangel crowd. Not that I want to know about that.

Oh but narwhals make lots of sounds! According to Fact 4 of The 7 Most Interesting Narwhal Facts, they make sounds like clicks, whistles and knocks, as well as trumpeting and squeaking. Fact 4 was one of the two facts that I did not illustrate; I see now that that's a glaring omission :-)

A huge part of the penguin!AU's charm was seeing just how much meaning the writers could imbue the simple word "ka-ark" with. I think that's the missing ingredient that's preventing narwhal!AU from taking off.

(That, and nobody's seriously pissed about the comics right now, at least in Spuffyland. Annoyed maybe. Right now "seriously pissed" is what the Bangels are. Although how the spacefrak didn't seriously piss them off is as mystifying to me as anything actually in the comics.)

Well, and ok, penguins are cute and look like they are wearing tuxedos and therefore sort of easy to humanize; narwhals are grand and epic and prehistoric and - where the heck are their eyes? And what about mouths? They look like torpedoes with lances at the end. So writers kind of have their work cut out for them.

Yeah, narwhals are definitely more challenging than cute cuddly penguins, at least for fic! In fact, doing a proper narwhal manip isn't that easy either. That's why my best ones (in my opinion anyway) are the ones using only a few simple props.

Hmm, I hadn't even thought about the challenge to artists but you're right!

Ah, who can resist a Narwhal?!

Not me, that's for sure! I was very happy with the prompt. I hope there will be some more narwhal!fic too.

Aww, I love it!

Must finish narwhal fic sequel.

Thanks! Please do write that sequel
I look forward to reading it!

Does you icon depict an arctic fox? I ADORE foxes.Now that is an AU I would totally go for. Buffy and Spike as foxes. Heh.

It is an arctic fox, yes. I guess if Buffy and Spike were foxes, Buffy would have to be a red fox, since they prey on arctic foxes. ;)

I'm sorry? I think you got that backwards. It's canon that Spike preyed on Buffy going all the way back to S2. Whatever Buffy did in their relationship she did not "prey" on him.

Edited 2016-01-12 13:03 (UTC)

I'm sorry? I think we're talking at cross purposes here.

I'm talking nature talk, as per my Narwhalverse fic. Spike is a narwhal in that fic, Buffy is an orca, because the Slayer is physically stronger than the vampires she hunts. If they got turned into foxes, she would have to be the fox that preys on other foxes.

ETA: or, for that matter, whatever else preys on arctic foxes. A polar bear, maybe?

If you haven't read my narwhalverse fic, it can found as the third item in this post.

Edited 2016-01-12 15:53 (UTC)

I have read it but didn't realize thats what you were referencing.

You mentioned Buffy and Spike specifically so I reacted to that but even in the story itself - she's not "preying" on Spike. But even generically I wouldn't say she "preys" on vampires, or demons. She primarily responds defensively to threat, even if that threat is to lunge for her neck in a cemetery. (I know there are exceptions.) Which probably makes her a bad Slayer in the eyes of the Council - a more proactive Slayer would probably be to their liking. Kill the threats before they are even a threat.

If you mean "hunter" then I can go with that. Except it still isn't quite the same. Polar bears and foxes aren't warriors...ok, I admit, the animal AU metaphors kind of fall apart the minute I think about them. So I probably shouldn't think about them (too hard).

And yes, I admit I react when I see the "buffy is all bad/ spike is all good" train of thought, which is what I read into your statement. This being you, I should know better than to think you were on board with that. And if you are? Do me a favor, don't tell me. Let me remain happily ignorant, pretty please?

Basically, I suck at the shipping thing. I should probably give up trying.

the Slayer is physically stronger than the vampires she hunt

Cue "here comes Joss' sucky world-building." She's as strong as the script requires her to be at any given moment; is she stronger than every single vampire she meets in canon? IDK. Her intuition and intelligence, her ability to go with the flow and use the tools at hand count for a lot too.

I apologize if I overreacted. Goodness knows you're one of my favorite authors in fandom.

Edited 2016-01-12 17:29 (UTC)

Surely this is all a matter of POV. From a vampire's perspective, I'm sure many of them do believe the Slayer 'preys' on them.

I'm sure that's what they "believe".

This being you, I should know better than to think you were on board with that.

Yes, you should.

Let's end this conversation. It's not going anywhere helpful.

Agreed.

Again, I offer my apologies for speaking carelessly and upsetting you. More precisely,I apologize for being a jerk.

Edited 2016-01-12 18:43 (UTC)

It's okay. Just forget about it.

Sweet! :)

Yeah, who would have thought that narwhals could be so romantic!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Negotiating Narwhals

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject