The walls grew fatter here than any in the land

[sovay]

It is not my norm that all of my completed fiction so far this year has been fanfiction, but on the other hand I could be not writing fiction at all. Most lately, for thisbluespirit: "The Debt of Centuries."

I wanted to write them reciprocal casefic for Sapphire & Steel (1979–82), so I threw their catalogue of original and other elements into the Ersatz Genremixer to see if I got any useful prompts. Among others, I received "Arsenic / Zinc - Awkward moment & tradition & Lending a coat in the cold," which was technically no crackier than the rest except that Arsenic and Zinc are fancast with Caroline Blakiston and Alec McCowen, last seen by me in Mr. Palfrey of Westminster (1984–85). I could not resist.

The title is a mondegreen left over from hearing Dave Goulder's "These Dry Stone Walls" (since I can't find a link to his own recording, here performed by Gordon Bok) decades before I saw the official lyrics. It seemed to suit. I do not think I am one of nature's tag-users.

Comments

[thisbluespirit]

Btw, apropos of nothing other than I think you will like to know this exists, and courtesy of tumblr - someone just wrote Kirk/Spock in Old English on AO3 for real: https://archiveofourown.org/works/42430848/chapters/106559934

[sovay]

Btw, apropos of nothing other than I think you will like to know this exists, and courtesy of tumblr - someone just wrote Kirk/Spock in Old English on AO3 for real

I'm delighted.

[selkie]

I have been told to inform you that Silver is my favorite person who has ever been in the television, as a fact you might enjoy knowing. [I am unable to consume most visual media, which makes me a hit at parties, but this has been all right, probably because it comes at one at the speed of a glacier and there are plastic murder geese.]

[thisbluespirit]

Personally, I think Silver is a good favourite even if you watch a lot of visual media, at any speed, so yay, that is a lovely thing to hear. <3

I don't know where you are, but if not at the end, I hope you continue to enjoy it. It is an amazing bit of weird, cheap and original TV SFF and it will never move faster than the speed of mud.

(There's an actual TV encyclopedia that, for its entry for S&S, legit started with something like this: "There are many ways to engage a TV audience. Total lack of explanation is not supposed to be one of them." XD)

I'm sorry about the lack of ability to handle visual stuff. <3 (I am a lot better now, but one of the reasons I ended up at S&S among many other slow moving bits of beige & B&W TV was because I was too ill to cope with the pace and visuals and wall to wall audio of so much current TV. I followed David Collings back in time instead!! This makes me so popular on tumblr with my strange old gifs, you can't imagine.)

[selkie]

For me, it's an inability to cope with fake dead bodies (when in fact my professional calling exposes me to an unlikely number of real ones) -- the uncanny valley makes me panic -- and, as you mentioned, the pace, visuals, and auditory onslaught of most stuff. But I am quite enjoying Sapphire and Steel just on its own! It has such a VIBE.

[sovay]

It has such a VIBE.

It does have a vibe. And also Silver.

[thisbluespirit]

That does sound like a lot to cope with!

Do audio things give you the same problem? (Sorry, between formerly being a librarian and having my own weird things that stop me watching/listening/reading to things, I'm interested. Also S&S have audios that were done about 15-20 years ago as well and I know where to find them if that's a workable medium, or just the Silver ones even. <3)

Anyway, it has a VIBE indeed. I hope you enjoy all the rest. <3