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pinewoodpipit · 20 hours

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Something About Us - Chapters 1-5 Fic Meta

Now we're 5 chapters in I wanted to give my thoughts on the chapters released so far! I'm not sure how long this fic will be and instead of releasing an insanely long post at the end I thought I'd break it up into chunks.

Even broken up, this is still quite a long post, so I'll include it under a cut.

Chapter by Chapter Thoughts

Chapter 1

I LOVE the raid. I love listening to the Sting audio files from Kingdom archives (if you've listened to it you'll recognise the dialogue from this chapter) and I think it's fascinating to think about Fade, who's normally so careful, making such a colossal mistake of inviting a strike team to essentially come kick her ass. She's strong, but it was an idiotic idea to try take on an entire Valorant team by herself. That said, she did almost get away, and would have done if it weren't for KAY/O.

I really wanted this fic to focus on the development of their entire relationship, from the very beginning. I wanted to show this ugly start and how bad things were at the beginning because I think that's important for showing how far they end up going as they grow and learn together. That's juicy stuff!! Their suffering is seasoning!!

I think Fade must have been at the end of her rope to slip up as badly as she did. I hope I got this across well enough - she skipped dinner to have a cigarette instead, she was behaving recklessly, brushing off danger and just assuming she could handle it, etc. I wanted to show that she messed up this badly because she was falling apart, not because she makes bad plans generally. I think, deep down, part of her knew that she'd fail, but she was almost hoping she'd lose after so long fighting and chasing dead ends. At least that would give her results, even if they were deadly ones.

I slightly changed things from canon in this chapter. Fade was held for about a week and while we know that in canon, Brimstone told the agents after a day that they'd captured her, in this fic I wanted it kept a secret from the majority of them until she was hired. I thought this made more sense from a storytelling perspective - it gave Neon some additional conflict in having to hide this secret from her friends, and also I think it makes more sense for them to keep Fade on the down low until they knew what they were doing with her. Letting all the agents know they were desperate, short on sleep, and terrified would have been a bigger risk than they needed, but keeping Fade a secret gave them time to adjust and decide what to do without the pressure of the entire Protocol reeling over her being there.

Chapter 2

The interrogation was a lot of fun. Again, the dialogue was taken from the official audio and you may recognise it if you've listened to it!

I really love Cypher and Fade's relationship. I picture it a little like a father-daughter relationship, although admittedly a one-sided one. Cypher wouldn't admit that he kind of sees Fade like his daughter, but a dad's a dad even if he left his family. I imagine he saw this woman looking like a wet cat born in a cardboard box after expecting someone imposing and terrifying, and his response was essentially "oh, yep, this one's mine, I'm protecting her from now on". I think Fade would resent the idea of being cared for at first, but I'm looking forward to showing their relationship developing. I wanted to showcase Cypher's care for her through things like him bringing her drinks and trying to make them interesting since he knew how bored she must have been, holding back on the caffeine when he saw she wasn't sleeping, etc. It's definitely a little invasive and Fade thinks it's patronising, but it comes from a genuine place of caring about her.

I don't think Fade's apology to the Protocol was long and I don't think she grovelled. I don't think she's the kind of person to really care what they think about her. She's there to get a job done and to find him, and they don't need to like her to do their jobs well. She explained briefly that she made a mistake and wouldn't do it again, and she doesn't give a shit if they can't accept that. In her eyes, they're adults who need to get over it. It doesn't really make her arrival much easier on the others, but she doesn't care about coddling them.

I think Fade walking through the portal to Omega must have been a harrowing experience. To suddenly feel the terror of an entire city crashing down on you all at once must be crushing, and I imagine Fade likely had a panic attack because of it. She took so long to return not because she needed that long to scout, but because it took her quite some time to get her bearings before she could do her job properly. She wasn't friends with any of them and so didn't want to talk about it, but she left a detailed report, like we saw in her voicemail to Brimstone after she travelled there. In that voicemail I believe she also hinted at Lotus's existence, which is why she started looking for Harbor behind the scenes at this point. Her looking for him is kept on the down low until later, but the signs are visible if you keep an eye out for them.

Neon and co ate shrimp pizza while waiting for Fade to return because I absolutely love it and was craving it when I wrote this chapter. I also have pet shrimps... does that make me a monster? Maybe. I can't help it, shrimp is tasty.

Omega Reyna tormented Neon using her insecurities, which she knows are there. I have a lot of hcs about Omega Fade and Neon which I'll be touching on in the future in a dedicated Omega Earth fic, but one of them is that Omega Neon is having a much, much worse time than Alpha Neon. Reyna has seen Omega Neon's power and sees Alpha Neon's reluctance in comparison, and she thinks it's pathetic how hesitant she is to let herself be used as a weapon. Alpha Neon on the other hand resents this idea, and so it was a pretty horrible distraction that ultimately led to her injury.

Neon breaking her leg is actually an injury I've had IRL. It was pretty fun to write about my specific leg break, I don't often get the chance to talk about exact 1-1 experiences like that since most of my personal struggles are talked about through metaphor in my writing.

Astra carefully watching Fade helping Neon was a hint to her watching Fade and slowly deciding to trust her.

Chapter 3

Neon's suppressor is something I hold very close to my heart. I see it as a metaphor for disability aids, which is very strongly hinted to in canon as Nathaniel Valdez's work on aids like her suppressor is said to have "made life livable for millions". A device that lets her go out in public and live some semblance of a normal life when previously she needed to be locked away to stop herself from hurting people... what else could that be but a disability aid? I need aids to get by as without them I'm in too much pain to sit or stand, let alone leave the house, and it means a lot to me to see a character I love needing a similar level of help.

Similarly, Neon experiencing seizures if she doesn't wear her suit due to the uncontrolled electricity in her body is also really personal to me. Without going into detail, I lost someone close to me to a seizure some time ago. I don't think seizure care and what to do in that situation or how debilitating seizures can be is talked about enough, with some pretty rampant misinformation still floating around on the internet (for example, please don't put your fingers in a seizing person's mouth even to try and clear their airway, because they can and will bite your fingers off). I focused on this a little more in one of my older fics, but it's still a headcanon I hold very close to my heart. It's a way to memorialize a lost friend and if I can spread a little awareness about seizures in the meantime, that's all the better.

Fade and Neon are starting to get used to each other. They're still on pretty bad terms, flinty and cold with each other, but they're trying in their own ways. They're showing each other respect, which is more than they need to do, and it's a start. I'm really really pleased with the pacing in this fic; it's slow and long, but I think it really benefits from it. I wanted to show these little moments and these small developments because I think they matter, and I really hope it feels as necessary to my readers as it does to me.

Neon remembers the book Fade was reading and brings it up later when she's helping her on the battlefield. This absolutely blows Fade's mind - she didn't expect anyone to care enough to remember such an insignificant detail as that.

Neon's adobo has carrots in it in this fic, which I found from a recipe online, but a Filipino friend later told me that carrots aren't typically used in adobo. My bad! Google lied to me.

Cypher calling Fade on becoming friends with Neon is essentially this meme, which I made and have a fantastic time using with my friends:

Fade's injury was actually a really important thing for Neon to see. It showed her that Fade, while frightening, was just a person like the rest of them. She might have looked imposing and might have tried to put on a scary face to discourage anyone from coming too close, but she bled and cried like the rest of them. Seeing her like that and realising that she wasn't really anyone to fear anymore was a really important step in Neon accepting her.

Chapter 4

Similarly to how it was important for Neon to see Fade hurt, it was incredibly important for Fade to overhear Neon's conversation and to see her explicitly choosing to keep her fear hidden. Neon had every chance to gossip with her friends about how terrified Fade had been while she was injured, but she chose to protect her privacy. That was huge for Fade and was a turning point in how she approached friendship with her. This scene is also when Prowler starts to like her.

I wanted to focus a little on Neon's struggles with Reyna here. They tie again into my view of her Radiance being comparable to a disability - I write her as having Radiance that is comparable to a stigmatised and misunderstood disability, particularly an invisible one. My disability is invisible and I've been told by so many people that it's all in my head, or it can't be that bad, or it's not something I deserve to take seriously when there are other people facing worse in the world. I want to fight back against this viewpoint. My disability is invisible but I know how badly it affects me and I will not stand for disrespect about it - similarly, Neon knows how badly her Radiance affects her and she isn't going to let Chamber or Reyna pressure her into taking off her suppressor for the sake of using her abilities as a weapon. I'll talk about this theme with her later in the fic, too, and it'll be important.

Fade noticed Neon was upset, but she didn't know it was about Reyna. They're not close enough yet that she's comfortable asking her about it.

This fic is a collab with Uni, like freckle fic was, and the coffee scene/morning run was first written by Uni! I redrafted it while working on this fic but the first draft came from them.

Fade's gay. Almost every sapphic ship she's in, the other person has a big ass (Neon, Astra, Deadlock, Viper, etc). Therefore? Fade's an ass guy. Also, Neon has beautiful eyes that definitely turn golden in the sunlight, and that's on top of her being muscular and having a nice ass. Fade stood no chance.

Astra befriending Fade is a little like that one video of the dude grabbing a rat like "you're my friend now, we're getting soft tacos later". She isn't giving Fade a choice, they simply are friends now. She's watched Fade for long enough to know that she can trust her and she's decided to take her under her wing. Fade isn't sure how to feel about so many people on the Protocol essentially adopting her (first Cypher, and now Astra and Omen). I'm excited to focus more on their developing friendships! It's been super fun to focus on Fade and Neon's friends alongside their relationships with each other, as I feel like they're often overlooked in the fandom while I love them dearly.

This chapter was originally also going to include what ended up being the first scene of chapter 5, with the guitar. It ended up way too long, though, and I'm actually glad it was cut, as I think the pacing flows better this way, and the chapter's message of Fade learning to open up to the idea of friendship is stronger.

I think it's quite funny that this fic has the record for the longest it's taken them to sort their shit out. In cowboy au it took them over 70k words to kiss, in Nathan fic it was almost 80k, but in this fic, it took them 53k to even admit that they might be friends. Ridiculous. I'm having a fantastic time, though.

Chapter 5

This chapter ended up cut short, too. It was originally going to include a couple more scenes, but I ended up diving deeper into the scenes I had and splitting the chapter in half, and I think it's much stronger for it. It feels less rushed this way and I can focus on the story beats with the appropriate amount of time given to all of them.

Finally, the homoerotic guitar playing tag has started to make sense! I'm very excited for this plotline.

Neon, trying to cover her ass after accidentally suggesting Fade might have a hobby she doesn't really have, making it worse by suggesting something worse (that she steals her pictures from Pinterest).

Fade isn't meaning to be cold in her responses to Neon. She's just generally Like That. I write her as autistic and tone is generally pretty hard for her, particularly over text. Luckily, Neon sees this, understands it, and doesn't mind.

I made a little edit of what Omen's hoodie gift looks like (it's shitty quality, but it gets the point across):

As is probably clear by now, sunrises are a pretty important motif for Fade in this fic. They're something she takes comfort in and they're starting to become a bit of a symbol of her mental health and making healthier choices, keeping social, etc. I also thought it was a nice little detail since Tala's name means Bright Star... like the sun... she's her sunrise... hehe.

Köri is here! It's actually canon that Fade has an orange cat, although I rarely see it talked about (similar to Neon and Breach having dogs, it was kind of randomly dropped but never expanded upon). Köri in my hc is a slightly chubby little bastard of a cat. You'll learn more about him later in the fic! I also want to note that I don't think those "chonky boy" cat memes are very funny and I don't want to glorify overweight pets, but Köri is a rescue and I think rescue pets like him have the right to be a little chubby. He's not overweight to an unhealthy degree, Fade takes very good care of him when she's there, but he's softer than he absolutely needs to be.

Fade's feeding him a fancy raw diet - something like this - meanwhile she lives off instant noodles and cigarettes. We know she's rich (to afford the office space we saw her in, she absolutely has to be loaded) and I imagine she spoils Köri rotten. He lives with her neighbour, Neriman Teyze (yes, like in my party rock series), and Fade sends her food and cash for him. Teyze also spoil him, but would also discipline him if he misbehaved.

Other notes

Changes from Canon

I've mentioned some changes I made already, but I wanted ot mention some others which were less relevant.

Some things that happened in canon weren't mentioned in this fic, even if they happened during the timeline that this fic covers. Raze going to a concert and ending up on Breeze was ignored, for example. I just don't think these things would add anything to our story, even if this fic is intended to be a step-by-step of their development through the canon timeline.

Neon, Chamber, and Reyna

I'm not focusing too hard on Neon's beef with Chamber in this fic, choosing instead to focus more on her conflict with Reyna. There are a couple of reasons for this.

I think Chamber is demonised way, way too much in this fandom for very little reason (people base their dislike of him off of other fan depictions, and those don't seem to be based in canon at all when canon Chamber is generally very polite to people and actively grows from his mistakes), and I strongly dislike the "haha ew, French" jokes that people make about him. I don't think jokes like that are funny and frankly, I think they do more harm than good. I've seen them and similar jokes about England and Germany etc affecting irl people's empathy for people from those countries. I've seen people laughing about people in England freezing to death in their homes thanks to our energy crisis and saying things like "serves them right for being English", and jokes like this "haha france" meme are absolutely not helping this lack of empathy people are developing. I do not want to contribute to that.

Also, Chamber has apologised for the way he treated Neon, which is more than I can say for Reyna. For all we know, Reya is still actively trying to undermine Neon's authority over her own body. We know from Chamber that she sees Neon as a "young mind to corrupt", and Reyna has consistently shown that she values Neon's power over her autonomy and her choice to keep her suppressors on, which she has expressed extremely clearly at this point. As such, I think her conflict with Reyna is far more important than her conflict with Chamber.

Music

I've posted it before, but for anyone who hasn't seen it, here's the playlist for this fic!

Like many of my past fic playlists, it's arranged in chronological order of the story, so do with that information what you will.

Thank you so much for reading! I'm absolutely loving working on this fic and I'm so, so excited to show you where they're going next. I think you'll enjoy it 👀

#valorant #fadeshock #fade valorant #neon valorant #own post #pipit writes #fic meta #something about us #Spotify

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