He said:
Regarding the Wendy & Tank Challenge Fics (or Tank and Wendy as they are used interchangeably): as with nearly all things dealing with me and L&C fanfiction – it’s Wendy’s fault. The fact that I write fanfics at all is Wendy’s fault. The fact that I began to write loooong fanfics is Wendy’s fault. And yes, you guessed it, these challenges are Wendy’s fault. A while back I wrote a perfectly good vignette depicting a slightly different take on the revelation scenario. It was simple, neat, and logical. Well, Wendy decided that SHE couldn’t leave it like that and she asked me if she could write an extension of the story, add some more to it so she could ‘fix’ it. Being the gracious fellow that I am, I said sure. She did.
Later, just as a joke, I commented that I wondered if Wendy was brave enough to write something and let me provide an addition to it. She did, and I did… and the rest as they say…
After this little exchange began, it escalated and it became, for a time, an ongoing thing. So ground rules had to be established. They were simple. A one instalment set-up, followed by a one instalment resolution. The challenge became for the set-up person to try and create a scenario that either puts the finisher into a set of circumstances that isn’t natural for them, or just tries to stump them. The only other rule was that the set-up person couldn’t create a ‘problem’ that they, themselves, hadn’t worked out a solution for. That was stipulated just to keep things on the level and take away the temptation of creating an impossible situation. Simple, yes?
So there you have it, and here you have the several challenge fics that have arisen over the last year or so. There may be more; you never know when one of us will get an evil idea that we’d like to torture the other with. (And apparently Wendy has no respect for my retirement).
Happy reading.
Tank <TankW1@aol.com>
She said:
What retirement?!
Every time this not-so-curmudgeonly writer announces that he’s retired, it’s only a matter of weeks, if that, before he starts posting something else. Naturally, therefore, I don’t respect something which doesn’t exist in reality. <g> As for the origin of the challenges… well, just read the first half of Just Another Revelation Story, and see whether you think it needed an addition! <g>
The challenges have been a lot of fun over the past couple of years, mostly due Tank’s great sense of humour and talent for coming up with either entirely evil set-ups or extremely ingenious resolutions of problems which I thought would be very difficult to solve. You can decide for yourself how successful we’ve been in producing stories which are actually readable!
Wendy 🙂 <wendy@lcfanfic.com>
Ambition – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (63k)
Consequences – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (32k)
Desperate Reporter – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (36k)
Don’t Tell Mom The Babysitter’s Hurt – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (53k)
Enemy Within – A Tank and Wendy Challenge, The – (72k)
Expecting the Worst – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (37k)
Getting Even – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (55k)
Homecoming – A Tank and Wendy Challenge, The – (59k)
Just Another Revelation Story – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (53k)
Lex Wins! Oh No, He Doesn’t! – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (33k)
Lois Gets Fired – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (52k)
Missed Opportunity, or Too Late to Love – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (91k)
Mori a Amor – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (46k)
Mxy and Match – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (35k)
Needs of the Many – A Tank and Wendy Challenge, The – (88k)
Oops, Did I Forget to Mention…? – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (56k)
Out of Sight, Out of Mind – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (47k)
PML Oh Boy…! – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (49k)
Reader, I Married Him – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (31k)
RIP Lois Lane – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (57k)
Samson Complex – A Tank and Wendy Challenge, The – (27k)
Soul…Mates? – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (75k)
Strange Visitor: the EVIL Vignette – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (36k)
What’s Another Year? – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (73k)
Who Says It’s Never Too Late? – A Tank and Wendy Challenge – (39k)