Bat Losers, Inc

Dick was the last to be adopted, Jason became the black sheep post-resurrection, Tim made himself Robin, Damian was dropped in Gotham after ten years of being kept secret, Cass possesses killer instincts that run counter to Batman's philosophy, Duke is a meta whose parents are still alive (albeit jokerized), and Steph has zero legal connections to the Waynes. All of the batkids have reason to believe they're the only one Bruce doesn't want around and Bruce is unaware of the problem because they don't vocalize it not just out of the usual emotional constipation, but also a deep-seated fear of being proven right. In this essay, I will—

Hi 👋 I can’t wait to read what ever you got when you publish it. It sounds interesting

@archaeologydigit thank you! I'm unfortunately still in the outlining stage, but I've got over half of it outlined now and I'm working on some background research for the setting and some OCs so I can feel confident to start the first few chapters. I realized I never gave much of a description for my fic- mostly because I thought this post wouldn't get any traction so many years after Pongnosis' work finished. But I think the Alex Rider tv show helped revive the fandom. Anyway, here's a description if you're interested: Not long ago Duval had asked Alex who he was loyal to: Yassen or SCORPIA, and Alex had tied his life to Yassen’s for better or worse. But board politics are never so simple. With Kroll’s forced resignation and Yu’s assassination, SCORPIA’s executive board members are dropping like flies and everyone’s under suspicion. Alex finds himself tangled in the middle of SCORPIA’s schemes as they vet candidates to fill their vacancies. They aren’t one to waste an investment that can be used to their advantage and Alex is no exception. But Yassen never warned him he’d be used like this. With internal politics at play and only Sagitta at his back, Alex’s loyalties are tested.

HO BOY, I can't believe it but I think I might have finally finished said fic outline?! Um, okay - time to stop dilly-dallying here and actually WRITE!

The first chapter is officially live! You can find it here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/61397821

@coffe-notebooks luckily you only have to read a light 42 chapters before you can switch over since mine diverges from the original fic after that 😄

Hi 👋 I can’t wait to read what ever you got when you publish it. It sounds interesting

@archaeologydigit thank you! I'm unfortunately still in the outlining stage, but I've got over half of it outlined now and I'm working on some background research for the setting and some OCs so I can feel confident to start the first few chapters. I realized I never gave much of a description for my fic- mostly because I thought this post wouldn't get any traction so many years after Pongnosis' work finished. But I think the Alex Rider tv show helped revive the fandom. Anyway, here's a description if you're interested: Not long ago Duval had asked Alex who he was loyal to: Yassen or SCORPIA, and Alex had tied his life to Yassen’s for better or worse. But board politics are never so simple. With Kroll’s forced resignation and Yu’s assassination, SCORPIA’s executive board members are dropping like flies and everyone’s under suspicion. Alex finds himself tangled in the middle of SCORPIA’s schemes as they vet candidates to fill their vacancies. They aren’t one to waste an investment that can be used to their advantage and Alex is no exception. But Yassen never warned him he’d be used like this. With internal politics at play and only Sagitta at his back, Alex’s loyalties are tested.

HO BOY, I can't believe it but I think I might have finally finished said fic outline?! Um, okay - time to stop dilly-dallying here and actually WRITE!

The first chapter is officially live! You can find it here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/61397821

the peak of "wouldn't it be awesome to be a child soldier? JUST KIDDING! it would be incredibly fucked up. anyway here's the main character getting eaten by wolves" is the alex rider series, which takes the wish fulfilment premise of being a teenage spy and then makes it explicitly clear from day one that alex is being blackmailed into acting as a spy for adults who have neither love nor even basic care for him and will let his life fall apart the moment he says no. coincidentally it's due to this career that alex is both an orphan and without a guardian in the first place; spying led directly to both his parents' and uncle's deaths. alex is repeatedly traumatised and nearly killed in increasingly horrifying manners, and it becomes clear that the only way for him to protect himself is to keep throwing himself in danger; he hates this and is completely aware that the only person he trusts could be ripped away from him at any moment and that his social life and academic standing is being ripped to shreds the longer he continues living his double life. the kicker is that he was raised in, perhaps intentionally moulded for, this lifestyle and the longer he continues it the harder he finds it to leave; he's essentially addicted to life-and-death situations and almost doesn't want to keep coming back to it. he turns to the other side only to turn that his bosses' enemies are just as bad as they are; at the age of just thirteen he finds himself completely alone in the world. and it slaps both as a thriller series and a deconstruction of the horrific violence both literal and structural that undergirds alex's life and job and the ethics of using a literal child to do your bidding as the lines between work and home life blur beyond recognition

your first draft is going to suck. And that’s okay. It’s supposed to suck. Your first draft isn’t about writing something good, it’s about writing something. You’re just shoveling sand into the sandbox so you can build castles later. Get the words on the page, even if they’re clumsy, even if you cringe while writing them. The magic happens in the revision, but you can’t revise a blank page. So let the first draft be messy. Let it be flawed. Just get it down, because that’s where the real work begins.

Hi 👋 I can’t wait to read what ever you got when you publish it. It sounds interesting

@archaeologydigit thank you! I'm unfortunately still in the outlining stage, but I've got over half of it outlined now and I'm working on some background research for the setting and some OCs so I can feel confident to start the first few chapters. I realized I never gave much of a description for my fic- mostly because I thought this post wouldn't get any traction so many years after Pongnosis' work finished. But I think the Alex Rider tv show helped revive the fandom. Anyway, here's a description if you're interested: Not long ago Duval had asked Alex who he was loyal to: Yassen or SCORPIA, and Alex had tied his life to Yassen’s for better or worse. But board politics are never so simple. With Kroll’s forced resignation and Yu’s assassination, SCORPIA’s executive board members are dropping like flies and everyone’s under suspicion. Alex finds himself tangled in the middle of SCORPIA’s schemes as they vet candidates to fill their vacancies. They aren’t one to waste an investment that can be used to their advantage and Alex is no exception. But Yassen never warned him he’d be used like this. With internal politics at play and only Sagitta at his back, Alex’s loyalties are tested.

HO BOY, I can't believe it but I think I might have finally finished said fic outline?! Um, okay - time to stop dilly-dallying here and actually WRITE!

Can someone who has read Russian Roulette please explain what happened to Yassen during his 3 years trapped with Sharkovsky? I haven’t read the book (only googled the plot to get the broad strokes) but I’d love to pull from this section of the book for a fanfic scene.

@mcskullmun Thank you for the screenshots! And @archerofunspeakablelove thank you for the insight into how in-depth (or not) Yassen gets about this period of his life in the book.