Clockwork Porcupine

The current word count of Violet Collar's sixth chapter is 25,690. For reference, I still have well over half that to go, but my momentum has dropped significantly as of late. Not due to lack of love for the story, mind, this is just a busy time of year for me. Hoping to pick up speed again soon. 💪

Howdy! This is the extended afterword for Chapter 5 of Violet Collar! I am, once again, way over the character limit. 😅 Well, that's what this blog is for, I suppose!

Apologies in advance for my rambling! I hope you enjoyed the new chapter! 😊💖

Spoilers ahead! Proceed at your own risk!

Hey, congratulations for making it through Chapter 5!! Don’t forget to have some water and a snack after that trek, or finally catch up on some sleep if you’ve been staying up (God knows I do that when my attention wanders to this place late at night 🤣).

The flashback with Revy and the chestnut-haired girl during Dutch’s interrogation was loosely inspired by something that happened to me when I was fourteen or fifteen; I was part of the teen’s chorus in a local community performance, and for one of the scenes, I was chosen to play a male extra, and was required to wear a suit for the role. My mom picked me out a handsome pinstriped ensemble, making sure my hair was nice and slicked back with hair gel, and on the night of our first dress rehearsal, a few girls flagged me down for a dance before the show started, which fried my young lesbian brain to a crisp. As you might imagine, that memory had a profound effect on me. 🤭 In any case, I wanted to show how events like those can be completely recontextualized as we get older and grow more secure in our identities (or less secure, as the case may be), and also how the shame placed on us by authority figures about who we are as children can haunt us well into adulthood. I’m forever thankful to have been raised by loving, supportive parents, which is a luxury I wish everyone could have, and though I was not spared the full sting of the world’s judgement growing up, I’ll never take for granted the sanctuary I had in them.

(By the way, I don’t actually think Balalaika actually wears Estée Lauder, Dutch was just generalizing for argument’s sake. I just know it’s something sophisticated and clingy that probably stuck to Revy like Velcro, making him wonder why the entire office smelled like an aristocrat’s bedsheets back in Chapter 2. 🤣)

Moving on, another goal of mine with this chapter involved taking ample time to make each of Roanapur’s mafia bosses distinguishably human. Even Verrocchio, who I’d hate as a person, but I love as a character for the power-hungry, greedy, awful bastard he is, needed exploration, if only a little. I was very pleased with his conversation with Chang at the start, it was so much fun to write. Again, he’s a contemptible person, but a person still. As for Abrego, my feelings are not particularly strong one way or the other: If Roanapur’s crime bosses existed on a sliding scale— with Balalaika and Chang nearly neck-and-neck (you’re close, Chang, but no cigar… pun intended!) and Verrocchio firmly in the “love to hate” category— Abrego falls squarely in the middle. I like what few scenes we get with him, though I admittedly haven’t delved into enough of Roberta’s Blood Trail in the manga to paint a complete picture. I hope I struck a good balance between his guarded friendliness with those he deems peers, and his discomfort and inexperience handling as seismic a threat as Balalaika. I didn’t want his character to seem inconsistent… Revy and Chang’s perspectives on him are going to differ, too… but I wanted to show how his ambition is undermined by his nonconfrontational approach to problems, which I hope I got across in the text.

I also alluded to this in the extended author’s note of the previous chapter, but I really wanted to explore Chang’s relationship with his people, which is rarely demonstrated in the anime (I cannot speak much to the manga, as I am not yet through with all the existing chapters). This may not be the case in actuality, but I like the idea that they are almost as close to one another as Balalaika is to her men, or as close as a boss can be to his underlings without being too chummy. (By the way, for those of you who may be wondering, the Chen who appears in this chapter as Chang’s subordinate and this Chen are indeed the same person… do with that information what you will, it could be useful to keep in mind!)

On that front: I’m aware the Balalaika and Chang segments are kitschy, like something out of a two-star 90s action flick, but that’s almost the point, in a way. I was aiming to overdramatize their conflict more than how I actually imagine it playing out, but then again, these two can be showboats when the blood gets pumping, so maybe it isn’t too terribly unrealistic. Oh, well, I shall leave that for you all to decide. It was fun to write either way!

Also, it likely need not be said, but my knowledge of maritime travel is limited, so I’m not entirely sure if a PT boat is quiet enough to sneak up on anyone, but my research suggests that they are stealthier than other vessels. Besides, Balalaika and Chang were fairly distracted at the time, so it’s possible they just didn’t notice the Black Lagoon’s approach.

I’m not going to give away too much about the upcoming installments, which are certain to be immense if the current precedent is to remain the norm, but I’ll leave you with a rough idea of what to expect; you’re owed that at the very least for getting through this monster of a chapter! For one thing, who’s ready for a change of scenery? You’ll need a DeLorean to get back from where I’m taking you! With that said, I’m going to be nose-deep in research for the foreseeable future, as I’ll be tackling a topic I don’t know much about. Please anticipate an added delay in the next installment’s publication— I believe it may be the first chapter I’m going into since the very beginning where I have yet to outline almost anything in advance. (All of the chapters following it have at least several concepts already waiting to be fleshed out.) This isn’t a hiatus, I promise, the wait just may be slightly longer while I put together something that will hopefully impress you lovely folks! I don’t want to let you down!

(…also, please don’t hate me too much for what’s to come… I may not have a clear idea of how all of the events will play out, exactly, but I can say with certainty that it’s gonna hurt. 🥺🫣)

Now, onto AMV recs! I have two I wanted to share, which I stumbled upon just today:

The first, which was released in 2017, is this thrilling AMV by Unicorn Rider, set to Royal Deluxe’s I’m A Wanted Man. For one thing, Royal Deluxe always gets you extra marks, so kudos there; next, the transitions are so well done! I also love how it sort of bookends itself in the final twenty seconds. Hats off to you and your editing skills, Unicorn Rider! 

The second AMV I wanted to shout out is The Path of Balalaika by FaMILITARY23, which is set to I Stand Alone by Van Canto, a very inspired song choice. For an AMV that was released 15 years ago in 2011 (God, that makes my bones ache to write 😖). I know not everyone will be a fan of the still images and old Windows Movie Maker transitions, it lends the video a certain charm of a time to which we will never return. For a, if I may remind you, 15-year-old AMV, it’s very well done.

Finally, I once again want to extend my gratitude to everyone who has taken the time to read, engage with, and support Violet Collar. What started out as an unserious concept (and remains, in essence, an unserious concept) has transformed this past year-and-a-half into an epic of totally unexpected proportions. I never knew I had it in me to write as much of this narrative as I have, but I cannot give myself all of the credit for that; your encouragement has been nothing short of astonishing, and it has motivated me to push myself as a writer beyond where I thought my limits were. Thank you for showing me so much kindness, words cannot express my appreciation for each and every one of you! 🥺🙏💖💖💖

The atmosphere in the room shifted dramatically. Revy held her breath, as did the entire assemblage. No one dared to move or even blink, but oh, did someone gasp when the visitor showed her face, and Revy was horrified to realize that it had been her own lungs which forsook her, betraying her now before a court of blood begging to be spilled.

It was her.

Balalaika.

Violet Collar resumes tonight at 6:30 PM EST in Chapter 5: "The Conquest."

This was something else I announced on Twitter first, but I thought it deserved its own post here as well. Here is a preview of my upcoming Balalaika x Tatiana longfic, Black Ice Blues (or The Debtor's Reprieve), which I will be working on in between chapters of Violet Collar and The Solitary Aspen.

As mentioned in my author's note for The Syrniki Incident, which, as of writing this, is currently the only Balalaika/Tatiana fanfic on AO3 that I know of, a longer narrative featuring these two was always in the cards, I just never had a solid direction until now. I must extend major thanks to Supernouvva over on Twitter for inspiring me to delve deeper into the chaotic relationship these messy women share, allowing me to come up with a concept I think you'll enjoy as much as I do!

TEXT VERSION

Yakovleva never attempted to flee Roanapur that fateful day. They found her out in the open, standing stiff, a gun not her own shaking in an unaccustomed hand. Two bodies lay nearby— one, familiar, the other, a stranger— both riddled with bullets, their killer’s method haphazard and unrefined. She was not a soldier or a gunman, not by a mile, and her messy workmanship showed it. This was not true of the steely figures surrounding her now, however, each one an expert marksman, and the most skilled and exacting of them all stood at the helm, gazing down at her prey as though to immolate it untouched.

“Well, well, Miss Yakovleva,” sang the scarred captain, rage shining dangerously in her lethal eyes. “Just what am I going to do with you now?”

🙥 🙧

Anyway, that's all for now! Chapter 5 of Violet Collar will be coming sometime within the next few months, if all goes to plan, but I don't want to say anything too definitive until it's closer to completion. (I might post a preview soon, though!) There's still a ways to go... 😅

I originally published these on Twitter, in response to this post by Mimidford— which motivated me to start writing, after first thinking of this concept months ago— but I decided to share what I wrote here, too! A couple unfinished snippets of gender-nonconforming butch lesbian Boris x Balalaika. 🫡

(By the way, these are screenshots from G-Docs, and I don't know how readable they'll be, so I copied over the text directly from the document below them, just in case.)

I may make these into pieces of a full-fledged fic someday, when Violet Collar, The Solitary Aspen, and now, Black Ice Blues (the new Tatiana x Balalaika longfic I just started writing) grant me a temporary reprieve. At present, they're hogging all my attention, as they should. 😅 If I do continue this, however, it will most likely appear on AO3 under the name Blue-Eyed Raven, but that would not be for a long time yet.

TEXT VERSION

"But, I cannot serve you as..." She paused, and then whispered her own name, the word foreign on her tongue, not unlike the homeland she could no longer claim to know. It, too, was a ghost of itself, familiar landscapes changed unreconcilably. "Not any longer. That woman— beloved sister, friend, confidant— is dead and buried. I request that we go on without her."

The Captain looked affronted, at the start, reproach darkening a blue so different from the murky teal-grey of her companion's, but at the tail of the confession, there came about a thoughtful look that communicated understanding. "Your request is granted. But how shall I think of you, Sergeant?" She quietly asked. In the privacy of my mind, is what she meant; outside of it, there was only their ranks.

The Sergeant thought back, her heart aching at the memories that flooded in, from which there was no escape. She thought of her brother, bound to his chair, the first person ever to raise a hand in salute to her as she marched off to territories unknown, though tears were running down his cheeks. The news of his death had killed her for a second time upon her return, his fragile body locked in a coffin seven feet below her boots. When he was alive, before she enlisted and exited his life forever, he jokingly called her his older brother, for how she would pick him up and race through the fields outside their house with him, so he might feel what it was to run and jump. They would laugh until they cried, and he would call her by that special name, the one only the two of them knew about, and now, only one was left to remember. It was an artifact of the past which would forge an uncertain future.

"Boris. My name is Boris, sir." The Sergeant told her at last, and something beyond them both, something nearby but otherworldly, offered its quiet approval from behind the curtain.

Confusion momentarily swam in the Captain's gaze, still hooded with unhealed wounds, however, she did not question her Sergeant's decision. But you're a woman never left her lips, if it had crossed her mind at all; they had done far more as women than names could ever encompass. Their titles— Sergeant and Captain— were not borrowed from men, nor worn as ornaments, but felt as scars, as the campaign with no end, outstaying itself eternally. She nodded once. "Sergeant Boris Talanova… Boris Talanov." She corrected, after a moment, searching for any sign of disagreement; upon finding none, she ordered, coolly: “Стройся.”

And Boris did, her beleaguered conscience lighter than it had been in years.

🙥 🙧

Roanapur, 1996

Well aware that she was overstepping her ken, with too full a heart to resist the temptation, Boris gently invaded the Captain’s sanctum with her heavy footfalls and labored breaths, an overbearing presence disturbing razor-thin air. The Captain whirled around to face the intruder, and summoned into existence the same expression the Sergeant had seen her wear in another lifetime, fury before the inferno that was directed at a pair of recruits no older than seventeen, who had encroached to insult her authority. They dared not do so again after the scorching she subjected them to— it had been a thing to behold. Boris, however, feared neither demotion nor anger; she had weathered too much, and died one too many times on the gallows of utter desolation, to waste time neither of them had left loitering at the threshold of Gethsemane for the rest of their days.

“Капитан.” Boris began softly, shutting herself in, but Balalaika did not— or could not, perhaps— permit her to continue.

“I ordered you to remain put, Sergeant.” She viciously intoned, her words fashioned into glass spears that were designed to shatter in the wounds they inflicted. The betrayal in her eyes was sharper than even the syllables she bit out. “I gave you a direct order. Do you have anything to say for yourself?”

Boris stood still, though the heel of her shoe hovered just off of the ground. She was not completely unaffected by the Captain’s scorn— it cut as it was meant to— but she was uncompromising. “I disobeyed.” Came her simple answer, not abashed with her usual reluctance. That had left her some time before she entered the bedroom, leaving only resolve to do what she had repeatedly failed to accomplish.

Balalaika glared at her. Her Sergeant’s impertinence must have made her feel that everything in the world had been moved many paces away from where it had been, she looked so jarred. “You’ll… you’ll be punished for that.” She seethed, but the spirit in it was broken, bordering on noncommittal. Streaks of blood and the sheen of sweat concealed tears… almost.

“I will take what I am given, Капитан.” Boris was careful in her phrasing, avoiding the mines where they had homed themselves. “But it will not solve our problem.”

The Captain’s eyes darkened, but not, the Sergeant was surprised to find, with further hostility. There was something bleeding and raw to be noticed inside of them, a door that had opened but now refused to be closed. The key clattered to the floor between them and splintered into a thousand pieces.

Before either of them had registered it, the old soldiers were propelled into one another’s arms, though Boris quickly found herself backfirst against the wall as Balalaika drove them into it, her eyes wild with repressed need at last unleashed. The Sergeant, whose superior height soon proved to be an obstacle, was dragged down by the collar of her shirt to a more manageable level, her lips colliding with the Captain’s painted ones in a flurry of desire. Finally.

🙥 🙧

Hello! This is the extended afterword for Chapter 4 of Violet Collar! I didn't realize until just now that I was thousands over the character limit, and I ultimately needed to remove some of the sections and condense them. 😖 I didn't want to do away with the cut sections completely, so I decided to post the full version here for your reference!

With that said...

Spoilers ahead! Proceed at your own risk!

Cliffhanger, hanging from a cliff, and that’s why he’s called cliffhanger! (Obligatory Between the Lions reference. 😜)

Poor Revy; didn’t she ever hear the one where if something seems too good to be true, it probably is? Of course, if you dangle a big juicy bone in front of a dog, he'll swim until he drowns…

The cafeteria scene was somewhat inspired by girlycards’ Таёжный Лес (GO READ THEIR SERIES IF YOU SOMEHOW HAVEN’T!!) but a large portion of this chapter, including that part, was already written before I read their fic, so let’s call it half-inspired; we had a lot of overlapping ideas. One element I did co-opt was the idea of Balalaika going to the back of the line, so many thanks to them for that idea. I’m not sure if that’s an actual military custom— I did some reading on the subject of meals during the Soviet-Afghan war, and struggled to find evidence for it— but it fit for the purposes of this story, demonstrating how much Balalaika values her soldiers’ wellbeing. 

(If anyone happens to have detailed resources/documentation on the Soviet-Afghan war, no matter what they are, I implore you to direct me to them, if possible! You would have my deepest appreciation; I predict I will be conducting a ton of research in preparation for chapter 6, which is going to be a really important entry for this story, so I want it to be somewhat accurate.)

On Sinnerman— terrific song. A classic, and dare I say, the unofficial anthem of gritty crime dramas and heist movies (Thomas Crown, anyone?). My reasoning for including it in this chapter is primarily because it is the song that plays in an episode Person of Interest immediately after a man thought innocent is revealed to be a powerful mafia boss. (I’m leaving it at that, as I don’t want to spoil it for anyone thinking of picking up the show; the reveal is top-tier and best experienced blind.)

A few materials served as reference for Revy’s time in solitary confinement, and those are as follows:

He Was Trapped in Isolation for 153 Days as a Child by an anonymous speaker, published by Azeal on YouTube  — This audio memoir was my first real exposure to the topic; it really had an effect on me when I first heard it in 2021, and subsequent listens have proved no less emotional. I reviewed it several times while writing this chapter, supplementing with a few online essays for validity. Many of the visual and auditory hallucinations Revy experiences, including the shadow figures, were sourced from here.

Hell Is a Very Small Place: Voices from Solitary Confinement compiled and edited by  Jean Casella, James Ridgeway and Sarah Shourd — A collection of essays from those who have suffered solitary confinement, as well as perspectives from relevant experts. A word of warning for anyone looking to pick this one up: if you believe yourself to be emotionally prepared for it, think again.

The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King — while not about solitary confinement, it does illustrate what complete isolation in harsh conditions can do to a person, and I was reading it at the time when I started on that part of the chapter, so it was certainly an influence.

I would recommend you give at least the first two entries on this list your time; before I started to research this topic properly, I thought I knew how terrible it was, but I really had no idea. The disgust and the anger I felt— feel— cannot be done justice by anything I could say.

I don’t know why I described Sakharov and Menshov so romantically here. I think it’s because I know they’re going to die, therefore, I feel the need to decorate my words when I talk about them. So much of what happens in Black Lagoon is fucked up, but for some reason, their deaths hit me so incredibly hard. What was done to Menshov especially makes me want to cry, knowing that with his final breath, he cried for someone who would never come, just as the twins themselves had probably cried out for the first few years of their lives with only the blood to answer. God… that arc really did wreck me.

(It’s funny, no one ever talks about how Chang lost people during that arc, too, two of whom were killed right in front of him when the twins attacked; we never really got to explore his feelings about that. Then again, is Chang half as close to his cohort as Balalaika is to hers? A question for another day, perhaps.)

Also, I wasn't planning to use original characters almost at all in this story, but for the prison sequences, I really had no choice. We know so very little about that part of Revy’s past from the canon, so a little invention was required. I hope you don’t mind. On that note, I wanted to play with the idea that Revy was not the beast she implies herself to have been in prison, and here we are. So much of her tough talk is just coping, after all. She’s still a force to be reckoned with, just not the most savvy when complex social structures are at play, which… tracks.

If my style seems a bit inconsistent this time (especially between the mini-teaser at the beginning and the rest of the chapter) please keep in mind that I have a very antilinear way of writing, and that occasionally impedes flow within the prose; some of these sections, for example, were written before chapter 2 was even finished. In addition, I frequently go through phases where I stop reading for lengthy periods of time, usually due to work, and my writing tends to suffer for it. As of late, however, I have been a very active reader, which greatly helped me to deliver this chapter on time. What I read tends to influence what language I use, too. I encourage you, if you find yourself in writing limbo, to pick up a book you haven’t read before, or an old favorite you last touched a long time ago. You will find that the words come easier, quicker. (If accessibility is an issue, Project Gutenberg is a great resource.) Often, I barely felt the time pass at all as I typed along, and it was wonderful. It really is a beautiful feeling to write uninhibited, without every sentence feeling like pushing Sisyphus’s boulder. Let’s hope it persists. 🤞

Also, you may have noted that another new tag has been added to this story. I should advise you to keep it in mind moving into Chapter 5, because a couple things are about to be called into question. It will be up to you to decide what you believe!

As for AMVs, I must confess that my recommendations are scant this round, but I wanted to be sure that I highlighted SONANCE’s chilling AMV set to Blues Saraceno’s The River, which, in my opinion, was fantastically cut. It gave me goosebumps when I watched it for the first time, especially the twins’ entrance at the end. Masterful. Go give it a watch when you have a moment, it’s four minutes well-spent! (Also, if I had a nickel for every Black Lagoon AMV I’ve watched set to songs themed around bodies of water, both being allegories for peace, I’d have two, which isn’t a lot, but… so on and so forth. 🤣) I also randomly stumbled upon this unknown gem of an AMV by Rainydays359, to the song Who Owns My Heart by Miley Cyrus; while it’s meant to depict a love triangle between Balalaika, Revy, and Roberta (gone horribly wrong, of course), which in itself is just an absolutely delicious little mess of a concept, it unintentionally comes across as Revy inviting Roberta into a dysfunctional lesbian polycule with herself and Balalaika, and Roberta accidentally learns that she enjoys being dominated by a sad Russian mafiosa at gunpoint along the way (it’s absolutely wild how they combined the scene of Roberta being pinned down, and the car hood scene with Balalaika and Rock, by the way, I think I actually wolf-whistled). I would read the Hell out of that, actually, if anyone gets to it before I do!

Many thanks to all who have read and commented so far! You have no idea how much I appreciate each and every one of you. I did not go into this knowing how much recognition this story would receive— I just wanted to get the concept off of my chest— but your encouragement and kindness mean so, so much to me. I hope my writing continues to be worthy of it!