what inspired you to write caged lungs in the first place? i assume some of the rottmnt episodes had a bit of a factor, maybe? (ex: smart lair, donnie’s gifts, donnie vs witchtown, etc) also love your writing!!
the whole "mind control forcing you to injure/attack your teammate/family member" is a pretty common trope in media (hell, it's in the movie) and i'd read a lot of fanfiction that utilizes it in a more grounded whumpy way that explores the emotional fallout of it, and i just wanted to do that for rise (and with donnie because he's the blorbo) and things just got out of my control lmao
originally i actually was just going to make this the attack at the end!! to make it something more conventional that they had less control over-- the scripts for the very beginning were the FIRST rise related things id ever written (yes, originally the food was going to be spiked, and the scene ended up staying as it was with the addition of the bathroom because i liked what it meant for the narrative), but it was ultimately an idea id shelved until i realized the potential behind the canary metaphor + got the idea for getting more psych horror with it. i cant fully remember what gave me the idea for the slowburn, but it was a big reason i got so invested and wrote it over the course of a month.
ALSO quite a lot, if not all of CW chapter four was planned out from the beginning!! i ALWAYS knew donnie's ptsd was going to be the worst with raph and the lightest with mikey. the first draft for what would become CL was going to be ,, i think 5-6 chapters, and that wouldve happened in chapter 3? it wouldve been a much simpler story lmao
ALTHOUGH i will say. a lot of what caged lungs was built around was the symbolism and parallels, and i put together a lot of the story around the parallels. i will come up with cool imagery and think of how to bring it back around later, and that takes me far (i cant remember a lot of the details but ive been doing this with fire at will too i think lmao). i remember the mirror parallel being one of the FIRST ideas i ever got. it's simple but it worked well :)
its funny because caged lungs' original concept was written on a google doc with a couple of other ideas, including an umbrella academy fic concept that will probably never see the light of day now that im so locked in with rise stuff. SAD!