#letsberesponsible

Anabasis has a very special place in my heart! Originally, that section of the story was going to be part of the Lost in the Middle fic but it was so so so long and I was advised to break them up, which was totally the right call. 

Lost in the Middle is about Klaus’s decent into hell. It’s his trauma and his journey of desperation, ending with the first glimmer of hope and his first steps up out of the pit. It was very focused on his drug use and addiction recovery.

 Of course, that struggle continues into Anabasis, but the second fic is much more heavily focused on emotional recovery as a whole. (Obviously, there was some of that in Lost in the Middle, but again, it wasn’t the focus.) 

Because of this distinction, it makes narrative sense to break it up into two volumes. Anabasis was always meant to be a transitional period from Lost in the Middle to Titanomachy, but it became more than that (I think). It’s a story about healing and recovery and covers a specific stage of Klaus’s life, which justifies it being its own fic. 

Now, as for specifics on the ~making of~ Anabasis? The most interesting thing I can think off the top of my head/without going back and reading the fic to find a specific section is how the fic changed HUGELY from original conception to final product. 

Some of the biggest changes were:

1. Daniel died in the original draft. I decided not to do this in the end because I got so much wonderful feedback from readers that the healing/recovery aspect of the fic meant a lot to them. I looked at what I had and ultimately agreed. The From the Brink series is supposed to be about coming back from the edge of the abyss and finding hope and happiness (hence the name). Killing Daniel for a dumb reason like advancing Klaus’s story/giving him something sad to deal with went against the message I wanted to leave readers with. So I changed it. And I’m really glad I did!

2. There was a whole additionally new character that I cut. He was a guy who Klaus met at the thrift store and eventually went on a date with. I ended up reassigning his role in the story to Lauren because I always planned on discussing her and Klaus’s dependence/trauma bonding but it felt too shallow and unjustified. So I gave her more to do and played off the relationship they already had together. It hurt to cut so much material and have to rewrite it, but I still have the original stuff saved in the Darlings folder lol.  

Between these two things, I rewrote most of the fic between the last chapter of Lost in the Middle being uploaded and the first chapter of Anabasis being posted. It was a shit-ton of work, but I’m really happy with how the story came out in the end! It was very worth it. 

Now that I’ve bragged about myself for a too long, I just wanted to say once again how I’m so grateful to the readers! They gave me endless love and support for the ambitious things I was trying to do and showered the ocs that the fic leans on heavily so much love. I never expected that!!!!!