“the Human Touch”, End notes

[aadler]

[ Endnotes posted 14 Aug 2015 ]

Where did the idea for the story come from?

I’d wanted for some time to do a Hallowe’en story of my own … and, as was my wont in those days, one that didn’t center on the core Scoobies. (I actually figured Jonathan would be the main character for one of them; instead, I let him have an uncredited guest appearance as the one ‘caparisoned as a gaucho’.) I’d also been playing with the concept of ‘mixed’ vampiric parentage; as far back as “Shadow and Substance” I had dropped clues that Dalton was actually Sheila’s ‘sire’, albeit with Drusilla doing the actual bloodletting. Finally, I had been impressed with the Nancy character in “the Wish”, and thought she deserved more attention than dying offstage; those threads, and wanting to do something with Dalton himself, eventually coalesced into the concept that became this story.

Is there any particular significance to the title?

Only the obvious: the Springsteen song with that title, Dalton being Janused into human form (in the likeness of ‘The Boss’), and feeling a human connection that resonates with his own nature but can’t be maintained once he returns to his original state.

Also, I simply like the song. Sang it once at karaoke.

What is the thing I like most about this story? the thing I like least, or about which I feel most doubtful?

I like Dalton’s self-awareness and cool thinking, and Nancy’s desperate sense of responsibility, but what I liked best about this story were 1) the point where the very real affinity between the two of them broke over her need to help others and his absence of any such impulse, and 2) Dalton looking down at the unconscious girl in his arms, remembering how he had felt about her but no longer able to feel it, and missing the thing that his nature simply wouldn’t allow.

Fundamental differences. They’ll always get ya.

As for dislike … there isn’t anything about the story that causes me dissatisfaction or insecurity, but I sort of wish this hadn’t been my only story featuring Nancy. As I said, the character seemed to deserve better treatment than canon gave her.

Is there anything I think I could have done better, or might do differently if I had it to do over?

Though this story was done with a deliberate focus away from the core Scoobies (the whole Backstage slant), I’ve wondered if it could have been positively accented by some interaction, however distant, with Buffy-Xander-Willow-Giles on that rather busy night. Aside from that, no ideas appear.

Do I have any plans to follow up on this story, or to use the character(s) or situation in a subsequent fic?

In a way, this one was the follow-up; as I mentioned before, I had laid faint clues about Sheila’s lineage in “Shadow and Substance”, and this story provided more to all but confirm it. Aside from that … no, Dalton would be incinerated by the Judge within weeks, and I’ve not had cause to use Nancy again. There have been links, of course (the most prominent being Nancy Doyle’s mention, in “Unbidden the Day”, of a prior shooting at the Bronze involving an Indiana Jones/Han Solo pair), but that’s as far as it ever went, nor is there ever likely to be more.

Any observations to add at the end?

Only that Selina was my idea of the ‘real-life’ version of Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman from “Batman Returns”. In 1997, that movie would have been only five years old, and thus a plausible source of Hallowe’en inspiration (particularly to someone, like Harmony, with little imagination).