“Yet to Be Seen”, End notes

[aadler]

[ Endnotes posted 24 Jun 2016 ]

Where did the idea for the story come from?

This one is pretty simple, actually. During my deployment to Afghanistan (which I used for the most intense, sustained writing period of my life), I realized I’d not yet done a Season 1 story. For a while I had in mind something built around Moloch’s activities (“I Robot, You Jane”, S1-08), but gradually this idea took form, and I wound up doing it instead.

Is there any particular significance to the title?

Nope, just a nice turn of phrase. Of course, it does reference the facts that Marcie 1) is NOT seen, and 2) has not yet reached the point of revealing herself as she did in “Out of Mind, Out of Sight” (S1-11).

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

Like most, I’d have to say the contrasts. First, between Marcie’s genuine toughness and genuine vulnerability; she’s very determined, very focused, and yet a part of her simply won’t recognize that part of what put her where she is springs from her own feelings of inadequacy. Second, between her fumbling but earnest attempts at the good-guy role (undercut by an inability to trust those who made her an outcast by failing to notice her) and the fairly clear-cut villain role we know waits in her future. And, yes, I enjoyed the bit of no-connection-but-still-connection between her and Nancy Doyle.

Like least … not so much disliked, but recognize as a possible weakness: I hadn’t watched OoMOoS recently when I wrote the story, and as a result had forgot just how far around the bend Marcie had become by the time of her appearance in canon. My story doesn’t contradict that, but neither does it truly acknowledge it.

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

Obviously, the above-listed recognition of Marcie’s precarious mental state would qualify. It also might have been interesting to have more direct inclusion of some of the core Scoobies … but, at that time, I was still focusing on lesser and one-shot characters, the ‘backstage’ approach that I so enjoyed then and still do.

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

There was some acknowledgment of Marcie’s clock-tower ‘meetings’ with Nancy Doyle in “God Save the Queen” (Part 5). That was as far as it went, though I’ve done other stories about both Marcie and Nancy. On the other hand, the vampire shaman mentioned in this story was also referenced in “Morning’s Echo”, and Carlie Nochs (also briefly mentioned) was described in “Walking After Midnight” and had a cameo in “Queen’s Gambit”.

Any observations to add at the end?

Though I’d been thinking about the story for some time (months, probably), I waited till I was on vacation leave in Germany to begin it, simply so that it would be done entirely in a country I’d never written in before. (I finished “the Human Touch” in Kuwait, and “Learning Curve” in Kyrgyzstan, but both stories had been begun elsewhere.)