Fanfic!

[Eta Carinae]

Lookie what I found during a Google search.

Gundam Wing fanfic centering around asexuality.

I think we're referenced, too.

2012 Mod Edit: the above links doesn't work anymore, but the content can be found here. For future reference, here is the text:

\ Disclaimer: I dun own Gundam Wing. I dun own much – I am a college student therefore I am poor. I write fanfic because the voices in my head tell me to…or rather they won’t shut up and let me sleep until I do.
Author’s notes: I’m weird so this fic is revolving around asexuality. Don’t believe it exists? Check out www.asexuality.org
Warnings: OOC, POV, sensitive topic

Off the Line

*by JeiC
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“Duo, can you drop by tonight and go over yesterday’s assignment with me in full detail?”
“Sorry, but it’s on the professor’s web page with some good links for more info.” I wave off a tall and fairly intelligent football player that I have a lab with.
“Duo, want to go with me tonight to the café? I hear a really cool new band is playing, and there’s this really cool spot if we get there early...”
A pretty blonde girl who tries to nearly sit on my lap during history stops me not twenty meters from the last one. “Sorry, I’ve got plans already.”
“Duo, can you help me with my math class? Things just don’t seem to add up on my own.”
If that’s not a pick-up line I haven’t heard before… “Been slacking – I’ve got a lot of homework to catch up on, sorry man.”
Rushing away from the latest one and into the nearest school dining commons, I am greeted left and right with invitations to this and that for the weekend. Sometimes I swear the main hobby is “lets see who can get Duo into bed with them.” Problem for them is, I’m not interested and so therefore, no one has won yet. The main lobby that is usually empty is rather crammed with students waiting for the Grab-n-Go to open. A few more invites, the annoying grope, and I better make a bathroom trip – I really need to cut back on the amount of Coke I drink for breakfast. Finishing my business in the men’s room, upon leaving, I find myself slammed against a rather hard brick wall and a hand wandering in areas it shouldn’t. I mean, I can tolerate the occasional grope just because I really can’t do anything about it without people getting hurt, and I like it here, but this has gone too far. Before his mouth can open to add commentary, I swing around to grab him by his collar and see how much he likes dangling a few inches off the ground. It is one thing to court Death, it is entirely another to try to claim. “Don’t you EVER think of touching me again. Do we understand each other?” I nod with him – keeping eye contact the entire time. I have not seen someone so afraid of me since the war…when I actively took on the role of the God of Death.
Bleh, he made me lose my appetite – might as well just go back to my room and study for the rest of the day. Man, I am ever grateful now for managing all morning classes.
People don’t seem to understand that I’m not straight, I’m not gay and I’m not bi. I’m just me – I’m not attracted to people like they are. To me, sex isn’t important and frankly I find it unsettling that it’s such a center of most relationships. I mean, there are a lot of ways to show your love and to love someone without having sex.
Quickly letting myself into my double-sized single, I lock the door and pray to hell that no one saw me. Don’t get me wrong – I like random visitors, but I have also learned to value my privacy over the past couple years. Sliding down the door, I let the exhaustion come down with me. Why can’t they understand that I’m not some new toy for them to play with and then toss aside when they’re bored? Why can’t there be romance without the sex? Why don’t they understand that I can appreciate a perfect body, but not desire to be in bed with whomever it belongs to? Why am I so different that it’s wrong?
I’ve never told anyone how I feel, that’s why, and I’m going to keep it that way so that it no one knows that there is something screwed up in my head other than the usual stuff.
Time has passed – how much, I couldn’t tell you, but I finally pull myself together enough to pick myself up off the floor, grab my Colony History book and collapse on my bed. My mind wanders from the text to my friends – the ones that may not understand me, but accept me as I am. Quatre, as gay as the day is long, was always like a little brother to me for two reasons, he emits that “I’m cute and lovable, don’t you think so?” aura, and he’s actually shorter than I am. The love of his life, Trowa, has always been a sort of reality check for me when things got too out of control – kind of like a big brother I guess. Wufei, who is madly in love with Sally I hear, is a great source of wisdom in this irrational universe we’ve created however peaceful it may be. Heero, well, he’s my best friend…and my next door neighbor. We’ve been covering each other’s backs since the end of the wars. Okay, so maybe we’ve been covering each other’s backs since before the end of the wars, but you get the idea. It seems like such a long time ago now…we were what? Fifteen years old and piloting Gundams? Now we’re twenty and we’re just your average citizens. Well, Heero and I are anyway. It’s funny though, he’s lightened up over the years and regained his humanity, and I’ve kind of mellowed out a bit. Quieter than I was, but then again, I don’t need to be loud anymore, and Heero doesn’t need to be so quiet and secretive.
Ah, the joys of giving yourself flashbacks in the middle of an identity crisis. Now where was I? Apparently not reading what I had set out to be. Awe man, this is really turning out to be one depressing day and to emphasize the fact, I close my text book and push it off my bed only to hear it make a loud thud on my floor.
And then there came a knock upon my dorm room door. I wonder what would happen if I called out that I wasn’t home. Whoever it is, just …just go away and leave me to drown in my depression alone.
“Duo? What’s wrong?”
Now who told Heero he could pick my lock and be perceptive? Okay, maybe it is partially my fault for giving him the lock picks in the first place. I decide not to give him the satisfaction of an answer.
“I noticed you skipped lunch – you seemed upset.” The former pilot of the infamous Wing Zero gently nudges me over to gain a seat on the edge of my bed and a soothing hand warms my back. From highly-trained assassins to harmless college students – to most people, that would just boggle the mind.
“Didn’t look edible,” I mutter into my pillow. I don’t want to move – I want to stay here with my best friend with no influence of the outside world to try and torture my tired mind further.
“That’s never stopped you before. The crowd?”
Damn him… “You could say that. Why me now?”
“Why not? You’re the best puzzle they’ve ever met.”
I glare at him with one eye, “You know, you weren’t supposed to have an answer for that much less an enigmatic one. Now would you care to kindly explain what the hell you just said?”
“Well,” he looks away in thought while toying with my braid. Heero is one lucky bastard, you know – he is one of a couple people that can do that and live to tell about it. “You’re outgoing, cheerful, friendly, handsome, extraordinarily intelligent, yet no one really knows who you are. If they get too close, you seem to gracefully dance back just out of reach, and I don’t think it’s because of your past anymore, is it?”
“Yes…no…I don’t know. I’m not like them, you know – I don’t think like they do. Wish I had your luck avoiding the attention. What’s your secret? Last I knew you gave up on death threats.” I’m so confused now. WAH! Heero, I didn’t ask you to come here and screw with my mind more.
The Japanese boy at my side gives me one of his rare genuine smiles that doesn’t send people screaming and ruffles my bangs as if I was a kid. “I just tell them the truth.”
An evil little idea graces my thoughts, “You mean you just go ahead and kill them now?” I can’t stop the maniacal grin from showing.
He whacks me lightly upside the head and informs me with a straight face, “No, I will not allow you to run through the campus with your plastic scythe screaming that you’re going to take all of them to hell.”
I blink and then burst out laughing so hard that if it wasn’t for the fact I was between him and the wall, I would have certainly fallen off my bed. “Man, to come up with that, you’ve been hanging around me way too long. So tell me, all-wise Heero Yuy, just how do you manage it?”
“Tell one that you’re asexual, and they pass the word on themselves. I had many questions at first, but they eventually left me alone.”
“Wha? That cannot possibly be the reason…I mean…”
The phone that I hadn’t realized was attached to Heero’s waistband starts calling for attention. After his two second conversation, he pulls me off the bed and over to my computer.
“Start reading some of the information on this site – I’ll be back in a few minutes.” I watch him quickly disappear and sigh…today has been a very odd day to put it mildly.
Scanning the text and following a few more links for more information, I find myself giving a low whistle in amazement. “Well, I’ll be damned – there’s a whole community out there of people that feel the same way I do.” It’s kind of creepy right now being a new revelation and all, but yeah, that’s me. This is how I feel…this is what I am.
Again there comes a light knock upon my door followed by my name. Now why doesn’t he just let himself in like he did before? Opening the door, I find out why. I’m sorry, but Heero Yuy, former Gundam pilot of the feared Wing Zero, holding a pizza box in one hand and a couple bottles of soda in the other is not something one would expect – not even another former Gundam pilot, and this Shinigami has seen many a strange thing.
Shrugging with all the look of any normal college student, he comments, “I thought you might be hungry.”
I shake my head and am pretty sure I’m probably muttering the comments aloud I have about him reading minds tonight. We’re back to normal best friend mode with the extra added debate of sexuality versus asexuality and pretty soon I’m feeling a lot better about myself and for some reason, the world around me seems just a little bit more clear. Kind of like that all-purpose proverbial weight that’s been lifted, but there’s still one thing bugging me, “Hey, Heero, how’d you find out about this?”
Pointing at me he replies, “You said a month ago when I couldn’t comprehend my popularity that I could always say I was a human amoeba to see if that would shut them up. I did some research and found that and several other sites.”
Shaking my head, I can only comment, “Only you, Heero, only you.”
********************
Fin
December 2002
*by JeiC
Comments?
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[AVENguy]

Yeah we're referenced, hot damn.

Must...resist....postmodern queer analysis of text.....academic inhibitions............failing....

ASEXUAL PORN!! YAY!!!

Not to classify it as that, but if one were looking for asexual porn one could certainly call this that. The narrative structure of identity formationis, in fact, paralleled (from what I understand) in a good deal of gay porn (though the latter is, shall we say, less emotionally graphic). It's all about constructing a powerful moment of nonsexual intimacy (the discovery/sharing of asexual identity). It's doing exactly what porn does, constructing a moment of intimacy for us to voyeristically enjoy. The notion of this intimacy is strengthened by putting it in contrast to sexual nonintimacy (the girl trying to hit on duo).

In nonacademic language:

There's a gay version of this story (the form now, not the specific characters), where Duo is feeling emotionally and sexually confused and Heero buggers him, leading to joyful orgasmic self-discovery and a closing line of "there's more where that came from." Replace buggering with loading up AVEN. Interesting? I would say extremely, because among other things it shows how porn isn't really about sex..

I also don't think that's it's without concequence that this is fanfic. This story could easily have been about any two asexual college kids, but it's about two asexual college kids who know how to jump into giant robots and fuck shit up, when (most of) the sexual people around them can't. If I'm reading this as porn then there's something kinda hot about the idea of a giant-robot-toting-amoeba. The idea not only that we're diffent but that we're different and can somehow thereby massively kick ass is not entirely unappealing and also not entirely inaccurate (or entirely new to new left identity politics.)

[Eta Carinae]

I'm a huge fandom nerd: I've written fanfic, I've read a shameful amount of it, and I've discussed it and lurked around countless discussions of it. So this is one of the few times when I really do know what I'm talking about. I've not been involved in anime fandom, though, for the record.

I hadn't noticed how closely this story follows the slash formula -- but yes, now that I look at it, it does seem to. Though I'm hardly an expert on slash, as m/m slash squicks me. (Oddly, m/m original fiction is just fine by me, and even preferable to the same-old same-old het story.)

I'd caution against drawing many conclusions about the nature of porn, or even the nature of slash (and not all slash is porn, no matter what definition of porn you use), by this piece's connection with the slash mini-genre, though. Slash is still pretty ill-defined, in terms of why people write it and what they get out of it -- the fans have tried, and can't agree, and haven't succeeded, by their own admissions. Some academics have tried, and also can't settle on an answer, and slashers have said that they're wrong, too. Your argument is on shaky ground if you're basing it on the story's similarity to slash.

This story could easily have been about any two asexual college kids, but it's about two asexual college kids who know how to jump into giant robots and fuck shit up, when (most of) the sexual people around them can't.

There are a number of reasons why this story could have been written as fanfic, and "asexual power!" is only one of them.

And an unlikely one at that, I think.

Many writers find fanfic easier to write than original fiction. Fanfiction has a built-in audience. The author could have wanted to play around with convention, and do something different. The author could have -- and I think this one is unlikely -- wanted to do something in regards to asexual visibility, and picked fanfic because of the built-in audience, or because she finds it easier.

[AVENguy]

Can't I be sarcastic and fanciful?

Sorry, I just get overloaded on this stuff.

Agree with you that I don't prove any larger point about porn, or anything else, I was mostly just playing around (I think I point at one without going into it at all, which is what I was going for.)

Also agree that it wasn't written as fanfic for the sake of asexual power, it's way easier to write a story with preexisting characters then to try to build some in a short piece, which makes fanfic a great way to experiment with writing. I don't think that this was fanfic for asexual power reasons, though I also don't think that the giant robots in this story are completely removed from the asexual material (it's not just a story about two asexual college kids with giant robots thrown in there for the sake of fanfic.) And I don't think it's about anything as explicitely political as "asexual power!," though I think that the two are in some way related. I have to ask myself why I, as an asexual, might want a giant ass-whomping robot (who WOULDN'T?) The presence in the story of a sexual imperative for Duo (people actively trying to get him to sleep with someone) means that Duo has ground to defend and, perhaps, gain, and when it comes to that having a giant robot up your sleeve doesn't hurt. The implicit fear of rape in this piece is neutralized both physically (by the robot and Duo's show of physical strength) and socially (by the naming of Duo's asexuality and the promise that it will cause people to leave him alone.) As a speaker I once attended said "There's something kinda nice about the idea of a gun-toting faggot." How do we know that Duo and Heero's intimacy is (more) legitimate than the sexual intimacy that's being thrust on them from all directions? They can kick sexual ass, that's how.

Ok, and I'm done now.