I like mpreg. I read it, I write it, but personally for me I'm prefer my mpreg in universes where it's more...possible. Like Buffy, I have no problems with believing that a curse or spell could get Spike, Angel, Xander etc... pregnant. Xena and Hercules, Greek gods? Totally can get knocked up at the drop of a hat(It happens in myths! Zeus has have several). Highlander those in some quickening weirdness and voilà! Methos is pregnant and pissed off. Or scifi like Star Trek where it's canon (in DS9 they mentioned throwing a baby shower for a male ensign I think it was who was having another baby, and on Enterprise Trip got pregnant by a female alien) or Stargate where I have no issues thinking that one of the many advanced aliens races could figure out a way to get a guy pregnant. I just don't really like the "Oh yeah men can just get pregnant, some men are born with a special pouch, etc...type ones. Give me a reason! Magic, science, something just don't go "Yeah it just happens in this universe." If I want to writer mpreg in a universe that's like House, I x-over with another universe, Like in my "Why You Shouldn't Visit Family..." fic Chase goes to visit his cousin Cordelia in LA and winds up getting cursed by a vengeance demon. After that I stick to the Houseverse while everyone goes "WTF?! House you've gone more insane then normal! Men don't have babies! It's not possible!" and "Stop stealing womans ultrasound videos and putting Chase's name on them!" Though I have read a few House mpregs based on like a scientist working on new technology, types ones that were good. But then I had issues with House going off Vicodin and switching to regular Tylonol... meh. (And yes in that fic House was the mommy, Cause neither Chase nor Wilson wanted to. And House thought it'd be fun to screw with people's heads, and get free food because "The baby's hungry!")

Yes, link us. Hahahah, House putting Chase's name on the ultrasound stuff.

Blackmare said one thing that wasn't physically painful ended up being what probably did the most damage. :cry: Poor Wilson went through a lot in Bad Company, but the rape scene was almost unreadable for me even though it was written well. I know that it has to come up again in Aftershocks and frankly I would have thought we would have seen it already. I'm not sure how I'll stand reading it, but not bringing it up wouldn't make sense, expecially in light on Wilson's battle with Carla of the Sponge Bath Fetish.

Agreed, extra_cat. I read it while literally cringing, gritting my teeth, and generally in great discomfort. And I won't re-read it. Jdr, remember that in the original tale Wilson woke the next morning and decided it was a bad dream -- and then so much else happened, and ... there's some question as to whether he thinks he really has told House everything. We could not have told this story without dealing with that particular thing. All I'm prepared to say is that it won't be as awful to read as the original. We had no desire to put the characters or the readers through a detailed re-living of that experience.

For me I don’t think any sort of torture or rape is sexy. Up close and personal it’s not. There’s a play - Death and the Maiden – set in some small Latin American country (Chile I think) and this lady was horrible raped and tortured because her husband was a journo. Then one day years later the doctor who repeatedly raped her walks through the door. After she has hit him on the head with a frying pan and tied him up, she asks him why and he says that it was all about the power and how good that made him feel. The other day there was a CSI Somethingerother that had groups of kids getting off on beating people. But although I have seen stories which just appeared pointless violence for pointless violence, in terms of fan fiction I think it is used as a tool to produce a story. Take Bruce in the Die Hard movies – not only does he lose most of his clothing he goes through hell. Or in a less out there example in the TV movie of the week someone will get cancer and all the characters will deal with it in their own way. House sort of veers a little more to the TV side, but no one really questions the proliferation of terrorists with bad German accents John McClean seems to meet because the story is interesting and we get lots of things blowing up. I think that’s why there are so many hurt comfort stories – anything from yet another car crash, to House getting horribly tortured for two weeks because he didn’t cure someone’s wife fast enough, she’s become agoraphobic and the husband is upset because they can’t go to the beach any more. Why some work better than others is not the violence or the event, but the exploration of the characters. And I think with House because we are learning more about the characters they are getting more plausible. Take the Contract v Aftershocks. One written two years ago and one written lately. The first relies more on what I thought normal people might do in that situation – and in retrospect in comes out a bit clumsy. We know now that if House was shot Cameron wouldn’t rush to his bedside and drool over him in a fit of wailing, he’ll profess his undying love for her and they’ll get married. The second story in terms of hurt comfort is more complex in the way that House and Wilson interact. How they do try to help each other. Both stories were intended to explore the House/Wilson dynamic on a gen level, but one has more knowledge of the characters (or better writers). I found it easier to write Not With a Bang But With a Whimper because I knew more about their dynamic and I wasn’t projecting my interpretations. And I think this is the same for slash. Haven’t we just decided that even if they were in a relationship they would not call each other dear and hunnybunkins.

*hugs Sheepie* Better writers? Eh, I doubt that. That little basement room of House's, from Not With a Bang, is always somewhere in my mind. I can see the dull greenish-gray cast of the light. The incongruous red mug with its broken handle; the rusted chrome cage with the rat. Everything. And it breaks my heart every time I think of it. I will now and ever after think of Wilson as the Jewish God of Bad Ties. You're pretty amazing, and you have managed to scar me for life, and I mean that in the best possible way. 8)

Probably the closest thing to hurt/comfort we've seen on the show is the "House, this is God," conversation -- and that's far from what others would think of as fandom. To me, though, it epitomizes why House still lets Wilson get under his skin, because Wilson has this ability to provide what House needs, without being so direct about it. I agree that THAT was a bit of hurt/comfort. HL portrayed House in the MRI as worried (and maybe a bit frearful) and wilson saw that, responding to it by joking. But we have seen other cases. House comforting Stacy on the rooftop in Honeymoon during the "I don't know what the problem is" scene. She's hurting and he's frustrated that he the cause of the disease is eluding him. He gathers her into his arms and holds her giving comfort, which she accepts (momentarily). When we see House hurting (which do often enough) I get the sense that under the right conditions he wouldn't refuse comfort. But on his terms (pity-free). When he falls in Skin Deep, losing his balance, very publicly in his office, no, I don't think he would have accepted any sort of comfort, because that would hit at his sense of dignity. His usual: let's leave it alone; I don't want to talk about it. But I have seen Cuddy, for example (and maybe I'm biased since I write House/Cuddy fanfic most of the time) get through his defenses. You can't necessarily hear it in the dialgoue but you can see it in their body language. The scene in Cane and Able in his office where Cuddy wants to get the PET scan and she brushes off all of his deflections and gets in his personal space by sitting on the edge of his desk talking softly by determinedly to him elicits that: "If there was something wrong, don't you think I'd want to do something about it..." line (and I think I"m misquoting it slightly) that HL rendered with much feeling and gravitas. The moment or two after that were (before, and just after he's called away) verging on that sense of hurt/comfort (despite the fact that it occurred midway into that terrible betrayal story). House also lets Cuddy get more physically close than he lets anyone. When House needs a lawyer, Cuddy comes into his office and sits on his ottomon, with House instinctively moving his legs to let her sit. It's those sorts of moments that fanfic writers grab onto to structure hurt/comfort in the fanfic world; House giving Cuddy the infertility shots, keeping her confidence, despite the fact she was sure he wouldn't. I know I'm jumping back to Stacy for a minute, but his canon/on screen relationship with her gives a lot of fodder for fanfic writers to frame how House might react to other women (or men) if he lets them in. Stacy when she comes down to sit with him silently in the airport while he's trying to figure out a case. Just being there for him--no banter; not jabs. Just sitting with him--must've meant a great deal to him. He looked apprecieate of the gesture. Again--would that work with another character? Possibly under the write fan-fic conditions. House even let Stacy tend to his chin in Hunting. You do get the feeling that UNDER THE RIGHT set of conditions, House would let someone in to comfort him. Those moments...and the moments where we see House hurting (emotionally or physically) alone, give many fanfic writers of hurt/comfort/angst a framework to write hurt comfort. At least that's where I'm coming from. I try really hard to stay within the on-screen charactizations. Only my readers can tell me if I'm at all successful doing it. OTOH I hate it when House is infantalized and turned in to a blubbering and needly basket of tears, crying for Jimmy to hold his hand. Or for House to suddenly become big daddy to CCF, Cuddy, Wilson and the whole gang. It's out of character (if not enjoyable sometimes anyway with the right writer), and my knee jerk reaction is to never start reading.

House also lets Cuddy get more physically close than he lets anyone. When House needs a lawyer, Cuddy comes into his office and sits on his ottomon, with House instinctively moving his legs to let her sit. It's those sorts of moments that fanfic writers grab onto to structure hurt/comfort in the fanfic world; House giving Cuddy the infertility shots, keeping her confidence, despite the fact she was sure he wouldn't. Of course the one time House actively came to Cuddy for help, and she looked sorry for him (in "Skin Deep") she gave him a placebo. That's the kind of twisted take on hurt/comfort that's canon on this show, and which I love.

This is a fantastic thread: deep thoughts, hilarious asides, challenging musings on so many topics! I bow down to the creators of this new board for giving space to such a wonderously fluid and stimulating conversation. I am not a writer of fanfic, but I am an avid reader of same. I also develop my analysis of this show into fairly long essays that seem to entertain those who come across them. My question to the gang is this: most of you have indicated that the best way to write a strong story is to keep your characters in character. Do you find that your approach to your stories has shifted over the course of the three seasons the show has aired? For example, were you first captivated by the possibilities of a connection between House and Cameron early in season 1 when she was recalibrating the centrifuge, but then found yourself unable to stomach that pairing after the coerced date of "Kids?" Did you find it easier or harder to write a believably sympathetic Wilson after the early season 3 episodes in which he seemed to engineer The Lie. Now that we have been given a hint of the story of Cuddy as House's once-and-future lover has that impacted your comfort in writing for her in your stories? In short, how much is your writing shaped by developments in canon?