Note: all spelling mistakes are intentional.


"What's slash?" Ian asked me one night, out of the blue.

I looked over at him. He was using my laptop instead of the room's desktop computer, and I wondered what he had found. "Let me see that."

To my relief, it wasn't porn. At least, I didn't think it was.

The page heading was MIRROR WORLDS. It was the fanfiction site based on Maya's book.

"I thought we agreed, all of us," I said, "that we weren't gonna look at this stuff any more. You remember what happened last time?"

"Yeah, I know. That's why I'm not going above PG-13 rated stories. Absolutely no porn."

"Well, good."

"Do the people who write this stuff know that it's real? I mean, that we're real people, and not just characters in a book?"

"I don't think so. It would be weird if they did. Then again, I read that one with the snakes . . ."

"What one with the snakes?"

"Never mind. You don't wanna know."

"Why?"

"Trust me. What's that you've found?"

"It says slash. What's slash?"

"Oh, that's . . . same-sex relationships."

"Like us?"

"Yeah, I guess, like us. Only they usually write characters who are straight in canon, just because they think the characters look hot."

"Oh. I guess that's why they paired you and Kit together."

"What?" I had to see this.


I Knew You Were Ready

by Kitance Lover1

Summary: Chance finally tells Kit how he really feels, but does the other boy feel the same? SLASH - you have been warned. DON'T LIKE DON'T READ!


"What does that mean, 'don't like don't read?'" Ian asked me.

"I don't know. I guess it means if you don't like slash, don't read it."


Chance waited until everyone else had gone before he approached Kit. "Can I talk to you?"

"Sure." Kit nodded. "Talk."

"It's kind of, um, perosnal . . ."

"Perosnal? What is that word supposed to be?" Ian was reading over my shoulder. I wouldn't have minded so much if he hadn't rested his chin on me. I waved him back.

"I don't know. So far it doesn't seem too bad."

I read on.

"I'm really glad you're staying with us," Chance said. "I like having you around."

"Well, thanks. It's good to have friends here."

"Actually, I was thinking we could be . . more than frieds."


"There's another typo," Ian helpfully pointed out. "I should e-mail the author about this. She should fix it."

I barely heard him. I was staring at the screen in shock. How did she know? How did this (presumed) stranger know about my super-secret crush on Kit? I hadn't told anyone. Yet there it was, splashed across the page in black and white.

I backed out of the story for a minute and checked the archive to see how many other slash pairings were represented. I found a lot of Kit/Len, some Kit/Trent, and even some Kase/Maya. Less popular were Chance/Price, Chance/Hunt, and some names which I didn't recognize at first, but I read a few and found that they were our mirror twins. Drew/James was the most popular of those.

There was some Chance/Kit, but not a lot. And apparently the author was the only one to smush the names together; everyone else wrote them out.

"There's no Chance/Ian. None at all."

"Will you stop reading over my shoulder?"

"What, don't they believe us as a couple?"

"We don't really get any scenes together in the book. It's kind of a long shot for a fiction pairing." Thank goodness.

"You should write one."

"Then it wouldn't be fiction."

"They wouldn't know that."

"Uh uh, no way. I am not getting into this insanity. I read that one where we bonded with our Advent Beasts by having sex with them."

"But they're mechanical."

"That doesn't stop these people. They write about Autocons having sex. I mean, I've heard."

He either let that go or didn't notice. "Do I get any action at all in these stories?"

"You really want to know?"

"I feel all left out. Nobody wants me to slash with anybody. Do I even get to be in any stories? Please tell me I'm there somewhere."

"All right." I did a search, and came up with . . . one story. Ian had been paired with the author's self-insert, a sugar-high, drooling, hyperactive twelve-year-old . . . sort of like him turned up to eleven. Scary thought, that.

"Can I read that one?" he asked.

"I doubt you'd want to." I bookmarked it anyway, in case he wanted to go back to it, and clicked back to the one with me and Kit.


"How would you feel," Chance said, leaning in closer, "if I told you I liked you in that way."

"What way is that?" Kit was stalling, and Chance knew it.

"Kit, I know you're young, but don't tell me you're too naïve to know what I mena. I-" he reached out and grabbed Kit's shoulders-"I love you. I have since I first met you. You have to have felt it."

Kit was shaking his head, trying to pull away. "No, I . . . I'm not ready for this."

"I think you're ready."

"Please don't."

"You want this as much as I do. Admit it."

"Chance, don't-"

Chance leaned in firther still and kissed Kit on the lips, cutting off his felt so powerful to do what he'd dreamed of for weeks, months. He came up for air and stared directly int Kit's blue eyes.

"Do that again," the dragon said.

"I knew you were ready."


There were four more chapters. But I couldn't read any more. I felt like I might throw up.

"That was . . . different," said Ian. "Can I have it back now?"

"Not yet," I said. I clicked the reviews. All of them were of the "OMG this is soooo good!" variety, which made me feel sicker. People who write stuff like this should not be encouraged.

I decided to send her my own review.


What is this? Chance and Kit? Not in a million years! And you really should proofread your work before you submit it. I stopped counting the typos when I hit double digits. This is awful and you should be ashamed of yourself!


I didn't know if she'd bother reading it, but I hit SEND anyway. That'd teach her.

Two days later, I got a response.

Most authors will reply to a review with a few words of gratitude. They know how to take criticism without having a meltdown. Why couldn't Kitance Lover1 be one of those?

I knew I shouldn't have put my real e-mail address in the box. But I hadn't expected this:

WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU! MY STORY IS BRILIANT! IT'S A BEAUTIFUL LOVE STORY AND IM NOT ASHAMED OF IT! YOUR THE ONE WHO SHOULD BE ASHAMED! YOUR A COWARD HIDING BEHIND A SCREEN MAKING FUN OF PEPOL WHO CAN REALLY WRITE! IM BLOCKING YOUSO YOU CANT LEAVE YOUR GARBIJ ALL OVER MY STORIS AGAIN!

Wow. My eyes were burning. Not so much from the message, but from the block paragraph in all caps.

But I couldn't let her get away with it. I sent her a PM:

First of all, turn off your Caps Lock. It's the big button to the left of your keyboard. Off? Good. Don't turn it on again.

Second, you really should invest in a spell checker, or better yet, read a dictionary, before you can claim to "really write". Professional writers don't make so many spelling mistakes. (Or if they do, they have someone paid to catch those mistakes, and correct them.)

Third, when you post your work to a public site, you put it out there for all to see. You can't tell them "Don't look at this if you don't like it!" How will they know they don't like it until they read it? You should say "Don't like, don't review" or "Don't like, don't complain to me." Or something of that nature, since that's what you really mean.

Finally, why don't you try another pairing? There aren't any Chance/Ian stories out there. I'd like to see one.

Ta,

A Fan

I had no way of knowing if she'd even read it, or if the blocking extended to PMs as well as reviews. If she didn't . . . well, I tried.

And so I was surprised to find this in my e-mail, a few days later:

Your right my spelling sux. But my compy doesnt have spelchek, so what do I do?

And I can post my stuff where I want! This is a public site which means its for everyon and that means me too! you cant tell me what to do!

Which was about what I expected. Typical teenage fanbrat.

Then I looked down at the last line:

Chanse/Ian sounds fun ill try it soon.

Oh boy. This could not be good.