fic talk: can(n)on divergence

[sword_logic]

i don't take constructive criticism on my bad puns, thanks.

anyways! a probably-long-overdue post on chorus canon, halo canon, and S11 canon. i mean au.

here i go on a detour: i recently read an incredibly interesting rvb longfic that, to my genuine surprise and supreme pleasure, ended up being more halo fic than rvb fic, which is why i've got this on the brain (as well as some halo canon elements coming into play in S11 au as i'm writing).

this fic managed to weave together halo and rvb in a way i hadn't quite thought was possible, and i was really impressed with how the author handled, well, rvb's handling of halo canon: the author chose to simply put rvb's events into halo canon, without trying to rationalize the differences. that was it! it was that simple. and it fucking worked. part of me wonders how much a non-halo-fan would get out of this fic, but i digress. i really enjoyed seeing rvb and halo brought together in a way that felt really organic.

(if you want a link to the fic, DM me — the author chose to not use warnings and there are certain elements of characterization and narration that i firmly believe require a heads up.)

but anyways, where i'm going with this is that i'm at a bit of a pivot point in S11 au and i think i'm going to depart from a few things that were established in S13 about the covenant/forerunners, because i think i like the halo answer more than i like the rvb answer. for what it's worth, i think it was the right choice to reimagine the forerunner structures as something original in S13; the venn diagram of rvb fans and halo fans isn't a circle no matter what angle you look at it from, and what 13 did with the forerunner flavor in the H4 maps was a great way to meet in the middle.

but! where i want to go with S11 au doesn't really have room for that. and that's ok! that's why it's got that Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence tag, after all. i'll just have to be clear about how my chorus is different from canon chorus in this regard. case in point #1 is that i've already mentioned covvie weapons (get it? cannon divergence? because cannons are—? har har), and #2, forerunner structures have been mostly inextricable from the landscape since S1, E1.

back to writing for now, though, while i'm both motivated enough to write a lot and far too exhausted to do anything more taxing on multiple fronts like play video games.

brief edit to add: 18,420 words :')