Story: Fire Answers Fire
Author: aces
Rating: All Ages
Author's summary: “A bike,” Martha said, looking it over as best she could in the dark. “You travel through time on a bike.” She looked up at Dorothy again. “How safe is that again?”
Characters/Pairings: Ace/Martha
Warnings: none
Word Count: 1923 words

Recced because: This story makes great use of the Year That Never Was setting: it provides the characters with motivation but is carefully placed as a backdrop to let Ace and Martha shine through. Ace (or Dorothy, as she's now calling herself), is older and wiser, and together they examine themselves and the role the Doctor plays in his companions' lives. It's quiet and fierce at the same time, and gentle without being at all sentimental. Really terrific.

Story: World Enough, And Time
Author: Aces
Rating: All ages
Word Count: 1739
Author's Summary: She would have always wanted *more*.
Characters/Pairings: Grace, Eight, Jack
Warnings: None given

Recced because: This is a wonderful character study of Grace, one of the most underrated companions. Jack's brief appearance is a lovely foil to Grace, and Aces writes all three characters skillfully and tenderly. I can't read it without getting a lump in my throat by the end.

Hmm, maybe yesterday I should have introduced myself, but I forgot, sorry! That's okay, I have no overarching theme I'm going for this week -- just a hodge-podge of Old School and New. Yesterday I brought the introspective angst, today let's go the other direction:

Story: 50 Ways to Propose Marriage to Your Non-Lover
Author: Aces
Rating: All Ages
Word Count: 1877
Author's Summary: Eight is bored. Therefore, he decides to get married. As you do.
Characters/Pairings: Eighth Doctor, Anji Kapoor, Bernice Summerfield, Charley Pollard, Compassion, C'Rizz, Fitz Kreiner, Iris Wildthyme, Lucie Miller, Romana II, K9, Samantha Jones, Trix MacMillan
Warnings: None

Recced because: I've reread this story several times and it never fails to bring a big, silly grin to my face. I'm not even acquainted with half the companions featured in this, but I'm delighted to see every single one of them, just because the Doctor is. It's infectious. I love Eight in more angsty circumstances too, but this is pure fun -- the Eight of the TV Movie who impulsively kissed Grace and squee'd over his perfectly fitting shoes. Won't somebody please marry Eight?

( An excerpt behind the cut )

Story: Overthrown
Author: aces
Rating: All Ages
Author's summary: Hex + nursing = Ace in big trouble.
Characters/Pairings: Hex, Ace
Warnings: none
Word Count: ~2,600 words

Recced because: Absolutely adorable audio!fic; this is set just after Live 34, but it stands alone very well, in case you haven't heard it. Ace and Hex are both perfectly in character, with wonderfully crackling dialogue. Hex nurses Ace, and for better or worse she lets him; the story has just a hint of shippiness lurking underneath, but really is about friendship and love, in all its forms. With some great lines, such as Ace snarking about Hex's propensity to take pulses with "Are you sure it's not just because you always had a secret desire to prop young women up with pillows and feel up their wrists?", discussions about responsibility, getting to see Hex perform and be utterly excellent at his job, and Ace's repeated desire to throw an alarm clock at Hex's head, the characters are lovingly rendered and this is just a complete joy to read.

( A sample: )

Hello all, I'm reccing this week! Except much in the way of slash, Fivey, and nattering about some guy named Fitz. Speaking of...

Story: Simple Progressions
Author: aces
Rating: All Ages
Word Count: 5,094
Author's Summary: AU Doctor-Fitz reunion after the Earth Arc. "Maybe he’d gotten the TARDIS working and had already left the planet. Maybe he had no intention of keeping the meeting. Maybe he was angry at Fitz, because Fitz knew what he had done and he didn’t want anyone to remember."
Characters/Pairings: Fitz Kreiner, Eighth Doctor
Warnings: none

Recced because: Sometimes canon FAILS. There was a time during the EDAs when the Doctor spent over a century on Earth with nothing but a weird blue box and a mysterious note which read Meet me in St. Louis. 8 February 2001. Fitz. When we finally get to the reunion, the longed-for moment, the culmination of six novels, it is glossed over in two paragraphs and then buried in plot. aces, bless her, said "no," and gave us this beautiful alternative filled with all the joy, sorrow, awkwardness, and hope that the real thing should have had. "Simple Progressions" gives that closure EDA fans were cheated of while also pointing the way forward.

Story: Face Another Day
Author: aces
Rating: None given (teen?)
Word Count: 8526
Author's Summary: "How did you get to twenty-first century Cardiff, Fitzgerald Kreiner?" Jack asked.
Characters/Pairings: Fitz Kreiner, Gwen Cooper, Ianto Jones, Jack Harkness, Owen Harper, Tenth Doctor, Toshiko Sato
Warnings: None

Recced because: It feels real. Fitz starts off in a bad way, and although he ends up at peace, it's not an easy or straightforward progression. Fitz brings himself to Torchwood and tells them he wants to help; this is true, but although he'll help, he won't be co-operative. He doesn't want to talk to them about himself or how he knows what he knows, because then he'll have to face what's happened to him and he's not ready to do that at first. And Team Torchwood, in their turn, don't immediately take him into their respective hearts and set about trying to help him. Their interactions with him feel more authentic because they're not smooth. (Sidenote: aces also does a great job with Torchwood themselves; though none of them except Jack play a particularly large role, they all have some nice character moments and there's a nice group scene that makes me believe that they do all actually like each other, something the show itself was having trouble with for a while.) Fitz's gradual recovery is portrayed very well and the hopefulness of the final scene makes a lovely ending. I could go on at much greater length listing all the things I love about this fic, but I'll spare you my gushing and instead give you a quote:

( an extract )


(This fic is a sequel to And I Will No Other To Follow Me Where I'm Going, recced here.)

Story: Everybody Wants You
Author: aces
Rating: Teen
Author's summary: Jack Harkness. He's quite shaggable, really.
Characters/Pairings: Jack/Fitz, Jack/Ace, Jack/Peri, Jack/Nyssa, Jack/Harry, Jack/Jo/Yates/Benton/Brigadier (really!), Jack/Polly, Jack/Ian
Warnings: none
Word Count: ~2,900 words

Recced because: Captain Jack. Meeting (and sometimes shagging) his way through the DW canon. A tremendous amount of fun, and even if you don't know each character involved (I still haven't read any non-fanfic Fitz, myself) there's bound to be some you know and love. Some gorgeous characterizations - "It’s not as if I expected to walk into your—invisible spaceship, now, is it?” Harry retorted, nettled. “Now, look here, old chap, you can’t just leave things like this lying about where anyone could trip over them." - a mix of funny, insightful, and hot scenes, and a moment in UNIT's history that will keep me amused for the rest my life just picturing it all add up to an incredibly enjoyable fic.

Story: [the other side of the sky]
Author: Aces
Rating: All Ages
Word Count: 2464
Author's Summary: Jack was bewildered and dead. Or maybe just dreaming.
Characters/Pairings: Jack Harkness
Warnings: None

Recced because: It is a waking dream that never happened, in places that don't exist, with people who are not as they seem, and probably not even people. My favourite bit is Jack's encounter with Desire, but every bit of it is good. Quintessential Sandman, it captivates, teases, hints; full of myth and atmosphere.

Looks like the calufrax slash representation is going to be up after this week then... :D

Story: Summer in the City
Author: aces
Rating: Adult
Word Count: 1578
Author's Summary: Traveling with the Doctor was a little more complicated than Rose had expected.
Characters/Pairings: Rose/Polly
Warnings: femslash, but nothing explicit

Recced because: 'Any time you want a little brightness in your life, come to Pol.'  Polly is tragically underepresented in fic, and the portrayal of her in this little gem is so beguiling that it might just result in more.  It's a simple vignette: Rose wakes up in 1966 after an atypical (but not at all regretted) one night stand with someone the Doctor would recognise - if he wasn't off trawling record shops.  But there are no tricksy games with crossed timelines and mentions of TARDISes here.  This is all about two women in the moment: Polly, the blithely confident, effortlessly charming party girl, singing in the shower; Rose, blearily remembering the evening's events and moving from hungover to something rather better. 

If you know Polly, you'll delight in aces' perfect characterisation.  If you don't, it's a lovely introduction: read this, leave a review, and then dig out a copy of The War Machines so you can be seduced by her too.

Story: And I Will No Other to Follow Me Where I'm Going
Author: Aces (wishfulaces)
Rating: Teen
Word Count: 4225
Author's Summary: "Hang about," Fitz had asked once, very early on when this whole thing started. "Didn't you already destroy your planet, once?"
Characters/Pairings: Eighth Doctor, Fitz Kreiner (with some Eight/Fitz), Romana
Warnings: None.

Recced because: The Eighth Doctor was rather screentime-deprived, with just the TV movie, but he did feature in a fascinating series of novels called the Eighth Doctor Adventures. This story is set between the end of EDA canon and the beginning of the new series--whi