I like to do this fun thing where I take a character and try and see how much bastard I can fit into them before they burst.

Archived stuff:

Beyond the Fire: A Mass Effect retelling where I have given myself carte blanche to pick up what Bioware made and go "this is lovely, but I will be changing everything." Takes place before the first game, starting with the funtime colony vacation that was Nicole Shepard's childhood (there's guns!). There's some heavy stuff--torture, terror, etc.--but nothing out of the realm of what you'd expect in any really serious Mass Effect fanfic. Probably the most frequent comment is "Darker than normal, but interesting!" so there you have it. Complete.

In-progress stuff:

Beyond the Fire: DragonRise: Sequel to Beyond the Fire, continuing Nicole Shepard's story. I don't like to make broad sweeping statements about what's going to happen in a story, preferring rather to let the writing speak for itself ... but I will say that if you thought Nicole gets to a dark place in Beyond the Fire, then you ain't seen nothin' yet. In-progress, sorta. To be honest, I don't have a ton of time for fanfiction lately; but I still entertain the idea of coming back and finishing Nicole Shepard's story. You never know.

Planned stuff:

All the fics in this section, if they ever do get released, will be updated sporadically.

Darker Futures: Beyond the Fire AU where Anderson never rescued Nicole, and she never left Shadowhill. Really an excuse for me to ask nature-nurture type questions and explore a darker side of the Mass Effect universe and make my villain from BTF weirdly sympathetic and hot. Updates when I feel like it. I have a soft spot for this strange little story, so I might return to it one day, much to the pleasure of the four people who read it and went "well, that was weird."

The Light Must Fade: A Dragon Age II retelling in the vein of Beyond the Fire, following Angelique Hawke, who has a military grade temper. I like the idea but I'm not sure I'll ever have time to get back to it. Here's the short summary of what would have happened: girl gets demon trapped in her arm. Girl and demon have wacky hijinx. they learn to live laugh love their way to a happily-ever-after with the sexy pirate who's new to town; but she just doesn't get the spirit of Christmas. Hallmark Channel, call me.

The covers for Beyond the Fire and DragonRise were done by my girlfriend wife Taz, who is a better human being than is strictly speaking reasonable. Since fanfiction.net has decided to arbitrarily stop letting you link to stuff on your profile page, I'll have to give you directions. go to tazmynburt(dot)tumblr(dot)com. There you will find oodles of incredible art to scroll through, so do that. In the process you will find the BTF art Taz has done, which is amazing and more than I deserve.

The Night Spirit is dead as a doornail; arguably a little deader, in actual fact, since a doornail is at least tangible.