Fic: Men of Legend (Merlin/Supernatural) PG-13 MASTER POST

[hells_half_acre]

Title: Men of Legend
Author: hells_half_acre
Beta: borgmama1of5 - my first time ever using a beta. It was interesting! Readers who are usually annoyed by my overuse of the word "said" will rejoice!
Fandoms: Supernatural and Merlin
Rating: PG (Gen/optional pre-slash)
Word Count: 33,935
Setting/Spoilers: This is set between S4 and S5 of Merlin and around S8 of Supernatural (in an undefined fantasy time period where Dean, Sam, and Cas are all available and doing alright.)
A/N: There's about as much merthur slash in this fic as there is in Merlin - which means that technically, it's pre-slash.

Summary: When a sorcerer summons monsters from another world, Merlin must summon heroes from another world to help save Camelot. Meanwhile, Dean and Sam Winchester didn't even know they were summon-able.

Chapters:
One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six | Seven | Eight | Nine | Ten

Read on AO3.

Comments

[kuhekabir.livejournal.com]

I was just about to pout but heading over to AO3 now. YAY!

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Haha, yeah, luckily I uploaded it there first. I just suddenly hit a tiredness wall and couldn't format for LJ anymore. (When I post on LJ, I have to go through and add back in all the italics manually - it's annoying.)

[franztastisch]

OK, how much of Merlin do I need to know to read this? And also of SPN S8? I quit watching Merlin end of S2/beginning of S3 and SPN end of S7 so... But I've always enjoyed your writing so I'd love to give it a go, so long as I'm not going "huh?" every three paragraphs. :P

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

It helps if you've seen S4 of Merlin, but I think even if you haven't, I explain the important plot points from it for Sam and Dean's benefit so you won't be TOO confused.

You don't need to see any of SPN S8. I couldn't find a good time to set it in the timeline, so where the Winchester's are in their story doesn't actually really matter... basically, it's just "sometime post S5" really.

[franztastisch]

Oh cool! I shall give it a go then. :)

[quickreaver.livejournal.com]

That's just what I was wondering; I'm completely Merlin illiterate. I'll slap it into my Kindle on Monday!

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

My beta had never seen Merlin, and though that meant for some interesting "corrections" during the editing process, I think she still enjoyed the story!

Basically, if I've done my job okay, you'll be as confused as Sam and Dean, which will probably just add to the story. ;)

[marlowe78.livejournal.com]

Oooooooooh, you're posting already! Yay!

I just fell out of the Merlin fandom again (well,I never was much IN it, so the fall wasn't very deep) and there's a Merlin story still sitting on my harddrive. Maybe this might encourage me to finish it?

Any which way, I'll be happy to read this!

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Haha, "already"?? I've been working on this story for MONTHS! It's actually sat on my beta's computer for 3 weeks. :P

Yeah, I like Merlin fic, but I didn't actually like S5 of Merlin... so yeah, I'm not sure I count as being "in the fandom", but hey, maybe... I've written two crossovers with the show, so I suppose I am.

I hope you enjoy it! :)

[marlowe78.livejournal.com]

Well,my story wasn't as complicated as combining two very different things. So it was just flowing because reading in that fandom made me a bit... uh, not really pissed but more like... annoyed. I ONLY ever found "poor Merlin, Arthur is mean to him" (except in the rare occasions I read slash) and that just... ugh.

So yeah, my story was to give some explanation to the other side, the not-poor-servant (who actually can magic his work, so I always thought HE shouldn't complain so much) and...yeah, now it's stuck :-D

So I might never finish except if you draw me back in. Let's see :-)

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Uh oh... I have a bit of "poor Merlin" in here, though I temper it with a lot of "Arthur absolutely adores Merlin", so hopefully it doesn't annoy you too much. If it does though, I apologize in advance. I kind of like the "overworked Merlin" trope.

[marlowe78.livejournal.com]

It's really not that I don't like it so much (I liked it fine in the show, as it was), but that that was the ONLY thing people seemed to write about.
Merlin being whiny (Oh, sorry, of course he was RIGHTEOUSLY whiny...) and being the hero and saving Arthur.
And Arthur was at best unconcious, and as worst a dweep.

I know that's to some extend what happened in the show, but that wasn't all there was (there are some other issues I have - like that non-trust Merlin had over Arthur, always disbelieving he could do ANYTHING alone), and in a lot of the stories I read, that was the main thing. Merlin is misunderstood and Arthur is too dumb do tie his shoes (but he can use a sword, at least)

So yeah, my story was kinda just putting everything in Arthur's POV,going back in his life a bit to show that he might be a spoiled brat, but he has his reasons and that there's more to being a crown-prince than just ordering your servant around.

Problem was, I don't know where that story should end ;-) So it's hanging half-finished.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Ah, okay, sounds like you've had a lot of bad luck reading stories in the Merlin fandom. My story isn't like that... I do have Arthur screwing up, but it's for good reason, and he's not a dweep.

But yeah, I've read those stories too and can't stand them. Not only because of the way they treat Arthur, but also because of the way they make Merlin into a whiner. In the entire run of the show, Merlin has only complained about being overworked once... so to me, having him be self-pitying is OOC and the mark of a bad writer.

Figuring out where/how to end something is the hardest part of writing, I find. I struggle with it every single time. :P

[marlowe78.livejournal.com]

I know your story will be different - you're a good writer! And I sure didn't have much luck, but I couldn't find any place to look for good stories - I prowled the merlinfinders and read through the recs there, and I tried just picking things from either ff.net or ao3.

I limited myself to gen, which might've been part of the problem. It's just that in most slash-stories, the plot consists of "how do I get him in bed and what the hell do I do once he's in there". That might be unfair to the slash-writers. But that's how I so far felt. It's why I don't read wincest outside of porn (weird, I know...)

OH, and my first post to the merlinfinders earned me an outraged cry because I DARED to ask for "NO slash please", the poster clearly seeing my capital letters as pure disgust.

That was fun, made me feel right at home... And she didn't even leave a rec, that bitch!

*chuckle*

I'll figure it out, I'm sure I will. And if not, no-one will ever know because it won't rot on my lj or somewhere because I HATE WIP going unfinished.

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Yikes, that sucks.

My advice would be to stay off ff.net. I really find that 90% of stories on ff.net are crap.

But yeah, the problem probably is that you're trying to stick with only gen stories. Merlin is one of those fandoms that's pretty much ALL slash, because of the whole magic=homosexuality metaphor of the show.

There ARE good slash stories out there that aren't just "how do I get him in bed with me" - but you'll probably have to brave merlinfinders again and ask for "fics with good plots" or something, or just go searching for them yourself.

What I did in the beginning was I just went on AO3's Merlin tag and I sorted by number of hits. I find that the more popular fics are once that are a)well written, b)have plot. You could try doing the same and narrowing down by "gen" as well and see what comes up...because of course if you go by hit counts, the slash stories are going to have the higher hit counts.

Oh you could just abandon the attempt and read ONLY my fic. ;)

[marlowe78.livejournal.com]

"Oh you could just abandon the attempt and read ONLY my fic. ;)"


hahaha, that would probably be my choice. And yeah, ffnet is a strange and dangerous place - the "problem" is that once in a while, you find gems ;-)

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

It's true. I've been directed to some good stories on ffnet from various reclists... but I still only go there if directed by a reclist, the gems aren't worth me wading through the trash. :P

[electricmonk333.livejournal.com]

Holy Sh*t! Considering how much I love your SPN/HP crossover, I am really thrilled to find this one. The bonus is that there's no slash, especially the crossover kind which means I can read it. *g*

Will definitely leave feedback once I have read it and will also be sure to pimp it.

Thank you!

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

I hope you enjoy this one too! For the record, I'm DEFINITELY not a crossover-slash fan - so when it comes to my stuff, you don't have to worry that much. (of course, the exception is my Merlin-Sherlock crossovers where I think it's heavily implied that Merlin and Arthur are a couple... but hey, it's not explicit.)

I look forward to your feedback. :)

[electricmonk333.livejournal.com]

I meant I don't much care for fics wherein there is slash between two crossover characters, because I like my SPN fics either Gen(cest) or Wincest. :) The Merthur I can live with and the show is rather slashy itself, so nothing shocking there!

[hells-half-acre.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, same here same here... I mean, I'm fine with heavily slashy shows having slash (Sherlock, Merlin), but I really can't stand characters from different universes hooking up.