"By Any Other Name" by Chelseagirl, 1996
- Vignette (8KB)
- PG
- Set overlapping the end of "The Human Factor"
Summary:
Nick brings Janette across against her wishes. She tells him what she thinks of that.
Recommendation:
Fanfiction routinely raises "The Human Factor"'s apparent cure for vampirism, but the episode's life-changing consequences for Janette receive less direct deliberation. This vignette bucks that trend, diving into the fiery dénouement and surfacing between the scenes. A brief model of coping with a difficult episode by contextualizing its changes, "By Any Other Name" restores the Immortal Beloved elements important to the author using the new canonical ingredients "The Human Factor" imposed.
Characters:
Nick, Janette, Others
More by this Author (Unavailable)
"Seduction of the Diligent" by Susan G., 1996
(This author died in 2010.)
- Novella (66KB) comprising three short stories: "Testing the Waters," "Wading," "Sinking Fast"
- PG
- Set in a parallel third-season
Summary:
Natalie falls for a television series just as it faces cancellation.
Recommendation:
Brimming with laughter and nostalgia, "Seduction of the Diligent" steps gaily from TB's inspired "Eternal Champion" parallel universe, which puts third season in its place by uniting our characters with us in our cancellation-induced woe. With Natalie as a raw newbie to Nick and Lacroix's favorite television show, we revisit the daffy and delightful heyday of the lists, as well as some "save our show" efforts. Best of all, this novella wisely points the way to post-series survival. Fanfiction is the answer, as Natalie discovers.
Characters:
Natalie, Lacroix, Nick, Grace, Others
"You Sick, Sick Monkeys! A Letter from Tracy Vetter" by Cousin Mary, 2004
- Vignette (6KB)
- PG-13
- No setting (meta-commentary)
Summary:
An outraged Tracy shares her opinions on her fanfiction pairings.
Recommendation:
The long-awaited season-three DVDs arrive this month. As we celebrate, and turn our thoughts to third-season tales, Mary's parody "You Sick, Sick Monkeys!" jauntily reviews some basic canonical considerations for romancing Tracy. This breezy complaint from the character to her fan-authors points out obstacles with which any serious fanfiction must grapple in order to pair-off Tracy. (But as we know, with careful attention and ambitious creativity, her every objection can be countered.)
Characters:
Tracy
"A Question of Conscience" by Kathy W., 1999
- Novella (114KB)
- PG-13
- Set between "Francesca" and "Ashes to Ashes"
Summary:
Tracy witnesses Vachon biting someone, and must decide what to do about it.
Recommendation:
"A Question of Conscience" testifies to the expansive possibilities still available precariously late in the series. This episode-like novella looks keenly at canon before the final two episodes close in, and reveals it robust with questions unasked and plots untried. Echoing her third-season arc, this Tracy stumbles into knowledge that fractures into complications requiring her to reevaluate her commitments to her job, her friend and herself. The story fits snugly between "Francesca" and "Ashes to Ashes," a sturdy bridge over a rarely-remarked gap. (First appearance: the charity fanzine A Taste of Forever.)
Characters:
Tracy, Vachon, Urs, Nick, Reese, Natalie, Other
"The Lure of the Alternanthera, or Clocknapped!" by Nancy K., 2004
- Short Story (36KB)
- G
- Set in FK's hiatus; crossover with XF's first season
Summary:
A UFO-sighting draws Nick, Natalie, Mulder and Scully to Niagara Falls.
Recommendation:
This good-natured romp frolics on the lighter side of two often-grim series. Dearly familiar voices banter, bicker and barely skirt clichés, spreading nostalgia for the genre-happy nineties. Thin but firm, the serviceable aliens-in-Ontario plot makes room for riffs from both character pairs on Niagara honeymoons, law-enforcement jurisdiction, and, naturally, the ultimate quests of each story. (Here's a peek at the Niagara Parks Floral Clock, just as the story describes it.)
Characters:
Stonetree, Schanke, Nick, Mulder, Scully, Natalie
"Toujours, Jamais" by Megan H., 2003
- Vignette (7KB)
- PG
- Setting indeterminate
Summary:
Nick faces his beast all the time, every day, eternally.
Recommendation:
This lucid little piece floats Nick's continuous struggle on the very top of his life, subordinating every other thought and feeling to the vampire's demands and the man's refusal. It's a perspective no other character precisely shares, something with which Nick is almost always alone — the uncommon exceptions include "Feeding the Beast," "Baby, Baby" and "Blackwing" — especially in his routine domestic moments. Concrete, concise and convincing, "Toujours, Jamais" makes its title's point.
Characters:
Nick, Natalie
"Fortune's Wheel" by Mary Co., 1999
- Short Story (54KB)
- PG
- Set after "Last Knight," mostly c. 2228
Summary:
Natalie eventually finds herself in the same circumstances that Nick was in when she first knew him.
Recommendation:
Real elegance is usually simple, as in "Fortune's Wheel." This surprisingly joyful story reruns Nick's life lessons through Natalie in a shrinking spiral, synchronizing the two souls into an alignment unachieved in canon's present day. Vampire Natalie seeks her cure in a future sketched convincingly with scant strokes, buoyed by her friendships and confronted by the hungers she long ago underestimated in Nick. And as Natalie's understanding grows, the dialogue delights in double-meanings, inviting readers to the fun of figuring out the final parallel before she does.
Characters:
Nick, Natalie, Lacroix, Janette, Others
"What He Deserves" by James K.W., 1995
- Short Story (17KB)
- PG (violence)
- Diverges between "Killer Instinct" and "Black Buddha"
Summary:
A murder changes Nick's thinking and inspires decisive action.
Recommendation:
This is the archetypal Forever Knight ending ("Last Knight" aside). With an "everyman" homicide investigation flowing into an apparently gratuitous vampire atrocity, then into death and new life, "What He Deserves" could happen at almost any point in the series — and, its implacable tone suggests, should have. But the piece challenges as much as it resolves, dipping disturbingly into the fungibility of Nick and Lacroix's motivations: autonomous and irreconcilable, yet utterly conditional and congruous.
Characters:
Nick, Schanke, Lacroix, Natalie, Others
"This River" by Mary Ch., 2006
- Short Story (25KB)
- G
- Set in second season
Summary:
Two on-duty detectives, one coroner and a cat get soaked as a river nears flooding.
Recommendation:
A gentle, ingenuous "hurt/comfort" set-up with very little hurt and a great deal of companionable comfort, "This River" offers familiar chills and snug contentment to everyone battered by a lingering winter. The piece splits into two river encounters — one rescuing a live body, the other retrieving a dead one — that brush briefly, almost involuntarily, against inescapable Forever Knight themes of recovery and reparation. "This River" forbids meandering metaphysical side-trips, however, and insists instead on the sturdy, solid coziness of hot baths, thick blankets, and trusted friends.
Characters:
Schanke, Nick, Natalie, Others
"The Nod" by Cousin Mary, 2005
- Vignette (8KB)
- PG
- Set in third season
Summary:
Tracy realizes Nick is a vampire.
Recommendation:
Canonically, Tracy does not recognize her partner's undead state until "Last Knight." But as with Schanke's "Close Call," any number of situations slip past in which the realization might easily have burst upon her. "The Nod" drives one such scenario all the way home, aptly fitting a staccato narration to Tracy's jagged shock as the pieces suddenly click for her. Staging her epiphany in public, the vignette also invokes the seldom-seen perspective of the unnamed majority of Raven customers, witnesses to more than the leading characters perhaps suspect.
Characters:
Tracy, Nick, Vachon, Urs, Miklos, Others
"My City of Ruins" by April F., 2004
- Vignette (7KB)
- PG
- Set following the flashbacks of "A More Permanent Hell"
Summary:
Lacroix looks back at the remains of Pompeii the night after Vesuvius erupted.
Recommendation:
We see few vulnerable moments in Lacroix's existence. This piece takes one — his first night after the end of all he knows — and finds in it his identity for all time. The ash buries his lover, his home, his status, even his hopes for his child. All else burns away; he is what remains. The backward glance he is unable to resist turns him into the Lacroix we know ever after, leaving vulnerability far behind. Unexpectedly and intriguingly, "My City of Ruins" also counterpoints Nick's own conversion aftermath (DK2, IWR); at that same stage in their lives, Nick wishes to go back, and Lacroix only forward.
Characters:
Divia, Lacroix
"Reckless Pantomime" by Eve D., 2001
- Short Story (14KB)
- PG-13
- Set after "Be My Valentine," likely before "Black Buddha"
Summary:
Snowed in at the loft with Natalie, Nick wrestles with temptation.
Recommendation:
Nick's longings — whether for humanity, redemption and sunlight, or for blood and the hunt — may be the cornerstone of Forever Knight. "Reckless Pantomime" skillfully packs all those other yearnings into Nick's desire for Natalie, creating a vivid, tense, sensual microcosm of his larger struggle. Confining Nick first to his loft, then to his bedroom, the story progressively cages him. Wisely, "Reckless Pantomime" retains Nick in a position of strength and choice even as it presses him to the edge of endurance. This steady strength achieves an affecting overlap of courage and indignity.
Characters:
Nick, Natalie
Please contact an author with feedback after reading her story. You may inspire her to write another! Your readership and responses are precious. Writers depend on readers.
Naturally, these fanworks are entirely fictional (there's no such thing as a vampire). Forever Knight was created by Parriot & Cohen and belongs to Sony. Feedback and suggestions are welcome; please let me know what you think. Thank you very much for reading!
