Sliding into July...

[unovis]

My apologies for the late welcome post. Idiotically, I made the welcome post to a different comm, and only noticed it wasn't here when I was nudged. Yes, coming unglued in the lovely swampy heat.

So, officially and in the right place, Welcome to this month's reccer, rachelindeed! Thanks for your continued participation, and as always, we look forward to your recs.

Thanks as well to [Bad username or unknown identity:  ] for stepping up with recs for June!

We are still accepting reccers for July and any later month. You can sign up here and General Information is here. Experienced and new reccers or members are all welcome. You only need to make four recs a month, for works created for any version of Sherlock Holmes, as fic, art, vids, podfic, or meta.

Fic Rec: Maintenance and Repair

[rachelindeed]

Title: Maintenance and Repair
Author: patternofdefiance
Pairing: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson; brief John Watson/OFC
Length: 106,000 words
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: graphic depictions of violence/gore; amputation; body dysphoria; ableism
Verse: Sherlock BBC
Author's summary: John wants to explain the rush of sensation and data, which is just another form of sensation (or is it the other way around?). John wants to say: Augmentation circuits report temperature, pressure, various forms of quantitative input. Sudden changes are reported as pain, since sudden changes are dangerous, and pain is the quickest way to encourage reflexive extraction. But all John can manage is, “Nng.” Because this sudden touch is not reporting as pain.

Reccer's comments: This wonderful fic was five years in the making, and I'm so excited to be able to share it here on this comm now that it is finally finished! Patternofdefiance is a terrific writer, and this story is full of rich characterization, internal struggle, complex emotional and interpersonal dynamics, utterly convincing world-building, and well-realized original characters. This is a science-fiction, dystopic AU, but it's set in the very near future and the social, political, and psychological elements are convincing because they're only a few degrees removed from those of the world today. In this slightly more technologically advanced future, it's become possible to repair previously incurable injuries by grafting sensitive but short-term technology into the bodies and brains of the wounded. These disabled persons, who appear close to cyborgs, then have to deal with the ableism of a society that regards them uneasily and a medical profession that considers them violently unstable. Most of the care they receive is limited to 'maintenance and repair,' with the goal of preparing them for death once their augmentations fail - usually within two years - and ensuring they take no one else with them in their slow descent.

John enters the story as one of these disabled veterans, struggling in the aftermath of invasive procedures that were undertaken without his consent and which have transformed his body and his life in ways he finds hard to accept. It is in this state that he meets Sherlock and becomes his flatmate, friend, and colleague. Gradually they are both drawn into a series of mysteries surrounding other 'augmented' people, and they begin to realize that the information about John's condition peddled by the medical and political establishments may not be trustworthy.

This story has it all: insightful social commentary, an intelligent cast of characters -- John's ex, Mona, is one of the best OFCs I've encountered in the fandom -- and a slow-burn romance between Sherlock and John that, though fraught with miscommunication, manages to be both passionate and analytical, and above all superlatively in character.