Hmm. Interesting.

So there was a small and dreary Jo-Ann's two towns over. I didn't like it much; there was hardly anything in it, so unlike the beautiful big one three more towns over.

But they moved the small one into a bigger building, and squeeee, it's so beautiful and bright and new and BIG! It even rivals that other big one now, I think. This new one may just be my favorite branch. It has everything in it that the other big one had, including those pre-stuffed dolls, if I ever get the urge to make more plushies.

They've also built a Wal-Mart in that town now. It's bright and big and beautiful too. And really a little bit strangely, their toy section is in a part of the store that I've never seen it at in a Wal-Mart before in reality ... but it's been in that approximate area in several dreams I've had. Weird.

One of those dreams was just a few days ago, too. I was overwhelmed with wondering what to buy, just as I have been in reality, but in the dream my choices were Ponies (particularly a shaggy alicorn version of Sunset Shimmer), Troll dolls, and Sailor Moon plushies. The Sunset came in two sizes, standing and laying down, and I liked standing best, but there was only one and there was a wire sticking out of her leg. So I was debating whether to get laying down or try a different store for standing.

I saw a lot of Troll dolls at that antique mall, including one with beautiful deep purple hair, so that's probably why I dreamed of them. I like them too, but I like them best when they're clothed. I'm not sure why a lot of Troll dolls are naked. But the ones at the mall seemed clean, at least, unlike the mall's Ponies, so I may go back and get some. There was a cute little one praying in a nightgown.

When I was at the Jo-Ann's, I saw a mini oar apparently used as a house decoration. It was rather heavy regardless, and I suddenly got the inward giggles imagining Ecks and Wye deciding to become private detectives since they can't go back to the spy business, and Wye going in some house and the woman there clocking him with the decorative oar.

Right now I seem to be at the stage where, yes, I am becoming fond of them, but I'm still entertained by poking fun at them a bit. If I ever grow to love them as much as I love some other characters, that enjoyment of poking fun at them will fade. Then I will adore them too much to want to do that. I had that happen with Mr. Sampson from Perry Mason.

I'd better finish that haunted house fic before I go past that point, because I definitely poke fun at Ecks in that.

**headdesk.**

I really don't like naming drabbles and vignettes 99% of the time. To me, they're fic snippets and not like a full-fledged fic, and titles don't apply. I really have to struggle to think of titles for them, and I have to come up with something, since I'm posting them to a comm. But I ended up forgetting to name today's piece and had to quickly edit and think of something.

I'm musing on how I've chosen to portray the characters. Since they have limited screentime, it requires some thinking to flesh them out. And I love it, honestly. When there's so little canon to work with, there's less chance of screwing up when you flesh out.

Ecks canonically seems to be depicted as someone with a playful streak who can also be deadly serious and efficient. To flesh him out, I draw from some of Chrissy's other more playful characters, such as Goniff from Garrison's Gorillas and Roger Bard from Mannix. I portrayed him as someone more serious in the past (similar to the always-serious Ginger in that respect) who opened up around Wye, and Wye's influence gave him a more humorous/playful approach to life. Wye is likely not always a good influence, but the damage is done. Ecks is still more serious than Wye, and sometimes surprises when he switches to a playful comment.

Ecks was raised in the organization and didn't have a choice about joining, something that embittered him and eventually convinced him to betray the organization when Mr. Zed proposed an alternate plan. Wye joined the organization voluntarily later in life, mostly for his own amusement, and went along with Mr. Zed's betrayal plan pretty much for kicks. He thinks the organization's idealistic ideas of taking over the world and forcing world peace are ridiculous and prefers Mr. Zed's matter-of-fact desire for power.

(Ecks could have alternately joined later, same as Wye, and been a juvenile delinquent before joining, but I decided to make him a little sympathetic by pretty much being forced into the position. Both ideas fit with the canon we have, I think, and I preferred having him be more sympathetic. I also thought being raised in the organization was a more unique and interesting idea. It reminds me a little of Shiho and Akemi from Detective Conan.)

Wye is the wild card of the two, a bit more sadistic and quite capable of taking revenge/tipping off the deep end when pushed too far, as canonically shown by his screentime after finding Ecks stabbed in the park. Hedley Mattingly gave him a Cockney accent, so I play on that and give him a lot more of the British slang that I first started researching when writing for Ginger. Ginger doesn't use as much. I think I determined that while Ginger is likely from the East London area, he may not specifically be Cockney. They say that all Cockneys are East Londoners, but not all East Londoners are Cockneys. Ginger doesn't come across as Cockney to me; he doesn't quite have that Cockney accent.

I portray Wye as having a "laugh at the world and all its stupidity" approach, something he's passed on to Ecks, but Wye is still much more that way than Ecks is. Wye is older and has seen more than Ecks has, although each has experienced heartache and sorrow somewhere alone the line. Wye decided to turn his heartache around and laugh about it. But he draws the line at laughing about what happened to Ecks. That still makes him serious and grim.

Wye and Ecks have a very close relationship, but are not often open about their feelings. Each know the other cares about him. Wye often still thinks of Ecks as a boy; there is a fifteen-year gap between their ages, as corresponding to the actors, but I haven't decided whether their ages are precisely the same as the actors. That would make Ecks 35 and Wye 50. Usually I make the characters several years younger than the actors. I was thinking mainly of dropping the ages by five years, to make Ecks 30 and Wye 45, but I'm not sure. With Ginger and Lou, I left their ages the same as their actors (47 and 41).

I'm not entirely clear on how each thinks of the other in relation to himself. They started as mentor and student, and working partners, and still are, but they progressed beyond just that. Are they like brothers? The age gap isn't enough for it to be father and son. Or are they friends, without really imagining each other to be familial?

I'm actually still not sure how Ginger and Lou think of each other, either, for that matter. It doesn't seem to me that they consider each other as brothers, but more as friends without familial connections. At the same time, they are very insistent that they are family. They have no romantic interest in each other, and even though for most friendships I write it isn't strictly said within the stories that it's that way (albeit it's implied), for Ginger and Lou it's an integral part of their storyline that they are not romantically involved. Ginger identifies as asexual and Lou identifies as straight. Perhaps the best term for their close friendship would be a term that seems to have originated on TV Tropes: platonic life partners. (I really don't care for the term "bromance" and think it looks and sounds really silly.)

Perhaps platonic life partners is the best term for what I'm doing with Ecks and Wye, too. Wye tried marriage, failed (his wife and his best friend ran off together), and doesn't want to try again. Ecks is still open to the idea, but has no immediate plans for it and is content for the time being to just stay bachelors with Wye. Lou is the same way as Ecks in that respect, although he doubts seriously that he will ever marry, unless he finds a girl who will accept Ginger and love him as part of the family. Ginger is not an easy person to get along with, so it seems unlikely. There's always the chance that Lou will find someone, but I would not be documenting that in any of my stories.

I'm toying with an idea where Wye might have known Ginger growing up. They're close to the same age and are likely from the same geographic area. Sometime I may write a fic where Wye and Ecks encounter Ginger and Lou and no one knows what to make of anyone else.

And following along the lines of what I was giggling about in the morning, I also started thinking about the silliness of Chrissy locking Hedley Mattingly in the closet on Mannix. Hedley was playing a fake Scotland Yard inspector in pursuit of Chrissy's Roger Bard. Roger tricked him into going into the closet with reverse psychology and then locked him in. LOL. And then went over to Mannix's place and asked him to turn the guy loose after he had time to get away.

Ecks would never trick Wye into going into a closet, but I started giggling about describing it that way, since the actors are the same. Also, the dialogue after Mannix lets the fake inspector out is priceless.

Mannix: What's going on?
Fake Dustin Rhodes: Obviously I was locked in that closet!
Mannix: How'd it happen?
Fake Dustin Rhodes: Accident. Now if you don't mind, I have urgent business with Roger Bard! **storms out.**

I love how he refuses to admit how he ended up in there. LOL. Of course he would. And I got the giggles imagining Wye ending up in a closet by some other means, and Ecks has to let him out.

One thing is, if I'm going to poke fun at one of them, I'll let the other play straight man. That looks more realistic, and kinder, really. Everyone does some stupid things in life, but if they both did stupid things at once, they would really look like idiots and that isn't my intention even if I want to have a little fun at their expense. So if Wye is clocked by the oar, Ecks will come to help him (and perhaps barely manage to dodge the oar flying at him, too). Same with the closet. But in the haunted house fic, Ecks is the one having strange problems as he's tormented by the ghosts in the house, until he finally has enough and flees out of there screaming and crashes into Wye.

Part of me kind of wants to alter it so Wye is in there with him, but I really wanted to have that exit scene with the crash, which is much funnier if Wye has no idea what's been going on.

I haven't had any time to work on that lately, as I've been busy with my theme set and finishing up that YGO fic (just the epilogue to go, after five years of working on it off and on! Squeeee, I can hardly believe it's really getting done and I've finally managed to tell the story I wanted to so badly!). But hopefully soon now I can get back to the haunted house fic, as I was really having some fun with it.