Chapter Text
Circi Loves Wilfre probably had the most changed from start to finish. It had three distinct drafts, one that was published as a word doc, one that was revised slightly, and then one that was finalized - the version that's currently on ao3. The first major difference was the ending. When I first wrote Circi Loves Wilfre, I started at around midnight and finished at 4:17 am, as you'll see later. It was also written before Drawn to Life: Two Realms released and before I had any real plans for this AU, and that can be seen in the original ending:
In the Afterlife
Athys wondered around with Steven, looking for any lost souls who may have recently died. Appointed as guardians of lost souls by the Creator, their job was about to come to its climax.
“Circi!”
“Wilfre!”
The two souls called out for each other in the white expanse. Athys began to look for the female’s soul, while Steven looked for the male’s. The two were eventually brought together to talk to each other, away from Athys’ and Steven’s influence.
“Wilfre, I had so much to tell you! You can go back!”
“But why would I want to? I’m here with you now!”
“As much as I would love for you to be here with me forever, that can’t happen. Listen, Boss told me some secrets, and now I need to tell them to you.”
“I understand. This is my role now, but you know the Creator would defeat me again.”
“And when that happens, we can be together forever!” Circi began to explain everything that had happened since he passed. The death of Boss. The collection and dispersion of the Artifacts. The importance of Mike in the Raposa World.
“I can’t believe some deformed kid ended up being so important.”
“Well believe it. The pen, the one my mother gave you. Its currently in the ocean. Before I left, I hired someone to retrieve it in case I died. His name is BakiBeard.”
“How can I get it back from him?”
“Well, continuing to call it a pen would be an exaggeration. It’s more of a scepter at this point.”
“Well whatever it is, it’ll let me control my Shadow when I return to the real world.”
“Don’t get ahead of yourself. You’ll need a host if you want—”
“Heather. I can pick Heather.”
“Why her? She’s only a kid, she can’t be of use.”
“She has a pendant. Your mother gave it to her, remember? Plus, he face is already partially Shadow; she’s the only one who can handle the transformation into me.”
“Well, in that case, good luck. I set up a home for you during the time you have. You can figure out what to do there.” Circi and Wilfre stared at each other and hugged. “I love you snookums. Good luck.” With that, Wilfre disappeared back into the world of Mike’s imagination.
“Circi!”
“Circi, where are you!” Circi walked over to where the voice was coming from, only to find Wilfre, surrounded by a cape and a sock.
“Did it work? Is he staying in his coma?”
“No, he isn’t.” Wilfre and Circi turned to face the voice behind them, only to be met by the Mayor. “I’m sorry for treating you so harshly Wilfre. Had I known what I knew now, none of this would have ever happened.”
“It’s ok Mayor, I understand. But what about Mike? If he wakes up, we all die.”
“That’s what I thought too, but as it turns out…” Suddenly, all the Raposa appeared in the afterlife with them. “We all just come here. Happy and peaceful. And when Mike is in a better mental state, the ones of us who are alive will return to the world, while the rest of us will stay here.” Circi and Wilfre looked at each other and Athys and Steven appeared behind the Mayor.
~~You don’t get a formal ending because I’ve been writing this for almost 4 hours now and its 4:17 am and I feel really weird goodnight.~~
As you can see, this was really hastily written, and for a while, this was how the fic ended. I never planned on actually publishing it anywhere, so I never bothered touching it up. I uploaded the Word Doc to the Drawn to life Discord Server and left it at that. Some other notable changes from the drafts to the published version include these segments:
Wilfre’s Lair
“You said you would protect him if I left him with you!” Circi stormed into the Boss’ tower, destroying the things trying to keep her out.
“I never said that. I said that if you didn’t interfere, I would make sure things went correctly. You need to learn to pay better attention to what I say!”
“I don’t need to do anything for you anymore! You let him die! Why should I spare your life?” Circi walked closer to Boss, beginning to shoot shadow at him.
“Because! You can get him back! In fact, I expect you to get him back! But you need to be discrete now that you’re deputy mayor.”
“How do you know about that? It literally just happened!”
“I know more than you think. Now, if you want to get your ‘snookums’ back, you need four items.”
“What are they? Tell me how to find them or else I’ll kill you.” Boss flipped to a page in Wilfre’s Journal, showcasing the four Artifacts of Power.
“Arrange these into a mannequin and draw Wilfre onto it. It’ll bring him back to you and the two of you can be together.”
“This better work, or it’s your head.”
“Just be careful. There’s one person you should be wary of – Mike.”
“The Raposa with weird ears? How important could he possibly be?”
“More important than you know. Let me explain.”
10 minutes later
“So, if we aren’t even real, why am I doing this?”
“Because! You can be real if the Creator keeps Mike under! As long as he never wakes up, then we’re real.”
“…Fine, give me the Crystal Mask and I’ll get this started.” Boss handed the mask over and sent Circi to the Treetop Village to deliver it. “I can’t believe he never even tried to save him! After all the work they did together!”
“Ook! Ook! Little person! What have in hand?” Circi dropped the mask on the ground in front of him and disappeared back to the village.
“He needs to pay for not stepping in. It would have been so easy to kill the Hero and save his life!” Circi knocked Zsasha unconscious and sent him to the Monkey King. “And Mike, I need to find a way to keep him as far away from us as possible…I got it!” Circi walked over to Mike’s house and knocked on the door.
“Hey Mike! Have you heard?”
“Hey…you! I haven’t heard. What’s up?”
“Mari wants me to tell you about a conference that’s coming up soon about engineering. She thinks you might be interested!”
“Well she thinks right! What are the details?”
That last paragraph ended up being completely reworked with "In The Treetop Village," and if my memory serves me right, no humans actually appear in these stories so far, not counting the Blank Slates characters.
“Circi, we need to go, now!” Percate packed her bags frantically and threw suitcases on Circi’s bed. “He’s back.”
“Wait, who’s back, I’m confused.”
“Wilfre. He’s attacking the Village! We need to go! Hurry up and pack!” Percate ran out of the house to go get food. Circi sat up in her bed and grabbed her earring.
“I hope he knows what he’s doing this time.”
1 year later
“No one told you a creepy bedtime story about me? Pity…” Wilfre stood on the Rapoville bridge, remembering the last time he was there. Before him stood a group of Raposa and what seemed to be a Creation Hero. “Boss was right,” he thought to himself. “The Creator really is back. Well, time to get this show on the road.”
“If you insignificant Rapos must know my name, it’s Wilfre. You can forget about rebuilding this village…”
There were a lot of scenes like this in the early drafts of CLW, where the scene changes way too frequently without giving any new or valuable information. As you saw in the segment before this, I also put any passage of time in the scene changes instead of naturally transitioning in the paragraphs. No clue why I thought this was a good idea, but then again, I was probably just incredibly tired and didn't really care. Also, I never ended up writing this down, but I do remember having the idea of making Steven an abusive dad and implying that Wilfre could've been the one to kill him. I ended up deciding against that plot because I felt it wouldn't really add much to the plot, nor would it make sense. Plus, I don't want to write about issues I don't have experience with.
Milfre also wasn't part of the original drafts, as Shadow Lives On didn't exist in my mind yet. However, after Milfre (the r63!Wilfre, not my OC) started to pick up traction in the DTL server, I decided that I would make a fic around her. As a joke, I decided that she would be a time travelling superheroine, and as it turns out, that's exactly what she became. I worked really closely with ls_arkos1334 on SLO, so not much really changed from the drafts to the final publication. In fact, the major change happened after the fic was already published. As I wrote Salem Rose Pt. 1, I realized that I wrote SLO's intro in such a way that it just wouldn't make sense in the context of the plot I had in mind, so I snuck in and changed it. Here's what it was before Molemite and Taz:
“It’s not here. Ok, well, if not here, where else would it be?” The dark figure rummaged through the building, clearing shelves, and dumping drawers. “They must have relocated it somewhere, but where…” Suddenly, the light in the building flipped on.
“Who’s there? I’ve heard you rummaging through here all night!” The old mayor wobbled into the building, her yellow knit shawl covering her frail torso, and her cane echoing throughout the room every time it hit the floor. “I’m blocking the only exit. You can’t hide from me forever!”
“Sorry old lady, but I got somewhere else to be!” The figure appeared behind the woman and wrapped their arm around her neck. “Shhhh…you’re not gonna die ma’am. You’re just gonna sleep for a while. Shhhhhh…” The figure turned off the lights and darted out of the building, running towards the now defunct Galactic Jungle Quarter. “Marxx has his machine that I can borrow. If it’s not here right now, it might still be here…earlier.”
I remember having this plot in mind where an older Mari was exiled to Wilfre's Wasteland for some reason, but I don't remember what my plans were for it. Part of the problem with this intro is that when Salem Rose Pt. 1 is taken into account, this just makes absolutely no sense. Milfre knows where the earring is because she saw this story play out as a 5 year old, not to mention the fact that Mari would still be physically fit in 2042 and that Milfre knows Kamalah built the machines, not Ranger Marxx. After trying to make this work with the other fics, I ended up just giving up and putting the current intro on the fic.