I don't know what, in fic, specifically qualifies as an epic. Thus far, I've done two stories that have gone over 30,000 words (Hindsight and Vera), which felt plenty epic to me. And while I love most of the other stories I've done, and they are all important to me for different reasons, those two epics have a special place in my heart.

I'm not sure if it's the sheer time and effort that I put into them, or that they were more complex than my vignettes, or that because of length alone I was able to put more into them than a shorter fic, to develop things more. But I will say for certain that writing those two fics was extremely rewarding — much more so than 30,000 words worth of vignettes would have been.

Suffice it to say that I would highly recommend attempting epic fic. Sure, there's more work involved. There's research, there's plotting, there's maintaining your characters and your voice through a written marathon. But you learn a lot in the process, hopefully have a ton of fun, and in the end have something truly substantial for your efforts.

So I encourage all you writers out there to at least give it a try.

Let me start this by saying that there is no right way to go about writing an epic. I only know what I've done personally to get it done, and I thought that by sharing, those of you out there considering an epic but not sure where to begin might have something to draw on. So here goes.

Out of the two fics I mentioned earlier, Vera is probably more "epic," due to both its length and the complexity of its plotting. So I'll be using it to illustrate the process I went through to write it. Be warned, the fic has spoilers up through the end of season one, so this likely will too.

1. The bunny. Starting out, I had a very simple concept behind what became a very large fic. After Masquerade and Snowman, I wanted Vaughn to have an intriguing ex to counter Sydney's Noah. I wanted to get them back together, and have angst ensue.

The seed of any epic, I think, can be equally small. And despite the fact that I just extolled on the virtues of writing epic fic, I believe that it's important not to go looking for your epic. It will come, eventually, in that plot bunny that is loose enough that it can grow large. All you'll need to do is start feeding it until it's a full-grown rabbit.

2. Developing the bunny. I think I was fortunate in the timing of my plot bunny for Vera. Because it came at a time when I was busy with school, and wouldn't have been able to start writing it, I had the opportunity to let it ferment in my mind for a long time. In my mind, I began to develop my original character, Vaughn's ex-girlfriend, and she ended up going through quite a few changes before I had someone I was ready to begin the fic with (she started out evil, to name the most significant). I began to envision scenes, and interactions, and things I thought I would enjoy writing into the final fic.

This, to me, is a very important step, and one I might have skipped if I hadn't had the schoolwork holding me back. Please don't skip it yourself. Sitting on an idea and rolling it around in your mind, makes it more mature and more developed when you finally go to write it. If you think of scenes, and you're just itching to write them, do. Scribble them down and develop as many notes on the fic as you can. Research the basics of the science, politics or technology that might serve as a portion of your plot. Begin to string together what would be your overall storyline. Just don't open your word processor and type "Chapter 1" until you've let the idea age for awhile. You'll know your brilliant idea really was brilliant when you've sat on it for a few weeks and still think it's great.

3. Figuring out the lines. Vera had a couple months, at least, to grow and change and develop in my head. And then, finally, I had time to actually write the thing. But I didn't start right away. This was a fic that was going to have a lot of subplots, and a lot of plot period, and the idea of trying to integrate all of those plotlines was making my head spin. At this point, I had a general idea of the characters I wanted to focus on, a basic overarching plot for the whole fic, and a series of scenes I wanted to include (the bar scene in chapter 1.6, for example, as well as the ending). To help with the head spinning, I sat down and just essayed out a few paragraphs on each plot line. The lines were: the overarching action (Red Balloon and the things associated with it); the aftermath of Almost Thirty Years; Vaughn's relationship with his ex, Chris; Vaughn's relationship with Weiss; and Vaughn's relationship with Sydney. Additionally, I knew that I wanted to deal with trust issues between all of these spies, and examine Vaughn's life and his past (particularly his father). And I just sat down and rambled on what I wanted out of each plotline (particularly the ones that weren't so well-developed at this point, as the Chris-Vaughn relationship was).

For example, here's a nice rambly paragraph that was Syd/Vaughn:

"Will was obviously an issue before, more so now. Having real issues adjusting to new realities, Syd feels obligated to help. They might even be pretending to have something, just so she can stay with him, spend time with him. Maybe she has to ask Vaughn to forward Joey's Pizza calls. Vaughn isn't really sure if something's going on between them or not, begins to think there is, changes in her voice, demeanor, etc. Reminds him of Noah. He has realized that he needs to pull away, Hurricane Sydney and all that, still blathering about mom, and eventually he's afraid it's going to get one or the other of them killed. And then you factor Will in, it's time to back away and lick wounds. Into this, you bring Chris. At first, there's just an uneasy tension in the existence of the history. Then Syd starts to figure out what's going on. After we reach a point where Syd has to trust her, then we bust out that big, angsty argument. This is when Syd reveals that there's nothing between her and Will beyond her trying to help her friend cope. So was she just dim, or was she playing him? Then, of course, we have a shifting of the relationship, some healing, in the aftermath."

Determining each individual subplot and what I would need to get out of them gave me a basis from which to build a balanced, well-developed outline. This is a step I would definitely recommend if your fic is going to have any semblance of subplots. I didn't, in fact, do it for Hindsight, as that fic was basically one long, linear plot.

4. Outlining. Once I had all of the plotlines I wanted to incorporate into the fic, it was time to figure out how those were all going to fit into the same story. Developing the fic in my head had ensured that the prologue of Vera and the first chapter, as well as last, were fairly well planned out. I had a point A and a point B — I just had to figure out how to get from one to the other, and where all those other subplots were going to fit in along the way.

Using my overarching action and my crucial scenes as a guide, I began to develop an outline. This meant taking the scenes I already wanted to do and interspersing items from each of my little subplot essays. Eventually, I had drawn things together well enough that I had a workable outline, with all of my chapters planned out and the scenes within each chapter detailed. Many of the scenes came directly from the goals and plans I had established in my subplot essays.

If there's one step I recommend taking in epic writing, it's this one. Flying by the seat of your pants works just fine in vignettes and shorter stories, but if you really want a big, huge, organized story with plenty of subplots, an outline will help immensely in keeping everything straight. I actually started Hindsight without an outline, got part of the way through three chapters and got completely lost. I ended up writing an outline, which put structure and organization back into the fic and back into the process of writing it. Then I went back through and rewrote, starting at the beginning. Suffice it to say that I've learned my lesson, and I'll be starting with an outline next time.

I think the amount of detail you put into your outline really depends on how much you'll need as a writer. For me, some scenes needed to be pretty well detailed, because I hadn't really thought them through. Others I had been planning for weeks or even months, and so the outline for those went something like, "bar scene here." But, at minimum, plan every scene. It will give your fic a structure, and give you the organization that will keep your head from spinning as you get deeper into the fic.

Does that mean your outline is iron-clad? Absolutely not. It will probably change as you write the fic and think of new things, or adjust your characterizations. With an outline, and a plan, though, you'll know what you're changing, exactly, and how those changes will affect the portion of your fic that hasn't yet been written.

5. Diving in. By the time my outline was done for Vera, I had a giant pile of notes, a lengthy (8-plus pages, I believe) outline, and a general idea of the themes and lines I wanted to be sure were interwoven throughout the fic. Which mean it was time to go for it, and I did. And this, I think, is where all of that planning and work beforehand really helped keep the fic from being overwhelming. With an outline and a plan, I didn't have to look at it as this enormous fic I was somehow going to come up with. Instead, I could break down the fic, and work from chapter to chapter, or even scene to scene.

You'll write however you're used to it, and I can't be of much help there. The only, final, parting thing I will say is to know in advance that there will be times you should put the fic down, and times you should pick it back up.

Put it down when a scene is frustrating you, or you're pushing just to get it done, or it's ceased to become fun. A little break might be all you need. I think I took a week or so at some point during Vera and wrote another fic. It changed my focus for awhile, and was refreshing. On the other hand, if you're darting off to write a whole bunch of other little fics, or taking enormous amounts of time off regularly, or procrastinating, that won't help your fic get done. And if you go too long, it's easy to decide never to go back to it. I think writing something of length requires a balance of determination, discipline, organization, and enough self-awareness to know when it's time to take a break (or, lacking that, a good beta who will make you take a break, which is, fortunately, what I had).

-Lara