Grimm Fic: The Price to Be Paid

[dizzydrea]

So, there are spoilers in this post. If you don't want to be spoiled for the season finale, stop reading now. You have been warned.

I didn't get to watch the Grimm season finale live on Friday, so I watched it with my mother at 11:15pm on Saturday night. If you heard a massive explosion coming from the vicinity of the West Coast, that was my head exploding. Holy cow just seems so inadequate, but I'll say it anyway: HOLY COW!

The last two minutes were simply amazing! Nick going all badass Grimm and then [spoiler alert] the woman in black turns out to be his mother. His mother who's supposed to be dead. I mean, I didn't see that coming at all. And of course the muse just had to write about it.

My brain didn't stop chewing on the episode until I sat down to write this story. I don't have any idea why my muse decided to give me this fic as opposed to something else, but I'm not one to complain.

The backstory for this fic was the interesting part of writing it. In this story, Nick is the bastard son of Marcel Renard, the product of an affair between Marcel and Kelly when she was younger. Reed Burkhardt adopted Nick and was the only father Nick knew growing up. And Sean, of course, was also the product of an affair, never acknowledged by his family until they needed him to fulfill their plans.

The reason I settled on this backstory is because I needed a reason for Kelly and Sean to meet. And I wanted there to be a connection between Nick and Sean beyond the deal Kelly struck for his protection. I debated with myself over whether Nick would be Sean's son, a nephew or something else before I finally settled on them being half-brothers.

I also wanted Marie's death to have been orchestrated by someone besides Sean. Taking the responsibility for her death from Sean and putting it with Kelly adds another hurdle to Nick's already-complicated relationship with his mother. And it lets Sean out of being the bad guy. Don't get me wrong, I like the moral ambiguity of the character, but this time I wanted him to be closer to an ally than an enemy.

I also addressed my curiosity as to why Marie never told Nick that he'd one day become a Grimm. That's always something that's niggled at me, and I figure there has to be an explanation that fits into the overall mythology of the show.

Hopefully you enjoyed reading this story as much as I enjoyed writing it. If you have any other questions about why I made the choices I made, please feel free to comment here.

The Price to Be Paid