Exactly! The reason why I sent it to this friend was because it was inspired by an idea of theirs, but it was clear from the beginning that it was going into a different direction. Ah, well...

I'd love a beta with a light touch - as I'm not a native speaker, I'll never completely certain about English grammar, which is more confusing than the timeline in the Whoniverse, and *that* is saying a lot. But people just don't seem to be able to deal with my writing. Some of my Torchwood stories, like "Atlantis Café", have been abandoned by four (!) beta readers already. They volunteered, then either dropped off the face of Earth after one chapter, or I never heard of them again at all. I've made similar experiences in other fandoms. Seems I have bad luck with betas.

I wouldn't be bothered by posting stuff un-betaed if I didn't get picked b/c of my grammar repeatedly. The even more annyoing fact is that a lot of poorly written, mediocre crap produced by native speakers is a lot worse grammatically, even with betas, and they never got bothered because of it. Life is unjust, and right now, I feel terribly sorry for myself. ;))