A Probationary Sentence is an Alice, Girl from the Future Continuation Fic series co-written in Russian by Анна Альба
and AutumnLeaves.
About ten years into post-canon, Rat is finally caught and (at first) sentenced to hang. However, Alice persuades the Intergalactic Police to go for Recruiting the Criminal instead, so he is accepted – on probation – as a police agent, with Alice acting as his partner and parole officer (nobody else volunteered for that job).
The series currently consists of six fanfics:
- A Probationary Sentence
- Before the Jury's Verdict
- Investigation Ethic
- Starship Drabbles
- Disappeared Ships, Carrots, and Everyone Else
- The Impassable Jungle
Tropes featured in the fanfics:
- Addiction Displacement: Since one can't purchase tobacco-containing products on Earth, Rat switches to smoking rosin.
- Ain't Too Proud to Beg: In his letter to Alice in A Probationary Sentence, Rat admits he never thought he would ever beg but right now he is past caring: he is definitely sentenced to an execution, and he desperately wants to live.
- All-Loving Heroine: Alice is a firm believer in the possibility of redemption for everyone. She convinces the InterGPol to give Rat another chance instead of hanging him.
- Anachronic Order: Disappeared Ships, Carrots, and Everyone Else, the fifth entry in the series by In-Universe chronology, was the first one published.
- Berserk Button: Alice is pretty composed most of the time and understands Rat needs time to adjust to a law-abiding life. However, she will not tolerate his (or anyone's, for that matter) distrust towards her.
- Character Overlap: Erliete appears in two other Alice, Girl from the Future fanfics by AutumnLeaves which are otherwise unrelated to this series.
- Crazy Enough to Work: After fuming about the madness of Alice's offer to let Rat join the police, Milodar says that actually, apart from execution, it's the only way to deal with Rat if they don't want a prison break, and that Alice's crazy ideas have already been known to turn out quite viable.
- Dark Mistress: A downplayed example in Erliete. She was Rat's lover, but they were never exclusive or committed: she simply used to be the only woman whose company he was able to bear for more than two hours. Now that he is working at the InterGPol, Rat says that he misses her very rarely if at all.
- Green-Eyed Monster: Alice is very annoyed after learning, in Investigation Ethic, that Rat had a lover – though she can't figure out the exact reason for her annoyance.
- He-Man Woman Hater: Downplayed with Rat. He says he is irritated by women and could never spend more than two hours even close to one, with the only exceptions being Erliete and... never mind. However, his actual behavior shows that he used to be more or less irritated by everyone.
- Hands-On Approach: One of the Ship Tease moments is this. In The Impassable Jungle, Rat teaches Alice to use a machete by putting his hands over hers.
- Ironic Name: The Martian director of A Thousand Horizons is called Win. Thanks to first selling substandard products and then resorting to theft to cover it up, he ends up an infamous loser.
- Meaningful Name:
- Odd Couple: Cheerful and Loved by All galaxy-level heroine and jaded Hated by All former criminal boss.
- The Paranoiac: Rat is extremely suspicious of... well, just about everything in the vicinity, which is a trait characteristic to his constantly-belligerent species.
- Pardon My Klingon: Rat can occasionally utter a Precision F-Strike – in a non-Earth language.
- Polyamory: Erliete is openly polygamous; according to Rat, when it comes to official husbands alone, she never has less than ten at a time.
- She Is Not My Girlfriend: Win thinks Alice secured Rat's job at the InterGPol and became his partner just because she wanted a Shapeshifting Lover. Rat is absolutely outraged by the suggestion and tells him in no uncertain terms they are nothing but friends. Though Win's interpretation of Alice's motives is spectacularly wrong, Rat's assessment of his relationship with her doesn't exactly hit the nail on the head either.
- Ship Tease: Rat and Alice sometimes act a bit more tender with each other than mere workplace partners would usually do.
- Thieves' Cant: During investigation, Rat sometimes lapses into a jargon he was used to in his criminal days, such as referring to the act of turning off the CCTV as "piercing".
- Villain with Good Publicity: Erliete Glatar is a wealthy socialite famous for her generous donations to charity. She is also a brilliant smuggler and embezzler who has evaded justice for years.
- What Does He See in Her?: Or, to be exact, "What did he see in her?" After Alice finds out Rat used to sleep with Erliete in his criminal days, she bitterly wonders why he would even be interested in a vain, stupid hen who isn't even that pretty (Alice's words).
- Woken Up at an Ungodly Hour: Alice wakes up at four in the morning and wants to wrap herself in a blanket and try to fall asleep again, with the narration musing that it's the worst time to wake up, especially with the early December wind howling outside. However, Alice's sleepiness lasts for about two seconds until she realizes she was woken up by an urgent message.
- Worthy Opponent: Even when he thinks he may still be executed, Rat writes to Alice that he is proud of an enemy like her.
