penguinmerchant

[penguinmerchant]

Chapters: 1/1, 7798 words

Rating: Mature Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Fandom: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat Relationship: Damen/Laurent Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Manhandling, Kidnapping, Politics, Secret Relationship, Romance, A beautiful two weeks in the woods

In the doorway stood a man, lithe and deadly, who looked like a character out of a storybook. He was dressed entirely in black, even his hair and face covered; only a small slit revealed his eyes, a deep extraordinary blue, and a strip of pale skin. In one hand he held a sword. The gleam of lamplight off his blade seemed to overwhelm the room. For a moment everyone stood in frozen shock, looking at this interloper.

My second Fandom Trumps Hate gift fic, this one for @folfar's generous donation to MECA!

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Zero's Fic Binding - Archive Anthology - Stony Volume 1

A collection of fics all written by Areiton (@areiton)

let me hear (your battle cry) | chains around my daemons | monsters of sea & sky | inspired | muse

Fandom: Marvel

Ship: Steve Rogers / Tony Stark

Start Date: 10/07/24

End Date: 11/25/24

Pages: 355

First Archive Anthology book. This is a collection of 5 of my favorite Arei Stony fics. They are all also from 2021, which I did not mean to do but just so happen to realize as I was typesetting. I wanted to start this proof of concept project with someone who I A) knew and B) would be cool with me using their fics as a test.

So, the cover. She's beautiful. For the AA series, I want the covers to be the uniform - so every Stony book will copy this cover type, but the colors will shift to blue and white for Vol 2, and then back to red and gold for Vol 3. I sketched out the Iron Man that I wanted myself and made an SVG for the first time, leave me alone, adding the swoosh marks to him and to Steve's shield. I wanted a simple, classic looking font for a universal text title. This book series wont have quotes on the back so instead I have a full spread of the graphic. Tony's the icon on the spine this time - and I think he looks great~

Ah! The side shot. I used my guillotine for the first time - so the chop on this bitch is CHRISP. Headband is gold and handstitched. The whole side profile? Crispy like fall leaves.

Title page shots. A TOC (that I only notices was a little low after I had printed both copies) with a new and customized copyright page. I looked at a bunch of pages in the Renegade Bindery discord and compiled something that felt right AND specific to this project going forward.

Typesetting this was not…bad. It did take a while while I worked out fonts and overall ideas, but ones I had them I was able to fly through. There are quite a few here, so lets take a peak...

I kept Let me hear a little simple - with more medieval drop caps and banner headers. This fic is the only one with a nontypical drop caps - but with how simple the titles were I wanted a little bit more. I also - as per my standard - did this fic first, and then started to dig down and get more complicated the further in I got.

Chains has a little more flavor - each chapter has a splash of color. Originally I had hyper detailed headers for this fic, but they just look like SO MUCH, and I couldn't figure out a way to make them look uniform with the different daemons I was showcasing. Scaling back with a flash of color, but not to much, feels much better for this fic. Also realized that I need to figure out how to trim to what my printer considerers a 'full page'.

mos&s has a little more character for the headers, where I pull peace out from each chapter to add to the title. This chapter header - and the last one - are my favorite. I used hand drawn lines to highlight under each chapter title, and pulled a color for the splash image to match with both that line and the matching line breaks in the chapters.

inspired is told from Tony's point of view - so I kept the chapter titles black and white, with harder linework and a focused idea from in each of the chapters.

In contrast, muse is told from Steve's POV - so every chapter header is an explosion of color. They're all based on a variety of art mediums - spray paint, stamp art, charcoal, oil pints, anything I could find that I remember ever doing myself. I also colored each of the drop caps a contrasting color to what the header art is.

All in all, I'm very happy with how this came out. This is the blueprint I'll use for any of my Anthology books going forward. I already have at least three more in mind for Stony specifically, and then a collection of Raven Boys and Good Omens ones that are not long enough to be a book by themselves but I still want THEM ON MY SHELVES.

Thank you again Arei - your wonderful <3 Go read Arei's fics ASAP!

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BHR 2

Okay so this stands for Black Holes and Revelations 2, which is (not surprisingly, given the name) a sequel! The premise is just basically that Laurent's brothers are worried about him because he's been acting strangely, but Laurent is just wound up because Damen's on a job that's really dangerous.

Here's a snippet. This is Laurent remembering the first time he and Damen kissed--they're hiding from enemies and Damen has just kissed Laurent to keep them from being discovered.

"Are you going to kill me?” “Almost certainly,” Laurent said, frowning. And it wasn’t a completely untruthful statement, because he knew the way his finger itched against the trigger, knew how much he wanted to press up against it—it would only take the slightest amount of pressure to set off, just a whisper, and it called to him���and he could imagine how the energy would feel in his hands when it came shooting out of the other end, making a mess of everything. He had fantasized about finally getting one up on Damianos for so long now and he desperately wanted to close this chapter between the two of them for good.  But he had never felt anything like what Damen had just done to him. Oh, he had been kissed before, sometimes of his own choosing and sometimes not, but either way it had never sparked any sort of pleasurable response in him. It was clinical, it was slightly messy and usually wet and it was, under the best circumstances, a prelude to something that was only slightly more enjoyable than what preceded it. He hadn’t known it could be like this. He hadn’t known that it was possible to feel dizzy from just one kiss, hadn’t known that there was something besides being shot at by a herd of angry Vaskians that could make his heart beat this fast, that evading blaster fire in space and smuggling illegal materials past watchful sentries wasn’t the only thing in the galaxy that felt this dangerous. He dug the blaster just a little harder into Damen’s ribs, and the smile on Damen’s face became feral, wild, and Laurent began to realize that there were others ways besides the obvious in which he wanted to see Damen powerless, defenseless, at his mercy, and when he leaned forward, just slightly, Damen was there to catch the movement—

This is 95% done. It's been sitting nearly finished in my drafts for like, two years. I just can't figure out how to end it! Maybe someday it'll see the light of day.

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🐛"I think it's time that he moves out..." (I kinda imagine Nicaise still annoying Damen for fun even when he's almost an adult, hehe.)

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The fork incident ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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Hey, I am really sad that your fic ends next Monday. I was always waiting impatiently for the update.

Thanks alot for the wonderful time.

This is so sweet! I had so much fun sharing this story with you all, it is very bittersweet that it's going to be over soon. But I'm glad that it's been a fun journey, and I can't wait to share what else I've been working on! 😊

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it’s time. tell me ur favorite book you read in 2024. also least favorite if you’ve got one!

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can i ask for a snippet of "spy"?

This is another short one! The premise was very much spy v spy (err--except without all the deaths) and a lot of that energy between them got put into Holding Out For a Hero.

This might be considerably longer than a snippet, but I thought it was fun.

“I’ve got it handled. Trust me,” Damen whispers, slipping into the next room. He quiets as he takes up space in front of the smallest painting and plants himself there, waiting for the next approach of his target. This time when the man approaches the angry huffs have matured into muttered curses, spoken just softly enough that Damen can’t quite make out any particular words, but he has the idea that they wouldn’t be very favorable to him if he could. And so he turns, regarding the man with surprise, as if he’s never seen him before in his life, like he hasn’t just followed him through four rooms of the Louvre, like they haven’t been tracking him through the city for the last three hours. “I’m sorry?” Damen says as politely as he can muster, as if the man had been doing nothing more than trying valiantly, shyly, to get his attention. “You’re sorry?” the man repeats incredulously, whirling on Damen like he’s getting ready for a fight. “You act like an animal and all you can say is sorry?  “I'm…very sorry?” “Fuck off.” “That's not very nice.”  “Neither is blocking all the best paintings with your gigantic body like you’re auditioning for the world’s most annoying curtain.” “Now I'm starting to feel offended.” “Oh, so you do have a brain cell after all.”

And then there's a lot of them chasing each other through Paris, with sleights of hand and trading their McGuffin back and forth and Damen being sure he's cornered Laurent only to watch him wave as the train pulls out of the station. Maybe if I watch a great spy movie to motivate me I'll pick this one back up!

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Your list is full of INTRIGUING words!!!! Can I hear some more about matchbreaker and praise 👀 👀 👀

Okay so praise is just what it sounds like 😂 Damen with a praise kink. Didn't get too far on this one because after I started it I found The Tall Kingdom I Surround and basically that fic did everything I wanted to do, and it did it so well, with such great characterization that I totally lost interest in writing anything myself. Maybe someday I'll come back to it...I'm sure the fandom could always use more fics of Damen being down bad for Laurent.

Matchbreaker is my longest wip right now. Basically the premise is that it's a retelling of Emma except since it's Laurent he breaks couples up instead of getting them together. 😂 I thought it was funny. Here's a snippet of dialogue.

“First of all,” Laurent said, his voice tight, controlled in a way that made both Auguste and Damen wince, “true love doesn’t exist. The entire concept is just a psychological defense mechanism that people use to make themselves feel better about the bad choices they make, and to justify why they stay with people who make them miserable.” “Laurent—” Damen started. “And secondly,” Laurent said, turning a harsh glare on Damen, “if true love did exist, then breaking up these couples would hardly be anything except a funny anecdote to them, wouldn’t it? Because if it were true, nothing I could do or say would be enough to stop them from being together.” “No one can be expected to weather a force of nature like you,” Damen murmured. “And I know the two of you love to harp on the fact that a lot of my friends end up breaking up with their partners—” “They’re not friends, they’re targets,” Auguste muttered. “—but did you ever stop to think that maybe I’m actually encouraging true love? Do you honestly think that Pallas would still be with what's his face if I hadn’t interfered on Lazar’s behalf? And now those two have been together for, what. Two years?”

So yeah! That's that! Damen is, of course, the Mr. Knightley character, while Auguste has taken over the father role. And...everything else doesn't quite line up perfectly. But that's the jist of it!

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Space dementia?

Ooh that's my prequel to Black Holes and Revelations! It was going to be a 5+1 story, almost all porn (which is most of the reason why it never happened) about the first few times Damen and Laurent stopped trying to kill each other and started making out instead 😂

This only has like 50 words in it, it's basically just an outline. I realized I didn't quite hate myself enough to write that many sex scenes.

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WIP game

Rules: In a new post, post the names of all the files in your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. Let people send you an ask with the title that most intrigues them and then post a little snippet of it or tell them something about it!

Thanks for tagging me @wrenaspun! This might be a mistake to share since I have zero intention of ever finishing some of these, but hey! It's always fun to talk about.

Spar

Space dementia

blind date

pirate story

post apocalypse

matchbreaker

BHR 2

Masked ball

spies

batfam

praise

long way small angry laurent

tattoo

Oh god, there's so many (also many of these have multiple drafts, for instance I have matchbreaker 1, 2, and 3) my drafts are a mess ha ha! Anyway I'll share little snippets of these if anyone wants them, some of these drafts are like 20k and some are just 20, but yeah. Just ask!

Not tagging anyone specifically, but if you write fanfic (and especially if you write Capri!) I want to see your list tooooo

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you're not innocent.

oh I'M not innocent? i never did anything. i'm not the one writing tetris sex manifestos all over a perfectly legitimate public survey. i bet you sickos want me to draw the tetrimino gijinkas more. you're all sitting there thinking things like 'i wish topsy would draw I/T toxic yaoi and post it' as if that's a normal thing to think. well FINE

this is insane. you people are all insane

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Alright. I'm calling it done before it kills me. This is Second Head. It's an Art Book containing instances of the phrase "second head" in fanfics found on AO3. I'll explain much, MUCH more in the cut.

So when I say 'art book', I mean this is an intrinsic piece. I have no motivations aside from personal amusement and interest in outcome. A lot of money was lost/transmuted into free frustration in this project and I have no claims, obviously. I will prolly be the only person alive to read this.

THAT SAID. I have noticed in my years reading fanfic, there's a few linguistic shibboleths that arise in authors who also have experience in the mines. I think there's not a soul alive who hadn't wandered across a 'ministrations' when reading Narutos oral sexing. There's- Hold on. Here's some pix.

There's an impulse, I think, to in-group even when performing a creative act. A feeling that there are certain ways one Should go about the act, by virtue of seeing it performed that way. Especially so when 'training' at the act is often just Doing. Double Dog Especially when the act is exclusively for oneself with very little oversight. Which is to say, we make what we see and we make what we think we should make. At least, at first.

Now, I've been noticing 'grew a second head' (to insinuate surprise) in fanfic for some time. I've never seen it used Outside of fanfic. That may speak to my own bad habits but it got me curious. So a friend and myself downloaded a mirror of AO3 from July of 2024. He did some code- Stuff to scan the mirror for "second head" and of the ~13 million works, ~70k (English) results were returned. That's a rounding error, honestly, but Far FAR more than I expected.

This book is 401 such examples that I personally selected for a variety of reasons. The number itself was arbitrarily chosen. Each page is separate fic, the roughly 300 words around our key phrase.

I don't think repetition or mirroring is a negative thing. I think it's quite charming. Nor do I think it's a sign of a 'bad' artist or 'bad' art. I think it's a signifier of personhood, of belonging, of enthusiasm. Of culture shared and wishing to share. I think it's real sweet. I always smile when I catch a 'grown a second head' in a work.

And it's really fucking funny when it's John Sherlock getting a sloppy toppy. Bless.

Edit: Fixed a very VERY funny error.

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🩸

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I will never get tired of posting these so I'm sorry (not sorry) but here is an amazing colored version of the fanart of Damen and Laurent! It's beautiful, I love the red on Damen, the blue on Laurent, the expression on Damen's face, the way Laurent is holding the pen---it's all fantastic! I love the line drawing but the color just pops. It's so amazing!

Non twitter image under the cut

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There is fanart now? Of my story? I honestly never thought this would happen and for it to be seriously, legitimately like the best thing I've ever seen? It's gorgeous, right? Laurent's eyes are shining just like I imagined they would. Damen's look with that sword across his shoulder---it's too perfect. The Writing looks exactly like I'd imagine Laurent would see it. I just...I don't even know what to say. It's so amazing.