Story Ideas I'm Never Going to Write #1: The Midnight Door
A mashup retelling of "Cinderella" and "The Twelve Dancing Princesses"
Main character is a young woman who is heiress to an estate and fortune that can pass down along the female line. Her father has remarried a woman with two sons of her own. Stepmother resents that Cinderella is going to get everything while she has two sons who get nothing.
Cinderella is in love with a seventh son who's also a soldier. An upcoming ball is going to be Cinderella's last chance to see him before he goes off to war.
Cinderella's father disapproves of this relationship, believing the soldier to be a fortune hunter. To keep Cinderella away from him, he forbids her from going to the ball and the family leaves her behind.
As Cinderella is mourning this, she is visited by a fairy who offers to help, giving her a ballgown and transportation to the ball (as well as magically ensuring that her family doesn't recognize her) so long as she returns by midnight.
Cinderella has a wonderful evening, bids her beloved a fond farewell after promises of everlasting devotion, and returns at the stroke of twelve. She thanks the fairy profusely, wondering how she can ever repay her.
The fairy says she'll think of something.
The next night, at the stroke of midnight, a door appears in Cinderella's room. When Cinderella walks through, she finds herself in a magical garden. The fairy states that the door will appear in Cinderella's room each night, which will allow her to come to the fairy's home and complete a few small tasks to show her gratitude for the help she received in getting to the ball. If Cinderella refuses, this will be proof that she is a wicked, ungrateful child deserving of magical punishment.
Cinderella has no choice but to agree. The door appears each night, and Cinderella spends each night completing tasks for the fairy--sometimes ordinary cleaning or gardening tasks that she doesn't want to waste magic on, sometimes on quests into the magical wilds to find items that are best retrieved by a pure-hearted human. Sometimes, the fairy offers magical help with these tasks, which only gives Cinderella more debt to work off.
This leaves Cinderella exhausted during the daytime, and eventually, her family notices. The stepmother thinks that this is proof that Cinderella is living a pampered, worthless lifestyle, and she convinces her husband that Cinderella needs to take up more responsibilities if she wants to live up to her role as heiress to the estate.
Cinderella tries not going through the door a few times, but time always stays frozen at the stroke of midnight until she goes through the door.
Cinderella's father figures out that she's going somewhere at night, but since the magic keeps everyone in the house asleep while she's gone, and keeps her from telling anyone the truth, he's unable to figure it out.
He recruits the help of some eligible young men in the area (hoping that this will also help her forget about the soldier and agree to marry a suitable man). Since the bonds of marriage are stronger than the bonds of gratitude that bind Cinderella to the fairy's service, the fairy gets worried that she might lose the best servant she's ever had, so she takes the precaution of stealing away the young men who try to solve the mystery, turning them to stone, and leaving them as statues in her garden.
The fairy has a brother who eventually comes by and learns about the situation. The brother doesn't approve of his sister's cruelty in general (which is why he interacts with her as little as possible), and he has a sympathy for humans after spending a portion of his young life as a changeling. He learns that his sister has no intention of ever allowing Cinderella to work off the debt, and he tries to force her to set Cinderella (and the stone suitors) free.
The sister is enraged, and with her stronger magic, she casts her brother out into the human world, leaving him weak and nearly powerless .
He's in this weakened state when a soldier comes by and offers help. Taking food from a human will leave the fairy in a debt to him similar to the one that binds Cinderella to his sister's service, but he's too weak to care much.
A conversation with the soldier reveals that he's actually Cinderella's sweetheart, newly returned from the war. The fairy is unable to directly tell him what's happening to Cinderella, but since he's now bound to the soldier's service, it is totally legal for him to set up a situation where the soldier can figure out what's going on for himself.
The fairy gives the soldier an invisibility cloak, and advises him to go to Cinderella's father and offer to solve the mystery. The father figures that this is a win-win situation--either the soldier solves the mystery and they resolve the situation that's harming Cinderella and stealing away these young men, or the soldier will get stolen away and her father won't have to worry about this unsuitable suitor chasing after her.
The cloak and the fairy bound to his service protect the soldier from any detection by the sister's magic, and he follows Cinderella and figures out what's going on. They could break Cinderella's bond of service by getting married, but Cinderella refuses to free herself until she can free all the innocent men who've been caught up in this.
The three of them figure out a way to save the suitors and defeat the evil fairy, Cinderella's father learns the truth and agrees to let Cinderella marry her true love, and everyone lives happily ever after.
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i didnt post it on here but i talked about it on discord but au where ariane and elster do make it back from the penrose mission not for any of the reasons people usually want that but because i think by that point they'd be so dangerously codependent and weird they literally could not function in normal society and i think that's a fun idea
yknow stuff like ariane finds herself watching those same movies with elster that they did on the ship still because it's the only thing that feels familiar and safe anymore because oh wait the regular world has a LOT of stuff and now it's a sensory nightmare and i thought i wanted this but now its too much too fast and nothing makes sense now
ariane not responding when people other than elster talk to her and staring right through them because she'd gotten so used to hallucinating family members near the end she just assumes that's what's happening now so she doesn't even bother replying
elster doing everything for her and being unable to be separated from her for very long before she starts to freak out and worry something bad has happened to her. plus ariane being physically unable to care for herself at that point anyway from the frostbite she definitely has or whatever other injuries you want to give her.
neither one of them ever saying something like "were you talking to -me-?" it's always "were you talking to -us-?"
idk i just like to give them problems <3
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i can’t really put into words, but every time i see some tradwife shit or even see someone parodying it, the comments are always like “ummmm actually this seems fun i would love this” “why did we ever stop this” “feminists ruined everything” from young women i always feel like. ive never talked to an older or elderly woman who recalls that shit fondly, and it feels so disrespectful to them to sit on TikTok and rage that they ruined your life by like. making sure you didn’t have to get financially abused by some random man 😭
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WIP FRIDAY
I apologize for getting this out two days late, I’ve been busy with lots of packing and events! But I have a little reprieve, so I wanted to post another WIP; this one is from Heart Full, Bowl Empty.
BE AWARE THAT THIS SEGMENT INVOLVES A CONVERSATION REVOLVING AROUND UNWILLING BUT INTENTIONAL STARVATION. I know there are people who say they can’t read this fic because of themes like this, so be aware of this before reading this WIP!!
I included this snippet in today’s WIP because I have like three versions of the entire segment this snippet is from. I feel like it’s a really important segment with a really important conversation, and I’ve had a hard time balancing all the emotions the way I want to between Ingo and Akari, with frustration, sadness, anger, and empathy, to realistically get them to the resolution I want at the end of it.
The final version will probably only include a few parts from this particular segment.
Enjoy!!
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“I knew it! You’re doing it again!” Akari’s eyebrows scrunched, trying to understand through the frustration. “You said you wouldn’t!”
“Circumstances will improve soon.” Clearly done with the conversation, that was all Ingo said, but it was confession enough that he had fallen back on his word. Shame contaminated his voice, but if there was any regret, he hid it well.
“No, it won’t!” They were not even half-way through winter yet. “And you know it won’t!”
Ingo said nothing as the kits carefully moved around his slumped form, finding comfortable places to settle around him. She didn’t know if he intended to snuff the conversation out with angered silence, or if he was just too exhausted to care about arguing with her anymore. If it wasn’t for his small occasional signs of movement or acknowledgement, she’d think he was actually sleeping.
Akari carefully stepped into the nesting layers, moving to sit down next to Ingo. She settled with her back against the cavern wall, pulling her knees close as a few kits shuffled around to accommodate her. “You know I’m right.”
Huffing out an irritated sigh and nothing more, it didn’t seem like Ingo had any intentions to engage with her argument anymore.
“You couldn’t even pull yourself up over the ridge,” She prodded at him again, trying to motivate more conversation out of him. “I had to help you!”
“There are many, many factors that go into that.” A reluctant answer, perhaps a reflexive attempt to quell her worry; Ingo feebly rubbed his wrapped hand, almost as a display for his excuse.
“I’ve seen you do more when you’ve been hurt worse.” Akari retorted, a little softer now but still cold.
Ingo’s eyes remained closed, though his hardened expression implied that it came across as more accusatory than she’d intended. But perhaps it was precisely the time to be accusatory.
“Ingo, you’re so tired all the time now – you stopped coming to the training grounds because you just can’t make the trips all the time anymore! And you’re sleeping so much more than you used to, and it’s like you’re always hungry all the time, even though all I see you doing anymore is gathering food!” Akari’s voice grew more jagged as she continued to jab at him, entirely uninterrupted.
It was getting difficult. With Ingo’s tunic still sopping by the bucket, still somewhat red from the exhausted effort of washing out the blood, it could not hide the ribs that pressed out just a little bit more, or help fill out what the waistline had lost under the loosening belt. The abject dread of directly acknowledging that was too much.
“And- and look! You aren’t even willing to hold a conversation with me anymore, and I don’t know if it’s because you just won’t, or because you can’t!” The kits shifted uncomfortably as Akari retreated back into her own frustration instead. “People think you’re sick, Ingo! They’re asking me about you! What are you doing?”
The exhausted man remained where he laid in the nesting material, only moving his hands to rub at his face and sigh — a deep, forced sigh that swelled his side before releasing. Akari almost didn’t think he’d answer her, but with some effort, he propped himself up first onto his elbows, then slumped forward. The teen watched him run shaky fingers through his hair as he sat next to her.
“…I don’t know what I should do.” The guilt. The weary guilt cracked his voice and tore Akari’s anger down to heartache.
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