#i could write dozens of ficlets out of this

[moonchildeath]

i am so normal about this.

( source )

[manchasama]

You know, historically I did most of my writing as random ficlets. Maybe that is why these are a bit easier? Either way, feeling out characterizations, these are fun to do!

--

"What are you doing?"

Ingo didn't move from where he was looking down at the brown…circles in front of him. "Baking," he said. He didn't have to look to sense Emmet's stare. "…Theoretically," he conceded with a sigh.

Emmet poked one of the circles. It dented under his finger, but bounced back into shape instantly. "It doesn't look bad," he said. He poked the circle again, fascinated at its texture.

"While that means a lot coming from you, unfortunately the taste leaves much to be desired." Ingo's frown pulled deeper. "They taste bad. I don't understand how the same ingredients can come out so wrong!"

Emmet leaned over so he could look Ingo in the face. His smile had a hint of teasing humor in it. "It looks like you tried to bake donuts?"

Ingo wasn't listening. "I have looked at dozens of recipes! I measured everything exactly so." He gestured ferociously toward the pile of used dishes soaking in the sink. "Baking is supposed to be easy." He threw his hands up, exasperation written in every line of his body. "You merely need to follow the directions, with the exact measurements. I thought I could do this!"

"Hmmmmm," Emmet drawled, looking entirely unsympathetic. "Why did you bake them? Aren't donuts fried?"

Ingo grimaced, half turned away as if that would save him from his brother's attention. "…I merely wanted it to be a bit…healthier."

"Uh huh," Emmet said. "And how may donuts have you snuck behind my back this week?"

"That is NOT why I did it!" Ingo protested loudly.

Emmet cackled, covering his ears dramatically from the sudden volume. "That is a confession if ever I heard one!"

All Ingo could do was splutter protests that fell on deaf ears. Emmet was far too delighted in catching Ingo out on his sweet tooth. Why were younger brothers so infuriating?

"If you are quite finished," Ingo said stiffly, "I have to clean up this mess." Emmet's smile still reached from ear to ear, his face rosy from his laughter. He reached out to poke one of the donuts again, and Ingo swatted at his hand. "Stop that! I need to wrap them properly, and I don't need your fingerprints all over them."

"Wrap them?" Emmet asked, eyeing Ingo as he picked up the plate of pastries. "Ingo, you are not planning on eating those?"

"Of course I am," Ingo sighed. "Just because they aren't ideal, doesn't mean I should waste food."

"Oh no you don't." Emmet swiped the plate of 'donuts' from Ingo's hand. "This is now a treat for Garbador!"

"But—" Ingo tried to protest.

"Nope!" Emmet popped the word in his mouth. "You can learn from your mistake. You do not need to force yourself to suffer because of it."

"Emmet…" Ingo would deny to his dying day the whine in his voice. "All I have learned is that donuts should not be baked!"

Emmet gave a satisfied nod. "And that is a valuable lesson."

They stared at each other silently. Then Ingo lunged, and Emmet turned and fled out the kitchen before Ingo could catch him.

"Emmet!" Ingo bellowed, charging recklessly after his brother.

"Garbador! I have a treat! Quick!" Emmet hollered, thumping against the walls as he took corners at speed. The real miracle of the day was the fact that he kept all of the donuts on the plate. At least until Ingo tackled him and the whole thing went tumbling across the floor.

Garbador did indeed enjoy her treat.

[magniloquent-raven]

Harringrove 😬🧸 and 💦 (since the breakup)

hey! 🥰 yall are getting tiny ficlets instead of blurbs because i have no self control lmfao especially when it comes to writing billy and his feelings

😬 confessing their feelings + 🧸 exes with feelings + 💦 sleeping together for the first time

**

He's just getting this out of his system.

That's what Billy keeps telling himself.

It's a closure thing.

He can get one last orgasm from Steve, knowing it'll be the last. He can savor it, memorialize it, commit every bead of sweat and tiny sound to memory, and then move on knowing he got everything he could from whatever this thing between them was.

Last time was a quickie in the backroom of Family Video, and Billy left before either of them said a word to each other, if he'd known...

He digs blunt fingertips into Steve's sweat-slick back. They can't get any closer, but he tries anyway, ignoring the sting of future rugburn forming on his chest where Steve's carpet of hair has been rubbing against his skin.

"Billy..." Steve says, warm and close, his nose brushing Billy's temple. He sounds fond and teasing, like he knows—

He knows nothing. There's nothing to know.

Billy turns his head, licking into Steve's mouth and stopping any dumb shit from coming out of it.

It's a bad distraction. Not because it doesn't work, Steve kisses him back with enthusiasm, but because it hurts. Billy's chest cracks open, and a terrible, wounded noise rips from his throat.

It must startle Steve. He jerks away, eyes going wide, but stopping is even worse than starting, because the second Billy's lips aren't occupied he gasps—

"I love you."

Steve goes very still.

Regret hits Billy like a bag of bricks. He's buried under it, choking on the dust. He needs out. Away. The wall he tried to build collapsed on him and he can't let Steve see the wreckage.

He shoves Steve off him and scurries back in one clumsy movement, panic making his limbs heavy, his fingers numb.

Steve catches his wrist. "Wait."

"Let go."

"You said you didn't want...y'know."

"I don't."

"So you don't want me to tell you I love you too?"

It's Billy's turn to freeze. Tears prickle at his eyes. "No," he says quietly.

There's a determined, defiant tilt to Steve's chin. "Well, too bad. Because I do."

A dozen retorts rattle Billy's teeth, and he grinds molars, trying to swallow them back. He doesn't know what he's supposed to say right now, but he knows nothing that's coming to mind should come out of his mouth.

"Billy." His voice is doing that soft, mushy thing again, and he scoots closer, sheets wrinkling around his bare legs. "I love you."

It hurts. Like it hurt when Steve kissed him. Like it hurt the first time he did something stupidly romantic for Billy, out of the blue, laced their fingers together while they were sharing a cigarette at the quarry. They were sitting on the hood of Steve's car, bathed in sunset orange, and Billy couldn't stand how picturesque it all was.

He takes Billy's hand again now, slipping down his wrist into his palm. This time Billy lets him.

💕tag list @spreckle @growup-thatbeautiful @prettyboy-like-you @suddenlyinlove💕

[infiniteeight8]

Locked Away by R. City -- Tony asking Stephen if he'd still love him if Tony lost everything? (kind of like 'would you still love me if I was a worm' but a billionaire superhero genius)

I love your fics btw!! I love your writing :)

Thanks so much! 😀  

I really wanted to lean on the whole 14 million futures thing for Stephen’s answer here, but I feel like I’ve leaned on those futures a lot lately, so I decided to challenge myself to have Stephen answer in a different way.

“Rabkin” is the surname of an OC invented for this ficlet.

-

They’ve changed out of their tuxedos and are curled up on the couch together, hot drinks in hand—coffee for Tony, although at this time of night it’s mostly cream, and spiced apple cider for Stephen—when Tony brings it up.

His voice is a little quiet. “Sometimes I wonder, you know.”

“Wonder what?” Stephen asks idly, tangling his fingers with Tony’s and stroking his hand with one thumb.

“What Rabkin said. If anyone would still love me if I wasn’t, you know,” Tony waves a hand. “Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist.”

Stephen frowns. “Rabkin is a jealous asshole whose judgment is worth less than toilet paper, why would you listen to him?”

“I’m not,” Tony says. He leans against the back of the couch, gaze tracing Stephen’s features. “But he’s hardly the only one who says it. So I wonder sometimes. How would I know? What I have, I’ve always had. No one’s ever been able to form an opinion of me without those things in play. So how can I be sure that if I lost it all, you’d still feel the same?”

This is far more than an idle question. Stephen takes a moment to put his thoughts in order, hoping that will lend weight to his reply. “You can be sure,” he says, “because the things I love about you have nothing to do with any of that.” Tony starts to speak—to argue, probably—but as much as Stephen enjoys arguing with Tony, he’s not finished. He placed a gentle finger on Tony’s lips, stilling the words. “I did lose everything once. Among other things, it taught me a very different way of evaluating people. I love that you’re the kind of man who stowed away on an alien ship with no guarantee of return to help someone you’d just met. I love that, despite considerable friction between us, you were worried about me when I came out of my visions of the future. I love that, when told you have a one in fourteen million chance to save the universe, you didn’t hesitate to go for it.” 

Stephen let his finger slip away from Tony’s lips, clasping their hands together instead, and went on. “I love that you learned therapeutic massage so that you could help with my hands. I love that you find arguing just as fun as I do. I love that you’re generous with your friends even though being that way has bitten you on the ass a dozen times.” Tony snorts, and Stephen smiles. “I love your curiosity, and your sense of humor, and—”

“You’re going to give me a big head here,” Tony interrupts, and if his voice is a little rough, Stephen isn’t going to mention it.

“Not possible,” Stephen said, letting the corner of his mouth curl up. “Your head reached maximum size a long time ago. I should know, I was a neurosurgeon.”

Tony breaks into laughter at that. He leans in and kisses Stephen, the caress messy and disjointed because they’re both still chuckling. “Thank you,” Tony murmurs as it tails off, their lips still brushing.

“Any time,” Stephen returns warmly.

[winter-parrot]

An Inconvenient Time

for day 1 of @tododekuweek. Prompt: But seventeen is an inconvenient time to fall in love. -- Gayle Forman. I definitey did not write anything ahead of time, but I had this idea as soon as I saw the prompt, so have this strange little ficlet I wrote in like an hour.

--------

The first day of third year comes and goes, almost disorientingly normal. Iida-kun is the first to arrive in class, as always. Kacchan is loud and rude and uncompromising, as always. Nedzu-sensei holds a school-wide orientation that Aizawa-sensei skips, as always. 

In a strange way, it almost feels like stepping through a portal two years into the past. If they didn’t move like soldiers, ready to run or attack or defend at half a moment’s notice. If their eyes didn’t wander constantly, scanning for threats or exits or civilians in danger. If they weren’t all bearing scars or missing limbs or both.

Midoriya Izuku is seventeen. He’s a lowercase-h hero of the War before he’s ever an uppercase-H Pro Hero, license and all. He’s a household name in his own right. He’s officially unranked, because he’s not officially a Hero, but every magazine and website and hero forum polls puts him in the Top 25, minimum. 

So seventeen is an inconvenient time to fall in love. 

The problem is, Izuku’s heart never got the memo. It staggers and stutters and trips over itself, every time he sees Shouto-kun. Blood rushes to warm his cheeks with alarming regularity, whenever Shouto-kun is near. His traitorous eyes find Shouto-kun in every room, in every crowd, in every Xitter feed video. 

Shouto-kun is always beautiful, always mesmerizing. Loose and comfortable in his body and himself, in a way he never was at fifteen and scared and bitter. Effortlessly charming when he smiles, or talks easily about his mother and siblings, or fails to understand jokes even now. Irresistible in the powerful competence of his body, and in the solid, steady weight of his presence, and even in the undignified way he snorts with uncontrolled laughter. It’s a lost cause for Izuku, long before he tries and fails to stop staring, stop wanting, stop daydreaming. He thinks he has loved Shouto-kun for a long time already. He thinks, perhaps, that he has loved Shouto-kun all along. 

But seventeen is an inconvenient time to fall in love.

The War may be over, but the world doesn’t get to go back to normal so easily. There are dozens of reckonings big and small still to be faced, dozens of problems still to be solved, dozens of institutions still to be rebuilt. 

And there are final exams still to be passed. Being war heroes doesn’t grant them any exemptions in Aizawa-sensei’s eyes, even if the man fought for and with and along them, nearly to the point of his death and theirs. If anything, he’s stricter on them than ever—because the world beyond is unstable. Because he knows the heights they can reach. 

There isn’t time for things like love and heartache. Not when there’s an entire country out there that still needs their help. 

------------

Graduation Day dawns bright and clear and chilly. A few early sakura blossoms flutter under the morning sun, pale-pink and joyful. 

Midoriya Izuku is eighteen. He’s the Number 12 Hero in all of Japan. He’s surrounded by all the up-and-coming Heroes of his generation, all of them in the Top 50. The current Number 1 Hero mingles easily with them like the old friend he’s become. The former Number 1 Hero is all but crying as he stands next to his mother, snapping endless pictures. 

And in his arms, bright and proud and beautiful, he holds the Number 17 Hero. Shouto is grinning the widest Izuku’s ever seen, and Izuku’s grinning back just as wide through the endless tears. It feels like a happy ending and a new beginning all in one, when he pulls Shouto in for a shameless kiss. Their classmates hoot and cheer, and his mother’s camera clicks a symphony with the reporters, and Kacchan complains loudly, and nothing could be better. 

The country is still rebuilding, even now. They still wake up with screaming nightmares and ache with scars that will never fade and tense at sudden movements. The weight of a whole society’s expectations still rests upon their shoulders, settling in and making a home. But still, for this one moment, Izuku is fiercely, fearlessly happy. 

Because seventeen may be an inconvenient time to fall in love, but as it turns out, eighteen is a glorious time to be in love.

[potterandpromises]

not just another bloody mary (your beauty never ever scared me)

Missing scene from 3x07. I wanted to write Tobert's thoughts about Mabel staying at Theo's. This ficlet doesn't exactly show Mabel and Tobert as having the strongest of relationships, but could be viewed as pre-OT3, or just pre-Theobel. I kept it pretty canon complacent. Title is from Mary on a Cross by Ghost. Also on AO3

Across the room, Mabel speaks into her phone in fits and starts until she hits a dramatic, sort of tacky tone. She completes a reading of Theo's script just after midnight.

Tobert isn’t even sure why he stays.

“Can you help us with these boxes? Lester left us the good luggage cart.”

“Sure." He doesn't ask who Lester is. “Where are you taking them?”

“Theo’s dad is in prison so we’re going to store most of it at his place.”

“Right, right.”

They load the boxes onto the cart. On the second trip, Tobert looks around Teddy Dimas’ apartment. It's both exactly how he imagined it from the podcast and nothing at all like he thought. It’s dark, and clean, if dusty, and is that a photo of Sting?

The last dozen boxes are to be loaded into Theo's car and taken to his apartment. “I can help with the rest of this stuff too.”

“Oh, you don’t have to," Mabel says.

“I want to.”

In the elevator behind Theo’s back, Tobert wants to say more. “I knew you were moving, but I didn’t realize you had to be out so soon.”

“Theo offered to let me crash at his place like, a month ago.”

“Tight.” He would have offered, too, if he’d known.

The elevator dings open and Theo, two boxes hoisted in his arms, steps to the side. He and Mabel exchange smiles that are, absurdly, too warm for the occasion. Theo nods slightly and Mabel steps forward. Ladies first. Tobert drags the luggage cart behind them.

They load the last of the boxes into the car. Everything fits, with no room in the backseat for a third. So, Tobert can’t help Mabel finish moving in, the way he would have liked.

“What’s your address?” Tobert asks, and feels foolish; Theo's leaning into the backseat. He moves a box to the floor.

“I’ll text it to you later," Mabel says.

She leans forward, kisses him, and he thinks— he thinks— he sees the corners of Theo's lips upturn, briefly, in a smirk.

He likes Theo, really. He’s a fascinating person. He’d love to get to know him better. It’s just some outdated ideas about men and women and whether they can be friends floating around his head that makes his stomach uneasy.

That, and the general vibe between the two of them in the podcast; the way Theo's reputation proceeds him.

“Goodnight.” Mabel waves.

"Text me when you get there." She disappears into the passenger seat.

Theo catches his gaze for a moment, maybe accidentally. And Tobert tries to imagine Theo’s apartment. Is it a studio, like Tobert’s? Or can the heir to a chain of successful Greek delis afford extra walls, and more then one bed?

[sinfulsunni]

👀💖 (pairing is up to u 🙌❤️)

send me an emoji combo and I’ll write you a little nsfw ficlet!

hehe okie this one is public sex 👀 + praise kink 💖 featuring some Sprizzy and a side of Izzy/Crew! :)

this one uh. this got away from me a little bit.

- ♥️ -

“Are you sure about this? You can still call it off at any time.”

Spriggs - no, Lucius - whispers close to Izzy’s neck, a question meant only for him. Izzy suppresses a shiver at the feeling of warm breath against his skin, and shakes his head.

“I’m sure. Fuckin’ wet already, check if you don’t believe me,” Izzy grumbles, face flushing. Lucius chuckles and Izzy blushes harder.

“Don’t worry, I’m getting there. Just promise me you’ll tell me if anything feels wrong.”

“I promise,” Izzy affirms.

“Good boy,” Lucius smiles, and presses a peck to Izzy’s cheek, right over his tattoo.

Izzy shudders at the praise, his chest heaving as his heart starts to race in anticipation of what’s about to happen.

When he finally manages to bring himself to look up from his kneeling position, a dozen pairs of eyes are looking at him. More specifically, the crew of the Revenge, minus the captains. They’re arranged in a crescent moon shape in front of him, most of them sitting or kneeling on the deck, and all staring at him intently. Izzy feels his pulse skip at the sight of them.

His audience.

Having all those eyes on him, as Lucius slowly starts to unbutton his vest from behind, should feel wrong. It should be humiliating, perverse, like he’s just a cheap whore putting on a show. But it isn’t. Somehow, the only thing he can feel is… safe.

And horny, his dick reminds him as Lucius’s hands slip underneath his shirt. That too. Safe and horny. It’s an electrifying combination. His cunt throbs in his leathers.

His heartbeat seems to echo through his entire body as Lucius pulls off more and more layers until Izzy is completely exposed. The cool air hits his hot, aching cunt, and a shudder runs through him.

“Gosh, aren’t you gorgeous,” Lucius murmurs fondly. He runs his hands over Izzy’s scarred back, gently massaging his shoulders, and Izzy’s already melting like butter in his hands. He spreads his knees involuntarily, earning a few intakes of breath from his audience. A spark of strange pride and excitement flutters in his chest.

“Isn’t he so pretty, everyone?”, Lucius says louder, addressing the crew this time. He strokes a single wooden finger down the side of Izzy’s face, smooth carved wood grazing over rough stubble.

The crew doesn’t make him wait for praise. Immediately, Izzy hears several small sounds of agreement, and sees a few of them smile in a way that can only be described as adoring. Who would have thought anyone could look at Izzy Hands with adoration?

“Qué hermosa…”, Jim breathes, staring at Izzy in a way that makes him tremble. “Un muy buen chico.”

Izzy doesn’t know Spanish, but he understands enough to flush at the words. That low, warm rasp of their voice… their dark eyes trailing down his naked body…..

“Yes, he is very good isn’t he,” Lucius agrees. “Are you ready to show them how very good you are, darling?”, Lucius asks, hands trailing slowly down Izzy’s chest.

Izzy barely manages to breathe out his consent before he’s desperately stretching up to meet Lucius’s lips in a hungry kiss, eagerly opening his mouth to grant him entrance. The heat goes straight to his core, pounding through his body in tidal waves of arousal, making him shake.

All at once he feels like he’s loose in a storm, tossed about by the sea, completely at the mercy of this man and his honeyed words. Lucius pulls himself around to face Izzy properly, bringing both hands up to cup his face as he kisses Izzy deeper, hotter, unraveling him.

Izzy feels splayed open, pinned like a butterfly for display, more naked than he’s ever been and more alive than he’s ever felt.

“God you’re so good, you’re so fucking good, you’re just made for this aren’t you,” Lucius gasps into his mouth in between kisses, suddenly sounding almost as desperate as Izzy.

His touch turns almost frantic as he pulls Izzy into his lap, exploring every inch of skin with his hands, raking his nails through silvered chest hair. He tweaks a nipple and Izzy gasps.

He loses himself in Lucius’s touch, almost forgetting about his audience until they break apart for breath and Izzy finds himself shaken by what he sees.

The crew. His crew. They’re all just… looking at him. Looking at him like - like he’s -

“You’re beautiful.”

Lucius whispers the words into his skin with a kiss, soft as sea foam. His hands are trailing lower, lower, chasing the heat between Izzy’s legs.

Beautiful. Beautiful. The words echo in Izzy’s head like a chime, like a song that’s lifting him up, making him gasp and roll into Lucius’s touch. The crazy thing is, he believes it. It makes him feel mad, but right now, he fucking believes it.

He chances another glance at the crew, and his heart soars in his chest as he looks at them. They’re beautiful too, he realizes. They’re all so fucking beautiful. He wants them, he wants them so fucking much. All of them, anything they have to offer him. He wants to be held, and kissed, and touched, and praised, he wants them to whisper a dozen sugar-sweet promises to him and he wants to believe it, he wants them to bring him to his peak again and again and again and he wants to make all of them feel good too.

Lucius’s fingers tease over his cock, sliding down to collect the wetness between Izzy’s legs, just how he promised to before.

“Tell us what you want, Izzy. We’re gonna take care of you.”

Lucius’s beard scratches against Izzy’s collarbone. The sun is warm on the back of his neck. The hushed sound of the ocean is a soothing lullaby in the background.

“Everything,” Izzy says. “Give me everything.”

- ♥️ -

thank you for reading! this will be posted to my ao3 as well <3

[theredcapeofk]

It's a Super life

Inspired by @fazedlight 's ficlet Do-Over

Mxy left. Kara looked around her apartment, her eyes tracing the familiar contours of her furniture. It was something she did frequently when she was anxious. Tonight was no different. She stood in her living room, tired after all the night's events, the weight of the world somehow heavier than it was a few hours before.

Kara sighed deeply. She felt so incredibly lonely. Not because Mxy left or because Alex wasn't with her in the apartment. No company could fill the void Lena's absence had created in her heart. As she was trying not to spiral back into the recent events with Lena, like she usually did when she wasn't actively focusing on anything else, something became very clear. She needed to see Lena, to tell her she still had hope for them.

She was about to fly off into the night when she thought it would be a good idea to write down what she wanted Lena to hear, just in case she couldn't tell her now. It was…she looked at her watch, ten o'clock. Not exactly late but not exactly early either. Better write it down so Lena could get the message.

She flew across town with a heavy heart. She approached Lena's penthouse carefully like she was afraid to startle Lena if she caught sight of her. Lena was there, pouring herself a cup of tea. She looked so calm and relaxed for once, Kara almost turned around to leave her in peace. She could make sure Lena would get the letter but not see her.

Kara was seriously considering this option when she realized Lena's balcony door was open. There could be a dozen reasons why this door was open, none of which had likely anything to do with Kara, but she couldn't help but feel invited to come forward somehow.

She landed softly, but hard enough for Lena to hear the sound of her boots. Lena looked up. Several emotions flashed across her eyes, and her hands shook lightly around her tea cup. She schooled her features, put the cup down, and walked towards her balcony door. Kara was standing on the threshold, not daring to go any further.

"Are you here to give me a speech about what I should or should not do?" Lena challenged.

"No Lena. What you do or do not do isn't my responsibility or mine to control. I know that now, and I'm sorry if I came out bossy or controlling the last time we saw each other. I was simply worried about you.

Tonight, I'm here to share an experience with you. Something happened to me tonight, something unexpected that opened my eyes to a lot of things. And…" she added hastily as Lena opened her mouth to cut her "While I'm sure you don't care about what happened to me tonight, I think you could be interested in the outcome. But I don't want to impose my presence on you, so I wrote you a letter so you can read it if you'd rather not hear it."

Lena took a minute to consider her options. Kara knew there was a risk Lena would choose neither and tell her to get lost. Lena gazed at the piece of paper in Kara's hand.

"Give me the letter." Lena chose.

Read it on Ao3

[strangersteddierthings]

for the fanfic ask game: E (for "Steve is sad, Eddie's accidentally-on-purpose a jerk, and the misunderstanding gets solved(?)" ficlet), U, and V?

V: If you could write the sequel (or prequel) to any fic out there not written by yourself, which would you choose?

I've been wracking my brain for like 20 minutes, so I'm going to say I can't think of any. Just know that I'll be lying awake tonight thinking about all the fics I would like to write sequel/prequels to.

U: Share three of your favourite fic writers and why you like them so much.

@aidaronan because I just enjoy her writing. I have several of her works bookmarked on Ao3, whereas I usually only have 1 or 2 from one author. And forever ago I had an ask about my fav fics, and this one of hers was on that list, and it still is. I still go back and read it not quite religiously, but it's close.

@steddierthings Originally I just followed because I was like 'teehee "matching" URLs' in my head but then Sad Steddie Scenario had me hooked and now I have to read everything posted.

And even tho there's dozens more I want to at, I'll end with @afewproblems. She's got great takes and I just devour everything she posts.

Not really eloquent here but I dunno what else to say. I like what I like.

E: If you wrote a sequel to Steve's sad, Eddie's an (accidentally on-purpose) jerk, and the miscommunication gets solved?, what would it be about?

It would be set a few weeks later, with Eddie being almost overbearingly sweet to Steve, and Steve finally having the time to gather his words and thoughts and they would talk it out. Steve would want to know why Eddie thought they weren't in a relationship, and Eddie would explain himself, and then they'd have to have a frank conversation about assumptions, and end with a promise to talk to each other about doubts they're having, especially about their relationship.

[lovevalley45]

untitled ficlet #336

a/n: me writing smth that acknowledges that the legends are technically trapped in time prison indefinitely? it's more likely that u think. thank you to @supermothering for suggesting i should write some behrastra when i put out an open call for writing requests and letting me revisit this idea!

Astra hadn’t expected time prison to be so boring.

The technical term for the facility the Fixers had brought them to was not “time prison”, really. Rather, it was “Council of Fixed Point Determination Facility for Re-Education and Rehabilitation of Temporal Offenders”, as the Fixers had informed them when bringing them in. But time prison was much less clunky. 

Upon arrival, they’d split them up and slapped a magic dampener on her wrist. Astra would have taken it more personally if they hadn’t taken Behrad’s air totem and Spooner’s gun, as well as finding about a dozen knives on Sara’s person. Where they were all hiding, that was unclear. 

The only saving grace was that in the splitting up, she and Behrad had gotten thrown in the same cell. It was just big enough to fit a bunk-bed and a table, with a door that only led to a tiny bathroom. It seemed completely walled in. But she knew that one of the walls was a face, occasionally becoming transparent enough that they could see the rest of the building they were in. 

Without the whole team together, it was hard to plan. But the two of them had already cracked what would be the first step of any attempt at a breakout. That is, if they could actually pull it off. 

“What’s the verdict?” Astra asked as Behrad took a look at the anti-magic cuff. They were huddled up on the bottom bunks, as tucked out of sight as they could be. It was a little nice, her back against his chest. The knowledge that there were guards that could easily peer in and see them was not so nice. 

He pried out the bamboo fork from their meal that he had been using to try and examine the inside. “No dice. Until I can get something that isn’t made of bamboo, we need the actual key to unlock it.” He dropped her wrist back into her lap. “Whatever tech they’re using is more advanced than Ray’s anti-nanite tech. But more fragile, so there’s always brute force.” As she looked at the cuff, considering it, he quickly added, “If you’re fine with breaking your wrist.”

She groaned. “Damnit.” She squeezed her hand into a fist. “You think I could make a run for it if they tried to take me to the medbay here?”

“I’d prefer to not have to watch you break your wrist,” Behrad told her. 

“Alright, I get it.” She flexed her hand. “This blows. We spend half a year trying to get back to our ship and the moment we can go back to time travel we get arrested.”

“At least, we’re stuck together.”

She closed her eyes as she pressed her head against him. “Behrad, you’re great and all, but stuck is still stuck.”

“I’m not saying it’s perfect.” Astra felt him shrug. “At least we aren’t stuck sharing a cell with the guy who stole our ship.”

“I admire your attempts to look on the bright side here.” 

“Yeah, if I don’t, I’ll be freaking out,” he admitted. “Focusing on trying to crack that lets me get my mind off things a little.”

Astra wasn’t the type to freak out, but she could understand that. With a goal, it was harder to dwell on their situation. “It’s not your fault that they gave us bamboo forks.”

“They are better for the environment than plastic,” he muttered. “How are you doing?”

“It’s weird to be without my magic. Not even for being able to get out, but just-” she sighed. “Another level of feeling powerless.” 

The Fixer’s stipulation had been that she could get it off if she was “good.” Astra figured that breaking her wrist to run off was not a case of good behavior. In a way, it reminded her of her first few days on the Waverider. Outnumbered and, once again, trapped in a cell. 

At least, then, she’d been able to get a sweet taste of temporary revenge. 

Behrad wrapped his arms around her, pulling her a little closer. She still felt drained from rebuilding the Waverider and just wanted to drift off to sleep in his warmth. As he rested his cheek against her curls, he said, “I don’t know how helpful the Air Totem would have been compared to your magic. But I got used to having the ancestors and the other Zari always with me.” 

“You’ve got me,” Astra said. 

“Is it a bad time to realize this is the most privacy we’ve had since we got together?”

She laughed. “We had that date in the manor when we were ‘retired’.”

“Okay, but everyone has keys to the manor and could’ve strolled in whenever they want.” Behrad lifted his head. “We just have the wall where Fixers may or may not be watching us.”

“Do they think we’re scheming or just cuddling?” Astra asked. 

“Are we still scheming?”

She looked up at him. “I think we might have stopped scheming when you told me I couldn’t break my wrist.”

He shrugged again. “Alright. Maybe we did.”

“But I wouldn’t mind staying like this for a while,” she confessed. 

“Me neither.” 

However, as he rested his head against hers again, the not-a-wall faded from opaque to transparent. Astra scrambled out of his arms like they’d been caught doing more than cuddling as a pair of the Fixers who’d arrested them accompanied a man in what she assumed was the futuristic equivalent of Ava’s old Time Bureau pantsuits.

“I’m, uh, sorry to interrupt your recreation time,” he said. “But it’s time for your first re-education session.”

Great. Another fun aspect of time prison.

As the Fixers came in to restrain them, she shot a look at Behrad. 

Not for the first time, she was grateful that they weren’t stuck here on their own. And she was sure it wouldn’t be the last time.

[a-driftamongopenstars]

penance; crow & fikrul ficlet;

finally, finally got to write Crow meeting Fikrul. i need this to happen in game asap, by the way! i think Fikrul could totally become our ally! and my friend :D also on ao3

Skimming through countless memories of the Prince of the Reef, Crow is careful to dance about those that came through the Darkness. Sometimes he wonders how many of them are true and how many are a product of elaborate fiction, planted there through the seeds of red flowers of the Black Garden.

And yet, after talking to many people, after reading through dozens of reports, Crow comes to find out nearly none of those were lies. Only somewhat changed through a cracked lens of a sad mind, twisted and upside down, bitter.

Bitter like the Dark Ether.

Crow begins to think of the Fanatic often. Uldren's memories of him are fond. He recalls sitting by his side, talking of their people. A string of understanding woven between them, two misconstrued people, accepted, yet outcasts. Crow remembers the sting of sympathetic tears that spilled against Fikrul's mortal wounds until through wish they closed and sealed and birthed something new.

And it comes as no surprise that Crow finds himself wandering into the space of the Reef, following the trail of corrupted Ether, purposefully searching for a familiar presence within those forsaken rocks. And finding it, alone and hidden, and terribly lonely.

Fikrul walks slowly through a desert plane of one of the broken asteroids. His staff leaves barely a point in the dust, the energy around it crackles.

Crow follows, one tall rock after another, making noise with the soles of his boots by design, until at last the Fanatic turns, raising his staff.

And lowering it just as fast.

"Father?" he croaks deeply. "No, you died."

"And was reborn," Crow says, almost surprised at the regal touch in his voice that has come out all too often lately. "A plunge in the abyss."

Fikrul pauses, consideration in his posture. Crow's memory swims with conversations of faith, of herecy of the Eliksni people, of sermons that Fikrul carried out to the believers. If he could look at Crow through that cracked lens, turned the other way, he would see that a plunge in the abyss may very well lead to a pool of Light.

The Fanatic steps closer. Then again, closer, and Crow moves not. His heart beats madly, less so in fear and more in excitement of a reunion.

Fikrul stops - and slowly bends the knee.

"Father."

Crow leans in and allows himself the impossible - to hug Fikrul, his long lost friend. He doesn't utter another word for a long while, simply simmering in the vivid images of the past long gone. And even though there was cruelty in what Uldren and Fikrul did, there was also a genuine compassion that one had for the other. Standing side by side against the world that wronged them, somehow.

Crow pulls and tugs on the threads of goodness that was of Uldren and weaves them into something new, of his own accord. How strange it is to have control over something with such clarity, that used to drown in obscurity of a bothered mind. Perhaps, it can be a penance on behalf of the Prince.

When Crow lets go, Fikrul walks with purpose again.

Not lonely, not scorned.

[wafflesandkruge]

hello, wraith (kanej 3+1)

3 times Kaz hears Inej behind him and 1 time he doesn't.

ao3

a/n: hiiii if the premise sounds familiar then you've probably read the original ficlet which i posted a few years ago (a real fan ty). after sab s2 (ew) i wanted to revisit some of my old kanej fics and rewrite them bc i noticed a lot of changes and edits i wanted to make so they're less,,,cringe. original can be found here if you want to do a comparison (pls don't). the plot is exactly the same, but (i hope) the writing has improved, so pls enjoy ✌🏼

The first time Inej entered his office through the window, he heard her coming. Her cheap boots scratched along the rough brick of the Slat’s exterior wall, and Kaz was alerted before she’d even reached the second floor below his office. He set his paperwork down with a sigh and pushed the window open for her just before she could reach for the latch. “Hello, Wraith.”

Inej clambered through the window, frustration evident in every movement, and pulled her hood down. In the soft candlelight of his office, her skin was luminous brown, the light catching the gold in her ears and the gleam of the knives at her waist. It had only been about a week since she’d left the Menagerie, and Kaz was pleased to see her color had improved somewhat. But her spywork needed improvement if she was to be of any use to him. “I could hear you a mile away.”

Inej pursed her lips, taking his criticisms silently. He could have said that it wasn’t her fault, that her boots were the problem, or her inexperience with the cityscape. But he was not kind, and Inej was not made of glass that would shatter under the slightest pressure. He opened a drawer in his desk and withdrew a small, wooden box.

“Don’t come back here until you can do it soundlessly. With these on.”

He tossed the box at her. She flipped the lid open and a combination of displeasure and anger flashed across her face. Kaz knew what she was seeing—metal anklets with dozens of little bells strung on them, not unlike the ones she’d worn at the Menagerie. 

It was a test, and a challenge, in a way. Kaz watched as she stared at the anklets for another moment, then snapped the box shut. Her lips were pulled into a scowl, but still, she nodded mutely and left his office without a word.

-

The second time had been about a month after the first. Kaz had been worried—Inej had disappeared for long stretches of the night, only to reappear at the Slat early in the morning. When he’d put a tail on her, they’d all reported the same thing: she was practicing climbing in the warehouse district. Why she thought that was safe, he had no idea. He’d posted a Crow there to watch her discreetly, then put it out of his mind. Either she would learn, or he’d overestimated her. And Kaz Brekker was rarely wrong.

He smiled to himself and set his paperwork aside. It was always nice to be right.

“Hello, Wraith.” 

Inej paused, half of her body still outside the window. 

“How did you know?” They were the first words Inej had spoken to him in almost two weeks. She pulled herself through the window and stood to the side of his desk, each movement as silent as shadow despite the anklets clasped around her boots. She looked well rested despite her late nights, her countenance more confident and self-assured than ever. A new knife, one with a simple bone handle, was strapped to her forearm. He’d seen Jesper purchasing the same one from a street vendor during one of their trips to Fifth Harbor. Inej making friends among the Crows would be useful to him in the future. 

He leaned back in his chair and folded his gloved hands together. “I don’t let the same person get the drop on me twice. But you passed. The anklets.” 

He extended a hand, and he could see the way Inej’s gaze was drawn to his leather gloves, a thousand unasked questions in her dark eyes. She unclasped the anklets and placed them carefully in his palm, her fingertips brushing against the leather for the briefest second. Kaz’s breath hitched at the slight pressure. Although it was impossible through the thick material, he swore he felt a lick of warmth from her skin. His skin went cold. 

He pushed past his body’s panic and threw the anklets into the fireplace. Inej’s gaze was finally averted from him and he could breathe again. She watched them burn with a small curl of her lips, then was gone as quickly as she’d appeared.

-

The next time, Kaz was busy working on the Crow Club’s monthly accounting. He hardly looked up when he felt the telltale change in the air. “Hello, Wraith.”

Inej made a small noise of acknowledgement, then crossed his office to the small cabinet of medical supplies he kept around for emergencies. There was some clattering around and a few muttered words in Suli, then Inej plopped onto the chair in front of her desk and dumped supplies onto his desk.

Kaz looked up, peeved. “Inej, what– Ghezen!”

She’d tracked bloody footprints all over his office, from the window, to the cabinet, to the chair where she now sat, wincing, as she cleaned the cut and blistered undersides of her feet. “Don’t worry,” she said, in that unnervingly calm way of hers, “I’ll clean it up.”

“That’s not–” Kaz bit back a curse, not sure why he felt so irritated. “What the hell happened? Was it another gang?”

She gave a noncommittal shrug as she began wrapping bandages around her foot. “My boots wore out. I climb better without shoes anyways, but I am not used to Ketterdam yet.”

“Don’t be stupid, you’ll contract some disease before the day is out,” Kaz growled. He wasn’t about to lose his investment over something as foolish as an infection. “Borrow a pair from someone downstairs until you get paid.”

“As you say.”

As soon as Inej was gone, his office clean as she’d promised, Kaz paid a visit to a grisha fabrikator.

-

Years later, Kaz sat at his desk, a blank page in front of him. With a sigh, he squared his shoulders and put his pen to the paper. Greatly esteemed Council of Tides…

If there was one thing Kaz hated more than kissing up to people, it was not getting what he wanted. He gritted his teeth as he used his most flattering language to ask for a blind eye at a certain berth, then signed the letter with a flourish. He stuffed the scrawled letter and a promissory note for an ungodly amount of kruge into an envelope and prepared his wax seal. Just as he started to melt the wax, his candle blew out with a gust of wind. Kaz paused.

“Hello, Wraith.”

The wind whistled on, but the voice he so desperately wanted to hear was missing. Kaz glanced at the window just to be sure. There wasn’t a soul in his office other than his, and that was debatable. Swearing softly to himself, he relit the candle and sealed the letter. He was losing his touch.

On his way to the Council of Tides, he passed by The Wraith’s berth. It was empty, as it had been for a month. Kaz glanced at the gray horizon. It wasn’t quite enough for him just to know she was out there somewhere, bringing down justice to those who deserved it. At every moment, he craved her silent presence next to his, her bright smiles, even her Suli proverbs. It was selfish, he knew. But he couldn’t help wanting. With one last glance, he continued on his way.

After a relative success of a meeting, he walked back through the harbor towards the Slat. Night had fallen, but the docks were still busy with wandering crews and raucous laughter. Kaz’s cane clicked against the ground as he turned his collar to the wind and resolutely went on his way. Perhaps there’d be an interesting brawl tonight, or Jesper would pay a visit. He passed by berth twenty-two. Then spun around. It was occupied, the crew already busy unloading by the dim streetlights. A voice came from the dark behind him. 

“Hello, Kaz.”

[pinkiepiebones]

I’ve been thinking a lot about a little ficlet you wrote, the one where special waits for copia backstage during a ritual. It mentions how spesh glows when he’s excited. I was wondering if you have any ideas/headcanons for the first time spesh did this, in general and around Copia? I can imagine he must’ve been quite confused at seeing his ghoulfriend light up like a christmas tree lol :•)

First off thank you for dumping a bucket of dopamine on my brain!!!!! I can't believe anyone thinks about my silly fics!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As for the first time Copia saw him glow...

Copia grew up within the church. He had been raised there. Some said he was even born there, though this was not factual- he had been born elsewhere, and left at the narthex steps as an infant. But, yes. Copia essentially spent the entirety of his life in the church. At least until he turned 25. At age 25, he was granted permission to visit nearby towns to spread the word of the Dark Lord. He took advantage of these monthly trips, proselytising as ordered but also wandering around, purchasing music records. By 28 he had managed amassed an impressive collection of music- not just records, but cassette tapes and new compact discs as well, and a lovely record player he had taken ages to restore. He had little space to call his own but managed to keep it all safe in his dormitory room. After long days of doing mindless research or writing manifestos or sermons for Papa Nihil, Copia relished in putting a good record on and flopping onto his little bed, letting the music wash over his aching back and shoulders.

He was creeping close to 30 when he met the nameless ghoul called Special. Well, to be clear, he had seen the ghoul dozens of times. It was one of the many nameless ghouls that haunted the hallways or ceilings or catacombs of the church, but this one managed to stand out amongst the nearly identical, mouthless, humanoid gargoyles. For one, it's tail never stayed still. It wagged. It twitched. It would even occasionally curl into a question mark. No other ghoul acted so... lively.

The other way the Special ghoul stood out was in it's voice. All ghouls communicated telepathically, but their telepathy had the unfortunate tendency of activating the same parts of human brains that stir up intense fear and nausea, so ghouls rarely spoke to humans (in fact, it was widely believed that those who rose through the ranks within the church's bureaucracy were just people who could listen to ghouls without screaming or crying). But Special's voice was wrong. It spoke telepathically, sure, but for whatever reason, it's voice registered in the human brain as audible input. Having Special talk to you was like listening to a human. A babbling, obnoxious human. His voice would drift into Copia's mind sometimes, and it would be as though someone were walking by his office and talking.

So when the nameless ghoul called Special knocked on his door one night and asked to listen to the music- "I've actually been sitting outside your room for weeks now, just listening, trying to build up the courage to ask you if I could come in, because I know humans don't so much care for us ghouls being close, I've heard we smell, which is probably true, I mean, we are made of Hell itself after all, it's no bed of roses there," and on and on- Copia was only a little bit surprised.

Copia knew about ghouls only as much as Sister Imperator had deemed it necessary for him to know. He had been a child when she took him down to the lowest basement to show him the portal from which all ghouls emerged. He had held her hand tightly, afraid something would come up from the glassy darkness if he let go of her. She squeezed his little hand reassuringly and told him "the Dark Father does not send ghouls to us without a purpose for each of them, C. Every ghoul you see in this church was brought to us with a reason for it's existence woven into it's very being. Each ghoul stays connected to our plane of existence by tethering to an element- Fire, Water, Air, Earth, or Aether. Each serves a purpose."

And now he and a ghoul had become friends. It was not something that happened in the church. Imperator had expressed her concern and Copia, in a rare moment of standing up for himself, had replied "all ghouls are sent up for a reason. What if Him Below sent this one because I need a friend?" Imperator had started to retort but Copia fled back to his room, where Special had been listening to Pink Flloyd.

"Special," Copia gasped. He flopped onto his bed and the ghoul scrambled over to the bedside, tail twitching in concern.

"Whoa, what's happened?"

"I talked back to Sister Imperator."

Special tilted his head, bird-like. "And?"

Copia looked at the ghoul with a mix of emotions.

Special continued, "aren't you, like, a hundred years old? Isn't that an adult? You can talk back to your mom at this age, I am sure."

Copia smiled a tiny bit. "I'm not a hundred, Spesh."

The ghoul's tail wagged. Copia sat up on his bed and sighed, then looked at the tail threatening to wear a patch in his rug. He looked at Special's featureless face. "What's that about," he asked, gesturing to the tail.

"You called me 'Spesh.' I get called Special almost all of the time when I am called something, but just now, you called me a new name."

Copia shrugged. "It's just short for 'Special,' not that big of a deal."

Then Copia noticed fine cracks appearing in the ghoul's dull grey scale-like skin. He backed up on his bed until his back hit the wall. "Fuck, what happened? Did I break you?"

Special looked at his arms, then his torso, then his legs, and laughed. "Oh, no! No, this is-" He gestured with a talon as though trying to pull the tight words from the air.

"I'm happy."

Special seemed to emit a honeyed glow from the cracks, as though his body was composed of burning embers. Copia stared, wide-eyed, and slid off his bed to sit beside the ghoul. He touched the ghoul's arm, amazed at the gentle heat radiating off it.

"This is the purest expression of Fire Ghoul happiness," Special said softly, shyly. "It equates, I think, most to human joy. Or love."

Copia and Special sat quietly together until the embers died down and vanished. And then Copia did something never before seen in the church.

He leaned in and hugged the ghoul.

Special startled but hugged the human back.

"Thank you for being here," Copia whispered. "Thank you for finding me, Spesh."

Special had no mouth but somehow smiled.

"No problem, uhhh, 'Cope.'"

[infiniteeight8]

What if Stephen turns into a cat?😇

I have had less writing time at con than expected (I really should have known), but I finally got to a ficlet!

I have done an angsty version of cat!Stephen here. 😀 This is the hopefully funnier version.

*

When the Sanctum doors swing open for Tony, he is immediately assaulted by the loudest, most ear-piercing yowling he has ever experienced in his life. It sounds like a dozen cats are being cruelly tortured. It’s so loud that people on the sidewalk actually turn and give him and the building wary looks. 

The Sanctum doors twitch a little, almost like they’re motioning him inside. The more cautious part of Tony loses the battle with his curiosity and he steps into the considerably-less-solemn-than-usual Sanctum foyer. The awful noise starts wavering up and down the aural spectrum. As Tony is wincing and wondering which way to go—the yowling is too loud to make out a distinct direction—the Cloak appears and waves for him to follow it.

Making his way down a hallway after the Cloak, Tony eventually emerges into the kitchen. There’s a cat carrier sitting on the kitchen table. Wong is facing the opening. “...screeching like this isn’t helping me find a solution!” Wong says, crossing his arms. He’s scowling, more discomfited than Tony has ever seen him. Tony wonders how long he’s been subjected to the ear-piercing wails of an infuriated cat.

“Wong?” Tony calls over the noise. “Where’s”—the noise abruptly cuts out—“Stephen?”

Wong visibly relaxes. “Stark,” he says, and there’s an actual note of relief in his voice. He waves at the cat carrier.

It takes Tony a minute to realize that the gesture is his answer. He comes around the kitchen table and peers into the carrier. The cat within is a slender, glossy black with two adorable smudges of gray just behind its blue-green eyes. “Hey there,” Tony says. “What are you doing in a cage?”

Stephen turns his gaze on Wong, narrows his eyes, and hisses. Tony raises an eyebrow at the sorcerer. Wong narrows his eyes back at Stephen. “He was clawing up the books.”

Of course Stephen would want to try and fix things himself even if he wasn’t really equipped for it at the moment. Tony scoffs, pulling Stephen’s attention back to himself. “Why lock yourself in the library going through dusty books when we could be pulling the best prank of all time on the Avengers?” Tony asks. He reaches for the carrier door. “Come on, let’s leave the boring shit to Wong while we do the heavy lifting.”

“Stark, wait!” Wong says, but Tony’s already got the carrier door open.

Fortunately, Stephen doesn’t make a break for it. Instead, he steps out calmly and very distinctly turns his nose up at Wong before making a leap straight from the table to Tony’s shoulder.

“Claws!” Tony yelps, but they quickly retract once Stephen is settled. A warm, soft tail curls around his throat; Tony smiles and reaches up to give Stephen a skitch. It’s very quiet, but Tony thinks he can hear Stephen purr. He turns to Wong. “Portal, please?” 

The look that Wong shoots him as Tony glances back over his unoccupied shoulder is distinctly grateful.

[hylianengineer]

✍🏻 👾

✍️ Which stat matters most to you (if at all!): subscriptions, kudos/favorites, comments, bookmarks, word count, or hits?

Comments. Always comments. One really nice comment is worth, like, a dozen kudos and a virtually infinite number of hits. But a close second: I really want bookmarks with interesting comments on them but I never get any.

👾 Do you have any "bad" writing habits you want to break?

I need to actually fucking publish things sometimes, lol. I've gotten out of the habit and I need to get back into it - I have so many random ficlets and oneshots that they make up several novel-length word documents. And a few things that might actually be multichapter fics if I could just edit the damn things. I have many writing problems and this is at least half of them.

[claudiajcregg]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

Tagged by both @mihrsuri and @unseenacademic 💜💜💜 Thank you so much! I actually wrote up most of the answers the day I was tagged, and then forgot to post them. For over 10 days, probably. Me bad.

1. How many works do you have on Ao3? 23! (One of them is a 'collection' of short ficlets, and has 6 chapters. So 28 stories in 23 works so far. Probably about to be more stories in still 23 works.)

2. What's your total Ao3 word count? 156,597 words. For now.

3. What fandoms do you write for? Currently? Just TWW. Who knows in the future!

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

They have about 35% of my total kudos, but the first two are ~21% alone. (The first one is the only fic that has over 100 kudos. Then again, any of them getting above 30 is a miracle.)

maybe everything's just turning out how it should be (Big Block of Cheese 2008; CJ & Josh. Posted Feb 2021) [121]

say it's here where our pieces fall in place (Vignettes, 1998-2008. Posted Jan 2022.) [66]

just your smile lit a sixty-watt bulb in my house that was darkened for days (Thanksgiving 2006. Posted Dec 2022.) [55]

nobody knows how to get back home (Missing scene from ITSOTG. Posted April 2023) (wait what. top 4?!) [50]

we could be the way forward and I know I'll pay for it (B4A Campaign Fic, spring 1998. Posted May 2021) [47]

5. Do you respond to comments?

YES. I don't take them for granted, and I like interacting with my readers. Sharing is nerve-wracking and makes me feel so exposed, so any comment makes it worth it. I like to thank peeps for their time! As of late, it's taking me weeks to get back to comments for Brain/spoons reasons (and because I try to do so in order, though not always). I sometimes feel bad I have fallen behind on leaving my own comments, so replying to what I get makes me feel bad. I love getting the rare, long, thoughtful comments, because I love seeing what people pick up on (had to restrain myself from commenting on everything), so if that one's up next… It'll delay everything. I have a harder time letting go of those.

I know replying or not is a hot topic, and I fall on the side of 'whatever the author does is fine' (I see them as being voluntary gifts to the author, kinda, but I understand why some authors can't or won't reply! Especially those who get dozens.). It does feel weird(ly demoralizing) when you see that yours is one of a couple of comments they haven't replied to, though. (Selfishly, as someone who tries to write medium-long comments, lack of anything can sting. It's irrational, it's not what I'm after, but it'd be nice to know whether that hour plus of my time was worth it. It's not transactional and I hate that c4c idea or whatever. Just. weird feelings.)

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

As we've established in previous similar memes (lol, I think I've answered these questions before), my fics don't really have angsty endings! For the most part. I think I said don't want you to go but I'll be okay then, and I can still buy that/definitely popped into my brain. I think some of my late S7 fics have an ominous feel to them, with some references/buildup to the angsty parts of IM, but I wouldn't call them angsty endings.

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Um. The opposite is true! still you never took your hand from mine was my first thought, but I feel like oh, and I will be with you to feel the California sun is pretty darn happy. I could have picked almost any of them and I could make a case for them!

8. Do you get hate on fics?

I luckily do not. I have gotten a couple of comments that have messed with my brain, and made me second-guess things, but they were not hate.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Yes, but not regularly and not that well. It's usually short, mild scenes at most, but I did challenge myself to write a more explicit one last summer, especially after I got those 'one bed' tropes in the Wheel but didn't go there in the 500-word limit. Streets say it's hot. IDK. I also wrote a smutty continuation to the exchange fic. Best if we forget parts of that one happened. I also started writing one that would be in my S5 pregnancy universe but 🤐

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

I don't. But this question confirms to me I have answered this before because I know I've joked about how TV has already done that for me, lmao. See: Bones/Sleepy Hollow.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen? (I had to track down this question because it wasn't anywhere.) I don't think so!

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope! I'm having déjà vu here. I know I have answered this before: I could do it myself! But I have a feeling it wouldn't be as easy as one might think, but I'd be honored.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

I don't think so…? If I have, it was years ago, in my forum/LJ days. I've been trying to make it happen for a while now, but who knows if it'll ever happen. WE HAVE IDEAS. We want to make it happen. (Wink wink, nudge nudge. You know who.)

14. What’s your all-time favorite ship?

Spaceships are so cool. Atlantis was the first space shuttle I saw in person (and also the one I've seen the most) and it and its exhibit are awesome. I'm only missing Discovery out of the four space shuttles, because I didn't go to the second National Air and Space Museum location in Virginia back in 2015. And once the new exhibit center is completed, I'd love to see Endeavour again.

(In all seriousness, I don't have one. Booth and Brennan will forever and always hold a special place in my heart, but I love CJ and Danny so much, writing for them, their journey. Pls don't make me pick.)

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

I am a big 'never say never' person, because I end up picking stuff up (and maybe rewriting it to fit my current style/ability) if I remember an idea… But I'm guessing many of them won't get finished. Probably some of those that are deep in my notes app or on the drive.

16. What are your writing strengths? I (try to) dig into the emotion of a scene as best as I can.

17. What are your writing weaknesses? Everything else? I know it sounds like an excuse (at least to my ears), but writing in your second language is hard. I know my writing sounds limited because of it – my descriptions will never be as evocative as I wish they were, my dialogue won't be there. I am not the most imaginative person, either.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

If it makes sense, and won't take the reader out of the story, go for it! (A few words, or a line or two, might work if there's appropriate context.)

But also, as a non-native speaker, I'll always recommend using pals who might be fluent in that language and checking with them! I know that, throughout my many years in fandom, I've read quick things in Spanish within English fics that weren't entirely correct in the context they were being used (i.e. character's fluency, smaller details), and they took me out for a second. (I know, I know – pot, meet kettle. If anyone has read an unedited story of mine, they've found me making up English phrases.)

19. First fandom you wrote for? Bones. In Spanish. (I also think I wrote some ficlets in English that are probably hidden in some random LJ comm I created for my writing. They're probably 14-15 years old.)

20. Favorite fic you’ve written?

I honestly cannot pick! And maybe it's yet to come. But basically, if I've gone through the embarrassment of having someone edit/beta a fic and catch all the avoidable mistakes, it's because it genuinely has something I like about it and that I think others will like, too. (Perceived quality aside.)

Off the top of my head, and out of the posted fics (obvious recency bias, sorry). I have a story for all 23… Also, let's consider I've mostly not read them since they were posted so I might be off. (Would love to hear what everyone's favorite is, if you've read any and are reading this!) Obviously, that top 5 by kudos has great ones. There's a reason

don't want you to go but I'll be okay: I just remember finishing it and knowing it was something special. Felt like many things coming together. I wanted to write angstier, a break from the endgame of the IM AU I've yet to post, and I think it works. I had had that quote as inspo for a while, and I think the trip to Berlin put it back on my mind. (The first haunted by the notion draft is from around this time, too!)

your love is a secret I'm hoping, dreaming, dying to keep: the structure is likely a tad repetitive, maybe (but also, the point of 3+1s, sort of?) but I love writing in that s7 period, and there should be more fic with the press corps. I think the stuff I wrote while editing (which included an overhaul of the +1) is even better than what was there.

oh, and I will be with you to feel the California sun: recency bias, yes. I love a good early Cali story, and even if this was nowhere the story I sat down to write originally, I love how it turned out. It's silly but fun, and so sunny.

still you never took your hand from mine: I will always have all the soft spots for my memoir stories, even if two of them have yet to be posted. This one doubled its size a year and a half after “finishing” it because I realized what it was missing. It's sappy, probably unrealistic re: the publishing industry, but damn it if it's not one of those that have made me cry while editing them.

we could be the way forward and I know I'll pay for it: I had to include an oldie but goodie from my first year, and this one is so special to me. (Along with BBC 2008, which I also absolutely adore. That was the fic I always wanted to post. Hilarious it was third. But it's also my most popular fic by a huge margin.) Seeing it recommended on Tumblr? God. I love campaign stories and all their potential. I love that I took a random line from some unposted story and it evolved into this fic.

nobody knows how to get back home: I almost added the most recent one because of how fun it was to write (or, as I mentioned above, Big Block of Cheese) but I like how bittersweet this missing scene one is. I find CJ's internal struggle so interesting to explore, and this is one of her most vulnerable moments. I also wanted to see a hug so badly.