#sort of pre-cherik fic

[martianbugsbunny]

Martian’s Masterlist!

Figured it was about time I collected all of my fics into one area, will ofc be updating it as I write more. It’s sorted by ship, including wherefrom they originate, with a brief description of what type (one-shot, chapter fic, same-universe if I’m feeling saucy) and a short summary of what happens. V proud of myself for figuring out how to link these tbh, but if any of the links isn’t working for the love of Pete please let me know. Fics with more than one chapter will be linked to the first chapter because...logic.

For the tags, I have chosen to only use the ship names, not __ x __ format, for the sake of trying to keep the tags somewhat in hand. I have, however, tried to use what I’m aware of being the most popular/common names for ships, as well as the alternate ones I’ve seen for more niche stuff. Also tagged are the shipped characters. If I add new ships, I'll have to reblog bc of the tag limit.

*Hands you the rabbit hole* Have fun going down!

CaptainCroc/GoldenHook (Rumplestiltskin x Killian Jones {Once Upon A Time}):

Is This Love Persevering? (It Feels More Like The End of the World): One-shot. Established CaptainCroc mourning the loss of Baelfire. Canon-divergent for the sake of Rumple actually getting to attend his son’s funeral.

Who Makes You See Color: Chapter fic, 14 total. CaptainCroc soulmates AU where one person sees color earlier than the other. Extends from pre-Dark One era to the First Curse being broken.

The Truth Echoes Darkly: Short series; part 1 for The Truth Echoes Darkly. Echo Caves AU where instead of Emma, Hook confesses that he loves Rumple for maximum awkward.

The Echo Goes On: Short series; part 2 for The Truth Echoes Darkly. Back in Storybrooke, Rumple finds himself obsessed with Hook and realizes that he’s fallen in love as well.

My North Star: One-shot. Established CaptainCroc vow renewal, featuring Hook’s inner thoughts about how much he loves Rumple.

Better Than Blood: One-shot. Pretty racy, but the point is thinking about the poeticism of having sex with your ex-nemesis.

Cherik (Charles Xavier x Erik Lehnsherr {X-Men Movies}):

Sweetheart Will You Sleep With Me: One-shot. The night before they fight Shaw, Charles and Erik make the most of the little time they know they have left together and sleep in Charles’ room. Fluff, don’t get too excited by the title lol.

Baby While You’re At It: One-shot. Based on a Jessie Murph song. Angst with a happy ending. Charles is furious when Erik crashes a party at the school, so they have it out in the kitchen and get more-or-less back together by the end.

Espionage Husbands (Talos x Nick Fury {Captain Marvel/Secret Invasion}):

Locked In This Embrace: One-shot. Focuses on the forehead-touching scene from Episode 1, plus an original scene or two afterwards. Mostly Talos pining for Nick with a happy ending.

If You Are Gilgamesh And Did These Things: One-shot. Angst without a happy ending because the author was very upset and sad when Talos died. Nick is grieving Talos; Sonya isn’t helping.

Frankenwolf (Ruby Lucas x Victor Frankenstein {Once Upon A Time}):

Den of Blankets: One-shot. Ruby’s wolf instincts kick in during pregnancy and she builds a blanket-fort den. V fluff.

She Deserves To Have Your Name: One-shot (possibly same-universe as Den of Blankets). Victor has doubts about whether or not their child should have the name Frankenstein, but Ruby wouldn’t hear of anything else.

It’s Just A Dream: One-shot. Ruby has a nightmare spawned from her fears of being a bad parent; Victor comforts her.

As The Storm Blows Through: One-shot. Victor has anxiety during a storm because of what happened with Gerhardt, and Ruby comforts him.

Secret Admirers Are For The Subtle: One-shot. Victor anonymously sends Ruby flowers at the diner so he can drop by, “notice” them, and stick around to sketch them, all so he can spend time with Ruby. She’s on to him the entire time.

Blue Skies Smiling At Me: One-shot. Utterly fluffy beach fic. Ruby is having a good day relaxing with her friends, and it only gets better when her handsome husband joins them.

Frankenberry And The Fruit Brute: One-shot. Fun little Halloween fic where Ruby and Victor discover the General Mills cereals that match their fairytale identities.

Precursor To A Love Song: One-shot. Hyperion Heights AU where Ruby and Victor meet and feel an instant connection, even though they don’t know why. She’s a fashion designer and he’s a piano player/freelance artist. Potential springboard for a full chapter fic if I feel like it.

HatterHare (Mad Hatter x March Hare {Adventures In Wonderland}):

The First Kiss: One-shot. Just a fluffy lil idea about what their first kiss might’ve been like.

Every Bit Of You: One-shot. Projection’n’stuff about food issues basically.

Kalluzeb (Garazeb Orrelios x Alexsandr Kallus {Star Wars Rebels}):

Don’t You Know It’s Because He Loves You?: One-shot. Kallus discovers that Zeb is in love with him via a Lasat Honor Guard tradition.

To Convince You That I Love You: Chapter fic. Kallus does risky things to prove he would do anything for love of Zeb, or that he’s worthy of him, and ends up getting hurt. Angst with a happy ending, hurt/comfort.

Lokius (Loki x Mobius {Loki}):

The Man Of My Dreams And He’s Just Out Of Reach: One-shot (with a very long name lol). Mobius stands there across the street from Don’s house and misses Loki. Author was having some Feelings™.

Outlaw Queen (Regina Mills x Robin Hood {Once Upon A Time}):

A Slice Of Life: One-shot. Regina spends the day with her boys and thinks about how awesome it is to have them. V fluffy because the OQ family didn’t get enough of that.

Paxe/AxePaz (Paz Vizsla x Axe Woves {The Mandalorian}):

We Are Mandalorians: Our Love Must Be Forged: Chapter fic, 11 total. Axe and Paz slowly fall in love as they engage in the battle to retake Mandalore, more or less a fix-it for Paz dying in S3 canon.

PloKit (Plo Koon x Kit Fisto {Star Wars: the Clone Wars}):

Reader, Plo Married Him: One-shot. Plo and Kit share some quiet time just after their wedding.

The Tender Daily Ritual: One-shot. Basically just fluff; Kit helps Plo with lotioning his skin because it dries out in oxygen atmospheres.

Scogan (Scott Summers x Logan Howlett {X-Men Movies}):

Torn Between Love And Fear: One-shot. Scott wants to stay after sex and sleep in Logan’s room, but Logan is terrified of hurting him during a nightmare. Angst with a happy (and sort of spicy) ending.

You Scratch My Back, I’ll Scratch Yours: One-shot. Logan and Scott discover they have a mutual pain kink and indulge in it together for the first time. Incredibly spicy, I'm so proud of myself.

Spones (Spock x Dr. McCoy {Star Trek TOS}):

I Could Drink A Case Of You (I Would Still Be On My Feet): One-shot. Based on a Joni Mitchell song; angsty with a happy ending.

[lyricfulloflight]

Ok, how about an angsty fic where Raven seduces Charles' boyfriends to "check they're faithful"

Okay, so my initial reaction to this prompt was: “horror, pure horror”, “Raven did what now?” “That bitch”.  But then, I wrote about it anyway.

I am not yet at 400 followers, so this post will be a bit of a tease.  I am at 398 followers though, so very very close.  When I get to 400 maybe I’ll fill a happier prompt?

I am posting the start of this because what started as a drabble is now turning into a fic.  So here’s the 2,500 + word ‘intro’ to the fic (dear lord what is wrong with me), that tackles this specific prompt.  Note to readers:  Erik is no where to be found in this part.  I decided, for reasons, that Erik would, ever be fooled by Raven trying to get him to cheat on Charles.  Never. (I think I decided this for my own sanity).

This fic will then continue, likely on AO3 at some point, as a fake-dating fic. I will include a few more notes at the end of this intro section to explain what will I have planned next.  

The Fall

Charles tried to be angry at Raven.  He really did.  He knew (as a telepath, how could he not know?), that most people would have reacted with anger, or outright rage.  Somehow, even all these years later with his mother and Kurt far away, hardly any influence left in his life, he could not help hearing their voices in his head; “You’ve brought this on yourself Charles.”, “This is all your own doing, young man.”.  The anger, the shame, the pain of it all turned inward.

Charles slipped away from the door where he’d overheard Raven talking to Hank, tiptoeing without so much as a sound - thank goodness for thick carpets.  The scene he’d just witnessed played over and over like a record stuck in an endless loop.

“Well I have to make sure don’t I?  That they really care for him.”  Raven had explained.  “Charles is such a horrible judge of character.  He really is the worst telepath of all time.”

“Still,” Hank had protested. “Luring his boyfriends away from him, tempting them to cheat, on purpose…that seems a bit much.”

“Look, two of those guys wanted to sleep with me when I was a woman and told me they weren’t even really gay.  If Charles can’t pick boyfriends who know their own sexuality, then he obviously needs my help.  You wouldn’t want him to actually keep dating these men would you? They all cheated on him!”

“With you. Because you intentionally tried to lure them away.  What if you hadn’t intervened?  You never know everything might have been fine!”

“It wouldn’t have been fine, Hank.  They’re CHEATERS.  If they didn’t cheat with me, or whoever I was pretending to be, they would have cheated on Charles with someone else.  They are scum.”

“If you say so.”

“I do say so. I’m protecting my brother, like any good sister would.”

“I feel the ethics of this situation are rather…murky.”

“Whatever, Hank.  I am a great sister.  A loving, protective, thoughtful sister who wants only the best for Charles.  And all his boyfriends have been awful, so I have no regrets.”

Had all his boyfriends been so awful, Charles wondered?  Perhaps they had.  Luke had been quite self-obsessed.  Really any man who needed to go to the gym every single day, and complained when they weren’t open on Christmas morning, was likely not the best match for Charles. Oliver had clearly been more interested in Charles’ money than anything else – he’d always looked happier after Charles gave him a present than he did after sex, which had been more than a little depressing.  Peter, well Peter had a small…appendage…and Charles was certain he would have broken things off with him even without Raven’s ‘helpful’ interference.

It was difficult to remember all the times he’d caught his boyfriend’s cheating, or had to listen to their admissions of having cheated, and realize that every single time his partner, the man he’d loved (or was at least hoping to love) had been kissing his sister.  Best not to think about it too deeply.

Hank, of course, had a point – perhaps the cheating never would have occurred without Raven forcing the issue.  Which, of course, was where the anger should have come in.  But Raven had a point too, they may well have cheated anyway, they could have already cheated before Raven’s seductions for all Charles knew – and that, that was where the self doubt came crashing through.

It seemed, and really how had Charles not realized this before, that he simply was not very lovable.  He was not worth someone’s commitment, their devotion, or their undivided affection.  Charles, by himself, was not enough.  His mother had certainly known, and his step-father.  Apparently even Raven knew Charles was lacking, why else would she have done what she’d done?  Why else would she have had such success?

Clearly, it was time to give up dating, to give up the fanciful idea of finding ‘the one’.  It was simply a waste of his time.

Charles spent the next six months devoting himself to casual encounters, one-night stands, fuck buddies, and random hook-ups.

He also spent very little time with Raven, though if anyone asked he would have vehemently denied it was intentional.

Casual sex was…empty and meaningless.  It burned at Charles’ heart and ate at his soul.  To go through with it, to make himself into the person he needed to be to flirt outrageously and tempt men who would clearly otherwise overlook him, he drank.  He drank a lot.  He drank copious amounts of fruity drinks with little umbrellas and sexually charged names.  He was reckless and wild.

It worked.  Though, honestly he didn’t much like himself in the morning.

He still got up and did it all again the next weekend.  And the weekend after that.  And the weekend after that.

Eventually it had to start feeling right, either that or it had to end.

It ended.  To be precise it crashed into a heap of of drunken excess and drug induced haziness.  

It ended in with Charles being shaken awake by a troubled looking young woman in the very dirty bathroom of a club who’s name he couldn’t remember.

“Are you okay?”

Charles peered up at the young woman through heavy lids that couldn’t seem to open completely.  His head was pounding, his telepathy muted to nothing more than a whisper, and he wasn’t completely sure he could stand if he tried.

“I’m fine.”  He winced at the croak of his own voice.

“Yeah, I’m not buying that.”  The young woman replied pointedly. “Is there anything I can do for you?”

Charles felt at his pockets and found them empty.

“Would I be able to use your phone?”  Charles asked with a wince. “I seem to have misplaced mine.”

“Took your stuff, huh?  Assholes.  Come out to the front, you can use the phone at the bar.  I don’t really have much money I can lend you -”

“No, no, I don’t need any money.”  Charles rushed to interrupt. “I…I’m sure someone can come and pick me up.”

“You know…”  The women began hesitantly, “you should probably use my phone.  You…you’re not going to want to go out there.”

“I look that bad, do I?”  Charles said with an embarrassed smiled.

“Yeah. You look…well, make your call and see for yourself.”  

She held out her phone and Charles took it.  He dialed a number he hadn’t called in months, crossed his fingers and hoped for an answer.

Raven picked up after six long rings.

“Hello?”

“Hello, Raven.  It’s Charles.”

“What the fuck are you calling me for at five in the morning?”

“I need you to come get me.”

“Come get you…are you in some kind of trouble Charles?  Are you hurt?”

Charles could hear the sounds of movement through the phone and the edge of panic in Raven’s voice.

“I’m fine.”  He answered. “I just…someone stole my phone and my wallet at a club and I need a ride home.”

“Where are you?”

Ah, good question.  Charles took the phone away from his face momentarily and smiled his best charming smile at the young woman currently staring down at him.

“Where am I, exactly?”  He whispered.

He wasn’t exactly surprised by the sad look the woman gave him as she recited the name of the club and its address.  Charles was more than a little depressed to realize he was quite so far away from his home in the Upper East Side of Manhattan.  It would likely take Raven the better part of an hour to come get him.  He sighed.  There was nothing for it, he had no one else to turn to who cared enough to come get him and had a car.

Charles got back on the phone and gave Raven the address.  He had to pull the phone away from his ear  when she yelled at him for being an idiot and making ridiculous choices and why would go to some club that was almost outside the city, etc, etc.

“You’ll come get me though.”  He ventured when her tirade ended.

“Yes, you fool.  I’m almost down to the parking garage.  I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

Charles hung up and handed the phone back to the young lady, and thanked her profusely for her kindness.  She nodded, gave him one more sad, troubled look and then left.

Alone, Charles managed to heave himself up off the floor, though not without a great deal of effort.  His limbs were stiff and sore as if he’d spent a good portion on the evening stuck in a very uncomfortable position, which frankly seemed quite likely.

One look in the mirror was all it took to understand why the young female employee had thought he might not want to come out of the bathroom. Charles was absolutely covered in…things.  He was almost certain a great deal of the sticky, multicoloured stains on his shirt were from various types of alcohol.  However, he also had to admit that the crunchy, dried substance in his hair was most certainly not alcohol. He immediately turned on the tap and stuck his head under the bathroom sink.  There was no way in hell he was going to have Raven pick his up from a club with come stuck in his hair. He had some dignity after all.

After washing his hair as best he could, Charles decided it was best to try the same with his shirt.  He winced as he struggled out of his white v-neck shirt, his muscles protesting each movement.  He succeeded in the end, and ran the shirt under hot water for several minutes before wringing it out and sticking it under the hair dryer in an attempt to dry it out.

As he held his shirt under the air flow, he took a quick glance at his torso and discovered he was covered in bruises, many of which bore the distinct look of finger prints.  His neck was worse than anything, absolutely covered in great purple bruise and teeth marks, one of which appeared to have broken the skin.

Charles found himself shaking at the sight and the realization he had no idea how he’d gotten any of the marks.  A wave of nausea hit him like a freight train and he stumbled into the nearest stall and vomited violently.

What in the world had he done?  How could have have let himself fall this far, spiral to such an incredible low point?  Waking up in a bathroom with no memory of the night before was appalling and terrifying.  As a telepath, he was generally cursed with excellent recall of people and events.  He couldn’t remember anything about the night before beyond accepting a particularly large slushy drink from a man at the bar.  Which meant, dammit, that he had more than likely been drugged. Lovely.

When Raven arrived he was going to get her to drive him directly home, where he could have a very, very hot shower, and he was immediately heading to the nearest clinic for testing.  And he was never, ever doing this again.  Ever.

Forty five minutes later, almost on the dot, the kind young lady from earlier poked her head into the bathroom and let him know his ride was here.  By that time Charles shirt was still stained, but mostly dry and smelled slightly less of alcohol and…other things.  Charles took one last look at himself, the damp hair, the dark circles under his eyes, the mass of bruises on his neck and prepared himself for an epic dressing down from his sister.

Her absolute stunned silence when she saw him was somehow a million times worse.  Raven always had something to say and to think his behaviour had literally shocked her into silence was a clear message unto itself.  Charles had crossed a line that even Raven had no response to.

The silence lasted almost until they reached Charles’ apartment building.

“Charles…” Raven’s voice was barely audible above the low level volume of the radio. “what are you…what do you need me to do?”

Charles sighed. “I’m going to go upstairs and clean myself up.  Then I need to head to the clinic.  You’re…”  He closed his eyes, hesitant to make the offer, but determined to push onward, “you’re welcome to come with me if you like.  But I’m fully capable of taking care of myself if you’re busy.”

“Fully capable…” Raven whipped her head around to stare at Charles as she parked down the street from his building. “Charles have you seen yourself?  You look atrocious.  You look…I’ve never seen you look like this in my life.  I will take you to the clinic.  I will take you to a therapist.  I will take you anywhere and do anything that will guarantee I never, ever see you like this again.  This is scary Charles.  You’re scaring me.”

“I’m sorry.”  Charles said, reaching out to touch Raven’s hand. “I made a mistake.  It’s not going to happen again.”

“I’ve barely seen you in six month Charles.  Has it been six months worth mistakes?  Six months of morning like this that I didn’t know about?”

Charles felt crushed under the helpless look in her eyes.  The truth was the last six months had been full of out of character behaviour and more than a few risky choices.  Nothing compared to the past 24 hours though.

“I…I’ve had a rough go of it lately.  I was trying to be someone…else.” Charles said, meeting Raven’s gaze directly.  “I was trying to be someone who’s sister didn’t feel she had to vet their boyfriends because they were a shit judge of character.  I was trying to be someone who’s boyfriends didn’t all cheat on him with said shapeshifting sister.”  He finally admitted.

“Oh. Oh, Charles.”  Raven’s eyes teared up, though in typical fashion, she somehow held them at bay. “I didn’t know…you weren’t supposed to know.”

“I know.  But I found out and I thought…I thought I should try something different.”

Raven huffed. “So you decided not to judge anyone’s character at all and just sleep with any man with a pulse.  That’s a brilliant choice Charles.”

Charles winced as Raven struck him firmly on the arm.

“Promise me you will never do ‘casually reckless’ again Charles.  Promise me you’ll just go back to being you.  The real, genuine you that I, and anyone worth your time, will love.”

“I promise to never do casually reckless again.”  Charles vowed.

They exited the car and walked slowly to Charles’ building where they were greeted by a surprised, but doing he best to hide it, doorman who had known Charles since he was sixteen and starting college. Charles felt himself flush from the roots of his to the collar of his shirt.

When Charles finally got upstairs and opened his front door he felt a wave of relief: home, safety, comfort.

Raven however, wasn’t quite done.

“You didn’t promise the last bit Charles.  You didn’t promise to be your genuine lovable self again.”  She said with a teasing smile.

“No I didn’t.”  Charles agreed. “I think…I think after everything, the last six months, my inability to have a loving committed relationship with a man who won’t cheat on me, I think I can admit the truth:  I am simply not fit for romantic consumption. That man, that ‘lovable’ man you think me to be?  He doesn’t exist.”

Charles turned on his heel and headed for his room.  He took a long hot shower.  He went to the clinic and got tested and waited none too patiently before he finally received a clean bill of health.  He moved on with his life.  If that life was now a perpetually lonely single life, he told himself he simply didn’t care.  He told himself he didn’t care so much, he almost believed it.

The End…so far

So this fic will turn into a fake dating situation where Raven and Hank are getting married.  Charles, who has lived in last five years as a celibate monk is in need of a date.  He knows how much it will mean to Raven if he starts dating again, especially for her wedding.  He runs into Erik one day (literally because that’s how this trope works folks) and spontaneous asks him to pretend to be his boyfriend at his sisters wedding.  Erik agrees.  Fake dating commences.

Thank you @akasanata for putting this story in my brain with your prompt.  I apologize for this first part being so…dark, but it really couldn’t be anything but I don’t think.

[elmaxlys]

13 and 15 :) ♡

13- list 5 OTPs from past fandoms

Jasico (Jason Grace x Nico di Angelo) from the Riordanverse. I still like the books even if I'm not up to date, but the fandom is pure garbage so I quit that part xD

Percabeth (Percy Jackson x Annabeth Chase), also from the Riordanverse. I couldn't not mention them

Cherik (Charles Xavier x Magneto) from X-Men. I've only seen the movies and was never involved with the fandom but I used to know all their scenes by heart

Oh there's all the KNB ones, I used to multiship like crazy. To this day I think it's the fandom I read the most fanfics for, maybe with HQ!! and EDEN. So the ones I have to mention here: Aida Riko x Hyuuga Junpei x Kiyoshi Teppei bro my first ot3 and the only of my KNB ships I never read a fic about I loved them so much and I'm sure if I rewatch it'd be the same

The different combinations of Kuroko Tetsuya x Kise Ryouta x Aomine Daiki x Kagami Taiga, also from KNB. Funnily enough, I don't like the 4 of them together, but the different match-ups of these 4 were all I was about haha! The time I awakened my multishipper soul..

15- Opinion on OC kids

They're not really my thing.

Pregnancy grosses me out majorly so I can't let my favs who haven't been through it in canon go through it in my head, you feel? I love omegaverse but really not for that aspect xD Adoption's better for that, to me, but still lol

The thing is, what I tend to like the most is the "pre-relationship" part, if that makes sense? Like, the pining, and how they got together, if at all. I don't often write or read about established relationships - let alone ones where's it's so established they have kids.

Also, like, when I want my OTPs who don't have kids in canon to be sort of parental figures, I just make them older siblings or parental figures of kids/younger characters that already exist in canon. For example in Tenkuu Shinpan, i have Yamajuoka as the big brothers of Haruka. Or also Rika as the big bro of Floor 9, or the other Guardian Angels as her stand-in parents. In Tokyo Ghoul, the Clowns toward Souta and Shikorae, esp Roma and Donato (not as a ship) as parents, the other as annoying big siblings.

This ended up longer than I thought rip I think the conclusion is that I'm all about found family and (somewhat) canonverse!

[joanthangroff]

WIP Nudge Game

@sophiainspace tagged me in this and luckily I JUST sorted my WIPs/fic ideas by fandom, so this will be fun! Warning: they are A LOT.

Send me the description and I'll share a bit about the fic.

ARROWVERSE

Rogues Heist AU where Hartley hires Snart to break into STAR Labs for him

Joe/Henry co-parenting

Snart being alive as a result of Crisis

Westhallen AU where Iris sets up Barry and her boyfriend (reddit inspired)

Flash s4 AU where Snart is in Iron Heights when DeVoe frames Barry

Mick/Ava team-up to figure out that Snart is wandering through the timeline as a result from the Oculus

ColdFlash kissing as distraction

3 times Barry and Mick met after Snart’s death

Sequel to my Sin Onboard the Waverider fic

Zari/Cisco bonding (DCTVGenPromptathon from ages ago)

Charlie/Clotho backstory

5 times Snart witnessed Barry being Bad(TM)

Team Flash visiting Julian in London (...DCTVGenPromptathon, ages ago)

Coldwave fae AU ft. Hartley

Hartley/Iris team-up vs Wells

Doctor Who/Legends crossover

pre-Flashpoint Julian being Barry’s childhood friend

Rogues/Southside Serpents crossover

Glee/Flash crossover (Speed Force reasons prompted!)

OTHERS

Smallville s8 Clark reacts to Lex’s death

Young Justice Core 4 in Smallville

TimKon Good Omens AU

Jarchie Superman Shirt

Jarchie Prom

St Smythe Spy AU

x times the Potters showed Sirius what a family is like

Captain America Musical

Shadowhunters Superheroes AU

Cherik Royalty AU

Spring Awakening YouTube AU

Teen Wolf s6 rewrite where Mason can see auras

Thiam Dirty Dancing AU

Sciles Fake Dating for an Apartment

Thiam Orpheus & Eurydike inspired s6a rewrite

Leverage OT3 Bakery AU

ORIGINAL

Lost Inside

Untitled (internet friends)

Trans Moses

I’m tagging (without obligation to do this, of course) @ruxian and @shingun!

[irelise]

Secret Mutant 2019 Round-up

So this was one of the first ever fandom events I’ve ever joined in and I wrote a couple of fics, both for Cherik and other miscellaneous pairs! In no particular order:

no such thing as bad publicity (4562 words) - Cherik, mutual pining, oblivious idiots being oblivious, grumpy protective Erik Several months ago, Charles Xavier and his twenty mutant students were kicked out into the streets after the Xavier mansion was seized by Sebastian Shaw to settle an old debt. At the same time, Erik Lehnsherr, founder and CEO of Lehnsherr Steel was embroiled in a publicity scandal that resulted in a backlash against his business. In an attempt to repair his reputation, Erik charitably opened his penthouse duplex to Xavier and his children. The kids are loud and hyperactive, and Xavier too damn kind and earnest and hopeful, but eventually they settled into an uneasy peace.

Now, months later, the publication of a provocative magazine article threatens to throw everything into chaos once more...

with eyes downcast (2099 words) - Kurt Marko/Charles, underage, character study The listless turn of days.

(Charles grows up. He is missing something, but he doesn't know what.)

The Time for Home (4040 words) - Cherik, sci-fi AU, old(er) mutants in love, DOMESTIC FLUFF!!! The relationship between diplomat Charles Xavier and engineer-turned-vigilante Erik Lehnsherr is a tumultuous one. However, once a year, they enjoy a week of (relative) peace and quiet with only each other for company. This year sees them on the planet Didyma in the depths of winter.

Sowing the seeds of discord (691 words) - ESN/Charles, background Cherik, non-con (non-explicit), mythology AU Charles is the golden apple of Greek mythology. En Sabah Nur wins him.

Bonus: Technically not part of the challenge, but for one of my Madness prompts I wanted a harem AU of some sort and ended up plot bunnying myself for it so hard I started building a whole new AU with a friend of mine! Come check it out, we’ve done a metric fuckton of world-building and we’re starting a fic collection!

carrying the torch (6261 words) - Cherik, Shaw/Erik/Charles in all combinations, non-con, harem AU, angst and H/C Erik has lived under Shaw’s thumb for most of his life after being captured in a failed rebellion. Charles is a new arrival to the harem, and already he has an agenda of his own. The bond they develop comes as a surprise to both of them, but now that they have each other, can they survive Shaw’s attentions?

AND FOR THE GIFTS I GOT oh my goddddd i’m so excited about them!!!!!! @ikeracity was my gifter for the main exchange and she wrote me the longest and THE BEST au with Charles as a runaway from ESN, and Erik as a hunter sent after him. Absolutely brilliant characterization with both Charles and Erik being wonderfully competent BAMFs slowly learning to trust each other and work together. I love love love the way ESN was written, and there are a few surprise characters involved ;D (and of course, plenty of cuddling and sharing body warmth! eeeeeeee)

all your love is sunlight by ikeracity (29961 words) Over twenty years ago, the world ended an inferno. From the ashes of what was once a modern world, survivors gathered what remained and slowly knit civilization back together. The Keep is one of the largest new cities in the north, ruled by the iron fist of a mutant named Apocalypse. He keeps an inner circle of favored mutants around him, a mixture of some of the most powerful mutants to walk the earth. But when his most prized treasure, Charles Xavier, escapes from the Keep, he sends wanderer and hunter Erik Lehnsherr after him.

An easy task, Erik figures. But soon enough, he discovers that Charles is much more of a handful than he'd bargained for. Their tumultuous meeting sets into motion a chain of events that will lead them deep into unfamiliar territory--in both the world and in matters of the heart.

for madness i got 4(!!!!!) different fics dealing with Christmas time at the mansion, all of them wonderfully bittersweet as Charles struggles through the dark days after Cuba/pre-DoFP and finds love and support from the people around him. Please read the first two in particular if you’re in the mood to read fics centered on the platonic love and loyalty between Hank and Charles, because there’s simply not enough of that relationship out there!

And I Wouldn't Have It (Any Other Way) by librata It's 1970, and Charles hasn't been dealing with a decade of loss with as much grace as he could. Hank wants to help.

There's Only Us by flightinflame Being alone in the mansion on Christmas, their children sent to war, is breaking Charles's heart. Luckily, one other resident remains.

i love you straightfowardly, without complexities or pride by lavenderlotion They were mere feet apart, and all Charles wanted was to get closer.

Missing Pieces by librata After coming home from Cuba with what's left of his little family, Charles is doing all he can to forget and move forward. Too bad a certain someone keeps pulling him back.

Thank you so much @jackyjango​ for running the event this year! Had a brilliant time and I’m still going through the fics because there’s SO MUCH good stuff!

[thevagueambition]

Slash and Canon

Do you ever just think about how much slash (and femslash) fandom has changed the last ~10 years? Expectation of canonicity have changed so immensely. This expectation just plain did not exist before Johnlock and Destiel, not as far as I remember, while nowadays you have certain slash fans harrasing creators over lack of canonicity...

It really is just those 10 years ago or so that people were still putting “m/m yaoi slash don’t like, don’t read!!!” stuff in their summaries, pre-defensive about what they were doing. My oldest slash-ish fic dates back to 2011 and I didn’t write a warning for it, but I think some people were still doing that at the time. I certainly kept seeing it in summaries on ff.net, so even if those fics may have been a bit older, they were still from within that time frame.

I remember being quite reluctant to go into actual Wolfstar at the time, despite primarily writing Marauders fic centered around Remus. I wrote post-Wolfstar (post-slash, as I apparently wrote in the summary at the time) in that 2011 fic I mentioned, but I didn’t write actual slash till some years later. 

Aside from that defensiveness, that reluctance to be seen as a “deranged slash fan” that has (seemingly) largely disappeared from international fandom (I’m sure it must still exist in some national ones, see the reaction “fujoshis” garner), there is also the question of expectations when it comes to canon. 

As I said, I don’t remember people ever expecting slash ships to become canon back in the day. Queerbaiting was rarer, of course, but it was happening. Subtext had certainly been happening forever, just look at Sherlock Holmes and Star Trek, two of the earliest fandoms. A lot of 90s shows had significant slash fandoms, as well, with, again, no expectation of canonicity (I mean, it was the 90s). Hell, I mean, people didn’t even expect Xena/Gabrielle canonicity, and that basically happened, to the extent that it could at the time! 

But getting closer to today, Merthur was a hugely popular queerbaited ship (and actually one I shipped while the show was ongoing, so I have a bit more authority on this than the earlier stuff). It was by far the most popular ship in the fandom, and the show certainly had it’s subtext about their relationship, but no-one was expecting it to go canon at any point during the shows run (2008-2012). Or rather, maybe a few people did, but that was not part of the fannish conversation about the pairing. Similarly, X-Men: First Class made Cherik hugely popular in 2011, but canonicity wasn’t discussed - and certainly not expected! 

I do think Johnlock and Destiel is where it changed. The queerbaiting for those ships was unbearingly overt. In think the fact that both those shows make direct references to a romantic relationship between the two shipped characters must have been part of what did it. People were getting convinced that, when so much had gone from subtext to outright text, their actual relationships must do at some point, too. 

I believe the fact that these two shows, that were popular to the extent that they were unavoidable within fandom spaces, both had overtly queerbaited ships simoultaneously is what changed the expectations for canonicity. Because, as they kept not going there, the conversation about queerbaiting spread far and wide. People felt insulted - and rightly so!

That other shows were starting to have more canon m/m and f/f relationships probably also affected things. Slash fandom was changing from a shameful, hidden thing to a natural reaction to parts of what a story was putting forth. Of course, LGBTQ rights have come a long way in recent years, too, which has probably set a different scene for slash, as well. Expecting that a show may have a gay or bisexual character in the main cast is not unrealistic today the way it was up until Will and Grace got really popular (with SFF shows still taking a while to get there, lbr). 

But the interesting thing to me is perhaps that this big focus on queerbaiting, this new thirst for canonicity (which I share, don’t get me wrong), has affected how fandom regards non-queerbaited slash and femslash ships, too. Certain slash ships with honestly not that much in the way of canoncial subtext have been expected to become canon. Slash fans of recent years have tried to bully creators into making such ships canon, then harrased them when they didn’t. And while I certainly understood it with Johlock and Destiel (as much as harrasment is always wrong), even that would have been an incomprehensible idea 10 years ago. People simply didn’t have those expectations. The fact that it’s been happening with ships that have very little in the way of subtext going on is sort of incomprehensible to me and I’m only 22. 

I’m really so very glad that the shame and guilt often associated with creating and consuming slash in the past isn’t really present in modern international fandom, because it’s a sign of homophobia being less prominent and it’s healthier for all involved. And I do think we should speak out when canon tricks us then shits on us. Expecting completely normal non-canonical ships to become canon, though...? That’s weird to me. And the change in atitude is absolutely striking. 

[widgenstain]

Secret Mutant Letter

Slightly updated version from two years ago. Yes, it’s still super long, but don’t be deterred by that, I’m grateful for any gift and I will squeeee over whatever you decide to write for me.

If there’s any confusion left after reading the prompts, here’s a guideline for the things I like and the things I’m not so fond of:

I LIKE:

 - Well thought-through characters with emotionally relatable/understandable motivations and a natural growth or decline. I will always pick a simple, short story with fleshed out, “real” characters over a twisty-turn-y ride that gives its players an unnatural progression and gimmick-y problems for ze ultimate drama.

- Porn.

- Charles Xavier. Yes, he’s my favourite character, with all his flaws and faults, so I would prefer if the story/art was focused on him. I don’t really care if it’s pre-beach Charles, canon disabled Charles, sad hobo trash-baby Charles, old Charles, or dark!Charles (hell yeah!) just give me Charles as the main character (unless you pick the Logurt or Alex/Armando fic of course). Concerning the smut: I very much like to see him top.

- Pairings: I pretty much ship Charles with everyone in the X-men verse, MCU, Elementary verse or verse of an obscure fandom only people from the Shetlands know about. Erik only with Charles, Magda, Moira or Shaw (as an abusive/bad boyfriend, not a happy relationship) please. I’m pretty open when it comes to side-pairings and I can’t really think of any that I wouldn’t like. Fem!slash is also always welcome.

- Balanced power dynamics in relationships. One of the things that draw me to Cherik is that despite the horrible things those two dumb men have put each other through in all those decades, they treat the other as some sort of equal. So, in a healthy relationship fix-it, I’d like to see this form of respect and sense of equality reflected. In all aspects of their lives, including the bedroom. I like to see this in other pairings too btw.

- Speaking of fix its and happy ends: I love AUs, I can’t help myself. If canon is as sad and depressing as ours, AUs are the way to go. You can go wild here since one of the reasons I fell into this fandom is the wide variety of AUs; Noir, Western, Space, Inanimate objects, Animals, Dragons, Historical, Mythology, Vampires… you name it and I’m pretty sure I’ll love it!

- The same goes for kinks. Excluding the exceptions mentioned below there isn’t much that could shock me or turn me away.  Vore, watersports, dub-con, infidelity, incest (Charles/Raven hrrgggnnn), scat, awkward sex, premature ejaculation, intercrural, blood play, spinal cord injury sex, mpreg, caning… this list goes on and on. The previous years I always put genderbending and lactation on my No list but this has changed since. Bring on the genderfuck and men with breasts!

   I DON’T LIKE

 As open as I am to all different kinds of pairings and no-vagina-no kinks in fanfiction, as picky I am when it comes to dynamics and certain characterisations.

- Nothing will turn me away quicker from a fic than when Charles ‘Leader Of The X-men’ Xavier is portrayed as a waifish, helpless, stereotypically feminine bimbo who cries all day and wantonly spreads his legs for every strong man he meets. He’s smart, an optimistic realist with a big forgiving heart; He’s caring in a traditionally paternal (actually quite patriarchal, hello canon!dark!Charles) sense, later on very confident in his abilities as well as his PAN PAN PAN sexuality and very very powerful. Show it, don’t tell and please don’t turn him into this cutsey-wutsey thing that needs constant protection and only lives to be fucked by Erik’s a giant pulsing cock.

- The other side of this coin: That characterisation of Erik. I love Erik. He’s the one I usually identify with (minus the genocidal tendencies) therefore, yes, great character. I see him as a passionate, honest, righteous, determined, committed, angry man who is proud of EVERYTHING he is and who can be hilariously camp (and funny) and truly good to the few people he cares about. He’s also an unstable drama queen, starved for love and admiration, unreasonable, stubborn to the bone and has troubles expressing his many more tender emotions. He’s basically a huge ball of issues, so if I see him written as this cool, in-control, hyper-masculine, I-only-top-hurr-hurr, Christian Grey-ish kind of super-dom, I do not only turn away, I run screaming.

- In a similar, if a little more focussed on the smut vein: Wolverine is a canon bi man, you cannot tell me that he never had a dick up his arse in the 200 odd years he spent on this planet.

- I used to love a/o verses for the self-lubrication, the (consensual) heat aggressiveness and all the possibilities I saw in it. A gender sand-box where there are no limits: Women impregnating other people, pregnant men, a fictional discussion of what exactly defines genders, are they limited to who carries the children and who sires them or is there more etc., how does sexual dimorphism play into this… blah blah blah. Instead it’s often used to write bodice ripper story lines where Beatrice, the busty maiden and her true-love, the brooding and mysterious Lord Fatcock are replaced by two men. Or it’s used to make up biology reasons that excuse rape. If you go for the a/o prompts: Please don’t do that.

- From rape to love story arcs. This No comes right after waifish Charles. I don’t mind non-con in fanfiction, even sexualised non-con (I’ve learned that I prefer the a little less common sadistic POV in those though), but if one character abuses the other for 100k words, I don’t want to read about them falling in “love” in the end and having babies. Show rape as the violent and destructive act that it is and deal with the consequences. Don’t romanticise it and have the victim fall for their abuser for the sake of a “happy end”.

- Shaw/Charles. I actually do enjoy this pairing and there are some very good fics that feature it, but I just feel that there are enough of them the fandom already. At least of the ones with the typical “Shaw tortures Charles” dynamic. Shaw is Erik’s demon and I like to keep it that way.

- D/s verses or hard-core BDSM. I like the latter occasionally, if it stays confined to the bedroom, but I really am not a fan of how these relationships are portrayed in fanfiction (balanced power dynamics, remember?). With D/s verses I sometimes have major troubles understanding what exactly qualifies as consent and a lot of those ‘raised to kneel at the table’ tropes that pop up in them squick the hell out of me. So I rather not read them.

- I also have very specific tastes when it comes to crossdressing, which would take hours to explain, so I’m putting this kink in the No section too.

 All of that said (phew, it was a lot), I hope one of my prompts will inspire you, write what you think feels right, and most importantly: enjoy yourselves and have fun!!!!

I can’t wait for the outcome!

  Love,

  Widge

[luninosity]

2) what work of yours, if any, are you the most embarrassed about existing? 15) why did you start writing? 19) when it comes to more complicated narratives, how do you keep track of outlines, characters, development, timeline, ect.? 20) do you write in long sit-down sessions or in little spurts?

2 - what work am I embarrassed about existing, if any?

There’re sort of two answers to that, but it’s not quite embarrassment in either case? The first answer is, I’m not really embarrassed by anything that’s up on AO3 or LJ - some of it I’d do differently if I were going to rewrite it today, and sometimes I can tell I’m a much younger writer, but that’s just part of the process of becoming better; it’s who I was then, and that led to me being me now. So I’ll stand by it all, in that sense (though, again, there ARE a few I’d write differently, especially Erik POV stuff; I’m not sure I was that good at him starting out).

The second answer is the McFassy fic that got mocked on the Graham Norton Show, and I am saying mocked and not just read, because they didn’t ask me (I’d’ve said no; other people might’ve said yes, but they didn’t ask, and I’d’ve chosen to say no, please don’t remove my fic from its context without any understanding of that context) and they read it all wrong - it’s a very bittersweet and at the beginning painful fic, and it was a gift-by-request for someone else (so they insulted her too), and they read it like it was supposed to be funny. And I still to this day get messages going, ooh, look how cool this is, they featured your fic!!! when I’m just like, no, this is actually one of the most uncomfortable moments of my life, I’d like to pretend it never happened. I’m not linking to it for that reason.

15 - why did I start writing?

I’ve been writing ever since I can remember - I mean, at like four years old, I wrote a story about a girl who gets brought a baby unicorn instead of money by the Tooth Fairy. Fandom stuff, though, I started doing that (by myself, not as part of a community, just handwritten scribbled stuff in a notebook with a kitty on it) because I was a giant Star Wars nerd, and remember that this was in the times after the classic films but before the prequels, so all we had were the EU novels, the Zahn and Anderson and Kathy Tyers, and that just wasn’t enough, so I started writing my own. (I kind of knew fandom and fanfic was a Thing - my dad’s a big Star Trek nerd, and he had a bunch of the old fanzines and related work, the Jean Lorrah and Sondra Marshak stuff - but it all felt sort of historical, y’know? Nothing he had was currently happening, so I just sort of assumed it was a particular phenomenon.) And then I kind of stopped for a while, because life got busy and the prequels weren’t great (I did write, or start, one or two Obi-Wan & Anakin fics - in retrospect they’d probably count as pre-slash, they were all about recognizing how much they each meant to each other, but the romance angle had somehow not yet occurred to me). And then in grad school Awesome Husband and I discovered Supernatural, at roughly the same time as I was going to a few conferences and realizing that Fandom Studies was a thing, and I went, OH MY GOD THERE ARE OTHER PEOPLE WHO DO THIS, LIKE WHAT I USED TO DO, LIKE THE STUFF IN MY DAD’S OLD TREK ZINES, ONLY TODAY AND ON THE INTERNETS, and I started venturing in...

19 - how do I keep track of complicated narratives?

Um...I’m trying to get better at it! Like I think I mentioned in a previous reply, I learned via a couple of Cherik fics (Pineapple Revolution, oh god) that I needed to at least think about things I *might* need later on, and a sense of overall plot/resolution to work toward. These days I tend to make outlines of at least big plot points, so I know what I’m thinking. For example: for Like Sugar I always had at least a couple of sentences describing each story (”Seb ends up defending their honor against Random Awful Dominant in a bar, this is absolutely a turn-on for Chris, time for some switching and topping-from-the-bottom and EMOTIONS...”) and then when I started working on each one I’d put in a few more notes to answer my own story-specific questions (”where’s Chris beforehand, so that he’s not with Seb when we start? WHICH emotions would they each be feeling, probably? how does this logically follow from the nightmare story, before this one?”) and then I’d sit down and write!

20 - do I write in long sessions or short spurts?

Both, actually! I prefer having a whole afternoon, or at least a couple of hours, to really get into the flow of words and get stuff done; but as that rarely happens, I have learned to squeeze in some writing in office hours if I have twenty minutes before a student comes in, or as a break from grading midterms. I also tend to think about fic while driving to/from campus, and if I have a very clear line or bit of dialogue in my head, I’ll write it down really quickly. A lot of the current original fic, and also the fic I’m writing with @boopifer, has happened that way.

[gerec]

Someone left me a really nice comment today on Lost and then Found, my Cherik amnesia fic and it made me sort of nostalgic for that story. I’d like to write a ficlet or two set in that verse...does anyone (who remembers the fic) want to give me an idea on what to write? I’d happily write during either the pre or post fic timeline, for Cherik, Xavierine or Starles...