#zkdd 2020

[none-ofthisnonsense]

You know what, I'm actually proud of some of the fics I wrote for ZKDD 2020.

Especially this one! (Warnings under the cut.)

Warning for:

heavy angst (whump)

major character death

unresolved trauma

[cattaralol]

zkdd day one: nightfall 

“Do you know what else they call fireflies?”

[rideboldlyride]

Alright, for your reading pleasure!

Day 5 of @zkdrabbledecember

Little Pieces

Link in the prompt/chapter title above.

Here's a small taste of today's experiment:

There's a string that holds her together.

It's blue like the sky, and blue like the waters of her homeland.

That's the color it's always been.

That's the color it should be.

It holds all the broken parts in their right places.

It runs from scar to scar, a makeshift person.

It makes her look human.

It makes her look whole.

I call it Prosetry. It's not quite prose, not quite poetry? It's Prosetry©.

[zelzenik]

soft moments warm the heart

zkdd (@zkdrabbledecember) 25 & 27: “here with you” & “don’t worry”

originally intended to be for sokkla week 2020 prompt “holiday” lol

sokkla & zutara (they’re balanced w two scenes each, lol), rated t, 2.9k words

Azula yearns for something more. Katara already has it. Sokka loves his wife, Azula. Zuko loves his wife, Katara, and their children. They all love their family.

click here to read on ao3.

[idontreadheartbeats]

Day 19: Crashing Waves

The realization crashes over him and steals his breath away.

“What did you say?”

She repeats the three words, eyes fierce with the truth of them. His hand reaches out, unthinking, to cup her cheek snaked with tears. A brush of his thumb clears them away.

“H-how long?”

“I don’t know.” Her head turns slightly to kiss his palm. “But if you got hurt today, Tui and La couldn’t stop me from hunting him down.”

“I’m sorry I scared you,” he says, with a pained smile. “But that’s just it: for you, I’d have challenged Zhao to spite Agni himself.”

Find on ao3

[i-concur-milady]

Zutara Drabble December Day 9

Okay this is the longest one I’ve written yet and I haven’t proof read it yet...I really should wait until tomorrow and reread it but impatience is my middle name.

Lock And Key

“Well if there’s a lock…there must be a key, right?”

The Gaang stood in front of a locked cabinet of expensive china, in one of the many extravagant decorated rooms in the Fire Lord’s beach house.

“Way to state the obvious, Sokka.” Katara rolled her eyes at her brother.

“I’m just saying! Hey Zuko, are you sure you don’t mind us selling your families stuff?”

Zuko shrugged. “It’s just plates and things, I can’t even remember ever using this stuff.” He’d already destroyed most of the things in the house that he had cared about…not that his new friends knew about that.

“So…do you know where the key is?” Sokka asked hopefully.

Zuko shrugged again. “For all I know, my father took it with him when he left.” Sokka looked disappointed.

Aang piped up enthusiastically “That’s ok, we can search the house for it! I’m sure with Toph’s metalbending it won’t take long!” he grinned at their resident earthbender encouragingly. Zuko noted that Aang had been far less reluctant about his earthbending lessons lately, although so far as he could tell, Toph wasn’t going any easier on him.

“Or we could just break into the cabinet?” Toph suggested dryly.

“Toph! You can’t just go around smashing things!” Katara scolded. “Especially when they’re not your –“ SMASH.

Katara cut off in stunned silence and stared at Zuko had punched the pain of glass. He shrugged and smiled sheepishly at her.

“Hell yeah! Go Sparky! Dibs on the next one!”

“Oh spirits Zuko, let me look at your hand, did you hurt it, what were you thinking…”

“It’s okay Katara, I kept my hand in my sleeve…”

Sokka glanced over at Suki and rolled his eyes. “And you reckon I’m the impulsive one!”

“That’s because you are! You’re both as bad as each other.” But she was smiling as she said it.

Only Aang was quiet, shaking his head as he looked at the cabinet. He loved his friends, but they all seemed so quick to destroy.

In truth, Zuko knew he had been a bit impulsive, and maybe they could have found a key – but this way was a lot quicker, and that was important for…important reasons.

Important reasons that definitely didn’t have anything to do with the waterbender currently fussing over his (completely uninjured) hand, cradling it between her own as she scolded him, gently checking each knuckle for broken skin (there was none) or shards of glass (absolutely none). He was starting to wish he had cut it, just so there was something for her to heal, and she could hold his hand a little longer.

“What were you thinking?” she asked him again.

How could he tell her that today he had seen a merchant with plum cherries for sale, and he was sure they would be her new favourite fruit if she just tasted one? But they were so expensive this early in the season, even for just a few, and if they were going to get some they needed enough for all of them to share - it wasn’t like he could just buy some for Katara, that would…raise questions. The Gaang needed other supplies as well, of course. Oh and he’d seen a scarf in the most striking shade of blue, pure silk and expertly embroidered…Katara was of course dressed in red, as they all were- but this was a Fire Nation scarf. He was sure she would love it, and no one would look twice at her wearing it, embroidered as it was with fire lilies. And if he didn’t buy those things today, would they still be available tomorrow?

But…how could he tell her all that?

“I guess I just wasn’t thinking at all” he lied, and she shook her head at him, but that was okay. Zuko knew she would love the plum cherries, and being delegated cleaning duty as punishment for “gross actions of thoughtlessness” was a small price to pay.

@zkdrabbledecember

[zkdrabbledecember]

December 11th, 2020 (Day 11 of ZKDD): Living Proof

(Remember to add your fic to the Ao3 collection and tag us in your Tumblr posts so we can reblog!!)

[drowninglight]

i wrote a little zutara drabble for zkdd :) ty @/dogwithalamp for being my meta!

[thejasminefireferret]

Blame it on Me (ZKDD 2020 - 12/4)

I’ve been having a great time writing drabbles for @zkdrabbledecember! Here’s my little piece for December 4th. :) 

Blame it on Me

“I won’t be mad,” she lied. “I just want to know who did it.”

Kya and Izumi shared a nervous glance before looking back at the messy calligraphy scrawled across the wall. The twins shook their heads, lips sealed. 

“I did,” a voice spoke up from behind them. 

“Zuko,” Katara sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. “That’s very admirable but I doubt you wrote Uncle Sokka has stinky feet on the-”

“Well, he does!” he argued. “I wrote it.”

The girls giggled and both reached for his hands, standing in solidarity before their exasperated mother. 

“You’re lucky you’re cute.”

[none-ofthisnonsense]

1,4,14,19,20💛💛

[Ask game]

Thank you so much for asking! This was lovely.

1: Do you prefer writing one-shots or multi-chaptered fics?

Weeellllll I have many many ideas for multichapters, but the fact is I've only ever written one complete one, and it was two chapters. Something about making an outline just sucks all the joy out of it...

4: Where do you find inspiration for new ideas?

A lot of places, and nowhere? Mostly I just get ideas for specific scenes or lines of dialogue, and those come anywhere, anytime - in English class, at dinner, on the métro...

14: how do you write emotional scenes? Do you ever feel what the characters feel? Do you draw from personal experiences?

I usually draw on my own feelings but not my own experiences, mostly because I'm terrified of writing an inaccurate emotional response. Which is also why I've had so much trouble writing this past year: I've been content, and rarely had strong feelings that I could release through fic writing, so nothing much to draw on. But I usually try to write 50% my own experiences and 50% adapted to the character/story. I've done more writing recently that isn't based on me, so still a little unsure about that, but I like it.

19: What is the most-used tag on your ao3?

Fandom tag: Avatar: The Last Airbender, with 36. (I was going to say "my first fandom" until I remembered my Wattpad days...)

Character tag: Zuko (Avatar), with 21. Which is weird considering I wrote 32 fics about him and Katara...

Relationship tag: Katara/Zuko (Avatar), with 32. From when I did the ZKDD in 2020, 31 drabbles + 1 short fic.

Additional Tags: Fluff! Much to my surprise. Probably a remnant of my Zutara days, because recently it's been Angst galore. (I also wasn't aware that "Nonbinary Character" had 3 of my fics, since I only remember tagging one of them with that specifically. I don't mind it though!)

Have you noticed any patterns in your fics? Words/expressions that appear a lot, themes, common settings, etc?

apart from an overuse of though I use a LOT of commas. Settings are mostly undefined because they don't interest me very much, but recurring themes are probably growing up and acceptance (of different things, and not always happy. looking at that one fic about accepting war...)

[cattaralol]

“But you’re not just an ambassador. You’re more than that. To me, at least.”

my entry for zkdd day two! :))

[cattaralol]

“Katara, it is with a heavy heart that I inform you that-” he paused to slap a hand over his mouth and suppress tears- “That adobe flash player has been t-taken away from us.”

for zkdd day three! a bit of a crackfic to contrast the angst :-)

[idontreadheartbeats]

Day 17: Feelin’ Sentimental

Darkness cloaks them in a veil of intimacy punctuated only by the light of the waxing moon. Her eyes peer at him from the other side of the bed, illuminated by its faint glow.

“Uncle told me to break his root.”

He’s not sure what makes him want to bare his soul to her—has long since given up resisting the urge to. So, the truth pours from him like plum wine, intoxicating and unrefined.

“But he could never break mine.”

Her eyebrows wrinkle in confusion. “Why?”

His words, a small voice warns, are growing reckless.

“Because I have you.”

Find on ao3

[idontreadheartbeats]

Day 15: Breathless

“Remember,” says Iroh, “power in firebending comes from the breath.”

His nephew glares across the courtyard. “It’s not my breath that concerns me.”

His bicep tenses beneath her hand. “Zuko, be careful.”

But the damage is already done. The Agni Kai was called as soon as Zhao found her that morning, wrapped in nothing but a sheet. Somehow, she held her chin high, unflinching from his vile touch; her arm still burns of it.

I never realized your tastes were so… exotic, Princeling. Is she any good? I’d so like to partake. 

She only breathes once the duel is won.

Find on ao3

[idontreadheartbeats]

Day 5: Little Pieces

His black undershirt smells of jasmine, amber, and musk. One deep inhale and her anxious thoughts of sneaking back into camp scatter like ash on the wind.

“Can I take this?”

He takes her in his arms, lays a tender kiss on her forehead.

“You can take anything you like.” You can have all of me, his voice says. You need only ask.

And he has no idea. As she takes little pieces of him, he takes little pieces of her: her hatred of his countrymen, her fear of his bending.

She’s never so badly wanted to be set aflame.

Find on ao3

[idontreadheartbeats]

Day 12: Living Proof

The calming scent of jasmine tea does nothing to cut the tension.

Uncle’s eyes pause over his mark on her neck, the living proof of their nighttime activities. He stifles a groan; he can’t bring himself to regret it though, not after all the sounds she made.

His lover throws him a pointed glance. Damn, she hadn’t missed it.

Uncle is uncharacteristically merciful in conversation, makes no allusions to their budding relationship. It’s unsettling. His instincts prove true when the old man excuses himself and leaves the box of contraceptive tea...

And the loveliest shade of red on her cheeks.

Find on ao3