Dear Fic in a Box Creator (2021)
Aug. 14th, 2021 09:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
scioscribeThank you so much for making something for me! I'm so excited for this incredible bounty of fannish delight. Some of these sections are longer than others, but that's just about how many different prompts I could think of and how succinctly (or not-so-succinctly) I could write them--I love all these fandoms/characters, and any of them would make me happy.
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Likes
hurt/comfort, emotional hurt/comfort, ensembles, enemies-to-lovers, enemies-to-friends, friendships, friends-to-lovers, opposites attract, conflicting worldviews and priorities, emotional vulnerability, fix-its, casefic, canon-style adventures, crack played straight, nuanced bad guys/terrible people with moments of goodness or vulnerability, redemption, pining, obvious feelings that don’t quite get admitted to, unconventional gestures of affection, partnerships, power dynamics, shippy gen and ambiguously intense relationships, intimacy, found family, friendships, first-time stories, established relationships, character death, amnesia, characters forced to cooperate, forced proximity, bedsharing, huddling/cuddling for warmth, 5 + 1 fics, slow-burns, fake/pretend relationships, arranged marriage/marriage of convenience, sex pollen, made them do it, power couples, age gaps, worldbuilding, undercover work, loyalty, tenderness, acts of kindness, trying to do the right thing, identity porn, complicated relationships, moral complexity, long relationships, canon-divergence AUs, added supernatural/fantasy/sci-fi elements
Historical- and canon-typical language, violence, attitudes, and darkness-levels all okay to include.
General Sex Likes/Kinks
clothed sex, wall-sex, rough sex, dubcon/ambiguous consent, teasing, anal play/sex, oral sex, frottage, fingering, rimming, gags, dirty talk, hand and finger kink, hair-touching, nipple play, characters giving orders/instructions, roleplay, casual D/s, spanking (including breasts, thighs, and pussy), talking during sex, emotional sex, sleepy/lazy sex, humorous sex scenes, enthusiastic sex, tenderness, loss of virginity, bad/awkward sex (either charmingly funny or downbeat), coming untouched, coming in pants, voyeurism, exhibitionism, collaring, people getting mussed, orgasm delay/denial, overstimulation, edging, begging, historical period- or location-specific sex, sex toys, praise kink, possessiveness, marking/bruising/biting
DNW
ageplay, mommy/daddy kink, explicit sex for characters under sixteen, scat, bestiality, vore
Only Ever Yours - Louise O'Neill
Canonical or non-canonical abuse/noncon of characters under sixteen can be mentioned/referenced, I just don't want graphic, blow-by-blow descriptions.
Solo: megan
None of the eves manage their awful world better than megan—but she’s spent her whole life mastering one very particular and very defined social environment, and at the end of the novel, she’s moving into an entirely new one. She’s “married” to a boy who dislikes her and whose social standing is dependent upon the patronage of his demanding and abusive father. She’s been trying to win, but what happens after she does? I’m really interested in what happens to the perfect winner and survivor once the nature of the competition has radically changed, and what happens to the “high school bully” after she grows up. I've gotten an awesome take on this before, but I'd still love more.
* If you want to include Darwin, what is the megan/Darwin marriage like? Incredibly bleak and unhappy, occasionally bittersweet, eventually surprisingly amiable? Does he continue to visit brothels, and if so, how does she feel about it? They offer an especially dark and riveting take on arranged marriages that gives high-stakes drama to the smallest of romantic or sexual interactions, so any look at the process of them becoming more familiar and intimate with each other, whether they end up liking each other or not, would be great.
* Social standing and worldbuilding! How does megan, the queen of the School, fare in the adult world of the companions? What’s her daily life like? Does she have any friends, or does the competition remain cutthroat even after the “victory” of being chosen? What are her obligations as Darwin’s companion?
* Nightmarish pregnancy/fertility scenarios. Is the pressure on immediately for her to start having sons? What is she like as a mother and how does she think of her children? Or does all her Machiavellian scheming hit a wall when she and Darwin have trouble conceiving? Would she risk a discreet affair in case she might have better luck with someone else? If there are no children, will she be put aside sooner, or even sent to the basement?
* How does she deal with the Judge? Play the obliging, charming daughter-in-law? Gradually grow defensive of Darwin? Given what we see with the Father and isabel, it would be utterly unsurprising if the Judge pressured Darwin to choose megan because he wanted access to her himself; given how cutthroat she can be, it would also be unsurprising if she welcomed that or even pursued it on her own. If so, does she find it damaging, whether or not she’s capable of recognizing that? Or is she just a winner in search of another winner?
* megan is unapologetically vicious throughout the whole novel, but she’s also a seventeen year-old locked in a competition that will determine the rest of her life. She’ll die young, but she’ll grow up a little first, and I’d love to check in on her as she matures, whether she begins to develop regrets and a conscience or just responds to different challenges. Does she ever look back on what happened with freida and isabel and feel differently about it?
WB: Any
Medium Opt In: Any - Any In-Universe Documents That Fit the Canon Setting
Medium Opt In: Art - Comics
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Medium Opt In: Art - Propaganda Poster
Medium Opt In: Art - In-Universe Advertisement
Medium Opt In: Illustrated Text (Art & Writing) - Bureaucratic Paperwork
Medium Opt In: Illustrated Text (Art & Writing) - In-Universe Advertisement
Medium Opt In: Illustrated Text (Art & Writing) - In-Universe Academic Publication
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Medium Opt In: Writing - Advice Column
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Medium Opt In: Writing - Epistolary
Medium Opt In: Writing - In-Universe Magazine Article
For all illuminated text opt-ins, I'm also fine with them just being plain text--whatever you prefer.
Obviously most of these have implied m/f relationships built in, and I'd also love to see all the secret and fraught f/f and m/m relationships that aren't as stamped out as the Zones think.
* Companions: The eves have lived such a carefully orchestrated, cloistered life at the School, and now they're suddenly completely stripped of their lifelong environment and thrown into an entirely new situation. And they've gone from being controlled by a mostly toxic group dynamic to being effectively owned by one person they don't know very well. Please tell me everything about what that's like. Show me the awkward early-days transitions of companionship, the horrible weight of unknown expectations, "happy" companions who believe this is as good as life could possibly get, companions who struggle to manage their new lives, etc. What kinds of relationships do they form with their husbands and sons? To what extent do they stay in touch with their friends, and how do they make new ones? What's it like to be nearing your termination date?
* Concubines: I'm really interested in the group of girls we see who passionately set their sights on being concubines, especially with freida thinking that megan is wrong: they aren't making the best of a bad situation, they genuinely prefer this to companionship. Is one of the advantages just getting to stay in close quarters with their friends? Does this let them build better relationships with each other? Once they get a little older, do they still feel relieved about the earlier termination date? How do they feel about the "game" we see Darwin playing, where they're remotely controlled and directed through acts they don't remember? Do they secretly remember them after all? What is their daily life like? Are there any "specialist" concubines who are encouraged to get fat for customers who like that? (Stuffing/feederism/weight gain is okay for this one--I'd actually like seeing the weird push and pull between "finally getting to indulge in a bunch of sensory pleasure" and "this is not at at all what I'm 'supposed' to look like.")
* Chastities: We know the chastities get less respect and far less luxury--even down to not being able to "waste" medical supplies on themselves--and that they're expected to run through self-sacrificing vows multiple times a day. But they also get uncensored internet, relative freedom from expectations, and a natural life span. I'd love to see something set from their point-of-view, as they have to watch these girls go through the School year after year. How often is it just completely depressing? What attachments do they develop, and do they manage to keep any of them up? (We do see that Darwin's mother sent chastity-magdalena a gift, which has always stayed with me.) What kinds of things do they learn once no one cares if they're "too smart" anymore? How do they feel about regurgitating the prescribed lessons designed at preparing the eves for a path they themselves didn't take? What's the balance of contentment and jealousy?
* Inheritants: I would love to see what life is like for the Inheritants. We know they grow up with their own kinds of rankings and social codes, even as they have vastly more freedom, and I'm curious what their families and early educations look like under this weird, status-obsessed system. And I'd love to see how they think and feel about the eves and the lead-up to the Ceremony. Are they nervous? Surprised by what the girls are really like? Do they expect them to be glossy perfection and then find glimpses of normal human messiness, or are any of them secretly hoping for actual connection and kind of disappointed to find girls who have all been molded into the same shape? What are the pressures of choosing a companion, and how much emotional weight do they really put on the relationship, when they know they'll almost certainly outlive her and get a second one?
* Minor characters: I'd also love worldbuilding through some of the minor supporting characters we see and hear about: the hosts of The Chit-Chat Show with the companion-concubine tension, agyness settling into her new and longed-for role as a chastity, Darwin's mother living in the shadows of her two predecessors and trying to make her son into a good person, chastity-magdalena and her vocation and kindness, the celebrities we see like the slutz or kate (famous women in a world not designed for them), etc.?
* All medium opt-ins: Feel free to go wild with these. This book's fucked-up worldbuilding seems like the perfect chance to design some dystopian beauty product ad campaigns or TV show promos or hellish advice columns. Chat correspondence transcripts between a chastity and a new companion? Articles and interviews following up on famous eves? Serious academic studies of what happened with isabel and/or freida or of any of the horrible premises we see, like the adultery punishment or the forbidden love before marriage? Or someone advocating that maybe they teach women to read after all? Voice diary of a Concubine? Basically, any of these can either stand on their own or be used for any of the above prompts, and I'll love it.
Barcelona
Fred Boynton/Ted Boynton
Fred Boynton & Ted Boynton
Medium Opt-In: A Softer World style art
I love the talky comedy-of-manners feeling of this, the dialogue, the specific social and historical context, and the way basically everyone turns out to be some degree of sympathetic. And most of all, I love Ted and Fred and their incredibly weird relationship of opposites who annoy the hell out of each other--well, Fred at least annoys the hell out of Ted, and understandably so--but so clearly feel a lot of love and loyalty to each other when the chips are down. Their random discursive tangents, Ted's insecurity and need to have a philosophy about everything, Fred's fecklessness and trolling, their emotional vulnerability… It's all excellent, and I want more of it. I love both shippy and gen takes for this.
* Hurt/comfort set during Fred's recovery period. Ted sitting on an endless bedside vigil, reading to him, was really delicious h/c, as was Ted escorting him around in the airport and sort of patiently dealing with his new mood swings. I'd love to see more of that in any capacity--close study of Fred getting better, problems with adjusting to the lingering trauma, problems recovering memories, shippy realization of feelings, etc. I'd also love anything that sort of turns the tables and has Fred realizing that Ted's been doing a lot of caretaking and may need him to return the favor.
* Also hurt/comfort role reversal where Ted gets seriously injured or ill and Fred has to take care of him. I feel like Fred would wind up being an absolute nightmare if something happened to Ted, because he would be both super-intense about it and flying off in ten different directions at once, and I'd love to see him dealing with that while also trying to tamp it down and be who Ted needs him to be right then.
* Fred keeps telling women that Ted is a Dom, and it's actually subconsciously because he's into D/s and wants Ted to Dom the hell out of him and keeps projecting his fantasies (and jealousies) into this elaborate joke. Ted somehow finds this out, and kinky sex and feeligns ensue.
* Anything set earlier in their lives, with more of their complex push-and-pull relationship, especially with the feeling of Ted as this kind of superficially boring presence that Fred keeps being drawn to and orbiting around even as he pretends that he's not deeply invested in whether or not his cousin cares about him. Also, the kayak incident.
* Shippy feelings realization, which might also include having to come to terms with their sexuality and deal with the cousin factor. I'd love to see a kind of reconfiguring of the movie where some of the same events are happening but it's actually the two of them falling in love the whole time, with much awkward pining and miscommunication. I could also completely see a sex-while-pining setup for them, where one of them gets into this theoretical framework where it just makes sense for them to have sex, but obviously that's all it is, while they're both actually pining for each other and unaware that it's reciprocated.
* The above, but platonically. I love a kind of platonic relationship pining where one person is convinced they're more invested than the other person or that they care more, and that turns out to not be the case.
* A Softer World opt-in: I'm thinking of something emphasizing them caring about each other but also it being weird and difficult, either with unrequited love feelings or with just Fred being ultra-annoying, and I'm also 100% fine with strips focused on either of them as an individual character or on the movie's culture clashes. (Both actual A Softer World text and you coming up with your own A Softer Pastiche captions are welcome.)
The Perfection
Medium Opt-In: A Softer World style art
Elizabeth "Lizzie" Wells/Charlotte Willmore
Lizzie and Charlotte have incredible chemistry, and I love how their relationship has such a weird blend of genuine loyalty and care… and for-your-own-good gaslighting and forced amputation and obsession and identity blurring. Charlotte feels like an escaped Brontë character, with this vibe of simultaneous fragility and danger, and Lizzie starts off seeming more normal only to wind up becoming stranger and more brutal. I'd love anything that digs into their fucked-up, promising complexity.
* I'm so curious about what happens post-canon. Do Charlotte and Lizzie become dark, off-kilter vigilantes, seeking out rapists and abusers and brutally murdering them? Do they somehow manage to take over the school and start running it together, becoming the new faces of Bachoff? Does that just mean trying to deprogram some of the top students?
* An alternate, darker version of them taking control of the school, with the two of them falling into their own kind of worship of the Perfection even in Anton's absence? Can they fully shake what they were taught, or do they find themselves repeating bits of that behavior even when they don't want to?
* I'd love full-on supernatural horror, too. I spent a lot of time thinking there might turn out to actually be some kind of cosmic force they were worshipping (and sacrificing to) that embodied a kind of musical/artistic perfection, and I'd be very happy to see this as a literal Lovecraftian cult that Charlotte and Lizzie wind up inheriting. Do they know how to deal with the force they might have just offended? Does it require them to do anything? Do they give the bodies to it as an offering? What does any of this look like--how they serve it, how they move forward, how they potentially try to defeat or contain it, etc.?
* What if that threatened virus/zombie outbreak from the beginning was real, and Charlotte's plans go awry because she and Lizzie are stuck in the middle of an apocalypse? Are they still in China, or do they have to take an uncomfortable, destined-to-explode refuge at Bachoff?
* More Gothic horror, just because the house is so perfect for it. The lingering ghosts of Anton, Paloma, Theis, and Geoffrey? A murderous student who's already been indoctrinated into the previous way of doing things? (I always welcome creepy children.) Past students seeking revenge for Anton? Alternately, I'll take other kinds of horror, too--what if that threatened virus/zombie outbreak from the beginning turns out to be real?
* I could also see some canon-divergences. What if Charlotte's mom hadn't gotten sick until after she'd had some time to get to know Lizzie, and she'd wound up running away and taking Lizzie with her? What if her mom had died sooner and she'd come back earlier on to wage a different kind of war on the school? Or a role-reversal, maybe, where Charlotte is the one who stayed with Anton and Paloma, and Lizzie wound up having to leave the school for some reason, only to come back years later--I'd love to see her starting off with the same motives (revenge, desire to save Charlotte, growing love) but playing them out in very different ways. Or I could also totally just go for a long-game road-trip through China, with the two of them deepening their relationship and Charlotte trying to change Lizzie's mind in more subtle ways.
* Random assortment of mini-prompts: music metaphors/musical structures for stories, Lizzie and Charlotte's relationship to music, their duets, consensual stump insertion, sex games that edge into being deeply unhealthy therapy, joyous sex all about emotion and experience/inexperience and tenderness and maybe kink discovery, porn in general, becoming composers, Charlotte having trouble dealing with the world after spending years as a virtual shut-in.
* A Softer World opt-in: There are so many fantastic A Softer World strips about passionate love that's also a really bad idea/out-of-control/messed-up/etc. in a way that really strikes me as having a Lizzie/Charlotte vibe. So much attraction and obsession and genuine caring and liking--and so many twisted directions. (I'm good with either actual A Softer World text or you coming up with A Softer Pastiche captions.)
The Falcon and the Winter Soldier
James “Bucky” Barnes/Sam Wilson
I totally fell for these two with their bickering and their deep feelings and their heart-eyes for each other. I love Sam's blend of ideals and practicality and willingness to just keep trying, and I love Bucky's grumpiness and humor and loyalty and persistence. They hit the sweet spot of blending together well enough to be terrific partners but still having conflict and pining potential. Plus, they're destined to spend their whole lives getting into trouble.
* Sam is now Captain America, putting him even more in the public eye. What's it like for him to suddenly be that much of a symbol, with all the accompanying pressures and criticisms and scrutiny? How can Bucky help him deal with it? If Sam's always bound to attract a lot of attention, does it feel like he and Bucky can't take things to the next level? Does Sam worry about the effects of being an openly queer Captain America? I'd love any takes on this, from angsty and full of pining to comedic and full of frustration as they're constantly trying to date/fuck but can't get enough time alone to "I'm going to make a big romantic declaration and to hell with what anyone else thinks about it" swoonworthy romance.
* Sam accompanies Bucky on a particularly fraught attempt to find/provide closure for a Winter Soldier-era event. Maybe it's a complex situation that they have to figure out how to handle, maybe it involves a lot of emotional vulnerability that sparks some feelings, maybe it winds up rousing ire from someone who doesn't differentiate Bucky and the Winter Soldier and wants revenge… Either way, it can serve as a great road trip/isolated setting catalyst for a feelings realization or get-together.
* Fantasy-elements AU where "Captain America" is more of a mystical, magical position that basically gives you a deep connection to the place you're representing and maybe some magical powers related to it. And Bucky is technically sworn to the shield/magically tied to it, but he doesn't want to be Walker's guy, so he wants to convince Sam to take up the mantle despite Sam's misgivings. (Does the mantle also involve sleeping with him? RITUAL SEX.) Feel free to go all in on the magic and worldbuilding.
* Background deep-dive: They have to solve some kind of elaborate Southern Gothic problem in Sam's neck of the woods, dealing with people from his childhood, or have to take the Paul & Darlene out for some lengthy sea adventure? Sarah and the kids are endangered, and Sam and Bucky have to make sure they're safe? They all accidentally travel back in time to 1930s Brooklyn?
* All kinds of hurt/comfort scenarios, seriously. Stranded in the winter and growing hypothermic, needing to share body heat? Captured and tortured? Captured and nonconned? One having to watch the other one suffer without being able to intervene? One trying to rescue the other? Bad guys or aliens Made Them Do It when they weren't sure they wanted to go there yet? I love scenarios like this where they're trying to make it as good as possible, but the situation is so awkward and uncomfortable that it's still rough and each is still unsure of what the other one is feeling.
* AWKWARD DRUNKEN VEGAS MARRIAGE when they weren't even dating. Maybe it's instant news or maybe they manage, against all odds, to keep it under wraps. In which case, oh, good, they can get an annulment, right? Weird how they keep postponing that and how many feelings they're having about it. I also love the idea of one or both of them having a reflexive possessiveness and a feeling that they should be spending more time together/living together.
James “Bucky” Barnes & Sam Wilson & Helmut Zemo
James “Bucky” Barnes/Sam Wilson/Helmut Zemo
I'm okay with whatever means you want to use to get this team-up happening: maybe Zemo's paroled to Sam and Bucky's custody with certain conditions or restrictions, maybe he's escaped/they've broken him out again For Some Reason, etc. I just really love the idea of them as a team, slowly working out an actual (if weird) bond of mutual, snarky attachment and loyalty. It's just all perfectly primed for my love of redemption arcs and/or relationships and priorities that change how one-time villains approach things. And they have such great, testy energy together.
I'm also fine with Sam/Bucky in a Sam & Bucky & Zemo scenario.
* I'd love to see them going up against some really weird, non-Flag Smasher problems. Maybe undoing the Snap caused weird ripple effects throughout the universe, and all kinds of mini eldritch horrors are manifesting everywhere? Maybe they have to use their relatively grounded combined abilities against a villain with superpowers?
* Anything that plunges them all into one of their backgrounds. They have to solve some kind of elaborate Southern Gothic problem in Sam's neck of the woods, dealing with people from his childhood, or have to take the Paul & Darlene out for some lengthy sea adventure? Sarah and the kids are endangered, and Sam, Bucky, and Zemo have to make sure they're safe? They all accidentally travel back in time to 1930s Brooklyn? Sokovia has been dissolved into other countries, but suddenly it's somehow a ghost territory full of phantom spirits and buildings destroyed in war, and they have to figure out what the hell's going on?
* Bucky has to pretend to be the Winter Soldier again. This time, Zemo has more complicated and less amused feelings about it. Maybe this has to go on for a while, and so eventually Sam and Zemo convince Bucky to coach them so they can take turns playing a Winter Soldier, if not the Winter Soldier. (I will go along with whatever reason you want for people not recognizing Sam--maybe they have advanced face-changing technology or stage makeup. Maybe everyone thinks he's the Smiling Tiger. Etc.) I'd just love to see the three of them potentially rotating through this role, all having different and weird reactions to it--while also running afoul of trouble?
* They're stranded in an inhospitable environment/taken captive together/lost on an alien planet/soulbonded/etc.--anything with a lot of potential for forced proximity and hurt/comfort, which are so great for getting over the enemies-to-lovers or enemies-to-friends hurdle that Zemo brings with him.
* It turns out someone is doing terrible experiments with or otherwise abusing the prisoners on the Raft, and Sam and Bucky reluctantly have to break Zemo out again and try to shut everything down. I just love the idea of "this has to stop, but also in particular we have to get this one guy out; we're taking our villain and leaving."
* AU where the GRC is even worse and more controlling, making everything dystopian and/or chaotic. If they're going to try to do any good, they're going to have to go on the run and deal with being constantly hunted while they exist in the cracks of society. I'd love to see Sam's practical idealism and heroism under these conditions, in particular, because he'd have even more of an impact then and be even more necessary.
* Additional random hurt/comfort prompts: One of them is doused with some kind of temporary super-soldier-adjacent drug that makes you reckless or kills off all sense of pain? Emotionally/physically complicated sex pollen, affecting one/two/all of them? Captured and tortured? Captured and nonconned? Forced to accept torture or rape for food/medical care for someone else? Feel free to whump any or all of them and then let them comfort each other (with or without additional sex).
* Amnesia and relationships: They all wake up with amnesia, and for some reason of your choice, assume that they're all together. By the time they figure out the truth and/or get their memories back, things have gotten weird. Or they're in a somewhat more settled relationship--friendship, established if wary allies, romance, It's Complicated--and then one of them loses the last few years of his memory and has no idea how they ended up like this.
Selfie
Medium Opt In: Writing - Reddit: In-Universe Reddit Post On Any Subreddit (Post + Replies)
Eliza Dooley/Henry Higgs
These two have such terrific chemistry, and I love their playfulness and the mismatch in their levels of spontaneity. They have a great emotional range in their relationship, too--they're funny, flirtatious, supportive, angsty, angry, and just generally passionate about each other. I like first times and established relationship fic for them and the chances are good that if you can think of some standard romance novel/rom-com-style plot to throw them into, as either an AU or a canon continuation, I will be all over it.
* Pre-relationship flirtation of any stripe, full of UST, either with them both actually feeling like they’re on the same page and enjoying themselves or all fraught and full of pining. Slow dancing at some event, having conversations about how meaningful they are to each other that just slightly miss the mark and leave them both disappointed, etc.
* First time/get together fic! I love all these tropey rom-com setups for them--fake relationship, thinly justified marriage of convenience (somehow statistically Henry’s more likely to get promoted if he’s married, maybe?), drunk Vegas wedding, surprise pregnancy, identity porn You’ve Got Mail setup where they fall in love online at the same time they’re falling in love in real life? And any and all takes on forced proximity--maybe they’re stuck at a pharmaceutical conference together? Or snowed in somewhere? Either way, does it end in bedsharing?
* Figuring out kinks together, including what doesn't work at all or what winds up turning ridiculous. I would totally read 10k of them experimenting and sometimes hitting stuff that's super-hot and sometimes just profoundly awkward and unsexy.
* Secretary-style setup where Henry is a reluctant, mostly awkward but very occasionally suave Dom and he winds up having kinky sex with experienced-but-emotionally-vulnerable subby Eliza and there’s all kinds of over-the-desk spankings and naked dictation and various attempts to top from the bottom, with them both getting more confidence out of it.
* There are also a bunch of cracky premises I like with them. Bodyswap where Eliza has trouble resisting taking Henry’s body out for a spin, and definitely can’t resist taking it out for a spin via sex with Henry in her own body? Hanahaki disease pining? Suddenly developed the ability to read minds?
* Reddit opt-in: I can so easily visualize a complex get-together or relationship arc for them played out via Reddit posts--I think Eliza would be obviously into the social/chatty aspects, and then Henry could easily get sucked into the "research" aspects of running his social dilemmas by someone and liking giving other people advice.
Eliza Dooley/Freddy/Henry Higgs
I talked up above about all my Eliza/Henry feelings, and I also really love adding Freddy to the mix. I really liked how the show handled him, making him a flawed but genuinely caring guy who adored Eliza. I kind of like the idea that while Eliza is moving away from him because she's aware of her growing feelings for Henry, she could also realize that her less-epic romance with Freddy is real, too. And then bringing Freddy and Henry together causes its own intriguing complications...
* All of the above Eliza/Henry prompts, but… with Freddy in them too. Bizarre scenario in which they have to fake a poly relationship and slowly stumble into OT3 feelings? (Look, I would not put it past KinderKare to somehow have a situation in which this was necessary. Maybe they're trying to woo a major client they find out is poly.) Having to share a hotel room at a conference when there’s only a single king-size bed? Three-way bodyswap? Freddy and Eliza both getting awkwardly dommed by an inexperienced Henry while falling in love? Eliza tries to work out her fledgling OT3 via r/relationships?
* I like the idea of the wrench the more antagonistic vibe between Henry and Freddy could throw into the works, complicating the pining and stretching it out further. Maybe Eliza and Henry are already together and Freddy assumes his chance is done? Maybe Henry is exasperated to be falling for this guy at all? Eliza feels torn over which of them to choose and doesn’t realize at first that they would go for a triad setup at all? Henry falls in love with them both but doesn’t like the idea of having more than one partner and feels guilty about it?
* Eliza/Henry are an established relationship, and they gradually begin to fold in Freddy too. Maybe he winds up also getting some lessons from Henry? Maybe he intends to totally keep resenting Henry but finds himself charmed by him instead, so now, great, he’s pining for two people?
* Freddy makes an extremely awkward attempt to introduce Eliza and Henry to his parents, possibly without explaining why he's doing it. How does it go? Is it just a dinner, or does this play out over a weekend visit? I'd prefer his parents not just be virulently homophobic, but them finding out the bi part or the poly part and being awkward and confused, cluelessly offensive, temporarily thrown, etc., can lead to the right amount of delicious angst. I would like them to eventually at least come around to awkward support, though.
* Scenario where Henry and Freddy get to know each other first, for whatever reason, and that changes the dynamics with the three of them and makes the developing feelings go differently?
The Twilight Zone
Mrs. Bronson & Norma
Mrs. Bronson/Norma
Episode: "The Midnight Sun"
* I would love stories from either the hotter world or the colder world, if you want to treat the hotter world as real. Or I'm good with stories set in the hotter world with the creeping awareness that it's all a dream creeping in. Or both worlds being real in parallel universes. Or anything. Basically, both the hotter world and the colder world are excellent, atmospheric apocalypses that I would love to see more of.
* I love their weary tenderness and a sense of being alone together at the end of the world. Taking care of each other, looking for each other, making gestures both big and small. I'm interested in all the little domestic details of life in the slow-but-steady apocalypse and this depopulated New York: whether they ever risk going outside for any real period of time, whether they eventually try to leave the building after all, how they try to stay warm (or cool) for as long as they can.
* Norma painting for Mrs. Bronson, making different hot or cold landscapes. Trying to keep the paint from freezing or melting. Norma convincing Mrs. Bronson to pose for her, clothed or nude. Mrs. Bronson learning to paint or draw too.
* Extremely bittersweet get-together fic where they both know that there's only a limited window of survival time.
* The two of them are somehow able to alternate between the hot and cold worlds, but while that gives them a little bit of comfort, it can't save them: they're always just going from one apocalypse to another. But they somehow managed to make that be enough.
* They're saved by another kind of Twilight Zone happening, like stepping into one of Norma's landscapes and having it become real around them or somehow finding that no matter how cold or hot it gets, they don't die, and they've become something otherworldly. Or there's some last-chance spaceship leaving in search of another world, and the two of them manage to get on it.
* Totally optional Twilight Zone crossover: Death comes for them, and it's either Murray Hamilton's Death from "One for the Angels" or Robert Redford's Mr. Death from "Nothing in the Dark." Or any other kind of crossover with another you want to do a literal crossover with any other classic Twilight Zone episode, I'm also totally good with that.
Solo: Janet Tayler
Walter Smith/Janet Tyler
Episode: "Eye of the Beholder"
* I've always wanted to see more of the Community of Uggos. I'd love to see Janet starting to settle in there and, as Walter promises her, beginning to feel at home and genuinely loved for the first time in her life. I would be absolutely delighted with 10k of just Janet adjusting to her new life, dealing with everything from living on a kind of remote ugliness leper colony--one that might be in a completely different kind of climate or at a completely different level of tech/wealth than she's used to, in addition to everything else--to slowly finding her own beauty standards adjusting to developing connections and relationships.
* Maybe the new community is basically ignored by the larger dystopian society, so they aren't just relieved of the burden of being constantly scorned as hideous, they also get--even if they don't notice it right away--more opportunities to be themselves without the constant pressure to conform in every way. I'd love to see Janet trying out different options that she couldn't have explored in the outside world, from "different kinds of fashion" to "oh, lesbian sex is an option here."
* Janet eventually becoming one of the people who go to the hospitals to collect the patients who have had the maximum number of failed corrective surgeries, and how she deals with that and feels about it. Is she ever able to reconnect a little with the people from her last hospital? I'm always intrigued by the doctor who veers close to treason because he sympathizes with her so much.
* I'd also love to see Walter's POV on Janet, gen or ship, as she starts to settle in--it could be really cool to see some of her journey through his eyes.
* Janet/Walter! Is a sweet slow burn? What draws them to each other? Does he actually find her attractive right away, since he's been with his own people for so long, or do they both have to get used to each other for a while before a spark really kindles? I'm also into seeing how Janet thinks of him physically at first--presumably in very unflattering terms based on very different norms--and how that might change as time goes by, but how her new beauty standards still might not match ours and her perspective still might feel alien there.
WB: "The After Hours" Mannequins
Episode: "The After Hours"
* Please give me any and all mannequin rumspringas. Is Marsha the first mannequin who has forgotten herself in the outside world, or does that happen often enough that it's a recognized hazard? Where do they go while they're living outside the department store? Do they all use the same rotating apartment? What are some pleasures they especially enjoy as humans that they don't get to have as mannequins?
* Someone forms a relationship with a mannequin while the mannequin is taking their turn outside. Do they find out the truth? Does it become a kind of weird long-distance relationship where the other person just waits, year after year, for their mannequin's visit? Is it bittersweet, star-crossed love where the human eventually gets married to someone else, or is a kind of touching "well, they're making it work" relationship?
* What is their life like in the department store(s)? Can any of the employees or customers ever see them move? Do they have more freedom and mobility on the ninth floor, or is it just that they have more privacy? Is that floor technically real but just for storage, or is everyone being 100% literal when they say it doesn't exist, and only the mannequins can actually access it? Do the mannequins have opinions about the clothes they model or where they stand in the store?
* Mannequin POV, just to capture the uncanniness of it. One of my favorite details is how they reflexively fall back into stationary poses when they're not actively interacting with each other, and I'd love to see more distinctly alien details like that from their perspective.
* Mannequin sex. I really ship Marsha/Scorching Hot Saleswoman Mannequin, whom you can name whatever you like, but I'm also good with original mannequin characters of any gender combination. I just want to know if the mannequins fuck, and if so, how.
I'm
Likes
hurt/comfort, emotional hurt/comfort, ensembles, enemies-to-lovers, enemies-to-friends, friendships, friends-to-lovers, opposites attract, conflicting worldviews and priorities, emotional vulnerability, fix-its, casefic, canon-style adventures, crack played straight, nuanced bad guys/terrible people with moments of goodness or vulnerability, redemption, pining, obvious feelings that don’t quite get admitted to, unconventional gestures of affection, partnerships, power dynamics, shippy gen and ambiguously intense relationships, intimacy, found family, friendships, first-time stories, established relationships, character death, amnesia, characters forced to cooperate, forced proximity, bedsharing, huddling/cuddling for warmth, 5 + 1 fics, slow-burns, fake/pretend relationships, arranged marriage/marriage of convenience, sex pollen, made them do it, power couples, age gaps, worldbuilding, undercover work, loyalty, tenderness, acts of kindness, trying to do the right thing, identity porn, complicated relationships, moral complexity, long relationships, canon-divergence AUs, added supernatural/fantasy/sci-fi elements
Historical- and canon-typical language, violence, attitudes, and darkness-levels all okay to include.
General Sex Likes/Kinks
clothed sex, wall-sex, rough sex, dubcon/ambiguous consent, teasing, anal play/sex, oral sex, frottage, fingering, rimming, gags, dirty talk, hand and finger kink, hair-touching, nipple play, characters giving orders/instructions, roleplay, casual D/s, spanking (including breasts, thighs, and pussy), talking during sex, emotional sex, sleepy/lazy sex, humorous sex scenes, enthusiastic sex, tenderness, loss of virginity, bad/awkward sex (either charmingly funny or downbeat), coming untouched, coming in pants, voyeurism, exhibitionism, collaring, people getting mussed, orgasm delay/denial, overstimulation, edging, begging, historical period- or location-specific sex, sex toys, praise kink, possessiveness, marking/bruising/biting
DNW
ageplay, mommy/daddy kink, explicit sex for characters under sixteen, scat, bestiality, vore
Only Ever Yours - Louise O'Neill
Canonical or non-canonical abuse/noncon of characters under sixteen can be mentioned/referenced, I just don't want graphic, blow-by-blow descriptions.
Solo: megan
None of the eves manage their awful world better than megan—but she’s spent her whole life mastering one very particular and very defined social environment, and at the end of the novel, she’s moving into an entirely new one. She’s “married” to a boy who dislikes her and whose social standing is dependent upon the patronage of his demanding and abusive father. She’s been trying to win, but what happens after she does? I’m really interested in what happens to the perfect winner and survivor once the nature of the competition has radically changed, and what happens to the “high school bully” after she grows up. I've gotten an awesome take on this before, but I'd still love more.
* If you want to include Darwin, what is the megan/Darwin marriage like? Incredibly bleak and unhappy, occasionally bittersweet, eventually surprisingly amiable? Does he continue to visit brothels, and if so, how does she feel about it? They offer an especially dark and riveting take on arranged marriages that gives high-stakes drama to the smallest of romantic or sexual interactions, so any look at the process of them becoming more familiar and intimate with each other, whether they end up liking each other or not, would be great.
* Social standing and worldbuilding! How does megan, the queen of the School, fare in the adult world of the companions? What’s her daily life like? Does she have any friends, or does the competition remain cutthroat even after the “victory” of being chosen? What are her obligations as Darwin’s companion?
* Nightmarish pregnancy/fertility scenarios. Is the pressure on immediately for her to start having sons? What is she like as a mother and how does she think of her children? Or does all her Machiavellian scheming hit a wall when she and Darwin have trouble conceiving? Would she risk a discreet affair in case she might have better luck with someone else? If there are no children, will she be put aside sooner, or even sent to the basement?
* How does she deal with the Judge? Play the obliging, charming daughter-in-law? Gradually grow defensive of Darwin? Given what we see with the Father and isabel, it would be utterly unsurprising if the Judge pressured Darwin to choose megan because he wanted access to her himself; given how cutthroat she can be, it would also be unsurprising if she welcomed that or even pursued it on her own. If so, does she find it damaging, whether or not she’s capable of recognizing that? Or is she just a winner in search of another winner?
* megan is unapologetically vicious throughout the whole novel, but she’s also a seventeen year-old locked in a competition that will determine the rest of her life. She’ll die young, but she’ll grow up a little first, and I’d love to check in on her as she matures, whether she begins to develop regrets and a conscience or just responds to different challenges. Does she ever look back on what happened with freida and isabel and feel differently about it?
WB: Any
Medium Opt In: Any - Any In-Universe Documents That Fit the Canon Setting
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For all illuminated text opt-ins, I'm also fine with them just being plain text--whatever you prefer.
Obviously most of these have implied m/f relationships built in, and I'd also love to see all the secret and fraught f/f and m/m relationships that aren't as stamped out as the Zones think.
* Companions: The eves have lived such a carefully orchestrated, cloistered life at the School, and now they're suddenly completely stripped of their lifelong environment and thrown into an entirely new situation. And they've gone from being controlled by a mostly toxic group dynamic to being effectively owned by one person they don't know very well. Please tell me everything about what that's like. Show me the awkward early-days transitions of companionship, the horrible weight of unknown expectations, "happy" companions who believe this is as good as life could possibly get, companions who struggle to manage their new lives, etc. What kinds of relationships do they form with their husbands and sons? To what extent do they stay in touch with their friends, and how do they make new ones? What's it like to be nearing your termination date?
* Concubines: I'm really interested in the group of girls we see who passionately set their sights on being concubines, especially with freida thinking that megan is wrong: they aren't making the best of a bad situation, they genuinely prefer this to companionship. Is one of the advantages just getting to stay in close quarters with their friends? Does this let them build better relationships with each other? Once they get a little older, do they still feel relieved about the earlier termination date? How do they feel about the "game" we see Darwin playing, where they're remotely controlled and directed through acts they don't remember? Do they secretly remember them after all? What is their daily life like? Are there any "specialist" concubines who are encouraged to get fat for customers who like that? (Stuffing/feederism/weight gain is okay for this one--I'd actually like seeing the weird push and pull between "finally getting to indulge in a bunch of sensory pleasure" and "this is not at at all what I'm 'supposed' to look like.")
* Chastities: We know the chastities get less respect and far less luxury--even down to not being able to "waste" medical supplies on themselves--and that they're expected to run through self-sacrificing vows multiple times a day. But they also get uncensored internet, relative freedom from expectations, and a natural life span. I'd love to see something set from their point-of-view, as they have to watch these girls go through the School year after year. How often is it just completely depressing? What attachments do they develop, and do they manage to keep any of them up? (We do see that Darwin's mother sent chastity-magdalena a gift, which has always stayed with me.) What kinds of things do they learn once no one cares if they're "too smart" anymore? How do they feel about regurgitating the prescribed lessons designed at preparing the eves for a path they themselves didn't take? What's the balance of contentment and jealousy?
* Inheritants: I would love to see what life is like for the Inheritants. We know they grow up with their own kinds of rankings and social codes, even as they have vastly more freedom, and I'm curious what their families and early educations look like under this weird, status-obsessed system. And I'd love to see how they think and feel about the eves and the lead-up to the Ceremony. Are they nervous? Surprised by what the girls are really like? Do they expect them to be glossy perfection and then find glimpses of normal human messiness, or are any of them secretly hoping for actual connection and kind of disappointed to find girls who have all been molded into the same shape? What are the pressures of choosing a companion, and how much emotional weight do they really put on the relationship, when they know they'll almost certainly outlive her and get a second one?
* Minor characters: I'd also love worldbuilding through some of the minor supporting characters we see and hear about: the hosts of The Chit-Chat Show with the companion-concubine tension, agyness settling into her new and longed-for role as a chastity, Darwin's mother living in the shadows of her two predecessors and trying to make her son into a good person, chastity-magdalena and her vocation and kindness, the celebrities we see like the slutz or kate (famous women in a world not designed for them), etc.?
* All medium opt-ins: Feel free to go wild with these. This book's fucked-up worldbuilding seems like the perfect chance to design some dystopian beauty product ad campaigns or TV show promos or hellish advice columns. Chat correspondence transcripts between a chastity and a new companion? Articles and interviews following up on famous eves? Serious academic studies of what happened with isabel and/or freida or of any of the horrible premises we see, like the adultery punishment or the forbidden love before marriage? Or someone advocating that maybe they teach women to read after all? Voice diary of a Concubine? Basically, any of these can either stand on their own or be used for any of the above prompts, and I'll love it.
Barcelona
Fred Boynton/Ted Boynton
Fred Boynton & Ted Boynton
Medium Opt-In: A Softer World style art
I love the talky comedy-of-manners feeling of this, the dialogue, the specific social and historical context, and the way basically everyone turns out to be some degree of sympathetic. And most of all, I love Ted and Fred and their incredibly weird relationship of opposites who annoy the hell out of each other--well, Fred at least annoys the hell out of Ted, and understandably so--but so clearly feel a lot of love and loyalty to each other when the chips are down. Their random discursive tangents, Ted's insecurity and need to have a philosophy about everything, Fred's fecklessness and trolling, their emotional vulnerability… It's all excellent, and I want more of it. I love both shippy and gen takes for this.
* Hurt/comfort set during Fred's recovery period. Ted sitting on an endless bedside vigil, reading to him, was really delicious h/c, as was Ted escorting him around in the airport and sort of patiently dealing with his new mood swings. I'd love to see more of that in any capacity--close study of Fred getting better, problems with adjusting to the lingering trauma, problems recovering memories, shippy realization of feelings, etc. I'd also love anything that sort of turns the tables and has Fred realizing that Ted's been doing a lot of caretaking and may need him to return the favor.
* Also hurt/comfort role reversal where Ted gets seriously injured or ill and Fred has to take care of him. I feel like Fred would wind up being an absolute nightmare if something happened to Ted, because he would be both super-intense about it and flying off in ten different directions at once, and I'd love to see him dealing with that while also trying to tamp it down and be who Ted needs him to be right then.
* Fred keeps telling women that Ted is a Dom, and it's actually subconsciously because he's into D/s and wants Ted to Dom the hell out of him and keeps projecting his fantasies (and jealousies) into this elaborate joke. Ted somehow finds this out, and kinky sex and feeligns ensue.
* Anything set earlier in their lives, with more of their complex push-and-pull relationship, especially with the feeling of Ted as this kind of superficially boring presence that Fred keeps being drawn to and orbiting around even as he pretends that he's not deeply invested in whether or not his cousin cares about him. Also, the kayak incident.
* Shippy feelings realization, which might also include having to come to terms with their sexuality and deal with the cousin factor. I'd love to see a kind of reconfiguring of the movie where some of the same events are happening but it's actually the two of them falling in love the whole time, with much awkward pining and miscommunication. I could also completely see a sex-while-pining setup for them, where one of them gets into this theoretical framework where it just makes sense for them to have sex, but obviously that's all it is, while they're both actually pining for each other and unaware that it's reciprocated.
* The above, but platonically. I love a kind of platonic relationship pining where one person is convinced they're more invested than the other person or that they care more, and that turns out to not be the case.
* A Softer World opt-in: I'm thinking of something emphasizing them caring about each other but also it being weird and difficult, either with unrequited love feelings or with just Fred being ultra-annoying, and I'm also 100% fine with strips focused on either of them as an individual character or on the movie's culture clashes. (Both actual A Softer World text and you coming up with your own A Softer Pastiche captions are welcome.)
The Perfection
Medium Opt-In: A Softer World style art
Elizabeth "Lizzie" Wells/Charlotte Willmore
Lizzie and Charlotte have incredible chemistry, and I love how their relationship has such a weird blend of genuine loyalty and care… and for-your-own-good gaslighting and forced amputation and obsession and identity blurring. Charlotte feels like an escaped Brontë character, with this vibe of simultaneous fragility and danger, and Lizzie starts off seeming more normal only to wind up becoming stranger and more brutal. I'd love anything that digs into their fucked-up, promising complexity.
* I'm so curious about what happens post-canon. Do Charlotte and Lizzie become dark, off-kilter vigilantes, seeking out rapists and abusers and brutally murdering them? Do they somehow manage to take over the school and start running it together, becoming the new faces of Bachoff? Does that just mean trying to deprogram some of the top students?
* An alternate, darker version of them taking control of the school, with the two of them falling into their own kind of worship of the Perfection even in Anton's absence? Can they fully shake what they were taught, or do they find themselves repeating bits of that behavior even when they don't want to?
* I'd love full-on supernatural horror, too. I spent a lot of time thinking there might turn out to actually be some kind of cosmic force they were worshipping (and sacrificing to) that embodied a kind of musical/artistic perfection, and I'd be very happy to see this as a literal Lovecraftian cult that Charlotte and Lizzie wind up inheriting. Do they know how to deal with the force they might have just offended? Does it require them to do anything? Do they give the bodies to it as an offering? What does any of this look like--how they serve it, how they move forward, how they potentially try to defeat or contain it, etc.?
* What if that threatened virus/zombie outbreak from the beginning was real, and Charlotte's plans go awry because she and Lizzie are stuck in the middle of an apocalypse? Are they still in China, or do they have to take an uncomfortable, destined-to-explode refuge at Bachoff?
* More Gothic horror, just because the house is so perfect for it. The lingering ghosts of Anton, Paloma, Theis, and Geoffrey? A murderous student who's already been indoctrinated into the previous way of doing things? (I always welcome creepy children.) Past students seeking revenge for Anton? Alternately, I'll take other kinds of horror, too--what if that threatened virus/zombie outbreak from the beginning turns out to be real?
* I could also see some canon-divergences. What if Charlotte's mom hadn't gotten sick until after she'd had some time to get to know Lizzie, and she'd wound up running away and taking Lizzie with her? What if her mom had died sooner and she'd come back earlier on to wage a different kind of war on the school? Or a role-reversal, maybe, where Charlotte is the one who stayed with Anton and Paloma, and Lizzie wound up having to leave the school for some reason, only to come back years later--I'd love to see her starting off with the same motives (revenge, desire to save Charlotte, growing love) but playing them out in very different ways. Or I could also totally just go for a long-game road-trip through China, with the two of them deepening their relationship and Charlotte trying to change Lizzie's mind in more subtle ways.
* Random assortment of mini-prompts: music metaphors/musical structures for stories, Lizzie and Charlotte's relationship to music, their duets, consensual stump insertion, sex games that edge into being deeply unhealthy therapy, joyous sex all about emotion and experience/inexperience and tenderness and maybe kink discovery, porn in general, becoming composers, Charlotte having trouble dealing with the world after spending years as a virtual shut-in.
* A Softer World opt-in: There are so many fantastic A Softer World strips about passionate love that's also a really bad idea/out-of-control/messed-up/etc. in a way that really strikes me as having a Lizzie/Charlotte vibe. So much attraction and obsession and genuine caring and liking--and so many twisted directions. (I'm good with either actual A Softer World text or you coming up with A Softer Pastiche captions.)
The Falcon and the Winter Soldier
James “Bucky” Barnes/Sam Wilson
I totally fell for these two with their bickering and their deep feelings and their heart-eyes for each other. I love Sam's blend of ideals and practicality and willingness to just keep trying, and I love Bucky's grumpiness and humor and loyalty and persistence. They hit the sweet spot of blending together well enough to be terrific partners but still having conflict and pining potential. Plus, they're destined to spend their whole lives getting into trouble.
* Sam is now Captain America, putting him even more in the public eye. What's it like for him to suddenly be that much of a symbol, with all the accompanying pressures and criticisms and scrutiny? How can Bucky help him deal with it? If Sam's always bound to attract a lot of attention, does it feel like he and Bucky can't take things to the next level? Does Sam worry about the effects of being an openly queer Captain America? I'd love any takes on this, from angsty and full of pining to comedic and full of frustration as they're constantly trying to date/fuck but can't get enough time alone to "I'm going to make a big romantic declaration and to hell with what anyone else thinks about it" swoonworthy romance.
* Sam accompanies Bucky on a particularly fraught attempt to find/provide closure for a Winter Soldier-era event. Maybe it's a complex situation that they have to figure out how to handle, maybe it involves a lot of emotional vulnerability that sparks some feelings, maybe it winds up rousing ire from someone who doesn't differentiate Bucky and the Winter Soldier and wants revenge… Either way, it can serve as a great road trip/isolated setting catalyst for a feelings realization or get-together.
* Fantasy-elements AU where "Captain America" is more of a mystical, magical position that basically gives you a deep connection to the place you're representing and maybe some magical powers related to it. And Bucky is technically sworn to the shield/magically tied to it, but he doesn't want to be Walker's guy, so he wants to convince Sam to take up the mantle despite Sam's misgivings. (Does the mantle also involve sleeping with him? RITUAL SEX.) Feel free to go all in on the magic and worldbuilding.
* Background deep-dive: They have to solve some kind of elaborate Southern Gothic problem in Sam's neck of the woods, dealing with people from his childhood, or have to take the Paul & Darlene out for some lengthy sea adventure? Sarah and the kids are endangered, and Sam and Bucky have to make sure they're safe? They all accidentally travel back in time to 1930s Brooklyn?
* All kinds of hurt/comfort scenarios, seriously. Stranded in the winter and growing hypothermic, needing to share body heat? Captured and tortured? Captured and nonconned? One having to watch the other one suffer without being able to intervene? One trying to rescue the other? Bad guys or aliens Made Them Do It when they weren't sure they wanted to go there yet? I love scenarios like this where they're trying to make it as good as possible, but the situation is so awkward and uncomfortable that it's still rough and each is still unsure of what the other one is feeling.
* AWKWARD DRUNKEN VEGAS MARRIAGE when they weren't even dating. Maybe it's instant news or maybe they manage, against all odds, to keep it under wraps. In which case, oh, good, they can get an annulment, right? Weird how they keep postponing that and how many feelings they're having about it. I also love the idea of one or both of them having a reflexive possessiveness and a feeling that they should be spending more time together/living together.
James “Bucky” Barnes & Sam Wilson & Helmut Zemo
James “Bucky” Barnes/Sam Wilson/Helmut Zemo
I'm okay with whatever means you want to use to get this team-up happening: maybe Zemo's paroled to Sam and Bucky's custody with certain conditions or restrictions, maybe he's escaped/they've broken him out again For Some Reason, etc. I just really love the idea of them as a team, slowly working out an actual (if weird) bond of mutual, snarky attachment and loyalty. It's just all perfectly primed for my love of redemption arcs and/or relationships and priorities that change how one-time villains approach things. And they have such great, testy energy together.
I'm also fine with Sam/Bucky in a Sam & Bucky & Zemo scenario.
* I'd love to see them going up against some really weird, non-Flag Smasher problems. Maybe undoing the Snap caused weird ripple effects throughout the universe, and all kinds of mini eldritch horrors are manifesting everywhere? Maybe they have to use their relatively grounded combined abilities against a villain with superpowers?
* Anything that plunges them all into one of their backgrounds. They have to solve some kind of elaborate Southern Gothic problem in Sam's neck of the woods, dealing with people from his childhood, or have to take the Paul & Darlene out for some lengthy sea adventure? Sarah and the kids are endangered, and Sam, Bucky, and Zemo have to make sure they're safe? They all accidentally travel back in time to 1930s Brooklyn? Sokovia has been dissolved into other countries, but suddenly it's somehow a ghost territory full of phantom spirits and buildings destroyed in war, and they have to figure out what the hell's going on?
* Bucky has to pretend to be the Winter Soldier again. This time, Zemo has more complicated and less amused feelings about it. Maybe this has to go on for a while, and so eventually Sam and Zemo convince Bucky to coach them so they can take turns playing a Winter Soldier, if not the Winter Soldier. (I will go along with whatever reason you want for people not recognizing Sam--maybe they have advanced face-changing technology or stage makeup. Maybe everyone thinks he's the Smiling Tiger. Etc.) I'd just love to see the three of them potentially rotating through this role, all having different and weird reactions to it--while also running afoul of trouble?
* They're stranded in an inhospitable environment/taken captive together/lost on an alien planet/soulbonded/etc.--anything with a lot of potential for forced proximity and hurt/comfort, which are so great for getting over the enemies-to-lovers or enemies-to-friends hurdle that Zemo brings with him.
* It turns out someone is doing terrible experiments with or otherwise abusing the prisoners on the Raft, and Sam and Bucky reluctantly have to break Zemo out again and try to shut everything down. I just love the idea of "this has to stop, but also in particular we have to get this one guy out; we're taking our villain and leaving."
* AU where the GRC is even worse and more controlling, making everything dystopian and/or chaotic. If they're going to try to do any good, they're going to have to go on the run and deal with being constantly hunted while they exist in the cracks of society. I'd love to see Sam's practical idealism and heroism under these conditions, in particular, because he'd have even more of an impact then and be even more necessary.
* Additional random hurt/comfort prompts: One of them is doused with some kind of temporary super-soldier-adjacent drug that makes you reckless or kills off all sense of pain? Emotionally/physically complicated sex pollen, affecting one/two/all of them? Captured and tortured? Captured and nonconned? Forced to accept torture or rape for food/medical care for someone else? Feel free to whump any or all of them and then let them comfort each other (with or without additional sex).
* Amnesia and relationships: They all wake up with amnesia, and for some reason of your choice, assume that they're all together. By the time they figure out the truth and/or get their memories back, things have gotten weird. Or they're in a somewhat more settled relationship--friendship, established if wary allies, romance, It's Complicated--and then one of them loses the last few years of his memory and has no idea how they ended up like this.
Selfie
Medium Opt In: Writing - Reddit: In-Universe Reddit Post On Any Subreddit (Post + Replies)
Eliza Dooley/Henry Higgs
These two have such terrific chemistry, and I love their playfulness and the mismatch in their levels of spontaneity. They have a great emotional range in their relationship, too--they're funny, flirtatious, supportive, angsty, angry, and just generally passionate about each other. I like first times and established relationship fic for them and the chances are good that if you can think of some standard romance novel/rom-com-style plot to throw them into, as either an AU or a canon continuation, I will be all over it.
* Pre-relationship flirtation of any stripe, full of UST, either with them both actually feeling like they’re on the same page and enjoying themselves or all fraught and full of pining. Slow dancing at some event, having conversations about how meaningful they are to each other that just slightly miss the mark and leave them both disappointed, etc.
* First time/get together fic! I love all these tropey rom-com setups for them--fake relationship, thinly justified marriage of convenience (somehow statistically Henry’s more likely to get promoted if he’s married, maybe?), drunk Vegas wedding, surprise pregnancy, identity porn You’ve Got Mail setup where they fall in love online at the same time they’re falling in love in real life? And any and all takes on forced proximity--maybe they’re stuck at a pharmaceutical conference together? Or snowed in somewhere? Either way, does it end in bedsharing?
* Figuring out kinks together, including what doesn't work at all or what winds up turning ridiculous. I would totally read 10k of them experimenting and sometimes hitting stuff that's super-hot and sometimes just profoundly awkward and unsexy.
* Secretary-style setup where Henry is a reluctant, mostly awkward but very occasionally suave Dom and he winds up having kinky sex with experienced-but-emotionally-vulnerable subby Eliza and there’s all kinds of over-the-desk spankings and naked dictation and various attempts to top from the bottom, with them both getting more confidence out of it.
* There are also a bunch of cracky premises I like with them. Bodyswap where Eliza has trouble resisting taking Henry’s body out for a spin, and definitely can’t resist taking it out for a spin via sex with Henry in her own body? Hanahaki disease pining? Suddenly developed the ability to read minds?
* Reddit opt-in: I can so easily visualize a complex get-together or relationship arc for them played out via Reddit posts--I think Eliza would be obviously into the social/chatty aspects, and then Henry could easily get sucked into the "research" aspects of running his social dilemmas by someone and liking giving other people advice.
Eliza Dooley/Freddy/Henry Higgs
I talked up above about all my Eliza/Henry feelings, and I also really love adding Freddy to the mix. I really liked how the show handled him, making him a flawed but genuinely caring guy who adored Eliza. I kind of like the idea that while Eliza is moving away from him because she's aware of her growing feelings for Henry, she could also realize that her less-epic romance with Freddy is real, too. And then bringing Freddy and Henry together causes its own intriguing complications...
* All of the above Eliza/Henry prompts, but… with Freddy in them too. Bizarre scenario in which they have to fake a poly relationship and slowly stumble into OT3 feelings? (Look, I would not put it past KinderKare to somehow have a situation in which this was necessary. Maybe they're trying to woo a major client they find out is poly.) Having to share a hotel room at a conference when there’s only a single king-size bed? Three-way bodyswap? Freddy and Eliza both getting awkwardly dommed by an inexperienced Henry while falling in love? Eliza tries to work out her fledgling OT3 via r/relationships?
* I like the idea of the wrench the more antagonistic vibe between Henry and Freddy could throw into the works, complicating the pining and stretching it out further. Maybe Eliza and Henry are already together and Freddy assumes his chance is done? Maybe Henry is exasperated to be falling for this guy at all? Eliza feels torn over which of them to choose and doesn’t realize at first that they would go for a triad setup at all? Henry falls in love with them both but doesn’t like the idea of having more than one partner and feels guilty about it?
* Eliza/Henry are an established relationship, and they gradually begin to fold in Freddy too. Maybe he winds up also getting some lessons from Henry? Maybe he intends to totally keep resenting Henry but finds himself charmed by him instead, so now, great, he’s pining for two people?
* Freddy makes an extremely awkward attempt to introduce Eliza and Henry to his parents, possibly without explaining why he's doing it. How does it go? Is it just a dinner, or does this play out over a weekend visit? I'd prefer his parents not just be virulently homophobic, but them finding out the bi part or the poly part and being awkward and confused, cluelessly offensive, temporarily thrown, etc., can lead to the right amount of delicious angst. I would like them to eventually at least come around to awkward support, though.
* Scenario where Henry and Freddy get to know each other first, for whatever reason, and that changes the dynamics with the three of them and makes the developing feelings go differently?
The Twilight Zone
Mrs. Bronson & Norma
Mrs. Bronson/Norma
Episode: "The Midnight Sun"
* I would love stories from either the hotter world or the colder world, if you want to treat the hotter world as real. Or I'm good with stories set in the hotter world with the creeping awareness that it's all a dream creeping in. Or both worlds being real in parallel universes. Or anything. Basically, both the hotter world and the colder world are excellent, atmospheric apocalypses that I would love to see more of.
* I love their weary tenderness and a sense of being alone together at the end of the world. Taking care of each other, looking for each other, making gestures both big and small. I'm interested in all the little domestic details of life in the slow-but-steady apocalypse and this depopulated New York: whether they ever risk going outside for any real period of time, whether they eventually try to leave the building after all, how they try to stay warm (or cool) for as long as they can.
* Norma painting for Mrs. Bronson, making different hot or cold landscapes. Trying to keep the paint from freezing or melting. Norma convincing Mrs. Bronson to pose for her, clothed or nude. Mrs. Bronson learning to paint or draw too.
* Extremely bittersweet get-together fic where they both know that there's only a limited window of survival time.
* The two of them are somehow able to alternate between the hot and cold worlds, but while that gives them a little bit of comfort, it can't save them: they're always just going from one apocalypse to another. But they somehow managed to make that be enough.
* They're saved by another kind of Twilight Zone happening, like stepping into one of Norma's landscapes and having it become real around them or somehow finding that no matter how cold or hot it gets, they don't die, and they've become something otherworldly. Or there's some last-chance spaceship leaving in search of another world, and the two of them manage to get on it.
* Totally optional Twilight Zone crossover: Death comes for them, and it's either Murray Hamilton's Death from "One for the Angels" or Robert Redford's Mr. Death from "Nothing in the Dark." Or any other kind of crossover with another you want to do a literal crossover with any other classic Twilight Zone episode, I'm also totally good with that.
Solo: Janet Tayler
Walter Smith/Janet Tyler
Episode: "Eye of the Beholder"
* I've always wanted to see more of the Community of Uggos. I'd love to see Janet starting to settle in there and, as Walter promises her, beginning to feel at home and genuinely loved for the first time in her life. I would be absolutely delighted with 10k of just Janet adjusting to her new life, dealing with everything from living on a kind of remote ugliness leper colony--one that might be in a completely different kind of climate or at a completely different level of tech/wealth than she's used to, in addition to everything else--to slowly finding her own beauty standards adjusting to developing connections and relationships.
* Maybe the new community is basically ignored by the larger dystopian society, so they aren't just relieved of the burden of being constantly scorned as hideous, they also get--even if they don't notice it right away--more opportunities to be themselves without the constant pressure to conform in every way. I'd love to see Janet trying out different options that she couldn't have explored in the outside world, from "different kinds of fashion" to "oh, lesbian sex is an option here."
* Janet eventually becoming one of the people who go to the hospitals to collect the patients who have had the maximum number of failed corrective surgeries, and how she deals with that and feels about it. Is she ever able to reconnect a little with the people from her last hospital? I'm always intrigued by the doctor who veers close to treason because he sympathizes with her so much.
* I'd also love to see Walter's POV on Janet, gen or ship, as she starts to settle in--it could be really cool to see some of her journey through his eyes.
* Janet/Walter! Is a sweet slow burn? What draws them to each other? Does he actually find her attractive right away, since he's been with his own people for so long, or do they both have to get used to each other for a while before a spark really kindles? I'm also into seeing how Janet thinks of him physically at first--presumably in very unflattering terms based on very different norms--and how that might change as time goes by, but how her new beauty standards still might not match ours and her perspective still might feel alien there.
WB: "The After Hours" Mannequins
Episode: "The After Hours"
* Please give me any and all mannequin rumspringas. Is Marsha the first mannequin who has forgotten herself in the outside world, or does that happen often enough that it's a recognized hazard? Where do they go while they're living outside the department store? Do they all use the same rotating apartment? What are some pleasures they especially enjoy as humans that they don't get to have as mannequins?
* Someone forms a relationship with a mannequin while the mannequin is taking their turn outside. Do they find out the truth? Does it become a kind of weird long-distance relationship where the other person just waits, year after year, for their mannequin's visit? Is it bittersweet, star-crossed love where the human eventually gets married to someone else, or is a kind of touching "well, they're making it work" relationship?
* What is their life like in the department store(s)? Can any of the employees or customers ever see them move? Do they have more freedom and mobility on the ninth floor, or is it just that they have more privacy? Is that floor technically real but just for storage, or is everyone being 100% literal when they say it doesn't exist, and only the mannequins can actually access it? Do the mannequins have opinions about the clothes they model or where they stand in the store?
* Mannequin POV, just to capture the uncanniness of it. One of my favorite details is how they reflexively fall back into stationary poses when they're not actively interacting with each other, and I'd love to see more distinctly alien details like that from their perspective.
* Mannequin sex. I really ship Marsha/Scorching Hot Saleswoman Mannequin, whom you can name whatever you like, but I'm also good with original mannequin characters of any gender combination. I just want to know if the mannequins fuck, and if so, how.