primeideal

As usual this is probably tl;dr about my fics, if you're not interested in that kind of thing then Just Walk Out, Hit The Bricks, Etc.

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I'm not very consistent about making recommendations posts so this is not a slight against fics I've loved in prior years, just wanted to contribute something for this year!

A lot of these are five-minute fandoms so when feasible, I've linked the fandoms themselves. Beyond that, it's very roughly sorted in order of "likelihood of knowing canon"/"necessity of knowing canon."

Unauthorized Narratives (~500 words, G, no archive warnings apply)

Strange Planet is a webcomic you might have seen around, even if you don't recognize the name--it's about aliens who do normal Earth rituals but describe them with odd words to point out how absurd Earth humans are sometimes. This is about the familiar desire to consume Unauthorized Narratives when there is an insufficient quantity of Authorized Narratives available.

In Which a Miscommunication Proves Infortuitous (~600 words, G, no archive warnings apply)

In which a Visitor proves a Nuisance is a standalone comic about time-travelling assassins. Incompetent Time Traveling Saxophone Haters is a tumblr post about time-travelling assassins. Put them together and what do you get? Autocorrect shenanigans. The main collection has a couple other stories for the latter fandom with are also droll.

"Cryptography" was nominated as an anthropomorphic fandom, with characters Alice, Bob, and Eve. The "canon" is that Alice is trying to send a secure message to Bob, while Eve is trying to eavesdrop (see this xkcd and the others linked). All the fics for them were amusing, whether it's "is calling professors by their first names a sexist double standard or just a West Coast thing," "Alice knits Bob a marriage proposal in encrypted Braille, the Eve as unknowable aliens, or Victor and Peggy with "zero-knowledge proofs" (don't ask).

Love Is The Worst Cardiovascular Disease of All (~2k, M, choose not to warn)
What do you do with a Christmas-themed romance song that, by widespread consensus, is overplayed and annoying, not to mention not very Christmasy? Make it a fluffy horror story, obviously! This takes "gave you my heart" literally, and runs with a bunch of other idioms like "catching your eye," turning it into something sweet (and original).

Ammurapi, King of Ugarit (~15k, G, choose not to warn) is a retelling of Hamlet set in the Late Bronze Age Collapse. I don't really know anything about that era of history, but the way things transpire with the story-within-the-story and the poisoned sword at the end are very clever, the Polonius analogue is as long-winded as you could hope, and by Hamlet standards, it qualifies as a fix-it!

That Supreme Charm (~3k, G, no archive warnings apply): Princess Bride fic (tagged with both movie and book) featuring Fezzick's love of rhymes. Sweet portrayal of an autistic OC, wonderful wordplay, and great mental image of chonky baby Fezzik.

Her Christmas Wish (~5k, T, no archive warnings apply) Baby-Sitters' Club, Mary-Anne/Charlie post-canon fic. Cute and fluffy, but I also like the characterization notes, like how Charlie's relationships with his stepdad and birth father might have played out, and Kristy's career trajectory (combined with her lack of tact at times).

known now in part, to be known in full (~7k, G, no archive warnings apply) Kairos (Murry-O'Keefe family) series by Madeleine L'Engle. After Polly's time-travel incident in "An Acceptable Time," a parallel universe collides with the main timeline and adult Meg meets an alternate version of herself. Which at first seems like a terrifying callback to the Three Mr. Jenkins Incident, but turns into a lovely depiction of what it means for Meg to be a Namer.

something you do, not something you are (~4k, T, no archive warnings apply [but canonical character death]) Dune movies, Gurney Halleck character study, eventual Leto/Gurney/Jessica. Good perspective at Gurney in different ages of his life, and the contrasts between the Leto+Gurney and Duncan+Paul mentorship relations given the different political threats they faced.

Blossoms on the Vine (~1500 words, G, no archive warnings apply), for Uprooted, is an outsider POV on Kasia and Agnieszka, and sort of a counterpoint to the "don't get too attached to a girl born in a dragon year" philosophy espoused in the early chapters.

Last but certainly not least, my own gift!
Two Spies in a Theater (~6k, G, major character death [canonical, it's about ghosts]), for Debrief RPG. It's a script/screenplay format of one potential "production", so there's the spoken dialogue between the two characters, but then also notes from the different "actors'" POV, annotating and giving context on the dialogue--which is a great contrast to the themes of communication failure. If you have the ability to read PDFs, that version is really great for showing the different handwriting styles/sizes--page 18 in particular epitomizes what I love about these two and their dynamic. But the overall meta-ness of "being envious of alternate versions of yourself" is very appropriate in an RPG context. There are even "Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead" vibes!

If you're familiar with Debrief, strongly recced; if you're not, please play it and then come babble at me about it (I am some level of "screaming into a void always and forever" about the endless possibilities the game allows, an emotion which has been wonderfully reawakened by this gift...)

Dear Yuletide Writer,

Optional details are optional! Please feel free to write anything about these fandoms/characters, this is just to provide some suggestions if you're interested. I have treats enabled on my Ao3 account.

I'm also primeideal on Ao3 (and Tumblr), and Ember Nickel on FFN. I have many previous dear author letters from which much of this is copied, pasted, and endlessly rewritten. I've written/blogged more heavily about several of these fandoms than others at times, but I would be equally delighted with fic for any one of them.

For the fandoms where it's relevant (Anathem, Debrief, False Doctrine), I'm checking the box for "one or more chosen tags," ie, if you want to focus on one character/worldbuilding tag and not include the others, that is very welcome! (That's also the case for The Celebrant.")

General Likes:

-canon-divergence AUs

-five things

-worldbuilding

-dialogue

-wit and wordplay

-nonstandard formats (documentation, epistolary, etc.)

-interactive fiction--I prefer formats like Twine to open-ended parsers.

-happy endings

-sad endings (character death, melodrama, heartbreak!)

General DNWs: (see fandom-specific notes for further details)

-explicit on-screen sex (fade-to-black or innuendo is fine)

-underage characters having sex

-rape/noncon

-moralizing/didactic stories (characters Learning An Important Lesson about the value of tolerance, etc.)

-non-canonical allegories of current events and/or contemporary politics (Alderidge has hot takes about Winston Churchhill, fine; Alderidge has hot takes about a Rishi Sunak stand-in, no thanks.)

-character bashing

Anathem

Erasmas, Jad, Orolo, Worldbuilding

Erasmas: What does his life look like in the post-canon era? Is he a mentor to future fids? What changes with the Second Reconstitution? More of his friendships with Sammann or Jules, or his family relationship with Cord?

Jad: What did a "normal" day in the life of a Millenarian look like, pre-canon? Is he bouncing around nearby "alternate universes," or moving farther up the Wick? Jad mentions that if it hadn't been for the Daban Urnud's arrival, Orolo would likely have become a Centenarian and then a Millenarian himself someday--what would their relationship have been like?

Orolo: How did he react when the Ita picked him to secretly spy on the Daban Urnud? What was actually going through his head in the early chapters that he couldn't tell Raz? Or during his death scene?

Worldbuilding: I'm primarily interested in the world of the concents pre-canon. Weird bell patterns! Giant clock towers! Math and science! Bizarre dictionary definitions! Whatever it is the Ita are up to! But if there's something you have ideas for in terms of the Daban Urnud or polycosmic travel, go for it.

For this request: DNW discussion of allswell or other mind-altering drugs.

The Celebrant

Any (Jackie|Yakov, Mathewson) nominated

My self-indulgent request: I want them to be friends and be happy! To me the tension of the book doesn't come from the baseball, which is "already" established history, but the difficulty of communicating their mutual respect when one is a national celebrity and the other has Jackie's shyness issues. Even if it ends in tragedy, I'd like to see a little more of them acknowledging each other's idealism.

-AU where Jackie never hurts his arm, he becomes a professional baseball player too, and they meet as teammates or rivals?
-Clara lives and Mathewson has to come up with some other conversational starter, because come on.
-More about Jackie and Edith's relationship, which is mostly offscreen. What does she see in him? Is she drawn to his creativity and intensity too?
-A very silly idea: Jackie and Mathewson somehow wind up in the 21st century, Mathewson is scandalized by FanDuel/legalized gambling/etc. and keeps railing about how this is going to cause problems, Jackie has to run interference somehow...?
-I love baseball so if you want to throw in any RL baseball history that didn't make it into the book, that would be wonderful but is absolutely not expected!

Debrief

George Russell, Robert Alderidge, Worldbuilding

So on the one hand, RPGs can be kind of difficult to prompt for, in that everyone's playthroughs are different and will result in slightly different characterizations; on the other hand, I have so many feelings about these guys and would absolutely love any version. A retelling of your playthrough, what happened next, more backstory, fix-it, "fix-it" that makes it worse...

-I love the dramatic irony of seeing the same incidents from different POVs in the character sheets, and then trying to talk about it just makes it worse. (The Catholic Underground in Spain, Courtenay's investigation.) Anything expanding on those or another memory that they technically share but actually remember differently.

-From Alderidge's sheet: "Bykov has the distinction of being the only human on Earth, apart from George Russell, who has ever known you in any meaningful sense." What's going on with these two? How much does Bykov know about the OUC? Is there hatesex?

-Does any of this ever get declassified? How much do Dora or Jean, or the kids, ever figure out, correctly or incorrectly?

-Worldbuilding! What kind of research is the OUC (or the Soviets) doing into ghost technology? What are spirit mediums doing in other parts of the world? At rates of ~one in ten thousand, it's unlikely you'd ever run across another unless there was some effort--but there are also more people who acknowledge ghosts and auras even if they can't directly witness them.

For me, the disruptor was an important focal point of the playthrough--my version of Russell is increasingly horrified at the thought of using it on Alderidge, meanwhile, Alderidge is insisting that it's this great tool of mercy and it's not clear whether he's talking about himself. Then once my Russell admits to himself that getting Alderidge to cross over and get closure is more important to him than anything else, he gets his act together in kind of a ruthless Pascal's Wager-y way. The sense they both have of "okay well here's when I draw the line, it's different when it's you at risk" is part of what I love about this dynamic, so anything touching on that (or the disruptor in general) would be great, but obviously everyone's characterization will be different!

Feel free to lean into the shippy aspects, or not, as you prefer; I don't really want anything too anachronistic or setting-changey, but Alderidge's level of candor (or Russell's level of having-a-clue) can be anywhere on the scale, it's all good.

Note: some of the DNWs I've listed for other exchanges do not apply to this request. For instance, I think the use of second-person POV works very well in the character sheets, so I enthusiastically opt in to second-person POV fic here! (As well as first or third.) Also, go as dark as you want in terms of "possible outcomes include ghosts being destroyed forever with the disruptor, or haunting the world until they decay and lose all coherence."

False Doctrine series

Evvie, Sara

So maybe this was an osmosis failure, but I'm not sure I completely understood Evvie's plotline. At first, her conviction that she's called to the monastic life could have been a case of "I know what I'm called to do in life, other people [and their heteronormative stereotypes] might not understand, but that's okay." But then she meets "Fee," who "fills the void in her life," and Charlie and Hal, who maybe open her mind to different vocations and ways of serving God in the world. And there's Sara's whole thing about "I can't marry George, I think I'm the handsome rake," and the demon pointing out that Evvie finds people like Daphne attractive. It sort of seemed to be setting up an Evvie/Sara endgame? Then in the the last chapter, there's the quick swerve from "not exactly a yes" (about going back to Patmos) to "actually, talking to Charlie made me decide I want to be a nun after all..."?

So with that:
-I would be interested in an Evvie/Sara AU where Evvie realizes that maybe her vision isn't really telling her what to do anymore, and considers other alternatives for what to do next.
-Alternatively, something canon-compliant, where Evvie talks more with Sara and/or Kit on the voyage back to Patmos. Kit and Evvie comparing notes about their relationships with their half-siblings? Or Sara and Evvie staying friends and pen pals, post-canon? (I'll admit I don't know a great deal about Greek Orthodoxy, I'm assuming nuns aren't so cloistered that they can't have friends and pen pals in the outside world?)
-More about Sara's relationships with any of the "From All False Doctrine" characters. Does her love for fabricating completely unnecessary details come from Uncle Peachy? What does Elsa make of the events of "Neither Have I Wings," once she's all caught up? Was there more going on with "Hal's" appearance to young Sara than we knew? Does Uncle Sven have advice on living with a disability?

Quatrevingt-treize

Gauvain

I have a lot of feelings about doomed moral-victor idealists and he definitely qualifies!

Pre-canon fic showing how he became the kind of leader he is? Interactions with Cimourdain or Lantenac? What do Radoub and the other soldiers think of him?

An AU where things diverge from canon much earlier? What if he'd been deployed to Paris rather than the Vendée? What if his aristocratic background had disqualified him from service?

For this fandom, I think there could be some humor from having Gauvain interact with characters from other canons of the same era, and/or putting him in a different setting, and seeing what form his principles take. Gauvain meets the Conventionist from Les Misérables, and/or survives until the events of that novel? He interacts with the "Hamilton" versions of Lafayette or Jefferson as they argue what path to take with regards to the revolution? 21st-century Gauvain's struggles to keep his idealism intact on Twitter? (Again, I don't want a serious focus on modern real-world issues or people, but if it's done for humor, then feel free.) The Reign of Terror in space?

---

Again, this is all optional, feel free to use as much or as little as is helpful. I look forward to reading your story!

Happy New Year, and happy Yuletide reveals to those who celebrate! As always, if you don't like self-absorbed rambling, you are free to not read this post, that is an option ;)

( 'tis the season to be ficcing )

Dear Yuletide Writer,

For the fandoms where it's relevant (Debrief, Steerswoman), I'm checking the box for "one or more chosen tags," ie, if you want to focus on one character/worldbuilding tag and not include the others, that is very welcome! (That's also the case for "Worst Journey.")

General Likes:

-canon-divergence AUs

-five things

-worldbuilding

-dialogue

-wit and wordplay

-nonstandard formats (documentation, epistolary, etc.)

-interactive fiction--I prefer formats like Twine to open-ended parsers.

-happy endings

-sad endings (character death, melodrama, heartbreak!)

General DNWs: (see fandom-specific notes for further details)

-explicit on-screen sex (fade-to-black or innuendo is fine)

-underage characters having sex

-rape/noncon

-moralizing/didactic stories (characters Learning An Important Lesson about the value of tolerance, etc.)

-non-canonical allegories of current events and/or contemporary politics (Alderidge has hot takes about Winston Churchhill, fine; Alderidge has hot takes about a Rishi Sunak stand-in, no thanks.)

-character bashing

Children of the Star

Noren

What I love about it: the complicated themes of science and faith, and how there's more to "heresy" than just wanting to burn the system down; the twisty reveals, especially in the first book; the way Stefred functions as a compelling antagonist.

-An expansion of any of the scenes fast-forwarded through in the last few chapters (The Archpriest, being an outcast even among the Scholars, new ceremonies like drinking groundwater and how they change in future generations.)

-Interacting with the First Scholar via memories/computers

-Helping Lianne or another recruit through the visions

-Post-canon shippiness with Lianne

-Outside POV on him from a Futurity settler

-His childhood friendship with Kern, nurturing each other's heretical ideas

-How would his research have been different (or the same) if Talyra had lived?

-Noren and Stefred get an opportunity to collaborate freely without Stefred having to pretend to be against him

-In the event you happen to also be familiar with "Steerswoman": Rowan and Noren meet by some handwavium and compare notes about their "sufficiently advanced technology" experiences? ;-)

Debrief

George Russell, Robert Alderidge, Worldbuilding

-Does any of this ever get declassified? How much do Dora or Jean, or the kids, ever figure out, correctly or incorrectly?

Steerswoman

Rowan, Bel

I love all the complexities of Outskirter society, and the differences among the various tribes. More about Bel's approach to life as a warrior and a bard--in her own tribe? With Kammeryn's people? How do Outskirters who only know her through her poetry imagine her? How did she learn to appreciate the "once upon a time" structure when adapting to the Inner Lands?

Rowan's time in the Archives as a student? Learning to draw and take measurements? A situation in which the Steerswomen's vow of honesty gets her in trouble? Something post-canon-so-far where she is able to communicate more with the "demons" or actually make some progress in learning about what's going on with the world?

There are lots of great tropey moments with Bel and Rowan that can be either shippy or gen: huddling for warmth, teaching each other swordplay, taking care of each other when they get dysentery! If you're so inclined, I'd be interested to see a shippy expansion on any of these, or something else along these lines. Another misunderstanding with the courtship gifts outside the tent?

In the event you happen to also be familiar with "Children of the Star," maybe Rowan and Noren meet by some handwavium and compare notes about their "sufficiently advanced technology" experiences? ;-)

The Worst Journey In The World

Apsley Cherry-Garrard, Henry Robertson "Birdie" Bowers ("any" with only these characters nominated)

What I like about it: the contrast between the different "character voices"--not just narrator!Cherry writing a decade after the fact, but also diary!Cherry in the moment and epistolary!Bowers being very proud of his cute green hat. Here is a tl;dr Google Doc I put together with some of my favorite quotes/over-the-top moments/tropes.

I enjoy both shipfic and gen for these two! Please no poly-shipping.

-Another incident with different POVs on the same event, whether it be future!Cherry interweaving his voice with present!Cherry or just the contrast between Bowers and Cherry's voices.

-Bowers writes a candid letter to his mom and overshares some details about the crew's personal life

-Testing the idea of a two- or three-man sleeping bag (as proposed by Fridtjof Nansen). Huddling for warmth...and for science.

-The Winter Journey ends in tragedy. (Does this change the approach to the Pole and wind up saving lives in the long run?)

-AU where Atkinson leads the group to search for Campbell's party in late 1912 and they don't find out for years how close Scott et. al got.

-Cherry mentions that he had a conversation with Bowers about potentially "doing himself in with a pickaxe if necessity arose." What was that talk like?

-I love how polar exploration fandom runs with weird fantastical tropes (time loop, body swap, ghost shenanigans) because it's Antarctica and the aurora did it. Anything along these lines is great.

Again, this is all optional, feel free to use as much or as little as is helpful. I look forward to reading your story!

This is my self-indulgent, digression-y, "how the sausage is made" reveals post for Yuletide 2022, featuring a bunch of links back to previous posts. If you're not into this kind of thing, you can just...ignore this post. It's cool.

So my recip and I matched on "Project Hail Mary." At one point, the protagonist remembers that his spaceship contains mini-spaceships that don't carry passengers, but can be launched back to Earth to send data. Because they look kind of like bugs, and there are four of them, they're obviously named "the Beatles." Later, he's talking to himself and complains "man, it's been a hard day. A hard day's night. I should be...hey, the Beatles can help me here!"

I wouldn't necessarily call myself a big Beatles fan, but I appreciate that they've done a lot for rock music as we know it. So I figured that I could use Beatles songs as a frame device to add some missing scenes and do a "5 Things" or equivalent. And when I started brainstorming ideas...it turns out there are a lot of Beatles songs that could be relevant for this book. "I Want To Hold Your Hand" for a touch-starved character? "Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I'm 64" for a precarious survival mission? "Here Comes the Sun" for a book about...saving the sun? Turns out all I need to better appreciate music is a pretext for viewing it as about space travel rather than romance even when it's space travel. Who knew?

Maybe it's a coincidence, but I choose to believe that after the success of "The Martian" (whose book featured a running joke about "I hate disco and it's the only music I'm stuck with out here," and got turned into a movie with a disco soundtrack), Andy Weir just doubled down on "if this book ever gets turned into a movie, it all needs to be Beatles puns." Anyway, that was the context of this post.

And then a few days later I realized that Ryland often translates an unfamiliar word as "Amaze!" even when it doesn't necessarily make perfect grammatical sense to do so. At first I chalked this up to "eh, language barriers, communication is hard." But no. If it's being directed in response to Ryland Grace's actions, that makes him...Amazing Grace. Groan.

So when I went to post it was like...I'm using 'Across the Universe' as a title because it's a Beatles song about travelling through the galaxy. That phrase also shows up in my recip's username. I'm guessing there must have been some subconscious influence but oh well, I'm not changing it now even if it is too on-point.

Across the Universe (4k, gen, no archive warnings apply)

A couple weeks later, I was visiting extended family and arguing about what movie to watch. We eventually compromised on "Knives Out." I'd sort of osmosed some of the plot, mostly in the context of "I didn't particularly care for Rian Johnson as a director in Star Wars, it's possible that switching genres and doing something original would be a better fit for him though." And it was fine, not my favorite thing ever, but amusing. So I idly checked to see if anyone had requested it...and sure enough, my recip liked happiness, fluff, and friendships. Sometimes the stars just align! And I got to use my fun facts about Go! And sometimes Wikipedia has the exact article you need for a throwaway joke?

Anyway, in keeping with the general tendency that you have no idea which of your fics will be successful, a fluffy fix-it for a murder mystery that avoids the whole murder mystery aspect, about a canon I wasn't necessarily the most passionate about, was surprisingly successful and crossed the centikudos mark earlier today. Yuletide!!

Where There's a Will (There's A Way) (1.7k, gen, no archive warnings apply)

I started canon reviewing "Elder Race" for treat purposes because it was short, I had enjoyed it, and the prompts were neat. A day later, it went out on the PH list. Again, sometimes the stars just align! This gave me an excuse to nerd out about linguistics, and also there is a terrible pun (that I can't take credit for but did think was very fitting in the context of language change and communication issues.)

Tree of Changes (1.6k, gen, no archive warnings apply)

And then "Steerswoman" came out on the PH list, so I was like, I definitely need an excuse for rereading "The Outskirter's Secret." (And fiddling around with how to send it to my e-reader, sigh, long story.) Anyway, I have a lot of feelings about all the Outskirters--the contrast between the Face People and Kammeryn's people and the raiders near the Inner Lands, how they can be extremely sophisticated and astute in some ways but not others. (Just like everyone else, tbh.) Having revisited it and Elder Race back-to-back, I saw some parallels between the Lyn/Esha and Rowan/Bel relationships. Maybe a stretch. (Does that mean Nyr==Fletcher? I kind of hope not.)

The Map and the Territory (2k, gen, no archive warnings apply)

Sometimes when I'm fighting headaches (which is often) I'm in the mood for self-indulgent darkfic. And FTL is a great fandom for "rocks fall, everyone dies, in many different ways." Roguelikes are hard. So I figured at some point in time I'd write a story about a woobie Rock person who just can't catch a break, even fire and/or boarders won't put them out of their misery. Except I kind of played myself here because, you know when I really have no energy to type? When I'm in bed with a migraine. And then once I started "canon review" I didn't want to write, I just wanted to play more of the game. So the fact that the treat came together was kind of a last-minute surprise, and it went in a slightly different direction than I'd planned on to be more about a specific character on a player ship, rather than a background NPC. I'll probably keep the alternate version as a "daydream for when I don't want to look at the screen." Also, the title was just too perfect.

Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies (3k, gen, major character death)

Watching the World Cup this past month or so, I, like zillions of other people around the world, got caught up in the narrative of "let's see Leo Messi win a championship! There's no doubt that he's a phenomenally, prodigiously gifted player who's tiny and kind of alien-like, but he's never won a World Cup with Argentina so critics say he can't really be the Greatest of All Time...and that's not fair, nationalism and countries are arbitrary and made-up anyway. Haters gonna hate. But let's see Messi shut them up." And somehow he actually did???

And then I remembered that Borges didn't like football and resented how popular it was in Argentina. And with the current situation of "inflation is out of control, the economy is in crisis, why are all these people losing it about football," it's like...what would Borges say. That, together with the surreal sports worldbuilding stuff I do on NationStates, provided the impetus for "Tlön Uqbar Orbis Tertius" fic!

Game of Worlds (650 words, gen, no archive warnings apply)

Dear Yuletide writer,

General Likes:

-canon-divergence AUs

-five things

-worldbuilding

-dialogue

-wit and wordplay

-nonstandard formats (documentation, epistolary, etc.)

-interactive fiction--I prefer formats like Twine to open-ended parsers.

-happy endings

-sad endings (when providing some measure of closure or melodrama; I'm fine with character death!) See fandom-specific note for Project Hail Mary.

General DNWs: (see fandom specific-notes for further details)

-explicit sex

-underage characters having sex

-rape/noncon

-second person POV (in "normal" prose, happy with it in IF or the like)

-moralizing/didactic stories (characters Learning An Important Lesson about the value of tolerance, etc.)

-non-canonical allegories of current events and/or contemporary politics (Ye Wenjie in the Cultural Revolution: fine; Cheng Xin comments on a Xi Jinping stand-in: no thanks. Columbus has issues: fine; Columbus has issues and this is a metaphor for the US educational system as a whole: no thanks.)

-character bashing

-cliffhanger endings

-themes of cynicism or futility, or that the (canon's) main plotlines "are for nothing"

Crying Suns

Any character/worldbuilding (Ellys Idaho, Kaliban, Worldbuilding nominated for this fandom)

I enjoy the self-awareness of a roguelike that has an IC reason for being a roguelike, and Ellys' belief in free will and mercy despite everything the galaxy throws at him.

Ellys: his relationships with Okonkwo and/or Rebecca before the shutdown? What if things had gone differently at Ganyma? (I am fine with any combination of ships for these three.) What have some of the previous clones get up to with their Kalibans? Post-canon? (Any of the game's endings, or something else!)

Kaliban: what do the rest of the Odysseus' crew think of him? Were the Kalibans on Gehenna self-aware before the Shutdown? What's some of the other humorous unhelpful advice he gives Ellys about to deal with random events?

Worldbuilding: what's the deal with the pirates and their unions, anyway? What kind of technology is still present on Earth, and how much do they know about the rest of the galaxy? What's the deal with House Vicarelli, other than being the butt of everyone's jokes? If you happen to be familiar with FTL as well, I think a crossover comparing/contrasting their mechanics, or lampshading the parallels, would be funny, but this is obviously not expected!

FTL: Faster Than Light

Any character (The Captain, Engi, Mantis, Rock nominated)

I like this game's sense of humor--the whimsical music, the absurd situations, the destruction and mayhem. Anything from weird "what's the deal with the giant spiders anyway" worldbuilding to tragic "rocks fall, everyone dies, again" quests would be great. If you happen to be familiar with Crying Suns as well, I think a crossover comparing/contrasting their mechanics, or lampshading the parallels, would be funny, but this is obviously not expected!

The Captain: what are the in-universe reasons for some of the OOC mechanics stuff? Do they feel bad about committing war crimes? How do they hold together a very diverse crew?

Engi: So they're a robotic species--were they programmed by one of the species we know, an ancient precursor, or did they just evolve on their own? The awkward Engi specialist who has to explain "achieving a union" to the crew? An individual Engi who yearns to go against type and excel in hand-to-hand combat? Do they see themselves as individuals, nanobot assemblies, something in between?

Mantis: do their violent tendencies create difficulties for the Federation even in peacetime? There are several enemy ships that have a mostly-Mantis crew and maybe one or two Engi for repairs--do they complement each other or get on each others' nerves? Are their mating rituals as violent as their namesakes would suggest?

Rock: more on their religion/honor culture? Do they get annoyed with crewmates using them as fire extinguishers? Who approved the design of a spaceship without doors?

Pastwatch

Some things I liked about this book: the parent-child relationships, the twist of "oh dang what if our 'real' timeline is someone else's alternate history," and the premise of "for a world-affecting evil like slavery, it's not enough to take out one or two bad guys--you really have to go back centuries to put history on a better course" combined with "we have nothing to lose in this timeline, so let's do it!" (I feel like a lot of works that engage with these tropes either handwave the implications of "eh we just wiped out one timeline, but oh well" and/or send the message that "the evil is so pervasive that your only option is total self-abnegation, which is metaphysically impossible, have fun being complicit in evil forever!") I would be interested in anything that engages with these themes, with the canon characters or OCs using the Pastwatch technology.

Project Hail Mary

Worldbuilding, Rocky

Please treat this as an OR request--I would be happy to receive something that's worldbuilding-focused even if Rocky doesn't appear, or vice versa.

I was captivated by the "science the shit out of this" adventures throughout the book, as well as the deepening friendship between Rocky and Ryland. For this request, I'd like something canon-compliant--could be a missing scene during the book timeframe, something pre-canon with the Eridians' outbound journey or Rocky alone at Tau Ceti, or post-canon when Ryland is on Erid (or later human contact?) But I'm not interested in an AU where the mission fails and one or both of the planets is eventually doomed.

Rocky: what was going through his mind when he was isolated at Tau Ceti for decades? Does Grace ever tell him the truth about his "volunteering" for the mission, or the irony/significance of his name? Eridians have long lifespans, so it's possible by the time the planets make contact via astrophage-powered ships or lightspeed communications he might still be around--what happens next?

Worldbuilding: more technologies that are commonplace on Erid but unknown on Earth, or vice versa? What kind of other creatures might have evolved on Planet Adrian? How does Earth adapt and develop new technologies during the interim? (Of the Earth characters, my favorite is Steve Hatch, the "Beetles" engineer who's so over-the-top optimistic and enthusiastic about technology even by the standards of an Andy Weir book...but feel free to bring in anyone.)

Remembrance of Earth's Past/Three-Body Problem (三体)

Any character/worldbuilding (Ye Wenjie, Cheng Xin, Worldbuilding nominated for this fandom)

I enjoy the shifting scales and narrative voices: how the narrator notes that Bai Mulin betraying Ye Wenjie to the government actually altered the fate of humanity even if he never knew it, how we see just enough of Bronze Age to understand how Blue Space escaped. Anything from weird physics worldbuilding or small-scale character pieces is great, and both scales at once is also great! For this request, I'm not really interested in "The Redemption of Time" as canon--feel free to draw ideas from it if you like, but I don't want to take it as read.

Ye Wenjie: secrets at Red Coast Base? Some more of the "declassified" documents? The early days of the ETO? What did she work out about Dark Forest theory before meeting Luo Ji? What if Yang Dong had talked to her about the documents she'd sneaked a look at? Or if Ye had lived long enough to discover more of Deterrence theory herself?

Cheng Xin: A fix-it where she doesn't miss Yun Tianming at their star? Any kind of outside POV on her and the many different hats she wears: Older men patronizing her during Project Staircase? The humans resenting her in Australia? Luo Ji and the museum? What if she'd stayed on the cylinder worlds near Jupiter where things felt "normal" and 2000s-y? Her relationship with Guan Yifan--is he really a different kind of human for having been to space, or are they more two sides of the same coin?

Worldbuilding: More of the "video game" that taught people about Trisolaris--what were others' experiences like playing it? The aftermath of Gravity and Blue Space? The four-dimensional artifact Guan Yifan talks to? The legacy of the old universe in the new?

Steerswoman

Worldbuilding, Bel

Please treat this as an OR request--I would be happy to receive something that's worldbuilding-focused even if Bel doesn't appear, or vice versa.

I was thrilled by the worldbuilding in this series--the depiction of Rowan's scientific inquiry is great, even if our perspective as readers is different from the characters'. And I especially enjoyed the complexity of Outskirter society in "Steerswoman's Road"--the tribes closer to the Inner Lands growing more militaristic and less cultured, the Face People and Efraim's weirdness around women, the naming ceremony and recitation of ancestors, the importance of poetry and lore--that makes them much more than "wilderness raiders." I'd love to see more about Bel's approach to life as a warrior and a bard, whether that be with Kammeryn's tribe or others in the outskirts, or adapting to Inner Lands culture (Rowan being impressed by the way she learns the importance of the "once upon a time..." narrative was a really neat touch!) I'm open to shippy Bel/Rowan if you're so inclined, but gen is great too.

Something more worldbuilding-focused elsewhere in the world would also be neat--documents at the Archives? Steerswomen and wizards' POV on the same events? What does religion look like in a world where Christian symbols and language exist but most people don't remember their homeworld? (I'd prefer no authorial bashing of any specific belief system or lack thereof, but canon-typical disagreements/skepticism on different characters' part is fine and expected!)

Feel free to bring in any canon characters or OCs. Steffie's POV sometimes dragged for me so I would prefer if he wasn't a central character, but mentions are fine.

--

Again, this is all optional, feel free to use as much or as little as is helpful. I look forward to reading your story!

*(I used to do limericks at the beginning of my Yuletide letters because I thought it was funny the first year and then I figured I had to keep going. Eventually I reached the point where it's like...this is maybe coming off as a little too tryhard. So if for whatever reason you're looking for one because it's tradition, I'm sorry for the disappointment.)

So somehow this is my tenth Yuletide.

The years and the decade have...flied?

Any sort of a gift

Gives my spirits a lift

When the weather is iffy outside!

Dear Yuletide writer,

Optional details are optional! Please feel free to write anything about these fandoms/characters, this is just to provide some suggestions if you're interested.

General Likes:

-canon-divergence AUs

-five things

-worldbuilding

-dialogue

-wit and wordplay

-nonstandard formats (documentation, epistolary, etc.)

-interactive fiction--I prefer formats like Twine to open-ended parsers.

-happy endings

-sad endings (when providing some measure of closure or melodrama; I'm fine with character death!)

I expanded more on some of the worldbuilding and darkfic tropes I'm interested in in the minichallenges posts.

General DNWs: (see fandom specific-notes for further details)

-explicit sex

-underage characters having sex

-rape/noncon

-second person POV (in "normal" prose, happy with it in IF or the like)

-moralizing/didactic stories (characters Learning An Important Lesson about the value of tolerance, etc.)

-non-canonical allegories of current events and/or contemporary politics (Wayside School closing for cows: fine; Wayside School closing for COVID: no thanks; Ye Wenjie in the Cultural Revolution: fine; Cheng Xin comments on a Xi Jinping stand-in: no thanks.)

-character bashing

-cliffhanger endings

-themes of cynicism or futility, or that the (canon's) main plotlines "are for nothing"

Adventures of Ledo and Ix

Any character/worldbuilding (Ledo, Ix, Worldbuilding nominated in this fandom)

This is a YouTube series that's less than an hour in total (one season of eight episodes, and a couple episodes in an unfinished second).

lemniskath wrote up a great promo post here, and...this entire canon is a trip. Anything leaning into the fourth-wall absurdity!

-Do they ever get the princess to her destination? By accident? While trying to accomplish something else?

-What does "winning" even look like in this context? Do they even want it?

-Maybe their self-awareness starts wearing off on others (temporarily? permanently?) and they have to deal with the chaos as all the tropes collapse.

-More horrific aspects of the glitches/world collapsing.

-This could be a fun fandom for some alternative formats/weirdness if you want to go down that road!

Crying Suns

Any character/worldbuilding (Ellys Idaho, Kaliban, Worldbuilding nominated for this fandom)

I enjoy the self-awareness of a roguelike that has an IC reason for being a roguelike, and Ellys' belief in free will and mercy despite everything the galaxy throws at him.

Redwall

Any (no characters nominated for this fandom)

I'm more interested in "new adventures in the Redwall world" than any specific character, so go crazy!

-I like the Salamandastron culture of honorable warriors, and especially characters like Russano the badger who see themselves as more peacetime leaders. How do those tensions play out? What happens to badgers or hares who aren't committed to a particular battle?

-The Guosim and their union struggles are amusing--I'd be interested to see more "political" type organizations transferred to the fantasy setting, as long as it's not too didactic.

-Quests and riddles and puzzles! Maybe with all the secrets that have been hidden over the years, someone stumbles on something they weren't supposed to, or come up with an interpretation that makes sense but isn't what the cluegiver had in mind?

-Villains with their own schemes. Maybe inside of trying to conquer Redwall for its own sake, they want to dam the rivers or construct their own fortress? Does battle ensue anyway? Or are creatures with long-term goals and planning ultimately not villainous enough to go to war?

-If you're interested in the religious aspects of "what makes this an abbey," anyway, with fathers and mothers and rituals, I'd be interested in that kind of worldbuilding. (What does faith look like in a universe where ghosts show up in people's dreams with practical advice?) But if this isn't your thing, no need to go down that path!

-If you're writing OCs: feel free to go against type--if you want to have a heroic searat or an evil hare, that's fine with me. (I'd rather it be something that just happens and not have the narrative dwell on it, though.)

Remembrance of Earth's Past/Three-Body Problem (三体)

Any character/worldbuilding (Ye Wenjie, Cheng Xin, Worldbuilding nominated for this fandom)

Steerswoman

Worldbuilding, Bel

Please treat this as an OR request--I would be happy to receive something that's worldbuilding-focused even if Bel doesn't appear, or vice versa.

Feel free to bring in any canon characters or OCs. Steffie's POV sometimes dragged for me so I would prefer if he wasn't a central character, but mentions are fine.

Wayside School

Miss Zarves, Dana, Sue, Bald Man in the Basement

Please treat this as an *OR* request--I would be very happy with fic that focuses on one of the requested characters, you don't need to include all four! But feel free to bring in any other characters, from the tagset or otherwise.

I enjoy the weird humor of these books, and especially the surreal contrast between the nonexistent nineteenth story and the rest of the school, which is only slightly less silly. Something during the canon timeframe would be great, but also feel free to age the younger characters up--is there a high-school or college equivalent of Wayside? How, if at all, do they eventually fit into the "adult world"?

Miss Zarves: Anything about Allison's time on the 19th story, with the whole Mark Miller|Benjamin Nushmutt doppelganger effect? The weird passage of time (especially given the real-world 25-year hiatus between volumes!) How did the 19th story deal with the Cloud of Doom? What does she think of Mr. Kidswatter, Miss Mush, and the "normal" staff--or does she even know they exist?

Dana: The chapter in "Falling Down" about Dana hating books but actually loving them resonated with me, as a kid who got too invested in/emotionally affected by sad endings. Dana seems to just trust Ms. Jewls' judgment, but does she ever discover that love in her own right? Become a writer or find some other way to make narratives she prefers? And (when they're older) does she really love John, too, or are they still frenemies?

Sue: she shows up in the "Wayside Arithmetic" spinoffs as a transfer student from the "normal" world who is not impressed. What's her take on the cow situation, or the substitutes, or the Cloud of Doom? What do the other students think of her? (Silly math is not expected but would be welcome!)

Bald Man in the Basement (and/or his fellow goons): What are they doing down there? How does Myron's "freedom" work? Are they aware of Miss Zarves? Is this a specifically Wayside thing, or are they just the equivalent of mysterious administrators at any other school?

Hopefully something here sparks your interest, but again, this is all optional--feel free to go in a different direction if you have ideas. Thanks, and hope you have a festive Yuletide!

Publish and/or Perish (5460 words)
Fandom: FAQ: The "Snake Fight" Portion Of Your Thesis Defense (McSweeney's Post) - Luke Burns
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Additional Tags: Academia, Mathematics, Snake Portmanteaus or Snortmanteaus
Summary:

In order to prevent “frivolous disputations unbefitting the history of our institution” (read: “some kid getting way in over their head, dying, and us getting sued,”) you couldn’t just walk in and demand to fight a snake.
--
So I offered this McSweeney's post because it's the kind of thing that's quintessentially Yuletide. There were 8 requests and 27 (non-bucket) offers, so I didn't really expect to match on it, I figured I'd get picked for something rarer. And then I matched on it. And it was like..."deadpan humor about how grad school is an absurd and surreal experience (and also by the way there are snakes)"? I can do that, I do not need to do any "canon review" for that one.

A couple of the author's notes pretty much speak for themselves:

-The snake people or sneople meme dates from Steven Universe and Tumblr on 2015. (The things you learn researching.)

-This is very loosely based on a true story, not only in the sense in which every artist puts a little of themselves in their work, but in the sense that some of the personalities and archetypes are drawn from RL with identifying details obscured. If any of my academic friends see themselves in this, I hope they are not too offended. No snakes were harmed in the making of this story nor my higher education.

My working title was "snek" (another meme) until I wrote a line about "publish or perish," blinked, and was like, "there's the title."

This being Yuletide, there are 14 other stories in the same fandom, and they are all great. (Turns out there are a whole lot of Yuletide people who are current or recovering academics, who knew?!) One of the things I noticed was how different subjects are treated slightly differently; one of the Madness stories pointed out that math students probably get tiny snakes because everyone assumes their thesis is correct but nobody out of their subfield can read it, and, too real. Whereas I think the old-school McSweeney's humor was more targeted at humanities students who often have longer PhD time and/or smaller stipends, so they need to play up the angst and woe.

--

Momomme (5465 words)
Fandom: Quatrevingt-treize | Ninety-three - Victor Hugo
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Characters: Michelle Fléchard, Housarde, Tellmarch
Additional Tags: Ghosts
Summary:

The dead do have power to protect.
--
Okay, so what if Quatrevingt-treize, but with ghosts? Actually, if you're willing to accept "everyone talks in paragraphs because Victor Hugo" conceit, a lot of this stayed pretty close to canon. Like, these are lines from the original that fit almost perfectly, except I wanted to rewrite them to not completely plagiarize!

"In the language of Georgette a "momomme" was anything that looked like a man without really being one. Living beings are strangely confused with ghosts in the minds of children."

"I am angry with you for saving me; you did wrong. I would rather have died, for then I should surely see them and know where they are. They would not see me, but I should be near them. The dead must have power to protect." (Michelle to Tellmarch)

"While the district was in a state of combustion and conflagration, when warfare, devastation, and carnage were the sole occupations of life, when every man was doing his best to burn houses, murder families, massacre outposts, and plunder villages, thinking of nothing but setting ambushes and traps and killing one another, here was this hermit absorbed in nature, enjoying absolute peace of mind, gathering plants and herbs, interested only in flowers, birds, and stars,—of course he was a dangerous character! He must be insane. He never hid behind a bush to fire at his fellow-men. "The man is mad!" said the passers-by." (Tellmarch)

Anyway, it's only at the end that the changes to canon have ripple effects for the other characters. I'm not sure what happens to Gauvain and Cimourdain in this timeline, hopefully good things. But it's Hugo so who knows.

--

Dreamt Music (1909 words)
Fandom: Blade Runner (Movies)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: K | Joe (Blade Runner), Ana Stelline, Rick Deckard
Additional Tags: Character Death Fix, Hurt/Comfort, Headaches & Migraines
Summary:

Ana gives K a place to hide and recuperate. K returns the favor.
--
So the prompts were for hurt/comfort and family feelings. Which is a little smaller-scale than the "hunt down and kill the treacherous robot" plotlines of canon. But, along the lines of the snake fight fic, it was like..."what if this very smart but isolated scientist lady also had migraines...haha...don't need to research that one either /o\" Title is of course from Deckard and Rachael's conversation in the original.

--

World Enough And Time (5836 words)
Fandom: 三体 - 刘慈欣 | Remembrance of Earth's Past Trilogy - Liú Cíxīn
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: Chéng Xīn/Yún Tiānmíng
Characters: Yún Tiānmíng, Ài AA, Chéng Xīn
Additional Tags: Fix-It, Yuletide Treat
Summary:

The universe is grand, but love is grander.
--

Spoilers for canon, but I really thought we were going to get the Cheng Xin/Tianming reunion at the star. And then Cixin Liu decides to run over our feelings with a bus. :( I do think the end of "Prince Deep-Water" is supposed to provide a hopeful context for Cheng Xin and Guan's life/the pocket universe/the future, but I wanted to write this AU as well.

I'm also not sure if the stuff about "Galactic humans" is meant to be taken as authoritative, there's a lot of commentary suggesting that "Death's End" in particular has some unreliable narrators/PoV in Cheng Xin. But either way, I wanted to push back against it.

--

Twice Dawns the Day (5593 words)
Fandom: Wheel of Time - Robert Jordan
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Characters: Nynaeve al'Meara, Rand al'Thor, Elayne Trakand
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, background canon relationships, Fate & Destiny, Yuletide Treat
Summary:

Rand slays the Dark One, and the world is set free. With one exception.
--
I never did get around to writing up all my "Memory of Light" thoughts, did I? Well, one of the prompts here was "the whole 'evil is necessary for free will so really you can't live without it' was kind of a cop-out, let's have a better reason why Rand needed to seal up the Dark One instead of just killing it." And...I agree. The whole "a world without of nations, without weapons, without war, where Andor and the Aiel are peacemakers and happy about it...WOULD BE TERRIBLE!" scene didn't stick the landing for me. So this happened. (By which I mean, I was brainstorming ideas almost as soon as I saw the prompt, and wrote the vast majority of it very close to the deadline. As one does.)

Dear Yuletide Writer,

2020 is its own punch line

Dog on fire says "this is all fine."

But I will take delight

In whatever you write

For these smallish fandoms of mine!

(Optional details are optional! Please feel free to write anything about these fandoms/characters, this is just to provide some suggestions if you're interested.)

I'm also primeideal on Ao3 (and Tumblr), and Ember Nickel on FFN. I have many previous dear author letters from which much of this is copied, pasted, and endlessly rewritten. I've written/blogged more heavily about several of these fandoms than others at times (especially this year when I've had a lot of time for (re)reading long book series on my hands), but I would be equally delighted with fic for any one of them.

General Likes:

-canon-divergence AUs

-five things

-worldbuilding

-dialogue

-wit and wordplay

-nonstandard formats (documentation, epistolary, etc.)
-interactive fiction--I prefer formats like Twine to open-ended parsers.

-happy endings

-sad endings (when providing some measure of closure or melodrama; I'm fine with character death!)

General DNWs (see fandom specific-notes for further details)

-explicit sex

-underage characters having sex

-rape/noncon

-second person POV (in "normal" prose, happy with it in IF or the like)
-moralizing/didactic stories (characters Learning An Important Lesson about the value of tolerance, etc.)
-allegories of current events and/or contemporary politics

-character or religion bashing

-cliffhanger endings

-themes of cynicism or futility, or that the (canon's) main plotlines "are for nothing"

FTL

Any character (none nominated for this fandom)

Anything for this fandom. A few ideas:
-The Crystals! What is their relationship with the Rocks? How did they evolve the Lockdown ability? Are they annoyed at you for bringing the rebellion into their hidden sector?

-The repair drones! Do they really not know or care where you came from? Are they the only ones in the galaxy who don't care? Why do they speak in rhyme?
-The final battle! Is the flagship AI just waiting for those pesky humans to die so it can assume power? Why does the player ship have to fight it, and what is the rest of Federation leadership doing? Who programmed the "multiple layers of defenses" strategy?

Feel free to go as morbid as you like with character death, it's part of the game! (A very big part if you've been unsuccessful as long as I have...)

Mystery of Time and Space

Any character (none nominated for this fandom)

So this game has been probably abandoned, but I want to know more! What happens next? Does the protagonist ever find out what in the world is going on? Do they create a paradox by interacting with themselves after they travel in time? Are there other clones waking up and being confused elsewhere?

I enjoy the silly "narration" voice when you click on things you can't use ("I need needful things, why aren't there any here.") So something goofy or fourth-wall breaking, playing with that, would be neat.

Worldbuilding in general could be cool--what's in all those books about time travel and stuff? Why does everyone love Commodore 64s? Does the jazz music exist in-world? Just tell me what's going on in this universe.

The original site is defunct, but you can find an archive copy of the game on Flashpoint here.

Ninety-Three (Quatrevingt-Treize)

Gauvain

I have a lot of feelings about doomed moral-victor idealists and he definitely qualifies!

Pre-canon fic showing how he became the kind of leader he is? Interactions with Cimourdain or Lantenac? What do Radoub and the other soldiers think of him?

An AU where things diverge from canon much earlier? What if he'd been deployed to Paris rather than the Vendée? What if his aristocratic background had disqualified him from service?

For this fandom, I think there could be some humor from having Gauvain interact with characters from other canons of the same era, and/or putting him in a different setting, and seeing what form his principles take. Gauvain meets the Conventionist from Les Misérables, and/or survives until the events of that novel? He interacts with the "Hamilton" versions of Lafayette or Jefferson as they argue what path to take with regards to the revolution? 21st-century Gauvain's struggles to keep his idealism intact on Twitter? (Again, I don't want a serious focus on modern real-world issues or people, but if it's done for humor, then feel free.)

This Wikisource translation is in the public domain.

The Prestige

Alfred Borden, Robert Angier

Friends to enemies to...increasingly obsessed enemies. I would be interested either in shipfic or gen for these two.

-Maybe they developed feelings for each other when they were both starting out? Julia never comes into the picture and disaster is averted.

-What if there were no duplicates, and Angier's "with you awaiting execution for my murder" was just that? His obsession with Borden leads him to kill himself in order to bring about Borden's death.

-The movement of the "teleporter" coincides with "Borden's" impending execution, so what if it really was a teleporter and Angier was reluctantly setting it up to whisk Borden away at the last moment, deciding he tolerated him after all? (Can be an AU in which there's only one "Borden.")

For this fandom, I'm okay with "dubious consent due to identity issues" (ie Angier thinks he's in a relationship with Borden, but actually, there are two Bordens and he doesn't know). But please no incest or violent non-con.

Remembrance of Earth's Past/Three-Body Problem (三体)

Any character (Ye Wenjie, Yang Dong, Cheng Xin, Yun Tianming nominated)

For this request, I'm not really interested in "The Redemption of Time" as canon--feel free to draw ideas from it if you like, but I don't want to take it as read.

Ye Wenjie: secrets at Red Coast Base? Some more of the "declassified" documents? The early days of the ETO? What did she work out about Dark Forest theory before meeting Luo Ji?

Yang Dong: for someone who has very little time "on screen," she casts a long shadow over all of the books. More about her friendship with the programmer from "Death's End," and/or with Luo Ji? What if she'd survived--what would she have made of her mother's betrayal? How would things have gone with Ding Yi?

Yun Tianming: His re-incarnation and interaction with the Trisolarans? How did he realize he would need to write the "fairy tales" if he wanted to communicate with Earth someday, and how did he decide what to include? A fix-it where he and Cheng Xin don't miss each other at their star?

Cheng Xin: see above for Xin/Tianming fix-it prompt! But I would also be interested at any kind of outside POV on her and the many different hats she wears. Older men patronizing her during Project Staircase? The humans resenting her in Australia? Luo Ji and the museum? What if she'd stayed on the cylinder worlds near Jupiter where things felt "normal" and 2000s-y? Her relationship with Guan Yifan--is he really a different kind of human for having been to space, or are they more two sides of the same coin?

Worldbuilding: anything for this fandom, tbh, in all its scope. More of the "video game" that taught people about Trisolaris--what were others' experiences like playing it? The aftermath of Gravity and Blue Space? The four-dimensional artifact Guan Yifan talks to? The legacy of the old universe in the new?

If it's relevant to the story you want to tell, feel free to bring in some of the historical issues that canon touches on (like how the Cultural Revolution shaped Ye Wenjie), just no contemporary hot takes (about China or anywhere else).

Wheel of Time

Egwene al'Vere

-Egwene's time among the Aiel. Culture shock? Unexpected similarities? I like Egwene/Aviendha if that's a dynamic you want to include.
-More of Egwene's private war against Elaida in the Tower. How she demonstrates the different Ajahs' strengths and works to build up/inspire the novices around her.
-How is Egwene's legacy viewed by future Amyrlins? Heroically? Critically? Misremembered?
-Any kind of weird magical worldbuilding. (Tel'aran'rhiod? The parallel universes from the Accepted test?)
-What if she survived the last battle? Would she be an Amyrlin for centuries, or would people worry she was getting too powerful? What if she'd burned out and had to return to non-magical life?
--
Again, this is all optional, feel free to use as little or as much as is useful. Thank you so much!

I like the double 0's in this year name, the 01/01/2020 displays are visually amusing. Good start.

Anyway.

The Apple Falls (Far From The Tree) (2048 words)
Fandom: A Series of Unfortunate Events (TV)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Beatrice Baudelaire II, Lemony Snicket, Isadora Quagmire
Additional Tags: Post-Canon, Vaguely Fearful Dialogue
Summary: Please avoid this document unless you wish to encounter such mental images as felines clawing out the organs of communication, underfunded public spaces serving as impromptu safety nets, and the economic potential of cormorant guano.
--
This is actually my first time writing ASoUE fic for either the book or the TV-verse? (I did do fic for a story-within-a-story, but that involves less Lemony-isms. I'm sure I've parodied his voice elsewhere, though.)

There's good meta about what the schism represents and how before they were "firefighters" and "firestarters," they might have been "the faction with shallow popular taste in literature" and "the elites who love True Art which is angsty and cliffhangery." In which case I would have probably sided with Olaf in the schism. :/ So Beatrice II is kind of working through those fears. (That and Olaf may or may not be her biological father but that's another problem.)

Fortuitously, shortly after finishing this, I read "The Library Book" by Susan Orlean which is about the Los Angeles Central Library, its history, including a major fire. (There are also two subplots about The Importance of Libraries Today, and the life of someone who was charged with arson in the case but then had the charges dropped--both are less interesting than the main storyline.) Lots of library/fire/VFD feelings. (I've been to the restored building, it's great, there's lots of cool artwork outside in tribute to the Spirit of Knowledge and stuff. Including pi!)

Anchor Ring (1489 words)
Fandom: Chess (Board Game)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Pawn (Chess)
Additional Tags: Temporary character "death", Chess Variants, Topology Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, Yuletide Treat
Summary:

The center pawn is loyal to her deities, win or lose. She wishes they'd stick to the normal rules, though.
--
Look, if you mention topology in your general likes, I'm gonna take it and run with it.

Cylinder chess is another variant mentioned in the Burt Hochberg puzzle book (that one truly is the gift that keeps on giving when it comes to chess-as-a-story bizarreness). Bughouse, I played a little in high school, but the time pressure is too stressful. Alice Chess was one of the many nerdy game variants my college math friends experimented with.

Also the wranglers in their "wisdom" have moved Chess (Board Game) to Chess Pieces (Anthropomorphic), which ???? It's not to filter out RL Chess Grandmasters RPF (yes, that exists, and under the same tag). And there are lots of other board game canonical tags too. I ain't even mad, the fics are still there and easy to find, but sometimes wranglers' priorities baffle me.

Fantasy Rules (1875 words)
Fandom: Galavant (TV)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Sidney (Galavant), Isabella (Galavant), Galavant (Galavant)
Additional Tags: Baseball, Song Lyrics, Yuletide Treat
Summary:

Never accept a quest from a strange man in a large dragon costume.
--
If you mention baseball in your general likes, I'm gonna be like "in this fictional twelfth century? ...actually yes, that makes as much sense as anything else in Galavant." I worked hard on the rhyme for the unicorn part.

The Citadel (2541 words)
Fandom: Megillat Ester | Book of Esther
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Ester | Esther, Hathach, Vashti (Abrahamic Religions)
Additional Tags: IN SPACE!, Yuletide Treat
Summary:

There had been talk that Ahasereus had tried to clamp down on the rights of human women in the wake of Vashti’s dramatic abdication. Of course, not even a king could singlehandedly dictate policy for all of the 7-Bits, but it was no surprise that cyborgs were even more paranoid than normal.
--

You know you're a fledgling ASCII programmer when you see "the same Ahasuerus who ruled over one hundred twenty-seven provinces" and are like "that's 2^7 -1." Actually no, I would have had that reaction anyway, but work is...interesting.

Anyway, I was a little nervous about this one--I'm not Jewish, so I didn't want to appropriate or twist too much in the AU setting, but the prompts encouraged me to go wild. But I'm gratified that people seemed to enjoy the worldbuilding. Also

cahn /

raspberryhunter wrote an amazing epic story based on the same prompt, only with femslash! And giant insects! Read that one too!

Hathach (the eunuch who waits on Esther in chapter 4) was already an existing tag and this is why I love Ao3.

The Mercenary Menace (1224 words)
Fandom: Star Realms (Card Game)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Additional Tags: Yuletide Treat
Summary: A day in the life of the Stealth Needle.
--
I love the Stealth Needle.

Star Realms is a game I only recently got into, first in physical form and then online, but it came in 9th in my recent ranking of board games. Let me know if you want to play on the app sometime! I'm being vigilant about not being tempted to buy "credits" or freemium expansions.

Kings and Rivers (1022 words)
Fandom: Wheel of Time - Robert Jordan
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Janduin/Tigraine Mantear
Characters: Janduin (Wheel of Time), Tigraine Mantear
Additional Tags: Mostly Pre-Canon, A bit post-canon, Timeskips are fun, Yuletide Treat
Summary:

Janduin and Shaiel share a quiet moment in the middle of the war.

--
As I continue with my reread, something for the prompt "visions and prophecies." Sometimes canon feels a little too "well, we must, because the prophecy said so," but I get the sense these two didn't need any supernatural meddling to fall for each other.

Dear Yuletide writer,

The colors now change on the trees
The rain is cold in the fall breeze
(At least over here
In the north hemisphere)
As I ponder stars, children, disease!

(Optional details are optional! Write whatever you like, I'm looking forward to reading it, but maybe something here can be a jumping-off point if you'd like inspiration.)

Previous dear author letters, from which much of this is copy-pasted:

Also, a previous writeup on the amusing parallels between Children of the Star and Star Child! I'll admit the similarities are a part of why I'm requesting both. :)

I'm also primeideal on Ao3 (and Tumblr), and Ember Nickel on FFN.

General likes:

-canon-divergence AUs

-five things

-worldbuilding

-dialogue

-wit and wordplay

-nonstandard formats (documentation, epistolary, etc.)

-time travel

-happy endings

-sad endings (when providing some measure of closure or melodrama; I'm fine with character death)

General dislikes

-explicit sex

-underage sex

-rape/noncon

-issue-fic

-second person POV

-character or religion bashing

-cliffhanger endings

-themes of cynicism or futility, or that the (canon's) main plotlines "are for nothing"

Children of the Star:

Any character (Noren, Stefred, the First Scholar, Talyra nominated)

-Noren: an expansion of any of the scenes fast-forwarded through in the last few chapters? (The Archpriest, being an outcast even among the Scholars, new ceremonies like drinking groundwater and how they change in future generations.) Interacting with the First Scholar via memories/computers? Helping Lianne or another recruit through the visions? Post-canon shippiness with Lianne?
-Stefred: his youth and his own path to heresy! How did he become a leader? What happens to him on the starships post-canon? Does he find a new OC partner?
-Talyra: her choice following Noren into exile? How does she adapt to life as a Technician? What rituals are important to her? What if she hadn't died--would Noren have ever begun researching genetics some other way?
-the First Scholar: what's his name? Does he watch over Noren and Stefred from some afterlife? Does he ever interact with the "savages" after his partner's exile? What are the little things he misses from the Six Worlds?
-anybody: worldbuilding or in-universe documentation? Non-heretic villagers' views of the City? I definitely don't expect anybody to be familiar with both this and Star Child, but a compare-and-contrast crossover could be hilarious!

Pandemic Legacy:

Any character (no characters nominated for this fandom)

Prompts are spoilery for both games, beware!

Any kind of worldbuilding. In-universe documentation from behind the scenes in the first game, the second, the haven years in-between? (Like the "recon reports" or "archives.")

The story of (any part of) your campaign, or the campaign you wish you'd had ;)

The point of view of a normal civilian.

S1: Sagittarius' thoughts during the infiltration? The fallout (literal or otherwise) of the nuclear option? What brought about Michael Davidson's change of heart? What's the deal with Team Bravo?

S2: The endgame from Jade's point of view? The Hollow Men's experience reaching the Havens? Rumors of the lost havens in the (searchable) mainland cities? What happened to India?

Star Child:

Any character (Taya, Kort, Cyron, Gallestari nominated)

-Cyron and/or Gallestari: their reactions to the scientific advances in the "afterworld"? How they react to returning to Azure, and the reforms they brought about? What lead Gallestari to plot betrayal? I'd like to see a shippy vibe to their dynamic, but gen is also great!
-Taya and/or Kort: learning experiences with the other children in the years between "Silver Shoes" and "Gods from the Sky"? Dealing with their changing place in Azure culture? What would Taya's relationship be like with Samir if he had survived? How do the other mecminds view Kort as he ages? Adjusting to the afterlife? Please, no Taya/Kort as a romantic pairing.
-everybody: the Mecminds arguing over something that seems natural for humans? More inversions of "creationist" arguments? I don't expect anybody to be familiar with both this and Children of the Star, but a compare-and-contrast crossover could be hilarious!

--
Again, all of this is optional, so if you have your own idea I'd love to see that too. Thanks for writing for me!

Another fun year of Yuletide with small fandoms new and old!

Miracle on Ice (3598 words)
Fandom: The Divine Cities Series - Robert Jackson Bennett
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Turyin Mulaghesh, Original Characters
Additional Tags: Post-Canon, Canon-typical language, Yuletide 2018
Summary: Part of Mulaghesh wonders how much Ghaladesh counts as the world. The world, in its vastness, calls to mind the small-minded squabbles of highland Voortyashtan, the areas of Bulikov cordoned off after the Blink, the humid isolation of Javrat.
Yet Ghaladesh is changing every day.
--

Post-canon "casefic" of sorts for Divine Cities, featuring Mulaghesh learning about Dreyling hockey and trying not to swear on the job.

Zersetzung (3982 words)
Fandom: Die perfekte Diktatur - Farin Urlaub Racing Team (Song)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Characters: Narrator's Friend (Die perfekte Diktatur), Narrator (Die perfekte Diktatur)
Additional Tags: Dystopia, Yuletide Treat, Yuletide 2018
Summary: There is only one way out.

--

I discovered this song via a Yuletide promo (lyrics in translation, on Youtube)--less than five minutes but features a cool plot twist and raises all kinds of worldbuilding questions. This is a retelling from another POV.
--

Escort Quest (6633 words)
Fandom: Chess (Board Game)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Characters: Knight (Chess), Pawn (Chess)
Additional Tags: Chess Problems, Fairy Tale Elements, Embedded Images, Crueltide, Yuletide Treat, Yuletide 2018
Summary: A loyal knight has one goal: to guide the kingdom's heir to promotion. But nothing will prepare them for the friends and threats they meet on the way to enemy territory...
--
Chess puzzles! Featuring "retroanalysis" (what was the last move? etc) shenanigans, and en passant-related angst.

The Bishop's Gambit (1589 words)
Fandom: Pierre Menard Author of the Quixote - Jorge Luis Borges
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Pierre Menard, Ruy López de Segura
Additional Tags: Chess, Yuletide Treat, Yuletide 2018
Summary: Pierre Menard meets one of his heroes.
--
More chess, this in the context of a Borges short story which is kind of the essence of "crack treated seriously." This was a fairly "iddy" fic for me in the non-porny sense; not just chess nerdiness but also allusions to other Borges stuff, calculus nonsense, and a weird philosophical trilemma in which I tend to reach a difference conclusion than Menard (and Borges' narrator), but think about on weird occasions.

The Journeys of Sarah Sioban Grey (19 words, about 5000 across all playthroughs)
Fandom: The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August - Claire North
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Characters: Sarah Sioban Grey
Additional Tags: Interactive Fiction, Yuletide Treat, Yuletide 2018
Summary: Life, death, rebirth, memory.
--
I'm into time travel and the conceits of this book (a few people are reborn after they die in the same time and place they were born the first times, with all their memories; they form a secret society where one generation can slowly pass messages on to another) held my attention more than the main characters. I thought IF would be a fitting format for this minor character exploration, since all of the possible "lives" could still take place in some order or another.

And not for Yuletide, but also just revealed, a holiday fluff treat:

Different Dreams (1021 words)
Fandom: Animorphs - Katherine A. Applegate
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Gafinilan-Estrif-Valad/Mertil-Iscar-Elmand
Characters: Gafinilan-Estrif-Valad, Mertil-Iscar-Elmand
Additional Tags: Soulmates, Dream Sharing, Extra Treat
Summary:

It is said that Andalites have two eyes to see their own world, and two more to see their beloved's.

--
Gafinilan/Mertil soulmates worldbuilding!

Hope you have a happy and healthy new year. :D

Dear Yuletide Author,

The year's getting colder (or hot)
The snow is approaching (or not)
Whatever the season
Small fandoms are pleasin'
And here are some I like a lot!

(Optional details are optional! Write whatever you like, I'm looking forward to reading it, but maybe something here can be a jumping-off point if you'd like inspiration.)

Some of these fandoms have more plot/character details in canon to work with than others, and their section lengths vary accordingly. I would be thrilled with a fic for any of these!

Previous dear author letters, from which most of this preamble continues to be reused.

I'm also primeideal on Ao3 (and Tumblr), and Ember Nickel on FFN.

General likes
-canon-divergence AUs
-five things
-worldbuilding
-dialogue
-wit and wordplay
-nonstandard formats (documentation, epistolary, etc.)
-time travel
-happy endings
-sad endings (when providing some measure of closure or melodrama; I'm fine with character death)

General dislikes
-explicit sex
-underage sex
-rape/noncon
-issue-fic
-second person POV
-character or religion bashing
-cliffhanger endings
-themes of cynicism or futility, or that the (canon's) main plotlines "are for nothing"

Blade Runner (2049): Ana Stelline, Luv, Lt. Joshi, Officer K|Joe

Please treat this as an OR request; I would be happy with fic focusing on only one, or some combination, of the requested characters! My ships for these characters are Joshi/Luv and K/Luv.

Joshi/Luv: More antagonistic showdowns, whether leading to reluctant attraction or just more violence.

K/Luv: They're both fascinated by each other's sometimes-obedient, sometimes-creative natures, and together the fascination only grows.

Is Ana really genetically sick, and if so, how does that affect her life after meeting Rick? Is it a cover story? What other memories has she implanted?

What if Officer K had gone rogue on a different mission and gotten in touch with his "humanity" another way? Why is Pale Fire his baseline test? Are there others for different replicants? Do replicants have an afterlife?

Does Luv even like her job? Does Joshi? Have either or both of them had close calls before?

Divine Cities: Shara Komayd, Olvos, Signe Harkvaldsson, Tatyana Komayd

Please treat this as an OR request; I would be happy with fic focusing on only one, or some combination, of the requested characters!

Olvos appears in an unexpected guise. Some of her hidden miracles. Her relationships with the other Divinities.

One of Signe's weirder inventions. Her relationship to her Dreyling and Continental identities. A generational culture clash with Sigrud (or anyone else).

Shara's tenure as Prime Minister. An idealistic conflict with Vinya. Something only she had clearance to research.

Lessons Shara tried to teach Tatyana. What does Tatyana remember post-Miracles? What does it mean to be Continental?

Any kind of worldbuilding for this fandom would be great, in any setting (or the afterlife! :p)

Newspapers (Anthropomorphic): New York Times, Washington Post

...I ship it. Around May 2017 or so, there seemed to be lots of cute and innuendoy Tweets/commentary/goofiness about how both of them seemed to be flirtatiously racing to outdo each other with hard-hitting investigations. (i.e. Emily Nussbaum!) So some version of the Grey Lady and her girlfriend? (Gen is great too!) Friendly rivals? Gloating about each others' misfortunes? Getting worked up about rival sports teams, in a professional way?

For this fandom, I'd prefer an emphasis on the humor and less on contemporary politics, except in a cracky "two scoops" kind of way. Feel free to set it in any era though--past, present, or future could all be cute!

Pandemic Legacy

Prompts are spoilery for both games, beware!

Any kind of worldbuilding. In-universe documentation from behind the scenes in the first game, the second, the haven years in-between? (Like the "recon reports" or "archives.")

The story of (any part of) your campaign, or the campaign you wish you'd had ;)

The point of view of a normal civilian.

S1: Sagittarius' thoughts during the infiltration? The fallout (literal or otherwise) of the nuclear option? What brought about Michael Davidson's change of heart? What's the deal with Team Bravo?

S2: The endgame from Jade's point of view? The Hollow Men's experience reaching the Havens? Rumors of the lost havens in the (searchable) mainland cities? What happened to India?

The Shipwreck Arcana

There's not much of a story here, but I'd love anything about these characters/archetypes who are "trapped in a drowned world" and trying to escape. Feel free to incorporate the mechanical/mathy elements, or focus more on the names and evocative art! What secrets does the Belltower hide? What happens when The Stranger meets The Prophet? Any one of these cards would be a great premise for a story.

Gallery of the face-up sides

Faded powers

Dear Yuletide Author,

There once was a fanfiction trade
For all of the stories we've made!
Whatever you bring
Will make my heart sing
For all of these fandoms displayed!

(Optional details are optional! Write whatever you like, I'm looking forward to reading it, but maybe something here can be a jumping-off point if you'd like inspiration.)

Previous dear author letters, from which most of this preamble continues to be reused.

I'm also primeideal on Ao3 (and Tumblr), and Ember Nickel on FFN.

I love happy endings, sad endings (when providing some measure of closure or melodrama), snark, wordplay, mathplay, gen of any stripe, friendships and familial bonds, fourth-wall bashing and unashamed meta, and general nerdery.

I do not want issue-fic, explicit sex, rape/noncon, or cliffhanger endings--I strongly prefer self-contained stories that lead to some resolution, be that happy or sad. (I have no problem with character death, if that's the route you want to go down!)

I'll talk more about specific pairings in each fandom section.

Alif the Unseen (any character: nominated characters Azalel, the Convert, Dina, Intisar, Sheikh Bilal, Vikram the Vampire, Alif)

Anything for this fandom! Worldbuilding in the djinns' society; what other forms do they take or books have they encountered with unexpected encodings? Who else has Sheikh Bilal needed to give counsel to? What books does Alif recommend to Dina going forward, and which ones click? Does Intisar have more freedom going forward to affect the changes she wants? What about the convert and her child?

I'd love something that tries to include the tones of canon, but whether that incorporate explicitly fantasy elements or just the hopeful tones of the human characters can depend on the timeframe you choose--anything from the distant past to the future is cool with me. Please no religion-bashing.

Chip's Challenge (any character: Chip and/or Melinda nominated)

Anything for this fandom! Chip's increasingly frustrated diary as he beats his head against a wall/block of ice/force field? Melinda's notes to him as she watches him drown for the twelfth time? Postgame adventures once Chip is a Bit Buster in his own right?

I'm also familiar with the second game, so if you happen to know it, feel free to incorporate the new puzzles (letting Melinda and Chip summon each other so they can get out of traps neither one could escape on their own, and so on); if not, absolutely not expected! Either allusions to specific levels from the original game or just generic "oh no, it's a monster" would be welcome. I'd be cool with either a shippy or a gen focus to Melinda and Chip's relationship.

The Prestige (any character: Alfred Borden, Bernard Fallon, Robert Angier nominated)

I'm fascinated by the dynamic of Borden and Angier's rivalry and how their hatred leads them in an ever-increasing pursuit of each other's destruction. I think a shippy take on this could be great, as could a gen one.

A couple spoilery AU scenarios that might be fun to explore:

-What if there were no duplicates, and Angier's "with you awaiting execution for my murder" was just that? His obsession with Borden leads him to kill himself in order to bring about Borden's death.
-The movement of the "teleporter" coincides with "Borden's" impending execution, so what if it really was a teleporter and Angier was reluctantly setting it up to whisk Borden away at the last moment, deciding he tolerated him after all? (Can be an AU in which there's only one "Borden.")

But again, anything goes for these characters. Please no incest.

Shadow Hunters (board game) (any character: Allie, Bob, Charles, David nominated)

Neutral chaos! Why do they have such different goals, and how, if at all, do they achieve them in the midst of battle? How does everyone feel about Allie just backing the winning side? What is Bob doing with all that hoard? Does Charles get a machine gun to kill off everyone? Is David's death wish thwarted?

Feel free to bring in any other characters, either from the original game or the expansion. Any pairing (or none) among the characters would be fine with me. Go as silly or serious as you'd like between the potential for dramatic battles or "why are we rolling dice to see who picks up a banana peel."

Here's an overview of the nominated characters.

-

Again, don't feel obliged by any of this, and thanks for writing for me!

Dear Yuletide author/random passerby/whosoever you may be,

There once was a winter exchange

For small fandoms wondrous and strange!

I'll read any story

And bask in its glory

Whatever you'd like to arrange!

(AKA, optional details are optional! Write whatever you'd like, I'll definitely enjoy it. These are just some ideas to get you started.)

My name is also primeideal on Ao3! If you've been around, you might know me as Ember Nickel.

Dear Writer tag, for previous letters (to see where I've stolen much of this from!) I've requested Animorphs the last couple years, and Schoolhouse Rock in 2012, but the others are new.

I love happy endings, sad endings (when providing some measure of closure or melodrama), snark, wordplay, mathplay, gen of any stripe, friendships and familial bonds, most canon ships for these fandoms, and general nerdery.

I do not like ambiguous endings, issue-fic, character or fandom-bashing, religion-bashing, explicit sex, rape/non-con, most non-canon ships for these fandoms, or overly pretentious, "post-earnestness" style. I'm here for joy. (Or groaning at bad puns, or melodrama...but something sincere.)

I've suggested a couple of goofy crossovers involving kiddy math fandoms (the theme here is that I really love math, okay? I mean, IRL, I have a more conflicted relationship with it, but for here). That doesn't necessarily mean I'm looking for crossovers in general, though. Really depends on the circumstance, use your own best judgment.

You can read my fics on ao3 (where I'm also primeideal) to get a sense of my taste. I'm infrequently on #yuletide chat, as primeideal, but don't expect to find me there on a regular basis. I'm on Tumblr too, and much more active there than on Dreamwidth this past year. You'll find me rambling about some big fandoms, and some of these--in particular, I'm aware that Animorphs is big-for-Yuletide, and Quatrevingt-treize "fandom" took off this year with the #clubninetythree readthrough. While I love those two, I would adore fic for the other tiny fandoms as well! Those just happen to be the ones where I sometimes have an audience.

So in alphabetical order, here we have them:

ANIMORPHS (any character)

Request: "Anything in this fandom. I adore Andalites and would love to read some Elfangor/Loren from the Earth years or in an AU, or Tobias and Ax being shorms. I'd love gen with the main six, Rachel/Tobias shipfic, maybe some Rachel/Marco banter, Jake/Cassie, or OC worldbuilding fic exploring some of the other fronts in the galactic war (the Iskoort and the free Hork-Bajir were sort of abandoned plot threads). More on the Ellimist's meddling could work here, or maybe a younger Toomin appreciating music. Post-series adventures/fix-it are always fun too."

In terms of the tones I enjoy, "The Andalite Chronicles" and its emphasis on hope (despite some tragedy) was one of my favorites of the series. I like that mix more than the giddy, off-the-wall "btw we're in Atlantis now?" of the middle of the series, and also more than the bleak ambiguity of the end. Another thing I don't care for is inaccurate teleology, in this case waxing poetic about how such-and-so-morph was "designed" or "perfect" for speed/strength/stealth/surprise/something. But like I said, anything goes.

PANDEMIC (board game)

Request: "Anything goes! A diverse cast from around the world trying to work together and managing their resources. Hilarious poking at the fourth wall as they complain about the arbitrary constraints of the game would be awesome, but so would melodramatic character death in a scenario where the luck doesn't work out. I'd prefer that graphic descriptions of disease aren't the focal point of the fic, but feel free to be creative."

I'm familiar with the On the Brink expansion so introducing alternate character roles, the virulent strains, or the purple disease would all be fine with me if that's where you choose to take it. Not necessary, though.

QUATREVINGT-TREIZE (any characters: Cimourdain, Gauvain, Michelle Fléchard, Sergeant Radoub nominated)

Request: "Anything in this fandom. Post-canon Michelle and/or Radoub taking care of the kids and making a future for themselves? I'd love either gen or shipfic in this vein. Gauvain is my baby--anything precanon with him and/or Cimourdain, showing his ideals developing, would be awesome. Or Cimourdain's life as a priest--in the village, La Tourgue, etc., his correspondence with people all over Europe. Fix-it fic would be cool (even if it's just fixing the Massacre of Saint Bartholomew, still a great idea), or a happy AU. But you can never go wrong with alternate melodramatic death scenes either."

Like I said, this fandom sort of burgeoned over the past year during a chapter-a-day readthrough. I don't really ship Gauvain/Cimourdain, so I'd prefer not to read their interaction in a romantic light, but obviously they have an intense friendship/familial bond and like I said, Gauvain is my baby. Um. I'd prefer no math-bashing, here, but Hugo has other ideas so knock yourself out. ;)

ROOKIE OF THE YEAR (any characters: Henry, Phil, Mary, and Chet nominated)

Request: "Anything in this fandom. Coach Phil giving Henry advice, or helping him adjust to the unexpected quirks of big-league life? Pre-canon with Mary's pitching career would be great! Mary/Chet post-canon, Mary trying to incorporate Chet into Henry's family life and Henry trying to go back to normal? Phil post-canon having to deal with not having Henry around? I love the Cubs so any baseball references you can work in would be appreciated, but that's just an added bonus."

I don't really remember the subplots involving Henry's kid friends too well, so I'd rather not see too much focus on them, but any of the nominated characters are fine with me. The manager mangling Henry's name is always fun, though. And like I said, baseball specificities are totally optional but great.

SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK (Figure Eight)

Request: "Figure Eight was my favorite of the Schoolhouse Rock videos. Something character-based, with the teacher trying to see how to connect with the daydreaming student? Humor with the skater who knocks himself into the thermometer? More about the infinity sign at the end? I love math at any level so from basic multiplication facts to advanced cardinality theory, there's no such thing as too much math nerdiness."

Well, if people 'get off on your new math tricks' I'd prefer it doesn't get /too/ explicit, but I'm sure there'd be room for humor in there if you want to go down that road. Integrating (oh, see what I did there) the other characters from Multiplication Rock or the other Schoolhouse Rock videos would be great as well (at least between the first four movies, I don't know the "Money" or "Computer" videos). Here's the link if you need to canon review: (and poke around YouTube for the others). This could also be crossed over with Super Solvers, see below.

SUPER SOLVERS

Request: "I'm not sure how to start narrowing things down for this fandom; I'm in particular familiar with Treasure MathStorm, OutNumbered, and Gizmos and Gadgets, so I'd prefer something based on those and not the others. Anything with math (or science) puzzles would be awesome. Scaled-up, harder puzzles? Or villainous backstory fic for the Master of Mischief, or what the other minor villains get up to when they're not trapping heroes. Humor is welcome, naturally."

All the games I mentioned have playthroughs on YouTube. Also, full disclosure: someone suggested nominating Number Munchers, and I went ahead and did that. Then I saw that this happened, and this is even better. So, if you want to crossover that and introduce Munchers and/or Troggles into any of the aforementioned worlds (or vice versa), go crazy. This could also be crossed over with Schoolhouse Rock, I think.

Hopefully this is enough to get started, and again, feel free to ignore any or all of this and just write the fic that inspires you! Thanks again for writing for me, and have a jolly Yuletide!

Another Yuletide in the books...and movies and plays and videogames and Other Media... ;)

I got assigned to write fic based on the hilarious Font Conference CollegeHumor video. Among other things, this made me aware of the existence of the sequel, Font Fight, and my recipient's prompts inspired me to write a fix-it fic for Helvetica and other character "deaths." Full disclosure; I usually use Windows, and am not very familiar with Helvetica, but that didn't stop me.

Of course, no Font fic would be complete without actual fonts, so I got to learn some Ao3 skin tricks to display as many different fonts in-text as I could!

Font of Every Blessing (3258 words) by primeideal
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Font Conference
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Times New Roman/Wingdings
Characters: Times New Roman, Comic Sans, Wingdings, Helvética
Additional Tags: fonts, Character Death Fix, Show Creator's Style for Full Effect, Yuletide 2013
Summary: Between rumors that Helvetica's been resurrected, and attempting to communicate with Wingdings, there's lots to keep Times New Roman busy. Fortunately, Comic Sans is always ready to save the day.

When the nominations came in, I saw several fandoms that, while not requested by the same people, seemed to work well together. Along with the Font Conference, there was Printing and Typesetting (anthropomorfic), (horror) Windows 95 Tips, and Minesweeper, where I'd already written about the adventures of sisters Timer and Mines Remaining. It all boiled over into a big crossover, which included wizards, pangrams, and me learning more about getting ASCII characters to display in HTML so that all of Wingdings' "dialogue"--such as it is--would come through.

Wing-ding-dings, or, The Fox (7454 words) by primeideal
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Font Conference, Printing and Typesetting (Anthropomorfic), Windows 95 Tips, Minesweeper
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Comic Sans, Wingdings, Mines Remaining, Lazy Dog, Timer
Additional Tags: Multiple Crossovers, Quests, fonts, Yuletide 2013
Summary: When the Quick Brown Fox is abducted by agents of the nefarious Windows 95, it's up to superhero Comic Sans--and his sidekick Wingdings--to brave the pitfalls of the minefield and reunite the fox with his faithful companion, the Lazy Dog.

I've had "Chess" (the musical) on my mind on and off for a while; specifically, the 2008 version of Leonid Viigand. I was glad to have an excuse to write more about him for Yuletide, and, as usual with me, shoehorn everything into my contrived chronology because I care more about matching the timing of RL chess tournaments than I should. Oh well.

Bit by Bit (4101 words) by primeideal
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Chess - Rice/Ulvaeus/Andersson
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Leonid Viigand
Additional Tags: 5+1 Things, 2008 concert version, The fifth thing is the AU, Yuletide Treat, Yuletide 2013
Summary: Five cities Leonid Viigand was moved to (and one he wasn't).

Here's to a storied new year!

Dear Yuletide author/random passerby/what have you,

There once was a wintertime fest

For small fandoms we love the best!

So I'll love any plot

You write, whether or not

It's anything I could have guessed!

(AKA, optional details are optional! Write whatever you'd like, I'll definitely enjoy it. These are just some ideas to get you started.)

My name is also primeideal on Ao3! If you've been around, you might know me as Ember Nickel.

Dear Writer tag, for previous letters (to see where I've stolen much of this from!) I was fortunate to receive Will Grayson, Will Grayson fic for the recent Fic Corner exchange, but it's such a tiny fandom there can and should always be more; and I requested Animorphs last year, but the others are new.

I love happy endings, sad endings (when providing some measure of closure or melodrama), snark, wordplay, gen of any stripe, friendships and familial bonds, most canon ships for these fandoms, and general nerdery.

You can read my fics on ao3 (where I'm also primeideal) to get a sense of my taste. I'm infrequently on #yuletide chat, as primeideal, but don't expect to find me there on a regular basis. I'm on Tumblr too, which is mostly me rambling about my own fic, but I mention a couple of these fandoms every once in a while (of course I would love fic for the other fandoms, too--those are just the ones where I sometimes have an audience!)

ANIMORPHS

Request: "Anything in this fandom. I adore Andalites and would love to read some Elfangor/Loren from the Earth years, or Tobias and Ax being shorms, but I'd also be up to see gen with the main six, Rachel/Tobias shipfic, maybe some Rachel/Marco banter, Tom shipping Jake/Cassie, or OC worldbuilding fic exploring some of the other fronts in the galactic war (the Iskoort and the free Hork-Bajir were sort of abandoned plot threads)."

BATTLE ROYALE (2000)

Request: "Shogo Kawada: Something with pre-movie Shogo would be great, maybe exploring his relationship with Keiko and how that progressed before or during the first program, showing his dark side during that Program, or how he hacked into the collar system before the second program. Anything about his friendship with Shuya and Noriko, during the movie itself, would be great too. If you'd prefer to bring in some novel or movie characterization, I wouldn't mind, but there's no need."

While I love all continuities of the story, I first encountered it through the movie, and that version of Keiko's calculated sacrifice is fascinating to me, so I'd especially like to see something drawing on that canon. (I'm not familiar with the sequel movie, so please nothing drawing on that--although that shouldn't be too hard if you're writing anything Shogo-centric.) Although just a few characters were nominated, if you'd like to do something using more non-nominated characters, feel free to bring in anyone you'd like (Shinji? Yuko? Mizuho? Anyone!) I'd prefer no Kazuo- or Mizuho-centric fic, though.

THE PRINCESS BRIDE

Request: "As Inigo Montoya was the only character nominated, I'll focus on him, but including other characters would be fine by me. With Inigo, his post-movie adventures in piracy would be hilarious, whether that includes rhymes with Fezzik or more swashbuckling encounters with OCs. Does he deal more mercifully to victims than the previous Dread Pirates Roberts, and if so, how does his legend get around? Does he reunite with Westley and Buttercup later? Something introspective about his having to get over the need for revenge could also be insightful."

I'm not familiar with the book, so I'd prefer no drawing on that canon, thanks! If Inigo's giving you trouble to write, I'd also be interested in seeing anything about the boy from the frame story and/or his grandfather. Grandpa hearing the story from his family? And the grandson seems to have very clear ideas about how stories should be told...I can see him becoming a fix-it fanfiction writer years down the line, if you're in the mood for something meta like that.

THE SANDLOT

Request: "Scotty and/or Benny in the intervening years from the main story to the epilogue scene? As I love baseball, any funny anecdotes from their parallel journeys with the game would be very welcome, but if you'd prefer just to write about their friendship over the years, that's fine too. If you're interested in them as kids, I'm guessing Benny in particular would, I assume, have to make his way into a more organized baseball team, leaving behind the chaos of the sandlot; how does he bring himself to make that changes, and/or how do Scotty (or the others?) support him? Or maybe, how does Scotty's relationship with his mom and stepfather evolve after the main plotline?"

I'm not familiar with the sequel movie, so please nothing based on that. I'd also prefer to keep the emphasis on Scotty and/or Benny rather than any of their teammates, though some degree of ensemble fandom is fine with me. Completely gratuitous, but I've just moved to LA in time to bandwagon my way into the Dodgers' playoff chase--while they're not really the team of my heart, and I don't know enough about the city to necessarily appreciate anything Dodger-specific, trying to find a timeline for the movie versus the Dodgers' real history would certainly entertain me. How about Scotty hero-worshiping Vin Scully...?!

WHEEL OF TIME

Request: "I've requested Tam, Thom, Moiraine, and Loial, so thanks for volunteering to write all of them, but for this fandom I'd happy to see just one, two, or three rather than all four of the requested characters--please don't feel like you have to force them in. For all four of them, I'd be interested in something post-series; where do they go from the events of the last battle onward? Thom and Loial have their different stories to write, anything about those (similarities? differences? meta-level commentary) would be fascinating, as would Thom/Moiraine or Loial/Erith. With Tam or Moiraine, I'd love to see Rand eventually revealing himself to them, maybe a while down the line once the tension of the Dragon's Peace has calmed down."

One of the reasons I'd love to see Rand+Tam or Moiraine gen is because I felt the ending was sort of anticlimactic, in terms of letting Rand walk away with all his romantic relationships intact but burning the bridges on all the other people who care about him (as a person and not necessarily a political tool). So if you'd like to write something similar with Rand+Mat or Perrin, even though I didn't request them, that would be great too. With Loial, I think there's lots of room for worldbuilding Ogier culture (post-Battle), if you'd like to work that in; maybe he runs into Perrin and they learn things about the Tinkers' Song? Feel free to bring in OCs, if it helps.

WILL GRAYSON, WILL GRAYSON

Request: "Anything goes, maybe post-book but don't hold yourself to that. Given the themes of the book, the importance of friendships and non-romantic relationships was something I'd really enjoyed, so I'd be interested in seeing more friendship stuff with Uppercase Will and Tiny (before or after the book). Or, at some other point, Tiny and Jane (setting up the Gay-Straight Alliance?) Uppercase and lowercase Will going on to be closer friends? Making fun of musical theater plots? Not that I'd mind Uppercase Will/Jane, either!"

Maura was not nominated, but if you'd like to write about her and lowercase Will, I'd be happy with that--I thought the story was a surprisingly realistic take on the importance online relationships can have to us. Another random plot bunny would be lowercase Will (perhaps influenced by any of his friends you choose) making amends to the math team (anything involving math competitions will definitely make me squee). Actually, anything specifically referencing the Chicagoland settings will make me squee too. I'd also be happy to read Will Three/Tiny, if that's your ship.

I'll repeat, optional details are optional! So be it something dental to please my sweet tooth, or a diamond in the rough mines of fandoms I've never heard of, write whatever you'd like, have fun, and I'm looking forward to your story! :)

Current Mood: gleeful

Well, for my first Yuletide...I may have gone overboard and I regret none of it. \o/

Here were my fics (the first two for my assigned recipient, plus treats!)

Galois Theory (5,000 words; Murry-O'Keefe families, Madeleine L'Engle)

After rereading some of the books in this series I had more plot bunnies than I knew what to do with. So my sincere thanks go out to the #yulechat crew who reassured me that literally going with "five times stuff happened with these characters" was a legitimate strategy. Of course, I like my mathematics a little more intricate than counting to five; hence, a crash course in field extensions.

To Play The Story To A Glorious Finish (2,000 words: Mistborn series, Brandon Sanderson)

A pre-epilogue missing scene from the third book in the trilogy, and hinting at what might lie beyond. The author wants to "give you, the reader, the power and authority to bring to the characters the ending you wish," which as a fanfiction writer I very much take to heart! The title is from Sonnet 10, by L'Engle.

Love Doesn't Have Restrictions (2,000 words, Twitter robot fandom)

As soon as this got suggested as a nomination I knew what I wanted to write. The love story of two automated Twitter accounts, one of which only counts numbers upwards from one, and the other of which retweets random pairs of Tweets that happen to form iambic pentameter couplets. So we get interactions like "one hundred fifty thousand eighty two/Love doesn't have restrictions, people do" The fic quotes a lot from the "canon" (such as it is). As bizarre as it sounds, but approved by the creator of @pentametron. Truly a great honor on my part.

Liberty and Justice and Shit (2,000 words, @mayoremanuel)

Speaking of Twitter and the 2012 election...it's more from everybody's favorite profane mayor! I had started this early last year but gave up when OpenOffice started making the wrong suggestions on all my other documents. This is extremely out of character for me; there is probably more profanity in almost any line of this than I have ever used in all the rest of my life. However, even if I never said anything like "I need a motherfucking “Avoid Panhandlers” route on my Google fucking Maps," that doesn't mean I don't believe it.

The English Opening (1,000 words, Chess (musical))

First we have women in math...now we have women in chess. A pre-canon glimpse of Florence meeting Freddie (or The American depending on your preferred version). And speaking of dusting things off, this inspired me to pick up my old Chess fic, so hopefully I'll be able to explain more of where this headcanon comes from soon!

I'll cross-post them to FFN over the next few days. :)

Current Mood: excited

( Cut for merry measure! )

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primeideal

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Entries tagged with yuletide

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Dear Yuletide Writer, 2012

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