FIAB 2023

[vanishresponse]

Dear Fic in a Box creator,

Thank you for thinking of creating for me! I am vanishresponse on AO3, and I'm really excited for this exchange. I provide some prompts as starting points, but if you have something you're excited to create instead, I would love to receive it; everything I requested is either a tiny fandom of my heart or a request that I'm deeply stoked about and I genuinely want to see your take!

In general, if there's something opt-in that you think will make your work stronger, consider me opted-in unless it contradicts a DNW!

For this exchange, I'm also very interested in different media and experimentation -- for those, please feel free to go as experimental as you like, within the medium constraints I've specified. <3 I also opt into all in-universe written works (e.g. written-only social media, diaries, todo lists, anything your heart desires) -- even if I didn't specifically request that!

Likes:

• Adventures
• Angst
• Animal acquisition
• Characters who are happy in an imperfect world, or after not getting everything they want
• Bittersweetness
• Cats
• Character studies
• Characters who understand each other really well!
• Competence
• Complicated relationships
• Conflicted loyalty
• Connectedness to or appreciation of nature
• Epistolary
• Hand kink
• Hopeful endings
• Humor
• In-universe documents
• Loyalty
• Monster on a leash
• Moral dilemmas
• Murderous or mean women. Woobieness optional -- even if they are not woobie,
• Nature
• People becoming better or finding hope as a result of love
• Pining, in all forms! Especially when the characters feel unworthy or hold themselves back.
• Politics
• Post-breakups and post-breakup get-togethers, in which everyone is having complicated feelings but still 100% hung-up
• Protectiveness
• Redemption arcs
• Repression
• Secret identities (and pretty much all forms of dramatic irony)
• Small details/actions that indicate understanding, feelings or intimacy
• Self-loathing
• Stoic or repressed characters and the one person they become emotionally vulnerable for
• Stories about myth and history
• Stories focusing on women (and stories in which women get what they want!)
• Trust Kink

Art Likes

Cats, birds, animals in general, landscapes, trees, flowers, tarot, symbolism, long hair, physical intimacy, swords, peaceful or melancholy atmospheres, humor, fluff

Smut Likes:

My biggest smut like is sex that is charged with feelings. I love intensity, and when the sex or kink is an expression or an outlet for the characters' feelings -- whether that's love, attraction, or something else entirely. I like repressed sex, too, and sex as a terrible coping mechanism, and sex that explores a character's relationship with vulnerability or connection!

I also really love power dynamics being explored through sex -- whether the playful taking and ceding of power in a happy relationship or the sex mirroring (or contradicting?) or something darker or angstier. For ships with women, I am very fond of women taking control!

For some specific likes:

• Blowjobs
• Bondage
• Characters getting off on their partners' pleasure or desire
• Collars and leashes
• Couples who know each other's preferences very well
• Cunnilingus
• Desperation
• Edging
• Fantasizing (especially with masturbation!)
• Femdom
• First times
• Hickeys and other displays of possessiveness, especially if the receiver is kinking on it
• Lots of little kisses and touches during sex (especially shoulder kisses and hand kisses!)
• m/m anal sex
• Masturbation
• Petplay with a focus on spoiling/rewarding the pet (or punishing them with orgasm denial or orgasms)
• Pining while fucking
• Playfulness, laughter, and humor, especially as a way of showing intimacy!
• Tenderness

INTO1

My RPF fandom! I have no prompts for this, but I'm interested in whatever you want to make here, and I would love to see AUs in particular. ;D

Horse No Rider - Josh Ritter

Narrator/Person They're Addressing

This song is so deeply iddy to me: the desperation and vulnerability of the narrator, the pining, the sense of history between them and the person they're singing to, the hope and the fear. I love the landscape as well, and the details of the boat! The absolute iddiest lines for me are "Have I ever been this turned around, have I been more at your mercy?" and "Has my hunger ever been more plain, has my need ever been more naked? It's too late in the evening to be ashamed, if you're offering, I'll take it". I'mm fascinated by the mutual understanding implied by "But you always were the type to know a lie before I said it" (and what else has the narrator lied about in the past, and why?) and the bitterness of the line about love as a bird.

Anyway, I just really love this song. <3 I'd be absolutely stoked to see any depiction. I have a preference for m/m here, but I'm happy to see any gender configuration! I would love to see the meeting spoken of in the song or any hints of what's going on in the long history. If you want to diverge from the setup in the song, go for it, as long as it has a hint of the atmosphere of the song and the feelings!

For poetry and art, I'd love something that plays with the imagery of the song or the lyrics, and I'd also be delighted to receive something in an audio media.

Losing Battle Battles - Josh Ritter

(apparently I have mispelled this song name for years, and in the tagset. oops!)

I love the sense of a narrator who has really gone down the wrong path in life and is now trying to mend his ways -- the mix of pleading, regret, and the uncertainty on whether he'll become any better, mixed with the hope that he'll be good enough one day. And all the gritty weird Western mythic/magical imagery in this song is a delight!

I'd love the fantastical elements to be taken literally, if you're interested in that! Anything that expands on the worldbuilding in a magical way would be a delight, and I'm also very happy to read werewolf interpretations of the lost man singing for his soul, between the beast references and the "girl of silver".

For art, I'd love something that plays with the imagery of the song or with the lyrics, I'd also be delighted to receive something in an audio media.

Lost Man Singing for His Soul/Original Male Character

I would love to see something shippy for this song, either a moment of connection set in the man's past, or something in the man's present that provides the motivation for him to change (building on the sense of a third person implied by the last few lines).

Lost Man Singing for His Soul

There's so much going on in this song, and every line of what the man gets up to feels like it would be a prompt in and of itself! Show me or tell me about any of that, please. <3

Two Hearts

I love this story with its reflections on death and mortality and the way it looks at the concerns of ordinary people -- it makes me cry every time, and I'm fascinated by the way it's both a continuation of The Last Unicorn but so different in styles and concerns.

I have read both The Last Unicorn and "Sooz"; feel free to refer to either of them!

And Lisene is my favorite character! She loves Lir and cares for him, and she gets things done -- and I love how she stubbornly resists the idea of individual heroes! She's so pragmatic and ordinary and efficient and prickly! And while what she wants for Lir and her view of things doesn't match with the rules of their fairy tale world, or with what he wants, she is presented sympathetically -- and also "actually take a full group of knights with you" is admirably practical. xD And I assume it works in other circumstances, when magic and heroes are not involved.

The way her grief seeps into the story is beautiful and sad (and also, I respect the way she doesn't let it keep her from getting her duties done), and I'm so interested in the history between her and Lir -- there's clearly a lot of deep and long devotion there, and admiration at how he was mixed with the strain and grief of caretaking -- and even though she manages his life, in the end, she defers to his wishes. The part where she asks Lir to at least take her with him if he won't take no one else was deeply sad (and makes me tear up a little bit writing this) -- just, the desperation there, and the fact that she probably knows very well that she can do nothing for him and she's just volunteering to die with him.

Lisene

More Lisene, please! How does she deal with Lir's death, post-canon, and what does she do with the kingdom? How did she become the king's secretary? Does she ever meet Schmendrick and Molly or Sooz again -- or does she meet a unicorn?

I would also love to see in-universe documents and the like -- a diary or letters, perhaps, or her records, or administrative stuff? She absolutely seems like she would have an agenda for the day.

Lisene & Lir

I would love to see more of this relationship, please, especially before Lir's dementia! I've always interpreted them as having a parent and child relationship, in which Lir rescued her while she was young and then raised her -- but please feel free to go in other directions! Something from Lir's point of view would be lovely as well, since I would love to see their relationship from his side!

The Forgotten Beasts of Eld

One of my favorite fantasy books ever, which I reread every year or so and find something new in each time; I adore it for Sybel, and for the animals, the riddles, the complicated tangle of relationships (so many of which are fascinating!), the language. I also find so many of its themes deeply resonant: revenge, obsession, betrayal, the move from isolation to commmunity, the way people change and grow -- and also pain and joys of love and the power of love and hate. I would love to see your take on this world or the characters.

In general, this canon does so much with legends and stories and history that I would love to see in-universe works of songs, poetry, art, or mythology! For art, I would also love to see depictions of any of the characters, or anything that captures a sense of the world! I Also, I would love to receive canon-style riddles for this, or art or other media that either references riddles or has the feel of one.

Maelga

Maelga is such an interesting figure -- pragmatic, wise, witchy, kind -- and I really appreciate the guidance she gives to Sybel and how protective she is over her! I would love to see more of their relationship, during or post-canon -- what does she think? Or alternatively, seeing her with Tam or the animals!

I would also love to know more about her background -- why does she have ravens everywhere, even in Drede's palace? What is Moriah hinting at when she says that Maelga has done many things? What kind of things are she doing for the villagers, and how did she learn magic, anyway?

Tamlorn & Sybel

Tam shapes the book so much and Sybel loves him so much, but there's so much more room to explore their relationship, with its love and many changes. I would love to see more of Tam's childhood growing up with Sybel or something set in canon itself, as they embark upon such different lives -- I would love to see missing scenes or his perspective on the things that happen in canon, especially during the time he's with Drede! He must surely, inevitably, compare his life and father at court to his life with Sybel and the way she raised him -- and then of course things get complicated, with the war.

Something set post-canon would be lovely too! I'm very curious about Tam growing up and navigating kingship, and what his relationship with Sybel would look like then. And, what does their relationship mean for the relationship between Sirle and the kings of Eld, when she's married to one of Sirle's lords and he is her adoptive son? Does it improve the relationship between the two, or are the political strains something they have to deal with?

WB: History of Eldwold

For this, I'm particularly curious about the politics, especially the lords of Sirle's rebellions! I'm also really interested in the Lords of Niccon and the mention of the only queen of Eldwold, but really, take this as your carte blanche to expand or depict any part of Eldwold's history. ;D

Coren of Sirle/Sybel

I'm at a loss for what to say about this relationship, honestly, because there's so much there and so many swerves -- I love the tragedy, the complicatedness, and the pain they cause each other, and the catharsis and forgiveness at the end.

Show me more missing scenes, please! I'd love to see more details of their marriage -- especially smaller, more intimate or realistic ones, especially since their love is so mythic and fairy-tale -- for instance. Also, angst. ;D More angst is always good, and more of the tension around the war and Sybel lying to Coren. Or what it's like during the period toward the end of canon, before they get together -- and of course what happens post-canon! While they're together, I'm sure they'll have a lot to work through and they'll also need to practically figure out what life will look like -- especially for Sybel, who has completely uprooted her life. What will they be like? What will home look like to them, and what will their relationship look like?

If you want to create canon divergences as well, I'd be interested in what you create for that!

I would also love to see what other characters in-universe make of them, whether they are close to them or more distant (I'm sure the bards have plenty to say about the seventh lord of Sirle and the enchantress he woos, who ends the war after starting!)

Characters mentioned in Riddles and Historical References in Books

They're so fascinating! I love the story of the prince who searches for the rose, and Glower and the other witches. Please give me all the witches and princes and magic. <3 Also, who is the giant Grof, and what exactly did he see?

Sybel's Beasts

The Beasts! I love them all so much, with their different personalities and their different goals.

I'd love to hear more about their pasts! How did they become such powerful beasts, and were there once more beasts like them? I'd love to see their adventures too, whether the ones in the book or ones you make up.

What was going on with the swan and its princess rescue, and did the swan do this often? What was Ter's relationship with the wizard Aer, and how did the vengeance play out? What kind of trouble has Moriah gotten up to with her spells and charms, and who were her previous mistresses? What were Cyrin's (undoubtedly many) adventures? And what's up with Coren's mention that the Lyon has 'seduced many an imprudent man into unwanted adventure"?

And, did the Beasts interact much with each other in the past? (I think there's one mention of Cyrin, the Lyon, and Moriah confounding three wise men together). I'd love to see them interacting in Sybel's home as well, and also more details of how it was Sybel cared for them.

Future fic would be nice, too! What are they doing post-canon, and do they meet Sybel again?

And of course, I would love to see the Liralen and the Blammor -- tell me more about its adventures in the past (whatever was going on with the prince, and also Blammor horror would be very appreciated too ;D).

The Beasts themselves also seem like they would inspire a lot of in-universe stories, songs, poetry, and other works. I'd love to see any of that! And of course, I would love to see any art of the beasts (they all sound GORGEOUS <3). ;D

The Locked Tomb:

John Gaius

John has SO MUCH going on -- meme millenial and war criminal and destroyer of worlds and his own poor little meow meow and god-emperor and...you get the idea! I find both his terribleness, his guilt, his manipulativeness, and his pretext of relatability all so fascinating. I'd love to see more John character studies! Humor is very appreciated! For in-universe documents and other media, I do have a fondness for the religious aspects of John and his classical references -- if you want to play with those, I would be delighted! Alternatively, show me about the different roles he plays! What did the lyctors do on the Mithraeum to pass the time? What are John's favorite recipes for cooking nights? How many spreadsheets does it take to manage an empire? Is there John RPF in canon?

More than anything, TLT is such an experimental, odd canon with so many different registers (and John embodies so much of the weirdness!) that I just really really want to see what you come with. Go wild, create whatever your heart wants, and I absolutely mean the Any Nominated Medium.;D

John Gaius & Original Cow Character

Cows! I love the cow meme in canon so much -- it's funny, but also deeply disturbing, with things like the cow wall and how that serves as the start of John doing weird necromancer shit (and denying responsibility!). So, please give me John and cows. ;D I'm happy to receive either serious takes, symbolic takes, or absolute ridiculousness. Go with whatever your heart desires!