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rthstewart ([personal profile] rthstewart) wrote2021-01-30 02:31 pm

Three Sentence Ficathon 2021

We have now opened a new post, for new prompts! Please leave all new prompts there. You may continue to fill existing prompts here. If you didn't get a prompt filled here, feel free to post it on the new post!





Welcome to the Three Sentence Ficathon!
2 Feb. 2021 See important edit below regarding where to find unfilled prompts.


What is the 3 Sentence Ficathon?
This is an open exchange where you answer a prompt with a fic consisting of only three sentences. It's open to all fandoms and you can post and fill as many prompts as you like, as many times as you want.

What do I do first?
You can start 3SF by posting prompts! When posting a prompt please format it this way:

fandom, character(s), prompt word/sentence.

Only one prompt per comment please. So, for example,

Star Wars, Obi-Wan Kenobi, I don't like sand."

Open ended and anthropomorphic fills are popular too, such as:

Any, Any, "I don't like sand."

or

Earth geography, sand, "I don't like humans very much, either."

What happens after that?
You answer other posters' prompts in three sentences (or more if you can't stop yourself) and fill as many prompts as you want, as many times as you wish. If you see that a prompt you loved has already been filled, go ahead and fill it again! Multiple fills of the same prompt are allowed and even encouraged! (We get really fun stories going this way).

Can I still post if I need more than 3 sentences? Or should I just abuse grammar in ways the English language never contemplated?
Yes. Yes.

But I'm not a member of Dreamwidth
No problem. You can comment anonymously or through open ID

I'm really overwhelmed by all the prompts and how much there is and how fast it goes. I can't read 1,000 prompts and fills. It's too much. 
I hear this a lot and it keeps a lot of people from participating.  The 3SF is big and it moves fast, especially at first. 
I get overwhelmed, too, and I'm hosting the thing. With 2020 and 2021 sucking so badly you don't want something that's supposed to be fun cause you anxiety.  I have a couple of suggestions for managing the 3SF volume. 
  • First, really, you don't have to read every prompt and fill on every page.  You can start at the last page of this and just go forward, or back a page or two.  It's fine.
  • You can come and go as time and energy allow, you don't have to participate the whole time, and it drops off quite a bit by mid-February.
  • Even after the 3SF and new prompting end, people fill prompts all year long.
  • You can fill an already filled prompt and you can can leave a prompt that's already been prompted before.  People do it all the time. 
Always make sure you're looking at top-level comments only, not threaded. That helps a lot. Your screen should look like this.




But shouldn't I read everything to see if someone already prompted the same prompt I want to leave if someone already filled it? 

No.  Prompt as many times as you want, as much as you want.  It doesn't matter if someone prompted the exact same prompt.  Go ahead and prompt again!

I left a prompt and no one filled it.  Can I prompt it again?
Absolutely!

Can I spread the word?
Yes, please. I generally fail at creating banners and embed codes but if you create one and make it really idiot-proof, I might be able to post and share it.  Feel free to cross-post this entry. If you create your own banners or icons, let me know and I'll share!
Please share the 3SF with your followers, friends, and any channels and comms you are active on.  I'll post on fandom calendar, Tumblr, and Twitter, but I don't have many connections in other spaces such as Discord.


How long will it go?

The 3SF closes to new prompts on February 28, 2021. The entry stays open permanently and people post fills all year long.

Are there any rules about cross-posting?
Nope, you can post wherever you want, whenever you want. A lot of folks collected their responses together and posted them on AO3 under the 3 sentence fiction tag. 3SFs are a terrific prompt for remixes and could be helpful for Yuletide bears, too.

What about spoilers, content and archive warnings, triggers, pairings, ratings, tags, and squick?
I thought a lot about this. It boils down to reader beware.  In my experience, this typically gets too big, moves too fast, and the stories are too short for content warnings and ratings to even apply. It is too big for me to moderate in this way. You should assume spoilers are fair game and that the initial poster and the responder have opted to use no content warnings or tags. This means AO3 content warnings for dubcon, violence, canon character death, underage, etc. COULD be present. I've found personally that I can skim and scroll by stuff that, from the prompt, I can tell isn't my favorite flavor of delicious cake. Use your best judgment and be prepared to skip over things that aren't your thing. In this format, the obligation is on you, the reader, to protect yourself from triggering content.
Some posters do include warnings and spoiler tags in subject lines or include spoiler space, but they don't have to do so.

Why is 3SF split among several posts?  That seems confusing.
It is confusing and we always lose momentum once we have to move to a second post. The reason is because at 5,000 comments to a single post, DW installs a human test CAPTCHA, which is a pain for users.  So, once this entry gets to the upper 4,000 comments, I open a new post.  If you've been waiting until things slow down to participate, when we open a second post is often a good place to join.

If I have questions, what do I do?

I'm rthstewart everywhere, here, Twitter, Tumblr, gmail and AO3.

A special thank you to [personal profile] conuly  .
Last year, Conuly started logging all unfilled prompts.
This year's (2021) unfilled prompts are here.
Last year's (2020) unfilled prompts are here.
Conuly asks that you not reply, as they want to be able to edit and add more prompts to the list.
Conuly does this just because they are an awesome person but should you want to write them fic in thanks, you can find a birthday wish list here.

Here is the 3SF 2021 Friending Meme to show of your new DW account.

Here, have some icons and banners and let me know if you've created your own!

 






text box you can try to cut and paste

















(Anonymous) 2021-02-09 01:06 am (UTC)(link)
any, any, bad ending

Obsidian & Blood, Acatl & Teomitl

[personal profile] notapaladin 2021-02-09 03:25 am (UTC)(link)
“Good. You are dismissed.” The Emperor's voice is steady, calm, regal; his mind is a choked-off scream, an arterial spray.

He catches a fluid rise, the swirl of a gray cloak, the tumble of an errant lock of black hair; soon he will be alone again, and that’s too much for him to bear. His chest is full of knives carving him open from the inside out--not again.

It leaves him like an arrow, like thought, and is out in the air before he can even think to take it back. “Acatl.”

Stillness. The flicker of an eyelid. A slow, indrawn breath. “Teomitl-tzin.”

(His onetime mentor, his onetime friend had said his name just the same on that day, in front of his siblings’ corpses and Teomitl’s warriors--cold and measured and echoing with the cavernous grief of Mictlan, held back only because he was too proud to break in front of him; it would have been easier to bear if he’d screamed.)
sincereously: night sky above mountains (Default)

[personal profile] sincereously 2021-02-09 04:40 am (UTC)(link)
Afterward, while Vader and the Emperor are nothing more than cooling corpses and the battle still whirls among the stars outside the transparisteel windows, Luke sits down shakily on the steps; his heart pounds scarily fast, freezing and burning him with each beat as power (he can no longer tell if dark or light, and he wonders if his father had felt that way just before Luke killed him) thrums through his veins, fear and anger and sorrow running with it as if his skin could barely contain it all.

So this is the end of it, he thinks, no more Jedi and no more Sith, Ben, Yoda, I'm sorry.

Distantly, he thinks he can hear Leia screaming at him to run even above the sound of the warning klaxons, but still he sits with the dead and the Force even as the Death Star begins to buckle and burn, I'm sorry I'm sorry this is how it has to end I'm sorry Han Leia I love you I love-
ceruleantactician: Yellow roses against a blue sky. (Default)

[personal profile] ceruleantactician 2021-02-09 07:38 pm (UTC)(link)
Oh this is so sad and so beautiful. Poor Luke!
alienacat: An image of the Wicked cover - Elphaba smirking with Glinda whispering into her ear. Behind her is a rainbow (Wicked)

[H2O: Just Add Water, s3 AU] What If the Water Tentacle Was Bad, Actually?

[personal profile] alienacat 2021-02-09 04:51 am (UTC)(link)
Rising out of the pool, the water tentacle split off into smaller tendrils. They snaked around Rikki like watery vines—around her hips, around her ankles, around her neck. When she opened her mouth to scream, a tentacle filled it.

Re: [H2O: Just Add Water, s3 AU] What If the Water Tentacle Was Bad, Actually?

(Anonymous) 2021-02-09 08:08 pm (UTC)(link)
Wow, creepy!

Re: [H2O: Just Add Water, s3 AU] What If the Water Tentacle Was Bad, Actually?

[personal profile] buttonloops 2021-02-10 01:33 am (UTC)(link)
OMIGOSH I HAVE NEVER READ ANY H2OJAW FIC AND I LOVE THIS it is my secret guilty fandom lmao
sheenianni: (Default)

Star Wars, Luke & Vader

[personal profile] sheenianni 2021-02-09 06:10 am (UTC)(link)
Luke is screaming on the floor, begging for help - "Father, please!" - and the Anakin who remains inside him urges him to action, to save this boy, save his son, move, you idiot!.

But Vader reigns him in. They've tried to save his mother, they've tried to save Padmé, they've tried to save the whole damn galaxy and it was always for nothing.

Eventually, the screaming stops.

Re: Star Wars, Luke & Vader

(Anonymous) 2021-02-09 08:08 pm (UTC)(link)
Nooooooo!!!
sheenianni: (Default)

Re: Star Wars, Luke & Vader

[personal profile] sheenianni 2021-02-09 10:39 pm (UTC)(link)
IKR.
It did say "bad ending"... :(
ceruleantactician: Yellow roses against a blue sky. (Default)

Star Wars, Anakin (cw: death, suicide)

[personal profile] ceruleantactician 2021-02-10 08:36 pm (UTC)(link)
Padmé is already dead by the time Anakin gets back to the ship, Obi-Wan’s death still fresh on his hands.

He stays there for a long time, in complete disbelief- she still looks so alive, her skin is still warm, her neck only slightly swollen- the bruises hadn’t even begun to form yet, but no matter how much Force energy Anakin pours into her, Padmé is dead, and so is their baby- babies, the Force whispers to him.

Sidious had not foreseen what would happen when Vader returns to Coruscant alone; after the Emperor is dead, the last thing Anakin does is put his lightsaber through his own heart, thinking to himself that he is about to restore balance, once and for all.
Edited (formatting) 2021-02-10 20:36 (UTC)
sincereously: night sky above mountains (Default)

Re: Star Wars, Anakin (cw: death, suicide)

[personal profile] sincereously 2021-02-11 01:48 am (UTC)(link)
Oh, man, this is intense. Heartbreaking for all of them, and of course this is a scenario where Anakin's going to think the only way out is to completely self-destruct and take everything down with him. Well done!
melime: (Default)

Criminal Minds, Spencer, Bait (part III)

[personal profile] melime 2021-02-28 04:45 am (UTC)(link)
Spencer saw them coming through the screens, left there to taunt him by the long gone killer, saw them walking right into the house, too fast for their own good, too desperate to find him.

He heard the click of the bomb activating behind him, and knew that meant only a few seconds until detonation, and could guess that it was enough to destroy half the block, enough to kill most people he ever cared about, and who were only there because he was careless enough to get caught again.

He tried to scream a muffled warning, but it was too late.

Bait