Three Sentence Ficathon 2022

[rthstewart]

This post is NOW CLOSED TO NEW PROMPTS!  PLEASE POST YOUR NEW PROMPTS HERE, IN POST 2!  Do continue to fill prompts here but please put all new prompts in Post 2.

 

Welcome to the Three Sentence Ficathon!

Here's a Friending meme!

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 at bit after about 2 weeks and especially once we open a new post because this one is approaching 4,500 comments.
• 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.

Here's my attempt at a text box that might go horribly awry.

<br /><a href="https://rthstewart.dreamwidth.org/172142.html" _fcksavedurl="https://rthstewart.dreamwidth.org/172142.html"><img src="https://rthstewart.dreamwidth.org/file/71907.jpg" _fcksavedurl="https://rthstewart.dreamwidth.org/file/71907.jpg" alt="" title="3 Sentence Ficathon 2022 Banner" /></a>




How long will it go?
The 3SF closes to new prompts on February 13, 2022. The entry stays open permanently and people post fills all year long.  (There were a bunch of new posts to the 2021 3SF this week!)

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 (and much more). 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, protect yourself, 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 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 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.

 

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



      

Comments

[syrena_of_the_lake]

Any Shakespeare play, Puck, "it could be worse" "...it's worse"

Tell Me that You’re Glad I Came (Anthropomorfic, rth's journal)

[vialethe]

“I don’t understand these prompts at all,” Post says mournfully, sifting through thread after thread. “Look at this one, it just says any, any/any, any, or this one - Narnia, The Narnicles of Charnia, what does that even mean?!”

“And the fills,” she continues, settling down with a steaming cup of tea, “look, this one is at least thirteen sentences, that is just blatantly off-theme - oh, but that’s quite good, how clever - and the wordplay, oh my, I do enjoy that,” and after that, only silence, broken by the intermittent click of keys, remained.

[last_haven]

Susan knit her eyes shut and tried not to sigh, while next to her Lucy giggled helplessly from mortification into her hands. Finally, Susan managed to clear her throat. "No, Lord Jackatooth, we and our brothers will not be separating this spring--humans do not go into heat. There's no need to worry about... in-breeding."

"Oh!" the retriever nodded, "what a relief that will be for the builders--I'll cancel the proposal for the new rooms at once."

"See to it," Susan managed as Lucy slid right out of her chair and hid under the table. She wished very much to join her and pretend that conversation had never happened in the first place.

[syrena_of_the_lake]

Enchanted Forest Chronicles, any character, the reappearance of the Frying Pan of Doom

[loveandrockmusic]

"Hair, check. Fourteen inches. Arm length, crown to cuff, check. Twenty-four inches. Inseam length, check. Twenty-eight inches."

She ran her finger down the list, expert eye cataloguing every checkbox, until it stopped at the very bottom.

"Ahem -- ah, Mr. Snow? If you'll just undo your pants, we have one more length to do."

[(Anonymous)]

Heeee, thank you! The mental image just hit me all at once - and poor Zag too, I think he might've fallen right back into the Styx. XD And really, Hades is so HUGE next to Persephone! He's at least three times her size, at least across the shoulders, surely! But I really like the idea of her being far, far more dangerous, though the game didn't take it that way, so... :D

[elementalraven]

Oohh I love this!! It's a cool idea and it makes me wonder about who will rule Narnia now, with an actual princess present

FF7-R, Mirielle, Marle and Elmyra

[raisedbymoogles]

The house smelled faintly of smoke and herbs when Mirielle eased her way in; she gave the kitchen's sole occupant a worried look and got a shrug in return. "Ghost followed Aerith home," Elmyra explained, in a low enough voice that the invocation of her name wouldn't wake her daughter up.

"Hn. Could be worse," Mirielle commented, and Elmyra agreed.

"Did you get it?" Marle asked from the living room, and Mirielle displayed her palm: letting the little gold cufflink she'd stolen from President Shinra's sleeve flash in the dim light. "Oh, clever girl," she said approvingly. "I'm almost done with the runes, then we can get this curse show on the road."

[syrena_of_the_lake]

Galavant, any, derring-don't

[last_haven]

Part of me thinks that one of the courtiers has to at least put out the idea that one of them needs to marry her, since that would be the simplest way to settle it. Shocking swerve though--it's one of the girls who marries her. (Because if she and one of the boys had children, then things probably would haven't gone to pot so badly after the Pevensies disappeared.)

Keep On Running to the Dark (MCU No Way Home, Peter & Dr Strange)

[vialethe]

“So like, you’re a doctor-doctor, right, mister doctor Strange, sir?” the kid stumbles his way through, and Stephen tries not to roll his eyes too blatantly, already sensing what’s coming.

“Yes,” he says, and barely waits for Peter’s follow up, “So what about that oath to first do not harm, doesn’t that apply-” before he breaks in with, “What I’m trying to do no harm to is the universe you broke, Mr Parker.”

Honestly, it does sting a bit, but between magic, aliens, millions of tragic points in time, and three really irritating teenagers, any oaths he’d taken seem lifetimes away - and he dislikes being reminded of it enough to ignore the hurt in the kid’s face, the way he’s had to ignore so much else to do the things no one else can.

[vialethe]

Yessss, this is so cute. Lucky would love Yelena!

Re: Kingdom Hearts, Aerith & moogles

[raisedbymoogles]

MIGHTY WARRIOR MOOGLES KUPO

[vialethe]

LARM OMG

[raisedbymoogles]

FF7R, Jessie, "we are living in a Materia world, and I am a Materia girl"

Re: Transformers: G1 cartoon

[(Anonymous)]

Hee, thank you! ^_^ (Full credit for the youngling centre goes to raisedbymoogles, she has a few Youngling Centre Six drabbles that are adorable and kind of sparked the idea.)

[vialethe]

Narnia, any, The Narnicles of Charnia AU

[raisedbymoogles]

Pressing bare knees together, Sephiroth tried not to tug his skirt down against the increasingly cheeky breeze tugging at the hem of his borrowed sundress. At least the barely-there shoulder straps meant his arms didn't strain against any sleeves too small for him, but still, he rather missed his leather trousers.

Arm fearlessly hooked through his elbow, Aerith beamed up at him. "I know I said it before, but you look adorable," she informed him, and Sephiroth mentally deep-sixed his desire for the protective restriction of leather.

[ruanchunxian]

Her mother named her the soul of summer – such a delicate little name that holds so many other meanings beneath the surface. She is also the intelligent child born in sweltering heat of July, screaming with enough strength to rival the roars of the Ten Rings her father once wore upon his arms; she burst into the world with spirit wild that can only to be tamed by the soft hands of her mother teaching her to guide the qi through her body, to allow the calmness that can only be found at the centre of every storm to engulf her and carry her as she learns what a delicate summer girl must face in a tempestuous world ruled by men.

Her mother dies, and it is her father’s rage that burns in her heart, forcing her to put one foot in front of the other and pass each day seemingly darker than the last in expectation of some retribution at the end of it all (against the murderers? against her father for bringing the murderers upon them? against herself and her brother for standing by and letting it happen? which of those she expects, she really does not know), but in the darkest of moments, Xialing closes her eyes, and it is Mama’s spirit that whispers to her, reminding her that she is the sun and she shines through it all.

(LISTEN, there really is SO MUCH to parse about the individual characters used in Shangqi and Xialing's names, how the characters work separately and together in their own names, how their names mirror and complement each other. But for the sake of this little bit: xia 夏 = summer, ling 灵 can have a variety of meanings/connotations related to spirituality, but also refers to intelligence.)

Re: Keep On Running to the Dark (MCU No Way Home, Peter & Dr Strange)

[ruanchunxian]

This is so perfect, exactly what I was hoping for!!!

[schoolsasaint]

Person of Interest, Bear, haircut and a steak, two pets

RWBY, Ozma

[ernest]

Ozma is a magic lantern, the shape of his soul flung carelessly across the nerves of whoever will come next. He does his best to fake the life he has just stolen, or he fakes being himself when there’s no way to know who that is after all this time.

But the one thing he does not do, cannot do, is turn back to see the light source that sends him on his way, for fear he will discover that Salem was right and it is no god at all.

Re: Winter after Penny gives her the gift

[ernest]

winter!! ahhhh, i love her, this is perfect. that last line is a killer.

[ernest]

eee, siblings! i love their dynamic, and the fact that laertes has been pining over horatio. i'm so glad i can always count on you to be a fellow shakespeare fan in the tsf

Re: Hamlet, Hamlet/Ophelia

[ernest]

thank you!