rthstewart | Three Sentence Ficathon 2022

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.

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!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

any, any, It's been a long day without you, my friend/And I'll tell you all about it when I see you again

Alone, Cloud lets himself collapse into his berth. The Highwind is quiescent under his head and it's weird, not to have its engine vibrating gently and faraway in his ears. They've been in the air for a lifetime, it seems.

It's over. Isn't it? Sephiroth is dead; so is Midgar, and they may have failed there but the Planet as a whole will survive. Reeve told them to stay the hell out of the rescue efforts, that the remnants of Public Safety will take charge of the survivors. I happen to know for a fact none of you have slept in the last 48 hours, he'd told them through Cait. Go and rest, for the gods' sake.

Cloud knows Reeve's right. He can feel exhaustion dragging at him; there's only so much even a Fullcure can do about that. But his dry eyes won't close and his head aches with the effort of trying to relax. He'd faced the monster Sephiroth had become and cut it to ribbons with Zack's sword, avenged Aerith and Zack and Nibelheim and everyone else, it couldn't be more over if Cloud had dumped Sephiroth in Hades' cauldron himself; yet there's a restlessness he can't shake, a certainty that there's something else he could be doing, something he's forgotten.

Well - there's lots of things I've forgotten. Right... Zack?

Even now, with his brain intact as it's ever going to be, even having seen the marks on the inside of those tubes in the mansion basement - he can barely remember Zack. Black hair, a scar, a smile. Overwhelming strength tempered by kindness. Had they been friends? Part of Cloud is convinced they were. The more cynical part of him is sure that's just wishful thinking; Zack was probably just being kind to an obvious failure and Cloud had just read too much into it, as usual. But in the end, Zack had dragged Cloud across two continents to Midgar, had died so that Cloud could live.

Cloud closes his eyes, not to sleep, only to pretend the other man can hear him. One day I'll be able to ask you directly, he tells the empty spaces in his head where Zack had once lived. And I'll tell you everything that happened. Everything that you made possible.

...thanks. For everything.

One day I'll be able to ask you directly, he tells the empty spaces in his head where Zack had once lived.

This piece is such a nice little captured moment—the calm after the storm, except the adrenaline hasn't quite settled yet, you know? But the part I quoted above is just oomf, perfect, such a powerful way of expressing the whole mess that was going on for Cloud. So good!

thank yoooouuu i am writing these in a tired haze currently i'm glad i could still oomf despite that

It's during a battle when his mind turns to his family, wishing for aid that will never come, but Salazar can only wallow in his grief in the quiet moments. He misses his wives, brilliant magicians born all through the centuries. His children and his students, determined and cunning and true in the defence of Hogewáþ and their respective homes, including his own of Castile and Ipuzko. And most of all, Salazar is lacking of his brother, likely the only one of his house left to him, trapped in a magical working that was meant to be but which guarantees no success at its end. One day, though, he will return to his school and have his family beside him once more.

One day, Kakashi thinks, eye tracing the carved names on the Memorial Stone before him, I'll see you again, and I'll tell you. . .

He reaches up, fingers slipping beneath the hitai-ate hiding his friend's eye, mouth twisting beneath his mask.

. . .I'll listen.

He can always tell when she returns to the barracks after a long night, because she's never been subtle about anything since -

Well.

Since that.

She's laughing, bottle to her lips as she turns and sees him watching, and for a moment it dies and then she lifts it almost in defiance and returns to her conversation.

Three Sentence Ficathon 2022

no subject

FF7, Cloud(/Zack)

no subject

no subject

no subject

Promises (Naruto; Kakashi, (Obito))

original