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, the last item on a length to-do list

"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."

LARM OMG

L.O.L.

ROTFL. Seamstress you are.

"Okay, bad future averted, parasite destroyed, mad queen stopped, forest restored, accidents in my own timeline prevented, Gurus reunited, spirits placated, computer reprogrammed, temporal paradoxes sidestepped, trials fixed, flunkies thumped, and finally, good friend saved from obliteration through frankly freaky time manipulation."

"Lucca," Marle said carefully, "where's Crono's cat?"

"Oh, Planet damn it," Lucca said, facepalming and jumping back into the cockpit of the Wings of Time.

Ianto closed the hatch and stepped off the ladder, stretching a little and smiling as he heard Myfanwy chirring contentedly in her nest above.

"Are you finished for the day?" Jack asked hopefully, and Ianto hummed and cleared his expression as he turned, finding Jack crossing the walkway towards him.

"There is one more item on the list, sir." Ianto said solemnly, and Jack pouted - Ianto snorted a laugh, catching him by one of his suspenders and tugging him in for a kiss.

"Are you available to lend a hand, sir?" he asked against Jack's mouth as their lips parted. "It might take all night."

Zhao Yunlan sounded exhausted, in a way Kunlun hadn't been even returning from open battle to a lack of every modern comfort he'd ever known (a way Shen Wei hadn't even begun to understand until thousands of years later). "I'm not some kind of duty for you to see through to the grim end, Xiao Wei."

"I know," Shen Wei said, and meant it because it was true; he could never be done with Zhao Yunlan entirely, even if it would be kinder to nearly everyone concerned.

Stiles goes over his "Things to Bring on Vacation" list as he backs down the driveway and to the street. "Clothes, check. Extra underwear, check. Toiletries, check. Condoms and lube, check check. Good snacks so I don't have to rely on Derek's boring snacks, check. Sunscreen, check. What am I missing?"

His phone chimes with a text.

Derek
your boyfriend
i'm still at your house

"Oh my god!" Stiles flails and turns the car around.

It starts when Yelena sees a novelty double-ended fork in a random shop in Belfast.

Following that purchase, now wherever she goes, after freeing every Widow she can find, explaining to them how they have all been imprisoned inside their own heads for however long, giving them contacts to resources which can help them recover, putting them in touch with the growing global support network of former Widows, and sticking around for a while to make sure they’re really okay, the last thing Yelena does before moving on to the next pin on the map, is to buy the first fork she sees, and sends it to Kate.

The speed of mail varies, so does the speed of freeing Widows. Sometimes Kate receives a new fork every day, sometimes even two arrive together, sometimes a month go by, no fork.

Most of the forks are functional and boring, but occasionally they might fall into the first category of “novelty items”: like one Kate is sure is made of solid gold and she would never eat from, one whose handle is twice as long as normal and thus rendered completely impractical, one so tiny that would be better suited for Ant-Man, ones that have handles in the shape of things, from hotdog to weiner dog to sushi dog. The only thing that these forks have in common is that they all come in a comically large bubble-wrap-lined envelope and are the only item in said envelope. The return address is always something nonsensical like “Town of Kitezh”, or “Lukomorye” or “Tridevyatoe Tsarstvo”. Google takes Kate down a rabbit hole of Russian mythology when she asks, but occasionally, she’s received forks from “Narnia” and “Hogwarts” as well.

Yelena doesn’t return to New York until some two years later, and Kate’s security has not improved in the meantime. There are loads of boxes of mac and cheese and bottles of hot sauce in the cupboard, though, as if Kate is anticipating a guest.

Mac and cheese cooked, and Kate is still nowhere to be found. It’d be a waste to let such good food grow cold, Yelena thinks, and grabs a bottle of hot sauce from the cupboard.

Then, she pulls open the nearest drawer, and gives an unholy cackle to see probably all the forks she has ever sent lying there, waiting to be used.

Edited 2022-01-19 04:20 (UTC)

Goddess I love this. Forks, hot sauce, mac and cheese and forks from Narnia and Asgard. ROTFL

"Remove broken mirror and order replacement - check; send staff to clean the floor of the great hall - check; send curtains to the washwomen for cleaning - check; dry wet books and press them - check; order new editions of Cicero's Tusculanes and Lettres - check (...if only it was so easy to replace his master's notes and half-finished letter to Voltaire...); order new ink - check; order new chocolate and cheese - check; tell the gardener to pick more fresh fruit - check (...he just hoped they hadn't gotten into the garden, too...); tell the cook to bake new bread and almond cakes - check; send the guest room chair to the upholsterer for mending - check" -- Fredersdorf looked up when his master entered the room in a rush, scowl on his face.

"They're finally gone," Frederick proclaimed, crossing the room and looking out the window as if to make sure that the carriage hadn't unexpectedly turned around, "and I'm telling you, Fredersdorf, I'll never look after my brothers again in my life!"

Fredersdorf stifled a smile, put down his pen, and got up to check off the last item on his to-do list: comfort the crown prince and make sure he wouldn't hold too much of a grudge against his younger brothers; one never knew when one needed allies after all.

Toby watched his shorn nails plop onto the porcelain, each snick reminding him of the bloody conclusion to all of the plans he'd hatched over months in those casts. Gain control of his anger; sit through enough fucking sessions with Sister Pete to convince her he's all right; let Metzger stew and come to him; most importantly, grow his nails.

Now, he just had to figure out how to gain entry to the store room.

Three Sentence Ficathon 2022

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Chrono Trigger, Marle and Lucca, One Thing Left Undone

Re: Chrono Trigger, Marle and Lucca, One Thing Left Undone

Never Done (Whoniverse; Jack/Ianto)

Guardian; Shen Wei/Zhao Yunlan

Teen Wolf: Derek/Stiles

MCU - Yelena/Kate

Re: MCU - Yelena/Kate

Babysitting at Rheinsberg (Historical RPF 18th Century; Frederick II./Michael Gabriel Fredersdorf)

Oz (tv series), Toby