Three Sentence Ficathon 2022 Part 2

[rthstewart]

UPDATE 14 FEBRUARY 2022 -- 3SF 2022 IS NOW CLOSED TO NEW PROMPTS!  Do continue to fill prompts already posted but the 3SF 2022 is now closed.  We'll be back next year in a new comm (If I can get my act together).  Thank you again!

THIS IS THE NEW POST FOR PART 2 OF THE 3 SENTENCE FICATHON -- ALL NEW PROMPTS SHOULD BE POSTED HERE
You may continue to fill prompts (but not leave new ones) at the original Post 1 here but please post new prompts here, not there.  And if you're asking, hey is just me, or did this get enormous really fast? Why yes, yes it did.  Last year, it took us ten days before I opened a new post.  This year, it took us about 5.5 days to get there.  So, by all means, go back and fill in Post 1 and post new prompts here!

Also woops, in an indication of how busy I've been with other things, I neglected to post that for a third year in a row the awesome conuly  started a master list of unclaimed prompts and has been updating it as time permits.  Obviously a huge task! Thank you!

 

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

[ruthchinn]

any, any, cats

Call of Cthulhu RPG - Downtime

[sidhehound]

She really was getting too old for this shit. The Investigator had seen her fair share of strange and inexplicable things in her time, but the mere knowledge gathered at this latest job was... uniquely unsettling. Every so often, she dreamed of a mad court, with inhumane pipers merrily playing their music and dancing around something too horrible for her mind to remember when she awoke.

The last week had been mercifully devoid of those horrible dreams. The Investigator scoffed at herself, but she couldn't help but connect that peace of mind to the tiny black kitten that had decided she was to be her human. The little creature slept on the Investigator's own pillow, above the Investigator's head, purring the night away.

It must be that her unconscious mind had been pushed in that direction due to the sudden arrival of her new companion, but for the entire week since the black kitten had decided to live in her house, the Investigator only dreamed of an idyllic city, far away from her own in both time and space, where cats roamed the streets without a care in the world, for it was a fact well know by all that no one could harm a cat in Ulthar.

[ruthchinn]

Daredevil, Matt's mom (Maggie), any

Cut Clean

[edenfalling]

When Jack dies, Maggie thinks long and hard about whether to renounce her vows a second time and step back into the secular world as Matthew's mother, but while that sounds virtuous in theory (aren't children owed a mother's love and care?), on a practical level there are nearly insurmountable obstacles. She has no guarantee of finding a well-paying job or suitable housing, no guarantee that she and Matthew would have compatible personalities, no guarantee that such a drastic change in her life wouldn't trigger a new mental health crisis, no guarantee she could navigate the maze of special needs education without the support of the Church behind her, and on and on and on.

Perhaps she could have introduced herself as Matthew's mother while still holding to her vows, but she's never been good with in-betweens; in the end, she keeps the break clean.

[ruthchinn]

Plants vs Zombies, Dr. Zomboss, any

[swirlsngirls]

The Good Place or any, Chidi/Eleanor or any, won’t you give me a boost over Heaven’s gate? (lyrics from Heaven’s Gate by Fall Out Boy)

[ernest]

King Lear, any, "I think the world's asleep."

Kent

[smallhobbit]

It was hard to accept banishment, but what else was he to do? He hated the thought that everyone seemed to believe that all would be well, without considering the potential consequences. He therefore made his preparations for when the world woke up and the nightmare really began.

[last_haven]

Witch Hat Atelier, Qifery/Olgurrio, where you go, I'll follow

[(Anonymous)]

Any, any, honey, green tea, lavender

Triple Fill: Sunless Sea, Zee-Captain/The Lady in Lilac

[(Anonymous)]

Lavender

You do not remember inviting her aboard, but she is here, so you must have.

You stand at the prow, your face turned Northward, and she stands beside you; her hand brushes yours, feverishly warm in the cold. The wind changes, and instead of salt and frost, you catch a breath of her perfume: spices, dried orange peel, the scent of a surface flower whose name you cannot remember and will not remember, except briefly, in dreams.

Green Tea

In dreams, briefly, you are safe.

When you wake, you are not safe, but you are warm; she sits in the flickering lamplight of your cabin and pours two cups of steaming tea, though you are the only one who drinks. What you pour out is stories: old sorrows and old loves, those you lost and those betrayed, the ones the zee has taken; each she lifts from you and tucks away, carefully, until you’re almost weightless.

Honey

You’re almost weightless when you fall into her arms.

You wake with your lamp gone dim and the North’s chill on you; you remember the feeling of silk against your skin, the taste of honey when she kissed you, and only fragments after that: her warmth, her weight, her lips against your throat, the darkness of a sweet and dreamless sleep.

You do not remember her leaving, but there is no one here, so she must have.

[schoolsasaint]

Untitled Goose Game/Stardust, any, goose on the loose

[vialethe]

Narnia, Susan Pevensie, after giving you the best I had/tell me what to give after that

[ruthchinn]

Susan stands at the graves of her family and weeps. She gave everything she could to Narnia during their reign, fought as hard as any of her siblings during the war to place Caspian on the throne. She came back to England and threw herself into living, not wasting away for a land closed to her forever. And for what? They're gone now, lost.

[vialethe]

Shadow & Bone/TGT, The Darkling/Alina, my mind turns your life into folklore/I can’t dare to dream about you anymore

[betony]

The children of Keramzin demand dreadful stories, and Mother Alina always obliges: she tells of sharp-toothed volcra, of kings undone; she rasps of children drowned and beauties scarred, of monsters felled unjustly thanks to a single man's greed.

She is so very talented at making one's skin crawl that they expect only to be pleasantly terrified when they ask for a tale of the wickedest man that ever lived; but Mother Alina only grows still, and studies her hands for a time.

"Once," she begins at last, "there was a boy who grew to manhood very lonely, indeed."

[vialethe]

Trojan War Cycle, Aeneas/Cassandra, we’re the smoke on a burned horizon/we’re the boat on a tide that’s rising

Can so write a happy-ish au! *laughs*

[betony]

"I shouldn't be here," Cassandra says, biting her lips, and Aeneas dismisses this as he has so many other odd words from her mouth.

"Too late now," he reminds her; after all, they've left their mooring and their burning city behind, and all that remains is to write a new fortune across the wine-dark sea.

"Yes," she says when he tells her this, and then, faint voice trembling, "I believe you, my friend."

[vialethe]

Shadow & Bone/TGT, The Darkling/Alina, and i have never loved a darker blue/than the darkness i have known in you/honed from you

[betony]

On nights where she means to bring about shipwrecks, his sister sings of love; and Aleksander always listens, bemused. It is not that he is unfamiliar with the concept, or even why lesser men crave it so, but it has always struck him as being--limited, somehow; emptying far sooner than expected.

Until he sees the spark in Alina's eyes, the slant of her smile; until he turns from the night sky to the sight of her face; until he wants to reach within her for the wickedness that lingers there, even among so many stars.

[vialethe]

Shadow & Bone/TGT, The Darkling/Alina, i can’t make it go away by making you a villain

[vialethe]

Shadow & Bone/TGT, The Darkling/Alina, will you forgive my soul/when you’re too wise to trust me/and too old to care

[vialethe]

Shadow & Bone/TGT, The Darkling/Alina, and when i felt like i was an old cardigan/under someone’s bed/you put me on and said i was your favorite

[vialethe]

Trojan War Cycle, Aeneas/Cassandra, i thought i was flying/but maybe i’m dying tonight

AU-ish from my own established Aeneas/Cassandra canon, I guess?

[betony]

"On such a day," Cassandra says dreamily, "did Icarus take flight, before the Sun betrayed him and brought him down;" and Aeneas mutters that at least he had wings.

"On such a day," she continues, "did my brother soar from the walls, and find himself turned a bird for his troubles;" but that, Aeneas begs her to consider, had been due to heartache, and surely beautiful Cassandra knows nothing of that.

"On such a night," she tells him, even as the guards shout that Prince Paris' ship has been sighted on the horizon, "I wrote my own destruction," and she pulls his face downwards to her own.

[vialethe]

Historical RPF, Anne Neville/Richard III, we were family pulled from the flood/you pulled the floorboards up and let the river rush in

[betony]

Anne never does learn to swim.

Richard promises he will teach her, and soon, but soon afterwards, he is recalled to his brother's side--and Mother will say it is not precisely ladylike, and Isabel support her; but she wishes desperately to have learned during that nightmarish crossing to Calais, wakes still with nightmares of water rushing to overwhelm her.

"Now you'll be safe," says Richard as he brings her back to Middleham, the ground sturdy beneath her feet, and Anne truly believes him; but years later, she discovers there's more than one deluge that might sweep them all away.

[anonne]

any, any, bandaged fingers

Naruto Founders, Hashirama & Tobirama

[dawen]

Training had been target practice today, throwing kunai, senbon, shuriken with endless accuracy, from all positions, standing, running, crouching in tree limbs - it didn't matter, if it could be thrown from any position, they threw it, weapons after weapon until their muscles shook and their fingers were slick with blood.

"I wish I could heal you as easily as I can heal myself," Hashirama said, carefully wrapping bandages around his brother's bloody fingers.

Tobiram, trembling from exhaustion, smiled at him; then, as a small spark grew in his too-intelligent eyes - even as Hashirama mourned their chances of a full night's sleep, now that Tobirama had an idea - he murmured, "Well, what if you tried..."

[sandrine]

DC comics, Jason Todd/Tim Drake, expecting hurt and receiving comfort

[sandrine]

DC comics, Jason Todd/Tim Drake, coffee and waffles

[sandrine]

DC comics, Slade Wilson/Dick Grayson, breaking and entering

[sandrine]

Batwoman, Alice/Ryan, stay alive

Not Friends

[swirlsngirls]

In the hazy space between dead and waking, Ryan feels cool fingers press against the fading pulse on her neck and frantically pouring a burning liquid—-Desert Rose—-down her throat; she’s nearly unconscious, but she thinks she hears a whispered plea. “Please alive.”

—

“Why did you save my life?” she’ll demand later when they’re in the Bat Cave, Mary flitting around checking her wounds and Luke and Sophie glaring distrustfully at Alice, who’s handcuffed to a railing. “We’re not friends.”

“No,” Alice agrees, with a meaningful glance at her cuffed hands, “but like it or not, we’re allies.”

[grandmemester]

The Long Dark, Mathis/Mackenzie, A predator in prey's clothing

[kalira]

any, any, fortune favours the ________

Greek Mythology, Odyssey

[betony]

"The bold," says Odysseus, eyes gleaming even as gray begins to touch his hair.

"The worthy," ventures Telemachus, who--if nothing else--has at least learned from his father's misadventures to mind his words.

"Those that survive to tell the tale," murmurs Penelope, and smiles when she hears the goddess' laughter.

[(Anonymous)]

mdzs, Nie Huaisang, birdwatching