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

[(Anonymous)]

Any, any, crane and heron

Obsidian & Blood, Acamapichtli & Quenami

[notapaladin]

Their people had once come from Aztlan—the place of white cranes, the place of white herons. Quenami, as High Priest of Huitzilopochtli, could still walk in the Heartland of their patron god without fear. There were times Acamapichtli thought about chafing over that; war fed the gods and the sun gave life, but without the rains brought by Tlaloc their Empire would reign over a barren pit. And besides, Quenami was far too useless (and cruel, and arrogant, and stupid—did he not think his days would be numbered ever shorter if he continued to make an enemy of Acatl once Teomitl took the throne?) to be as smug as he was. It was enough to make him more than mildly annoyed.

But then he sat on the steps of his temple and listened to the herons calling each other over the lake, winging home to their nests with mouthfuls of fish, and he wouldn’t trade his current station for anything.

[(Anonymous)]

Sense and Sensibility, Margaret Dashwood, marking in her atlas the places she will go

[(Anonymous)]

Any, any, mid-autumn and mid-spring

Hamlet, Claudius, major character death

[ernest]

The days are getting longer: a prince kills his brother to take his crown, his wife, and his ambition, so things are looking up for him.

He gets one glorious summer, marred only by the stifling madness of his nephew-son, which seeps into more and more aspects of the castle, and he realizes too late that he should have been paying attention.

The days are getting shorter: everyone’s life is forfeit and it is clear that there is no way out, so when at last he is handed a chalice and the swipe of a sword, he shrugs and, following his queen, succumbs to the darkness.

[betony]

S&B/TBT, Darklina, And maybe we got lost in translation/Maybe I asked for too much/But maybe this thing was a masterpiece 'til you tore it all up

Never Called it What it Was (TGT, Darklina)

[vialethe]

In the future, when they write their story, they will cast him as the dark sorcerer, seducing and wounding the sweet saint; hounding her, trapping her, forcing her into bargains bad and worse to save herself, to preserve all that was light and good and filled with love.

They will not write about the part where the saint was willing, Alina knows; not the part where she went into his arms without thought of the consequence, not the parts where he lingered in her mind like smoke, not the nights when she longed for him in her bed, when he obliged, and came to her, and left her shaken.

They won’t write about the gift of his name, given over to her like a beating heart; they will only speak of the knife she took to it, and leave out the maimed soul it left her with; they will never know Aleksander existed at all, left to die within her.

[betony]

S&B/TGT, Alina & Any, You're not my homeland anymore/So what am I defending now?/You were my town, now I'm in exile

A Very Thin Line (TGT, Darklina (shock, surprise, etc))

[vialethe]

“You don’t have to keep haunting me,” she says, hunched over a book of fairytales she’s long since ceased to read, too distracted by the silent apparition of him starting over her shoulder. “It’s not as though I’m going to forget you exist if I can’t see you.”

“No, Alina,” he says, dipping his head, nudging aside the edge of her robe with gentle fingers that shouldn’t even be able to touch her; “I’ve made certain you’ll always feel me with you,” he adds, the heat of his skin melting into the blackened wound left in her shoulder, the sound she makes twisting between pleasure and pain - and when she turns, he’s gone.

[betony]

S&B/TGT, Kaz/Inej, I'm like the water when your ship rolled in that night/Rough on the surface, but you cut through like a knife

Feel You Sneaking In (S&B, Kaz/Inej)

[vialethe]

“I’m thinking of growing a beard,” he says to her, partly because it’s the truth but mostly to distract from the way she’s looking at his face; Inej sees too much in him, always has, and some days her gaze is like being stripped bare, down to the dirty black of his soul. “Adds to my reputation if I look more fearsome,” he says, and doesn’t add and less like a boy who you might still love, if you weren’t careful, like someone who could give you everything you deserve.

But Inej only makes a soft dismissive noise, pacing towards him on silent feet until her proximity makes him breathe faster; all she says is, “That sounds like just another way to distance yourself from me, Kaz Brekker - making your face rougher won’t work,” and her kiss, when it comes, is feather-light enough that he doesn’t even flinch.
*
(The TSwift prompt flood amused me, btw.)

[betony]

S&B/TGT, Baghra, I had a marvelous time ruining everything

Must Have Been Her Fault (TGT (R&R), Baghra & Alina)

[vialethe]

She imagines it, imagines saying it right to this silly little girl’s face, imagines the stupified expression that would pass over it if she said all her secrets out loud; much like the look on it when she spoke all her son’s secrets and ruined his precious last chance, she hopes still.

Imagines:
-I made my children what they are on purpose -
-I never liked any of you, and I enjoyed tormenting your weaknesses -
-I was so small, but I meant to do it and I wasn’t sorry for it -
-(I am still not sorry for it) -
-(But I am lonely; I do miss my sister) -
-He is the best of them, the only one I loved, the only one I regret making -

Instead, she sighs, and coughs, and jabs at Alina with her stick, forcing her out, forcing her away, and says only, “Go on girl, you’re spoiling my marvelous time,” and does not let on how much of it is truth.

(Yes, I cheated. And also laughed out loud when I read the prompt.)

[betony]

S&B/TGT, Any , darling I'm a nightmare dressed like a daydream

Baby, I’m Your Queen (TGT, Darklina)

[vialethe]

She looks the part of Sankta Alina, she knows, gold spikes and pearls set into the gossamer white of her hair (“Think of it like the rays of the sun if a tiara bothers you so much, sweetheart,” had been Nikolai’s offering), robes falling to the floor in waves of glistening silk, shot through with gold threads, rich and resplendent and nearly stiff enough to stand empty without her.

The embroidery marking it is deepest blue, of course, the summoner’s color, and Genya does up her face beautifully, all rose blush and thick lashes and just a scattered hint of gold, enough to distract from the Ravkan double-eagle jewelry that waits in velvet cases to be draped over her.

But that robe - alone for one last moment, Alina eyes it where it hangs, drawing back the edge to slide her fingers across the fabric that will touch her skin, hold her, caress every bit of her, and smiles to see the Fabrikators followed her last and most important instruction to the letter: line it in black.

(I have no idea what's going on in this AU oh my god)

[betony]

Hamlet, Gertrude/Claudius, It's born from just one single glance/But it dies and it dies and it dies/A million little times

[smallhobbit]

How many years ago had it all started, one look and they'd fallen for each other? And each time they'd met there'd been the fear of being found out, that someone would know, would say something, that drop in the pit of the stomach which never ceased to happen. And now that they are together it still continues, the fear that someone knows, that blackmail is just round the corner, that it will be broadcast throughout the castle.

[betony]

Hamlet, Gertrude & Any, Now he sits on his throne in his palace of bones/Praying to his greed/He's got my past frozen behind glass/But I've got me

[ernest]

(a slightly different gertrude from the one i've been writing, one whose husband was not an abusive dick)

Gertrude is a queen of Denmark, meaning she is Denmark, meaning she has never been herself alone. Every moment of her life is preserved on screen or in print, but by now she is used to a mediated existence, and she says the correct words to keep the critics at bay with a practiced smile she doesn’t even need to think about anymore, and even enjoys her role, most of the time.

Still it’s hard, watching the royal funeral rebroadcast, and she winces to see how she would have stumbled without her son there to guide her away from a dead king’s coffin, until Claudius finally says, “I think it’s time to turn that off,” and she knows he’s right.

[betony]

15th Century RPF, Richard III/Anne Neville, If you kiss me, will it be just like I dreamed it?/Will it patch your broken wings?

A Figment of My Worst Intentions (Historical RPF, Richard III/Anne, modern political AU)

[vialethe]

“Kiss me,” she demands, hot and breathless, and if it gives him pause, it’s only because of his sister’s words ringing in his head (“She may not be the same girl you remember, you know - she’s been through a lot,”), only because the bit of her husband’s blood he’d missed, still embedded in the crease of his knuckles where they’d reduced Edward Lancaster’s face to a less-than-pretty state.

Only because of the way he remembers her from their university days, sweet, dreamy Anne with her head full of poems and paintings, with her endless patience for his political philosophy and impassioned rants about whatever his brother and her father were plotting, even as it ruined them all.

“I won’t break, Richard,” she says, adding, “stop making me wait longer than I already have,” and that’s all it takes in the end, enough for him to bring his mouth down on hers for the first time in way too long; enough to erase all the blood painting their past.

[betony]

15th Century RPF, Anne Neville, Sometimes giving up is the strong thing/Sometimes to run is the brave thing

The Same Little Breaks (15 Century RPF, Anne Neville (/Richard?))

[vialethe]

Marguerite asks her once for stories of her cousins, almost absently, as though she has forgotten who they are, who Anne grew up with, though the Queen does not forget such things, nor does she forgive them.

“But I hardly remember those days,” Anne says, her voice a blithe light, as though she spoke the truth.

And maybe she does; that night, as her husband breathes in the dark beside her, she tries to conjure up Richard’s face in her mind and finds it blurred, a smudged collection of features she once knew as well as her own - and all she can think to do is close her eyes and give thanks for the mercy of memory, blotting out the things she cannot allow herself to mourn.

[betony]

Greek Mythology, Clytemnestra, Cold was the steel of my axe to grind/For the boys who broke my heart/Now I send their babies presents

[ernest]

If she loved Agamemnon less, she could simply leave him – not that there’s anything simple about it, it’s still a daunting thought. But to live knowing that somewhere out there a man is still living whom she still loves, and trying to reconcile that with a small grave is a future that doesn’t bear thinking about, so her mind and hand are steady.

She loves him, so it has to hurt; that is what tragedy demands – in the end, it’s not vengeance, but balance.

[betony]

Greek Mythology, Aeneas/Cassandra, The devil's in the details, but you got a friend in me/Would it be enough if I could never give you peace?

You Paint Dreamscapes on the Wall (Greek Mythology, Aeneas/Cassandra)

[vialethe]

Andromache hesitates, her smile faltering as she says, “I love you both dearly, my friend, but - you do know she is not well, that there are easier wives you might take from among Priam’s many daughters?”

Aeneas watches Cassandra across the courtyard, watches the ripple of her hair and thinks of the river of it falling across his face, dark and rich with perfume; watches the sun light up her skin like a jealous lover and think of its heat pressed against his own; watches her eyes narrow as she spies them and thinks of the oddity of her words, the terrifying blankness of her gaze on him at times, of the storm of her tears that too often follows, a flow he is unable to stem.

And he thinks, too, of the shuddering in her breath as she calms in his arms, of the words she repeats into the space over his heart, not meant for him - yours is my only peace - and responds with two words only as she approaches, her hands outstretched: “I know.”

[betony]

Greek Mythology, Helen, No one teaches you what to do/When a good man hurts you/And you know you hurt him too

[dariaw]

You watch the greatness of Troy crumble away, scattering into Greek ships, a few captives and vases and bronze shields at a time, the greatest of cities dissolving into the sea a little more every day.

You know precisely what it means to shatter slowly; that's what it felt like to be married to Menelaus.

You hate yourself for the pain you've caused, but you recognize it, remember it deep in your bones, and so you can look at it directly, without flinch.

[betony]

Collegia Magica, Dante, You are not like the regulars/The masquerade revelers/Drunk as they watch my shattered edges glisten

[betony]

Collegia Magica, Anne/Dante, I'd meet you where the spirit meets the bones/In a faith-forgotten land/In from the snow

[betony]

Greek Mythology, Hektor/Andromache, You take my hand and drag me head first/Fearless/And I don't know why/But with you I'd dance in a storm

Capture It, Remember It (Greek Mythology, Andromache/Hektor)

[vialethe]

“Be fearless,” he says to her, eyes firm on hers, the battlefield commander in him speaking, as though she were part of his phalanx, and so she nods, grasps his hand tight, and feels his kiss on her brow like a blessing before he flees the room, herded out by a flock of women, clucking and fussing; almost, she laughs to see his confidence vanish in a flash, if not for the pains that wrack her.

Long after the sun falls, she presents him with their son, watching the quiet joy in his eyes enfold them both.

For that moment, the storm outside is far away, and Andromache is content.

[betony]

Greek Mythology, Any, They say "move on," but you know I won't/And women like hunting witches too/Doing your dirtiest work for you

[ernest]

So what exactly is she supposed to do – pretend she only had the one brother and leave Polynices for the dogs?

No.

The laws of men are temporary but the laws of gods persist beyond bones, so she goes by herself into no man’s land to do the hard, dirty, right work that no one else will, unshakable in the knowledge that it doesn’t matter how she may be hunted for it.

[betony]

Greek Mythology, Penelope(/Odysseus), Before I learned civility/I used to scream ferociously/Any time I wanted

Though I Can’t Recall Your Face (Greek Mythology, Penelope/Odysseus)

[vialethe]

As she takes apart the day’s weaving her hands have accomplished, Penelope remembers the early days of her marriage, the explosive arguments that raged from peristyle to gardens to bedchamber, their passions too wild, too unrestrained, too much.

“Two clever people married to each other is a poor idea,” Odysseus would say, once they had collapsed in sweat and giggles, the ferocity of disagreements forgotten; until she reminded him that it had been his idea, in truth, and the cycle would spin anew.

And now, now that every creeping coward for miles circles her like a pack of hungry dogs - now Penelope dreams of pulling his bow from the wall, forsaking the string as she has been forsaken, and clubbing them all to death with their own impotence, all the fierce rage of a decade and more released in a howling lust for blood; instead she pulls the threads free with a woman’s patience, one by one, careful not to let them snap (as though they were his lifeline, as though they were hers).

[betony]

Greek Mythology, Hektor/Andromache, 'Cause all I know is we said, "Hello"/And your eyes look like comin' home/All I know is a simple name/And everything has changed

I’ve Missed You All This Time (Greek Mythology, Andromache/Hektor)

[vialethe]

When her brother Etocles finds her before their father can, tells her that Priam’s heir has come down from the great city of Troy to ask for her hand, she laughs in his face, so absurd is the idea; there are scrapes on her knees, bits of bracken in her hair, the scent of horse lingering about her person; she is hardly anyone’s idea of a queen.

When she discovers the truth of it, she assumes the true wealth of her father is the desired goal: the horses, bred for strength, beauty, war and glory, a far more impressive prize than she could hope to be, for Hektor is a well-known horseman, respected for it even by she, who respects so few.

When she meets him for the first time, she expects little and less, expects a man who will dismiss her as one more piece of baggage, just the price he must pay; so it is that he takes her by surprise, all dark curls and intense gaze, a look that sees right through her and enjoys the view, she thinks, and watches the warmth in those eyes as he speaks a single word: “Andromache,” her life spinning off course, contained in the lyrical syllables of her name rolling across his tongue.

[animus_wyrmis]

Narnia, The Tisroc and the King, Rabadash's maybe-maybe not son, palace intrigue finds him kidnapped and taken to sea; the ship is recaptured, but not before the baby drifts northward to Archenland and is found by a poor fisherman...

[chanter1944]

Star Trek: TOS or DS9, Hikaru Sulu or Benjamin Sisko & any, the unexpected benefits of a warm command voice

DS9, Ben and Jake, Getting What You Want

[silveradept]

"Did I tell you that my first-year Academy instructors left a note on my files for other instructors to pay more attention to what I was saying?" Commander Sisko said, waving some of the smells of the pot over to his nose too check the food.

"What did you do?" Jake said, watching the cooking intently, trying to see all the steps involved.

"When you have a warm voice and and approachable personality, people tend to believe you and that you are reasonable," Commander Sisko replied, "which, for you, means they'll tell you things they didn't plan on saying, and for me, meant I convinced all of my classmates to make small modifications to a supposedly unwinnable scenario so they could succeed at it, and I could take advantage of all of their work without having to risk getting caught."

[chanter1944]

Star Trek: DS9, any two or more characters, roleswap (roleshuffle?)

[animus_wyrmis]

Narnia, The Tisroc and the King, the Tisroc has a harem partially for political reasons. Aravis isn't thrilled about the tradition.

on the subject of husbands

[nasimwrites]

"I fear it will always be a difficult balance to strike, O Tisroc," Ishamiel says. "You are going against tradition, and yet require tradition to bolster your reign."

Aravis fights the annoyance his little explanation and instead tries to focus on the practicalities -- or rather, the lack of practicality at hand. "The entire premise is lacking. The only reason Tisrocs have historically had multiple wives has been with the object of birthing as many potential Crown Princes as possible, then watching them fight it out to determine the strongest surviving candidate. This is impossible with me," she snaps.

"I agree," Ishamiel replies. "But this practice is also a way to strike policial alliances that cannot be solved any other way. You are still offering the possibility of am heir, and a direct line to the throne, for the families. Not to mention a clear preference for their provinces."

"I would be opening myself up to murderers. Who would your candidates be? One of Bilash Tarkaan's other sons, who would slit my throat in my sleep?"

"Or," Lasaraleen puts in pointedly, and most unhelpfully, Aravis feels, "One of Rabadash's brothers, who might protect you even more closely while bolstering your claim to the throne. A child of two Tisrocs is much better than one." She sniffed. "But certainly having only a single husband would be limiting your reach."

"But how on earth would we ascertain parentage?" Aravis feels nauseated at the thought.

"Perhaps there is power in that ambiguity. A luxury your predecessors did not have."