We Can't Rewind, We've Gone Too Far

Eventually you have to acknowledge that you're never going to finish the giant smutty epic you started six years ago, and that you should just post the perfectly good sex scene that's been sitting around mostly finished on your hard drive for most of that time. Because it's perfectly good smut and hopefully it will make other people happy!

(Technically there's another increasingly fragmented 5k or so of this, so further chapters are theoretically possible but unlikely.)

Title: Are You the Answer?
Rating: Explicit
Fandom: Marvel Post-CA:TWS Nostalgia
Characters: Clint Barton, James "Bucky" Barnes, Natasha Romanov
Warnings/Enticements: MCU Post-TWS Nostalgia, Deaf Character, Oral Sex, Anal Sex, Explicit Sexual Content
Summary:
Clint and Bucky hook up.

That’s it, that’s the fic.
Wordcount: 2897 words

On AO3

The threesentenceficathon is now closed for prompts, but remains open for fills forever. Here’s some more of mine, in all different fandoms; I will eventually post the last bunch of them once I’m sure there’s not going to be any more.

( The Old Guard )

( Our Flag Means Death )

( Snow White (Disney) )

( Marvel Comics )

( This Is How You Lose the Time War (El-Mohtar & Gladstone) )

( Batman Comics )

( Goodbye Earl - The Chicks )

( Original D&D-ish fantasy )

First of all, the Retired Beekeepers of Sussex are no longer holding events, and while their journals are still archived online I thought I should put this on AO3:

Title: Discretion
Rating: G
Universe: ACD Holmes
Characters: Mrs. Hudson, Sherlock Holmes
Warnings/Enticements: Character Study, Victorian Attitudes
Summary: Mrs Hudson overhears something, and is thrown into an ethical dilemma.
Word Count: 722

On AO3

And here is a (very brief) second chapter to a fic from September:

Title: Far to Go
Rating: T
Universe: Marvel
Characters: Natasha Romanov, Clint Barton, Bucky Barnes
Warnings/Enticements: De-Aging, Implied Child Abuse, Canon-Typical Violence, Natasha Romanov Backstory, Angst, Paranoia, Hurt/Comfort, Natasha Romanov Needs a Hug, But She Certainly Wouldn't Accept One, Sign Language, Blizzards, Handcuffs, Unreliable Narrator
Summary: "You know the kind of thing: scientists make something, realize they have no use for it and no one sane would want it around, and then instead of destroying it like anyone sensible would they stick it in a high security containment facility and forget about it until someone steals it, and we have to go and steal it back. They say it’s only dangerous if you drink it, we say great, we’ll have it back by Tuesday, and then Natasha touches the bottle and loses twenty years."
--
It's a test. Of course it's a test. She must have been drugged. This must be a false mission set up by the Red Room. These men must be Red Room too. She just has to figure out how to pass the test.

Right?
Word Count: 5417

On AO3

And finally, from a shameless self promotion angle, if you are waiting impatiently for Yuletide to open, have a fic recommendation:

Title: Strike the Harp and Join the Chorus
Rating: T
Universe: The Hidden Almanac
Characters: Reverend Mord, Pastor Drom, George the Crow
Warnings/Enticements: Episode Style, History, Canon-Typical Weirdness, Mentions of Human Sacrifice, Mentions of RPF (Real Poultry Fiction), Characters Participating in Yuletide, Holidays, Humour
Summary: It was on this day that the gifts in a holiday fanfiction exchange were revealed. It is the Feast Day of Yuletide, and in the garden, there are stories.

Be Safe, and Remember: You Are Not Alone.
Word Count: 3400

On AO3

I keep feeling like I have things to say about stories, and then I post them in the evening and have to come up with titles and tags and summaries and by the time I get to DW I barely remember how sentences work.

Title: Far to Go
Rating: T
Universe: Marvel
Characters: Natasha Romanov, Clint Barton, Bucky Barnes
Warnings/Enticements: De-Aging, Implied Child Abuse, Canon-Typical Violence, Natasha Romanov Backstory, Angst, Paranoia, Hurt/Comfort, Natasha Romanov Needs a Hug, But She Certainly Wouldn't Accept One, Sign Language, Blizzards, Handcuffs, Unreliable Narrator
Summary: "We were on a mission today. You know the kind of thing: scientists make something, realize they have no use for it and no one sane would want it around, and then instead of destroying it like anyone sensible would they stick it in a high security containment facility and forget about it until someone steals it, and we have to go and steal it back. They say it’s only dangerous if you drink it, we say great, we’ll have it back by Tuesday, and then Natasha touches the bottle and loses twenty years."
--
It's a test. Of course it's a test. She must have been drugged. This must be a false mission set up by the Red Room. These men must be Red Room too. She just has to figure out how to pass the test.

Right?
Word Count: 4711

On AO3

So basically all of the dystopic takes on superheroes I've seen have the supers, or at least most of them, employed by either the government or a single shadowy organization and acting as law enforcement.

But why? Clearly their skills are more useful in the private sector.

Superhero teams are mercenaries organized by major corporations. Their celebrity status raises the companies' public image, they can attack other companies to distract them/discredit them/steal trade secrets, and of course then everyone needs their own team to fight off rivals.

This is all very inconvenient for the general public but of course the superheroes also do photo-ops cleaning up litter and volunteering at animal shelters. So that's fine.

Also there are reality TV shows, media interviews with the heroes, corporate award ceremonies, etc., etc.

And every so often a superhero team will deal with an actual threat to a nearby area, like cleaning up after a natural disaster, or stopping some terrorist whose exact plans and location the team just happened to find out about just in the nick of time. (The city is billed later.)

If a non-combatant sustains injuries during a superhero battle of course the company responsible will pay compensation! As long as you can prove that it was definitely one of their superheroes, that you could not possibly have known there would be a fight at that place and time, and that you were taking reasonable precautions to avoid it.

Each team's media releases claim that most/all of the other teams are full of supervillains. Alliances are constantly shifting.

I am amused to realize that immediately after I fell out of Holmes fandom and therefore stopped doing watsons_woes's July Writing Prompts, I found another annual month-long low-stress short fic prompt fest to participate in.

Tidying up my last few fills; fics over 100 words are appearing on AO3 as usual; recs post to follow.

( Narnia (2) )

( Greek Mythology )

( Marvel )

Maybe if there is productive activity in one area I will actually go and listen to my microcontrollers lectures.

Three Sentence Ficathon is now at a new post, so if you were thinking "Oh god 50 pages of comments" now you can start there. It's fine, you don't need to read everything!

That said, these are mostly from the previous post.

( Marvel (2) )

( Narnia )

( Hamlet )

( The Little Mermaid (Hans Christian Andersen) )

( Fin-de-Siecle RPF )

( Calvin and Hobbes )

( Harry Potter )

( Cordelia (Movie Poster 2020) )

Taking a break from scrolling through to post about Three Sentence Ficathon!

I am having so much fun again. (Possibly I should be thinking about microcontrollers instead, but whatever.) Fun is what I need in writing right now, and I hoped this would help, and it really really has.

So actually the first of these is not for this Three Sentence Ficathon, it's for the one at be_compromised which started Friday and is still open if you want MCU specifically and Clint&/Natasha more specifically.

( MCU )

And for rthstewart's, from the last couple days:

( The Old Guard (2) )

( Calvin and Hobbes )

( Harry Potter )

( Narnia )

All of that was just yesterday. Today so far:

( Original Horror )

( Much Ado About Nothing )

( Greek Myth )

( The Addams Family crossover )

So much fun.

A lot of these are drabbles or longer and will go up on AO3 eventually.

I'm sure everyone has other things to think about right now,* but here is my Trick or Treat fic:

Title: Desert Dreams
Rating: T
Universe: The Old Guard
Characters: Quynh, Andromache
Warnings/Enticements: Canon-typical Temporary Character Death, Pre-Canon, First Meeting, First Kiss
Summary: Quynh gave up—once.
Word Count: 408

On AO3

And Growing Seasons was updated Friday as usual, although now that I am slightly less anxious I should start properly editing the last chapter.

I have not signed up for Yuletide this year, because I very clearly need a break from writing. Therefore I don't know if I'll make it to 400,000 words total on AO3 this year or not. If I end up treating anything then I probably will.

*I'm not watching the speech because I would have to watch it with my mother, and probably I would cry. Which would be fine in, you know, other circumstances, with someone who wasn't allergic to emotions. I am reading the 538 liveblog and explaining to Pepper that she doesn't get fed yet.

Marvel Femslash Drabble Exchange is open.

Mostly unrelated to that:

Title: Girls Like You
Rating: T
Universe: Marvel
Characters: Natasha Romanov
Summary: Strong female role models build and reinforce young women’s capacity to achieve their dreams.
Warnings/Enticements: Red Room, Backstory, Various Dark Themes
Word Count: 337

On AO3