Beyond the Roundels

This is a random fic I wrote sort of for the Genremixer meme back in December, but not, because it was actually just from a prompt that I generated from it in conversation with sovay about Iron: "Iron / Mercury / Emerald - hiding an injury & trust issues." I had trouble with editing it after and then couldn't give it the last pass because of being so ill for three and half months, which was ridiculous. /o\

Anyway, here it is, also for hc_bingo square "locked in a box" and allbingo square "Borage - bluntness."

Jack in the Box (2066 words) by thisbluespirit
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Sapphire and Steel
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Emerald & Iron & Mercury (Sapphire and Steel)
Characters: Emerald (S&S), Iron (S&S), Mercury (S&S)
Additional Tags: Community: hc_bingo, Community: allbingo, Genremixer, Trapped, Locked In, Jack in the Box, Blood and Injury, Trust Issues
Summary: Put three 'elements' in a box and what do you get?

I will try and do a proper update soon, but in the meantime I have been quietly managing some fic in between rl stuff and I have a couple nearly done. But first here is a quick ficlet from the Reverse Writing Meme I did a while back on tumblr, this one for the prompt "Regina & Snow - Minor illness," one of those given me by romanajo123, and also for hc_bingo square "Taking care of somebody."

Nursing a Chill (686 words) by thisbluespirit
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Evil Queen | Regina Mills & Snow White | Mary Margaret Blanchard
Characters: Evil Queen | Regina Mills, Snow White | Mary Margaret Blanchard
Additional Tags: Ficlet, Meme, Murderous Thoughts, Illnesses, Hurt/Comfort, Community: hc_bingo, Canon-Typical Behavior, Pre-Canon, The Enchanted Forest (Once Upon a Time), Regina being the evil stepmother and fantasising about harming snow, but not actually doing anything (yet), Angst, Dark, Missing Scene
Summary: It’s not in Regina’s interests for Snow to die. Not yet. Not like this.

Written, if belatedly, for sovay (who suggested I write Iron fic), for their birthday, and also for Whumptober Day 22 (Pick Your Poison), hc_bingo square "drugged" and genprompt_bingo square "Case / Mission Fic."

Lavender's Green (5313 words) by thisbluespirit
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Sapphire and Steel
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Iron (S&S), Emerald (S&S), Silver (S&S), Original Characters
Additional Tags: Whumptober, Poison, Murder, Implied/Referenced Suicide, 1980s, Terrible mid century decor, Elemental Weirdness, Community: hc_bingo, Community: genprompt_bingo, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Nursery Rhyme References
Summary: There's something lurking in the garden, under the lavender...

(My casting for Iron and Emerald turned up in the same scene as David Collings in Breakaway for a bit. I giffed this right at the end of writing, and look at them; my casting is spot on, thank you. *bows* points smugly to gifset. ;-p I didn't actually exactly write this for this reason: I generated some prompts and of the two that bit hardest, this one included that line up.)

hc_bingo is open again, and so, having made some progress on my exchange fic, ahem, I asked for a card and got this:


( my hc_bingo card )

At the moment, I think I'm eyeing the bottom horizontal line, but it's an interesting card, and didn't immediately terrify me. What to write, and who/what for????

Because whatever's going on, I always have to sign up for my favourite bingo with the scary prompts! This year's hc_bingo card:

( My hc_bingo card )

A 500 Prompts fic for jaxomsride2, for prompt #495: The tattered, the torn - Vila Restal. Also written for hc_bingo square "Shipwrecked" and genprompt_bingo square "The north wind doth blow."

the tattered, the torn (1001 words) by thisbluespirit
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Blake's 7
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Vila Restal
Additional Tags: Shipwrecks, Post-Gauda Prime, Survivor Guilt, Community: hc_bingo, Community: genprompt_bingo, 500 prompts
Summary: Vila is washed up on a distant shore.

A rainbowfic AU that got rather out of hand. I wrote it in 2019 as a thing to cheer myself up and never really intended to type it up (for various reasons but also because I was amusing myself in part by writing this while reading Austerity Britain and making it the dullest AU ever as is appropriate for 1947) but then I decided I would to cheer myself up and keep typing regularly with 2020 being what it was, so I did. These two choices probably shouldn't have gone together. But I've finally edited the thing now, so here it is.

It also fills 2 bingo squares and a rainbowfic prompt and hopefully it will cheer at least somebody else up sometime too, and it is always good practice at steady writing, so I don't regret my life choices as much as I ought to.


Austerity Gamble (35854 words) by thisbluespirit
Chapters: 7/7
Fandom: Original Work
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Original Female Character/Original Male Character
Characters: Edward Iveson (OC), Julia Graves (OC), Hanne Graves (OC), John Iveson (OC), Elizabeth Iveson (OC)
Additional Tags: Community: rainbowfic, Community: hc_bingo, Community: genprompt_bingo, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Slow Burn, Romance, 1940s, Family Loss, Grief/Mourning, mentions of World War II, Mentions of the Blitz, Austerity Britain, Northumberland, fetes, Nightmares, Period Typical attitudes to divorce
Summary: All Edward Iveson needs right now is someone who can type, not a proposal by proxy from a family friend who’s decided he should marry her daughter. Julia has excellent typing and shorthand and no intention of doing what her mother tells her, so there shouldn’t be a problem, should there?

The other Whumptober fic I wrote (over 3 weeks ago!) needed much less editing than I thought, so here it is. \o/

Brief Candles (1058 words) by thisbluespirit
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Daisy Dalrymple - Carola Dunn
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Daisy Dalrymple/Alec Fletcher
Characters: Daisy Dalrymple, Alec Fletcher
Additional Tags: Blood, Blood Loss, Murder, Hurt/Comfort, Whumptober 2020, Community: 100fandoms, Community: hc_bingo, 500 prompts, 1920s
Summary: "You couldn't have lost this much blood. You'd be dead..."

Also for hc_bingo square "Blood loss", 100fandoms prompt #20 (discover) and for delacourtings in the 500 Prompts meme: #186 nothing could bleed that much - Alec/Daisy.

I need to catch up again, but in the meantime, (probably) my favourite bingo opened for sign-ups and I was right there, even though the prompts tend to scare me - hc_bingo!

(In addition I have rashly volunteered to sort out their tags, which has been a nice low level activity for the last couple days. If a bit too addictive!)

Anyway, I have a card! It actually has one of my vetoes on it (crucifixion), but I looked at it and decided I mostly really liked it apart from that so I kept it anyway as I would have regretted it lots had the replacement been scarier.

( My hc_bingo card )


I don't know what I'm going to do with it yet, but I am eyeing up the second horizontal line, and trying to avoid my Veto. (Which probably means I'll make something for that first if I'm not careful.)

What should I make or write for it? Assuming I ever have brain again... XD (They allow any fanworks.)

1. intoabar is open for sign-ups!

This is a fun old school ficathon (no exchange troubles here) where you choose a character you like and then choose 1-4 other fandoms you can write and the mods will randomly generate a character from those for your other character to meet (in a bar, hence the name). I wasn't sure which character to choose - I was going to have Obi-Wan Kenobi, and then I thought maybe Clara or even Jenkins, but then I decided that this was clearly the year to have Silver, so that's what I did (and chose SW Prequels, DW (12th Doctor Era), OUaT and Ripper Street as the fandoms. (I might regret Ripper Street, but I suddenly thought it could be really cool in this context.)


2. justmarriedexchange is now open for nominations! (Cracky marriage tropes for all! Or possibly if you're not me, romantic shippy marriage tropes for everyone but people who evilly contemplate nomming S&S!)


3. as is littleblackdressex which is for characters you ship with everyone/anyone. (The fandom bicycles, basically.) It's running at the same time as Just Married, so I won't be able to do it, but that does seem like a fun idea. (I definitely have some characters like that, though - Silver, Ruth Evershed, Clara Oswald, Obi-Wan Kenobi...)


4. hc_bingo have got the last of their Amnesty challenges running (with no obligation to take part in any other aspect of the bingo) - the May Small Fandoms challenge, where you get a bingo 'stamp' of four prompts and you create something in a small fandom using 1-4 of those prompts.

I got one with "mind control/possession," "orphans," "deadline/time bomb," and "sensory deprivation" and thought, hmm, this is that Copper fic I wrote for hc_bingo proper a while back, minus the orphans. At the moment, I'm thinking of using Dracula (TV 1968) as I have an idea and that should be under the 400 limit (which S&S probably isn't any more).


5. And, on top of all that, unconventionalcourtship is deciding when to have its next round. (UC is a lot of fun - you take a Mills & Boon type romance novel summary and turn it into fic, either straight or with a lot of ridiculous and subverting and as gen or shippy as you wish. With bonus fandom book covers.) It's in summer, so I suspect that'll be out, but I do love it, so we'll see. (I have a perfect summary for Obi-Wan/Padme and an idea, but OTOH I have now written that a lot since January and it was tiring so someone should just write 10k of that for me.)

For hc_bingo's March Amnesty Challenge.

loss of identity

forced soulbonding

isolation

As per the comm requirements, all contain some level of hurt, comfort, or hurt/comfort. With most recs being for "isolation" rather than the other two squares. (The squares were random selections, so I only accidentally got relevant). May contain a lot of Star Wars, because it's also a relevant square for when you're having an Obi-Wan Kenobi reading splurge.

( Cut for 16 recs in Blake's 7, Doctor Who, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, The Librarians, Once Upon a Time, Spooks, Star Wars )

Guess what's back? It's my favourite bingo! The prompts still scare me and I'm a bit wary of half my card yet again, but I can never keep away from hc_bingo:

hospital stay	group support	crisis of faith	forced marriage	whipping / flogging
bullet wounds	mutation	on the run	unwanted transformation	fall from grace
forced to participate in illegal / hurtful activity	exhaustion	WILD CARD	arena	bargaining for protection
dystopia	abuse	apocalypse	vehicle crash	loss of job / income
brainwashing / deprogramming	touch-starved	motion sickness	haunted	suicide attempt

(I'm laughing at the whole second line, because I've just been binge-watching S1-S3 of Lucifer, courtesy of my b'day presents and I'm pretty sure it's done all of that already.)