Dear Yuletide Author

[letterblade]

 Will finish this when I get back from offline vacation this weekend. turned into when I get back from offline vacation and also recover from being in dysfunctional levels of pain for like three days straight, ugh. Hi, it's finally here!

Dear Yuletide Author,

Welcome, thank you, and happy holidays to come!

So I tend to use my Yuletide letters as a space to throw out every idea I’ve had for something I’d like to see in a fandom in hopes that one of them excites you too. Please don't be intimidated by the length or feel like you have to write one of said ideas. Write what moves ya. <333

Things I Like - Fic that fills in holes or expands upon details, brings characters together who never got to meet or interact much, develops things that were only subtext or potential in canon, or otherwise enriches canon. Fic that brings in little details of worldbuilding and character and doesn't feel generic. Fic that takes into account the full depth and complexity of characters without filing down their sharp bits. Bittersweetness, complicated emotions, little words and gestures that mean the world to those specific characters. Realistic trauma response and recovery. Alternate continuities. If it is in your wheelhouse, kink that feels visceral and real. (I love yuleporn! I do not require yuleporn. Any AO3 rating welcome.)

Things I Dislike - Alternate settings, especially A/B/O and high school/coffeeshop/similar modern AUs. Seme/uke/top/bottom conventions (and role essentialism in general really), and kink where people drop out of character to read a negotiation and consent checklist. Mpreg, guro (except in Umineko where that counts as canon-typical violence), and cross-generational incest (portrayed...positively...again this refers to Umineko.)

Horizon Zero Dawn

Man, this game was a blast, Aloy is a A+++ protagonist, the worldbuilding was epic, and it was sufficiently complete unto itself that I didn't really feel the fandom cravings until a certain spy sauntered in and waggled her eyebrows. I have a primary request here, as my signup mentioned, and then some backups.

• Primary: If you at all feel the Aloy/Vanasha thirst as I do, please bring it. I adore how quickly, during their first private mission meeting, Aloy loosened up and started matching Vanasha’s friendly flirtiness a little; how quickly they fell into a dynamic where Aloy recognizes that Vanasha’s a spy and a troll and a liar but also trusts her heart. (How a girl raised in that much isolation is so socially savvy is the greatest mystery of HZD, but we take what canon gives us.) And after they ride off into the sunset together, Vanasha’s willing to show her the trust in return of being honest, maybe, if she wants. So like. I adore these two and their complimentary skills and their unexpected trust and respect for one another and their cut abs.
• Actual prompts tho: Adventurefic! Vanasha attempts to teach Aloy the ways of court intrigue and there is maybe something in the world that Aloy isn’t good at. Does Aloy ever start spilling even a little of the massive apocalyptic weirdness she’s uncovered and dealt with over the course of game, and/or does Vanasha try to ferret it out because she’s a curious spy and can’t leave well enough alone? Sparring!! and Aloy handing Vanasha her ass ofc. Galloping around on robocows together while Vanasha goes WHEEEE. Vanasha can think of all sorts of clever uses for hacking surveillance robots that Aloy hasn’t because Aloy isn’t a spy. Actual moments of intimacy that both of them are a little scared of because Aloy hides behind her stoicism and Vanasha hides behind her tricksterism but they maybe are comfortable showing their actual feelings for five whole seconds holy crap. How much is Vanasha's trolling and lying modus operandi something that pre-existed and how much of it was developed as a coping mechanism for being stuck amongst the Shadow Carja--that could be a fun thing to explore. Yuleporn very welcome: has Aloy even considered the possibility of having that kind of relationship before Vanasha came along, is she an awkward stoic virgin, will Vanasha blow her brain. (Probably!)
• Backup requests: I love Elisabet and GAIA’s relationship, the little we see of it: the way GAIA constantly surprises her as she gains sentience and empathy, the way they care for each other.
• I am not usually one for handwavy stuff that breaks the rules of canon, but if you can even vaguely justify a chance for Aloy to interact further with either Elisabet or GAIA herself, that would totally be worth it, because there are a lot of feelings to have there.
• Hey, how a girl raised in that much isolation is so socially savvy could also easily be a fic, if you have feelings about Aloy’s early childhood social development, idk.
  

(I will put in a noTP request here, involving nominated characters I didn’t request: I really don’t feel Aloy/Erend or Aloy/Avad. Which is not to say I don’t adore her dynamics with both (the evolution of her friendship with Erend from awkward flirting and suspicion to practically found siblings is stellar), but no shipping there, please. >.>)

Xenosaga

Man, idk why I keep requesting this; bullheadedness, and the fact that I forgot to nominate Star Driver instead. I pulled some different characters this time, at least?

This clutch of character nominations is basically all about chaos’ friendships, because zen space Jesus has endearing close friendships with multiple dudes who he met during hellwar on Miltia. Or more than friendships if you choose.

• chaos and Jr. They have a really excellent friendship, going all the way back to chaos carrying Jr. out of the wreckage of Miltia, and there’s a lot of implied stuff offscreen which seems really fun to explore. We know for a fact that chaos was there after Jr. killed Albedo at the end of II—psychically pulling him out of breakdown, even, because lol Xenosaga—and I’d love to see some of what happened between then and the two of them coming back to the Durandal with Jr. in a stat of sad acceptance. (Especially since it was pretty much immediately after that chaos popped off to give his “I’ve made up my mind, I won’t stay on the sidelines” speech to Wilhelm—were the two connected, even? Did this whole string of events affect chaos much more than he wanted it to?) Or earlier on, during the time between Miltia and game, when Jr. was learning how to be a civilian and have fun. Or pretty much anything, really. chaos feels like an extra big brother to Jr., pretty much, and given the entire URTV situation, that is some feeling.
• chaos and Jin. This is probably the most low-key one: the interaction that really drove their friendship home to me was at the beginning of II, when the party visits Jin’s house and Jin casually invites chaos to stay the night and they sit up in the garden being old war bros. Really I’d love to see more exploration of Jin’s character in general; his history with Margulis and Pellegri and how deeply that affected him kind of got the short end of the stick in canon development and the let’s-try-to-shove-everything-in of III. And it seems that chaos understands Jin far better than most people—especially because Jin is kind of an old-fashioned guy, and chaos is, well, six thousand. It’s…hilariously ambiguous…what happened to chaos at the end of III, but I’d love to see him getting some time to process Jin’s death. (I personally assume these two are low-key banging, but ship quotient is entirely up to you.)
• chaos and Canaan. The big ship, an excellent ship (or friendship), and given everything that happened in canon, I’m not sure there’s anything more I need to say here besides “aaahhh feelings” and “more please.” There wasn’t much time for quiet moments in III, and given everything that was going down, there’s a lot of interesting emotional context for both of them to sort through.

Umineko no Naku Koro ni

The short version: I want an Umineko fic! Anything. Go. I live in hope.

The long version is…well, this canon is very tl:dr; and so is this pile of bullet points. Let me restate the above: you don’t need to write off this list, it’s just some ideas. (Some of them could probably even slide into the same fic, idk.) Also a large chunk of these requests could end horribly, given, y'know, Umineko; crueltide is ok in this context.

 

• I adore Will and Lion and their relationship, so shipfic 1000% welcome. Happy end domesticity, casefic (esp. casefic where the Watson gets to shine), adventures across the sea of fragments, hurt/comfort, metafic (lolmineko), smut (oh please), whatever the hell else, because they’re excellent. If you can’t decide, let this be the thing I make the most puppyeyes for.
• Or genfic that hits some of the same places, if shipfic is not your cup of tea.
• Will character focus: we know he used to be a ruthless, accomplished, feared inquisitor, and the turnaround from that into the lazy (or depressed?) and grumpily-yet-profoundly kind Will we know fascinates me. I’d particularly love to see fic that digs into how he relates to his past, how much he regrets, how he carries it, because that sort of redemption arc is my catnip.
• Lion character focus: this is less even a specific request and just blathering about aspects of the character I enjoy and would like to see brought out more, but I love the very subtle ways in which you can see the common threads of character running between Lion and Sayo. The intense intelligence and charisma and willpower, the streak of mischief and trolling and deception (tempered in Lion’s case to butt-pinches and “well which do you think I look like? :P” but definitely present), they’re both queer as heckie regardless of circumstances even if they are queer as heckie in different ways due to circumstances, etc. Lion’s lack of emotional self-awareness is slightly sad and also slightly adorable. Admittedly this is more in the context of larger plottier fic than other things, but I would always love to see Lion getting a chance to take a more proactive role and put that cleverness and willpower into play; they prefer to be a civilian and live happily, clearly, but hey, the shonen fantasy sequence where they have to fight for it would be fun. (Also if somebody made of the same stuff as Beatrice is vanilla, I will eat my hat.)
• There’s a lot of potential to explore Lion’s other relationships, which didn’t get much depth because of their relatively brief and reactive role in the story. (Honorable mention to Natsuhi who wasn’t nominated.) Jessica, for example! Those two would have had an interesting sibling relationship, I think, contentious but also pretty devoted, given that they’re both warm-hearted people in search of connections. (Also dating in some other continuities…that’s a jolt on the meta.) I noticed that Jessica seems slightly more comfortable at performing ladylike politeness in ep.7, which makes me wonder if Lion managed to…translate, more or less, between Natsuhi’s expectations and Jessica’s reality, and bridge the painful gap of Natsuhi and Jessica pretty genuinely loving each other but really not understanding each other. Also how does it change Jessica to have the pressure of the headship off her? To have her overachieving sibling against her own perceived mediocrities (oh, Jessica, your self-esteem is broken)? Did they ever sit up at night banging their heads against gender roles and expectations together?
• Lambdadelta’s patronage of Lion is also a thing I deeply enjoy, particularly that moment in ep.8 where Lion pretty much, by sheer certainty and charisma, talked Lambda into throwing in with these losers and giving them their chance. I’d love to see more of their…friendship? Partnership? I can’t quite say mentorship because Lion is so decisively human and not a witch, but…whatever it is. Meta shenanigans? Lion fearlessly dealing with Lambda’s cruel and ruthless side? Will along for the ride?
• And of course Lion and Beatrice. I wish that oh-so-brief interaction in the “cast party” of ep.8 could have been an entire tl:dr; Umineko scene because wow, here are a lot of feels. (Maybe it is in the manga, idk, I haven’t read past what’s released yet.) Again, bonus if Will is along for the ride, given the peculiarly intimate, bittersweet thing of him being able to do for her, on some deep or strange or distant level that she may or may not be aware of, what she desperately wished Battler could do but he couldn’t. The horrible AU would be what if Bern had moved far earlier, put Lion into contact with Beato where she was in, like, episode 2; I can’t imagine that would be as positive a self-reunion. Crackship time: if you can make Beatrice/Lion work I will expire in glee.
• Oh, yes, Battler and Beatrice? I also ship them one whole hell of a lot. Would love to see kinky smut with these two, hell yeah. Would love the real-world what-if of Sayo choosing to…if not live, then at least not die right then, and dealing with aalllll the messy fallout of the massacre and Sayo trying to find a place in the outside world and physical intimacy with massive dysphoria and guilt and grieving for George and Jessica and possibly taking care of little Ange…there is endless stuff to chew on there.
• Speaking of AUs: Jessica Learns Everything AU. I don’t think I’ve seen somebody do that one yet, and there’s so much potential. I’d love to see how Jessica’s awkwardly endearing desire to coax Kanon out of his shell rearranges itself around all the surprises that pour out of said shell. Her guilt at not recognizing that he was Shannon (or did she recognize that eventually? is that part of setting up the AU?) Her sexuality questioning? Her fear, voiced or not, legitimate or not, of losing the person she fell for to…the rest of his alter egos? And of course Sayo is no doubt an utter wreck through all this, given…well, everything.
• Also in general, really, Jessica and Kanon/and/or/Sayo being cute madly-in-love teenagers figuring out how to love each other is adorable ok, I love their relationship.
• Speaking of Sayo and back to fantasyland: I would have loved to see more exploration of Beatrice and Kanon’s relationship after he pretty much hands her the key to her own resurrection in ep.6, especially in light of all the terribleness in ep.2 and other earlier outings. (Man, Tohya likes to write Sayos being profoundly kind to and supportive of one another, compared to Sayo’s own fantasies of self-loathing writ large—like look at the two Beatos in ep.6 too. Well, lbr, Tohya probably kept hoping they’d make out…right, back to fantasyland.) Beatrice and Kanon have always seemed to…understand each other better than the far more conventionally idealized Shannon, and I’d love to see that understanding change in light of Kanon’s choice to tell Beatrice about her nature (and the almost smug joy he took in doing so, ilu Kanon). Golden land friendship, short version here.
• Speaking of golden land friendship, I have no detailed source for my conviction that in a perfect world, if she wasn’t busy trying to murder her boyfriend, Jessica and Beatrice would get along like a house on fire, but it’s there. Well, we know Jessica likes fellow rambunctious and high-energy girls. Idk, I would just love to see Jessica’s extroversion and sheepish desire to share her interests meeting Beatrice’s more earnest side of wanting to see the world and experience all kinds of fun things. (A very Sayo trait that got poured into Beatrice because she was the only one who could safely express it, at least is how I read that. Who knows, maybe this is a meta/fantasy side to Jessica-learns-everything.)
• Intra-Beato interactions in general that aren’t entirely crappy and let them figure out ways to support each other give me life.
• I haven’t even gotten to Ange yet, holy hell. I love Ange. That’s about all the energy I have to say at this point, because this is getting long and I need to post it and I’ve belatedly realized that it’s actually impossible for me to get matched for Umineko so this is all useless anyway. Appropriately enough on Ange’s entry. Also some of the things I want to say about Ange aren’t relevant with this character set (i.e. she’s gay and lonely pls give her a girlfriend even an imaginary one, and the reasons I crackship her and Lambda are tied up in rambly personal continuities and hard to explain.) Character study as she starts living her new writer life would be wonderful. Ange and Beato interactions are beautiful. I also adore the idea of Will and Lion becoming narrative influences on Ange as she starts to let herself live past her tragedy, since they are team HAPPY ENDING DAMMIT :E; whatever form that influence takes, new imaginary friends or whatever else. This has gotten very tl:dr. Ah, it’s useless, it’s all useless. So long, see you in hell.