temptin' you to defy it (prompts post)

[harborshore]

Tonight, I have rewritten the introduction to my thesis so that it accurately reflects what it is about (and in the process, things became very clear in my head in a beautifully structured way). I might be feeling fairly pleased with myself at the moment.

Now, though, I am drinking beer, working on old ficlet prompts and contemplating stories, the kinds I like to tell. So if you're around and feel like it, give me two characters, a pairing or a friendship, some kind of 'first' or realization, and a setting. Bonus points for rare pairings, weird inclusions of magic, wacky AUs or crossovers, etc. I will do five or six or so. ♥

(And yes, I realize the fic I just posted also fits this. I did say the kinds of stories I like to tell. *grins*)

Fandoms/bands: The Like, PATD, The Young Veins (but probably not the new members, they're named Andy and Nick and--Nick? right?), FOB, BTVS, Veronica Mars, DCU, potentially something else that I have forgotten.

Comments

[dancinbutterfly.livejournal.com]

Okay - rare.... Bob/Ryan Ross and.... accidental soulbonding

Do i get bonus points?

[harborshore.livejournal.com]

Haha, yes, I suppose you do. *grins*


Ryan doesn't think much about it at first, the way he feels a steady pull in the back of his head. Not, like, a physical pull; it's as if there's someone right there with him, all the time. Or someone who is supposed to be there.

He chalks it up to missing Spencer (he does, he's just not going to call him) and keeps going to class, keeps doing his thing. Like that.

But then there's a moment when he walks into the music department in order to see whether he can audit Music Theory II despite the semester already having started, and he sees the guy sitting there, fiddling with a pair of drumsticks. It's almost like there's an audible click, and then Ryan can't move.

"Oh fuck," the guy says, and then he's out of his seat, catching Ryan.

Ryan tries to explain that he wasn't fainting, he was just, um, but all he can manage to say is, "Hi."

The guy is holding him pretty steady. "Hi."

"Do you--"

Yeah.

Holy shit. Did you just think that at me? Ryan can't breathe.

The guy--Bob, Ryan knows now, without him having to say it--looks miserable. "Sorry," he says. "Sorry, I think this is my fault."

Ryan shakes his head. It's not bad, it doesn't feel bad, it's, "It feels really right," he explains.

Bob swallows. "That's, yeah, but it wouldn't have happened to you if not for me." And now you're stuck.

Ryan is going to not think about what that means for a second, because he really is trying very hard to not freak out. "It'll be okay," he says instead, and nudges Bob back to the couch he was sitting on, sitting down next to him. "We'll make it okay."

After they've sat there for a while, Bob carefully takes Ryan's hand, and Ryan ducks his head and smiles, just a little bit.

[dancinbutterfly.livejournal.com]

Hey, so it took me forever to get to t his but oh. my. god. Seriously, this is gorgeous. It hurts and is hopeful and I want to live in this verse. There are so many things I want to know - why is it Bob's fault? how will they make it okay? ARGH THIS UNIVERSE IS AWESOME. I love it so damn much. Optimistic!Ryan is kind of lovely, no joke. You dont see him very often and I adore him.

[kyasuriin.livejournal.com]

let's go with Ryan Ross and the one where's he's a potion maker's apprentice. I'm curious to know what kinds of people come into his shop and what they ask him to make :) (whatever 'verse/pairings you want. I just want Ryan being good with his hands...phwoar)

[kyasuriin.livejournal.com]

oh and congrats on the thesis progress! You must be feelin' good :D

[harborshore.livejournal.com]

I am indeed pleased! Of course, I also have three measly days to put together a complete draft so that my advisor and my darling friend can read it and give me feedback in time to make changes before the final due date--but I am pleased with this progress. *nods*

[harborshore.livejournal.com]

"I need a love spell," the girl says, peering at him from under her cap.

"A love spell," Ryan says. "Really? I mean, have you considered--"

"I just want to be able to say no to her and have it mean as much as when she said no to me," the girl says, eyes dark. She sounds really bitter, and Ryan doesn't quite know how to help.

"That seems pretty vindictive," he says carefully.

"Yeah, well, if you've spent months and months saying yes, over and over, and you just want to--" she bites her lip and stops talking. She doesn't have tears in her eyes, not quite, but Ryan hands her a tissue all the same. Just in case, like.

"I get you," Ryan says. "I just don't think, look, wouldn't it be better revenge if you were happy and you didn't need her?"

"I don't think you have a potion for that," the girl says.

And no, he doesn't, not exactly. But. "What do you like," he says. "I mean, apart from this girl?"

"Against my better judgment, etcetera," she says, and then appears to think about it. "I like dragons," she says then, "dragons and castles in the sky and things that are too beautiful to be true."

Ryan takes a moment to breathe (her tiny smile when she mentioned dragons was pretty much the best thing he's seen all week), and then says, "Look, that I think I can do."

--

Her laughter, Z's laughter, when she watches the cavorting dragons that rose out of carefully poured powders on the floor of Ryan's work room, is the best kind of music. Ryan watches her and aches, and vows silently that he's going to keep making her laugh for as long as she'll let him.

[kyasuriin.livejournal.com]

Oh this is so lovely. Z isn't the only one Ryan has made smile! *beams*

[anoneknewmoose.livejournal.com]

THESIS \o/

I really want Willow/Tara now, naturally. Maybe while they're fumbling through beginning their relationship? Spells going awry or gaining extra surprise power because of their ~attraction?

[harborshore.livejournal.com]

"I don't think that was supposed to happen." Willow was trying to get her breathing back under control, flat on the ground and looking at the ceiling.

"No," Tara said. "No, that's never happened before."

"I mean, like, I'm not saying I mind."

"Oh no, me neither! It was, um, it was nice."

It really had been. Very nice. Willow tried to convince herself to move. It was difficult. Wait.

"Tara, where do you think our clothes went?"

Tara was quiet. "You know, I don't--"

Willow grinned. "Oh well," she said casually. "I guess we'll have to investigate the possible consequences of, ah, such a disturbance in our planned spellwork, right?"

"...right," Tara agreed.

Willow could hear the smile in her voice, and she was planning to kiss that gorgeous, gorgeous mouth as soon as she could convince herself to move again. Any minute now.

Tara beat her to it.

[anoneknewmoose.livejournal.com]

PERFECT. ♥ I love them.


(Can you tell me where your Tara and Willow icons came from? Or did you make them?)

[harborshore.livejournal.com]

Thank you, darling!

maharet83 made that one, and I'm pretty sure she's made some others of them as well. I really really like her icons.

[inlovewithnight.livejournal.com]

Victoria/Z? :D? And...hmm...realizing that they ARE the revolution, post-apocalyptic AU?

Yay thesis!

[harborshore.livejournal.com]

♥!



Z first met Victoria at a rally.

Correction: Z first met Victoria during a raid after a rally, when she was coaxing a group of frightened teenagers into making a run for it (there were more of them and fewer police in this particular corner). Suddenly there was this tall amazon in combat boots and a teeny-tiny skirt next to her, and sure, her they followed.

That night they hid out in one of the safehouses together; Z didn't quite know what to say but talked anyway, like she did, and Victoria smiled a lot. Z liked her smile.

She also liked that short skirt Victoria wore (Z wished she could wear short skirts, but she looked so young when she did that she tended to dress as a boy instead, to be safe) and holy shit, did she ever like her legs. She told Victoria so once it got really late (or early, depending on how you counted), and Victoria's smile slid into a grin.

"I like you too, Z Berg," she said. They kissed, then, tired and careful, and slept curled up on the world's most uncomfortable couch.

--

Z first told Victoria she loved her after a meeting they'd accidentally ended up at, a meeting where they sat in appalled silence for about twenty minutes before Z got up and clambered onto the table.

"This is it? This is the glorious revolution?"

Someone shouted at her to get the fuck down, and Victoria stood up.

"You should hear her out," she said. "I've never heard such a stupid bunch of ideas in my life, and I would like it if we won and didn't die." There were some muttering agreement at that (apparently everyone was not on board with the plan of the fearless leaders).

"Like she can win it," a dude blurted, and Victoria laughed.

She looked at Z, and neither of them had to say anything, really.

"No," Z said. "We can win this." And it sounded like she meant everyone, Rah Rah Team Spirit, but she meant her and Victoria, because she knew they could. There would be freedom and there would be clear skies and laughter and no fear, she had never been so certain of anything before.

I love you, she thought, and Victoria smiled like she got it.

"Let's save the country," she said, and Z nodded, sitting down right on the table to make plans. Every now and then she would look up, and Victoria would chime in with the perfect idea, the thing that needed to go right in Z's pause, like she always did. It's not like Z would ever start thinking in terms of completing each other, because that was stupid, but.

--

They won. Of course they did.

[inlovewithnight.livejournal.com]

♥ ♥ ♥ AWESOME.

[egelantier.livejournal.com]

congratulations!

first time z saved ryan (with bonus dungeons setting) :D

[harborshore.livejournal.com]

"Dammit," Z said under her breath, twisting the bit of wire carefully in the lock. "Dammit, dammit, dammit." She would have been home free by now if it wasn't for the skinny boy she'd met in the baron's dungeons, chained to a wall by his wrist and quiet eyes that just--dammit, she had to get him out.

The lock finally clicked open.

Double-checking that the document she'd originally come for was still safe under her tunic, she slid the door open carefully and started making her way down the stairs. She was pretty sure she'd timed it right; about an hour before the changing of the guards was when they were the least alert, the least likely to notice if she went and stole one of their prisoners.

And she was right. The two guardsmen on duty were playing poker and barely batted an eye when she entered, used to her as they were (she'd been walking freely around the castle all week, because there were advantages to a forged introductory letter from the Marchioness De La Gare). Of course, if she overstayed her welcome (that is, if she didn't get out of here before the baron woke up and shouted the house down to come release him from his bed), they would probably object to her presence.

Also, once she got Ryan out, well. She squared her shoulders, trying to look as authoritative as possible, and walked down the hallway to his cell. He looked up at her approach. Automatically checking again that they were out of sight of the guards, she laid a finger to her lips and waved the wire she held in her other hand at him.

"You have no unavoidable engagements here tonight, correct?" she said, voice low.

He blinked at her, but then he smiled, shaking his head. "None that can't be missed," he replied in a whisper.

She started jimmying the lock of the chain on his wrist open, one hand holding his arm steady and the other twisting, twisting. He was so skinny, she thought with a pang, and she hated the baron even more while she worked, a slow burn that made her wish she would have done more than dose him with a sleeping draught and tie him to his bed.

The lock clicked and Z grinned smugly. Damn, she was so good.

"Come on," she said, walking him toward the exit.

"We're just going to walk out?" Ryan said quietly, voice so low she could barely hear him.

"That's doubt, I can hear you doubting," she said, ignoring the gnawing feeling in her own stomach that she was about to do something dumb.

An hour later, when Ryan was wrapping her side so she'd stop bleeding quite so much, and the wet leaves of the trees dripped down the back of her neck, she thought ruefully that it had been very stupid indeed. But looking at Ryan's careful hands on her, she also thought it might turn out for the best.

[egelantier.livejournal.com]

oh my god, so amazing ♥____♥

[desfinado.livejournal.com]

Pete/Brendon or Pete/Spencer (or all three!). On the set of the Cooperstown unofficial video. The realization that they kind of like the feeling of arranging/moving Pete, or that Pete enjoys being pushed/pulled around.

[jamjar.livejournal.com]

Buffy/Kon first time meeting the family.

[mahoni.livejournal.com]

Ooh, dang, you have more than six. But just in case you get on a roll and do more, I would like to toss in Bob(or girl!Bob)/Batgirl, first time Bob has a front row seat to watch Batgirl kick some bad guys' asses.

[saekokato.livejournal.com]

Can I second this? Because YES.

[x_dark_siren_x]

Hey, hey, congratulations on the thesis stuff! I currently have only a few scribbled notes for my dissertation (only we're calling it a journalism project, whatever), so I'm currently feeling very lazy. But you! You're awesome. :D

(Also, thank you very very very much for my Midsummer ficlet. It was just what I needed to read right then, and oh. ♥)