Dear Chocolatier,
This year, I'm all about people just having terrible ideas and the lovely chaos that results from it. Screwing your ex-partner who's trying to kill you? Yes! Sleeping with a long-lost family member? Why not! Deciding that delicate diplomatic negotiations are far less important than getting with that hot chess player across from you? I've already endorsed this decision!
Also, vampires. Just turn everyone into vampires and we're good. Thank you for writing for me!
Cowboy Bebop (Live Action TV)
Spike/Vicious
Look, I liked this show a lot and I was actually bummed when it was canceled, because there was still so much potential for hilarious chaos, especially with a Vicious that was at the mercy of all the bad decisions that he had made, a Spike that was still perfectly free to keep making bad decisions, and a number of other delightful people that could sit back, eat popcorn, and watch it all unfold. And I'm not going to lie, I definitely appreciated that finale where Spike was gratuitously tied to a pillar, Vicious was talking about family crypts and brotherhood and definitely not being a rejected ex-boyfriend, and everyone was watching them, like should we interrupt this? Is this something they do?
So yeah, something with the two of them and their intensely terrible relationship would be great. How far did they get in their past - is Vicious angry because he never actually got to sleep with Spike and the gun thing is a metaphor for all the penetration he's not getting? Or did they actually hook up and now look at Spike, running around with that floozy (turns out he doesn't mean Faye, which is a treat for her). Also, I don't mind references to their triangle with Julia but please don't make it the focus of the piece.
DNWs: No animal harm, extreme underage, scat/watersports, no focus on unrequested pairings involving nominated characters (brief mentions of past canon relationships are fine), no permanent nominated character death.
Prompts:
Vicious is the fair “princess” who demands rescue and then constantly criticizes it, Spike's only doing it because he wants info on the organization and for no other reason, and Julia's so sick of their shit that she goes “you know what, take him because I'm tired of all of this mess and he's your problem now.” It's s the best revenge anyone can think of.
Amnesia! Someone gets it - maybe Vicious gets it and can't figure out why everyone is like, don't you want Spike dead and he's like, but that's my brother/guy I want to bang? And then Jet goes, nope, didn't sign up for this. Or Spike loses his memory post-Julia's appearance and Vicious sees an opportunity to just throw more gasoline on the trashfire that is his life.
Vampires where Vicious meant that family crypt thing in a different way and Spike wakes up to a whole new set of problems.
Dexter (TV)
Dexter/Harrison
All right, so technically, there's one more episode to go while I'm writing this, which means it could all end in tears and blood and handcuffs. And that's just if it's a happy ending, because let's face it, I'm watching this show for all the wrong reasons and I don't care. I had no expectations of a Dexter sequel, given how the previous show ended, but wow, this show has given me everything I wanted from the premise that Dexter's son that he dumped on a woman he barely knew suddenly showed up and wanted all the love he could get. So given all of that, how could I resist, especially when everyone involved is like “family? Is that where your dead sister whispers to you not to tell your very clingy son about your fetishes?”
I really love their relationship - how Dexter is clearly terrible at setting any kind of good example and how Harrison grows to recognize this, but hey, when you're both strangers and kindred spirits, normal relationships go out the window and what's left is something twisted and beautiful. So something that explores that loneliness and alienation and clinging on to anything that makes you feel connected for the first time in your life would be great.
DNWs: No animal harm, extreme underage, scat/watersports, no focus on unrequested pairings involving nominated characters (brief mentions of past canon relationships are fine). Also, normally I don't want permanent nominated character death, but there are exception in my prompts to this.
Prompts:
The great thing about this show is that even when you're dead, you can still participate in the murder sprees. So I'd love something where Dexter dies (at any point) and now Harrison's got his dad with him as his Dark Passenger forever. Is this a happy ending? Does it matter?
I have this thought where Harrison doesn't tell Dexter right away and Dexter now has to deal with this unexpected bond with this weird boy semi-stalking him around town, and he's like, why do I have these strange feelings? Then he's relieved when Harrison reveals he's his son (maybe after stabbing someone to save him) because having inappropriate chemistry with your relatives is what counts for normal in his books.
Vampires! That's pretty much it, considering it's a serial killer show where everyone's obsessed with blood and “codes” and hiding your true nature and look, Dexter showing Harrison how to feed is A+ for me.
The Queen's Gambit (TV)
Beth Harmon/Vasily Borgov
Look, I know their relationship is a terrible idea, which is why I'm so very behind it. Age gaps, rival countries in a time of cold war, the whole marriage thing, past addictions... the list goes on. So it means also that I definitely want Beth and Borgov getting closer, alternately drawn and repelled by each other's backgrounds, personality, and their connection to the game that binds the two of them together. I have never been very good at this game, mind you, but that has never stopped me from adoring how it's played and these two play it so very splendidly.
Past Beth hook-ups are fine to mention - just please don't turn them into Beth's one true love that she will never get over. And as far as Borgov's canon marriage, I lean towards divorce/separation/never happened, but if you choose to go the infidelity route, I'd prefer something that doesn't wallow in angsty despair - everyone knows it's a fucked-up situation, but that's sort of part and parcel of living in that world.
DNWs: No animal harm, extreme underage, scat/watersports, no focus on unrequested pairings involving nominated characters (brief mentions of past canon relationships are fine). Please, no killing off either one (temporary/fake deaths is a-okay).
Prompts:
Post-defection road trip fun! And by fun, I mean it could be something where they're on the run, staying in dingy safehouses and maybe people are injured and look, huddling for warmth is a fine and noble trope and I love it to pieces.
Or maybe Borgov's family dies and he flees his country and he has nowhere left to go and Beth is like, oh, you're damaged and broken and want to make terrible choices? Then she temples his fingers together and it's all downhill from there.
Also, vampires. Games played out over decades instead of days, as black and white give way to a river of red and in the end, chess is in the blood.
Squid Game
Hwang Inho | Front Man/Hwang Junho
I got some great fic for Yuletide for this pairing, but I can definitely go for more because this show hits all the right things for me. The reveal that the enemy you've been fighting all this time is your brother? And he's trying to get you to join him? And he's messed-up and kind of evil and damn it, played by Lee Byong-hun? Well, that's just going to hit all the right buttons. I like Jun-ho, too. In any other show, he'd be the hero, but instead, he's the side plot that sort of just... well, falls off a cliff. But before that, we get to him basically do anything to find his brother and that level of devotion (obsession) is both admirable and in the world of Squid Game, really unfortunate.
I'd love something about the two of them and their close relationship - how their connection seems to be their greatest weakness and yet neither one of them really can give it up because it's all tied up in love and loyalty and what you owe to the other person and when murder games get involved, it does tend to mean that people make terrible decisions that are still, often the least terrible of what they can do.
DNWs: No animal harm, extreme underage, scat/watersports, no focus on unrequested pairings involving nominated characters (brief mentions of past canon relationships are fine). Please, no killing off either one (temporary/fake deaths is a-okay). Also, I like my In-ho to be messed-up and morally ambiguous, but not an outright psychopath.
Prompts:
An AU where maybe Jun-ho legitimately ends up being a participant in the games - maybe Inho's money never made it to his family or it got swindled and now In-ho realizes he's got to find a way to keep him alive without revealing this weakness to anyone.
Or In-ho realizes from the beginning that Jun-ho is going to be a problem and resolves it by say, making sure Jun-ho is under his control right away - no police investigations, no undercover work, no asking your brother to join you after he's seen the worst.
Also (and gee, is this is a running theme in my requests?), vampires. Could be a metaphor for how society/capitalism inevitably creates monsters out of those willing to climb to the top? It could also be really hot sex involving blood and your brother telling you to take just a little more, because how else are you going to get strong enough to take him down?
Also, vampires. Just turn everyone into vampires and we're good. Thank you for writing for me!
Cowboy Bebop (Live Action TV)
Spike/Vicious
Look, I liked this show a lot and I was actually bummed when it was canceled, because there was still so much potential for hilarious chaos, especially with a Vicious that was at the mercy of all the bad decisions that he had made, a Spike that was still perfectly free to keep making bad decisions, and a number of other delightful people that could sit back, eat popcorn, and watch it all unfold. And I'm not going to lie, I definitely appreciated that finale where Spike was gratuitously tied to a pillar, Vicious was talking about family crypts and brotherhood and definitely not being a rejected ex-boyfriend, and everyone was watching them, like should we interrupt this? Is this something they do?
So yeah, something with the two of them and their intensely terrible relationship would be great. How far did they get in their past - is Vicious angry because he never actually got to sleep with Spike and the gun thing is a metaphor for all the penetration he's not getting? Or did they actually hook up and now look at Spike, running around with that floozy (turns out he doesn't mean Faye, which is a treat for her). Also, I don't mind references to their triangle with Julia but please don't make it the focus of the piece.
DNWs: No animal harm, extreme underage, scat/watersports, no focus on unrequested pairings involving nominated characters (brief mentions of past canon relationships are fine), no permanent nominated character death.
Prompts:
Vicious is the fair “princess” who demands rescue and then constantly criticizes it, Spike's only doing it because he wants info on the organization and for no other reason, and Julia's so sick of their shit that she goes “you know what, take him because I'm tired of all of this mess and he's your problem now.” It's s the best revenge anyone can think of.
Amnesia! Someone gets it - maybe Vicious gets it and can't figure out why everyone is like, don't you want Spike dead and he's like, but that's my brother/guy I want to bang? And then Jet goes, nope, didn't sign up for this. Or Spike loses his memory post-Julia's appearance and Vicious sees an opportunity to just throw more gasoline on the trashfire that is his life.
Vampires where Vicious meant that family crypt thing in a different way and Spike wakes up to a whole new set of problems.
Dexter (TV)
Dexter/Harrison
All right, so technically, there's one more episode to go while I'm writing this, which means it could all end in tears and blood and handcuffs. And that's just if it's a happy ending, because let's face it, I'm watching this show for all the wrong reasons and I don't care. I had no expectations of a Dexter sequel, given how the previous show ended, but wow, this show has given me everything I wanted from the premise that Dexter's son that he dumped on a woman he barely knew suddenly showed up and wanted all the love he could get. So given all of that, how could I resist, especially when everyone involved is like “family? Is that where your dead sister whispers to you not to tell your very clingy son about your fetishes?”
I really love their relationship - how Dexter is clearly terrible at setting any kind of good example and how Harrison grows to recognize this, but hey, when you're both strangers and kindred spirits, normal relationships go out the window and what's left is something twisted and beautiful. So something that explores that loneliness and alienation and clinging on to anything that makes you feel connected for the first time in your life would be great.
DNWs: No animal harm, extreme underage, scat/watersports, no focus on unrequested pairings involving nominated characters (brief mentions of past canon relationships are fine). Also, normally I don't want permanent nominated character death, but there are exception in my prompts to this.
Prompts:
The great thing about this show is that even when you're dead, you can still participate in the murder sprees. So I'd love something where Dexter dies (at any point) and now Harrison's got his dad with him as his Dark Passenger forever. Is this a happy ending? Does it matter?
I have this thought where Harrison doesn't tell Dexter right away and Dexter now has to deal with this unexpected bond with this weird boy semi-stalking him around town, and he's like, why do I have these strange feelings? Then he's relieved when Harrison reveals he's his son (maybe after stabbing someone to save him) because having inappropriate chemistry with your relatives is what counts for normal in his books.
Vampires! That's pretty much it, considering it's a serial killer show where everyone's obsessed with blood and “codes” and hiding your true nature and look, Dexter showing Harrison how to feed is A+ for me.
The Queen's Gambit (TV)
Beth Harmon/Vasily Borgov
Look, I know their relationship is a terrible idea, which is why I'm so very behind it. Age gaps, rival countries in a time of cold war, the whole marriage thing, past addictions... the list goes on. So it means also that I definitely want Beth and Borgov getting closer, alternately drawn and repelled by each other's backgrounds, personality, and their connection to the game that binds the two of them together. I have never been very good at this game, mind you, but that has never stopped me from adoring how it's played and these two play it so very splendidly.
Past Beth hook-ups are fine to mention - just please don't turn them into Beth's one true love that she will never get over. And as far as Borgov's canon marriage, I lean towards divorce/separation/never happened, but if you choose to go the infidelity route, I'd prefer something that doesn't wallow in angsty despair - everyone knows it's a fucked-up situation, but that's sort of part and parcel of living in that world.
DNWs: No animal harm, extreme underage, scat/watersports, no focus on unrequested pairings involving nominated characters (brief mentions of past canon relationships are fine). Please, no killing off either one (temporary/fake deaths is a-okay).
Prompts:
Post-defection road trip fun! And by fun, I mean it could be something where they're on the run, staying in dingy safehouses and maybe people are injured and look, huddling for warmth is a fine and noble trope and I love it to pieces.
Or maybe Borgov's family dies and he flees his country and he has nowhere left to go and Beth is like, oh, you're damaged and broken and want to make terrible choices? Then she temples his fingers together and it's all downhill from there.
Also, vampires. Games played out over decades instead of days, as black and white give way to a river of red and in the end, chess is in the blood.
Squid Game
Hwang Inho | Front Man/Hwang Junho
I got some great fic for Yuletide for this pairing, but I can definitely go for more because this show hits all the right things for me. The reveal that the enemy you've been fighting all this time is your brother? And he's trying to get you to join him? And he's messed-up and kind of evil and damn it, played by Lee Byong-hun? Well, that's just going to hit all the right buttons. I like Jun-ho, too. In any other show, he'd be the hero, but instead, he's the side plot that sort of just... well, falls off a cliff. But before that, we get to him basically do anything to find his brother and that level of devotion (obsession) is both admirable and in the world of Squid Game, really unfortunate.
I'd love something about the two of them and their close relationship - how their connection seems to be their greatest weakness and yet neither one of them really can give it up because it's all tied up in love and loyalty and what you owe to the other person and when murder games get involved, it does tend to mean that people make terrible decisions that are still, often the least terrible of what they can do.
DNWs: No animal harm, extreme underage, scat/watersports, no focus on unrequested pairings involving nominated characters (brief mentions of past canon relationships are fine). Please, no killing off either one (temporary/fake deaths is a-okay). Also, I like my In-ho to be messed-up and morally ambiguous, but not an outright psychopath.
Prompts:
An AU where maybe Jun-ho legitimately ends up being a participant in the games - maybe Inho's money never made it to his family or it got swindled and now In-ho realizes he's got to find a way to keep him alive without revealing this weakness to anyone.
Or In-ho realizes from the beginning that Jun-ho is going to be a problem and resolves it by say, making sure Jun-ho is under his control right away - no police investigations, no undercover work, no asking your brother to join you after he's seen the worst.
Also (and gee, is this is a running theme in my requests?), vampires. Could be a metaphor for how society/capitalism inevitably creates monsters out of those willing to climb to the top? It could also be really hot sex involving blood and your brother telling you to take just a little more, because how else are you going to get strong enough to take him down?