penguinzero | Recent Entries

Dear Author:  

Thank you for signing up for Yuletide! I've been participating for many years now, but it's always a new thrill to put out my requests for someone else to see. I hope my prompts give you some interesting ideas, and that you enjoy the writing process as much as I'm going to enjoy your story!

  If you're interested in seeing what I've written in the past, or the gifts I've received in previous years, everything's up at my profile on Ao3: PenguinZero I'm not a very prolific writer, so there's not all that much there, but it might be an inspiration.  

Don't consider any of my requests as mandatory in terms of detail. I personally enjoy getting specific requests to prompt my imagination, but I'm not picky in terms of what I receive! As long as it includes the characters I requested and at is at least loosely inspired by the mood of what I'm looking for, I'll be happy.  

I'll be including source links for each of my fandoms -- obviously, we matched on at least one, but if my request for another catches your eye, go ahead and do whichever!  

( Read more... )

Dear Author:

Thank you for signing up for Yuletide! I've been participating for many years now, but it's always a new thrill to put out my requests for someone else to see. I hope my prompts give you some interesting ideas, and that you enjoy the writing process as much as I'm going to enjoy your story!

If you're interested in seeing what I've written in the past, or the gifts I've received in previous years, everything's up at my profile on Ao3: PenguinZero I'm not a very prolific writer, so there's not all that much there, but it might be an inspiration.

Don't consider any of my requests as mandatory in terms of detail. I personally enjoy getting specific requests to prompt my imagination, but I'm not picky in terms of what I receive! As long as it includes the characters I requested and at is at least loosely inspired by the mood of what I'm looking for, I'll be happy.

I'll be including source links for each of my fandoms -- obviously, we matched on at least one, but if my request for another catches your eye, go ahead and do whichever!

General likes:

Plot-filled fics — while quick vignettes or mood pieces are fine too, there's something about a story with a challenge the main characters overcome or an event they have to react to that really appeals to me. Doubly so if it's thematically appropriate — if it somehow parallels the dynamic the main characters have, or highlights their personalities, strengths, and flaws. You can absolutely have the emotional relationship between the characters be the main point of the story, but I do like having something else going on at the same time.
WLW relationships. I was hooked on yuri and femslash at an early age.
Worldbuilding. I didn't tag it specifically on some of these fandoms, but I'd love to explore all of their worlds.
I love exploring the sides of a world that often go overlooked in the big drama — how people get by day to day, what they do to relax, where the basic necessities come from, how whatever weird powers or unusual situations they're in affect their daily routine.
Happy endings. I don't mind a story where things get tough for the characters — indeed, that's often really satisfying. But in the end, I like optimism in my stories. I like the idea that even when times are tough, people can make a difference if they work at it.
Additional characters. I may have only asked for one or two characters in my prompt, but I know that all of them have a whole constellation of supporting cast or other protagonists around them, and I'd love to see them get involved in whatever the story is. Having characters bounce off their friends, their family, their enemies, or just the random people they know can add so much depth and richness to the story.

General dislikes:

Plotless smut. I like romance in my stories, but just having two characters making out or more for the whole story doesn't really satisfy me. It's the plot and the emotional depth I'm here for.
Random AUs. I'm generally invested in the characters and the world as they are, and looking to explore their depths. Canon divergences, or pre- or post-canon stuff is just fine, but randomly taking the characters and putting them in a coffee shop or a sitcom premise kind of takes a lot of the fun out of it for me.

General DNWs: underage below about 16, graphic violence, graphic sex, incest, noncon/dubcon, futanari (trans is okay), cheating, loss of body parts, hopeless situations, 'grossout' situations or kinks, ABO, PWP.

Sub-challenges I'd be interested in: Interactive Fiction, Chromatic Yuletide, Queering the Tide (may add more as the posts are put up!)

Chuubo's Marvelous Wish-Granting Engine:

I've been a huge fan of Jenna Moran's writing for many years now. There's just something about her style that is so amazing, and the worlds and characters she builds are breathtaking. I've read Hitherby Dragons, Nobilis, her work on Exalted, Glitch, and a lot more. (I've got a particular soft spot for the lore sheet vignettes she wrote for Weapons of the Gods.) I keep coming back to all of them, off and on, and right now, Chuubo's has me enraptured again.

I'm particularly fascinated by Natalia and Jasper, as portrayed in The Glass-Maker's Dragon. They're two very different characters, and yet they have some undeniable parallels and interesting ties that I'd love to see explored more. Even just in the game mechanics, there are some elements that immediately draw them together -- for instance, the quest set for being Natalia is the same as the quest set for being someone accompanying Jasper on her story, and vice-versa. Just by being themselves, they're also in the perfect position to accompany each other.

Then there's their asymmetric Connections. Jasper has a level 2 Connection with Natalia, stronger than she has with anyone else -- as strong as the bond Chuubo has with Seizhi, even, and they're best friends by dint of a world-changing wish! And the only reason given is that Natalia fascinates her, and she's not sure why.

And on the other hand, we've got Natalia, who has a -1 Connection to Jasper.  Negative one! Which means that when she's trying to work with Jasper, or trust her, or just spend time with her, she's got to spend Will just to get to a neutral result! She just doesn't know how to deal with someone like Jasper, apparently. And that leads to the obvious image of the two of them trying to do something together, and the cheery naive daughter of the sun somehow outshines the superhuman prodigy who's good at everything, just because Jasper's really enjoying Natalia's presence and Natalia feels somehow incredibly awkward around her.

Overall, I see them as a fascinating odd couple. Jasper the cheerful ray of sunshine who's uncannily drawn to the dark, brooding Natalia for reasons neither of them can understand, and despite Natalia's discomfort with it, she can't get out of it somehow.

Personally, I like to interpret this mysterious imbalance as a mutual crush, where neither of them has any experience dealing with romance, but there's plenty of other ways to see it, and I'm eager to see how you take it.

The arcs of their stories also make for a number of potentially interesting scenarios they could find themselves in. At the start of everything, they're both probably the newest arrivals in Town, and still trying to get their bearings in their own unique ways. The two of them crossing paths during that could lead to some interesting interactions. I'm struck by the way two of their early quests have the potential to overlap. Jasper's 'The Miracle (Changes)' has, as one of the once-per-chapter actions, 'dealing with acne, braces, your period, ear infections, or other annoyingly intrusive elements of physicality.' Natalia's 'The Golden Snake of the Rooftops,' meanwhile, has 'helping someone who's in trouble' and 'talking about your past in Russia, reflecting on and developing the memories the snake is resting on.'

And seeing those, I thought, well, aren't those annoyingly physical troubles the sorts of things Natalia might have been forced to deal with on her own in Russia?  The sort of things that a group of people training a prodigy to be the perfect physical specimen would have expected her to be capable of handling, or otherwise not seen as worth their time? Might she not have had some sort of minor trauma from that -- something she'd feel the urge to try to help with when she meets a girl who's completely lost and bewildered by them?  (I mean, canonically, Jasper's utterly confused by sneezing -- how much worse would some of these be?)

So I can picture a first meeting between them, or at least an early one, where Natalia helps Jasper out, and Jasper is utterly, sunnily grateful for this in a way Natalia can't handle, and yet can't quite dismiss -- an early way in which Jasper's sunlight might melt Natalia's frozen heart a little.

And then on the other side of the story, the climax to both of their sagas involves journeying to the Bleak Academy. For Jasper, it's because things have gone wrong, and she's not handling her grief for her mother well, and she's starting to turn from a sunny incarnation of hope into a more shadowy being of despair. And for Natalia, it's also because her life has been going poorly, but she's coming to the Bleak Academy to demand answers of it, to find out why they sent an innocent weapon to kill everyone who she had to kill in turn, to try to fix or destroy the place to make the world better.

Under those circumstances, I can actually see the two of them reversing their roles from the first section. Where it's Jasper who's the dark, depressed person who can't see the meaning of life and has a heart that's, if not frozen, perhaps shadowed -- and Natalia the one who pulls her out of it with her determination, her courage, her surety that there's something in the world worth saving -- and maybe that something is Jasper.

Those are just my broadest of ideas -- if you have any other interesting ways to make them interact, go for it! I'm fine with most of the alternate versions of the characters, too, if that's what interests you (though as mentioned above, I'm a big WLW fan, so if you're going to ship them, I'd like female versions of each). And of course, you can include as many or as few of the other main characters as you want -- obviously, they could have plenty of other friends getting involved in their mishaps, whether it's Rinley making mischief, or Seizhi ending up at the Bleak Academy as part of his story arc, or Leonardo or Chuubo or anyone else playing some kind of role in the plot.

Where to find: There are links to all currently-available releases on the official Chuubo's Wiki.

Magus of the Library:

I've loved reading since I was a child. I love books, I love libraries, I love everything connected with the art form in general. And so finding a series like Magus of the Library, which is a love letter to all those things, was amazing and overwhelming to me. The enticing, mysterious plot, the charming characters, and the fascinating world were just a bonus.

So it might seem a little odd that I'm requesting worldbuilding. But there's two reasons for it. First, I really do enjoy the world and all the little hints we get of its depth. The implications of cultures and races beyond the ones we've seen so far, the offhand references to authors and texts that may or may not get filled out later, the customs and rituals that pretty much everyone takes for granted until they come across someone who breaks the mold. I'd love exploring that more. Maybe take a look at some books that have been alluded to, like the famous authors the popular fiction club talks about, or the Seven Seminal Scripts described in Volume 3, and get more into their contents and their impact. (You could even do a story as an in-universe work of fiction, if you liked -- maybe a new chapter of the Adventures of Shagrazzat or something like that!) I'd like to see just how fiction or other writings would be affected by the cultures of the setting -- they obviously wouldn't be just like something written by a modern 21st century author! What assumptions or stereotypes would go into their works? What different tropes or cliches would they use that would be familiar to them but strange to us? What moral lessons might they try to teach that we'd disagree with?

You could also explore the different cultures and their customs, as we did with marriage customs early on. What sort of differences exist in the ways the various races approach parenting, or major life turning points, or grieving? Looking at their approaches to LGBTQ+ issues could be fascinating, too -- I doubt they'd have a modern approach, with equality and individuality as ideals, and yet there have been places in cultures throughout history for people who didn't gender conform or who loved the same sex. Is there any place for such people in Hyron society, or Rakta, or Kokopa? What sort of clashes would come up when someone who fits such a role in one society faces someone from another society where the rules of acceptance are different?

And the second reason is that I'd love to see the world expanded with more details on, well, the parts of it having to do with books and librarian duties in general. I loved the section in the first volume where the team of kafna go into repairing a damaged grimoire with all the intensity you'd find in a standard manga fight scene. I loved the test where the candidates had to identify a book given just a cover and one page in an unknown language. I loved the kafna giving Theo's home-town librarian a dressing-down for not letting poor people check out his books. Every part of the story where we get into the making of books or the ways they're bought and sold or the duties of the kafna is enthralling to me.

A story focusing on this aspect could use any of the kafna trainees the series focuses on, or some of the other peripheral kafna, or original characters of your own devising. I'm fond of a few of the trainees more than others (particularly Mihona, Ohgga, Sala, and Aya), but they're all pretty darned interesting characters. You could write something about them learning a new aspect of a librarian's duties, or struggling with work repairing or categorizing books, or visiting a provincial library to learn how they'll be expected to interact with them, or in general anything else about their work with books.

Overall, I'd just like something that celebrates books, reading, and libraries, in whatever way you find most interesting. I'm guessing most of the people who sign up for Yuletide have a love of the written word in one way or another, so I'd be honored if you'd reach deep inside and show off what you really love about writing and books, however that manifests!

Where to find: The first three chapters are available on Kodansha's web site, which also has links for purchasing all currently available volumes in digital or print versions.

Star Trek: Lower Decks:

Of all the characters on this show, I'm fondest of Tendi. A cheerful, optimistic nerd who's got a somewhat hidden but very strong conflicted relationship with her past and her heritage. She grew up as heiress to a criminal empire and a trained pirate assassin, she's good at being a pirate and assassin, but that's not who she wants to be. She wants to be a Starfleet officer who helps people and studies science and geeks out about Jeffries tubes and tweaking RNA sequences.

I like exploring that conflict a bit. It seems to me that, in trying to hide and ignore her past before Starfleet, she's been denying the culture she grew up in -- and for good or ill, our cultures tend to influence us a lot. Is she really comfortable cutting off her past like that? Certainly there's a lot of stereotypes about Orions -- the piracy, the criminality, the whole 'dancer slave' business. And there's an unfortunate amount of truth to some of them. It's not surprising someone like Tendi would want to distance herself from that.  But is that the whole story? Cultures are rarely monolithic, no matter what impression we might get from 'planets of the week' and the quick glimpses we get of them on screen. Even just on Lower Decks, we've seen Orion as having beautiful public plazas, grimy cyberpunk cities, luxurious criminal estates, junkyards, and open fields with rhinoceros beasts. There could very well be parts of Orion culture that don't match up to the stereotypes that Tendi is throwing away regardless. And for that matter, when she does 'break character' and do piratey things, she does seem to get surprisingly in to it. Maybe she really does enjoy some stereotypical piratey things, and is just really embarrassed about it.

I'd like to dive into that a little. Have Tendi face up to her conflicted feelings about her heritage, and maybe find things are a bit more complicated than she'd like them to be. Are there any things about Orion society she misses, or that she loves but tries to avoid because she'd be playing into stereotypes? Any kind of Orion sports, or entertainment, or recreational activities? Any things she enjoyed doing growing up, or that bring back memories of good times with her family? They could be stereotypical Orion activities tied to piracy, crime, and racy behavior that she thinks would reflect badly on her current image -- or they could be completely non-stereotypical things, things that no outsiders would imagine Orions do, that she still avoids because she's trying to cut herself off from her past, maybe to an unhealthy degree.

There's all sorts of angles you could take on this -- maybe after her sister's wedding, she gets roped into some hijinks on Orion with Mariner and T'Lyn that bring her back to things she'd cut herself off from, maybe Starfleet needs an expert on Orion customs for some crisis of the week, maybe there's some sort of traditional Orion competition she gets pushed in to by her friends and she's torn on how to react to it. Take it in whatever direction you want, just as long as that whole conflict in her history is at the core.

I'm just fine with whatever cast you want to include in this -- obviously the other three of the main quartet are great, as is T'Lyn, and Dr. T'ana is always great, but I like all of the main cast of the series and just about all of the guest stars, so I'm entirely up for anyone you think would make for an interesting story.

I'm not particularly set on romance or shipping for this, but if you're interested, I think I lean towards either Mariner or T'Lyn with Tendi. I know the show tends to hint at her more with Rutherford, but I'm not all that fond of it -- partially that's my bias towards WLW, but partially it's just that I love the two of them as platonic friends nerding out over things and oblivious to how they look to others. But I'm just fine with no romantic shenanigans at all, so go with whatever you prefer.

Where to find: All episodes are available for streaming on Paramount Plus.

Wayfarers Series:

There's something about Speaker and the Akarak that speaks to me (if you'll pardon the redundancy). Speaker's not the most prominent character in the books, and the Akarak only get one real appearance outside of her story, but just what's seen there is fascinating to me -- and what could come next, even more so.

The Akarak are interesting because of their place on the margins of galactic culture. The Galactic Commons is generally a good place to be -- but not for everyone. The exposition on how the GC council kept putting them off for centuries, due to the difficulties of finding a methane-atmosphere world they could survive on and the inconvenience their shorter lifespans caused in negotiations, was heartbreaking. In a way, they're a mirror to the humans -- the humans lost their planet due to their own excesses, and had to live on spaceships for generations, but were warmly accepted by the GC, and now have worlds of their own and the ability to live just about anywhere. The Akarak lost their planet due to the actions of one of the GC's founding species, and have had to live on spaceships for many more generations (due to their shorter lifespans and the longer time they've been exiled), and yet were given the brush-off by the GC, can't go anywhere without protective suits, and are unwelcome due to the reputation they've gotten from some of them turning to piracy to survive.

And Speaker, just by being trapped at the Five-Hop One-Stop with Roveg, may have started to change things (ironically enough, given how isolationist both of their species are). I feel like when Speaker and Tracker attend the next rakree, they're going to be eager to figure out how to distribute copies of Wushengat to every Akarak who wants one. And after initial skepticism, I think it would probably take the community by storm. The way it hit Speaker will probably be echoed in just about every Akarak who experiences it. After hundreds of generations, just being exposed to the world like that is beyond even the remotest imagination of any Akarak alive.

You could take this in a lot of different directions -- Speaker and Tracker at the rakree, trying to find ways to copy the sim and get sim hubs bought or built for any Akarak who wants them, or trying to persuade skeptical Akarak to try it, or enlisting Roveg to make more sims so the Akarak can get an even broader understanding of what a world is like. A grand-scale overview of the changes over the next few standards as Akarak culture undergoes an upheaval due to this could be interesting. Or maybe thirty or forty standards later, Roveg gets a guest named Speaker, and is overjoyed for a moment before realizing the Speaker he knew must be long gone, and it turns out this is an entirely different Akarak with a talent for languages wanting to meet the sim artist who did so much for xyr species. Or any other idea you have! Speaker running into the characters from the other books could be interesting, too -- maybe she meets up with Pepper while trying to get sim hubs made on Port Coriol? I certainly think Sidra and Owl could have empathy for people whose existence is inconvenient for GC regulations...

Crossing over with the Wayfarer itself would be tricky, but possible, and I'd love to see Rosemary and Sissix if you have an idea for them. (As I said above, sucker for WLW.) Seeing if the Akarak have any analogies to romance would be interesting, too -- they don't have recreational or bonding sex, and they view all members of their ship as basically equal family, but do they have any form of short- or long-term connection above and beyond that with its own place in their culture?

And what sort of things have survived from their dead planet? Not just materially, but in terms of history, legend, and myth, or ancient cultural practices that have long since lost the context they make sense in? Are there any Akarak archaeologists who try to reconstruct their lost civilizations, or historians who have ancient information they carefully preserve? And would the arrival of sims be a blessing or a bane for them? Or perhaps some Akarak know their lost history is archived in some Harmagian database or museum somewhere, and now Speaker's inadvertently inspired a heist to get it back so it can be reborn in sim form...

Where to find: The author has links to purchase all of the books at her web site. Speaker's story is entirely contained in The Galaxy and the Ground Within, but the other books would give more depth to the setting.

To my author: hello, and thank you for putting up with the delay on getting my letter out! I've been a bit busy lately, and frantically trying to get a bunch of things handled. Hopefully my actual sign-up has been helpful to you — I don't expect there to be that much more here aside from some general principles, but check the bottom of each fandom for any additions. I'll also put in general sourcing for each canon, just in case you were matched to me on one of my fandoms but get interested in checking out the others!

General likes:

Plot-filled fics — while quick vignettes or mood pieces are fine too, there's something about a story with a challenge the main characters overcome or an event they have to react to that really appeals to me. Doubly so if it's thematically appropriate — if it somehow parallels the dynamic the main characters have, or highlights their personalities, strengths, and flaws. You can absolutely have the emotional relationship between the characters be the main point of the story, but I do like having something else going on at the same time.
WLW relationships. I was hooked on yuri and femslash at an early age.
Worldbuilding. I didn't tag it specifically on any of these fandoms, but I'd love to explore all of their worlds.
I love exploring the sides of a world that often go overlooked in the big drama — how people get by day to day, what they do to relax, where the basic necessities come from, how whatever weird powers or unusual situations they're in affect their daily routine.
Happy endings. I don't mind a story where things get tough for the characters — indeed, that's often really satisfying. But in the end, I like optimism in my stories. I like the idea that even when times are tough, people can make a difference if they work at it.
Additional characters. I may have only asked for a couple of characters in my prompt, but I know that all of them have a whole constellation of supporting cast or other protagonists around them, and I'd love to see them get involved in whatever the story is. Having characters bounce off their friends, their family, their enemies, or just the random people they know can add so much depth and richness to the story.

General dislikes:

Plotless smut. I like romance in my stories, but just having two characters making out or more for the whole story doesn't really satisfy me. It's the plot and the emotional depth I'm here for.
Random AUs. I'm generally invested in the characters and the world as they are, and looking to explore their depths. Canon divergences, or pre- or post-canon stuff is just fine, but randomly taking the characters and putting them in a coffee shop or a sitcom premise kind of takes a lot of the fun out of it for me. (With one exception; see below.)

General DNWs: underage below about 16, graphic violence, graphic sex, incest, noncon/dubcon, futanari (trans is okay), cheating, loss of body parts, hopeless situations, 'grossout' situations or kinks, ABO, PWP.

Hitherby Dragons

Her name is Ink Catherly. Named for the fact that you'll be doing a lot of writing about her, she'll tell you, and maybe that's the truth.

Ink is perhaps my favorite character in all of Hitherby Dragons, and I'd love to see anything more about her. Another floor in the tower where she confronted a strange and beautiful and horrible world, another step on her quest as the imago to kill whoever's on the throne of the world, something backstage as Jane and Martin work on the performances of her legends, anything.

But one thing that specifically intrigues me is her potential connection to Mei Ming. Back in the day there were theories that they might have been linked together, or even in some sense the same person. That perhaps Mei Ming was the person playing Ink in the legends, or even that the Ink Catherly legends and the creation of the imago was Jane and Martin's way of giving Mei Ming a real identity, instead of leaving her 'nameless.' Is that the case? Or is there something even weirder going on? Your own thoughts on the idea would be interesting.

And there's a lot of other options, if you don't want to go for that. Ink was twelve when she started exploring the tower, and fifteen when she was trapped in her personal Hell of Greystoke's jungle, and still fifteen when she emerged into the real world. Even if time didn't pass for her like it does for real people, there's still a lot of room for her to have grown and changed. Did she have some sort of experience at fifteen that reflected something she experienced at twelve, but have a different perspective on it? Did she have any sort of recurring encounter over the years with the same being, or different-but-related beings, or beings that claimed they totally weren't the same even though they obviously were?

Romance is obviously a possibility, but tread carefully. It never seemed to be a strong element of the Legends, possibly due to Jane avoiding it on account of her own trauma. And Ink had her own baggage, which could be worth exploring in herself. She was of an age where a lot of teens are starting to get interested in that stuff, but she was also fixated on finding Hell, and bearing a lot of personal issues with her home life and father that could have caused her to avoid thinking about it. But still, it could be interesting to see if there was some guy or girl or nonbinary being she met in the tower who had an interest in her, leading her to explain herself more as she pulled away from them.

And, of course, I'd love to see any other Hitherby characters -- whether as actors in the Legends, or people she crosses paths with as the imago, or any other reason to interact with them you can think of!

Hitherby Dragons is kind of overwhelming to get a hold of, I know. It's a long canon, it's pretty obscure, and it's got an extremely ideosyncratic voice and philosophy behind it that is hard to recapture. But I really love it enough that I hope it'd be worth the effort for you.

Links: The entirety of the canon can be found at hitherby-dragons.wikidot.com. There's links there to Ink's storyline, alongside a number of others. You can also take a look at my promo post over in the Yuletide community for more links. Adding to it, there's at least one Mei Ming story I missed (the site's search function is sadly offline), at The Nest of Mirror Pieces (5/5), which may be the most important one for the connections between Ink and Mei Ming (as it has Martin seeming to want to help her become more of a real person).

Undead Unluck

Juiz is a fascinating character for me simply on account of how long she's lived. Billions upon billions of years, through countless cycles of the universe being destroyed and reborn. She's borne it well, and one can presume that the Ark's looping has an effect on her to reinforce her mentally, but she's still lived more time than any normal human could even realistically imagine, with Victor her only reliable companion.

And she's lived through the addition of rules countless times over, too. We've seen her androgynous form from before the rule of sex/gender is added to the world. We've heard her discuss the rules that have been added, from disease to death. She must have gone through lifetimes with countless variations of what rules were in play at any given point. And that's something I'd like to see. What's a blank-slate, ruleless world like? We may be seeing that very soon with Fuuko looping, but your own take on it would be interesting. Is the order of the rules always the same, or does it vary? Does she get used to the steps the world takes in turn -- 'ah, now that Spoil is in play, the world will be like this for a few months before we have to deal with Language' -- or does it feel novel each time? For that matter, do the same rules always come into play, or do some get skipped sometimes? Has she lived through a world with no insects, or disease, or sex? Are there rules that didn't come into play in this cycle that sometimes do -- fictional concepts, maybe ones we don't even have an idea of? Did the Union at some point head off the creation of a UMA Dragon, or a UMA Soulmate, or a UMA Slood? (Shout-out to Terry Pratchett there.)

And how does it feel getting to know some of the same people over and over again through countless lives? The first time she meets, say, Gina or Billy or Tatyana or Nico in a given cycle, she'll know everything that happened to them in all the previous times she's worked with them, but they won't know anything about her. They won't even know the sorts of things they're likely to have happen to them, but she will. We've seen Nico alongside her in previous loops, implying he had the Unforgettable power in them -- does that mean he always loses Ichico? In contrast, we've seen Gina not trying to look young -- does that mean this time around was an aberration, due to her meeting Andy instead of Victor? How much changes, and how much stays the same? And how does Juiz deal with all that? What's it like when she meet someone new, and the world takes a turn she wasn't expecting, as may have happened with Fuuko this time around?

There's a lot to explore in Juiz's endless life -- and her recent choice to stop looping. Use that space however you like!

With the new loop having started in the chapters since I submitted my request, we're likely to be on the verge of seeing information on a lot of what I asked for, so if there's anything you can incorporate, go for it! Or if you have any ideas that aren't quite aligned with where canon is going, I'd find that interesting too. You might run through the events happening in the manga in a version of the timeline where Juiz looped -- or see what she's like and how she's reacting in a world where she's not the ancient veteran, but the newcomer! I can't predict where the story's going, so I trust you to do your best!.

Links: The entire current series is available at the Shonen Jump web site with a subscription -- and even without it, you can read the first three and most recent three chapters. Print or digital volumes are available there too, but they don't have the whole series yet.

Wayfarers -- Becky Chambers

One of my favorite things about the Wayfarers universe is the exploration of the psychology and social structures of the various races, and how they're affected by their biology. And my favorite specific instance of that is the Akarak, and Speaker's story in the fourth book. A short-lived race that focuses intently on one subject to the point that they name themselves after it, a race dealing with the loss of their homeworld so many generations ago that it might as well be myth by now, a race that's been mistreated by the Galactic Commons for so long that they've withdrawn from its society almost entirely, a race that can't share the things all the other races have in common, be that oxygen atmospheres or sims.

And Speaker, just by being trapped at the Five-Hop One-Stop with Roveg, may have started to change things (ironically enough, given how isolationist both of their species are). I feel like when Speaker and Tracker attend the next rakree, they're going to be eager to figure out how to distribute copies of Wushengat to every Akarak who wants one. And after initial skepticism, I think it would probably take the community by storm. The way it hit Speaker will probably be echoed in just about every Akarak who experiences it. After hundreds of generations, just being exposed to the world like that is beyond even the remotest imagination of any Akarak alive.

You could take this in a lot of different directions -- Speaker and Tracker at the rakree, trying to find ways to copy the sim and get sim hubs bought or built for any Akarak who wants them, or trying to persuade skeptical Akarak to try it. A grand-scale overview of the changes over the next few standards as Akarak culture undergoes an upheaval due to this. Or maybe thirty or forty standards later, Roveg gets a guest named Speaker, and is overjoyed for a moment before realizing the Speaker he knew must be long gone, and it turns out this is an entirely different Akarak with a talent for languages wanting to meet the sim artist who did so much for xyr species. Or any other idea you have! Speaker running into the characters from the other books could be interesting, too -- maybe she meets up with Pepper while trying to get sim hubs made on Port Coriol?

Crossing over with the Wayfarer itself would be tricky, but possible, and I'd love to see Rosemary and Sissix if you have an idea for them. (As I said above, sucker for WLW.) Seeing if the Akarak have any analogies to romance would be interesting, too -- they don't have recreational or bonding sex, and they view all members of their ship as basically equal family, but do they have any form of short- or long-term connection above and beyond that with its own place in their culture?

And what sort of things have survived from their dead planet? Not just materially, but in terms of history, legend, and myth, or ancient cultural practices that have long since lost the context they make sense in? Are there any Akarak archaeologists who try to reconstruct their lost civilizations, or historians who have ancient information they carefully preserve? And would the arrival of sims be a blessing or a bane for them? Or perhaps some Akarak know their lost history is archived in some Harmagian database or museum somewhere, and now Speaker's inadvertently inspired a heist to get it back so it can be reborn in sim form...

Links: Becky Chambers has the series (and her other books) listed on her website, with links to places to buy them.

Unpacking:

There's so much implied in this game, and so much that can be overlooked -- I've found new details whenever I've played, and even more when watching other people play. There's implied stories over the course of the years, that could be interpreted several different ways -- a rock-climbing injury? The fate of the beetle? The girlfriend's job?

And so I'd like to see something fleshing out those interim stories and the implied characterization. Ideally it would be something romantic -- how the protagonist and her girlfriend get together, or some of the things that happen to them as they're building a life. Maybe something about them exploring each other's jobs and hobbies, maybe something about them adjusting to past events that still linger. (The boyfriend is an obvious choice, but maybe too obvious -- though I wouldn't object to them talking about him! Something to do with the protagonist's physical issues might be meaningful, though -- after all, with the cane, the heat pads, the wrist brace, and so on, it's clear the protagonist has had to deal with the stress her lifestyle puts on her. Does she embrace it, or feel it's a failing?)

A story taking place over several years could be interesting, too -- maybe jumping between the gaps between the chapters? Or a story exploring the homes she's moved in to, and the neighborhoods she lives in, and the friends she's made. (I'd love to have some callbacks to the apparent RPG campaigns she and her first roommates got up to!)

Ultimately, however you approach it, I'd like a generally happy mood. Unpacking ends up a pretty optimistic game, even with the struggles along the way, and I'd like an attitude in keeping with that.

Link: The game is available on multiple platforms; check out its home page for whichever works best for you.

To my assigned author:

Thanks for signing up! This is my first time doing Original Works Opportunity -- I've done the Yuletide fanfic exchange before, but I've never written original fiction to someone else's spec before, or had someone else do it for me. So this is rather exciting! I hope that my prompts can give you interesting ideas without constraining you too much. If I've put in too much detail, feel free to ignore some of it to go with your own ideas! If you can go for the general feel I'm indicating, I don't care too much if the specifics are all different.

General DNWs: underage below about 16, graphic violence, incest, noncon/dubcon, futanari (trans is okay), cheating, loss of body parts, hopeless situations, 'grossout' situations or kinks, ABO, PWP.

Queen Who Thought She Was Widowed/Her First Wife Back From the Dead/Her Second Wife (F/F/F)

I was highly amused the moment I saw this tag, and knew I wanted a story based on it. I picture it as being light-hearted and maybe even comedic, though not without real emotions. The first wife is probably who it's all going to hinge on -- why was she thought dead, and what happens when she shows she's not? You can go with whatever feels right for you, but my first thought is that she was an adventurer-queen (or princess-consort? Titles can be tough) who got in over her head at some point while out saving the realm. Maybe she got into trouble and had to spend years making her way back from a distant land. Or maybe she really did die -- but she's enough of a hero that she managed to fight her way out of the underworld to get back to her beloved's side! She could be a bit of a 'herbo' -- cheerful, enthusiastic, strong, loving, devoted, but not incredibly bright.

Then there's the queen and the second wife. How did this come about? Was there a love triangle while the first wife was alive, that was resolved in the second wife's favor when she 'died?' Was she there to comfort the queen after she lost her wife, and love blossomed from there? Or was it a purely political engagement at first, which the queen reluctantly entered to protect the realm, only to find love growing with her new wife? I picture the queen as a sensible, practical, intelligent type, in contrast to her first wife, but I have less of an idea for the second wife -- go with whatever works for the story.

And, of course, the meat of the story is what happens when the first wife gets back. I'm actually picturing an overblown scene where the first wife bursts into the bedchambers in the middle of the night, cheerfully announcing that she's back (and maybe bringing a monster head or other trophy with her), only to be surprised to see the other two in bed together. But anything suitably humorous and/or awkward could do. And what then? Maybe the queen scrambles to find legal precedent to establish which of her marriages is still valid (and finds that it's actually both). Maybe the first wife challenges the second wife to a series of contests for the queen's hand. Or, conversely, maybe the first wife decides the only proper thing to do is to elaborately romance the second wife, as well, so they can all be together!

Whatever the case, the story should end happily. A three-way marriage at the end would be great, but it could also work with any pair of the three living happily ever after while the third falls for another girl. Just make it light, make it wholesome, and make it funny if that works for you!

SFW preferred over smut, but do whatever feels best for you. I don't at all mind romance or flirtiness or making out or the like, as long as it supports the emotions and the humor.

Female Time Traveler/Female Time Traveler & Pet Tyrannosaur (Mixed Gen & Ship)

One of my RP characters has a pet baby dinosaur, so I was naturally interested in this prompt. There's a lot of potential with a couple of characters trying to wrangle a dinosaur!

My basic image is the classic 'can we keep him?' scene. With dinosaurs. I can imagine one time traveler wanting to adopt this adorable baby dinosaur she found, and her girlfriend/wife trying to shoot it down out of practicality (where would we keep it, adopting wild animals is trouble, who's going to walk it, etc.). Bonus points for a discussion on whether time travel even works in a manner such that it's okay to take an animal out of its native era.

The tyrannosaur itself I'd like to see as adorably enthusiastic, a little aggressive, and not too bright. It could be a tiny baby, or big enough to try to eat their time machine. ('No! Drop it! Bad dino!') And surprisingly affectionate to at least the time traveller who wants to adopt it, and probably the practical one, too.

Exactly what the time travelers are doing in the Cretaceous in the first place, and what the circumstances are that led to them being there, are entirely up to you. A little world-building established around the heroines would be fun -- are they researchers, explorers, heroes on some sort of a mission, or just there for a vacation? What's the time they come from like?

Probably should be SFW -- having a dinosaur around can kill the mood, I'm sure.

Leader of Revolution in Cyberpunk World/Powerful Businesswoman Who Is Seduced To Her Side (F/F)

Modern times being what they are, the idea of an uprising against the rich and powerful is an unfortunately tempting one. Cyberpunk has always been a genre that's about exaggerating the flaws of the modern world and showing them off in stark relief, and if you look back to the early parts of the genre there's sadly very little exaggeration left in them. So I'd like this to be a very political story -- if that's not your sort of thing, I don't mind you picking one of my other prompts. I want to see modern political problems having only gotten worse, and the way people are fighting back against it. You don't have to go into horrible detail, but the setting just feels like it should have massive wealth inequality, voter suppression, legalized sexism and racism and homo/transphobia, union busting, ignored climate change, all the things that the powerful use to divide and keep down the underclass while empowering themselves.

There should definitely be an enemies-to-lovers element to this, I think. The businesswoman starts out fully invested in the world as it is (or else she would never have gotten to be powerful and wealthy), and only through her conflicts with the revolutionary does she start to see how the status quo is harming everyone, even the people nominally on top. Being seduced to the side of the revolution shouldn't just be about how charming and attractive the revolutionary leader is (though there absolutely should be some of that too), but about genuinely coming to believe in a cause, and regretting the damage she's done in her life.

The revolutionary leader, I think, should whole-heartedly believe in making the world a better place, but exactly how she goes about that is up to you. Depending on the setting and the challenges she's up against, it could make sense for her to be a hacker, an underground journalist, a musician playing outlawed music, a saboteur, or an all-out military leader. Or all of the above! She could meet the businesswoman coincidentally, or as part of an operation (such as breaking in to corporate headquarters to sabotage something or steal documents), or even directly target her (taking her hostage, maybe?). Her attitude to the businesswoman at the start can be just about anything -- does she view her as an enemy not worth trying to reach out to, or does she think anyone can be convinced? Are there any ulterior motives in getting together with her -- does she think having an asset on the inside is valuable, and is that stronger than her genuine emotions?

The setting can be classic chrome-and-leather-jackets-and-mirrorshades cyberpunk, or something based on more modern aesthetics. Interesting tech and gadgets are a good thing, but the human connections have always been an important part of the genre, and more so here.

SFW preferred over smut, but go with whatever works for you. Gritty, grungy romance and passion are classic elements of the genre, and getting a little dirty is totally acceptable.

Civilian identity of Superhero/Civilian identity of Supervillain (F/F)

One thing I've been thinking about of late is the whole 'villains act, heroes react' paradigm for certain types of stories. Essentially, the villains are the ones who want to change the status quo, and the heroes are the ones who want to protect it. That's got its advantages -- in a long-running series, it means the world will never change too much from the one outside the reader's window, and it prevents the writers from having to think too much about how certain developments would realistically change the world (the whole 'Reed Richards is useless' bit where superhero technology never trickles down to everyday use).

In a world where the status quo is considered good or at least comfortable, it's defensible. But when the status quo isn't great for a lot of people, what then? Or what if the writers start wanting to write villains with depth and sympathetic motivations, and so give them ideals people can relate to? Then, suddenly, it gets harder to frame the one wanting to change things as the bad guy. When Poison Ivy is fighting to stop logging in the Amazon Rainforest, and Batman is trying to stop her, doesn't Ivy start looking like the hero here? And so the writers have to add on 'oh, and Ivy's doing it by poisoning people/mind-controlling people/trying to slaughter the whole human race' in order to make Batman the good guy again. But that leads to the uncomfortable position that 'only a villain who wants to kill people would ever try to actually make the world a better place.' The people with morals never try to change things, and the people who try to change things have villainy tacked on.

It'd be interesting to grapple with this a bit from inside a superhero universe. You could be as political as you like about an issue that's important to you, or just make it a general 'trying to make the world better' angle, but either way, I'm picturing the heroine and the villainess meeting in their secret identities in some context where they get to talk about their ideas of making the world better -- maybe working at a charity, maybe some sort of campus activism club, maybe at a political rally, or maybe just a blind date where they get to talking about serious things. The heroine is passionate about helping the world, but feels like the system works, that gradual progress is significant, that generally if people of good will keep on working hard, things will improve. And the villainess is passionate about the same things, but thinks that the system is broken, and that more radical activism is important, trying to break down the power structures that are keeping things stuck in a bad status quo. (Perhaps each finds the other's traits attractive -- the villainess envies the heroine's optimism and pure heart, while the heroine is smitten with the villainess's passion and drive.) They can't agree, but it gets each of them thinking -- and then, when they eventually meet up in their powered identities, what happens then? What happens when the villainess sees the heroine's optimism, and the heroine sees the villainess's passionate desire to improve things? Do they keep fighting, or find a way to team up? Is the villainess really going too far in her actions, or are the worst of her 'misdeeds' overhyped by media invested in the status quo? Would the heroine eventually decide that the status quo needs to be improved, not just protected -- and if she did, how would the rest of the world react?

You can keep this primarily focused on the secret identities, or give the super identities equal time, your choice. SFW preferred over smut, as usual, but also as usual I'm fine with wherever the story ends up taking you.

To my assigned author:

Welcome, and thank you for signing up for Yuletide! I've been participating for years now, and it's always so fun to see what someone else is going to come up with based on my all-too-vague prompts. My works are all up on AO3 as PenguinZero — if you want, feel free to poke through them to get a feel for what I like. I don't have much experience writing Dear Author letters — I've usually just put my simple requests on the signup form and let the author take it from there — but I thought I'd try to give a little more support to you this time around. Feel free to go wherever your inspiration takes you, of course — I just want to give you seeds to work with! If you get inspired to something completely different than any of my suggestions, I'm sure I'll be thrilled.

Obviously, we overlap on at least one of my fandoms, but just in case you skim through the others and find my descriptions interesting, I'll link to where to find them all. I'd be thrilled to introduce you to something you end up liking!

General likes:

Plot-filled fics — while quick vignettes or mood pieces are fine too, there's something about a story with a challenge the main characters overcome or an event they have to react to that really appeals to me. Doubly so if it's thematically appropriate — if it somehow parallels the dynamic the main characters have, or highlights their personalities, strengths, and flaws. You can absolutely have the emotional relationship between the characters be the main point of the story, but I do like having something else going on at the same time.
WLW relationships. Probably pretty obvious from my chosen characters — I was hooked on yuri and femslash at an early age.
Worldbuilding. I didn't tag it specifically on any of these fandoms, but I'd love to explore all of their worlds. (Even Kase-san, which is basically modern Japan — see the entry below.) I love exploring the sides of a world that often go overlooked in the big drama — how people get by day to day, what they do to relax, where the basic necessities come from, how whatever weird powers or unusual situations they're in affect their daily routine.
Happy endings. I don't mind a story where things get tough for the characters — indeed, that's often really satisfying. But in the end, I like optimism in my stories. I like the idea that even when times are tough, people can make a difference if they work at it.
Additional characters. I may have only asked for a couple of characters in my prompt, but I know that all of them have a whole constellation of supporting cast or other protagonists around them, and I'd love to see them get involved in whatever the story is. Having characters bounce off their friends, their family, their enemies, or just the random people they know can add so much depth and richness to the story.

General dislikes:

Plotless smut. I like romance in my stories, but just having two characters making out or more for the whole story doesn't really satisfy me. It's the plot and the emotional depth I'm here for.
Random AUs. I'm generally invested in the characters and the world as they are, and looking to explore their depths. Canon divergences, or pre- or post-canon stuff is just fine, but randomly taking the characters and putting them in a coffee shop or a sitcom premise kind of takes a lot of the fun out of it for me. (With one exception; see below.)

Sleepless Domain

Requested characters: Undine, Kokoro

Sleepless Domain is possibly my favorite currently-running webcomic — there are a few others that come close, but it's just got that perfect combination of all the things I like wrapped up in Mary Cagle's beautiful art and fascinating writing. And the characters all make you care about them intensely. It's a story with darkness that doesn't wallow in the darkness, and holds tight to the idea that things can get better, even when you're coming out of the worst part of your life.

Kokoro and Undine are now an official couple, and I'd love to see how they're handling that outside of their monster-hunting hours or the ongoing plot. Have they gone on an official date yet, and if so what was it like — and how did they approach it? Do paparazzi try to get photos and interviews of them together? Where might they try going to get some privacy? What would their ideal date be, anyway — dinner and a movie, or a picnic lunch, or an afternoon shopping and going to the arcade, or racing across the rooftops in a prolonged sparring session? Might they end up at each other's homes? I'm sure Momdine and Daddine would love to meet the girl their daughter's dating, but how would Undine react to seeing how Kokoro lives? (I'm sure she'd love to meet Kicks, though — and, for that matter, Kokoro might be interested to see Undine's fish Bert.) Though there's sure to be a little nervousness when your girlfriend invites you home for the first time…

Looking at them working as partners would be interesting, too. Undine's used to working with a team, but Kokoro has tended to go it alone — when they're deliberately going out to fight together every night, does this difference in experience cause any friction? For that matter, does Undine have any habits from working with Team Alchemical that aren't applicable any more — or might cause her a bit of pain when she realizes she's slipping back into them?

I'm also entirely up for interactions with the other cast members. Go wild — do Undine and Kokoro cross paths with Zoe and Rue while out one night? Does Bud try to snoop on one of their dates to be ready with all the gossip? Might Vedika accidentally get a glimpse of the two of them smooching while practicing mind reading, and how would she react? What would happen if Undine introduced Kokoro to Tessa? (Nothing good, probably, given Tessa's emotional state…)

The worldbuilding in the comic, though usually subtle and in the background, is always something I'm passionate about seeing. It's a single, solitary city with no way to get beyond its walls, and yet it's survived for at least a century and a half in this state. The logistics of just how they get by day to day just grab my imagination. We've seen rooftop farms — is this the main source of food in the city, or are there big farming parks somewhere? Fish are known to be able to pass through the barrier — do they make up a substantial part of the city's diet? Are they commonly caught or even farmed? Pets exist in the city, and other urban animals seem to be at least known, but how common are they? The technology level is about comparable to ours, but there are no cars and apparently no personal computers (though arcades do exist) — how does that alter daily life? With their odd schedules, what do magical girls do in between late school and monster hunting when they want to relax and have fun? What sort of research is the MGSI doing to learn more about magical girls, and how does the CDD defend the city? And so on. You don't need to delve deep into the world or anything, but if you were to include even a little exploration of things as part of the plot or a mention in passing, I'd be thrilled.

Where to find it: The full story is available at the official website, and you can get the first volume in print from the store.

The Locked Tomb Series:

Requested characters: Gideon, Harrow

It's the last year that this fandom's going to qualify for Yuletide, and while I'm happy to see it getting more and more popular, I also feel a bit of wistfulness that I'm not going to have the chance to request it (or take requests for it) again. So if you're into lesbian necromancers in space, I'd love to see the fandom go out with a bang!

I like almost all of the characters in the two books so far, but I'll admit that Gideon and Harrow are the true core of it for me. I basically see the entire series as an extremely slow-burn enemies-to-lovers romance between them, and I'm eager to see how that resolves. It's clear that they've been the most important people in each other's lives since they were just children, and that's carried through all the way to the point where Gideon literally died for Harrow, while Harrow gave herself brain damage that left her nearly defenseless while entering the company of ten-thousand-year-old scheming immortals just to make sure Gideon wouldn't completely die.

I could appreciate a story set anywhere along that timespan — whether it's Gideon and Harrow as little girls fighting each other (and maybe sort of half flirting, as Gideon gets to vent her frustrations with Ninth House life and Harrow gets a chance to be not the Reverend Daughter but just another frustrated and upset girl for a while), or the two of them bouncing off each other at Canaan House as it becomes harder to deny how much they mean to each other, or Gideon narrating Harrow's life and raging at just how bad her decisions have been.

This is one fandom that I'd actually be okay with AUs for, if that's something you like to write about, as long as they're framed properly. I loved the little AU bits in Harrow the Ninth, especially the Harrow Nova one, and I would not at all object to you setting up something in the same vein — one of those AUs taken further, or something entirely new of your own imagining — as long as it's implied (or stated) that this is something happening in the dreambubbles, before or during or after the novel. Maybe something Harrow's mind tried to set up before the alternate Canaan House, maybe something skipped over during the brief montage of AUs (or an extension of one of them), maybe something afterwards, as Harrow and Gideon are trying to survive being dumped into the depths of the River and their minds come together to hold off the pressure and the ghosts. You can do it as blatantly or as subtly as you like, though try to take into account the real mindset Harrow and any others would be in while creating them.

And whether canon-compliant or AU, I definitely wouldn't mind seeing the supporting cast. Cam and Pal are two of my favorites, and Isaac and Jeannemary shortly after them, but there's hardly anyone I don't like in the cast — especially the Canaan House crew. Even the oft-forgotten characters back on the Ninth House are great — I'd love to see more of Aiglamene training Gideon and gently but firmly standing up to Harrow.

As for worldbuiding, we get hints here and there of what day to day life is like in the Nine Houses, especially in Cam and Pal's short story, but there's so much more left unsaid. A story set on the Ninth House could explore a lot more of what it's actually like living on a world of aging decrepit monastics served by an army of skeletons. And at Canaan House, there'd be plenty of opportunities for other characters to talk about or compare what things are like back home. There's so much to fill out, from the use of necromancy in the infrastructure to the nature of an interstellar smut mag industry — if there's any topic you want to speculate on, go for it.

And if you're being true to the canon's tone, I fully expect at least one groan-worthy meme reference buried somewhere in the story. I am fully braced for it.

Where to find it: The publisher's website has links to buy both books at most major online stores. The short story 'The Mysterious Study of Doctor Sex' is available for free on line.

Sexiled: My Sexist Party Leader Kicked Me Out, So I Teamed Up With a Legendary Sorceress!:

Requested characters: Tanya, Laplace

A relatively obscure fandom that deserves more love. I've tried a fair number of light novels recently, and they've been of varying quality, but something about Sexiled just has a spark not all of them do. Maybe it's the energy in the writing, maybe it's the thrill of seeing passionate women going all-out to make the world into a better place. You can tell that the premise lit a fire in the author, and I love that her passion comes through.

What I think this fandom offers more than anything else is a chance to really vent about something. There are so many sexist problems in the world today, from major scandals to little petty day-to-day annoyances. I would be entirely on board with you finding one that matters to you, transplanting it into Pajan, and having Tanya and Laplace figure out a way to make everything better. Probably with fireballs. After all, the very inspiration for these books came from the revelation of the examination scandals in Japanese medical schools, and it got put into the first book wholesale. It's one fandom where you don't have to worry about being too on-the-nose or over-the-top. Go wild!

I also ship Tanya and Laplace, of course. It's pretty obvious that Laplace has a thing for her young protege, and equally obvious that Tanya doesn't quite realize it but also hasn't exactly rejected it. Having those feelings come out into the open could make for some very interesting changes to their dynamic, and also be a way to explore LGBT rights in Pajan — and also gender roles, as Tanya starts to question the whole 'guys marry girls; girls become homemakers' narrative on even more levels than she has already. (Of course, if you prefer them as just friends and adventuring partners, that's fine too! They work great on that level, as well.)

Needless to say, I'd also love to see the supporting cast come into play — Nadine, Katherine, Arianora, Alisa, and anyone else they've helped out. I'm also not at all averse to original characters here, possibly in the role of someone who's been caught up in some kind of sexist problem that Lilium can solve, as happened a few times in the canon. This could be any sort of person with any sort of problem — probably a woman, but if you want there's sure to be room for examining a man who's not happy with the role he's expected to play by society. Or maybe a trans person (of any gender) has never heard of the concept of being trans before, and Laplace gets eager to shepherd them through understanding themself (maybe even a little too eager, needing to be reined in by Tanya)?

Basically, the series is a brash, over-the-top, unapologetic feminist power fantasy, and I'd love to see more along those lines. Put your whole heart into it, wherever it leads you!

Where to find it: Get both books in physical or digital form at the official J-Novel Club website.

Kase-san and Morning Glories:

Requested Characters: Yamada, Kase

I've got a weakness for yuri manga, I will admit, and there's a certain appeal to slice-of-life ones that don't just focus on the struggles and misunderstandings of having a couple get together, but instead on the joys and difficulties of keeping a relationship going. And Kase-san and Morning Glories really pushes those buttons.

I don't have as many thoughts on what I'd want to see as I do for the other fandoms — this was a last-minute pick when I saw someone else had nominated it. But I love the characters, I love the way they interact, and I'd love to see more things in the spirit of the manga.

I'd love to see more on how the two of them are getting by in their college life. How do they make time for each other between classes? What sort of challenges is their coursework presenting them with? Does Yamada ever pick a horticultural project because she wants to gift it to Kase after? Does Kase ever ask Yamada to help her exercise?

As for 'worldbuilding' here, Kase and Yamada have moved to Tokyo, and I'd love to see what their daily routines are, and what sort of places they frequent beyond the ones we know of. It's not exactly deep worldbuilding, but seeing what they do for grocery shopping or if there's a restaurant or entertainment venue they like to go to together could be surprisingly interesting.

And though the cast isn't as large as some other series, the recurring characters are really neat, too. Mikawacchi would give a useful outsider's perspective on their relationship, and the various people they've met through college and sports all have their stories to tell. We also see very little of either of their families — are there any problems there? Do they have any idea Kase and Yamada are dating? Are they trying to set either of them up with boys?

Post-canon flash-forward stories could be interesting, too. I think the two of them are going to be together in the long term (it wouldn't be much of a romance story otherwise!), but what would that entail exactly? What are the two of them going to do after they graduate? Will there be any struggles with finding a job and supporting each other? How would Kase feel if she couldn't make a living from her running and Yamada ended up the breadwinner? Would they eventually get married — either moving to another country, or being part of a movement to make it legal in Japan? How would they deal with living together — what stresses could that cause, and what would be the unexpected benefits?

And one minor idea -- I'm not usually a fan of crossovers, but there are just so many good yuri manga set in Japanese school settings. If you wanted to have Kase and Yamada run into the heroines of any one of those, well, I'd at least be amused!

Where to find it: The official site at Seven Seas Entertainment has links to stores selling the physical and digital volumes.

I hope you have fun writing for whichever fandom we match on, and I hope whichever Yuletide gift you receive turns out to be a great one!