Just Married Exchange 2019
May. 24th, 2019 09:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lucymonsterCrossover Fandom (Girls, Star Wars OT, Star Wars ST) | Imperial Radch | Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Dear author,
Thanks so much for writing for me! I'm ridiculously excited about this exchange - the tagset has made me realise that I like marriage tropes a whole lot more than I previously knew, and I've had to sit on my hands to stop my tags and letter getting out of control. Some ship/freeform combos sparked more prompt ideas than others, but I promise I'm equally enthusiastic about everything I've asked for even if some letter sections differ in length.
Basically all my freeform requests fall under a loose banner of forced/accidental/arranged/pragmatic/pined-for marriage. I'm not devoted to any specific one of these scenarios so much as the general theme of two people getting thrown intimately together before they've had the chance to resolve or communicate their feelings for each other. With that as the cake, I'll happily eat any other wedding-related tropes as frosting: lavish ceremonies, undercover hijinks, awkward or erotic wedding nights, whatever.
Dear author,
Thanks so much for writing for me! I'm ridiculously excited about this exchange - the tagset has made me realise that I like marriage tropes a whole lot more than I previously knew, and I've had to sit on my hands to stop my tags and letter getting out of control. Some ship/freeform combos sparked more prompt ideas than others, but I promise I'm equally enthusiastic about everything I've asked for even if some letter sections differ in length.
Basically all my freeform requests fall under a loose banner of forced/accidental/arranged/pragmatic/pined-for marriage. I'm not devoted to any specific one of these scenarios so much as the general theme of two people getting thrown intimately together before they've had the chance to resolve or communicate their feelings for each other. With that as the cake, I'll happily eat any other wedding-related tropes as frosting: lavish ceremonies, undercover hijinks, awkward or erotic wedding nights, whatever.
Other than my handful of DNWs, I'm open to anything. I've written some prompts to get the ball rolling, but I'm honestly not married to anything and am totally happy for you to use as much or as little as you like: adapt or subvert or branch off with any of my ideas, or scrap them and use your own. Go where your heart tells you to go, and please feel free to include past/background ships, opt-in kinks, unhappy endings if that's how you roll - seriously, go wild!
Also, please don't spare a thought for the level of shippiness. I'm completely agnostic about it: gennish pre-ship, tropey romance, toxic darkfic, explicit smut, it's all great.
If you're looking for me elsewhere, I'm on ao3 and occasionally tumblr.
Thank you again, and happy writing!
Do Not Want
- underage smut (<18 - ageing up, tactful handwaving or fade-to-black is fine)
- parent-child incest
- extreme gore, graphic internal/organ damage
- genital bleeding, cutting or tearing (but pain, bruising and feeling like something might tear are welcome)
- AUs other than canon divergence (including trope AUs: please no a/b/o, soulmates etc)
- pure fluff
- poetry or second-person prose
- poetry or second-person prose
- scat, emetophilia, vore, bestiality, lactation kink
- graphic depictions of needles, injections, transfusions or blood-drinking
- graphic depictions of needles, injections, transfusions or blood-drinking
- issuefic, character/ship bashing
- unwarned major character death (if it's not a canon death, please flag it in tags or author's notes so I'm ready).
GENERAL LIKES
Story likes
- anything with a strong character focus
- characters who are flawed and abrasive and challenging to love
- worldbuilding, incidental details
- difficult or dysfunctional relationships
- dark/gritty/moody aesthetics
- romantic tension, unrequited feelings, love triangles
- ensemble casts, background characters
- outsider or observer POVs
- banter, snark, gallows humour
- hurt/comfort (the more hurt, the better!)
- hurt/comfort (the more hurt, the better!)
- descriptions of food, characters eating or sharing food, food as comfort
- military kink: uniforms, weapons, 'sir' (including and especially to address women)
- enemies to lovers
- stranded together, huddling for warmth
- harsh environments, survival/adventure stories
- redemption arcs (or failed redemption arcs)
- subversions, pastiches, crack treated seriously
- first times (sexual or non-sexual)
- non-standard formats: drabbles and drabble sequences, non-linear, epistolary, social media, in-universe meta.
- non-standard formats: drabbles and drabble sequences, non-linear, epistolary, social media, in-universe meta.
General smut likes
- character-driven smut
- orgasm delay/denial, sexual frustration, begging
- coming too quickly, loss of control, getting overwhelmed
- crying after sex
- rough sex, hate sex, power imbalances
- humiliation, verbal insults, gendered slurs
- frottage, dry humping, clothed sex
- sex pollen, aphrodisiacs, drugged sex, fuck-or-die
- different erogenous zones, being sensitive in non-genital places
- anal sex (het or slash), double or multiple penetration
- sounding, watersports, forced wetting
- public use, gangbangs
- loss of virginity, inexperience, clumsy sex
- praise kink
- scar worship
- uncomfortable, consensual-but-unpleasant type sex
- under-negotiated kinks
- any level of complex, problematic or questionable consent.
Darker likes
- creepy, uncomfortable, 'something's off here' vibes
- self-sacrifice, suicide for a good cause
- 'ugly' mental illness: violence, paranoia, warped thinking
- noncon/dubcon
- grey morality, antiheroes
- villain-centred morality
- coercion, blackmail, abuse of power
- victim-blaming
- mind rape, violation, psychological torture
- imprisonment
- physical or sexual torture.
Adam Sackler (Girls TV)/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren (SW ST)
I'd love something cracky and meta for these two - or something cracky and meta treated as serious! Is Adam a Star Wars fan? Do the new movies exist in the Girls universe, and if so, has Adam noticed the eerie physical resemblance between himself and the Sequel Trilogy's main antagonist?
Requested tags:
Married on the astral plane, Fuck marry kill - The ST does exist, and Adam is a fan. Screw the naysayers, he loved The Last Jedi, and he's a big fan in particular of the handsome, charismatic Kylo Ren. Imagine his surprise when his melodramatic claims of devotion turn out to have some unexpected consequences!
Made up spouse, dream marriage - Or maybe it's Kylo who unwittingly initiates this cosmic selfcesty clusterfuck. Alone in his Supreme Leader's quarters, misunderstood by the galaxy at large, he dreams of an alternate life with a spouse who he can truly connect with. He never dares to actually believe a perfect match is out there for him ... until his earthly doppelganger appears out of nowhere.
Method acting - Adam Sackler's acting career takes off in an unexpected way when he gets cast in a brand new installment of the pop culture phenomenon he loved so much as a kid. Like any Good Serious Actor, he devotes himself to getting to know his character - really getting to know him. But as he throws himself into the role, something strange happens: his efforts to make Kylo Ren real are working just a little too well.
Darth Vader (SW OT)/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren (SW ST)
I'm not sure what I'm craving more here: tongue-in-cheek humour about Kylo's fanboy obsession with his granddad, or dark crack-turned-angst as he learns the true horrors of his hero's redeemed-evil life and death, or some ungodly fusion of both. I'm totally happy for Vader to be either his pre-redemption self in full Sith Lord swing, or his post-redemption ghost condemned to watch his grandson reenact his worst mistakes. I'm also easy about Ben/Kylo's timeline - post-fall Kylo Ren or sullen teenage Ben Solo are both great! But if you go down the explicit route, please have him be at least 18 years old.
Requested tags:
Prompts:
Married on the astral plane, Fuck marry kill - Kylo (or a not-yet-fallen Ben Solo?) asks, and the Force answers. Maybe this happens before he finds out the truth about his family, while he's still in the early stages of his giddy crush on the dead Galactic Empire? Or maybe he already knows exactly who Darth Vader is, but sees no problem with keeping his fantasy marriage in the family? Either way, I'd love to see him get more than he bargained for when his self-indulgent game turns real.
Dream marriage - Kylo really did seem to expect that old helmet to start talking back to him! Does he often commune with Vader? Have the dreams been growing stranger and more vivid lately? Does Vader (perhaps as Snoke's proxy or mirage) have a role in turning Kylo to the dark side? Or is their dream marriage a desperate attempt by Vader's guilty ghost to turn his grandson back towards the light?
Resurrection - Is it Kylo's idea? Snoke's? Does Vader's charred helmet tell him to do it? For whatever reason, Kylo decides that finishing what his grandfather started isn't really good enough unless grandfather is around to see it. But as it turns out, the resurrection magic comes at an unusual cost.
Gem of Sphene/Zeiat, Justice of Toren One Esk Nineteen | Breq/Mercy of Kalr, Justice of Toren One Esk Nineteen | Breq/Seivarden Vendaai
Prompts:
Accidental marriage - A visit with the Presger, or a journey to a non-Radchaai system, takes an unexpected turn, and suddenly our heroes find themselves far more intimately attached than either of them intended. I'm here for this played straight or as a joke - I just love the whole cultural misunderstandings trope and would love to read absolutely anything about it.
Marriage fantasy - One of my favourite things about this canon is the understated but profound sense of yearning that runs through it. Everyone's so full of love and grief and unmet needs: Breq's guilt and fractured identity and inability to accept love; Mercy of Kalr's uncertain steps towards autonomy; Seivarden's battles with addiction and hard-won humility; Sphene's impossibly long exile in the ghost system. They're all just desperately searching for home, and maybe a part of them wishes they could find it in someone else.
Propaganda marriage, ending a conflict - The Republic of Two Systems is busy building its case that AIs are significant beings capable of managing their own affairs without human supervision. Will a strategic high-profile marriage help them demonstrate their significance to the doubting Radch and the adjudicating Presger? And more importantly, will there be fish sauce at the wedding?
Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Requested tags:
Time travel - Some space anomaly or quirk of the Force creates an entryway to a future where Ben has renounced the First Order and married Rey. Maybe one of them falls through it, and has to come to terms with the surprise of learning that they're destined to marry their mortal enemy? Or maybe they both fall through together, and have to cooperate to get back to their own proper place in time while staying off the radar of their happily married future selves (who may or may not notice that they're suddenly being quite literally haunted by the ghosts of their past)?
Marriage as rehabilitation / enemy supervision / jail evasion - This tag lends itself beautifully to captured or defector Kylo. Maybe he's turned back to the light and Rey has resolved to help him keep his freedom. Maybe he's still resolutely evil, but the Resistance need a way to use his powers and control him while they do. Or maybe he's hovering somewhere between dark and light, and marriage is the only way to tip the balance.
I'd equally love to see something the other way around: Rey has fallen to the dark and joined the First Order, or else she's been taken prisoner and Kylo has found a creative alternative to keeping her locked in a cell.
Trapped in fake perfect world - Is it Force magic? A dream? An enemy trick to get them out of the way? This tag screams bittersweetness and regret: Rey and Kylo want each other so badly, but for as long as they're on separate sides of the war and the Force, it's never going to work. Maybe one of them fantasises that the other person the fight and came over to their side. Maybe they wish they'd changed their own course and gone willingly with the other. But however their fake perfect dream world lines up, all they know is that when they wake up, they're going to lose the best thing that's ever happened to them. (For a darker/angstier twist: maybe being trapped in the fake world is killing their fake-spouse in real life, and they're forced to choose between living their own dream and saving the other's life?)
Finn/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
I ship these two both crackily and in absolute heartfelt earnest. I love them as enemies drawn together by circumstance, as foils to each other's best and worst traits, as lost soul with a shared background in evil doing their best to leave the First Order's influence behind. I love pre-canon stories where stormtrooper!Finn stumbles into his scariest commander's orbit (only to find that maybe he isn't so scary after all?) I love post-canon or divergent stories where Ben defects to the Resistance and Finn helps him find his footing on the new terrain. I love happy endings and bleak disasters and bittersweet could-have-beens. Honestly, if these two are interacting, I'm happy.
Requested tags:
Fake marriage - FN-2187 gets assigned an unexpected mission that brings him into very close contact with Snoke's notorious apprentice. Or in a defector!Ben AU or forced enemy team-up, the two of them both get roped into going undercover as married. I love fake marriage tropes for all the surprise unwanted intimacy, domestic pettiness, and confused 'is this real or are we still play-acting' feelings.
Marriage as rehabilitation / enemy supervision / jail evasion - I love any and all scenarios where Resistance!Finn is forced to babysit his crazy ex-boss. Do they get married (or fake-married) to help assimilate a defecting Kylo into the Resistance, or to keep a closer eye on him, or to ensure he doesn't change his mind? Does Finn agree to the betrothal out of duty to his friends, or out of some half-suppressed feeling of attraction or empathy? Does Kylo take kindly to the union, or is he under seething duress?
Adam Sackler (Girls TV)/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren (SW ST)
I'd love something cracky and meta for these two - or something cracky and meta treated as serious! Is Adam a Star Wars fan? Do the new movies exist in the Girls universe, and if so, has Adam noticed the eerie physical resemblance between himself and the Sequel Trilogy's main antagonist?
Requested tags:
- Fannish "married on the astral plane" claims magically develop real world repercussions
- A game of "Fuck Marry Kill" somehow becomes magically binding
- Made Up Spouse That Turns Out to be Real
- Marriage within dreams becomes real
- Pretending to be Married for Method Acting
Married on the astral plane, Fuck marry kill - The ST does exist, and Adam is a fan. Screw the naysayers, he loved The Last Jedi, and he's a big fan in particular of the handsome, charismatic Kylo Ren. Imagine his surprise when his melodramatic claims of devotion turn out to have some unexpected consequences!
Made up spouse, dream marriage - Or maybe it's Kylo who unwittingly initiates this cosmic selfcesty clusterfuck. Alone in his Supreme Leader's quarters, misunderstood by the galaxy at large, he dreams of an alternate life with a spouse who he can truly connect with. He never dares to actually believe a perfect match is out there for him ... until his earthly doppelganger appears out of nowhere.
Method acting - Adam Sackler's acting career takes off in an unexpected way when he gets cast in a brand new installment of the pop culture phenomenon he loved so much as a kid. Like any Good Serious Actor, he devotes himself to getting to know his character - really getting to know him. But as he throws himself into the role, something strange happens: his efforts to make Kylo Ren real are working just a little too well.
Darth Vader (SW OT)/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren (SW ST)
I'm not sure what I'm craving more here: tongue-in-cheek humour about Kylo's fanboy obsession with his granddad, or dark crack-turned-angst as he learns the true horrors of his hero's redeemed-evil life and death, or some ungodly fusion of both. I'm totally happy for Vader to be either his pre-redemption self in full Sith Lord swing, or his post-redemption ghost condemned to watch his grandson reenact his worst mistakes. I'm also easy about Ben/Kylo's timeline - post-fall Kylo Ren or sullen teenage Ben Solo are both great! But if you go down the explicit route, please have him be at least 18 years old.
Requested tags:
- Fannish "married on the astral plane" claims magically develop real world repercussions
- A game of "Fuck Marry Kill" somehow becomes magically binding
- Marriage within dreams becomes real
- Resurrection Ritual Requires Marriage
- Resurrection Sex Spell Gone Wrong Results in Unbreakable Magical Marriage Bond
Prompts:
Married on the astral plane, Fuck marry kill - Kylo (or a not-yet-fallen Ben Solo?) asks, and the Force answers. Maybe this happens before he finds out the truth about his family, while he's still in the early stages of his giddy crush on the dead Galactic Empire? Or maybe he already knows exactly who Darth Vader is, but sees no problem with keeping his fantasy marriage in the family? Either way, I'd love to see him get more than he bargained for when his self-indulgent game turns real.
Dream marriage - Kylo really did seem to expect that old helmet to start talking back to him! Does he often commune with Vader? Have the dreams been growing stranger and more vivid lately? Does Vader (perhaps as Snoke's proxy or mirage) have a role in turning Kylo to the dark side? Or is their dream marriage a desperate attempt by Vader's guilty ghost to turn his grandson back towards the light?
Resurrection - Is it Kylo's idea? Snoke's? Does Vader's charred helmet tell him to do it? For whatever reason, Kylo decides that finishing what his grandfather started isn't really good enough unless grandfather is around to see it. But as it turns out, the resurrection magic comes at an unusual cost.
Gem of Sphene/Zeiat, Justice of Toren One Esk Nineteen | Breq/Mercy of Kalr, Justice of Toren One Esk Nineteen | Breq/Seivarden Vendaai
I adore Ann Leckie's intricate worldbuilding around manners, religion and diverse alien societies. I'd love to know more about the concept of marriage in the Radch, and how it might differ between annexed cultures. I'd also love to see what the Presger make of it all, and whether they have their own traditions to bring into the mix.
Requested tags:
- Accidental marriage due to misunderstanding the norms of another culture
- Arranged marriage to end conflict
- Character fantasizes about getting married
- Marriage for propaganda purposes
Prompts:
Accidental marriage - A visit with the Presger, or a journey to a non-Radchaai system, takes an unexpected turn, and suddenly our heroes find themselves far more intimately attached than either of them intended. I'm here for this played straight or as a joke - I just love the whole cultural misunderstandings trope and would love to read absolutely anything about it.
Marriage fantasy - One of my favourite things about this canon is the understated but profound sense of yearning that runs through it. Everyone's so full of love and grief and unmet needs: Breq's guilt and fractured identity and inability to accept love; Mercy of Kalr's uncertain steps towards autonomy; Seivarden's battles with addiction and hard-won humility; Sphene's impossibly long exile in the ghost system. They're all just desperately searching for home, and maybe a part of them wishes they could find it in someone else.
Propaganda marriage, ending a conflict - The Republic of Two Systems is busy building its case that AIs are significant beings capable of managing their own affairs without human supervision. Will a strategic high-profile marriage help them demonstrate their significance to the doubting Radch and the adjudicating Presger? And more importantly, will there be fish sauce at the wedding?
Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
I'm here for absolutely any variation of Kylo and Rey having fraught, dangerous chemistry that overrules their better judgement. I love their intense, spooky bond, and I'd love to see it play out in every way possible: whether it ends in redemption or heartbreak, in tragedy or comedy, in spiritual union or violent blood-soaked conflict. The only thing I'm not super into is pure fluff that completely smooths over Kylo's dark side. I ship them because of the sharp edges, not despite them, and I love fic that lets Kylo keep a bit of his unpleasantness even if their ending is otherwise completely happy.
I especially love how similar Rey and Kylo are in the power and loneliness, and how different they are in everything else: Kylo comes from safety and economic plenty and a loving if imperfect family, while Rey spent her childhood fighting for survival in the unforgiving Jakku desert. Rey doubts her place in the galaxy, but her moral core and self-knowledge are rock solid; Kylo is swaggeringly sure of his destiny, but his inner self is hopelessly fractured and easy to manipulate. I don't know whether or not they'll find a way to meet in the middle, but the prospect that they could is something I never, ever get tired of.
I especially love how similar Rey and Kylo are in the power and loneliness, and how different they are in everything else: Kylo comes from safety and economic plenty and a loving if imperfect family, while Rey spent her childhood fighting for survival in the unforgiving Jakku desert. Rey doubts her place in the galaxy, but her moral core and self-knowledge are rock solid; Kylo is swaggeringly sure of his destiny, but his inner self is hopelessly fractured and easy to manipulate. I don't know whether or not they'll find a way to meet in the middle, but the prospect that they could is something I never, ever get tired of.
Requested tags:
- Accidental travel to a future with an unintended spouse
- Both Spouses Are In Love But Believe The Other Is In The Marriage Out Of Obligation
- Character fantasizes about getting married
- Fake marriage results in surprise real feelings
- Have to get married to bring balance to the Force
- Marriage as criminal rehabilitation
- Marriage to keep enemy under your control
- Marriage to get spouse out of or keep spouse out of jail
- Trapped In Fake Perfect World That Includes Marriage They Don't Believe They Can Ever Really Have
Time travel - Some space anomaly or quirk of the Force creates an entryway to a future where Ben has renounced the First Order and married Rey. Maybe one of them falls through it, and has to come to terms with the surprise of learning that they're destined to marry their mortal enemy? Or maybe they both fall through together, and have to cooperate to get back to their own proper place in time while staying off the radar of their happily married future selves (who may or may not notice that they're suddenly being quite literally haunted by the ghosts of their past)?
Marriage as rehabilitation / enemy supervision / jail evasion - This tag lends itself beautifully to captured or defector Kylo. Maybe he's turned back to the light and Rey has resolved to help him keep his freedom. Maybe he's still resolutely evil, but the Resistance need a way to use his powers and control him while they do. Or maybe he's hovering somewhere between dark and light, and marriage is the only way to tip the balance.
I'd equally love to see something the other way around: Rey has fallen to the dark and joined the First Order, or else she's been taken prisoner and Kylo has found a creative alternative to keeping her locked in a cell.
Trapped in fake perfect world - Is it Force magic? A dream? An enemy trick to get them out of the way? This tag screams bittersweetness and regret: Rey and Kylo want each other so badly, but for as long as they're on separate sides of the war and the Force, it's never going to work. Maybe one of them fantasises that the other person the fight and came over to their side. Maybe they wish they'd changed their own course and gone willingly with the other. But however their fake perfect dream world lines up, all they know is that when they wake up, they're going to lose the best thing that's ever happened to them. (For a darker/angstier twist: maybe being trapped in the fake world is killing their fake-spouse in real life, and they're forced to choose between living their own dream and saving the other's life?)
Finn/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
I ship these two both crackily and in absolute heartfelt earnest. I love them as enemies drawn together by circumstance, as foils to each other's best and worst traits, as lost soul with a shared background in evil doing their best to leave the First Order's influence behind. I love pre-canon stories where stormtrooper!Finn stumbles into his scariest commander's orbit (only to find that maybe he isn't so scary after all?) I love post-canon or divergent stories where Ben defects to the Resistance and Finn helps him find his footing on the new terrain. I love happy endings and bleak disasters and bittersweet could-have-beens. Honestly, if these two are interacting, I'm happy.
Requested tags:
- Accidentally married someone you hate
- Arranged marriage to end conflict
- Both Spouses Are In Love But Believe The Other Is In The Marriage Out Of Obligation
- Fake marriage results in surprise real feelings
- Forced marriage leads to genuine feelings
- Marriage as criminal rehabilitation
- Marriage to get spouse out of or keep spouse out of jail
- Marriage to keep enemy under your control
Fake marriage - FN-2187 gets assigned an unexpected mission that brings him into very close contact with Snoke's notorious apprentice. Or in a defector!Ben AU or forced enemy team-up, the two of them both get roped into going undercover as married. I love fake marriage tropes for all the surprise unwanted intimacy, domestic pettiness, and confused 'is this real or are we still play-acting' feelings.
Marriage as rehabilitation / enemy supervision / jail evasion - I love any and all scenarios where Resistance!Finn is forced to babysit his crazy ex-boss. Do they get married (or fake-married) to help assimilate a defecting Kylo into the Resistance, or to keep a closer eye on him, or to ensure he doesn't change his mind? Does Finn agree to the betrothal out of duty to his friends, or out of some half-suppressed feeling of attraction or empathy? Does Kylo take kindly to the union, or is he under seething duress?
