Three Sentence Ficathon Roundup 3

[mad_madam_m]

My final roundup post for the 3SF! Although as of right now (~10pm Central Time on March 3) the ficathon hasn't been officially closed, the prompts haven't been grabbing me and I'm feeling the need to move back into focusing on trope_bingo fics.

This update has only 6 fandoms and 16 fics, which I know is still quite a bit but it's definitely slowed down from the first few weeks. XD

I'll be archiving all of this year's and last year's ficlets into a collection on AO3, organized by fandoms, so look for that in the coming weeks. It should make things a little easier to browse.

Hope you all have enjoyed this year's ficathon as much as I have!

Tiger & Bunny

Barnaby/Kotetsu, Absolutely Not
Prompt: any, any, the red string of fate

"And what's with removing your mask?" Wild Tiger skates around in front of him to stop Barnaby from walking away. "A hero should never reveal their face!"

Barnaby rolls his eyes at the old-fashioned notion and he's about to respond, but there's an insistent tugging on his finger that makes him look down instead.

His Thread is visible. Not just visible, but...

He looks up slowly, following the bright red Thread to its other end, which is standing out against the dark blue fabric of Tiger's gloves.

Barnaby can only stare. He knows logically what this means, but his brain refuses to process the information.

Tiger gapes at the Thread between them, looking from his hand to Barnaby's and back again, blinking in confusion. "What the hell?"

Barnaby watches at the confusion on Tiger's face turns to realization and then to something he can only describe as horror.

Well, he never expected his soulmate would be horrified to meet him. Then again, the feeling is mutual.

Barnaby clenches his fist and yanks it down to his side; the Thread is still taut enough that the movement jerks Tiger's hand away from his face.

Tiger takes a step toward him. "Hey—"

"No," Barnaby snaps. "Absolutely not."

He stalks away as fast as he can without slipping on the ice, ignoring the insistent tugging on his finger until he's far enough away from Tiger that the sensation fades completely.

Absolutely not.

Barnaby/Kotetsu, Getting Better
Prompt: Any, any, but still I have trouble with/ most days and nights

Things are supposed to get better, Barnaby thinks. Things are supposed to be easier now that he's found his parents' killer, now that justice has been served. But he still has nightmares more often than not, still spends some days angry or sad for no obvious reason at all.

The only thing that helps is knowing that he's not alone, knowing that Kotetsu is right there beside him through every bad day and worse night.

It may not stop the nightmares or the grief, but it makes it easier for Barnaby to get up every day, to keep putting one foot in front of the other, to find new ways to live the way his parents would want him to.

Gen, True Fear
Prompt: any, any, brushing/braiding/putting up someone else's hair

"I have to admit, I've never done this before," Barnaby said dubiously.

Kaede clasped her hands together. "Please? Dad's not here and I really need help. It should be easy for you, right?"

Barnaby looked from the brush and hair tie in his hand, to the video Kaede had pulled up on her phone, back to her pleading face. "Okay, I'll try."

Kaede cheered and Barnaby smiled wryly; nobody had ever told him that after years of launching into life-threatening danger without the slightest hesitation, he'd be nearly paralyzed with fear at the thought of braiding his stepdaughter's hair.

Good Omens

Anathema/Newt, Overrated
Prompt: any, any, "the end of the world was overrated"

"The end is coming! Armageddon is upon us!"

"It's already happened," Anathema cuts in.

The man on the corner stammers to a stop and stares at her. "Er, what?"

"Armageddon. The end of the world," she explains helpfully. "It's already happened. About two months ago. It was a little overrated, to be honest."

"Speak for yourself," Newt mutters, and pulls her along before the street preacher can figure out what to say to either of them.

Aziraphale/Crowley, Helping
Prompt: Any, any, turning into a giant snake never helps

Crowley made a face. "It helped in the garden."

Aziraphale scoffed. "You said that you were up there, and I quote, 'to make some trouble.' I should hardly think that counts as helping."

"I—well—it worked out all right in the end, didn't it?!"

Aziraphale sipped his wine. "I'm simply saying, when was the last time you turning into a giant snake intentionally helped anything? Mostly it just ends up with lots of screaming and you getting tetchy about it for a few hours after you've turned back."

"Helps if you want people to be screaming," Crowley muttered into his wine.

Aziraphale rolled his eyes.

Aziraphale/Crowley, A New Pastime
Prompt: any, any, brushing/braiding/putting up someone else's hair

After Armageddon't, Crowley started growing his hair back out, the red tresses reaching a length Aziraphale hadn't seen since...goodness, was it the 1600s?

Aziraphale had always rather liked Crowley's hair long, and now that they were on their own side, as it were, he could actually do something about it.

Sometimes it was just trailing his fingers through Crowley's hair, gently untangling it with his fingers, but other times Crowley would sit and let Aziraphale brush and braid his hair, a pastime Aziraphale had considered often over the past several millennia but had never, not once, imagined he'd actually get to do; now that he could, he was quickly finding he enjoyed it even more than he'd thought he would.

Teen Wolf

Stiles/Derek, Shirts
Prompt: any, any, wearing a loved one's clothes

Stiles's shirts don't really fit him any better now than they did when Stiles was in high school. But that doesn't stop Derek from pulling the plaid button-downs out of the closet whenever Stiles is away and tugging them on.

The sleeves are just a little too tight on his arms and Derek can only button about half the shirt, but he falls asleep like that regardless, with Stiles's scent in his nose and the sensation of his arms wrapping around Derek in a hug.

Stiles/Derek, A Shoulder to Cry On
Prompt: Any, any, "maybe I was brainwashed, but that still doesn't mean I need you to fix me"

"I can't fix you," Derek says simply, quietly. "You're the only one who can do that. I just meant if you need to talk about it, I'm here."

Stiles wants to laugh at the offer; he really does, but somehow the laugh turns into a sob, and the next thing he knows, Derek has arms wrapped around him and is letting Stiles cry on his shoulder.

And for the first time since the fucking nogitsune took over his mind and his body, Stiles doesn't feel so alone.

Stiles/Derek, Not My Blood
Prompt: any, any, bloody footprints

Derek tenses at the sight of the bloody footprints trailing through the loft. "Stiles—"

"Not my blood!" Stiles shouts from the bathroom. "I swear it's not my blood!"

Derek breathes a sigh of relief that he's grateful no one else is around to hear. "I just meant that this is going to be hell to clean up."

"Oh, fuck you," Stiles snaps back, irritated and familiar, and it loosens another knot in Derek's chest.

Cora/Lydia, Stiles/Derek, past Stiles/Lydia, Making a Move
Prompt: any, any, regrets about a past relationship

Cora nodded across the room, where Stiles was either flirting or fighting with her brother. Probably both, to be honest. "Doesn't that bother you?"

Lydia shook her head and sipped her drink. "No. Stiles is great and he's one of my favorite people, but we're better as friends. And we definitely shouldn't have dated when we were both in love with other people."

"Oh." Cora tapped the side of her glass and hoped it wasn't obvious the way her heart sank. "So are you going to make a move?"

Lydia eyed her contemplatively. "Oh, I'm working on it."

Castlevania

Alucard, Heavy
Prompt: Any, any, but still I have trouble with/ most days and nights

Days are bad. The destruction of the castle is the most obvious then, light slanting over the wreckage of the rooms and the loss of so much of his father's work.

But the nights are worse, with the shadows crowding in on him as harshly as the memories, the grief and loneliness weighing on Alucard like a physical thing, so heavy not even his supernatural strength can give him any relief from it.

Trevor/Alucard, A Hair-rowing Concern
Prompt: any, any, brushing/braiding/putting up someone else's hair

"No," Alucard said flatly. "I'm neither drunk nor insane enough to let you touch my hair."

"Oh, well, forgive me, your highness." Trevor gave an exaggerated bow. "I didn't realize you were so bloody picky about who touched your hair. The fuck do you think I'm going to do, cut it off?"

"Yes," Alucard said. "You have a sword and I've seen how you handle unexpected problems."

"I managed to braid my sister's hair for years without hacking it to bits," Trevor snapped back. "I think I can handle yours."

There was a bitterness behind the words; Alucard forgot, more often than not, that Trevor had lost not only his parents, but his entire family when he was only a child.

"Fine," Alucard relented, not out of pity, but out of some other unnameable emotion he didn't wish to examine too closely. "But if you ruin my hair, I will kill you. Slowly."

"Oh, how terrifying," Trevor said, his sharp, sarcastic tone at odds with the gentleness of his hands, and Alucard found himself newly worried for an entirely different reason.

Trevor/Alucard, Training
Prompt: Any, any, you must not fight too often with one enemy, or you will teach him all your art of war

Their first fight wasn't entirely intentional; Trevor saw a vampire, Alucard saw a hunter, and that was that.

Their second one was more so—ostensibly for training, but mostly for both of them to see if there was a way to gain an upper hand that they hadn't in the first match.

The many subsequent ones were all the same: claimed for training, but secretly for more, for learning how the other moved, how he strategized, how he fought and thought and planned. To learn an enemy as well as they knew themselves.

But you can't fight someone for that long without them learning everything about you as well.

And so it is somehow both surprising and yet entirely expected when Alucard pins Trevor to the ground, and Trevor yanks him in for a bruising kiss that Alucard returns wholeheartedly.

Gargoyles

Gen, Surprise Visitor
Prompt: Gargoyles, any, "reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated"

Elisa walked into her apartment, flipped on the light, and nearly jumped out of her skin to see David Xanatos sitting on her couch and sipping from one of her coffee mugs like he owned the place.

She had her gun out in the next breath, training it right on him. "You're supposed to be dead. What the hell are you doing here?"

Xanatos set his mug on the coffee table. "Don't believe everything you read in the newspapers, Detective Maza. And I'm here because," he winced, "I need your help."

Elisa took another second to think about it before she holstered her gun once again. "This had better be good."

Xanatos smiled wryly. "Oh, it will be."

Gen, Temptation
Prompt: Gargoyles, Lex, smartphones

Lexington woke up and immediately jumped out of his skin; Alex was right there. "Lex! You'll never guess what Dad got me!"

Before Lexington could even make a suggestion, Alex shoved a black rectangle in his face, about the size of his palm, with a glass screen and one button at the bottom. "It's a cell phone!"

Lexington picked it up and turned it over; this wasn't like any cell phone he'd ever seen. "Really?"

"Yeah!" Alex pushed the button on the bottom and the screen popped to life. "It's an iPhone. It's a phone and a PDA and it plays music and takes pictures and gets email and you can download apps and play games! Dad said it's gonna be the future of cell phones and he's so pissed Steve Jobs did it first."

That wasn't a surprise; the only surprise was that Xanatos hadn't tried to buy Apple the second he'd learned this was in development. Lexington tapped the screen first with his claw, then with the side of his finger, swiping the screen left and right. "Wow. This is impressive. They must be in really high demand."

"They will be. They're not out for another month, though." Alex snagged the phone back. "This is, uh, pre-release."

"Pre-release," Lexington said flatly. "Your dad got you a cell phone from one of his major competitors in pre-release."

"He got it legally!" Alex insisted, fast enough that Lexington was pretty sure Alex had no idea whether the phone had been obtained legally or not.

"Alex—"

Quick as a wink, Alex produced another phone from behind his back. "He got you one, too?"

He should probably say no. He should definitely say no. But Alex was practically vibrating with excitement, and really, Lexington had no way of knowing how Xanatos had gotten the phones. Plus, they'd be out in a month for everybody, anyway.

Lexington took the phone, and Alex jumped on him with a whoop. "Come on, Lex, let's go play some games!"

Greek Mythology

Penelope/Odysseus, Matched
Prompt: Greek Mythology, Penelope/Odysseus, his disguises never fool her

"Never?" her husband asks, dismayed. "Not even once?"

Penelope leans back against her pillow, fighting a smile, and she shakes her head.

Odysseus follows her, sinking disconsolately into his side of the bed. "How?"

She gently touches his brow, tracing a finger over the furrowed lines there until his face relaxes. "Because you are the man who matches my heart, my darling, and I would know you through any disguise you might wear. My heart will always recognize the one who fits it."