mad_madam_m

This week's roundup post features 8 fandoms and 29 fics!

Tiger & Bunny

Gen, Ponytail
Prompt: Any, Any, Character brushing another character's hair

"Hold still, Kaede!" Kotetsu chided, with a brush in one hand and a handful of hair and a scrunchy in the other. "Daddy doesn't want to yank your hair."

Kaede giggled and lunged forward, grabbing for one of the toys in front of her, and Kotetsu moved with her, trying to keep his grip on her hair.

Tomoe laughed from her spot on the couch. "Not so easy, is it?"

Kotetsu mock-scowled at her before he went back to putting his three-year-old's hair into a ponytail. "I think catching criminals might be easier."

Barnaby/Kotetsu, Bunny-chan
Prompt: any, any, nicknames

The nickname had started out as a joke, a way to needle Bunny, who took himself so seriously back in the beginning. He hadn't had a hero name, so Kotetsu needed something to call him that wasn't his real name and, well, he'd had never claimed maturity as one of his strengths, so he'd kept at it, silently awarding himself points whenever Bunny broke his usual composure with an irritated "My name is Barnaby."

But somehow over their partnership, it had gone from being a way of poking at him to being genuinely affectionate, something Kotetsu no longer said to make Bunny snap, but to make him smile. And although Bunny had never said it—would probably never admit it aloud—the fact that he did smile now at "Bunny-chan" told Kotetsu he felt the same way.

Barnaby/Kotetsu, Romantic
Prompt: any, any, writing a letter because it's more romantic

Barnaby reads the letter three times before he tucks it in his pocket and goes to find Kotetsu, who is sitting on the couch and going through the stack of mail he's let grow for the past two weeks.

Barnaby leans over the back of the couch and wraps his arms around him. "I don't know why you wrote me a letter, old man. We live together."

"Because it's Valentine's Day, Bunny-chan, and letters are romantic." Kotetsu stiffens. "You did think it was romantic, right?"

Barnaby kisses his cheek, and then his neck, and then goes with it when Kotetsu pulls him over the couch, the pile of mail forgotten once again.

Barnaby/Kotetsu, Good Things
Prompt: any, any, too good to be true

Most days, Kotetsu feels like things are okay. But others, it hits him that this is too good to be true, that there's no way Bunny wants to be with him, that he's going to wake up and find out this is all a dream.

Those days, maybe, he gets clingy—holds Bunny a little too tight, stands a little too close, like if he can't reach out and touch him, it's all going to vanish—but Bunny doesn't mind; he just smiles and takes Kotetsu's hand, comforting and warm and real.

Barnaby/Kotetsu, He Did Stop Singing
Prompt: any, any, singing in the shower

It is nine in the morning on Barnaby's day off, and there is singing coming from the shower.

"Kotetsu!" he yells, to be heard over the spray. "I'm trying to sleep! Stop singing!"

"Sorry, Bunny!"

Barnaby sighs and has just closed his eyes when the humming starts up. "Kotetsu!"

"What?! I stopped singing!"

Barnaby drags the pillow over his head and groans.

Gargoyles

Gen, Again!
Prompt: Gargoyles, any, Coney Island

"Again!" Alex said as soon as they disembarked from the Ferris wheel. "Go again? Go again peez Daddy?"

"Alex, we've gone on the Ferris wheel three times in a row," Xanatos said. "Are you sure you don't want to go on a different ride?"

"How about the carousel?" Fox suggested.

Alex looked between his parents, and then turned to Owen with the largest pleading eyes ever seen on a toddler. "Owen go again peez?"

Owen cleared his throat. "I could take him on the Ferris wheel again, sir, if you and Fox would rather do something else."

Xanatos glanced at Fox, who was fighting a smile. "I guess we're all going again."

Alex cheered.

Gen, Negotiations
Prompt: Gargoyles, Elisa, de-escalation

The raised voices in the other room finally reached a point that Elisa couldn't ignore it, and she slammed shut her book and stalked into the TV room to find Lex, Brooklyn, and Broadway all inches away from being at each other's throats, with Lex actually trying to grab the phone from Broadway's hand.

"What is going on?" Elisa demanded.

Three voices tried to explain at once, and the only thing Elisa gleaned from it all was the phrase "pizza toppings," which really shouldn't have been as surprising as it was.

She rolled her eyes and snatched the phone. "Why don't you three chill out, and I'll place the order?"

Owen/Xanatos, Being Good Does Not Come Naturally
Prompt: Any, Any, skewed priorities

"We'll need to be careful with this next test, Owen." Xanatos studied the computer readout thoughtfully. "There's a chance we could lose all the data we've gathered over the past three months."

"There is also a chance that one of the clan could die, sir," Owen reminded him.

"Right, right, we want to avoid that, too." Xanatos shook his head. "Alex and Elisa would never forgive me."

Gen, Real or Not?
Prompt: any, any, dragons

"Are centaurs real?" Alex asked, setting aside his math homework.

Owen flipped through a binder and made notes on one of the pages. "Not to my knowledge."

Alex frowned at him. "What about unicorns?"

"Also, not to my knowledge."

Alex made a face. "Dragons? C'mon, Owen, dragons have to be real."

"I'm afraid I don't have an answer for you," Owen said. "Just because you want something to be real doesn't mean that it is."

Alex kicked the leg of the desk and considered. "Hey, Owen?"

"Hm?"

"You said not to your knowledge." Alex sat up straighter. "What about Puck's?"

Owen didn't look up, but Alex caught the edge of his smile. "What an excellent question, Alexander. I suppose you'll just have to ask him."

Alex grinned and sat back. "I suppose I will."

Gen, Famous First Words
Prompt: Any, any, "famous last words"

"So," Matt tapped his Illuminati pin on the top of the table, "remember what you said when we first met, about how you didn't believe in UFOs, Loch Ness, or secret societies?"

Elisa glared at him and took a long drink from her beer. "And your point?"

Matt shrugged, but he was grinning. "I just think it's funny. You know, given that all those things turned out to be real."

Elisa rolled her eyes. "Yeah, yeah, famous last words."

Matt lifted his own bottle. "More like famous first words, I'd say."

Elisa kicked him.

Gen, Father-to-be
Prompt: Any, any, an evil character who loves and does right by their kids and/or partners

Xanatos picked up the folder with the paperwork for the construction site in Arizona and browsed through it, double-checking that everything was in order for his trip down there later this month. Not for the first time, he was glad that Goliath and Elisa were—mostly—MIA, although they were apparently showing up in random places around the globe, as Fox had mentioned running into them in Australia on her latest project. At least there was a reduced risk of them showing up to interfere with this.

Speaking of Fox... he set aside the folder and picked up a catalog he'd had Owen grab on his last trip to the store and paged through the nursery offerings inside. There was so much that went into bringing a child into this world, honestly, and Xanatos was determined that his son would never lack for anything, least of all doting parents.

Gen, Justice
Prompt: Gargoyles, Elisa, truth and justice

Elisa rubbed her temple; she loved Alex, she really did, but... "Alex, when other kids are being jerks at school, you're supposed to tell a teacher. You can't go around taking matters into your own hands."

Alex stood in the hallway, glaring mutinously. "I can when the teachers don't do anything. That's what the clan does when the cops fall down on the job, right?"

"That's different." Elisa sighed. "You know I'm going to have to tell your parents, right?"

Alex raised his eyebrow, a mannerism he had to have picked up from Burnett. "Go ahead. Last time they found out about this kind of thing, Owen said he was proud of me, Mom laughed for five minutes straight, and Dad bought me and Lex ice cream. This time I'll probably get pizza, too, since I didn't actually get caught."

Elisa raised her eyes to the ceiling; why was she even remotely surprised? "Yeah, I was afraid of that."

Castlevania

Dracula/Lisa, First Time for Everything
Prompt: any, any, brushing/braiding/putting up someone else's hair

Vlad combed his fingers through Lisa's hair, separating the fine golden strands into three sections and cautiously lifting one over the other, just as she'd shown him. "It will not be my fault if your hair ends up in a mess of knots, my dear."

Lisa laughed, her voice clear as bells. "I have faith in the dexterity of your hands, darling, and I assure you it's not nearly as difficult as you're making it out to be. "

Vlad kept his additional comments to himself and focused on her hair; literal centuries of life behind him, and yet somehow this was the first time he'd ever attempted to braid someone's hair.

Trevor/Alucard, Can't Save Them All
Prompt: Any, any, your heart is bigger than they say

Alucard found Trevor outside the village, standing in the graveyard in the midst of an icy drizzle and staring down at a gravestone.

Alucard picked his way over the frozen ground to stand beside him. "Friend of yours?"

Trevor scoffed and looked away. "Hardly. Only knew 'em for a few hours. Demons were preying on the village and we stopped it, but not before—"

Trevor snapped his jaw shut hard enough Alucard heard his teeth clack. No further explanation was forthcoming, but one was not needed: these were people Trevor had been unable to save. From the dates on the stones, three years had passed, but from the tightness in Trevor's jaw, Alucard supposed it may as well have happened yesterday.

Trevor swore under his breath and stamped his feet. "Fucking freezing. We should go back."

He spun and started back toward the inn, long legs putting distance between him and the grave, and Alucard took another long look at the stone before following.

He had expected many things from the last of the Belmonts, but a caring heart had not been one of them.

Gen, A Peaceful Moment
Prompt: any, any, peace and quiet

Trevor lay in the crook of his tree, the old twisty branches blooming with pale green leaves, a nod to the changing of the seasons. A few feet above him, two birds were harassing a squirrel that had gotten too close to their nest and the eggs within, and on the ground below him, a family of rabbits was making itself at home under the massive gnarled roots.

It was quiet and peaceful, two things that had been in short supply for most of his life, and damn it, Trevor was going to enjoy it as long as he was able to.

Gen, Hidden
Prompt: any, any, lost letters

Alucard finds the box hidden behind a false wall in his father's study; it isn't a very large box, but it's clearly been cared for. The lock is complex, which tells him whatever is inside was extraordinarily valuable to his father, and it takes Alucard the better part of an hour to finally break it.

He eases the lid open to find a handful of letters tied with a blue ribbon and his mother's handwriting across them, and immediately slams it shut again; at some point he may have the emotional fortitude to read her words again, but it is most certainly not now.

Alucard/Trevor, Regrets
Prompt: Any, any, regretting not saying something

The words are on Alucard's lips the entire time he watches Trevor and Sypha pack, as he helps them load the wagon for their journey, as he watches them ride away from the castle.

Stay, please, stay with me.

But he doesn't say anything, doesn't call out, and the only friends he's ever had leave him behind.

***

"I should have asked you to stay."

Trevor looks up; Alucard is staring vacantly at the fire, the shadows of the flames giving his face a haunted look, and there's a wealth of pain in the words that doesn't sound like it's coming from the wine.

Trevor sets aside the bottle he's been drinking and crawls over, looping a clumsy arm around Alucard's shoulders. "And I shouldn't have left."

Alucard leans into him with a sigh. "You came back."

Trevor/Alucard, Dance
Prompt: Any, any, an invitation to dance

"I'm sorry, you want to what?" Trevor asked.

Alucard gave him a flat look. "Dance, Belmont. I asked if you wanted to dance."

"A vampire asking a hunter to dance?" Trevor snorted. "That's a first."

Alucard rolled his eyes. "If you don't want to, then—"

Trevor scrambled to his feet. "Hey, now, I didn't say that."

Voltron: Legendary Defender

Pidge/Allura, One Method of Diplomacy
Prompt: Any fandom, any rarepair, trying to make a fake dating plot happen

"Okay, Allura, I don't speak that language," Pidge waved her hand back at the reception they'd just left, "but I know you told those diplomats something about us. What's going on?"

Allura cleared her throat and didn't meet Pidge's eyes. "Well, they were being rather aggressive about seeking a more permanent, marriage-related alliance between their race and the Alteans. And I couldn't just tell them no, so...I may have indicated that you were my, ah. Partner."

"Wait, what?!" Pidge gaped. "You mean I've got to pretend to be your girlfriend?!"

"Just until we leave!" Allura grabbed her hands. "It's only a few days, and I'll find a way to make it up to you, I promise! Please?"

Pidge wanted to argue, but the way Allura was looking at her, any objections died in her throat. She closed her eyes and groaned. "Oh, quiznak."

Star Wars

Gen, Hope
Prompt: The Mandalorian, Grogu, memories
There is a memory in the back of his mind, of fear and fire and death, that drives him to hide what it is he can do. But it has been joined by new memories, of a pieced-together ship and long flights and a tall masked figure in shiny armor stepping in to protect him.

And now, on a new planet with a new person who can train him in how to use his powers, Grogu watches the stars and holds onto his memories of his father and the hope that they will see each other again.

Finn/Poe, Heroes
Prompt: Star Wars, Poe Dameron/Finn, Poe is telling Finn the story of Bodhi Rook/Cassian Andor

"And that's where the Rogue Squadron got its name," Poe says, taking Finn's hand in his. "From a cargo pilot who defected from the Empire, and a group of rebels who gave us the knowledge we needed to take down the Death Star. They gave us hope."

Poe's voice is awed, reverent, like he's sharing a sacred story he's heard a million times, and Finn gets it, the real core of it: how so many of the heroes of the rebellion are not politicians or princesses or great Jedi warriors, but ordinary people who made the decision to do the right thing.

He leans into Poe and looks up at the stars sparkling in the night sky. "They gave us hope, and we pass it on, yeah?"

Poe rests his head on Finn's and kisses his forehead. "Yeah, we do."

Finn/Poe, Into the Garbage Chute, Flyboy
Prompt: any, any, "damn, we're in a tight spot!"

Finn glanced up and down the corridor, trying his best to use the jammed door as a shield from the blaster fire pinning them down. "We're in a pretty tight spot!"

Poe grabbed his shoulder. "I think I found a way out, but you're not going to like it."

"What do you mean you—" Finn stared at the smoking hole in the wall and the gag-inducing smell wafting out of it. "Oh, hell."

Teen Wolf

Gen, Attention
Prompt: any, any, female werewolves

There were probably better ways to get attention from the student population. Erica can acknowledge that.

But the power she feels after the Bite—coursing through her blood, giving her the confidence to stride down the hall in tight pants and a leather jacket—and the attention she draws then, all eyes on her, is enough that she'll never, ever regret her decision.

Cora/Lydia, Getting to the Good Stuff
Prompt: any, any, soft sweater

Cora crouched over Lydia and ran a finger up the arm of her cashmere sweater. "You know, the sweater looks good on you."

Lydia raised an eyebrow and smirked. "But you're thinking it would look better on the bedroom floor? What a coincidence, so do I."

Cora suddenly sat back, her cheeks turning red. "That's what I'm supposed to say!"

"Because you're trying to seduce me," Lydia said patiently, "and I’m letting you know that it worked. Do you want to argue about it or do you want to get on to the sex?"

Cora growled and pulled her in for a kiss. Pick-up lines were overrated, anyway.

Derek/Stiles, Entendre
Prompt: any, any, competence/capability kink

"You know," Stiles said breathlessly, "if I'd known using magic did it for you, I'd have started studying this shit way sooner."

Derek growled and continued kissing his way up Stiles's neck. "You protecting the pack does it for me."

"Heh, the pack's not the only thing I can protect—actually, scratch that, I don't think that works as a double entendre. Let me—"

Derek groaned and kissed him before he could get distracted.

Good Omens

Gen, No More Horses
Prompt: any, any canonically immortal character, travel

Crowley watches this new invention with no small amount of glee; it's sleek and beautiful and fast and moves on wheels instead of four legs, and seems to have absolutely no mind of its own, which is very much a bonus in this case.

He buys the first one that catches his fancy, a type of automobile they've called a Bentley, and she's beautiful.

And most importantly, Crowley is never going to have to set foot on a horse again.

Aziraphale/Crowley, Bargains
Prompt: any, any, deal with the devil

"I have told you," Aziraphale said primly, "this is not something that I can help you with, Crowley. You are on your own, and that is final. I won't do any bargaining with a demon."

Crowley sighed and lifted the bottle of wine he'd brought. "A shame, really. And I'd already gotten you a thank-you gift."

Aziraphale's eyes went straight to the bottle of wine. "Well...I suppose a little bargaining won't hurt."

Crowley pushed the wine over and grinned. "Always a pleasure doing business with you, angel."

Leverage

Eliot/Parker/Hardison, Everybody
Prompt: Any, any, "I love everybody in this bar."

"There are only two people in this bar," Eliot pointed out. "Me and Hardison."

Parker giggled and threw her arms around them both. "Yup! I love everybody in this bar!"

Hardison grinned and kissed her cheek. "We love you too, baby girl."