kimaracretak (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
fiachairecht) wrote2019-06-27 04:45 pm
fiachairecht) wrote2019-06-27 04:45 pm
everywoman 2019
Hello friend, it is time for fic about ladies and I am so excited to see what you will write for me! If you want inspiration beyond this letter I am also ![[archiveofourown.org profile]](https://p.dreamwidth.org/b164c54b26e4/-/archiveofourown.org/favicon.ico)
kimaracretak, where I have a small but reflective-of-things-I-like set of bookmarks, and kimaracretak on 8tracks if you want #aesthetic musical inspiration.
I've by and large chosen canons I love for their worldbuilding and mytharcs as well as their characters and relationships, and I am easy to please as long as you stay away from my DNWs (both general and canon-specific), so don't feel like you Have to write any of my specific prompts. Don't read anything into relative lengths of sections, I am equally happy to get something for anything in this letter! Some of these prompts are reused from old letters, and if you have written them for me before, rest assured that I loved your fic, I am simply greedy and would like to see every possible take on my favourite scenarios.
I love everything from short introspection bits to long plotty missionfic to sex scenes as ways to explore character/setting/worldbuilding, and I don't need a lot of romance in my ships: sex for power, manipulation, or just between friends who want to have fun is also great. Please no unrequested ships unless specifically allowed for, but feel free to combine any compatible ones from my requested ones.
Likes || Smut Likes || DNWs || Jordskott || Picnic at Hanging Rock (TV 2018) || River (TV 2015) || The Southern Reach Trilogy - Jeff Vandermeer || Under the Pendulum Sun - Jeannette Ng || Y Gwyll
General: Witchy murderforest of my whole entire heart and all the women and girls it loves, ahhhh. This show has so many beautiful things to say about love and care and loss and obsession and it's eaten me as surely as Silverhojd has eaten Josefine. Tell me stories about witches and women and love and life and forests and I will be so, so happy. I would be totally happy with gen, but I ship Eva/Jeanette, Eva/Klara, Eva/Laila, Eva/Zara, Laila/Zara, Esme/Linus, and Esme/Maja, if you want to write something shippy. I headcanon Linus as nonbinary, but don't feel beholden to that if you involve him in fics. You don't have to resurrect Klara/ignore her death if you're writing late/post-s2 fic, but I'd rather it not be dwelt on.
Fandom-specific DNW: Eva/Bahar, Bahar being married to a man, romance for the kids (Ida, Josefine, Kalem).
Bahar Holmqvist: Bahar would not be paid enough for what s2 put her through even if she'd taken that promotion. I love her, I love how she's a little bit of an asshole but just genuine and self-aware enough for it to be a mostly good thing, I love her stubbornness and kindness and her refusal to let her belief in order make her do what she believes to be wrong. I'd love to read about her life and career pre-Eva, I would also like to see her slowly becoming more comfortable with the supernatural post-s2. I'd love to see her develop more of a relationship with Ida, or perhaps help Kalem get more settled in Sweden. Post-s2 casefic, especially given that last offer she received, would be great if you want something more plotty.
Josefine: Josefine is my favourite tree in the whole world and I would love anything you would like to write about her. I am especially interested in her missing years - what did her life look like before Eva came back?
Ylva: I was stunned by how much love the show had for Ylva the first time around, she's such a rare, joyful embrace of all the most wonderful things about the crone archetype despite the pain she's gone through. I'd love to see something about her life with Muns, or with Klara, or with the network of support she's built in the town and the forest. She's so aware, of thoughts and of life, and getting her perspective on the events of the show more immediately than we did through Eva's visuals would be lovely. We know she's far, far older even than she appears - she's had centuries in that forest, go wild with your worldbuilding and tell me all about them! AU where she managed to save + raise Laila? Can she shapeshift? When did she meet Klara? Are there others like her in other countries that she keeps in touch with?
Bahar & Eva: Y'know Bahar put on trousers for Eva and Eva said 'I hate having to lie to Bahar' and for all s2's turmoil they're really a stunningly lovely and genuinely good-for-each-other partnership. I'd love post-s2 fic where Eva takes Bahar to the forest, as part of making amends for her secret-keeping - maybe she even introduces her to Josefine's tree. Also casefic where they get to actually work together, in Stockholm or Silverhojd. Post-s2 casefic would be great, especially given the offer Bahar got at the end of s2. Eva bonding with Bahar's kids? Bahar somehow seeks out Ylva to try to help Eva?
Esmeralda & Klara: Witches and mentorships and found families, I love forever. Something set in the s1-s2 gap would be wonderful, showing how Esme grew from the rightfully distrustful lonely girl she was to someone who uncomplicatedly called Klara her foster mother and left that heartbreaking voicemail. Klara teaching Esme - anything from serious things about her powers to more simple 'no, you cannot actually eat that plant without dying'. I would love resurrection fic - Esme taking Klara back from the forest, Esme being given Klara-but-wrong by the trees, weird wonderful necromancy rituals with Ylva's help. Fic with them travelling somewhere - maybe a post-s2 AU where Esme takes Klara to Stockholm to show her why she found the city so important, or maybe Klara has friends/contacts somewhere else in Finland/Norway/Scotland/wherever that she takes Esme to meet. Anything that gets into hulderfolk/banshee mythology would be fantastic.
Eva & Klara: I would be super interested in a s2 AU where Eva never went back to Stockholm? I'm really not sure how well Klara would be able to help Eva recover when she's Like That(tm) at the end of s1, but it's the process and the attempt that is important almost more than the success. Or a s1 AU where Klara finds Eva before Ylva - how would Eva handle learning about the forest from someone who initially appears much more similar to herself than from someone who slots more easily into the crone-witch archetype (Klara-Eva-Esme as crone-mother-maiden is deeply intriguing, as is Ylva-Eva-Klara as crone-mother-maiden). If you go shippy, maybe Esme's POV on them - would she be okay with sharing Klara, or would she not care? We've seen Eva with Ida, who's quite similar to Josefine in age/appearance/temperament, how would she handle Esme? And, as always, resurrection fic is loved.
Ida & Josefine: They understood each other when no one else did, in a way that no one else did, and I'm obsessed with how the forest functions a conduit between them and what affect the Ida-is-a-changeling reveal might have on that. I'd love to see something that acknowledges that Josefine is continuing to grow - Ida sneaking off to the forest to sit by Josefine's tree and draw her pictures, maybe. Or dreamsharing, I am super into dreamsharing for them. I love how Ida acts as voice for Josefine and the forest both, and how Josefine, in human or tree form, might help bring some of Ida's own visions to life in return. I don't need Josefine to be in human form for this, and honestly it would be super cool if she wasn't? Lean into all the weird wonderful inhuman love and special care these girls have for each other!
Klara & Ylva: I would dearly, dearly love Klara-resurrection fic. Resurrection/rebirth/what it means to come back are such huge themes, and I'd like that to be explored in some way, especially because some form of necromancy is canonically possible. Whether the forest gives Klara back (slightly wrong?) or Ylva brings her back, I'd love anything dealing with improbable survival and learning to live again. But I would be just as happy with any quiet pre-show moment for them, Ylva teaching Klara about the forest, Klara helping Ylva care for Muns, both of them tending to Josefine while they wait for Eva to come back.
General: This show has a thesis of 'why be a girl when you could be an eldritch horror instead' because it loves me, it really loves me. I love the bonds and the backstabbing and the love-through-horror, I love the changeling girls and the amount of respect it gives stories of self-creation. I love the contrast between the suffocating boarding-school atmosphere and the equally terrifying 'I would like to let the sky eat me' of the Rock and how that's reflected in the characters' emotional relationships. Permadeath of any of the requested characters is fine for this fandom, as is ambiguous/show-consistent explanations of what happened at the Rock. The show does so much excellent work with forests that probably want to eat you/nature which tries to eat you/nature which wants to crawl inside you and never come out and I want to see infinitely more of it! Sith and vampire AUs especially adored for this fandom.
Hester Appleyard: She's so fucked up and so sad and I adore her madly. Every time we get a glimpse inside her head it's so frantic compared to the perfectly composed facade she builds, and I would love anything that plays in the space between those two. Favourite ships for her are with Irma or Dianne but character-study gen is equally loved. Ghosts haunting ghosts - I'd love Hester haunting her husband's ghost, or Sara's, or somehow slipping into the space beyond the Rock. Pre-series fic would also be excellent.
Marion Quade: Marion/Greta would be fantastic if you want to go for shipfic - secret relationship and mentorship problems, everything I love. Or post-Rock Miranda/Marion - what does their world look like? I loved the little we saw of her with Hester, the almost-affectionate mind games, and I'd love to see more of that whether shippy or not - school holidays together, or an AU where Marion ends up as a teacher for her or at a re-constituted Academy that Hester and Dianne found.
Miranda Reid: I'm obsessed with this weird eldritch forest of a girl and the way she draws people into her. She helped break the fabric of time and space by loving her friends and wanting freedom for them and I want to know everything about that beautiful, Weird self.
Dianne & Irma: I loved the glimpses we got of Dianne trying to help Irma readjust to linear time, her softer questions and her optimism in contrast to Irma's studied apathy that she pastes over her regret. Irma is so deeply concerned with appearances, while Dianne is - much less so unless forced to, and I'd love something that gets into that, or into Dianne trying to protect Irma from Hester.
Hester & Dianne: I mean, hatesex for always if you go shippy, or any sort of emotionally manipulative sensuality. There's an odd undercurrent of 'why aren't you better' that they both have towards each other (and themselves) and I'd love a story that lives in the lovely-awful tangled knots they tie each other into, and the ways in which they can't quite bring themselves to wish they were more like the other. I'd love to see an AU where Dianne accompanies Hester to the Rock or one where Hester and Dianne moved and built a new school out of the ruins of the first Academy. Any sort of post-canon fic where Hester haunts Dianne in her new position.
Hester & Greta: Greta owes Hester a lot, and while she never goes to the lengths Hester did to keep her secrets (largely because Hester didn't care) I feel like they're both very aware Greta is on a very thin line there, and I'd love to see some exploration of that. I'd love something that leans in the loyalty kink - sexual or not, consensual or not (seriously, dubiously consensual loyalty kink was one of my favourite smutswap tags. The whole ... we both know what the other isn't saying and why and we're both responding to that sort of conversation/mutual existence is so good, and I'd love more of it.
Hester & Miranda: I love how Miranda spends the whole series deconstructing Hester so deftly no one's quite sure what she's done til the very end. Maybe Hester sees Miranda at the Rock, maybe Miranda taunts her about Sara, maybe one of Hester's attempts to dress her up nicely backfires somehow. An extension of the punishment scene, especially one including Hester bandaging her hands afterwards instead of Irma and Marion, and the glorious emotional whiplash that could provoke.
Hester & Sara: Their cold war is one of my favourite things about the show, and I just want to see more of it, whether it's pre-series, missing scenes, or even post-series where they're ghosts haunting each other. I'd love to see them at the Rock together in some sort of canon-divergence, or pre-series fic about Sara first coming to the Academy and starting to become suspicious of Hester. More sneaking around, more disturbingly cheerful games, more races through the woods, just - more of them.
General: Gods, this show has so many beautiful things to say about love and loss and grief and I just want to dwell in it a while longer. I interpret Chrissie has having been in love with Stevie but not having recognised/admitted it even to herelf until after she'd died, and my prompts do stem from that interpretation, but if you want to keep their relationship platonic that's also fine.
Fandom-specific DNW: Any m/f ships apart from background Marianne/Ira, Brexit references (the show's set in 2015 so it's only really releveant if you're doing futurefic, and you don't have to, like, have a line about how Remain won in 2016 (though I would not say no to it), just let me pretend they live in a world where they're not about to get fucked over by this bit of pure evil).
Chrissie & Stevie: John's grief over Stevie takes centre stage for most of the show, and I would really like something that moves the focus over onto Chrissie and her grief here.
Rosa & Chrissie: Gen or shippy or anywhere between is lovely, I'd love anything about them finding peace together post-series, especially Rosa helping Chrissie rediscover/reclaim her sexuality.
Rosa & Stevie: Canon leaves it ambiguous whether they ever met, so I'd love to see them meet pre-series - missed opportunities, things half-said.
Marianne & Chrissie: Chrissie ended up somewhere so sad by the end of the show, and I'd love to see her just - having a quiet moment with Marianne post-series where she doesn't have to think about her husband, or her work, or really anything and can focus on remembering (re-learning) how to make friends, how to sit with her grief with someone who doesn't share it but still wants to help.
General: I love them as a changeling story, I love them as a story of nature-as-entity, I love them as a story of how desolation is never bleak and usually alive. I would prefer you use the characters' professions to describe them (eg "the psychologist" ) in narration, rather than their names. I am fine with canon-consistent 'being eaten by Area X' for either of the requested characters but DNW them to die in any other way. The canon by nature is playing with some pretty dark questions about embodiment and environmental catastrophes and death, but there's plenty of potential for light and joy - there is plenty of light and joy for both the requested characters as they give themselves back over to Area X, so don't be afraid to lean into that. I've read all three books and my prompts do get kinda spoilery, but if you've only read Annihilation, I welcome fic based only off that. I love the journal style of Annihilation and epistolary fic is especially welcome for this fandom.
Ghost Bird: I love clones/bits of sentient nature coming into themselves as their own creatures and I love Ghost Bird. I'd like to get inside her head, during her time alone in Rock Bay, sometime post-series with Grace in the new world that is wholly Area X, while meeting what the Biologist has become. I would especially love some way for her to meet the psychologist - time is weird! The Psychologist is in a weird not-dead/not-Area-X limbo! It is so possible, and I would love it.
The Psychologist: I'm obsessed with the image of her walking towards the Southern Reach carrying the barrier that we got in Authority - it's vague whether it was her or a simulacrum imo, but regardless of the answer I'd love something that dwells in that moment from her POV - what it means to come forward like that, to carry her old home to her new. I'd also love her take on the events of the 12th expedition, what it means to her to hold the full weight of knowledge, how she planned, how it felt to hypnotise the other team members. Documentary/epistolary fic - anything that brings to life her notes, her files, all the threads she wove through the Reach and all the things she couldn't keep after the barrier came down. Pre-Annihilation fic that goes along with her
The Surveyor: She's the one character who gets significant alone time in Annihilation whose head we never get into, and I would love something set during that span of time where she's alone in the ruins of the campsite, sitting next to the tower, dwelling over the anthropologist's body - what was she thinking, what creatures did she meet? Pre-series fic would be cool, as would be came back wrong fic or fic about an Area-X-doppelganger!Surveyor observing the events of the next two books, perhaps meeting Ghost Bird or the returned biologist.
Ghost Bird & The Biologist: Do you ever think about how Area X creates Ghost Bird in the image of the Biologist and then by the time Ghost Bird meets the Biologist the Biologist has become Area X? Because I think about that a lot and I'm emo about it and I just want something that dwells in that uneven furrow between the two creatures and their desires to be/love/consume each other.
The Biologist & The Psychologist: Gods - anything and everything? Their scene together at the lighthouse wrecked me, and I'd love to see something where the Psychologist transforms same as the Biologist then, or an AU where the biologist didn't figure out the hypnosis commands, or a scene with them together before going into Area X.
General: Oh hey this weird book about fucked-up missionary siblings in clockwork Fairyland snuck into my life and ruined me and I would love to be further ruined by any fic you write! I really, really loved the Changeling!Cathy faux-reveal and was a bit put out by its last-chapter reversal (all books can do with more weird changelings, lbr), so any Changeling!Cathy fic - or fic where she's human but grappling with the fact that she enjoyed elements of the time when she thought she was a soulless creature - is always adored. Canon-compliant deathfic for Ariel is fine - especially if it leads to Mab further manipulating/fucking with Cathy, and Cathy continuing to spiral about her identity, but I am also thrilled by any AU you come up with where she survives or is brought back. I ship loads of things a stupidly intense amount - Cathy/Laon, Cathy/Ariel, Cathy/Mab, Mab/Ariel, Cathy/Kasdaye, they're all incredibly good - so if you want to write shipfic, go for it! Just lean into the weird and I'm happy!
Ariel Davenport: Changeling stories are my favourite in all universes, and I love Ariel madly. She clearly has some history with Arcadia's lies and masques, and I'd love any glimpse of it. Alternatively, what was life like for her in the mortal world?
Kasdaye: Kasdaye as temptress-and-oracle is so incredibly My Thing and I want more of her! Life in court, life with her brother, telling fortunes and breaking rules. Fae parties and rituals, how she came to Mab's court, other courts she was with before, what it means to read fates and fortunes in a land where the line between spoken word and reality is incredibly malleable.
Mab | The Pale Queen: I love Mab so godsdamnned much, she's so extra in such a calculated way, and absolutely malevolent in such a gloriously fake-careless way and I want to dwell in her mind and her court forever. How did she build her court, what is her life like in Pivot, what other interactions has she had with humans, has she ever been to the mortal world, what are her relationships with other Fae lords like? I just want to know EVERYTHING about Mab and Arcadia, so do all the worldbuilding you like!
Ariel & Cathy: I would love some of Ariel's POV on the novel's events - she has a sort of resignation to liminality about her that I find fascinating. What if she had been given more time to convince Cathy she was a Changeling too? What if she tried to sell Cathy to Mab for Laon's safety (or, perhaps, Cathy tries it with her). Resurrection attempts? Ill-advised wanderings into the depths of Arcadia? We see glimpses of what Changelings think about Cathy and Laon's theology, but what kind of myths and religions of their own have they developed that Ariel and Cathy might stumble into in this land where everything's just a bit too real?
Ariel & Mab:How was Ariel summoned back from the mundane world? How did Mab 'lay claim' to her changeling - did she get any pushback form other Faerie lords? Did Ariel ever think about defecting to another court, or is that not allowed by Faerie laws? AU where she did defect to another court, and how that influenced her relationships with both Mab and Catherine. Is necromancy possible in Arcadia? Came back wrong fic would be delightful. Ariel - or whatever's left of her - confronting Mab about the Hunt, before or after it happens.
Cathy & Kasdaye: I mean - "Have you not wanted to speak to me all your life?" makes me want pre-Arcadia Cathy dreaming of/dreaming with Kasdaye, but I would also love an AU of the masquerade where Kasdaye does succeed in telling Cathy's fortune.
Cathy & Mab: Changeling Cathy! Either one where Mab made her before sending her off into the mortal world, or one where Mab decides to turn her into one at some point during/after the events of the book (look ... we don't know how Changelings are made, it's totally possible). I wasn't entirely sold on the 'Arcadia = literally Hell' conceit of the ending, so maybe something where that was Mab's real lie? Human Cathy becomes one of Mab's courtiers in exchange for Laon's life/freedomBut, look, Cathy killed someone she liked to spite Mab, even if Laon's soul was also playing some part in that decision, I am gonna be super into whatever you write for them! Arcadian adventures and rituals, Cathy-as-servant, Cathy-as-toy, Arcadian politicking ... all excellent.
General: I watched the Welsh version of this on S4C, and fic in/incorporating Welsh is welcomed if you speak it! Involvement of any of the canon m/f ships is fine, though I'd prefer they not be the focus.
Fandom-specific DNW: M/F shipfic for Mared or Siân, Brexit references - let me pretend they live in a world where they're not about to get fucked over by this bit of pure evil. If you explicitly toss in a line saying Remain won the referendum, I will die of joy, if Tory politicians come to Unfortunate Ends I will be delighted.
Mared Rhys: Mared's sense of self is so distinctly tied to her sense of place and I love it a lot. I'd love pre-canon fic for her, something about her life in Aber and the people there, or fic about her and her daughter (kidfic DNW lifted for this specific prompt, though I'd still rather Elin be, like, 8+).
Siân Owens: I want to know everything about her! Pre-canon especially, her relationship with Cardiff, things she does in her off time (does she sing as well as Hannah Daniel does?), station politics, her attempts to build a home in Aber, present or past girlfriends (OFCs welcome!).
Mared & Siân: They were the two who immediately caught me from the moment Sian tried to slink in late to the team's first briefing. I'm obsessed with how, despite the very real tensions between them, they're still quite close - the same Siân who makes it obvious repeatedly that she would rather be in Cardiff also chose repeatedly to stay and work specifically with Mared, and looks out for her during the investigation in s3. Despite everything they work well together and look out for each other. Things I would love include casefic, things dealing with Welsh mythology, the small town/city dynamic, pre-canon fic and first meetings, or post-canon fic where they deal with the fallout from the s3 finale.
I've by and large chosen canons I love for their worldbuilding and mytharcs as well as their characters and relationships, and I am easy to please as long as you stay away from my DNWs (both general and canon-specific), so don't feel like you Have to write any of my specific prompts. Don't read anything into relative lengths of sections, I am equally happy to get something for anything in this letter! Some of these prompts are reused from old letters, and if you have written them for me before, rest assured that I loved your fic, I am simply greedy and would like to see every possible take on my favourite scenarios.
I love everything from short introspection bits to long plotty missionfic to sex scenes as ways to explore character/setting/worldbuilding, and I don't need a lot of romance in my ships: sex for power, manipulation, or just between friends who want to have fun is also great. Please no unrequested ships unless specifically allowed for, but feel free to combine any compatible ones from my requested ones.
Likes || Smut Likes || DNWs || Jordskott || Picnic at Hanging Rock (TV 2018) || River (TV 2015) || The Southern Reach Trilogy - Jeff Vandermeer || Under the Pendulum Sun - Jeannette Ng || Y Gwyll
- Mentorship and loyalty dynamics, including ladies' suicidal world-saving or world-breaking devotion to other ladies, #unavailable older women in positions of authority
- Femslash and female friendship in both the foreground and the background
- Nature and cities and houses and spacecraft as characters (especially when they would like to eat you because they love you), architectural horror
- Vampires, magic, witchcraft, rituals, eldritch things, fey things, eerie things, cosmic horrors
- Feelings about embodiment and iconography, body horror (especially flowers growing out of people's bodies)
- Epistolary fics, IF, poems for poetry canons, song lyrics for song/album canons
- First- and second-person pov, unreliable narrators
- Politics, worldbuilding
- Flirting, domesticity, sensuality, friends-and-lovers
- Canon-divergent/what-if AUs, Aniara, Vampire: The Requiem, Changeling: The Lost, Scandinoir, and Star Wars Sith AUs
- Conflicted loyalties, moral ambiguity, hero/villain and villain/villain relationships, 'I am the only one allowed to hurt you' hero/villain relationships
- Darkfic
- Arranged marriages, marriages of convenience, married by a technicality
- Relationships negotiated around characters' different vocabularies of trust and care
- 'I hate you I love you I would like to wear your skin as a sign of my devotion' types of relationships
- Getting back together after messy breakups
- Desire, women who aren’t afraid of desire, women who lean too far into desire, women who desire to kill and eat their gods
- Porn as character work.
- Hair braiding, hair pulling
- Bathing, washing, bath/shower sex
- Painplay, bloodplay, knifeplay, wax play, edgeplay, edgeplay to the edge of death
- Mirror sex, identity porn
- Bondage, shibari/kinbaku, suspension, honour bondage, blindfolds, gags, D/s dynamics (though not 24/7 bdsm lifestyle setups)
- Jewellery and clothes kink
- Consent play, somnophilia
- Praise kink, loyalty kink, competency kink
- Public and semi-public sex, having to stay quiet
- Oral sex
- Overstimulation
- Biting, marking
- First time with each other
- Sex for manipulation/political gain/conversion to the other political-military side (success optional)
- Inappropriate use of magic and weapons
- Mutual masturbation
- One person in a threesome directing the other two and getting off watching them.
- Unrequested m/m or m/f ships
- Rape/noncon (dubcon is fine)
- Permanent death of female characters, except when fandom prompts say otherwise
- Kidfic, breeding, pregnancy including unconventional forms like fpreg/oviposition, age-regression and time-travel to see kid versions of characters
- Scat, watersports, emetophilia, enemas
- A/B/O
- Food in/on genitalia or used as sex toys, weight gain/stuffing kink (fantasy body horror and metaphors are fine)
- 'Only one destined true love' AUs like soulmates or hanahaki disease
- Detailed descriptions of injuries to feet, amputated feet (minor/referenced injuries are fine)
- Apocalypse and post-apocalypse fic, zombies
- *isms, issuefic
- 'It was all a dream' sort of mindfuckery
- 'I am too old to be loved' angst in age-gap ships
- Bodyswap fic, crackfic
- sex involving under-16s.
General: Witchy murderforest of my whole entire heart and all the women and girls it loves, ahhhh. This show has so many beautiful things to say about love and care and loss and obsession and it's eaten me as surely as Silverhojd has eaten Josefine. Tell me stories about witches and women and love and life and forests and I will be so, so happy. I would be totally happy with gen, but I ship Eva/Jeanette, Eva/Klara, Eva/Laila, Eva/Zara, Laila/Zara, Esme/Linus, and Esme/Maja, if you want to write something shippy. I headcanon Linus as nonbinary, but don't feel beholden to that if you involve him in fics. You don't have to resurrect Klara/ignore her death if you're writing late/post-s2 fic, but I'd rather it not be dwelt on.
Fandom-specific DNW: Eva/Bahar, Bahar being married to a man, romance for the kids (Ida, Josefine, Kalem).
Bahar Holmqvist: Bahar would not be paid enough for what s2 put her through even if she'd taken that promotion. I love her, I love how she's a little bit of an asshole but just genuine and self-aware enough for it to be a mostly good thing, I love her stubbornness and kindness and her refusal to let her belief in order make her do what she believes to be wrong. I'd love to read about her life and career pre-Eva, I would also like to see her slowly becoming more comfortable with the supernatural post-s2. I'd love to see her develop more of a relationship with Ida, or perhaps help Kalem get more settled in Sweden. Post-s2 casefic, especially given that last offer she received, would be great if you want something more plotty.
Josefine: Josefine is my favourite tree in the whole world and I would love anything you would like to write about her. I am especially interested in her missing years - what did her life look like before Eva came back?
Ylva: I was stunned by how much love the show had for Ylva the first time around, she's such a rare, joyful embrace of all the most wonderful things about the crone archetype despite the pain she's gone through. I'd love to see something about her life with Muns, or with Klara, or with the network of support she's built in the town and the forest. She's so aware, of thoughts and of life, and getting her perspective on the events of the show more immediately than we did through Eva's visuals would be lovely. We know she's far, far older even than she appears - she's had centuries in that forest, go wild with your worldbuilding and tell me all about them! AU where she managed to save + raise Laila? Can she shapeshift? When did she meet Klara? Are there others like her in other countries that she keeps in touch with?
Bahar & Eva: Y'know Bahar put on trousers for Eva and Eva said 'I hate having to lie to Bahar' and for all s2's turmoil they're really a stunningly lovely and genuinely good-for-each-other partnership. I'd love post-s2 fic where Eva takes Bahar to the forest, as part of making amends for her secret-keeping - maybe she even introduces her to Josefine's tree. Also casefic where they get to actually work together, in Stockholm or Silverhojd. Post-s2 casefic would be great, especially given the offer Bahar got at the end of s2. Eva bonding with Bahar's kids? Bahar somehow seeks out Ylva to try to help Eva?
Esmeralda & Klara: Witches and mentorships and found families, I love forever. Something set in the s1-s2 gap would be wonderful, showing how Esme grew from the rightfully distrustful lonely girl she was to someone who uncomplicatedly called Klara her foster mother and left that heartbreaking voicemail. Klara teaching Esme - anything from serious things about her powers to more simple 'no, you cannot actually eat that plant without dying'. I would love resurrection fic - Esme taking Klara back from the forest, Esme being given Klara-but-wrong by the trees, weird wonderful necromancy rituals with Ylva's help. Fic with them travelling somewhere - maybe a post-s2 AU where Esme takes Klara to Stockholm to show her why she found the city so important, or maybe Klara has friends/contacts somewhere else in Finland/Norway/Scotland/wherever that she takes Esme to meet. Anything that gets into hulderfolk/banshee mythology would be fantastic.
Eva & Klara: I would be super interested in a s2 AU where Eva never went back to Stockholm? I'm really not sure how well Klara would be able to help Eva recover when she's Like That(tm) at the end of s1, but it's the process and the attempt that is important almost more than the success. Or a s1 AU where Klara finds Eva before Ylva - how would Eva handle learning about the forest from someone who initially appears much more similar to herself than from someone who slots more easily into the crone-witch archetype (Klara-Eva-Esme as crone-mother-maiden is deeply intriguing, as is Ylva-Eva-Klara as crone-mother-maiden). If you go shippy, maybe Esme's POV on them - would she be okay with sharing Klara, or would she not care? We've seen Eva with Ida, who's quite similar to Josefine in age/appearance/temperament, how would she handle Esme? And, as always, resurrection fic is loved.
Ida & Josefine: They understood each other when no one else did, in a way that no one else did, and I'm obsessed with how the forest functions a conduit between them and what affect the Ida-is-a-changeling reveal might have on that. I'd love to see something that acknowledges that Josefine is continuing to grow - Ida sneaking off to the forest to sit by Josefine's tree and draw her pictures, maybe. Or dreamsharing, I am super into dreamsharing for them. I love how Ida acts as voice for Josefine and the forest both, and how Josefine, in human or tree form, might help bring some of Ida's own visions to life in return. I don't need Josefine to be in human form for this, and honestly it would be super cool if she wasn't? Lean into all the weird wonderful inhuman love and special care these girls have for each other!
Klara & Ylva: I would dearly, dearly love Klara-resurrection fic. Resurrection/rebirth/what it means to come back are such huge themes, and I'd like that to be explored in some way, especially because some form of necromancy is canonically possible. Whether the forest gives Klara back (slightly wrong?) or Ylva brings her back, I'd love anything dealing with improbable survival and learning to live again. But I would be just as happy with any quiet pre-show moment for them, Ylva teaching Klara about the forest, Klara helping Ylva care for Muns, both of them tending to Josefine while they wait for Eva to come back.
General: This show has a thesis of 'why be a girl when you could be an eldritch horror instead' because it loves me, it really loves me. I love the bonds and the backstabbing and the love-through-horror, I love the changeling girls and the amount of respect it gives stories of self-creation. I love the contrast between the suffocating boarding-school atmosphere and the equally terrifying 'I would like to let the sky eat me' of the Rock and how that's reflected in the characters' emotional relationships. Permadeath of any of the requested characters is fine for this fandom, as is ambiguous/show-consistent explanations of what happened at the Rock. The show does so much excellent work with forests that probably want to eat you/nature which tries to eat you/nature which wants to crawl inside you and never come out and I want to see infinitely more of it! Sith and vampire AUs especially adored for this fandom.
Hester Appleyard: She's so fucked up and so sad and I adore her madly. Every time we get a glimpse inside her head it's so frantic compared to the perfectly composed facade she builds, and I would love anything that plays in the space between those two. Favourite ships for her are with Irma or Dianne but character-study gen is equally loved. Ghosts haunting ghosts - I'd love Hester haunting her husband's ghost, or Sara's, or somehow slipping into the space beyond the Rock. Pre-series fic would also be excellent.
Marion Quade: Marion/Greta would be fantastic if you want to go for shipfic - secret relationship and mentorship problems, everything I love. Or post-Rock Miranda/Marion - what does their world look like? I loved the little we saw of her with Hester, the almost-affectionate mind games, and I'd love to see more of that whether shippy or not - school holidays together, or an AU where Marion ends up as a teacher for her or at a re-constituted Academy that Hester and Dianne found.
Miranda Reid: I'm obsessed with this weird eldritch forest of a girl and the way she draws people into her. She helped break the fabric of time and space by loving her friends and wanting freedom for them and I want to know everything about that beautiful, Weird self.
Dianne & Irma: I loved the glimpses we got of Dianne trying to help Irma readjust to linear time, her softer questions and her optimism in contrast to Irma's studied apathy that she pastes over her regret. Irma is so deeply concerned with appearances, while Dianne is - much less so unless forced to, and I'd love something that gets into that, or into Dianne trying to protect Irma from Hester.
Hester & Dianne: I mean, hatesex for always if you go shippy, or any sort of emotionally manipulative sensuality. There's an odd undercurrent of 'why aren't you better' that they both have towards each other (and themselves) and I'd love a story that lives in the lovely-awful tangled knots they tie each other into, and the ways in which they can't quite bring themselves to wish they were more like the other. I'd love to see an AU where Dianne accompanies Hester to the Rock or one where Hester and Dianne moved and built a new school out of the ruins of the first Academy. Any sort of post-canon fic where Hester haunts Dianne in her new position.
Hester & Greta: Greta owes Hester a lot, and while she never goes to the lengths Hester did to keep her secrets (largely because Hester didn't care) I feel like they're both very aware Greta is on a very thin line there, and I'd love to see some exploration of that. I'd love something that leans in the loyalty kink - sexual or not, consensual or not (seriously, dubiously consensual loyalty kink was one of my favourite smutswap tags. The whole ... we both know what the other isn't saying and why and we're both responding to that sort of conversation/mutual existence is so good, and I'd love more of it.
Hester & Miranda: I love how Miranda spends the whole series deconstructing Hester so deftly no one's quite sure what she's done til the very end. Maybe Hester sees Miranda at the Rock, maybe Miranda taunts her about Sara, maybe one of Hester's attempts to dress her up nicely backfires somehow. An extension of the punishment scene, especially one including Hester bandaging her hands afterwards instead of Irma and Marion, and the glorious emotional whiplash that could provoke.
Hester & Sara: Their cold war is one of my favourite things about the show, and I just want to see more of it, whether it's pre-series, missing scenes, or even post-series where they're ghosts haunting each other. I'd love to see them at the Rock together in some sort of canon-divergence, or pre-series fic about Sara first coming to the Academy and starting to become suspicious of Hester. More sneaking around, more disturbingly cheerful games, more races through the woods, just - more of them.
General: Gods, this show has so many beautiful things to say about love and loss and grief and I just want to dwell in it a while longer. I interpret Chrissie has having been in love with Stevie but not having recognised/admitted it even to herelf until after she'd died, and my prompts do stem from that interpretation, but if you want to keep their relationship platonic that's also fine.
Fandom-specific DNW: Any m/f ships apart from background Marianne/Ira, Brexit references (the show's set in 2015 so it's only really releveant if you're doing futurefic, and you don't have to, like, have a line about how Remain won in 2016 (though I would not say no to it), just let me pretend they live in a world where they're not about to get fucked over by this bit of pure evil).
Chrissie & Stevie: John's grief over Stevie takes centre stage for most of the show, and I would really like something that moves the focus over onto Chrissie and her grief here.
Rosa & Chrissie: Gen or shippy or anywhere between is lovely, I'd love anything about them finding peace together post-series, especially Rosa helping Chrissie rediscover/reclaim her sexuality.
Rosa & Stevie: Canon leaves it ambiguous whether they ever met, so I'd love to see them meet pre-series - missed opportunities, things half-said.
Marianne & Chrissie: Chrissie ended up somewhere so sad by the end of the show, and I'd love to see her just - having a quiet moment with Marianne post-series where she doesn't have to think about her husband, or her work, or really anything and can focus on remembering (re-learning) how to make friends, how to sit with her grief with someone who doesn't share it but still wants to help.
General: I love them as a changeling story, I love them as a story of nature-as-entity, I love them as a story of how desolation is never bleak and usually alive. I would prefer you use the characters' professions to describe them (eg "the psychologist" ) in narration, rather than their names. I am fine with canon-consistent 'being eaten by Area X' for either of the requested characters but DNW them to die in any other way. The canon by nature is playing with some pretty dark questions about embodiment and environmental catastrophes and death, but there's plenty of potential for light and joy - there is plenty of light and joy for both the requested characters as they give themselves back over to Area X, so don't be afraid to lean into that. I've read all three books and my prompts do get kinda spoilery, but if you've only read Annihilation, I welcome fic based only off that. I love the journal style of Annihilation and epistolary fic is especially welcome for this fandom.
Ghost Bird: I love clones/bits of sentient nature coming into themselves as their own creatures and I love Ghost Bird. I'd like to get inside her head, during her time alone in Rock Bay, sometime post-series with Grace in the new world that is wholly Area X, while meeting what the Biologist has become. I would especially love some way for her to meet the psychologist - time is weird! The Psychologist is in a weird not-dead/not-Area-X limbo! It is so possible, and I would love it.
The Psychologist: I'm obsessed with the image of her walking towards the Southern Reach carrying the barrier that we got in Authority - it's vague whether it was her or a simulacrum imo, but regardless of the answer I'd love something that dwells in that moment from her POV - what it means to come forward like that, to carry her old home to her new. I'd also love her take on the events of the 12th expedition, what it means to her to hold the full weight of knowledge, how she planned, how it felt to hypnotise the other team members. Documentary/epistolary fic - anything that brings to life her notes, her files, all the threads she wove through the Reach and all the things she couldn't keep after the barrier came down. Pre-Annihilation fic that goes along with her
The Surveyor: She's the one character who gets significant alone time in Annihilation whose head we never get into, and I would love something set during that span of time where she's alone in the ruins of the campsite, sitting next to the tower, dwelling over the anthropologist's body - what was she thinking, what creatures did she meet? Pre-series fic would be cool, as would be came back wrong fic or fic about an Area-X-doppelganger!Surveyor observing the events of the next two books, perhaps meeting Ghost Bird or the returned biologist.
Ghost Bird & The Biologist: Do you ever think about how Area X creates Ghost Bird in the image of the Biologist and then by the time Ghost Bird meets the Biologist the Biologist has become Area X? Because I think about that a lot and I'm emo about it and I just want something that dwells in that uneven furrow between the two creatures and their desires to be/love/consume each other.
The Biologist & The Psychologist: Gods - anything and everything? Their scene together at the lighthouse wrecked me, and I'd love to see something where the Psychologist transforms same as the Biologist then, or an AU where the biologist didn't figure out the hypnosis commands, or a scene with them together before going into Area X.
General: Oh hey this weird book about fucked-up missionary siblings in clockwork Fairyland snuck into my life and ruined me and I would love to be further ruined by any fic you write! I really, really loved the Changeling!Cathy faux-reveal and was a bit put out by its last-chapter reversal (all books can do with more weird changelings, lbr), so any Changeling!Cathy fic - or fic where she's human but grappling with the fact that she enjoyed elements of the time when she thought she was a soulless creature - is always adored. Canon-compliant deathfic for Ariel is fine - especially if it leads to Mab further manipulating/fucking with Cathy, and Cathy continuing to spiral about her identity, but I am also thrilled by any AU you come up with where she survives or is brought back. I ship loads of things a stupidly intense amount - Cathy/Laon, Cathy/Ariel, Cathy/Mab, Mab/Ariel, Cathy/Kasdaye, they're all incredibly good - so if you want to write shipfic, go for it! Just lean into the weird and I'm happy!
Ariel Davenport: Changeling stories are my favourite in all universes, and I love Ariel madly. She clearly has some history with Arcadia's lies and masques, and I'd love any glimpse of it. Alternatively, what was life like for her in the mortal world?
Kasdaye: Kasdaye as temptress-and-oracle is so incredibly My Thing and I want more of her! Life in court, life with her brother, telling fortunes and breaking rules. Fae parties and rituals, how she came to Mab's court, other courts she was with before, what it means to read fates and fortunes in a land where the line between spoken word and reality is incredibly malleable.
Mab | The Pale Queen: I love Mab so godsdamnned much, she's so extra in such a calculated way, and absolutely malevolent in such a gloriously fake-careless way and I want to dwell in her mind and her court forever. How did she build her court, what is her life like in Pivot, what other interactions has she had with humans, has she ever been to the mortal world, what are her relationships with other Fae lords like? I just want to know EVERYTHING about Mab and Arcadia, so do all the worldbuilding you like!
Ariel & Cathy: I would love some of Ariel's POV on the novel's events - she has a sort of resignation to liminality about her that I find fascinating. What if she had been given more time to convince Cathy she was a Changeling too? What if she tried to sell Cathy to Mab for Laon's safety (or, perhaps, Cathy tries it with her). Resurrection attempts? Ill-advised wanderings into the depths of Arcadia? We see glimpses of what Changelings think about Cathy and Laon's theology, but what kind of myths and religions of their own have they developed that Ariel and Cathy might stumble into in this land where everything's just a bit too real?
Ariel & Mab:How was Ariel summoned back from the mundane world? How did Mab 'lay claim' to her changeling - did she get any pushback form other Faerie lords? Did Ariel ever think about defecting to another court, or is that not allowed by Faerie laws? AU where she did defect to another court, and how that influenced her relationships with both Mab and Catherine. Is necromancy possible in Arcadia? Came back wrong fic would be delightful. Ariel - or whatever's left of her - confronting Mab about the Hunt, before or after it happens.
Cathy & Kasdaye: I mean - "Have you not wanted to speak to me all your life?" makes me want pre-Arcadia Cathy dreaming of/dreaming with Kasdaye, but I would also love an AU of the masquerade where Kasdaye does succeed in telling Cathy's fortune.
Cathy & Mab: Changeling Cathy! Either one where Mab made her before sending her off into the mortal world, or one where Mab decides to turn her into one at some point during/after the events of the book (look ... we don't know how Changelings are made, it's totally possible). I wasn't entirely sold on the 'Arcadia = literally Hell' conceit of the ending, so maybe something where that was Mab's real lie? Human Cathy becomes one of Mab's courtiers in exchange for Laon's life/freedomBut, look, Cathy killed someone she liked to spite Mab, even if Laon's soul was also playing some part in that decision, I am gonna be super into whatever you write for them! Arcadian adventures and rituals, Cathy-as-servant, Cathy-as-toy, Arcadian politicking ... all excellent.
General: I watched the Welsh version of this on S4C, and fic in/incorporating Welsh is welcomed if you speak it! Involvement of any of the canon m/f ships is fine, though I'd prefer they not be the focus.
Fandom-specific DNW: M/F shipfic for Mared or Siân, Brexit references - let me pretend they live in a world where they're not about to get fucked over by this bit of pure evil. If you explicitly toss in a line saying Remain won the referendum, I will die of joy, if Tory politicians come to Unfortunate Ends I will be delighted.
Mared Rhys: Mared's sense of self is so distinctly tied to her sense of place and I love it a lot. I'd love pre-canon fic for her, something about her life in Aber and the people there, or fic about her and her daughter (kidfic DNW lifted for this specific prompt, though I'd still rather Elin be, like, 8+).
Siân Owens: I want to know everything about her! Pre-canon especially, her relationship with Cardiff, things she does in her off time (does she sing as well as Hannah Daniel does?), station politics, her attempts to build a home in Aber, present or past girlfriends (OFCs welcome!).
Mared & Siân: They were the two who immediately caught me from the moment Sian tried to slink in late to the team's first briefing. I'm obsessed with how, despite the very real tensions between them, they're still quite close - the same Siân who makes it obvious repeatedly that she would rather be in Cardiff also chose repeatedly to stay and work specifically with Mared, and looks out for her during the investigation in s3. Despite everything they work well together and look out for each other. Things I would love include casefic, things dealing with Welsh mythology, the small town/city dynamic, pre-canon fic and first meetings, or post-canon fic where they deal with the fallout from the s3 finale.