revolver | TRICK OR TREAT 2020

I am so excited about this fic exchange and I am pumped to be participating! I am requesting fic for all the below canons, and either trick or treat. I cannot wait to see what you come up with for this exchange, and I want to thank you for writing for me. This letter is more or less me throwing everything I like at the wall and seeing what might stick for you. If you have ideas beyond anything I've rambled about here, please, run with it! I want you to have as much fun with this as I am sure I'll have reading what you create.

In addition, for this year's Trick or Treat I am opting in to the Battle of the Bands community challenge, so if there's a specific song on the nominated list you want to run with for any of these requested fandoms, by all means!

And, I can be found elsewhere as arbitrarily on AO3 and widespindriftgaze on tumblr.

GENERAL LIKES
unreliable narrators
nonlinear storytelling
character study
morally gray characters
moral complexity and/or ambiguity
backstory
missing scenes
outsider POV
epistolary fic
mentor/protege relationships
blurring the lines between professional and personal relationships
codependency (both healthy and unhealthy)
dysfunctional families
power play
mind games
antagonism between characters
loyalty and/or loyalty kink
identity porn and identity issues
intimacy in all forms, emotional and/or physical, from domestic and lived-in to unexpected or inappropriate
super messy, complicated, and difficult to categorize relationships between characters (made all the better if/when they share a history and maybe probably repressed feelings)
repression, generally
sexual tension, resolved or unresolved
friends or enemies or colleagues to lovers (or any other scrambled version of this., i.e., friends to enemies to lovers or enemies to lovers to friends)
slow burn
hurt/comfort
infidelity
on the road, travel, road trips, and the entire aesthetic/vibe that goes with it
AUs, both of the canon divergence variety and the whole new setting variety (though, that said, I am not a huge fan of mundane AUs, i.e., coffeehouse AUs, high school/university AUs, etc., unless specified.)

SMUT LIKES
casual sex––or, sex first, feelings later
first time
overstimulation
mutual masturbation
choking or breathplay
fingering after fucking
wet and messy, comeplay
switching (I have no real top or bottom preferences for any pairings listed below)
size kink and size difference
orgasm delay/denial
dirty talk, both the good and the hilariously bad
dub-con of the sex pollen/fuck or die/villains made us do it variety
marking via bruising or biting
sex as ill-advised attempt at communication between characters
sex as unhealthy coping mechanism
drunk sex
hate sex and/or rough sex
voyeurism
friends or enemies or colleagues (or, somehow, all of the above!) with benefits
character study via porn
intimacy and/or trust demonstrated via sex acts
under-negotiated kink or D/s

DNWs: non-con (dub-con or fuck or die/"something made them do it" is fine); A/B/O or omegaverse; scat or watersports; formal BDSM; issue fic; asexual or trans headcanons (unless requested); kid fic; poly relationships (unless requested); soulmates or soul marks or soul bonds.

Spoilers for all the below canons.

DUBLIN MURDER SQUAD - TANA FRENCH
Frank Mackey, Stephen Moran

• My perennial favorites! If you want to plunk these two down in a pub for a couple pints and some heavily-loaded dialogue, I would adore every word of it.

• Maybe the first time that Frank and Stephen see each other again after St. Kilda’s is due to an Internal Affairs investigation that inevitably pits the both of them against each other. Unreliable narrators! The both of them recounting the same events differently, either to protect themselves or because they genuinely remember it in their own contrasting ways. If you want to play around with loyalty or loyalty kink, having that fidelity rear its head in unexpected ways between them would be absolutely wonderful.

• And speaking of St. Kilda's, I am all for missing scenes or a rewrite of some of their scenes in The Secret Place. The scenes where Frank tried to intimidate Stephen into backing off of Holly were easily some of my favorite parts of that book. More of that intimidation! And hey, if you're into it, maybe that intimidation evolves into something else or Frank plays a very different strategy and the world's tensest, most threatening and heavily loaded fucked-up hook-up occurs.

• Stephen has to work Undercover! Devise whatever reason you wish, or even hand-wave it, I won’t mind, but for whatever reason, Stephen is placed in the field and Frank is his handler. Maybe Frank knows he is deliberately placing Stephen in danger and has chosen to make that gamble. How much of the risk does Stephen know? Or if you really want to go wild, I’d gobble up a twisted retelling of The Likeness where Stephen is the undercover that Frank drops in. Frank and Stephen still have their history, but the dead body they find looks exactly like one Stephen Moran. Give me alllllll that push-and-pull of authority and obedience, Stephen both outside his element and falling under the thrall of pretending to be someone he isn't, all the phone check-ins with Frank, Frank both putting him out on a limb and trying to protect him—all of it!

• And speaking of undercover, again, I am all in on whatever morally-fucked shit these two might get up to. Bad Guys Made Them Do It? Of course! Fucking to save cover? Yes! I’d also be big into any sort of voyeuristic/exhibitionist content, like namely while Stephen is in the field he is wired and Frank is listening to everything. Maybe Stephen bites off more than he can chew, or he really steps into it, and in order to save his cover identity he has to sleep with the mark or the suspect or whoever, and Frank listens in to the whole thing. Cue the incredibly tense debrief session between Frank and Stephen after!

GENERATION KILL
Brad Colbert, Ray Person

• I took a dive back into this fandom after a decade over the summer, and needless to say, I'm still here lol. I feel like these two are truly the platonic ideal for me when I imagine the perfect ship, lol. The shared history! The way they always seem to be buzzing on the same frequency even if the way they behave couldn't be any more different! They complement each other so well and there's an emotional fluency shared between them (that scene with the "Brad got dumped" conversation and "It's nice having friends" and the accompanying facial expressions and Gazing™ lives in my head and my heart rent-free) that makes me feel like my hair's on fire. Anything you write that reflects that easy and earned intimacy between the two of them while also cut through with that push-and-pull mutual (and loving?) antagonism that's more or less a cornerstone of their relationship, I am all in.

(Also, brief side note: as I said at the start of this letter, I am totally into participating in the Battle of the Bands community challenge and you're free to use any song you want, but, uh, for these two I am definitely eyeing Johnny Cash's "The Man Comes Around" for obvious reasons.)

• Pre-canon (the first time they met?); during canon (anything, literally, I'll eat it up happily with a spoon); post-canon and how they stay in each other's lives––this is me granting you carte blanche to go wild and write what you wish.

• In the spirit of Halloween and Trick or Treat, if you wanted to tread in a more "trick" direction or something darker, a) I point you to my letter for these two for this year's Darkest Night exchange; and, b) feel free to AU it up in whatever capacity you want. A classic zombie AU? Sure! Why not! Vampires? Of course! Nightmarish time loop shenanigans? Always!

• If you want to get hyper-specific in the AU territory, I present two (wildly different) AUs: Gideon the Ninth!AU. Ray as some kind of Gideon-adjacent, foul-mouthed, never-shuts-up shit-kicker cavalier to Brad’s cold-as-ice but weird-as-hell, this-is-serious-business necromancer? They should've sent a poet. Or, Green Room!AU. Green Room is one of my favorite movies, and the very thought of Brad and Ray and whoever else of your choosing planted into some scuzzy start-up punk band having to fight (and kill) their way out of the venue they just played at—it speaks to me, lol.

THE GIRL WITH ALL THE GIFTS (2016)
Helen Justineau, Eddie Parks

• Just as a general note, I have read the book the film is based on, but it's been awhile and the film is far fresher in my mind. If you want to draw anything from the novel for any fic you write, I am totally down with that.

• What a wild ride this movie is! I am always a sucker for the "disparate group of survivors on their own roving the apocalyptic landscape trying to survive" genre, and that certainly delivers here. If you wanted to write missing scenes for the films, any other moments between Helen and Parks, be they quiet ones, comfort, more wild misadventure and perilous escapes, I would love to read it.

• Similarly, fix-it fic! Or, I suppose fix-it fic where nothing is really fixed beyond Parks living! What if Parks didn't wake before Melanie returned and he survived the release of the pollen. Now, it's Helen and Parks stuck in that mobile lab, unable to escape the airlock without dying. What sort of misery is that, day-in and day-out stuck in that small space, knowing the world as they knew it is finally over? Hurt/comfort, I would love beyond words, as well, if you wanted to delve even deeper into "trick" territory a sort of No Exit, "hell is other people," vibe where even though they are all each other has but that only makes them grate against each other all the more.

• The glimpses of worldbuilding the film offers are fascinating, and I would love a pre-canon fic set at the base. Go as far back as you want, to when the Hungries first started, the mad scramble for survival, maybe Helen's first days on base, or when she and Parks first met (and, I am sure, instantly disliked each other.)

• And, last, if you want to go in a total body horror direction, maybe the spores affect Helen or Parks differently. You can decide how wild you want to go with that (good lord, if ever there was a fandom for sex pollen, lol), but I would be fascinated to see what you might invent.

HANNIBAL (TV)
Abigail Hobbs

• I recently chewed through this series in one giant binge-watch and for the love of all that is holy, I cannot get both it and specifically the character of Abigail Hobbs out of my head. I would absolutely love anything that explored her character in greater depth, so by all means! Pre-canon and what her life was like with her father or any sort of missing scene you want to flesh out, especially including anything from her fake death onward until her death.

• The most obvious selection: fix-it fic! Hannibal doesn't kill her at the end of Season 2 and he absconds to Europe with her in tow. Play around with that alternate storyline any which way you like, whether it's Abigail as unwilling or active accomplice to Hannibal, Will trying to track the both of them down, Abigail trying to break the hold Hannibal has over her, Abigail trying (and, let's be real, probably failing) to play her own mind games on him––any and all of the above!

[As an aside, I would totally not be opposed to Hannibal/Abigail or Will/Abigail or Hannibal/Will/Abigail if like me your brain likes to travel the dirtybadwrong track.]

• Or, rather than Hannibal not killing her, Abigail continues to "haunt" Will and live in his head. Or, there are two Abigails: the one in Will's head, and the one who haunts him. And if you want to go the "trick" extra mile for this exchange, her haunting turns malevolent and Will's interest in her––both the imagined Abigail in his head and ghost!Abigail––goes the obsessive route.

• And, last: serial killer Abigail. Serial killer Abigail batting around potential adversaries like Freddie Lounds. Maybe she learns from Hannibal and then the student begins to outpace the master and she plots to kill him (before he can kill her), or maybe her father was never the killer and she framed him for her crimes. However you want to spin this AU scenario, go for it!

LOVECRAFT COUNTRY (TV)
Atticus Freeman, Letitia "Leti" Lewis

• I am enjoying this show so much and I especially love these characters SO MUCH. The pacing moves so quickly on this show, so if there was a moment you wanted to track back to and elaborate on or expand, I would love to read it.

• I am especially into Leti's "resurrection" and would love anything at all more about that. She died, and then she came back! I would love just about anything with her processing that, or failing to process it. The haunted house episode alluded to the fact that maybe Leti didn't come back "right," so if you wanted to go deeper down that path––what if she brought something, or someone, back with her?––I would love that.

• And speaking of the haunted house episode, oh man, but I do love a haunted house! I would love more of Tic and Leti in that house, more of the bumps in the night and the creepy hauntings and her and Tic playing ghost hunter together.

• Another thing this show does that I love more than anything: road trips! Please, more of Leti and Tic on the road! Feel free to run the gamut of any and all tropes that might crop up, from "there's only one bed, whoops, guess we have to share," to the car breaking down and they have to huddle for warmth or, for whatever contrived reason, fake dating.

• Last, their first time Tic didn't know Leti was a virgin. If you wanted to write a fic where Tic tries to make it up to her, rather than rushed quickie in a bathroom, I, needless to say, would love that more than words can convey.

OVERLORD (MOVIE 2018)
Chloe, Edward Boyce, Lewis Ford

• This movie is NUTS in the pulpiest, goofiest way possible and I enjoyed it a ton. Killing Nazis who are making zombie super soldiers? Yes, please! This is me saying feel free to give me more of all that unhinged violence (maybe after D-Day, and with the obvious fix-it of Ford's survival, the three of them continue across Europe taking out other medical facilities like this), Chloe with the flamethrower and Ford as their explosive expert.

• And speaking of fix-its, we'll focus on the big one: Ford lives! Or, if you wanted to embrace the body horror or the "came back wrong" angle, he lives, but at what cost? Maybe his survival makes him that much more a ticking time bomb than he already was, and how much danger have Chloe and Boyce put themselves in by keeping Ford alive?

• If you can't tell, I am 100% open for you to go as nuts with all the trope-y, id-y weirdness as your heart may desire. This is my invitation to you to go wild! Bad Guys Made Them Do It, weird medical experiment sex pollen-like results, more body horror than any single non-zombie human could shake a stick at, all sorts of wound recovery and Florence Nightingale-y hurt/comfort business––any and all of the above, please!

• And, if you wanted to go the more "treat"-esque route for this exchange, I'd be all in for leaning into the OT3 of it all and all the post-canon hurt/comfort you could dream up.

STAR WARS RPF
Domhnall Gleeson, Oscar Isaac

• I 100% blame the new Dune trailer for leaving me in a state of oh no Oscar Isaac hot and I clearly want to deal with those feelings via fic, lol, so here we are again.

• Promo tours! On the road and all that travel as they play their role promoting their work. Set it during Ex Machina or any of the Star Wars or all of the above. Or I am all in for fic set during filming of any of the projects they actually have done together.

• Alternatively, we live in fantasyland and they do another project together. Maybe it's another sci-fi, maybe it's a romance, maybe a rom-com--whatever it is, I am all in for the bleed between fiction and real as reality informs performance and performance begins to inform reality.

• I am a perpetual sucker, always and forever, for any and all takes on Friends With Benefits But Uh-Oh I'm Way More Attached And Into This Than I Have Any Intention Of Confessing To You (Let Alone To Myself.) However you might want to play with that, I guarantee you, I will be into it.

• I am similarly super into whatever the inciting incident is to get these two hooking up in the first place. Oscar starts rambling in great and graphic detail about sex one night while the two of them are drunk and Domhnall doesn't know what the fuck to do with any of that? Oscar, while fucking around with Domhnall's phone, accidentally stumbles upon a cache of really bad sexts? Nudes? One or the other walks in on the other jacking off? If the spirit moves you, I invite you to go to there, writer!

• Attached to all of the above: their sexual relationship is a series of escalating self-proclaimed non-events. The both of them have promised themselves that nothing is going on here and nothing is going to happen, so if conversations over the phone or by text start to devolve into phone sex or sexting, that's not a big deal. That's nothing. If the next time they see each other they decide to masturbate while seated next to each other, that's not really fucking. That's fine. And so on, and so forth lol.

• And! Since this is Trick or Treat! Feel free to lean into any sort of supernatural AU business: vampires, werewolves, witches, whatever and however that might work and however you might wish to employ that angle.

SUCCESSION (TV 2018)
Tabitha

• Your honor, I love her. Give me everything about business mogul Tabitha who sold her own company when she was young and now just coasts on the self-made millions in her bank account, her mind sharp as ever, playing business mentor to anyone willing to listen to her.

• Tabitha may be self-proclaimed "pathologically incurious," but I would love to see her outsider POV of the Roys and what she actually thinks of all of them. And, if you wanted that supposed lack of curiosity and her comfort in her own skin and station to be a front and she is quietly scheming on the sidelines, I would love that all the more.

• Or, Tabitha as goop. Please. I can practically hear the newsletters she and/or her former company send out in my head and it is delicious.

• I truly would ship her with anyone and everyone on this show, so if there's a particular character you would like to write her with, by all means. I admit to being curious about her with Grace, Roman's last girlfriend, and think that could be absolutely hilarious. I also can't help but love thinking about Tabitha toying with Roman that much more by cozying up with Frank. And, uh, I'll let this photoset do all the talking (matching PJs, costume department?), but maybe Shiv finds out about Tom's night of fun at his bachelor party and Shiv's response is to hook up with Tabitha, too.

• Last, if you wanted to insert Tabitha into any scenes in the latter part of Season 2––the trip to Dundee, Roman's accidental hostage situation, the death cruise yacht politburo purge––I would love to see her dynamic thrust into any and all of that. (Um, Tabitha/Roman/Eduard? I am definitely not incurious about that?)

• Actual last for real: if you wanted to lean into the "trick" side of this exchange, might I suggest Tabitha (No Last Name?): American Psycho. She might've sold her company, but she keeps busy, y'know. Via murder.