Status: Closed
This round has closed. It remains open for fills, comments and remixes, but prompts are no longer accepted.
About
"If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more."
"What is grief, if not love persevering?"
"You kept me like a secret but I kept you like an oath"
Calling all readers, lovers of poetry and music, screen and stage. Quote collecters and lyric hoarders, unleash your archive. Each prompt must contain a quote - you can combine them, add commentary, link to articles, and more. Steal from a literary classic, or WeVerse drama. Have fun!
Examples
Minghao + Ocean Vuong
The most beautiful part of your body
is where it's headed. & remember,
loneliness is still time spent
with the world.
Ocean Vuong - night sky with exit wounds
Hoshi/Anyone; "Beauty is terror"
Thinking about these two quotes together and the idea of on/off-stage personas:
"Beauty is terror. Whatever we call beautiful we tremble before it. And what could be more terrifying or beautiful, to the Greeks to to our own, than to lose control completely?" - Donna Tartt, the Secret Histories
"I am calm in everyday life but when I put on my in-ear device and step on stage, I can feel the tension and hear the cheers getting louder as the music gets louder. When the staff tells me it's time to step on stage, I feel something boil inside me. I feel it steaming inside and I think I have to give a burst of something, spill what is inside me." - Hoshi in Hit the Road Ep. 04
Any ship; "It's been so many years"
Hello, hello there, is this Martha?
This is old Tom Frost
And I am calling long distance
Don't worry 'bout the cost.
'Cause it's been forty years or more
Now Martha please recall
Meet me out for coffee
Where we'll talk about it all.
Tom Watts - Martha
Rules
- Sign up is not required.
- Fills have a minimum of 400 words for prose, haiku-length for poetry (3 lines), and 400px by 400px for art (memes are also art). Other mediums are fine too!
- There is no maximum cap.
- Tag and provide content warnings at your discretion, but a good guide are the Ao3 four (Graphic Depictions of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage) and this list of common CWs (cr: SportsFest).
- NSFW/Explicit content should be tagged
- NSFW art should not be visible, please provide a link and a warning. You may crop the artwork and embed a SFW preview.
How it works
Prompting
- Click on [Post a New Comment] at the bottom of this post;
- Change the subject to something interesting;
- Copy+Paste the following HTML into your comment and edit the sections. Feel free to add as much detail as you want!
Filling
- Reply to the original prompt;
- Change the subject to [FILL], you may add a title or stay chaotic;
- Copy+Paste the following HTML into your comment, edit the sections, and add your text.
You may also upload your fill to the AO3 Collection.
Remixing
- Post as a reply to the fill you are remixing, using the same HTML as above;
- Change the subject to [REMIX].
Art/media
- Upload your work to any platform (twitter, imgur, youtube, soundcloud, google maps, etc.)
- Using the same HTML code as above, copy the link into your fill or remix. That's it!
- Optionally, you can embed a picture into your comment. Please use the following code instead.
(To explain, the HTML resizes your picture to 400x400px so that it fits on most screens. Users can view the full size if they click on it. You can also add a link to your work on twitter so that others can share it, or to any other website you want)
Note!
On dreamwidth, you can't edit a comment once someone has replied to it.
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what you will think, of the me that lives on without you
Major Tags: Major Character Death
Additional Tags: the bittersweet victory when you save the world but outlive your comrades (post-apocalyptic mecha AU is optional)
Do Not Wants: None
Prompt:
(had to restrain myself from translating the whole song ahhh, its also about helplessness, of duty over love, of the pain when you could never say the words, but now it's too late)
[FILL] built on the ashes of our hope
(Anonymous) 2021-12-28 09:57 pm (UTC)(link)Major Tags: Character Death
Additional Tags: N/A
Permission to remix: Yes
***
The end of the world doesn’t look quite like Minghao expects. For one, it’s too bright, too many lights. For another, there are too many trees and too much wildlife; it was a definite far cry from the nuclear wasteland everyone thought the world would end with. He’s always thought that by the time humanity managed to lay waste to the Earth, they would have also stripmined her of all her resources, dug out her cores and left her hollow.
Nobody could have expected the monsters that came from the sky and sea instead.
Nobody thought they would live to survive it but by some miracle, scientists managed to produce a way to generate contained nuclear fusions, an infinite source of energy. It was the breakthrough advancement of the century, the lightning in the bottle innovation that changed the course of a war. Minghao has no doubt that without it, there wouldn’t be any humanity left to puzzle at the state of their world now.
But no war was without consequences and even with hulking metal robots powered by the same reaction that burns through the sun, they were still fighting creatures of never-before-seen proportions and strength and someone had to pilot those mechs. The government set up training centers and strategic strongholds, recruited the most promising pilots the army and civilian population had to offer, the ones who were ready to die for god and country. Recruits were taught to look death in the eye and take the swing anyways, that it was an honor to be shot out of the sky like Icarus too close to the sun.
None of them were taught what to do if they survived. None of them truly expected to survive.
Minghao had never meant to start piloting at all but Junhui had turned out to be a phenom in the sims and Minghao would have followed him anywhere, would have died for him like other men would have died for god and country. They endure basics together, huddled in their shared dorm trading stories about their terrifying sergeant, and live out of each other's pockets as much as possible through training.
The first time they actually get to pilot real mechs is a revelation for them both, Junhui whooping into his comms the entire time while Minghao is simply too breathless to scream. It’s also the first time they kiss, wide eyes and fumbling, high off the adrenaline of rocketing through the sky defying all laws of physics.
It becomes a sort of routine; Minghao and Junhui fly thirteen missions together and against all odds, they make it home together every time. They fly together, eat together, sleep together; they trade messy desperate kisses when they survive, just to remember that they were alive together, that they aren’t one of the many who had fallen to the seemingly endless siege of monsters from god knows where.
It becomes a sort of ritual; everytime, Minghao looks at Junhui, the curve of his eyes and the dip in his smile, and thinks desperately I love you. I love you. I love you. Until the words become stuck in his lungs, caught in between his teeth. Everytime, he swallows his words, the things he’s not allowed to want and cannot hope to have in these hopeless times.
“They want me to go on a flight alone,” Junhui says one day, “Not a fight, just a recon patrol.”
Minghao frowns. Junhui was the most talented pilot they had but everyone knew that solo recon patrols were too dangerous, researchers only beginning to unravel the monster behavior patterns.
“Why aren’t they sending anyone with you?” Minghao asks.
Why aren’t they sending me with you?
Junhui shrugs, “Too many pilots lost in the last fight, they don’t want to risk anymore people.”
Please don’t go, Minghao wants to say.
“Come back safe.” Minghao says.
The base never even recovers the mech in the end.
Seokmin and Mingyu are the only pilots who dual pilot a mech. Minghao meets them shortly after Junhui’s funeral and they fall in together almost immediately, bonded by age and pre-army interests and a kindred grief. Neither of them ask Minghao about Junhui but they know, everyone knows.
Watching Seokmin and Mingyu work is a marvel. Unlike Minghao and Junhui, who never were even in a mech together, the two of them never seemed to agree on anything. Mingyu purposely leaves out Seokmin’s laundry in spite when he’s cleaning their dorm and Seokmin likes to wait until Mingyu answers any question just to respond in the negative. They can never agree on anything for lunch, are constantly arguing over which is the best flavor of ice cream, and yet, Minghao has never seen any pair like them.
They speak in half spoken sentences, a foreign language born out of knowing someone so intimately you can tell their thoughts from the tilt of their head, the flicker in their eyes. Seokmin is always reaching for Mingyu, leaning towards him, seeking him out in a crowd; actions so practiced they are now more instinct than thought and Mingyu reciprocates everytime.
It was impossible for Minghao not to be drawn into their orbit, for their presence to fill in the cracks of his ribs like kintsugi, mending along the frayed edges of his loss.
When the researchers announce that the number of monsters were dwindling, their numbers no longer replenishing each time one falls, the three of them celebrate the news together.
“I want to build a house by the beach, after all this is over.” Minghao tells Seokmin and Mingyu, heart hammering in his chest with hope.
Mingyu tilts his head and says, more than a little amused, “At the beach? With all the fighting over the water we’ve done?”
He never asks if he or Seokmin is invited, if this would be a house for the three of them. He knows it is.
Minghao nods and Mingyu says, “Alright. We’ll build a house by the beach.”
“With a dog, we need to have a dog.” Seokmin says, sounding absolutely convinced that this house by the beach would not be perfect without a terrier nipping at their heels.
Minghao laughs and says, “We’ll also have a dog.”
Minghao hears it when they are ripped out of the sky, comm link a static shock before falling silent.
So the world hadn’t actually ended, but Minghao sits on the ledge of his cockpit and thinks of everyone who hadn’t made it back to him, the ones who hadn’t made it home. He thinks of Mingyu and Seokmin and Junhui. He thinks about the house on the beach, the dog, the words he never said caught in his throat like needles.
He thinks of what it might have been like to die with them.
--
largely pacrim, vaguely other mecha inspired. I didn't think the worldbuilding through tbh.
Re: [FILL] built on the ashes of our hope
Re: [FILL] built on the ashes of our hope
Re: [FILL] built on the ashes of our hope
Re: [FILL] built on the ashes of our hope
[FILL] and then sorrow comes forth
Major Tags: Implied Character Death
Additional Tags: evangelion-inspired mecha au, confessions never spoken out loud, au-typical violence
Permission to remix: Yes
WC: exactly 400 <3
i’ve never watched nge but i bastardised some of what i know from friends and used it here. i know the prompt was already filled but it really gave me brainworms…
***
The thing about love in the face of war is that there’s no point in telling someone you love them if neither of you are alive to hear it. Minghao sees it like this: first you save the world. Then you give someone your heart.
Most people die before they ever get to that part. He’s not stupid, but he is superstitious, helplessly afraid that if he ever says it out loud they’ll be doomed the next deployment out, consigned to martyrdom. The important part here isn’t the tragedy of their youth, it’s the dying: Minghao doesn’t want that. He wants Seokmin to stay alive. He wants to stay alive. He wants to stay alive so badly that when the Angel barrels towards him he keeps his eyes wide open as he jams his sword through its chest, no finesse, all animal fear; keeps his eyes wide open as the Angel in its death throes screams and screams and the world beyond his cockpit disappears into searing light, white-hot flame, the smell of burning flesh.
They heal his eyes but they don’t wipe the blood off his face. Seokmin’s the one who finds him kneeling in the grass, watching crimson drip from his jaw and fall to the blades below like raindrops. He hasn’t glanced in a mirror but he knows what he must look like: blood carving tear tracks down his cheeks, arms spotted with bruises from where he’d writhed in the hospital bed and they’d had to hold him down long enough to repair the retinal damage.
Behind him Seokmin bends down to wrap him in an embrace, rests his head on Minghao’s shoulder, kisses the side of his head. Minghao clings to the arms around him and shakes so violently it hurts.
In the cockpit of the mech that’ll be his grave Seokmin hits a button and his voice crackles over the radio. Minghao looks up.
“Myungho,” Seokmin says. “I want you to know. I really—“
“Don’t say it,” Minghao begs. “Not now.” He listens to the way Seokmin’s breath catches in his throat. “Tell me when we come back?”
“Okay,” Seokmin says, and Minghao can hear the wan smile in his voice. “I will.”
You need to come back. Seokmin, do you hear me? You need to come back. I haven’t told you anything yet. I haven’t even told you anything. Seokmin. Seokmin!
Re: [FILL] and then sorrow comes forth
Re: [FILL] and then sorrow comes forth
first of all the opening ( The thing about love in the face of war is that there’s no point in telling someone you love them if neither of you are alive to hear it. Minghao sees it like this: first you save the world. Then you give someone your heart. )is such a banger it is so Minghao. it’s romantic! but also pragmatic bc he Wants to Live so he can Love, so badly. the social club kissing the side of their head gif described here i got my head in hands :( another line: They heal his eyes but they don’t wipe the blood off his face. … “Don’t say it,” Minghao begs. “Not now.” He listens to the way Seokmin’s breath catches in his throat. “Tell me when we come back?”
“Okay,” Seokmin says, and Minghao can hear the wan smile in his voice. “I will.”
Re: [FILL] and then sorrow comes forth
Re: [FILL] and then sorrow comes forth
Re: [FILL] and then sorrow comes forth