You, man

(the first bit is something another player told jesse off the record so he didn’t name names)

notes on devotion | sidnate - whatever you wanna by annabelle dinda

Free agency means hockey is getting closer, but for some it’s close enough. New faces have been added, and familiar ones have departed, so why not take advantage of all the new possible dynamics that have graced us?

Introducing: Free Agency Fic Fest, a fest purely dedicated to the under appreciated and under utilized ships within the hockey fandom. Whether it be an existing pair or a new one spurred by an acquisition or trade, this is the place for it.

Prompts can be submitted now until September 1st, and the deadline for writers to submit their works will be two or three days before regular season starts (a specific day will be given once regular season schedules are posted). Fics will then go live on the first day of regular season. Writers can submit their entries as early as they’d like, but I’d recommend taking some time to edit and revise, but that’s not strictly necessary.

Don’t see a prompt that’s tripping your trigger? Not to worry! A free space will be provided that allows for any ship, as long as it falls within the rules of the fest. I really want anyone and everyone to participate, so I hope this covers all the bases.

RULES:

1. As stated, this is a rarepair event. The ship must have less than 50 fics in the ship tag to be counted. I will be checking each prompt to see if they fit within these rules; if they don't, they will be removed.

2. Please refrain from requesting athletes who are racist, homophobic, have committed domestic violence or sexual assault. Examples: Carter Hart, Patrick Kane, Evander Kane, Matthew Tkachuk. For now, certain athletes will still be accepted, however do not be surprised if nobody writes for them. Examples: the Hugheses, Auston Matthews. These are players who have participated in an event that may indicate their morals one way or another, but there is no definitive proof, so they will be allowed until proven otherwise.

3. Absolutely no AI. You cannot use AI for anything, whether it be "rephrasing sentences" or brainstorming. If any AI is found, your work will be removed from the collection.

4. At least ONE of the people must be a hockey player or have been a hockey player. Example: Dan Potash/Evgeni Malkin is acceptable, so is Josh Getzoff/Colby Armstrong.

5. PWHL, European leagues, and college leagues are welcome to participate! Literally the only requirements are that they have to play hockey, and that there are less then 50 fics within the AO3 tag.

6. RPF ONLY. Fictional ships are not permitted. Not even if one half of the ship is real.

Please direct any questions to my ask box!

a couple days ago i saw someone post something like “i wonder if nate sent the message over saying that it was private and the pens admin just passed it on or if they watched it and decided it was too private” and i can’t find it right now and i don’t remember who the post was by but by god ive been thinking about it since. like. the amount of moving and personal things his family said!! and NATE was the guy who got censored????

Imagine getting asked to make a video for him where you get to say as much as you want about how great he is and how much he means to you as a hockey player and as a man, knowing that he won’t be able to laugh it off or make a joke about it like he usually would because it’s going to be broadcast before the game.

Imagine being told it’s not going to be broadcast because it’s too personal, and being absolutely baffled because what does that even mean?

Dunno why they did that, you text Sid. It’s nothing I haven’t said before.

Nate, you said you were in love with me.

penguins We really said copy + paste 🤝

truthfully, everything about them is insane and feral. recently i remembered nate used the same tape job as sid and i blacked out for a minute. i rediscover things regularly that make me crazy-eyed because wdym you think it’s normal to just be this codependent.

i’ve talked about the buddy basket before, and “I <3 Sid”, and those are big ones. so is every mention of sid during the avs’ cup win. currently though, I’m obsessed with sid hanging nate on his Captains Wall of Shame though. I was recently reminded how much Sid is historically a superstitious guy— this is the man who hasn’t talked to his mother or sister on the phone on a game day in fifteen years. Viciously guarded for most of his life, but he let an amazon film crew in his house and let them catch the moment his eyes landed on nate’s picture on the Self-Flagellation Wall of Winning Captains. While he says “I always put the winning captain up”. while both the camera and his eyes drop to the elephant in the room: Nate MacKinnon and the blazing A on his chest, who apparently overrules a law of nature usually so diligently and punishingly followed that calling it a mere neurodivergent stim would be disrespectful towards the religious rigorosity with which Sid usually follows his own superstitious commandments. luck is god and jesus to that man.

And like he’s upset superstitions for Nate before, but it used to be under conditions waved off as one-offs; circumstantial. But here we are, a dozen years down the line, and every time Sid steps into his home, his most prominent sanctuary— every day when he exercises and feels the strain in his muscles like drinking water, like breathing, more often than he falls asleep every day, a ritual so old he doesn’t remember living without it; he looks up and there is the one person he breaks every rule for, right up on the wall, in the most perfect, exceptional way. that man reminds himself of his quiet devotion to nate every time he looks at the wall during a workout.