Five Favorite Fics - 2021 Edition
Rules: it’s time to love yourselves! choose your 5 (or so) favorite works you created in the past year (fics, podfic, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought to the world in 2021. Tag as many creators as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works!
1. Zemo’s Book of Secrets (June-July, 7k)
I remember thinking ‘Zemo read the Winter Soldier’s instruction manual and can read Bucky like nobody’s business, but what if it was the other way around?’ - and the idea of Zemo having a secret diary of sorts and Bucky finding it (and reading it) was born. I definitely started being properly obsessed with the idea of Bucky and Zemo turning the tables on each other with this fic.
2. Killers Dancing (July-September, 52k)
The younger-Zemo-hell-bent-on-revenge-finds-the-Winter-Solder one shot that ended up being over 50k. I’ve been meaning to write about the Zemo/WS dynamics and all it took was listening to a couple of songs, looking at a gif of bellydancing, and the plot of this fic drove its claws into my mind. The Zemo and James from this specific story (aka miláčik and хозяин) haunted me for months, and I’m extremely proud of the final result. (I’ve also had way too much fun using different languages, including but not limited to: Russian, Slovak (my take on Sokovian), Latvian, and Japanese.)
3. Do You Remember Now? (September, 4k)
Amnesia has to be one of my favorite tropes. The idea of Zemo, a man addicted to control, losing all memories of his romantic relationship with a man he once swore to kill was irresistible to my muse. Writing him playing the role of husband for a day was an interesting challenge!
4. Breathless (October, 8k)
I’m not sure why I enjoy writing depressive, heavy-angst stories, when it inevitably makes me feel super down, but I guess the idea chooses the writer, and not the other way around. Pretty sure I was doing something extremely mundane when the ideas of Zemo almost drowning and Zemo being blind collided in my head. And that’s how a depressed and desperate Zemo and a protective (and just as desperate) Bucky ended up trapped in a cell together.
5. The Pain (of You Caring) (December, 6k)
This one is the result of a prompt on Discord. As soon as I began to try not to think about it, the idea unfolded in my mind: Zemo seeking out a dom for extremely rough sex & abuse, and Bucky findind out by accident - and deciding that he’s better suited (even as a first-time dom) to give Zemo what he needs (my headcanon is that Bucky knows better than Zemo what Zemo really needs, and vice versa).
Extra. The Handling of Wayward Soldiers (November, 3k)
My love letter to Machineries of Empire and TFATWS both - the fusion that nobody asked for, but I felt compelled to write all the same. I’ve never spent so much time writing explanatory notes, and I had a lot of fun doing so. The Machineries of Empire universe is amazing, and if writing this piece got even one more person to read it, then my goal is achieved.
Tagging: @emptymidnight, @flannelsaurus, @fuddlewuddle, @mirunalives, @sagegarnish, @scioscribe, @sholiofic, @spintwinwb
and everyone else who wants to play!
