#sharkinterviewee fics

Rules: It’s time to love yourselves! Choose your 5 favorite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc!) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2018. Tag as many writers/artists/etc as you want (fan or original!) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works!

I was tagged by the lovely @startofamoment, and subsequently realized that I wrote over half of the fics I have on AO3 this year alone (67/109 total), so narrowing these down was fun. I joined new fandoms, so I had 3 OTPs that I mainly wrote for: peraltiago, starmora, thorkyrie (listed in the order I got into the fandom chronologically, of course) (and I just realized that even though I only chose one peraltiago fic, B99 is mentioned in three/four-ish of these reflections, so even if you only know me from one fandom, stick around, cause there’s a lot of cross pollination in these reflections)

Wedding Day -

As she sprinted through the fields, barefoot and free, it made her feel like a child again, racing through the fields of her home planet, because she had promised Mamma she would be home in time to help her with supper.

Her feet were dirty from playing outdoors all day, but, as green little toes pressed into the freshly tilled ground beneath her feet, she was fast, laughing like a wild child as she ran, confident that she’d make it in time to keep her promises.

This time, she had a different promise waiting for her.

It was a different ground beneath her, one she’d never been to before today, but running bare feet in the grass still felt good, just like she remembered. As she ran, long green toes were pressed into a soil that was a different color than she remembered, and her sprinting feet were long and sure as they pounded against the earth with the speed and grace of a gazelle in its natural habitat. Her feet were practiced now, balanced and efficient. This wasn’t the clumsy running of little feet slapping down with every step. This was quick, light, elegant movements, barely touching the ground before propelling into her next step, with long green toes covered in dirt of a foreign land.

Much had changed.

But she was still running and smiling like a wild child, racing home, because she had promises to keep.

If I had to pick an absolute favorite from this year, it would probably be this one, and the funny thing is it was almost never written at all. This was actually an anon prompt fic and kinda technically a starmora week fill. The prompt for day 6 was Wedding, and I made a self explanatory one shot titled Wedding Night

The day after I posted it, I received the anon ask “Starmora prompt: Peter and Gamora's wedding day.”

The thing is- I had no plans to ever write an actual wedding for them. I didn’t even have any ideas for what their wedding would look like when I got that prompt.

In an alternate reality that anon never sent that ask, and one of my favorite fics would have never even existed.

So really, to that anon, that you, because this is isn’t just one of my favorite fics of 2018, but one of my favorite fics I’ve ever written, so thank you for sparking it!

Whirlwind

The majority of my Brooklyn Nine Nine fics from this year were explicit peraltiago one shots, and this was no exception. Just the sex that immediately follows the decision to screw light and breezy on their second night. Kinda kinky, kinda awkward, kinda giggly, and definitely happy.

There’s a specific line in this fic that I love more than anything, and really don’t know why, just that I do.

Amy kissed him like finally and supposed to be.

Honestly, I think this is my favorite line of the year.

Like I just love the way it sounds, reading it aloud in my head. It just fits.

It’s always the best when people leave their favorite lines/parts in comments, and I’ve found that nothing pleases me like writing a mundane sort of detail and finding out that really made an impression on someone. There were a few specific lines left in the comments, but one comment really stood at to me, just in general and also cause of the line they chose:

She felt him stroking at her slicked up curls

Someone left a comment about just that line as a subtle detail being something they really liked. And I was like ‘huh, interesting’ because as far as just regular details go, I didn’t think anything of that line, and I had no idea how good it would feel in the center of my chest when someone left a comment on how much they loved what I just considered a regular sorta line

Healing

“There’s more to healing than what’s just physically necessary,” Val replied calmly, choosing to focus on treating and bandaging hand injuries rather than the weight behind her words. It’s a process, she thought, but didn’t say. She had a feeling he already knew.

Okay, so I actually got the term hand whump from a comment left on one of my older b99 fics, but it was so perfect the first time I read it cause like, that’s my favorite type of whump! I’m glad I’m not alone in being a sucker for hand injuries in the fanfic community. I don’t know what it is. Symbolism??? Maybe???

The first time I saw Thor Ragnarok, I was barely dipping my toes into the MCU fanfiction community with GOTG, so it wasn’t until I watched this movie again for the second time that I wrote my first Thorkyrie fic, cause, I mean, how could I not? How can you not just love everything about them?

Our Stories can Heal

“S’okay. I know this stuff is hard for you. Thanks for trusting me with that.”

Her heart swelled at that. There was a little ache at how he said that like it wasn't clearly just as hard for him, but mostly her heart felt warm and full.

“Thank you for being the kind of person I know I can trust,” she replied, and that earned her a chuckle.

This one is near and dear to my heart as a sexual abuse survivor myself- plus, I have a thing for badass couples supporting each other (can’t you tell from my OTPs?)

I pretty much wrote exclusively for B99 for almost three years, and while I love digging into emotional issues with a generous serving of comfort, I guess the most severe emotional issues I’d ever explored in a Peraltiago fic was Jake’s abandonment issues. While I’m clearly not opposed to exploring themes of support for traumatic experiences, I was never really able to do that until I had a ship that I could do that with in starmora.

It’s much easier for me to explore things like traumatic pasts in starmora fics because A: it’s canon that they both had traumatic childhoods with physical abuse and were both raised in just traumatic environments in general, and B: with pretty much every hurt/comfort fic I write (whether hand injuries or emotional issues) I like starting at the healing point.

With Peter and Gamora, the trauma already happened in the past, and I don’t have to establish it as an author (plus in the MCU meeting each other in the first movie and starting the Guardians of the Galaxy is where every member of the team’s life starts to get better). That’s all established canon.

If I were to write a soft peraltiago fic of  healthy relationships and emotional support involving past sexual abuse for either of them, I’d have to CREATE something in their backstories that led to that situation, and that’s just something that I honestly don’t wanna do.

I only have two starmora fics that touch on this, and tags for both of those are “implied/vaguely referenced past non-con” because I never actually state anything about it directly in the fics, and never go into what actually happened.

Seriously, in both fics, it’s impossible to tell if it was past CSA or if it was a past incident of sexual assault. That’s how vague it is. And I’m able to be that vague with it, because I don’t have to establish traumatic pasts, because their traumatic pasts are canon. Rather than having to create a trauma like I would have to if I wanted to explore these healing themes with peraltiago, with starmoa I just have to go sideways from what’s already canon, you know? (In Our Stories Can Heal they’ve both had vague past trauma, in this fic right here, Peter is the only one who’s had extremely vague past trauma- both are about healthy relationships and healing and emotional support)

The Hourglass Runs Out of Sand

Here is the exact summary for this

“You are always telling me that I am more than what I was made to do,” Gamora reminded him gently.

“Yeah, but you weren’t made for it,” Peter said, looking up at her with a sudden intensity she wasn’t ready for. The anguish in his eyes made her chest pang with a dull, resounding ache. “Your parents made you so you could be a kid, not a weapon. That’s what you were made for. To be a person. You weren’t supposed to be used to kill people or the entire universe. That’s not why you exist, not like me.”

(Or: Peter’s body isn’t reacting well to losing Ego’s light is one of the author’s favorite tropes)

This was such a self indulgent work of all my favorite tropes and themes. Emotional hurt/comfort? Check. Physical hurt/comfort? Check. Mutual comforting? Check.

I even put in the freakin’ summary that it’s written for my favorite tropes. So, I mean, of course it’s gotta make my top 5 of 2018

Plus, I actually had some fun working in ideas that I didn’t actually use, but still love as concepts.

And it was actually thanks to the comments on this fic from Wawa_Girl / @marypoppinswasmyfatherbitches that pushed this over into something extra special as an author.

She made a much better in depth analysis of this fic than I ever could, and her entire long ass comments on this fic made my entire fucking year

Like damn, you get yourself a cheerleader who leaves 2,000+ word comments on your fics, cause I got mine.

Here are just 3 subsections of her comments that meant the fucking world to me:

First of all, I love the very premise, the specific types of emotions and trauma Peter is going through here. It's twofold, and it's fascinating. 1) The idea that he was only "made" to be "used," discovering and contemplating and becoming self-loathing over the fact that the entire reason he was conceived was to be used to as a battery, a tool, a thing to help destroy the universe. WOW. That is a take I had never really considered, or at least never thought about for long. That would fuck anyone up, create serious identity problems, that at least on the side of his father, he was intentionally created for evil purposes, and not just to be a person. 2) Guilt over the thousands of innocent people he hurt while being used as a battery, although it was greatly out of his control. Because to someone who wants to be a hero and with such a big heart, the knowledge that he even involuntarily killed anyone through Ego's power is horrifying, to the point where the guilt is so high he feels he deserves any physical pain/illness/injury. Awww man, another take I would have never strongly considered. We've seen fanfics where Peter feels guilty in the aftermath of Ego, but it's usually in relation to how he treated the main characters (never appreciating Yondu or realizing he had a father all along; not listening to Gamora and yelling mean things to her during their fight; being too cocky and rude to Rocket in the beginning, overall wanting to be a better person/hero/boyfriend). NOT insane guilt over the strangers and planets he destroyed via Ego's light. Goddammit. :( This is the first time I've seen a fanfic address these two ideas. And it's realistic and creative and GOOD.

- How Gamora originally thought Peter "felt" the other children, his siblings dying, how seeing the bodies scared her for Peter's well-being so much, and how making Peter relive their deaths seemed like Ego's brand of sick, psychological torture. But also that Peter actually meant he felt the other strangers dying due to the expansion, scared and running away and being buried. Feeling that is horrifying, of course he would feel insane levels of guilt. The comparison that, despite Gamora's guilt over her victims under Thanos, she never felt them die, and not all at once but over the course of years. Again, great contrast. I still love her reminder "That wasn't you." That could never be Peter.

- Peter breaking down crying when Gamora says "Earth" instead of "Terra." That's so interesting, one of the most original concepts in this piece, how that slight name change would resonate with him so much. Fascinating. And heartbreaking. He held it together well, and that was the thing that broke the thread. Poor baby.”

If you’ve got anyone in your corner who builds you up like that, then you’re set for life, baby.

(I think that Gamora misinterpreting Peter’s statement and thinking he meant the other children when in fact he meant the people that died during the expansion is the example of working in ideas I didn’t actually use but just love as concepts)

And that last one kinda goes to the point I made in Whirlwind reflection about people liking what I thought of as regular/sorta mundane details- like obviously the part about Earth/Terra was supposed to be emotional and I wrote it that way on purpose, but I didn’t intend it to be even in the top 8 emotional hard hitting moments in this fic, so what she wrote about that little bit has always stuck with me

And turns out her favorite part was a last minute addition, which always makes me feel extra special, I don’t know why. Finding out that last minute inclusions are things that people loved just makes me glow

If you have a reader who sometimes gives you comments even half as good as marypoppinswasmyfatherbitches gives hers, then you too can consider yourself truly blessed (she writes freakin’ amazing starmora fics too, so she’s the kind of commenter I aspire to be as a fanfic writer, you know? If you don’t have your own marypoppinswasmyfatherbitches, you go be somebody else’s marypoppinswasmyfatherbitches. You go make somebody’s year just by being you)

I’ll be tagging @thehoneymoonbinder, @marypoppinswasmyfatherbitches, @ephemeralcontinuum, @nymphrea, and @startsrose3