fic recs

[getintherobot]

[fiquereques]

The Names of the Spaces Your Heart Can’t Fill by MJ 900 words, rose, martha, donna: what they are without the doctor.

There are a million and one familiar things to hold on to, hot tea and the sky — the proper sky, empty of everything but blue and the pale shadows of distant stars — and Jack’s grin, his arm round her shoulders — and still Martha hesitates. Planets and holocausts behind her eyelids, the end of the world in her hands: how is she supposed to pretend like nothing has changed?

[fiquereques]

A Haze of Fire by Rubynye 1,800 words, steve rogers/sam wilson, (past) steve/bucky, sam+riley.ptsd, grief; spoilers for the winter soldier.

Sam nods against Steve's neck, but his shoulders under Steve's arm are rigid as steel. Steve blinks at movement and sees the maple tree tossing outside the window, its young leaves crimson under the streetlight, and a tumble of recurring thoughts turn and click together, slotting into place. "Sam," Steve says, and Sam nods again, then gets it and shifts back enough for their eyes to meet. "Sam."

"Yeah?" Sam asks, eyes narrowed, arms tightening fractionally around Steve's waist.

"I have to save Bucky," Steve starts, at the wrong end; he squeezes his eyes shut a moment, shaking his head against the marshmallow pillow, and starts over. "But, what I mean is, this, what we're doing." He waves over them, between them, and Sam's eyebrows lift. "This isn't temporary. It's not a stopgap. I want it for it, for you."

"This relationship, you mean," Sam says precisely, setting each word out, and Steve's cheeks burn, heat rushing up the back of his neck and curling over his ears.

[fiquereques]

You’re My Moon by sabinelagrande 850 words, cecil/carlos.

"I thought Night Vale schools offered astronomy," Carlos says, which is the nicest possible way he can think of saying that Cecil has lost his mind.

Cecil shakes his head. “When I was supposed to take it, the sky was briefly banned,” he says, which somehow doesn’t surprise Carlos at all. “We had the option of Astronomical Re-Education or Beginning Imaginary Spanish.” He turns, looking at Carlos. “On the bright side, I still remember how to not-say a lot of helpful phrases.”

“Uh huh,” Carlos says, though somehow he’s not surprised. Cecil is waiting for an answer, and Carlos realizes that in that moment, he can say anything. He could tell Cecil that the moon is made of green cheese, and Cecil will not question it for an instant. He say that the moon is papier-mâché, and Cecil will take it as gospel. He can say nothing, and Cecil will have an existential crisis and eventually decide that the moon does not exist at all, merely a figment of his imagination.

[fiquereques]

Flesh Beneath by isagel 5,700 words, natasha romanov/steve rogers. knifeplay, D/s, scarification. no spoilers.

She says it without thinking, instinct like the thrust of her knife:

“Then maybe I should make sure to keep you marked.”

And, damn, she should have turned around for this, after all, because Steve makes a noise, a quick exhalation as though the air’s been punched right out of him, and she wants to see that, the first, unguarded expression on his face that comes with a sound like that, wants to see his every reaction, soak up every little thing he gives.

When she does turn around, he is looking at the floor, face in shadow.

“Maybe you should,” he says.

[fiquereques]

Aggressive Mimicry by etothepii 5,700 words, sherlock holmes/jim moriarty. directedverse AU; violence, bdsm, knifeplay, consent play (dub-con, non-con).

Sherlock sucks his lower lip into his mouth and bites down. He sucks on it until it hurts a little, as if he’s undecided. He looks at John, a quick dart of his eyes first to meet John’s horrified ones, then down to the floor. Three seconds, don’t forget to adjust your breathing, he tells himself. Fear. Fear, fear, fear. Quicker breathing, indecision, curl your shoulders forward to look smaller, and then—

And then pretend you’re being brave. Chin up, jaw clenched, and Moriarty’s so hungry for victory that he laps it up, triumphant and so very easy.

“I’ll do it,” Sherlock says, and now his voice is strong, determined—false bravado, or a convincing facsimile thereof. “Just let him go, and let me go—” pause, nervous as he realizes what he’s agreeing to, “Let me go afterwards.”

[fiquereques]

and go seek by sunaga 850 words, joan watson + sherlock holmes. references to addiction.

She slowly moves her way across the house in no particular order. Outside her room is hard; those are Sherlock’s spaces and it’s crammed full of things and junk and things that have no use to her, but every obvious use to him. Downstairs is even worse, piled with books, locks and handcuffs with no keys hanging from odd corners.

Sherlock knows she’s searching. He has to with his mind and the burdens of it. He makes no comment on it, and Joan has no desire to update him on the careful cataloging she does. She keeps this list in the safest place she can think of: not papers or computer files, ripe for finding or hacking, but her own mind. She made it through med school; what is a house to the human body?

[fiquereques]

Never, Once by rubynye 7,700 words, jim kirk/chris pike. consensual sex work; canon-compliant.

Beyond this snug room and warm well-stuffed bed there’s all of Tritonia Base Two, fifteen hundred people under eight linked domes, not to mention its sister bases. There’s Tritonia One, dug into the frozen crust, with the Minor Planet Center and all the distractions people come up with when living in close quarters, and the Andorian colony attached to Tritonia Three, where Pike’s Quartermaster Teirde has family. There are EVA suits and ice sleds and Triton’s planet-facing far side, where Neptune hangs ultramarine and unmoving in the chill, clear sky. There’s an entire moon to see out there, and the rest of the Sol system to be seen from its vantage point.

Instead Pike spends his hours moonside exploring one two-meter-tall Human boy with translucent skin and cool blue eyes, finding in every moment as much to discover as on any new world. Jim seems to be made mostly of sunshine and insolence and laughter; he moves in Pike’s grip so eagerly Pike can almost let himself believe the boy’s willingness, but always with an arched eyebrow and a wicked chuckle, as if deigning to squirm in Pike’s lap. The attitude is as maddening as those big clever hands and sleek hard thighs, as heady as the pillowy-lipped kisses, those lascivious flickers of tongue and brief sharp hints of teeth.

[fiquereques]

For Want of a Comb by feverly 1,300 words, mikasa ackerman/sasha blause; mild spoilers for the manga.

It happened without warning when Sasha dropped her comb. It hadn’t even stopped clattering on the floor before Mikasa was at her side, sweeping it silently off the floor and placing it back into Sasha’s fingers as if she had rewound time so that it had never fallen to begin with. Sasha froze at Mikasa’s unexpected presence. She could have sworn Mikasa had been across the room, at her own bedside. And even if Mikasa had been next to her, she never would have thought the other girl would make a gesture like this.

Mikasa was so self-sufficient it seemed only natural she expect the same out of everyone else around her.

Sasha gulped and sputtered a tangled, “Thank you.” She wrapped her fingers tighter around the comb.

Mikasa nodded perfunctorily, swayed her body to leave, and then paused, a single strand of dark hair slipping from one side of her nose to another. She blinked down at the comb, still suspended in Sasha’s hand.

[fiquereques]

The Events at Elgin Avenue by hollycomb 32,000 words, kyle reese/marcus wright; underage, homophobia, minor character death.

"What are you on?" Marcus asks as Kyle regains his balance, lingering a little too close as he rubs his eyes.

“Huh? Oh, you think I’ve been taking drugs?” Kyle beams as if this is all a charming misunderstanding. “No, no, I’ve just been wandering through the desert naked for like two days, so. Um. Can I have some water?”

Marcus takes him back into the kitchen and watches him drink two big glasses full of tap water. Kyle wipes at his eyes when he’s finished, and Marcus can see that he’s trying not to start crying again. Marcus wonders how Kyle really lost his clothes, and for a minute he just hates Ray so much. Not that it’s Ray’s fault, really. The kid’s parents are dead. This is what happens. Worst case scenario.

“I’m sorry,” Kyle says, sniffling. “You must think—it’s just—it’s so clean, you know?”

[fiquereques]

Blush by helenish 2,540 words, mckay/sheppard.

Rodney can’t help but think that getting involved with Sheppard is a really incredibly monumentally terrible idea, but John kisses him, and seems sure, and Rodney is weak and just really likes being flirted with. He’s always had to spend a lot of time carefully pursuing people and trying not to offend them and generally being the aggressor without seeming to be aggressive. He’s generally found romance tiring and demoralizing and John is so good at smiling at him like he wants to take his clothes off that Rodney just lets it happen.

So, yes, he’s surprised when John gets quieter and redder and less sure, the more clothes he takes off.

[fiquereques]

Ampersand by alibi_factory 4,000 words, goren/eames.

Day one (of whatever this is) went like this: bad case, one neither of them could help taking personally, one of those cases where the job just sucked and why didn’t she become a teacher or a manager of a mid-priced restaurant and why didn’t he take that offer from the FBI? One of those cases that had both of them on a knife’s edge and at the bar after they’d locked that fucker up she downed a few G&Ts and hated Goren more with each one and he did his impression of a black hole, the sad-bastard routine getting more and more grating as the night went on. And then afterwards spilling out onto the sidewalk with the rest of the last-call drunks she discovered all the frustration and rage and repressed whatever of the past four years piling up behind her fist and then she had the strange experience of watching herself punch her partner in the face.

“Fuck,” he’d said, hand to his mouth. She couldn’t believe she’d actually been able to reach. “Eames, what the hell was that for?”

“Everything,” massaging her knuckles. “Nothing. Let me clean that up for you.”

[fiquereques]

the butterfly stance by transversely 7,000 words, annie leonhart/eren jaeger. spoilers through ch. 47.

There are twenty points on his torso alone she could use to kill him. Soft nerves and softer skin, and the eyes he trains on her now are the eyes he has knocked flat from a throw, exultant, temporarily exhilarated. She’s told him time and time again to get up immediately, never even to run the risk of teaching your body that being knocked on your back meant a hand pulling you back up and a drag from a water bottle still wet with someone else’s saliva. You could tell yourself you’d be braver in combat, and that you’d be capable of dealing with the incomprehensible lack of trust when it came, but the body had its own ways of conditioning that instinct out of you, this a proof more than anything that the human form was built for peace.

[fiquereques]

Take Clothes Off As Directed by helenish 2,500 words, john sheppard/rodney mckay. the original directedverse AU; bdsm, punishment, sexual harrassment.

Until 1941, subs hadn’t been allowed in the military at all; temperamentally unsuited, everyone said, for fighting. Much better to keep them safe at home. Subs were excellent aids and secretaries, junior engineers, kindergarten teachers, nurses, assembly-line workers, mechanics, accountants—careful, rule-following, meticulous, obedient. In the midst of World War II, personnel shortages had forced the armed forces to allow subs to enlist, but they’d been put in separate units, and couldn’t be promoted beyond Corporal. Subs had separate rank insignias until 1970 and wore an S-pin on their collars until 1982. John entered the Air Force Academy in 1987; it was only the third year subs were accepted into the flight program. John wasn’t the only one in his class, but he was the only one who looked like he did, and it didn’t make him any friends.

[fiquereques]

The Phenomenon by whitachi 1,000 words, cecil/carlos.

Scientific progress is on the march in Night Vale! Carlos, the scientist—sweet, tender Carlos, with his hands that are at the same time so delicate and so strong—has established a new research center in our fair town. It used to be an International House of Pancakes, but now, beneath that once-blue sharp-pointed roof, Carlos is discovering new and wonderful things. He gave me a call the other night and said, Cecil, I need you to come and see me. I have something I have to show you.

And so maybe I was a little later than I should have been because I couldn’t decide what to wear but when I did arrive at Carlos’ new scientific research facility in what used to be an IHOP, well, listeners, he did have something amazing to show me. Of course, it wasn’t something I or anyone else could actually see, but it was definitely, definitely there. Carlos called it ‘The Phenomenon.’ Isn’t that cute? Just a cute little name for it. I thought so. And when I told Carlos I thought it was cute, well that’s when things got scientifically interesting.

[fiquereques]

balanced on my head like steak knives by spellmans 2,250 words, joan watson/jamie moriarty.

Moriarty’s gaze goes cold and shallow. “People’s attachment to each other, people’s attachment to life, are the things that make murder, supposedly, an unforgivable sin.”

“What if Sherlock stepped in front of a train today?” Joan asks quietly. “Would you say the same thing?”

Her answer is in Moriarty’s silence, and so Joan knows. Moriarty would miss the game of Sherlock Holmes; she would miss the opportunity of him, the possibilities of him, but she would not miss him. She wouldn’t miss his horrible, ugly sweaters and his awful excuse for an inside voice and his shirts buttoned all the way up to the collar. A long, long time ago, maybe her first or second year of college, Joan had gotten stuck in an endless cycle of papers about personality disorders. She remembers plucking from the textbook and quoting, verbatim, what it meant to be a sociopath: a consistent disregard for the rights of others.

“We’re all people,” Joan says. “Just like you.”

Moriarty laughs.

[fiquereques]

Wolf Tone on F# by moonsheen 10,400 words. mostly gen; post-end.

“Why did you pilot the Eva?”

Shinji stared. Really? A thousand realities and they ask him that that? “I’ve answered that already.”

There was a pause. “Not according to our records.”

No, Shinji supposed it wouldn’t be there. He bent low in his chair, and folded his hands between his knees.

“Why did you pilot the Eva?”

Shinji looked up at him. “For approval and a general sense of self-worth?”

“That isn’t an answer,” said the man—for he was, in fact, a man. Shinji could see his face now and, for a second, more than that. He could see he pressed his lips together when irritated. Shinji knew his name was Agent Courbet. He was 45, and French from his accent. Shinji also knew, for a long nauseous moment, that when the world had flattened and pulled it’d been a young girl who had come for Agent Courbet. She’d died at age six of a genetic disorder. His side of the family had been the carrier of the disease, and he had never forgiven himself for it. Shinji thought about telling him that was stupid. Why would he blame himself for something like that? But the man chose that moment to clap his binder shut and cross out of the light again, and as the light hit Shinji’s eyes he forgot most of it.

“Why did you pilot the Eva?”

[fiquereques]

Rum Cake Arête by anon 1,400 words, mark zuckerberg/eduardo saverin.

Mark wants to go to New York on Saturday—something about a Klee exhibition at the Met and extra credit for Art History. It’s heavily implied that Eduardo will come, too.

“Do you even need extra credit?” Eduardo asks.

Mark doesn’t answer.

Such spartan detail is provided about the not-hypothetical-to-Mark trip that Eduardo forgets about it and fakes that he’s totally on board when Mark knocks on his door at six o’clock in the fucking morning. Eduardo only has time to yank on clothes and rake toothpaste through his teeth, but Mark has showered and smells nice. A warm herbal humidity surrounds his head like a halo.

At the train station, Mark drains the prepaid Acela card issued by his mother in hopes of seeing him once in a while. “I won’t be offended if you sleep on the way there,” he says, and Eduardo sighs with relief and does exactly that.