Mark your calendars! Send out the servo-skulls! 40k Women Week is happening this September, 7th to 13th!
PROMPTS
September 7th: Imperium // Violent
September 8th: Books // Brave
September 9th: Xenos // Arrogant
September 10th: Games // Intelligent
September 11th: Heresy // Cold
September 12th: OCs // Powerful
September 13th: Free day!
FAQ
What is allowed?
All kinds of fanworks, including, but not limited to: fic, art, podfic, gifs, cosplay, mini painting, poetry, crafts, interpretive dance, etc.
Gen works, ships of any kind, SFW, NSFW, dark topics/dead dove (provided it is tagged properly), written works in any language, having fun and being yourself.
What is NOT allowed?
Hate and bigotry of any kind — sexism, racism, transphobia, queerphobia, any other kinds of predjudice or being an indiscriminate asshole — all not allowed. 41st Millenium is a dark place, but in the here and now let's be civil to each other.
GenAI use — we're here to appreciate human* passion and creativity regardless of skill level
(*we do however welcome any friendly abhumans or xenos willing to take part in our event)
Character or ship bashing — have your fun and let others have theirs, we're here for good vibes.
Can I include Rogue Trader and Dark Heresy CRPG characters for this week?
We consider any work focusing heavily on Rogue Trader and Dark Heresy CRPGs by Owlcat to be outside scope of this event, however we understand that many original characters take on lives outside of the game's canon. Creations featuring original 40k women who may be Rogue Traders or DH Acolytes but focus on their lives, backstories, or futures outside of the Owlcat games or their relationships to the canon characters from these games are welcome in this event. Use your best judgement.
If you are primarily interested in canon Rogue Trader characters, we recommend you check out @rtwomenweek
How do the prompts work?
Each day (except the last) has two prompts: the source of origin or the faction for the woman you are creating for, and a general prompt. You can use either, or combine them if you wish. The prompts are intentionally broad — the goal is to inspire our participants and give them more creative opportunities, rather than limit them.
Are men/non-binary characters allowed?
The focus of the event is female characters in the 40k universe, and as such, your work for the event should center them. However, we do not limit who else can feature in your works! Many of the canon ladies have male colleagues/romantic partners/family members/comrades/bitter rivals/etc, and if you want to focus on one such relationship, you're more than welcome to. Same goes for your original characters.
Are genderbends/trans headcanons allowed?
You are free to include genderbent/transfem versions of canon male characters in your work as long as it centers a canon woman character or a female OC. (For example, f!Orikan/Vishani work qualifies for this event and so does an ungenderbent version, but f!Orikan/f!Trazyn does not.)
You are free to include original female characters from a canonically all-male faction. (For example if your work centers on an OC Novamarine from an AU where all Space Marines are women, or an OC Blood Angel who realises that she's a trans woman we will happily reblog it)
Of course, you are completely free to center your work on trans women characters, original, headcanoned or otherwise. Trans women are women.
Where else can I find you?
The event will be run on tumblr. Use #40kwomenweek to tag your post and/or mention this blog and we will reblog it. You can also add your work to the ao3 collection here. We will be monitoring the tag and the collection submissions for a week longer after the event ends to give you a little extra time as well.
How should I tag my work?
For us to find your post, you should tag with #40kwomenweek or @ our account
Additionally — we are only two people, and as such have not familiarised ourselves with every book/game/show/piece of lore out there. We are kindly asking you to include some information in the post with your work, so we can tag it correctly.
For canon characters: Full name, faction, source (Black Library publications, games, animation, other)
For OCs: Indicate that this is an OC and list the relevant faction
What about this thing that you haven't mentioned/considered?
Please feel free to reach out to us with any further questions, the askbox is open.
I know I'll sound like a tinhatter saying this, but I find it very telling that Gregor's instinctive lie/cover story for Beta was that she's his wife, when daughter or niece would have been just as believable.
And more natural for a man interacting with a girl who is a clone of his past lover and who he's trying to claim a father-daughterly relationship with. (He's 287 years old. She's 24. Who, accompanying someone so much younger that they supposedly see as their child, thinks "Ahh yes, husband and wife. That's the most appropriate dynamic between us for people to see and believe. Let's perform that.")
I think there's unreliable narration going on. Like Gregor is in denial about seeing Beta as separate from original!Bequin, or Beta herself is in denial or vastly misreading the situation when she claims he doesn't see her as a replacement for original!Bequin and instead he's like a father to her. Maybe *she* wants him to be like a father to her, but he can't see her like a daughter.
I think it's possible the author deliberately went for that complex/grey/unreliable/ambiguous vibe.
I'm pleased as punch with the result--it's way more problematic and psychologically complex if there's father-daughter relationship undertones and he's haunted by an inability to distinguish her from the original and they both know it's a bad idea and struggle to avoid giving into any romantic/sexual chemistry. And if she really does just see him as a father figure but later gives into turning the relationship into something romantic+sexual because she wants to be with him, on whatever terms she can.
And maybe he did want to keep them as father/daughter in dynamic but he loathes the idea of her being with anyone, he can't stand it (maybe even in a traditional protective father way, but that *always* has weird Freudian undertones. After all, he seemed extremely repulsed/bothered by reading the thoughts of that guy that was lusting over Beta.) so he takes up with her himself to be the lover she needs and keep all the unworthy scum away. And that comes with its own guilt <3
Or maybe reading those perverted thoughts/fantasies about Beta woke something up in him. Or all of the above.
That's way better than if the narrative had just gone "oh goody we brought his love interest back as a clone and she's basically the original and there's nothing weird about them getting back together". Let it be weird, and fucked up, and sad and hot.
My egg ass reading Eisenhorn and latching onto Alizebeth 8equin:
"Wow, this story of a woman who is 8oth 8eautiful and repulsive, desired and loathed, loved yet untoucha8le, really reson8es with me, a man, for reasons I will not examine at all."
