#ctenfic

[cteranodon]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

In my latest Claypollo fic, Apollo challenges Clay to never put laundry detergent in his mouth no matter how tempted he gets, and I make my first official foray into heresy for the sake of art.

[cteranodon]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

The Many Nonsenses of Clay Terran

Claypollo, domestic fluff, no warnings, 448 words

Apollo is awake in bed on the morning before a big case. Clay is several things, but "awake" might not be one of them.

please accept this short and soft piece

[cteranodon]

I'm gonna go with 34 for our dear doctor and not-a-spy-but-a-simple-tailor ;D Have fun!

(34: a kiss to pretend)

“How many times have I said, NOBODY MOVE!”

Nobody had been moving, so Bashir quite frankly didn’t know what the man’s problem was. The Orion who seemed to be leading the operation, however, was back to aggressively pointing his phaser rifle at the host of hostages before him.

Deep Space Nine had been infiltrated by a band of Orion, apparently a faction of war-hawking rebels, who had taken over Ops and were now planning to hijack a starship. Bashir’d had the bad fortune of being in Sisko’s office at the time, so he was stuck at phaserpoint with the rest of the senior staff.

“Colonel,” one of the other Orion said, “we’re getting a signal from the station’s hostage negotiator.”

This time, Bashir saw movement in the form of Sisko’s eyebrow arching. Bashir thanked his stars that Sisko had saved him the embarrassment of wondering for too long if the station had a hostage negotiator he didn’t know about.

“What do they want?” the Colonel demanded.

“He says he wants to negotiate the release of one of the hostages… in exchange for supplies.”

“What supplies?”

“He didn’t say yet.”

The Colonel spun on his heel to face the senior staff, absolute fury in his eyes. “And which of you is he planning to have us let go?”

“You know,” Jadzia said with a keen smile, “not letting the hostage negotiator do any negotiating… kind of defeats the purpose of us having him around.”

The Colonel opened and shut his mouth several times, before apparently conceding the point to Jadzia and making his way to another console to have his negotiations.

Sisko sidestepped closer to Jadzia to have a hushed conversation of his own with her. “I don’t suppose you know what’s going on here.”

“Not exactly,” Jadzia replied. “But I have a guess as to who our ‘negotiator’ really is.”

“And when will we know if your guess is correct?”

A much softer smile played on her face. “When we find out who they want released.”

After a minute, the Colonel, looking several orders of magnitude less grumpy than before, trudged back over to the senior staff. His eyes scanned over them, then he pointed his phaser rifle firmly at Bashir.

“You! Come with me.”

Jadzia responded with a click of her tongue and a “Thought so.”

That was enough for Bashir to catch on. He dutifully followed the Colonel over to the lift.

“Keep the rest of them right where they are,” the Colonel barked to one of his lackeys.

The whirring of the lift started before they called it. The Colonel didn’t seem to think anything was wrong with that at first; perhaps he didn’t realize it wasn’t quite so automatic. When the lift came into view, it had the two Orion who had been stationed just outside, flanking a certain Cardassian.

“Julian!” Garak stepped down and flung his arms around Bashir.

“Is this the appointed go-between?” the Colonel asked the guards.

“Yes, the package is below,” one of the guards said. “He insisted on coming up here—”

“Just to make sure my Julian is safe.” Garak accentuated the point with a kiss directly on Bashir’s lips, lasting several seconds, with a mechanical precision, before he broke and looked Bashir up and down. “I trust you aren’t hurt?”

“Hhhhhuh,” Bashir answered.

“You poor thing, you must be in shock.” Garak clasped Bashir by the shoulder and glanced back at the Colonel. “Thank you, my friend, for being willing to let him go.”

“I’m nothing if not reasonable,” the Colonel half-growled, not all that interested in remaining reasonable for very long. “Let’s go back down and do the exchange. The rest of you, make sure the other hostages don’t move one micron.”

Garak guided Bashir by the lower back to the lift, where they stood beside the Colonel as they were taken back down. Bashir was still a bit dazed from the kiss he wasn’t remotely expecting, but he noticed the crate left in the middle of the floor.

“Is that the package?” the Colonel asked.

“Y-yes, that’s the one,” Garak answered.

“Open it.”

Garak went to it with an affected nervousness, pressed a button, and removed the lid, standing back for the Colonel to see what was inside. “Latinum, a photon torpedo, and a weapon that I am told will put your current one to shame.”

Glee made itself known on the Colonel’s face as he tossed his phaser rifle aside (in the opposite direction from Garak and Bashir) and picked up a similar, but more contemporary-looking weapon from within the crate. “Now this is a rifle.”

“I was hoping you’d say that.” Garak smiled affably at the Colonel, an immediate signal to Bashir that the Colonel was already dead. “A gift from the Orion Syndicate.”

The room was filled with heavy silence for a five second count.

“…Excuse me?” the Colonel finally asked.

“Yes, delivered personally by Thadial Bokar, as a matter of fact.”

Another silence. Bashir wondered what it was Garak had just said, and how much this Colonel knew of what was about to happen. He could never really be sure with a trap set by the “plain” and “simple” “tailor.”

“How dare you speak that name to me.” Considering how temperamental the Colonel had been up to now, he was speaking remarkably evenly.

“Ah, is there some unpleasantness in your history?” Garak blinked innocently. “Perhaps there’s a message you’d like me to deliver him when I see him next?”

“I’d rather deliver it to him myself,” the Colonel said. “But… I might as well give it to you, first.”

He pointed the new rifle at Garak and pulled the trigger. Instantly, instead of any energy fired from the weapon, it was the Colonel himself who was surrounded by it, as he vanished with the distinctive sound of the transporter.

Garak eased his posture. “Well. I don’t believe he thought that idea through at all.”

Bashir had finally found his ability to speak. “Where did you… send him?”

“Nowhere at all. Or, at least, far enough away from the station that his body isn’t likely to collide with it. I doubt Chief O’Brien would appreciate the carcass of a reactionary terrorist arriving in one of the docking pylons.” Garak pulled the supposed photon torpedo out of the crate and began fiddling with it.

“No, I don’t suppose he would.” Bashir watched Garak carefully. “And what, dare I ask, are you doing with a torpedo?”

“Ah, but it’s not a torpedo, it’s a computer disguised with the casing of a torpedo. I can use it to interface remotely with the station’s transporters. I would hate for our Colonel to feel lonely out there, and he was so helpful in making sure the other officers of this station didn’t move, so I would know exactly who not to lock onto.”

“But if you have a torpedo casing, that means you have the internals of a photon torpedo elsewhere,” Bashir finished.

“Nonsense. Someone accidentally left an empty torpedo casing in my shop while I was measuring them for a wedding gown.”

“And how exactly is it that you can interface with the station’s transporters?”

“Oh, that knowledge I came by during my time with the Obsidian Order.”

Perhaps it was partially the lingering surprise from the kiss, but Bashir was once again shocked beyond words.

Garak offered Bashir a sweet smile. “That is what you wanted me to say, is it not?”

“Well, I wouldn’t have assumed you were… that is, I—”

“Not to worry. It’s untrue. I’m shocked you could believe me capable of something so disreputable as membership in the Obsidian Order.” Garak smirked as he went back to the torpedo casing. “It’s just some knowledge I was given as payment for a bit of weeding.”

“Weeding.”

“Yes, Doctor.”

“Now why do I find that so hard to believe?”

“I couldn’t say. You hardly have what I could describe as healthy skepticism. Ah!” Garak appeared to have finally pinpointed all of the persons in Ops. “Now, I’ll have to transport one more of them into space just to prove I mean business, otherwise they won’t surrender before killing your fellow Federation officers, plus Major Kira, and I simply couldn’t bear a world without her.”

“You’re not planning to just beam them all into space?” It had managed to take Bashir by surprise, and despite the fact that these particular Orion were all despicable, he found himself relieved.

“I know. You must be having an undue influence on me.”

“Are you sure? I mean, to a veteran spy, there must be value in the taking of prisoners.”

Garak rolled his eyes. “Certainly, to a veteran spy, but to me it just serves as a source of danger.”

“You think these Orion could be dangerous prisoners? What, you think they could take over the station again?”

Garak gasped, affixing Bashir with a scandalized gaze. “My dear Doctor! What possible reason could you have to jump to that conclusion?”

“It seemed like a natural—”

“Oh, I don’t believe that.” Garak stood, placing the torpedo/computer to one side, and stepped closer to Bashir. “There are any number of reasons political prisoners could be dangerous. You picked one of the least likely among those reasons. Escape! Now, perhaps my understanding of the human psyche is not what it should be, but I wonder if some part of you… hopes for a second takeover of the station? Perhaps…” He stepped closer still. “Perhaps you are hoping that I will perform the same harried spouse routine for them a second time?”

Bashir was feeling very warm all of a sudden, but he managed to say “The thought hadn’t even occurred to me, my dear Mister Garak.”

“Ah. Well, I’m disappointed to hear it.” Garak didn’t back down. “Rest assured, I will take a different angle in future rescues.”

“I didn’t ask you to do that.”

“Hm.” Garak had the smug aura that signaled that Bashir had played right into his hands. “Then perhaps you want to rehearse? Only to ensure that you play the part better in the future, of course.”

“Naturally.” Bashir didn’t let his eyes back down from Garak’s, despite the intensity of the situation and how badly he wanted to break. “Perhaps some preparation work will do me good.”

There was a twinkle in Garak’s eye as he smiled back. “Then prepare a list of fake terms of endearment that are believable but uncomfortable to hear. Putting the listener in a position of discomfort is the key to the entire operation. I expect at least twenty, and I plan to critique each one at length.”

For the umpteenth time today, Bashir was left speechless.

“Now then. I must return to the problem at hand.” Garak swiftly placed a kiss on Bashir’s cheek, then spun to face his contraption. “Well done out there for your first run, my dear Doctor.”

(Sorry this took forever! Hope you enjoyed! ao3 link in comments.)

[cteranodon]

Claypollo 19!

“You’re gonna do great.”

“I’m gonna crash and burn.”

“You’re gonna do great.”

They were approaching the parking lot where Clay would drop off Apollo, and Apollo would go to take the bar exam. The closer they got, the more Apollo’s nerves were creeping up on him.

“Record low pass rates, Clay.”

“Doesn’t matter if the pass rate is one percent. You’ll do great.” Clay took a moment to smile over at Apollo. “You’ve been studying your butt off. You’re as ready as anybody else. You got this, okay?”

Apollo nodded. “…Yeah. Yeah, I do.”

“There we go.”

“But what if I don’t?”

Clay chuckled. Apollo’s tone shift was too much for him not to. “If you don’t, I’ll still be proud of you.”

That seemed to make Apollo feel a bit better. He settled back into his seat, a tiny shadow of a smile playing on his face.

So Clay decided to keep going. “Everything you do is amazing to me. No matter what you think of yourself, I’m still impressed with you. And, whatever happens, I’ll be here to help us figure out where we go next.”

Apollo heaved a sigh. “Thanks, Clay.”

“Besides, Gavin was confident enough in you to offer you a partnership as soon as you passed the exam. This exam.” They pulled into the parking lot. “He and I both know you’ll be in the with-flying-colors range.”

“You’re right.”

Clay found a spot fairly quickly, parked, and hopped out as quickly as he could. This seemed to take Apollo by surprise; surely Apollo didn’t think he’d get away with a one-second goodbye inside the vehicle?

Clay bounced around to the passenger side, where Apollo was slowly climbing out. As soon as they were both standing up straight, Clay pulled Apollo into a tight hug.

“You’ll be fine,” Clay said.

“I’ll be fine!” Apollo echoed.

“Atta boy.” Clay squeezed Apollo to him for a few more seconds, then relaxed his grip to give Apollo a peck on the forehead. “That’s for luck.”

“That wasn’t even close to lucky enough.” Apollo faced up to grin at Clay. “If you left me like that and I failed the bar, the blame would have been on you.”

“You’re so right! My mistake.”

Clay put his hand on the back of Apollo’s head and pulled him into a proper kiss, one that certainly felt a lot luckier for Clay, to say nothing of how Apollo must have felt about it.

Clay patted Apollo’s neck. “Now go get em.”

Apollo, however, had a wicked expression on his face now. “You know what this means, right?”

“Oh no.”

“You’ve established a precedent. This will be a necessary procedural step in all trials from now on.”

“Apollo, your brain’s busted.”

“Foregoing any part of a trial could have disastrous consequences.”

“It’s just busted up there. Law and out-of-order, that’s what you are.”

“I can’t help the way that Justice operates.”

“Go take your exam, before I make you late!” Clay shoved the still-chortling Apollo away until he finally prevailed. “Sheesh.”

He got back into the driver’s seat and started the car. The gigantic smile on his face wouldn’t go away.

He was looking forward to the morning of Apollo’s first trial.

[cteranodon]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Letters Across the Sea

Fandom: Castle Swimmer Pairing: Kappa/Siren Warnings: Castle Swimmer spoilers Genre: Fluff; love letters

A series of affectionate letters between Siren and Kappa, in an alternate universe where everything else is the same as in canon. 

Some absolute genius suggested a letters AU to me so I decided to make it happen. Love letters between Siren and Kappa that are concurrent with events in canon. For now there’s one each from Siren and from Kappa.

I aim to keep updating this fic alongside plot developments in the source material. Be sure to let me know what you think!

[cteranodon]

TURNABOUT HONEYMOON - A fic where Apollo Justice and Clay Terran solve a murder together

https://archiveofourown.org/works/19887232/chapters/47102812

Fandom: Ace Attorney

Relationship: Apollo Justice/Clay Terran

Words: 73,243

Genre: Casefic

Warnings: AA4 spoilers

Apollo and Clay are enjoying their honeymoon at a B&B in the mountains, the perfect setting for quiet walks on mountain trails and late nights of stargazing. But their good time is cut short when a new acquaintance dies under mysterious circumstances... and right before Apollo's eyes.

This is only the latest in a string of nebulous events plaguing this small mountain town, and local law enforcement is running short on resources. So the case is given to two more vacationers, Sebastian Debeste and Dick Gumshoe, who quickly determine that this death was no accident.

An arrest is ordered, and Apollo immediately takes up the defense, with his new husband right by his side. But who could have committed such an impossible crime?

A complete casefic in the style of an Ace Attorney case, with Apollo as defense attorney, Clay as his assistant, and Sebastian as the rival prosecutor.

[cteranodon]

i had seen this brian david gilbert fellow on my dash quite a lot and he’s just completely attractive to me so i decided to look him up and he’s like two and a half months younger than me. really made me feel like i need to get my life together. anyway here’s a claypollo hurt/comfort i just wrote

[cteranodon]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Good Enough - Chapter 1 - A Star and Good Company 

Relationship: Clay Terran/Apollo Justice Words: 3110 Genre: Fluff Warnings: None

Clay's birthday is December 25th, and on the year of his 16th birthday, he doesn't have anyone planning to come and see him. Apollo, of course, finds this unacceptable, and decides it's time to go all-out. 

it’s late but here’s a festive claypollo for yall! i always bring out my christmas headcanons for every jam, so i decided to finally make a fic about some of them!

it’s gonna be a set of three self-contained but connected narratives. no suspense this time, just some good old-fashioned pre-relationship fluff.

this is fluffy and sweet and it’s got trans clay. yall are gonna love it i promise.

check back soon for chapter 2~