Thanks very much for tagging me, @sanguinarysanguinity! I write so little that I rarely have anything new for this meme -- therefore I'll get creative with the rules, and share first sentences from ten vignettes in the next chapters of my VetVimes WIP :)
(Stop) Vimes left the palace grounds after a brief but necessary pause to be sick in an ornamental shrub.*
(History) How did one go about obtaining awful mansions, anyhow? Most of them had awful people in them stretching back generations, surely. Clearing them out usually took a revolution, and Vimes didn't have one up his sleeve.
(Fool) He'd always been a little too good at playing stupid.
(Bother) Still, canine or not, the appearance of a giant monster fanged in triplicate did cause some temporary ruckus.
(Need) The great puzzle of this Patrician was simply why he was Patrician at all: given his brains, birth, wealth and self-possession, he could have done absolutely anything else with near-certain indulgent success. There weren't very many positions in life that a man like that could reasonably be expected to lose.
(Power) There would be no monuments to him. But there would be a working sewer system, which amounted to much the same thing.
(Cool) That's just the kind of couple they were, unfortunately: once smitten, twice wry.
(Attention) Breaking the kiss, Vimes pulled back only far enough to glare.
(One) "Have you been tormenting Mr. Lipwig this morning?" / "How could you tell?" / "You have a glow about you, like a cat who's just gobbled down a mouse. You know, every time you terrorise some other civil servant, you cheapen the experience for me."
(Naked) Of all the things Vetinari could have been in bed, Vimes hadn’t been expecting honest.
If anyone reading this would like to play, please consider yourself tagged!
Many thanks to @s0lifuge and @starquestingfordrarry for tagging me! 💕 See their first lines here and here!
Rules: share the first lines of ten of your most recent fanfics and tag ten people. If you have written less than ten, don't be shy and share anyway!
The hands of the grandfather clock on the other end of the deserted common room hadn’t moved since the last time Draco checked, though he could swear it had been minutes.
- from Any time, Potter
Draco drew the barbs of his crow-feather quill back and forth over his lips.
- from The Bubo
Draco hesitates in front of Potter’s door.
- from Just a little liquid luck
They don’t know how to act around one another, now that their old lives hang in tatters. But they know they have to be around one another.
- from The good ones are the worst
“Mmh,” says Harry, hugging the large pillow tighter. Muscles dance under the dark skin of his back like moonlit ripples over calm water.
- from Spicetober 2024
“Professor Moody!” In the sudden silence, all eyes turned to Professor McGonagall. She pushed past the crowd. “Is that… a student?”
- from A Ferret's Sensibility
Harry sensed trouble the moment the telephone rang.
- from Telephone and Post
"You slimy bastard."
Startled from a deep reverie, Draco almost drops his book.
- from more than i can say
One hallway, two spiral staircases, three turns, and they were lost.
- from Draco Malfoy and the Mirror of Erised
By the time they reached Madam Malkin’s, Draco was exhausted.
- from Bruised
tagging: you! yes, you! please come play with us? 💕 and also: @slightweasel @holygnocchi @chocolando @izroan-ff @smugrobotics @mourningliliesmorningglories @lizziedrip @fastbrother @teacup-tai @erin-orolin 💕
Rules: post the first sentence (or two) of your latest 10 fanfics, then (attempt to) tag 10 people. I was tagged by @oldshrewsburyian. Thank you! I thought I hadn't done one of these in a while, but then I looked at my own tags and realized I did one in October. Mindbogglingly, I've posted 6 new fics since then, so I'm doing it again. 10 fics takes me back to January of 2025 and really illustrates how completely Dept Q has taken over my brain since September.
Carl is in early Monday morning, for no other reason than he has fuck all else to do. (Slow Disaster - Dept Q, Carl/Hardy, Donna/Hardy - my current wip, part 4 of Nothing is Harmless - In which Carl cannot conceive of that fact that he can have nice things.)
“See you up there.” Carl slides the door of the birdcage lift shut with a rattly clang, flashes James a grin through the metal scrollwork, and springs for the stairs. (Wonder what the weather will be - Dept Q, Carl/Hardy - part 3 of Nothing is Harmless. Porn with feelings.)
Carl extricates himself from the weird fucking tennis ball party as soon as he finishes his beer. (Puncture Repair - Dept Q, Carl/Hardy - Episode 1x09 missing scene.)
“Knife!” Hardy spins in the direction of Carl’s shout, and that slippery fucker Declan Fraser is right there, must have been hiding behind the skip. (Wasp Nest - Dept Q, Carl/Hardy, Donna/Hardy - In which I hurt Carl by hurting Hardy.)
Rose looks up when the lift pings. For a split second, when the doors first rattle open, she could swear the toes of the two pairs of trainers visible are touching, as if their owners are standing face to face, close enough to be in each other’s arms. (Seeing Things - Dept Q, Carl/Hardy - Five times Rose suspected there was more to Carl and Hardy’s partnership than work, and one time she called them on it.)
Carl’s mobile buzzes from somewhere unseen. (Proven Techniques for Stress Management in Public Speaking - Dept Q, Carl/Hardy - Phonesex while Carl is away at a conference in Aberdeen.)
The rest of the day drags like no day has ever dragged before. (I’ll do what I can to be a confident wreck - Dept Q, Carl/Hardy, part 2 of Nothing is Harmless - Porn with more feelings than Carl anticipated.)
“We need to talk about this,” Hardy says as the lift doors rattle shut behind Rose and Akram. (Nothing is Harmless - Dept Q, Carl/Hardy - Featuring Hardy calling Carl out on his lack of self-preservation instinct.)
By the time James lands in Christchurch, the hope that followed him onto the first flight of his journey has worn thin and doubt is beginning to creep in around the edges. (The last place we left off - Lewis, James/Robbie - The 3rd and final part of my Lewis/Shetland crossover Lead me wild to your dark roads.)
“What are you doing here?” (It’s not a date - Ted Lasso, Roy/Jamie - Post-s3. Jamie knows what’s up even if Roy doesn’t.)
Tagging: @codswalloping, @gettingbyi, @themisanthropiclycanthrope, @femmenerd, @saltwaterandstars, @patrice-bergerons, @swimmingfoxsticks, and anyone else who sees this and wants to play.
the meme has hit me lkjdfkjldf thx for the tag @ashdragon22! i feel like i have done this before at some point in the last couple of years, but i can't remember when or whether i saw a pattern, so let's just do it again
Game rules: List the first line of your last 10 (posted) fics and see if there's a pattern.
there is no crisis here, there's no conspiracy - caitvi postcanon longfic sequel, wip
She can’t move.
Nine Months in Nazareth, Pennsylvania - griddlehark pastor's-daughter-and-cult-runaway au, finished
“Harrowhark,” says Father Gaius, rolling the sounds around his mouth with the air of an unintentionally patronizing uncle.
blow through my garden - alecto & pash NTN missing scene, finished
Our Lady of the Passion intensely, furiously regrets every life choice that landed her here.
every move made so I can stop - caitvi postcanon longfic, finished
Some time passes.
for they shall be comforted - griddlehark GTN missing scene, finished
There’s a new kind of quiet between them, after Gideon inveigles her into the oath.
The Ninth Attempt - young griddlehark and aiglamene pre-canon, finished
Things had curdled with Harrow since Gideon had done what she’d done.
I bowed down my ear a little, and received her - cam & harrow GTN missing scene, finished
Camilla had braced herself, on the shuttle to the First, for a reasonable amount of necromancer bullshit.
flashlights comin' down the way - griddlehark modern au pwp, finished
When Harrow comes back to the bedroom, Gideon is stretched skew-whiff on her side across their bed, propped on one elbow, a paperback book in her hands.
“Sstooory?” says Nona, curled into our back, fumbling her mouth around the word in the dark.
Accommodations - SU pearl ocs postcanon pwp, finished
The Pearl dorm is never completely quiet, even at night.
what i'm getting from this assemblage is that i favor a pithy opening, something that sets the immediate visual and drops us right into the scene, or alternately something that very quickly catches us up with the scene context. i really like all of these tbh!! they're all the kind of first line i like to read, so good to have the evidence that i'm writing to please myself first and foremost lkjadsfkljfadkljadsfkljdfa
tagging @jeejyboard @camwolfe @beyoncesfiancee and any other writer mutuals who wanna do this, i really mean it, consider yourself tagged
If you've already done this with your most recent 10, share from your OLDEST 10
Tagged by @roselightfairy oh what a cool idea this is!
Rules: share the first lines of ten of your latest fanfics (or up to if you have less!) & tag 10 people.
From my ten most recent fics posted on my AO3 account:
The bells of Minas Tirith fell silent. (Home to that Hither Shore)
The light of Valinor was unlike the light of Middle-earth, though Gimli could not have described precisely how. (A Last Light and Shadow Lingering)
"Celebrimbor…would you marry me?" (Being An Invitation to the Wedding of Celebrimbor of Eregion and Narvi of Khazad-dûm)
Upon the ringing of the bell, Frodo fell into step beside Bilbo and together the two Hobbits followed Gandalf out to the porch where Frodo had spoken with his friends the evening before. (And in the Darkness to Unmake Them)
Gulls wheeled overhead and for once their cries did not pierce through Legolas’s heart like the blades of cold knives. (To Live in Undying Lands)
It started, at least in Mirkwood, when the king came home. (Dead Faces in the Water; Dead Faces Everywhere)
Rachel shouldered her way through the hallway like a charging elephant. (The One Where They Start a GSA)
Thranduil stood on the high stone ledge and stared out into the night. (To Share in Speech Beneath the Stars)
Glorfindel had last seen this forest when it was still named Greenwood the Great, before the Shadow fell over its fair trees and turned it instead into a Forest of Nightshade and Great Fear. (A Nightengale in Mirkwood)
Even amidst the desperate bustle and chaos of preparing Helm's Deep for a siege, it did not take Gimli long to notice that the Elf was missing. (Mortal Comforts)
This was splendid fun, thank you! I'm not sure if I did it quite right, because I went by the ten latest things I posted something for, and not necessarily the ten most recent new things I posted; but I was too lazy to sort through my multi-chapter fics to try and figure out what would be the ten most recent fics by starting post...and as I type this I realize AO3 probably has a filter I could have used to do that, oops. Well, too late to change now lol!
Ten seems like a lot of people to tag, but let's give it a go (and please ignore if you're not interested, and if you are interested and haven't been tagged, let's both pretend that I tagged you too! I'm always so bad at remembering people's user-names anyway, but alas: tumblr doesn't let me tag by icon image in my brain yet lol): @babybat98 @sallysavestheday @katajainen @bifuriouswaterbender @thescrapwitch @chthonion @mossy-thing @estel-of-the-eyrie @lanthanum12 @fishing4stars ...and everybody whose user-name I can't remember how to spell off the top of my head to tag!
Rules: share the first lines of ten of your latest fanfics (or up to if you have less!) & tag 10 people
Thank you for the tag @littlespoonevan 💓
Spiralling in silence [emmerdale]
Not again, not again, not again.
Slipping underneath (so cold and so sweet) [emmerdale]
The rain’s been falling since late Wednesday afternoon.
Haunted by the ghost of you [911]
The aftershock hits hard and fast and with a chorus of “go, go, go!” Buck urges Ravi forward, to scramble over the debris that had almost buried them alive mere moments earlier.
To hum and sway [911]
Now that Chimney’s been moved out of the ICU, the hospital staff have kindly set up a cot bed in his room for Maddie to get some rest beside him, while Buck stands—or rather–- sits sentry outside.
All these memories run my mind in slow motion [911]
Buck says, I’ve got you, when he pulls him out from the camper van, and Eddie can’t shake the sense of déjà vu that haunts him alongside the burning ache of his broken ribs.
Tried to conceal the scars we wore [911]
Buck wakes up in the middle of the night with a strangled gasp.
Raise my hand before I can speak my mind [911]
The kids in Evan's class haven’t long settled into their seats.
Fragile lines (and wasted time) [911]
Eddie barely remembers being behind the wheel of the ambulance, but thinks he might have held his breath for the whole drive.
Rewrite an ending or two [911]
When Buck sees Doug sitting next to his sister at the dinner table, all he can do to avoid causing a scene is to clench his fists around the napkin in his lap until the tissue's in shreds all over his jeans, while he waits for the chance to pull Maddie aside, and out of her husband's earshot.
Coloring outside the lines [911]
When Chimney brings his daughter down from the loft where she’s been napping quite happily, Jee-Yun has her hands curled into little fists as she rubs at her tired eyes.
& I’ll tag @allisonrw96 @princessfbi @capseycartwright @madroxed @kananjarus @renecdote @thisissirius @userautumn @nymika-arts and @fcntasmas <33
When I've done this before I've done a bit of analysis to go with each line, and I will be doing that again, because last time I learned a lot.
three dates
Carter’s not sure exactly when he first learned about the patented Peter Benton Dating Algorithm, but it must have been early on, because he internalised it like it was any other scrap of information he’d gleaned and hoarded like a crazy person, like his GPA (a respectable 3.8), his birthday (September 9th, 1966) or his blood type (B positive).
I am very much in my run-on sentence era. I do like this one, though, I think it sets out the stall right and proper. Originally it didn't have the embellishments of what the GPA, birthday and blood type are, but I don't know if they're good or not. I added them for the summary, then moved them into the text.
2. our eyes are yet to open
Everything starts with Langdon.
SO, I love the opening to this because it directly references the paleblood hunt, the famous bloodbore lore dissecting essay by Redgrave (which begins 'everything starts with byrgenwerth'), and by proxy, the vaatividya video with 13 m views that was heavily plagiarised from the paleblood hunt. and now, in the grand tradition, I have referenced/plagiarised it here.
3. the last of the ER cowboys
The original email, and indeed, the six follow up emails, had all come from Andrea Connaught, contributing features editor at the Pittsburgh Tribune, and he had, in the way of all emails, ignored them way past the point when it was acceptable to respond.
Yeah I am pleased with this one, because it sets up that this is a comedy of errors quite succinctly. Robby does not read his email. This will be plot relevant later.
The rest are under the cut
4. living proof (of what it means to be loved twice)
It all started because someone ordered pizza and left it in the break room (good), and said pizza turned out to have clams on it (bad).
Nothing like food poisoning to start your story off with a bang! clam pizza does sound like it could be good, honestly. maybe not chicago style clam pizza though.
5. before you kiss me you should know
September in New Orleans is a time best fit for poets and artists, hot and humid, beautiful, strange and with the colours of the world turned up to 11, the old city and the new with the scars from the hurricane still etched on her skin, but the city survived and continues to survive, and that’s one of the things that made Dennis happy with his choice.
So I'm going for a parallel about recovery here: this is Dennis Whitaker in recovery, moving to New Orleans, which is still also in recovery from Katrina. Everything is recovery in this story and everything hurts.
6. baby I don't learn
Its not that he doesn’t have entirely legitimate reasons not to fuck her outside of HR rules and regulations.
Hate it. Don't know why. Just do.
7. pedagogyphilia (its okay to not be okay)
Things change after PittFest.
like...its fine? Its okay? Honestly the whole first section feels like it comes from a different story. But its fine.
8. wreck our friendship
He does the edit.
so I actually wrote this in 2023 and didn't end up publishing it until this year for RPF reasons. again, its fine. I think short, pithy openings work well, they grab the eye, but this one is just...there.
9. nothing good happens after 2AM
They’re lucky it's a warm night, really, Jack thinks as he drains the last third of his beer and gestures for another one, because they needed this.
I wrote 2AM by the seat of my pants over two and a half glorious weeks, averaging 4k per day some days, and the story it started as was NOT the story it ended up. Literally, this was going to be an ensemble kinda funny thing where they didn't kiss until the final chapter. For that reason I quite like how mundane the first line is, it really doesn't let on just how batshit hatstand insane the story would become. No one knew, least of all me.
10. this crisis could have been an email
It is frankly unbelievable that the next time the hospital shuts down isn’t because of incel rage or a natural disaster, but because someone in the pathlab clicked on a link in their email.
I do feel that my writing is split into pre-2AM and post-2AM, making this the last pre-2AM story I wrote. I still have a niggling feeling the grammar is wrong or that this could be worded differently. I definitely tried a few ways of writing this, and this is what I settled on. I thought I'd just write some porn and move on. Again, no one was more surprised than me.
Anyway, this was fun!!! feel free to do it, either the original version or the amended version I do.
I got tagged in a fun thing by @westiec! Thank you! ^_^
Rules: share the first lines of ten of your latest fanfics (or up to if you have less!) & tag 10 people.
This is, naturally, in reverse chronological order, newest to oldest, which means you kind of get to move backwards through a couple of series.
lend a hand (TGCF/Kamen Rider OOO)
Naturally, Hua Cheng notices the ghost before Xie Lian does, and both of them have been looking at it curiously for several minutes before they really take a look at the man it's following, and so they're rather startled when he says, in lightly-accented Cantonese, "Good afternoon, can I help you with something?"
never let go (MDZS)
The murderer Xue Yang was beheaded on a fine morning, with bright, warm sunlight and sweet breezes in the air, and Xiao Xingchen had to force himself to watch.
The Limitations of Flight (TGCF)
The first thing Xie Lian said, once Quan Yizhen had finished laying out his problem, is, "Quan Yizhen, I will not help you turn your lover into a bird."
Graven Images (TGCF)
If someone had asked Hua Cheng five years ago if he thought of restringing and tuning a guitar as erotic, he would have said no.
Be Honest With Me (SVSSS)
Someone was knocking on Shang Qinghua's door.
"Journeys End in Lovers Meeting," from Spectral Interludes (The Untamed) - this one is theoretically chapter, but as each chapter is its own standalone piece I'm counting just this one as most recent
Once he was off the country roads and could get a signal again, Xichen called Sizhui to let him know, "I'm bringing a guest back with me."
Grand Hazard (TGCF)
Waning Moon Reviews—Nostalgia Deep Dive: "His Royal Highness" and the Rise and Fall of Lawrence Xie
Yin Yu: So we all know about Disney's legendary devotion to courting the Chinese market, yeah?
Liu Mingyan Decides (SVSSS)
Luo Binghe had been away for a long time, much longer than his usual adventures, and Liu Mingyan was almost beginning to feel concerned for him when she returned to her bedchamber after a morning's flight and found that he'd quietly let himself in.
Really Luo Binghe (SVSSS)
It was a beautiful morning, the sun was warm, and Shen Yuan was seriously considering taking out a hit on one of the programmers when someone started hammering on his apartment door.
and found (Mysterious Lotus Casebook)
When Fang Duobing is thirty-five he stops aging.
-
I love the throughlines I can see here? Also it occurs to me that this leaves out Tumblr promptsthat haven't made it to AO3 yet, but if I had to work out the timeline there as well I'd get so confused.
And I will tag: @materassassino @timetoddddavis @sinn-bee @geneticcatalyst @travelingneuritis @acernor @stickers-on-a-laptop @giraffeter @redundare @eclipse-song
