Weekend Challenge: Keep It Simple, Silly!
Dec. 20th, 2024 02:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thatwasjustadream posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
1_million_wordsI thought about getting fancy for the weekend challenge, but I haven't even started sorting and wrapping presents yet and haven't finished holiday cards. And I'm guessing I'm not alone!
So for our weekend challenge I'm offering up a simple favorite of mine: Three nouns, a random place (one generic place, one specific), and a love quote (some quotes, some play/novel excerpts).
Lemme know if you are in and I'll deal them out. The usual applies- post something inspired by them before next Saturday and I'll write you a ficlet, make an icon or put words on a WIP.
Hope everyone has a good holiday season, and here's to a fresh year of creativity ahead!
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Date: 2024-12-20 07:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-12-20 07:55 pm (UTC)Sure thing! Good luck!
Three nouns: Anxiety, Application, Phone
Random place: Kitchen. And/or Walton Hills, Ohio
quote:
“Love all, trust a few,
Do wrong to none: be able for thine enemy
Rather in power than use; and keep thy friend
Under thy own life's key: be check'd for silence,
But never tax'd for speech.”
― William Shakespeare, All's Well That Ends Well
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Date: 2024-12-20 07:43 pm (UTC)Since I'm a glutton...and I'm SO far behind, give me two sets and I'll see what I can do to jumpstart my 2 weeks off :)
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Date: 2024-12-20 08:03 pm (UTC)Sure thing! I hope they inspire. Yours are:
Nouns: People, Judgment, Basket
Places: Novalaise, France And/Or Living Room
Quote: “People think a soul mate is your perfect fit, and that's what everyone wants. But a true soul mate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that is holding you back, the person who brings you to your own attention so you can change your life. Elizabeth Gilbert ~ Eat, Pray, Love
And for round two:
Nouns: Cigarette, Country, Signature
Places: Belle Glade Camp, Florida And/Or Mud Room
Quote: “There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. I have no notion of loving people by halves, it is not my nature.”― Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey
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Date: 2024-12-22 07:22 pm (UTC)Used the place and nouns from the first batch in this excerpt. Still looking for ways to use the rest :)
***
“Let’s see what you’ve got…I’ll let you know.” There had been faces gleaned from what he had read, mostly faces that matched the sketches some other officer had brought down to him during the morning as his work had begun. He had provided a few more faces to the sketcher, but after that, the things he saw began to repeat on a loop as the day-to-day activities in that place tediously drudged on without variation. By now, the Protectorate would be hunting down those new faces. He did not think the larger equipment would offer much more. Buildings, however, often held traces of those who entered but did not touch anything else but a door latch, a table-top, a toilet or a sink.
Mental work sounded preferable to returning to an empty living room with an equally empty liquor cabinet to taunt him into doing something he would regret.
He studied the street the facility was on, a non-descript, normal enough street with people shuffling about in the cold, baskets in their arms, pouches on their hips, sacks slung over their shoulders, going about the business of surviving without passing judgment on the pair in Protectorate uniforms who entered a building they averted their eyes from. So, they had known illicit business had been conducted here. Or they knew now. Vance wondered how many had innocently aided the work, or had been bullied into cooperative silence, and whether it was worth finding and arresting each one.
It was not his call to make.
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Date: 2024-12-23 03:19 pm (UTC)and the use of the 3 nouns from the second set (still hoping to work in the quotes and the places):
***
“Suppose you have a plan…” Nepo sat down next to him, seeming to groan and struggle with great effort without making a sound, and held his hands out to the flames. He had intentionally avoided Donn’s proximity as much as he could, a status both men had seemed to prefer, and though Donn bristled now to have the tracker so close, this conversation was to be expected.
The end of their journey was near. There was little need for pretense any longer.
“Tomorrow I’ll see Hallister. From there it’ll be St. Albans, then home.” He would report the chain of events, what was found, who had lived and died, announce his change in status and his claim on LaGuardia, and once he was confident of the support of HOPE and Hallister, he would return to LaGuardia to stake that claim.
“You could send the HOPE soldiers on their way…send her with them if that’s her…”
Donn shook his head, glancing over his shoulder to where the pale woman huddled beneath the furs and cloaks she had been provided. It had been necessary to clothe her from the start, to provide her additional means of warmth or else risk her dying. It would not do for his gift to Francis Lord to be dead upon arrival. Now, however, he was not certain he was willing to part with her.
“I’ll take her there myself,” he muttered, voicing his wavering intent. “And the report’s coming from me. They can wait a few more days.”
“Don’t think they want to.” Nepo rubbed his hands together and then tucked them under his arms to keep them warm. “You’ve got things from here. I’ve got things to do…”
“You’ll stay with her tomorrow til I’m back.” Nepo scowled and Donn quickly continued. “Bringing the soldiers with me, a show of good faith, but I need someone to manage the ruffs, keep them in line and off her til I send for her or come back to…”
“I’m not a babysitter…”
“For what I’ll pay you, you’ll be anything I fucking tell you to be.” Donn flicked the stub of the ivy leaf cigarette he had found and taken the opportunity to enjoy, a rare indulgence that had taken his mind off of his tender leg into the fire.
“So you’re paying me now?”
“We both wanted to get back to familiar territory…that was different. Now that we’re here, I’ll pay you for your service. Don’t need signature agreements. You do it, you get paid…you bail on me and there’ll be no place in this fucking country that I won’t find you and end you…”
“Like to see you try.” He was used to Channon’s bravado and he knew that, for all the bluster and talk, the boy needed him too much to follow through. He might make a show of trying in the hopes to intimidate Nepo into compliance, but he knew as well as Nepo that he could not succeed even if he tried.
“I will.” Tired of the conversation, thinking he should get a drink and then sleep off his exhaustion so that he would face Hallister as clear-headed as he could be, he struggled to his feet, refusing Nepo’s offered assistance, and limped away in the opposite direction of their captive. He could not indulge tonight. There were no walls, no opportunity for secrecy or privacy here. Best to sleep and avoid that temptation…and avoid further argument with the tracker.
Nepo would do as he was told. It was what he was paid to do.
But first, he had a letter to write, a letter to send.
If he was going to establish a presence in Kennedy, make himself welcome here, he needed his wife at his side.
Maybe then he would be able to be rid of the anthro he could not keep out of his head.
no subject
Date: 2024-12-23 05:43 pm (UTC)and the second quote is in. one quote and one place left to go :)
***
Vance craned his head to the side at the creaking of the office door, a movement that both revealed that Ernest had left some time before and turned off the office light behind him, and assaulted him with the stabbing pain of having slept with his neck in an unhealthy position.
“Sorry,” the officer said sheepishly, a man Vance did not recognize but one who apparently knew who he was and was uncomfortable with him because of it. He came in far enough to put the folded slip of paper into the tracker’s hand with a muttered, “Told to get this to you and Chief…” before quickly retreating and closing the door behind him.
Vance shuddered at both the flavor of distaste and aversion the messenger left upon the page and the warmth remembrance the imprint of the sender had unwittingly left there. It was silly, he reminded himself, this fleeting infatuation with the Cana Marrock. Their mission together was complete. Whatever need she had for him now would only ever be business.
Though it was a rare occurrence for him to deeply care about anyone, but once he did, there was no half-measures. She had his loyalty for however long he continued to breathe.
Which might be a fortuitous thing, he thought with pursed lips as he read the message twice to be certain he had read it correctly. So she was going through with it. Come tomorrow, for as long as she could hold her ground, she would be not only the Flushing Pack’s Alpha, but co-Laedan of LaGuardia as well, just as her father before her had been. Maybe she would not ask him to serve the Fortress as full-time Tracker as her predecessors had tried to do, but there would be times he would be called upon to serve and work with her again.
He lay the message on the chief’s closed ledger and left the office, needing some air, needing to think. It did not matter how awkward such employment might be for him, or how nerve-wracking it would be for him to watch her assume her father’s place. He would be there tomorrow to see it…and every time after that she called upon him. So long as Donn Channon was a free man, so long as she was in danger or in trouble, there would be no other choice Vance could make.
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Date: 2025-01-03 04:31 pm (UTC)got the last quote in too!
“Stay safe…” She nearly kissed him then, her mouth so near hers that she could feel his breath against her lips, taste it…the tea he had last consumed…on her tongue, but Wist’s whistle of readiness severed the moment and she let go of his hands when he backed away.
She saw it then, as he stared into her eyes with a passionate sincerity she knew must have always been there but that she had never fully noticed or appreciated before. It wasn’t that he fit her heart perfectly in every way she wanted. He was the one person who always reflected her back upon herself to lovingly expose her weaknesses and just as lovingly help her to overcome them.
She was a negotiator. She was a fighter. She had bested Pain to lead the pack, she had led them somewhere safe and chosen the best person, she mused with her hand pressed to his cheek, to lead them whenever she was away. She could do this. She could face down HOPE. She did not, however, know if she could beat them.
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Date: 2025-01-04 04:40 am (UTC)Wooot! :). I'm so sorry I haven't commented before this- the holidays took over. But I'm so glad the prompts paid off for you!
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Date: 2025-01-05 12:31 am (UTC)I'm glad they helped me be so productive over the last 2 weeks, so its a win all around :D
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Date: 2024-12-20 08:40 pm (UTC)I'll give it a go!
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Date: 2024-12-20 08:44 pm (UTC)Great! Yours are:
Nouns: Shopping, Opinion, Diamond
Places: Waterloo, Belgium And/Or Patio
Quote: ““I would always rather be happy than dignified.”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
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Date: 2024-12-20 08:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-12-27 04:46 pm (UTC)Finally finished! I think I used most of my prompts in this one, but it wound up being a lot longer than I expected.
FAKE Fic 'Fatherly Advice' is here: https://badly-knitted.livejournal.com/2567221.html
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Date: 2024-12-20 10:06 pm (UTC)I am in. Thank you!
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Date: 2024-12-21 12:22 am (UTC)Sure thing! Yours are:
Nouns: Guidance, Satisfaction, Ambition
Random Place: Oasis, California And/Or Dining Room
Quote: “Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I'll meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass the world is too full to talk about.” ~ Rumi
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Date: 2024-12-21 09:33 pm (UTC)I’m in! Please!
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Date: 2024-12-22 06:03 pm (UTC)Sure thing! And sorry for the delay. Yours are:
Nouns: Queen, Opinion, Education
Random Places: Los Barrios, Spain And/Or Library/Office
Quote: “They say a person needs just three things to be truly happy in this world: someone to love, something to do, and something to hope for.”
― Tom Bodett