Dear Creator - Worldbuilding Ex 2021
Jan. 15th, 2021 04:18 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
simplecoffeeHi there! Thank you for creating for me. 💛 I am academicgangster on Tumblr, and simplecoffee on ao3.
So, the thing I love most in fanwork is taking canon character dynamics and just...making them More. Taking them further, exploring their natural progression, usually in a hurt/comfort-y way. I've mentioned the character dynamics and ships I love under each fandom, along with some rambly thoughts and prompts - speaking of which, please feel free to pick, choose, mix, match, play with any, all or even none of said prompts, if that's where the muse takes you. 💛
I love hurt/comfort with all my heart and soul, so most of the prompts here will probably contain it to some degree.
I am a-okay with any kind of exploration of character dynamics - h/c, casefic, fluff fic, angst, missing scenes, outsider POV, outsider POV contrasted with canon characters' POV, getting together fic, established relationship, you name it I love it. I'm also very much okay with or without smut - I enjoy it, but please don't feel pressured to include it or not to include it. If you do feel inclined toward the lovin', I have a preference for a Mature rating over an Explicit rating, but I will likely enjoy whatever rating speaks to you. :D
I am super open to unconventional medium/narrative styles if you feel inspired to use them - outsider POV, outsider POV contrasted with canon characters' POV, epistolary fic, framing devices such as mission reports, medical reports, audio transcripts/debrief transcripts, text messages or post-its between characters, news articles, official documentation, even drone!POVs for Oblivion, are all amazing.
Navigation
> Likes & DNWs (art likes)
> Mission: Impossible (Movies)
(Requested media: fic, art, in-universe meta)
> Oblivion (2013)
(Requested media: fic, art, in-universe meta)
> The Hunt for Red October (1990)
(Requested media: fic, art, in-universe meta)
> Men in Black (Original Trilogy)
(Requested media: fic, art, in-universe meta)
> Minority Report (2002)
(Requested media: fic, art, in-universe meta)
> The Shadow (1994)
(Requested media: fic, art, in-universe meta)
Likes & DNWs
General likes:
• Character studies
• Hurt/comfort of all stripes
• Exploring the fallout of canon trauma
• Missing scenes, slice-of-life, etc - exploring canon character dynamics/canon traits of known characters
• Touch starvation
• Deep friendships
• Earned trust and casual intimacy (carrying, clothes sharing, characters only allowing touch from people they trust, etc)
• Bonding over shared trauma
• PTSD, illness messing with a character's grip on reality, combat/mission injuries, scars, and injuries acting up, touch starvation, sensory deprivation / sensory overload, characters not believing they deserve comfort or being surprised to receive comfort
• Eventually requited pining
• Worldbuilding
• Outsider POV, especially when contrasted with our characters' POV
• Mission aftermaths
• Smut with Feelings (I don't really need to know what body parts are going where, I love to know how it feels, in the sensory way and especially the emotional way)
• Pain, bittersweetness, sadness, exploring the darker side and implications of canon is great, but I really need some happiness/comfort and hope along with it!
Sexual likes:
D/s overtones. Femdom. Service subs. Subs With Issues. Praise kink. Hands, fingers, touch; touch starvation. Finger-sucking. Aftercare. Tenderness, especially if the person receiving it isn't expecting it, isn't used to it, and it breaks them just a little.
Marking, intentional or no - bruising with lips or teeth; hiding the bruises under clothing. Suit kink. Wrists bound or held down. Honour bondage. Shibari and intricate knotwork. Careful sex / making out when one partner is hurt or ill and feverish (fever sex is, uh, a Thing of mine). Or rough, desperate, life-affirming sex / making out.
There are some fandoms where I love the sex a lot rougher; see the sections under Collateral and Top Gun.
Art likes:
Realistic and sketchy styles, bold lines and rich colours/textures, bold accent colours, creative lighting choices, noir-style art especially for action canons, minimalist styles/silhouettes, characters captured in unaware moments as though they're being photographed without realizing it, art that captures the vibe of canon without necessarily capturing the style of canon; angsty hurt/comfort or warm, gentle, casually intimate moments.
I love kisses of all descriptions, especially at the forehead, temple, hands, throat, or collarbone. I love characters undressing each other, reverently for most pairings, roughly for some. I love seeing characters in partial states of undress rather than seeing them completely naked, especially if there's also a focus on their hands or collarbones or throat. I love seeing characters with love bites, hickeys or bruises; I love characters touching and tracing other characters' scars, especially if it looks like they got distracted while undressing them to do so. I love characters in shibari, especially under dress shirts, or characters' wrists being tied with something luxurious like velvet or ribbon.
I also love h/c focused art - characters undressing their injured/sick partners or taking off their glasses, if they wear them (eg. Hunley, Mancuso, Ethan in MI 1). Characters patching sick/hurt characters up, with stitches or bandages or ice packs, or cleaning scrapes on the hurt character's face or hands. Sick/hurt characters with their hair messed up, perhaps hiding their faces in other characters' chests or shoulders. Hurting characters sitting at other characters' feet to be taken care of with hair stroking or shoulder rubs, or burying their face in the other character's lap. Smaller characters getting carried bridal style when they're not feeling well, maybe clinging to the character carrying them if they're not unconscious. Hands in general, especially if they're scratched or hurt and being taken care of. :D
(I would not prefer pink or green as a dominant/background colour, but I love basically every other colour there is. Jewel tones are great! Limited palettes are great! Bold colours are great! Whatever you can think of is great! I love it all. :D Style-wise I would prefer no chibis or overly cartoonish styles; I'm very cool with anything and everything else, including experimental styles!)
General DNWs:
• Mundane/depowered/setting change AUs
• Bleak, hopeless endings (as long as there's hope, bittersweet endings are fine!)
• Unrequested crossovers and fusions
• Any mention of coronavirus or quarantine/lockdown situations
• Any mention of Mission: Impossible 2 canon
• Ethan/Benji, Ethan/Ilsa, Ethan/Brandt
• Death of requested characters (even if they died in canon; Alan Hunley Is Alive That's My Story And I'm Sticking To It. The exception: Princess Lauranna under MIB.)
• Non-canonical death of non-requested characters
• Terminal illness
• Permanent injury (the exception: Oblivion, and Jack Ryan's canonical past injury in The Hunt for Red October)
• Gastrointestinal illness (nausea/vomiting is okay but not as a focus of the work, and not as a result of GI illness - so character getting nauseous or throwing up from a migraine or just severe pain in general, yes; character getting nauseous or throwing up as a result of a severe anxiety attack or PTSD episode, yes; character suffering anything related to food poisoning or GI bugs or overeating and similar, no)
• Pregnancy, menstruation
• Infidelity (for Red October, I would prefer that Jack and Cathy were never married, separated amiably and share custody of Sally)
Sexual DNWs:
• Noncon or dubcon, except where noted (see Oblivion)
• humiliation as a kink, except where noted (see Oblivion)
• pain play for Mission: Impossible and The Hunt for Red October
• gags of any kind (hand over mouth is okay for dubcon/noncon prompts in Oblivion, but I would like it to trigger the character on the receiving end and for there to be some emotional fallout of it)
• anal, dirty talk, spanking, ageplay, scat, watersports, rimming, emeto, A/B/O, d/s-verse, mommy/daddy kink, maledom/femsub
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Mission: Impossible (Movies)
Characters:
Ethan Hunt
Alan Hunley
Luther Stickell
Ships I love: Ethan/Luther, Ethan/Hunley, Ethan/Sidorov, Ethan/Luther/Hunley
Ships I DNW: Ethan/Benji, Ethan/Ilsa, Ethan/Brandt
Worldbuilding Tags:
• Reinstatement of the IMF post Rogue Nation
I love Alan Hunley, and I love his journey from cynical, ruthless CIA director to intense idealist at the helm of the IMF. I'd love to see him learning how the IMF works, after the end of Rogue Nation when he's clearly decided he's going to learn the ropes and take over as IMF Secretary. Hunley strikes me as a very 'inside every cynic is a disappointed idealist' kind of guy, and Ethan and the IMF seem to have given his inner idealist a place to shine; I'd love to see his worldview change to accommodate all the insider knowledge of the IMF's history that becoming Secretary grants him. I'd love to see him figuring out the best way to run the IMF, the best way to look after the agents as much as possible while still making sure they can save the world, and how his taking over works both operationally and ideologically.
Approaching this same time period from another angle: Ethan went through hell and back physically in Rogue Nation. He tracked the Syndicate for a year, and was a fugitive on the run with no support for another six months, before nearly drowning and then reinjuring the knee he broke in Ghost Protocol - it's probably safe to say he's about to spend a significant amount of time fairly sick or in a lot of pain. So I'd also be very interested in seeing the reinstatement and all the official goings-on against the backdrop of him crashing and recovering behind the scenes. Maybe he falls ill after his recent near-drowning, and Hunley and Brandt have his health to worry about as well as dealing with the official side of things, while Luther looks after him and lets them handle the politics. (Maybe the committee wants to hear from Ethan, and Hunley and Brandt fight to let him recover in peace - or maybe the committee insists, and Ethan has to appear and give a statement while he's pretty sick, with everyone worrying over him because of it.)
• Agent-handler dynamics and emergency exfiltrations
The IMF has exfiltration protocols that we sometimes see in action, and sometimes see going wrong. Handlers we've met in canon differ greatly as to how they deal with exfiltration requests, some being more compassionate than others; they do, however, all seem to be operating within a system that tries its best to be kind to its agents and prevent harm to them as far as possible (which mitigates some of the damage that could be done by a handler taking a more hardline approach). This is the system Ethan and Luther have been shaped by: they've each had bad experiences with handlers, debrief analysts and/or Secretaries who didn't make sure they were okay, but they've also had good experiences with those who did make sure they were okay, and as they've grown older and more experienced over the years, it looks like they've managed to make the system better and more compassionate along with them. I'd love to see any and all experiences they might have had along this bumpy road to where they are now!
The CIA, by contrast, seems to have less compassion both toward people outside it and toward its own operatives. This is the system Hunley was shaped by, and it's the one he explicitly rejects at the end of Rogue Nation in order to head the IMF. (Later, in Fallout, he says he did that specifically because of Ethan, which is a Lot.) I've mentioned how much I love Hunley's whole turnaround from ruthless CIA director to intense IMF idealist; I'd love to see him dismantling his previous beliefs and practices as CIA head, realizing both how he wasn't treated the best as an agent and how he enforced the same systems himself, and watching the IMF agents do their best to do their best, as it were, while also figuring out how to address the flaws that still exist in the IMF's system.
I would especially love to see the new dynamic between Ethan and Hunley, as agent and handler. Ethan, being the senior field agent at the IMF, probably warrants someone high up as his handler, and in Fallout it's clear that he and Hunley have worked together enough to consider each other close friends. I'd love to see Hunley thinking about his younger days as a handler at the CIA, what he did right and wrong, what the system taught him right and wrong, what he questioned and what he didn't, and having whole new revelations about it now that he cares for this agent so much. I'd also love to see Luther being suspicious of Hunley until he sees him really doing his best to look after Ethan and be gentle with him after a mission, or during a debrief, or while answering an exfiltration call from him.
I'd also love to see Hunley doing his best to look after Ethan while they're in agent/handler mode, while they're pining or dating or just generally having a Lot Of Emotions About Each Other outside of work. Hunley comforting Ethan over the phone, or picking him up at the airport after a particularly awful mission, and Ethan growing to trust him and respect his advice (even if he doesn't always take it) and look forward to seeing him, even for debriefs and mission reports he knows are going to be difficult to get through. I'd love to see how they work together to save the world and/or to make the IMF better, and how they form a bond that's stronger than any agent-handler dynamics they've each had before.
• Intelligence community and inter-agency relations
We get a few hints as to what the CIA thinks of the IMF, not only via Erika Sloane in Fallout, but also via Hunley's assertions at the beginning of Rogue Nation. We also get Hunley's new point of view, when he tells Ethan heloves him believes in him and the mission so much that he quit the CIA because of him. Clearly, the CIA (if not the entire rest of the intelligence community) looks down on the IMF a bit - why is that? Just because of the masks? Because their agents care about prevention of harm in every single life, not just about the greatest good by the numbers? Because the IMF is less militaristic in general than the CIA, and much less about obeying orders and more about getting the job done? What are the discussions and arguments and political points of disagreement between the IMF and other intelligence agencies? What are the debates Hunley has with Sloane, and which ones does he win? How does he use his years of experience at social/political manoeuvring to achieve decisions favourable to the IMF (and from the IMF's point of view, the world)? Hell, how does he defend his agents in general - and Ethan in particular - from being used as political bargaining chips by the other agencies, or being questioned while in no condition for it, or generally being pushed around by those in power?
• Medical aftermaths of canonical or non-canonical missions
Ethan's been hurt pretty badly after a lot of the canon missions, and we very rarely get to see him in recovery or being looked after. Luther was hurt in the first mission of Fallout, and Hunley was stabbed to near-death by Walker afterwards. I'd be down to read the medical aftermath of any canonical or non-canonical mission - show me the injuries and illnesses, the realistic recovery times, show me the medical reports if you feel so inclined! And of course, if it strikes your fancy, please show me Ethan, Luther and/or Hunley looking after each other till they're well again.
• Honeypot missions and aftermaths
The IMF seems to have never gone as far as actual seduction, but flirtation as a form of intelligence-gathering has very much been played with. Ethan has historically been okay with heavy flirtation with targets/adversaries in order to get things he wants (Max, and he coaches Jane in the art of flirtation with Brij Nath), but has never gone as far as touch with anyone who's not fully in the know. We've seen his reaction to the White Widow kissing him to claim him - which was a pointed non-reaction of discomfort, and decidedly not what consent looks like on him. I would be down to read Ethan having to flirt his way out of a situation that goes wrong, and having to call for exfiltration (or find a different way to achieve his goal) when it ends up being more than he's comfortable with. (I'd prefer this not end up at full on dub/noncon, but rather heavy groping or kisses that Ethan has to find his way out of.) I'd very much like to see Hunley as the comforter in this situation; I don't think Ethan would talk about why he called for exfil unless he had to, and with Hunley being his handler, he would indeed have to tell him exactly what went down. Hunley would certainly notice him being shaken, too.
I am good with similar things having happened before, and Ethan having been met with less than sympathetic superiors, but I would like Hunley to hold the opinion that Ethan did the right thing by getting out of Dodge, and be indignant that he came to harm. I'm also very down for this particular trauma being the catalyst that finally gets them together.
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Oblivion (2013)
Characters:
Any Jack Harper (this includes canon Jacks and original Jacks)
Any Vika Olsen
Drones
Ships I love: Jack 52/Julia, any Jack/any Jack, any Jack/any Vika, any Vika/any Vika, threesomes in any combination of Jacks and Vikas
Ships I DNW: Jack 49/Jack 52
Unhealthy/dubiously consensual/nonconsensual dynamics I like to see explored: Vika/Jack, both canonical ones and potential original ones
Worldbuilding Tags:
• Pack dynamics/"interpersonal" dynamics among the drones
• Trust and "interpersonal" dynamics between the drones and their technicians
• Drones' POV of their technicians and their lives
I love and adore how the drones are shot as though they have a sentient point of view, how they seem to act like animals or people or otherwise sentient beings. Jack, too, treats them as though they're living/sentient - he seems to perceive emotion from them, speaks to them as though he understands them / is having a conversation with them that is verbal on his side and nonverbally responded to on theirs. (He also calls one 'she' at one point, which is why I'm calling all of them that.)
We get to know two drones in this way - drone 166 is businesslike, dedicated to completing whatever her instructions (from the Tet) are at all costs, curt and rather ruthless - she blasts off immediately after Jack repairs her without so much as acknowledging him, has to be convinced multiple times not to hurt him during his rescue of the Odyssey, and later repeatedly bodyslams his ship to ground it and injure him. (We know her directive at this latter point is to capture him and Julia, not to harm them both, but she is demonstrably hotheaded.) By contrast, drone 172 is anxious and frightened when she wakes up tied down in the Scavs' custody, but while she thrashes in fear she does not lash out or attempt to harm anyone, and in fact is calmed and reassured by the very sight of Jack. I'm here for exploration of either of these drones' POV, the 166 and 172 of any other territories than 49's and how they exist in their day-to-day lives, any other drones' POV of their techs and their lives, and I'm also super here for the drones' opinions of each other and how they express those opinions. Drone pack dynamics / ways in which they are sentient/animal-like / ways in which they are alien lifeforms with alien worldviews? Drone body language? Drone nonverbal communication? Drones acting as service animals post-Tet explosion? Drones' interpretations of Sally's orders? Drones who resent their techs for having power over them vs drones who are grateful to their techs for fixing them when they're hurting? Drones, perhaps, who realize their techs are sad and a little bit trapped, and try to understand, or try to take advantage, or try to comfort them? DRONES.
• Jack's abuse at the hands of Vika
• Healthy vs unhealthy Jack/Vika relationships
Jack 49 is a lovely man who's had a lot of awful things happen to him. I imagine many other Jacks are equally lovely, and may have suffered just as much.
49's story is filled with people expecting him to be someone he's not - Vika expects him to be her perfect partner, Julia expects him to be her dead husband, the Scavs expect him to be a mindless killing machine (and Beech expects him to be the dead hero he remembers, too). With that in mind, I'm deeply interested in 49 surviving and learning to live as himself - learning who he really is as Jack 49, and that he deserves to be loved as Jack 49. I'm very here for him realizing what he went through with Vika 49 was abuse and he didn't deserve it, and I'm also very here for him falling in love with another Jack who is protective of him and never lets him go through anything like that again.
I'm here for 49 surviving that final scene somehow, perhaps with permanent injuries (maybe he ends up with a limp, having to walk with a cane), and slowly healing both physically and emotionally.
I love OG Vika, but the two Vikas we meet in 2077 aren't good to their partners at all. We see Vika 49, who refuses to listen to Jack when he rambles, guilt-trips him, and trips him into the pool to forcibly make out with him to shut him up, and we see Vika 52, who isn't bothered when Jack is visibly injured and acting off as long as he does his job, and also guilts him into a kiss. It's not unreasonable to assume some (or most) Vikas' relationships with their Jacks might have been as bad or worse. I'm here for anything and everything exploring that. From 49 and 52 themselves and exploring the implications of canon, to any potential original Jack and Vika characters you might think of. The dub/noncon tags are with this in mind, for any Jack and Vika pair including the canon ones. For the physical abuse tag, Vika 49 and Vika 52 didn't seem to be physically abusive (rather tending towards coercion and insidious emotional and sexual abuse), but I could definitely see other Vikas going that far. I'd love to see a Jack who's gone through absolute hell at Vika's hands manage to finally leave her, and begin the slow, painful healing process after years of abuse.
I'm also really interested in Jack/Vika as a healthy relationship, but as the exception, not the rule - I'd love to see a healthy Jack/Vika pair who love each other deeply and support and look after each other even through hardship, but I'd especially like to see them in stark contrast to one or more Jacks who were deeply unhappy or left traumatized by their relationships with their Vikas.
• Different Jacks and their secret hideaways
• Different Jacks' salvaged libraries and how they shape their worldviews
• Survival and community post Tet explosion
• Fashion and culture post Tet explosion
I'd love some worldbuilding and exploration of the differences between the various Jacks as individual people. Please feel free to invent all the original Jacks and Vikas you desire, and show me how they're all distinct people despite their shared traits; show me how their life circumstances, the geography of their territories, the different books they found in ruins, shaped who they are. Show me how their special interests differ! Show me how some Jack/Vika relationships were better than others, and some worse. Show me how some of those relationships last through the Tet falling, and how some don't - and, indeed, how the Tet falling affects them all differently. Maybe some Jacks are permanently injured, and have (or have had) to learn to live with and make accommodations for their levels of ability. Maybe some Jacks and Vikas find each other and try to rebuild when the Tet comes down, and form a close-knit community that looks after its own when they need it.
As mentioned above, I'm very open to exploring healthy, loving Vika/Jack relationships (and how they remain strong through hardship!), but I'm especially here for exploration of those in contrast to the deeply unhealthy ones that leave so many Jacks scarred.
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The Hunt for Red October (1990)
Characters:
Jack Ryan
Bart Mancuso
Marko Ramius
Ships I love: any and all combinations of these three characters! Jack/Ramius, Jack/Mancuso, Ramius/Mancuso and Jack/Ramius/Mancuso are all wonderful!
Worldbuilding Tags:
• Debrief and mission reports after the film
I am very here for all the official conversations that have to be had at the end of this movie. I presume Admiral Greer and other CIA higher-ups are going to want to know exactly what happened from all the parties involved, and are also going to have to concoct an 'official version' of events, protect the Russian officers by placing them in appropriate locations under adequate witness protection, etc. I'm very here for the Admiral being a warm, supportive presence to all the main cast during debrief, especially Jack, Ramius and Mancuso, and I'm also very here for any discussions that might take place behind the scenes - for instance, as Jack, Ramius and Mancuso get to know each other while sequestered after the events of the film; or as Ramius and Mancuso look after Jack when he's exhausted and possibly hurting; or Mancuso's orders to the crew of the Dallas before she and the Red October part ways.
• Lasting effects of Jack Ryan's pre-canon spinal injury
There are subtle moments during the film where Jack's back injury is called attention to: in the shower on the Enterprise, he's shown with his back under the hot water, and later seems in quite a lot of pain when a beam falls on his back on the Red October. Clearly that injury still troubles him; I'd love to read about its lingering effects, whether immediately after the film or even years after that. I would be down for an exploration of what it's like for Jack to live with chronic pain and perhaps mobility issues, maybe even eventually getting a cane or needing to use a wheelchair. I would be very down for Ramius and/or Mancuso looking after him when he's hurting.
Cold and damp are not great for old injuries and chronic pain, and by the end of the film Jack's had a rough few days. I would love to see him trying his best to hide how much he's hurting when the action is over, but Ramius (and perhaps Mancuso, too) sees right through him, and takes care of him as best he can with the Red October's medical supplies. I'd even love a more dramatic collapse, with the captains finding out that way that they need to look after the boy.
Further in the future, I'd love to read a slice of life with Bart and/or Marko looking after Jack on a day when he's hurting - Jack having to learn to admit he's hurting, and Ramius and/or Mancuso making the effort to learn how to help him when he needs it, with hot water bottles and medication, it by coaxing him into a hot shower or whirlpool therapy tub until he feels better. I'd also love to see Jack navigating work life (or even political life!) with his mobility aids and chronic pain. I'd also be very down for an exploration of Ramius and/or Mancuso getting to know about Jack's fear of flying, about the trauma response it is, and perhaps one or both of them holding Jack's hand(s) on a plane, or holding him after a nightmare on the ground.
• The contrast between analyst duties and field work
I love that Jack is an analyst, extremely knowledgeable with regard to strategy and history, but has absolutely no knowledge of military activities and spycraft on an operational, tactical level. How does his understanding of day-to-day field agent work change and evolve in the years after the film? Does he gain a deeper sympathy for field agents, or does the perspective of his analyst work change? How does he approach field work when he inevitably ends up on other adventures in the future?
• Books and articles authored by Jack Ryan
Jack is a writer! He's also a dramatic, lyrical nerd! I'd love to read some of his work. Does he write a book about (the official story of) the Red October incident? Does his official biography of Ramius write lush, lyrical descriptions as though he's Alaska State Trooper Ken Marsh, with Marko laughing about it as he reads it later with Jack nestled in his arms? Does he eventually write a book or article about Bart Mancuso, and is that how Bart figures out he has a crush on him - or are they already together, and does Bart blush at the effusive praise that Jack heaps on him but also kiss him a lot?
I'd love to see an article or an excerpt from a book that Jack wrote about Ramius, and/or one that he wrote about Mancuso. Either way, he's clearly in love with the subject - perhaps obliviously, or perhaps he's in a relationship with the subject and just can't talk about it in the article/book. Alternatively, this book excerpt or article coming to light years later when Jack is the President and Ramius and/or Mancuso is/are his husband/s, and the internet losing their entire minds over how head over heels President Ryan already was for his husband(s) way back around like, 1986-1996.
• Jack Ryan's eventual presidency
Since book!Jack Ryan eventually becomes President of the United States and this Jack Ryan is fairly different from book!Jack Ryan, I am very here for an exploration of this Jack's journey to the presidency and his time in office. (Unlike book!Ryan and Ford!Ryan, I feel as though this Jack doesn't need to get there via a senior position in the CIA - perhaps his general idealism would lead him to politics earlier in his career than that.) I'd doubly love to see it against a backdrop of his chronic pain and mobility issues and learning to live with them, and I'd especially especially love it with his supportive, badass husband(s) by his side.
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Men in Black (Original Trilogy)
Characters:
Agent Kay
Agent Jay
Princess Lauranna
Ships I love: Kay/Lauranna, Jay/Laura
Ships I DNW: Jay/Kay
Worldbuilding Tags:
• admin and inner workings of MIB as an agency
There's a lot of fascinating background detail in the MIB universe. What does a day in the life of someone working at the immigration desk look like? What does a day in the life of the loafing Worms look like? What are the different jobs you can have at MIB? What does Zed's day look like, dealing with all the administrative functions and all the paperwork? What about the field agents and agent handlers? What official procedures and hoops does an alien landing on Earth for the first time have to jump through?
• Agent Kay's career
Kay canonically joined MIB at its very inception, in 1961. There's some wiggle room for how old he is - if he is TLJ's age, that means he joined MIB at fifteen years old (which is a reading I could see working!), but even if he is a little older, he clearly still joined MIB very young indeed. I'd love to see the trajectory of his career, alongside the development of the agency itself. What jobs did Kay do in the early days, when hardly anyone at MIB even knew what they were doing? How did he help shape the agency's policies and worldviews? Kay is clearly compassionate toward refugees and disadvantaged folk in general, and chooses Jay for his lack of Alien Racism; I would love to see young Kay clash with his fellow agents who don't want to do the right thing, leading to older Kay teaching younger agents to do the right thing. I'd also love to see how Kay's great skill as a field agent does not translate At All to being good at administration, and that perhaps that's why he's still in the field after all these years.
I'd also love exploration of any of the variety of other MIB duties Kay's done over the years, including diplomacy and protecting Zarthan royalty, which brings us to:
• interplanetary diplomacy
• Kay and Lauranna's secret relationship
How did Kay and Lauranna meet? How did they fall in love? Was Kay a diplomat helping her negotiate treaties? Was he a bodyguard, protecting her from potential assassins whose aim was destabilizing Zartha and its adjacent planets? What was the backdrop of galactic politics against which the two of them fell in love and had a child? How did they keep their relationship secret before tragedy struck?
(Since it is canon that Laura is Lauranna's daughter, this is an exception to my pregnancy DNW. However, I would still prefer pregnancy not to be the focus of the fic.)
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Minority Report (2002)
Characters:
John Anderton
Ships I love: John/Danny Witwer
Unhealthy/dubiously consensual/nonconsensual dynamics I like to see explored: Lamar Burgess/John, Lara/John
Worldbuilding Tags:
• Medical and psychological aftermath of halo incarceration
Post-canon, I'm really interested in how John deals and how he recovers. I'm here for John suffering through aftereffects of the halo (neurological symptoms, maybe migraines, auras, nightmares, flashbacks, days when he's trapped back in that world of torment and can't make it out, not knowing what's real) and dealing with suddenly being blind in one eye, as well as the loss of everything that's helped him survive the past six years. I'm very here for medical fallout of literally everything he's just been through, including the traumatic eye surgery - vision issues, light sensitivity, lingering pain, having to get used to new levels of vision and associated adjustment issues, anything in that vein. I'm also very here for his addiction getting worse until it reaches breaking point and he has to suffer through getting clean, withdrawal symptoms and all.
I would also love to read about how other people who've been haloed recover from it all and try to pick up their lives afterwards. Maybe through John's eyes realizing the horrors he's been inflicting on people as a Precrime officer (as he also experiences and processes those horrors himself firsthand), or maybe through the eyes of another halo survivor watching the trials post-film and hearing John's evidence, learning he was haloed too and went through what they did as well. I'm very down for them thinking it serves him right. Maybe they arrive at some kind of sympathy for him after hearing his life laid bare during his statements; maybe they don't.
I would definitely be up for reading, say, John's medical report post-film detailing his symptoms and recovery, or something along those lines! I am also very here for John keeping in touch with Agatha and the twins, for all of them to still be friends and stay supportive of each other while they're all healing and finding ways to go on living.
• Neuroin addiction and recovery
• Rebuilding and recovery post film
It annoys me deeply that John's addiction was brushed away and ~magically cured~ at the end of the film for the sake of a pasted-on babies ever after ending. I don't read the happiness of that ending as in any way real or lasting. I am here for any and all exploration of John's addiction, relapse, recovery, and how hard his journey is - feel free to go as dark as you like, as long as there's some hope at the end for him to recover and he happy again. If you want to show me what neuroin actually does, what its effects are, what makes John reach for it in the first place, how he lives with it in the day to day, and how he finally gets clean, I am absolutely down for that.
John and Lara's relationship doesn't have to end happily. In fact, I'd prefer their happy ending to be breaking up and slowly learning to live better lives while not tied to each other. They're both very heavy on denial as a coping mechanism, so I could see John doing his best to hide how badly he's relapsing from her, and Lara in turn trying to pretend that everything's okay, both steadfastly ignoring how very much John's mental health is not okay. (I could see Lara being deep enough in that denial to pressure John into things he doesn't want to do, sexually or otherwise, and John for his part also being deep enough in denial to go along with what she wants and acquiesce, even if it just makes him feel worse.) Maybe it takes a particularly severe relapse or PTSD episode, or even a severe self-harm incident, for John to realize he can't stay with her any more, that he can't subject her or himself to the life they're currently leading. I would like to see him have that revelation, and leave so that they both can heal.
Consent issues or no, I could see John kind of running away from Lara - not leaving her in the lurch, but certainly having a deeply stressful conversation telling her he can't do this any more, and then getting as far away from her and the MPD as he can. Does he hole up in his apartment hoping he'll eventually feel better? Does he go to Agatha and the twins if he realizes he's possibly too sick to be alone? Does he just go somewhere offbeat and cut off contact with everyone until somebody starts to worry (is that somebody Danny Witwer - assuming this is a universe in which Danny Witwer Didn't Die)? Does he go through withdrawal alone and eventually come out okay, or does Witwer find him during and hold him through the shakes? Do things get bad enough that Witwer has to drag him to hospital despite his protests and newfound distrust of the system? Does he even get good treatment if they do, or are the medics in this universe just as cruel and uncaring as the police?
Speaking of which, I'm super here for John quitting the MPD and finding something else to do. He's probably had a revelation about the system he used to trust, and he's probably disqualified anyway now because of the blindness in that eye and his other symptoms post-halo. I'd love to see him reconstruct his life when he gets better, adjust to a new normal with essentially a chronic illness if the effects of the halo get better but never fully leave. I'd certainly be down to see him do it with Danny at his side, and both of them learning not just how to be with each other and look after each other but also how to be people, not just bland colourless law-enforcement officers in their bland colourless law-enforcement world.
• Police brutality/abuse of authority before/during/post Precrime
As I mentioned above, John has clearly had a revelation about the system he was part of - not only that it was based on a heinous crime in the first place, but that it's wrong to arrest someone and essentially put them in stasis for their entire life, for something they didn't do. There wasn't much compassion to Precrime's arrests, either; the weapons they used to catch and subdue their would-be perpetrators were pretty brutal, and there is that line about how everybody runs.
This universe is clearly an authoritarian, cynical one. Even when John is chief of Precrime, he's implied to be very much a cog in a machine, following procedure to the letter and never thinking about it, never quite having the ability to think about it. It's implied he was just a low-level cop before, with not much power, and even now that he has some social standing he's still kind of small-time, not really respected by the Feds or the non-Precrime police or anyone from Lamar's fancy high-class social circle. He doesn't have much of a life, and nearly all the social privilege he has is because he's a cop. So what happens after the film, when he is no longer one? When he's the one to bring Precrime tumbling down, going from its poster boy to acknowledging all the horrors of it, all the horrors he was complicit in? How does the world react? How does his former team react (do they agree with him or disagree? do some of them see him as a traitor to them?) How do the former haloed react? Does he appear to give evidence at the hearings to shut Precrime down, while still processing everything that's happened, still battling addiction and suffering the aftereffects of the halo? How does he process all the awful things he's done, up to and including killing Leo Crow? How does he deal with hearing the testimony of, or meeting, those he harmed? Does he apologize? Does he listen to their pain and do his best to help? Does he feel he has to atone in some way?
I would also be very here for exploration of systemic apathy/cruelty in the specific light of John having lost whatever little social power he had as a cop, and now being just an ordinary guy...who has an addiction and at least one disability. How do the cops treat neuroin addicts if they're found out? How do the cops treat a random guy who's half blind and suffering PTSD flashbacks or blackouts post-halo? How do the cops treat this guy when they specifically know he's not only the once Precrime Golden Boy they were all jealous of, but also the reason Precrime was dissolved, leaving its officers either out of a job or having to be absorbed into other departments?
Relatedly, how does the healthcare system in this world deal with someone of John's social status who presents with neuroin addiction/overdose/withdrawal and/or mental health symptoms? Is the healthcare system as cruel and uncaring as the cops? Does John have to go through withdrawal or PTSD or general halo aftereffects on his own, fearing that if a health official figures out what he's dealing with it'll go on his record and he might be committed against his will? Is he treated grudgingly, as though if he weren't a public name by now because of Precrime and the trials he would have just been left to die?
• Manipulation of John & other Precrime officers by Lamar Burgess
The dynamic John has with Lamar Burgess seems to indicate that he trusts him deeply as a mentor figure, but also that that trust is based on Burgess having been the only person he could lean on when he was torn apart and suffering after the death of his son. Burgess knows John intimately well, says he chose him specially to be Precrime's chief/general poster boy, knows about his neuroin addiction, and seems to have been pretty entwined with him and his mental health struggles for the past six years. John, still deeply unstable and miserable, invariably turns to him in times of trouble, and then we find out Burgess has been lying and manipulating his trust the whole time. It's not a stretch to think Burgess may have been manipulative and string-pulling in general as a boss, and specifically toward his Precrime officers: the sales pitch John gives Danny while introducing the department is just that, a sales pitch, and it sounds a lot like he was sold it six years ago using the same talking points, and was vulnerable to those talking points because he lost his son in a way that Precrime could have prevented. Lamar uses John's grief to sway him, frame him, hurt him and make him hurt others, multiple times in the film; it's not too far of a leap to think he saw an opportunity when Sean was taken, took advantage of John's overwhelming grief to manipulate him and has been intentionally feeding that grief, enabling his drug habit, and keeping him emotionally unstable ever since.
I'm here for any and all exploration of how truly awful Lamar was to John, all while keeping both Lara and John himself convinced that he only had John's best interests in mind. I'm especially interested in this turning sexual, with fucked up, manipulative Lamar/John at any time from six years before the film to during - either implicit with Lamar offering John emotional support and implying romance, offering intimate touch but it never reaching the level of kissing or sex, or full-blown Lamar taking advantage of John when he's vulnerable with grief, making him dependent on him emotionally and for dope, thoroughly messing him up. I could see John having a massive praise kink, and Lamar taking full advantage of that to get him to do more and more work for Precrime as well as sexual favours for him. Maybe Lamar starts him off slow, asking for small favours that gradually turn more and more sexual, and John, adrift and lost and overwhelmed with grief for his dead son with no chance to heal, believes Lamar is his only friend and feels like he can't refuse him anything for fear of losing his support. Maybe Lamar offers romance, starts off kissing John tenderly, and then pushes him away, only touching him when he wants to get off, and leaves John desperately wondering what he did wrong, how he can get his affection back. He might pretend to help John with his grief, but really says 'well-meaning' things that keep him deliberately in pain and unable to heal. Maybe he even enables John's addiction by pretending to help, but really sending him to dealers who give him stronger stuff to keep him hooked. Possibly whenever he notices John's doing better, whether with regard to addiction or to mental health, he makes sure to very gently say things that sound concerned and well-meaning, but really deliberately reopen so many wounds that he knows John will be using that night. Maybe he even convinces himself he's doing it for the good of humanity, keeping John able to do his important work as a Precrime officer so potential killers can get caught.
I'd like any kissing or sex to happen after John and Lara separate, but for the Burgesses this particular scenario would stand as an exception to my infidelity DNW as well - Mrs Burgess can know and not mind, or not know, as you see fit. If she does, I'd like John to be conflicted; if she doesn't I'd like him to be absolutely destroyed by it but still helpless to stop or resist Lamar's advances.
I'm very here for John having to process all of this after the film, and heal from it just as much as he's healing from everything else. I'm also very here for him discovering he's not the only one Lamar manipulated - maybe Jad and Fletch and the other Precrime officers all had similar traumas or fears that Lamar could take advantage of to run a tight ship in the department. Maybe they all form a support group and work toward healing in their own ways.
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The Shadow (1994)
Characters:
Lamont Cranston
Ships I love: Lamont/Margo Lane
Ships I DNW: Lamont/Shiwan Khan
Worldbuilding Tags:
• Supernatural injuries
This tag is a license to go full-on with the hurt/comfort casefic. Lamont is used to using his superpowers to deal with very non-supernatural things - normal people committing crimes and getting up to awful things - but clearly there are strange forces in this universe, as demonstrated by Shiwan Khan showing up. What kind of supernatural injuries are there in this universe that could instantly throw Lamont out of his element, and pose a real threat to his crime-stopping ability and perhaps his life? Does he fall ill or end up in pain after touching a cursed object? Does he get cursed by someone who clocks who he is? Does he get stabbed with a supernaturally-powered blade that halts his powers, or slowly spreads venom through him, or just prevents him from healing? Does he get injured telepathically, someone targeting him by sending crippling pain over telepath radio? A new powerful telepath on the block injuring someone else (or themselves) in order to harm Lamont - or in order to lure him into a trap? How does the situation resolve? I'd love to see Margo, Mo and the butler help solve the case, slowly taking over more and more while Lamont gets worse, looking after him as best they can and also taking out the enemy with whatever little help he can manage, and then helping him recover afterwards.
• Telepathy and mind manipulation
What makes telepathy work in the Shadow universe, and how does it go wrong? We know that supposedly anyone can learn to use the part of the brain involved in telepathy; can anyone teach it, or can learning from an inexpert teacher end up hurting the learner? I'd love to see Margo learning how to use telepathy, with Lamont insisting she take it very slow so she doesn't hurt herself - and maybe also insisting that because he's afraid he might accidentally hurt her.
I'd also love to see how telepathy interacts with telekinesis in this universe - Lamont seems to accidentally break things in his sleep sometimes, which makes me wonder how often that's happened and why. I'd love some exploration of the Shadow superpowers in this vein, and how they work (and how they can go wrong) - perhaps with Lamont losing control of them when he's unconscious while hurt or ill, resulting in things breaking, flying around the room, people accidentally getting mind-controlled into doing odd things, maybe someone getting mildly injured, and Lamont being overwhelmed with guilt and hiding himself away when he's losing control for years until Margo realizes she's the only one who can help. I'd also love to see the effects of Lamont sometimes overusing his powers and working himself to exhaustion - perhaps it gives him migraines or gets him sick, leaving him shaky for a few days afterward, or exhausts him to the point of burnout, and this too has been going on for years before Margo walks into his life and realizes he's a whole idiot who can't sustain this way of working forever. Perhaps his occasional bouts of overusing-powers-sickness have been mistaken as hangovers or other debauchery by his uncle/butler/etc, and he's done nothing to disabuse them of the notion because it suits him for them to assume he's an empty-headed layabout. (Perhaps someone finds him in a gutter one morning too deeply unconscious to make it home, and it makes the tabloids and his uncle gives him a Stern Talking-To that he has to pretend he's taking to heart, while Margo knows the real reason and worries and shows up to domme him into letting her look after him.)
Speaking of Margo domming Lamont into letting her look after him, that's the exact dynamic for them that I love. Margo is super assertive, knows exactly what she wants at all times, is very very sexual and horny on main, and she's also very generous with comfort when Lamont needs it. Lamont, meanwhile, is all haunted and racked with guilt for his past, and afraid he'll hurt her, and also kind of awkward and embarrassed by her boldness; embarrassed to be wanted as much as she wants him. I'd love to see her taking him in hand and showing him how to let go of his guilt and nervousness and place his trust in her - him all reverent and worshipful, her patiently finding out what he needs (even if it's a long-term project, and even if what he needs is pain or bondage - perhaps especially if it is!), and maybe her giving him lots of praise and aftercare as a reward for being good for her. I also think Lamont might, in his self-flagellating way, sometimes go too far in asking for pain, and Margo might have to figure out when those times are, take care of him and reassure him, and figure out how to help him stop doing that.
D/s or no, I really love the idea of Margo putting Lamont in shibari while he's sick, perhaps because they've found it helps keep his powers or power-induced sickness/headaches/burnout in check, perhaps as a simple exercise in comforting touch. I love the idea of Lamont just...not being able to deal with tenderness and being loved, especially so when he's ill or hurt, and Margo having to kiss away tears of sensory overstimulation/general overwhelmedness. Lamont just being very used to curling up and riding out illness/injury alone, and Margo refusing to let him do that and giving him lots of gentle touch and kisses, is such a soft spot for me, as is the fact that she can read his mind and hear his distress from miles away, so he literally cannot hide any kind of suffering from her.
• The Shadow's Agent Network
We don't hear much about the Shadow's agent network in canon - just that his agents are everywhere, and that they're inducted into the network when he saves their lives. We do see that while most of them know Lamont as a fellow agent, Mo is the only one who knows Lamont is the Shadow himself. Does this mean Mo is the first person Lamont ever saved? Or does it mean that at some point Mo has rescued Lamont - helped the Shadow get to safety, get medical help maybe, when he was so injured that there was no hiding his identity? How do the agents' shifts work - I presume the ones who work full time, spending shifts at the message centre and such, are handsomely compensated for it - but since they don't know who Lamont is, how do they get their payment? Do they have their own suspicions, maybe, as to who the Shadow is? I would also love to see the agent network come into play in a casefic, directed by Mo and/or Margo in a strategy to help save or look after Lamont.
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Thank you for creating for me! I hope you have fun with it, and a great exchange. 💛
So, the thing I love most in fanwork is taking canon character dynamics and just...making them More. Taking them further, exploring their natural progression, usually in a hurt/comfort-y way. I've mentioned the character dynamics and ships I love under each fandom, along with some rambly thoughts and prompts - speaking of which, please feel free to pick, choose, mix, match, play with any, all or even none of said prompts, if that's where the muse takes you. 💛
I love hurt/comfort with all my heart and soul, so most of the prompts here will probably contain it to some degree.
I am a-okay with any kind of exploration of character dynamics - h/c, casefic, fluff fic, angst, missing scenes, outsider POV, outsider POV contrasted with canon characters' POV, getting together fic, established relationship, you name it I love it. I'm also very much okay with or without smut - I enjoy it, but please don't feel pressured to include it or not to include it. If you do feel inclined toward the lovin', I have a preference for a Mature rating over an Explicit rating, but I will likely enjoy whatever rating speaks to you. :D
I am super open to unconventional medium/narrative styles if you feel inspired to use them - outsider POV, outsider POV contrasted with canon characters' POV, epistolary fic, framing devices such as mission reports, medical reports, audio transcripts/debrief transcripts, text messages or post-its between characters, news articles, official documentation, even drone!POVs for Oblivion, are all amazing.
Navigation
> Likes & DNWs (art likes)
> Mission: Impossible (Movies)
(Requested media: fic, art, in-universe meta)
> Oblivion (2013)
(Requested media: fic, art, in-universe meta)
> The Hunt for Red October (1990)
(Requested media: fic, art, in-universe meta)
> Men in Black (Original Trilogy)
(Requested media: fic, art, in-universe meta)
> Minority Report (2002)
(Requested media: fic, art, in-universe meta)
> The Shadow (1994)
(Requested media: fic, art, in-universe meta)
Likes & DNWs
General likes:
• Character studies
• Hurt/comfort of all stripes
• Exploring the fallout of canon trauma
• Missing scenes, slice-of-life, etc - exploring canon character dynamics/canon traits of known characters
• Touch starvation
• Deep friendships
• Earned trust and casual intimacy (carrying, clothes sharing, characters only allowing touch from people they trust, etc)
• Bonding over shared trauma
• PTSD, illness messing with a character's grip on reality, combat/mission injuries, scars, and injuries acting up, touch starvation, sensory deprivation / sensory overload, characters not believing they deserve comfort or being surprised to receive comfort
• Eventually requited pining
• Worldbuilding
• Outsider POV, especially when contrasted with our characters' POV
• Mission aftermaths
• Smut with Feelings (I don't really need to know what body parts are going where, I love to know how it feels, in the sensory way and especially the emotional way)
• Pain, bittersweetness, sadness, exploring the darker side and implications of canon is great, but I really need some happiness/comfort and hope along with it!
Sexual likes:
D/s overtones. Femdom. Service subs. Subs With Issues. Praise kink. Hands, fingers, touch; touch starvation. Finger-sucking. Aftercare. Tenderness, especially if the person receiving it isn't expecting it, isn't used to it, and it breaks them just a little.
Marking, intentional or no - bruising with lips or teeth; hiding the bruises under clothing. Suit kink. Wrists bound or held down. Honour bondage. Shibari and intricate knotwork. Careful sex / making out when one partner is hurt or ill and feverish (fever sex is, uh, a Thing of mine). Or rough, desperate, life-affirming sex / making out.
There are some fandoms where I love the sex a lot rougher; see the sections under Collateral and Top Gun.
Art likes:
Realistic and sketchy styles, bold lines and rich colours/textures, bold accent colours, creative lighting choices, noir-style art especially for action canons, minimalist styles/silhouettes, characters captured in unaware moments as though they're being photographed without realizing it, art that captures the vibe of canon without necessarily capturing the style of canon; angsty hurt/comfort or warm, gentle, casually intimate moments.
I love kisses of all descriptions, especially at the forehead, temple, hands, throat, or collarbone. I love characters undressing each other, reverently for most pairings, roughly for some. I love seeing characters in partial states of undress rather than seeing them completely naked, especially if there's also a focus on their hands or collarbones or throat. I love seeing characters with love bites, hickeys or bruises; I love characters touching and tracing other characters' scars, especially if it looks like they got distracted while undressing them to do so. I love characters in shibari, especially under dress shirts, or characters' wrists being tied with something luxurious like velvet or ribbon.
I also love h/c focused art - characters undressing their injured/sick partners or taking off their glasses, if they wear them (eg. Hunley, Mancuso, Ethan in MI 1). Characters patching sick/hurt characters up, with stitches or bandages or ice packs, or cleaning scrapes on the hurt character's face or hands. Sick/hurt characters with their hair messed up, perhaps hiding their faces in other characters' chests or shoulders. Hurting characters sitting at other characters' feet to be taken care of with hair stroking or shoulder rubs, or burying their face in the other character's lap. Smaller characters getting carried bridal style when they're not feeling well, maybe clinging to the character carrying them if they're not unconscious. Hands in general, especially if they're scratched or hurt and being taken care of. :D
(I would not prefer pink or green as a dominant/background colour, but I love basically every other colour there is. Jewel tones are great! Limited palettes are great! Bold colours are great! Whatever you can think of is great! I love it all. :D Style-wise I would prefer no chibis or overly cartoonish styles; I'm very cool with anything and everything else, including experimental styles!)
General DNWs:
• Mundane/depowered/setting change AUs
• Bleak, hopeless endings (as long as there's hope, bittersweet endings are fine!)
• Unrequested crossovers and fusions
• Any mention of coronavirus or quarantine/lockdown situations
• Any mention of Mission: Impossible 2 canon
• Ethan/Benji, Ethan/Ilsa, Ethan/Brandt
• Death of requested characters (even if they died in canon; Alan Hunley Is Alive That's My Story And I'm Sticking To It. The exception: Princess Lauranna under MIB.)
• Non-canonical death of non-requested characters
• Terminal illness
• Permanent injury (the exception: Oblivion, and Jack Ryan's canonical past injury in The Hunt for Red October)
• Gastrointestinal illness (nausea/vomiting is okay but not as a focus of the work, and not as a result of GI illness - so character getting nauseous or throwing up from a migraine or just severe pain in general, yes; character getting nauseous or throwing up as a result of a severe anxiety attack or PTSD episode, yes; character suffering anything related to food poisoning or GI bugs or overeating and similar, no)
• Pregnancy, menstruation
• Infidelity (for Red October, I would prefer that Jack and Cathy were never married, separated amiably and share custody of Sally)
Sexual DNWs:
• Noncon or dubcon, except where noted (see Oblivion)
• humiliation as a kink, except where noted (see Oblivion)
• pain play for Mission: Impossible and The Hunt for Red October
• gags of any kind (hand over mouth is okay for dubcon/noncon prompts in Oblivion, but I would like it to trigger the character on the receiving end and for there to be some emotional fallout of it)
• anal, dirty talk, spanking, ageplay, scat, watersports, rimming, emeto, A/B/O, d/s-verse, mommy/daddy kink, maledom/femsub
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Mission: Impossible (Movies)
Characters:
Ethan Hunt
Alan Hunley
Luther Stickell
Ships I love: Ethan/Luther, Ethan/Hunley, Ethan/Sidorov, Ethan/Luther/Hunley
Ships I DNW: Ethan/Benji, Ethan/Ilsa, Ethan/Brandt
Worldbuilding Tags:
• Reinstatement of the IMF post Rogue Nation
I love Alan Hunley, and I love his journey from cynical, ruthless CIA director to intense idealist at the helm of the IMF. I'd love to see him learning how the IMF works, after the end of Rogue Nation when he's clearly decided he's going to learn the ropes and take over as IMF Secretary. Hunley strikes me as a very 'inside every cynic is a disappointed idealist' kind of guy, and Ethan and the IMF seem to have given his inner idealist a place to shine; I'd love to see his worldview change to accommodate all the insider knowledge of the IMF's history that becoming Secretary grants him. I'd love to see him figuring out the best way to run the IMF, the best way to look after the agents as much as possible while still making sure they can save the world, and how his taking over works both operationally and ideologically.
Approaching this same time period from another angle: Ethan went through hell and back physically in Rogue Nation. He tracked the Syndicate for a year, and was a fugitive on the run with no support for another six months, before nearly drowning and then reinjuring the knee he broke in Ghost Protocol - it's probably safe to say he's about to spend a significant amount of time fairly sick or in a lot of pain. So I'd also be very interested in seeing the reinstatement and all the official goings-on against the backdrop of him crashing and recovering behind the scenes. Maybe he falls ill after his recent near-drowning, and Hunley and Brandt have his health to worry about as well as dealing with the official side of things, while Luther looks after him and lets them handle the politics. (Maybe the committee wants to hear from Ethan, and Hunley and Brandt fight to let him recover in peace - or maybe the committee insists, and Ethan has to appear and give a statement while he's pretty sick, with everyone worrying over him because of it.)
• Agent-handler dynamics and emergency exfiltrations
The IMF has exfiltration protocols that we sometimes see in action, and sometimes see going wrong. Handlers we've met in canon differ greatly as to how they deal with exfiltration requests, some being more compassionate than others; they do, however, all seem to be operating within a system that tries its best to be kind to its agents and prevent harm to them as far as possible (which mitigates some of the damage that could be done by a handler taking a more hardline approach). This is the system Ethan and Luther have been shaped by: they've each had bad experiences with handlers, debrief analysts and/or Secretaries who didn't make sure they were okay, but they've also had good experiences with those who did make sure they were okay, and as they've grown older and more experienced over the years, it looks like they've managed to make the system better and more compassionate along with them. I'd love to see any and all experiences they might have had along this bumpy road to where they are now!
The CIA, by contrast, seems to have less compassion both toward people outside it and toward its own operatives. This is the system Hunley was shaped by, and it's the one he explicitly rejects at the end of Rogue Nation in order to head the IMF. (Later, in Fallout, he says he did that specifically because of Ethan, which is a Lot.) I've mentioned how much I love Hunley's whole turnaround from ruthless CIA director to intense IMF idealist; I'd love to see him dismantling his previous beliefs and practices as CIA head, realizing both how he wasn't treated the best as an agent and how he enforced the same systems himself, and watching the IMF agents do their best to do their best, as it were, while also figuring out how to address the flaws that still exist in the IMF's system.
I would especially love to see the new dynamic between Ethan and Hunley, as agent and handler. Ethan, being the senior field agent at the IMF, probably warrants someone high up as his handler, and in Fallout it's clear that he and Hunley have worked together enough to consider each other close friends. I'd love to see Hunley thinking about his younger days as a handler at the CIA, what he did right and wrong, what the system taught him right and wrong, what he questioned and what he didn't, and having whole new revelations about it now that he cares for this agent so much. I'd also love to see Luther being suspicious of Hunley until he sees him really doing his best to look after Ethan and be gentle with him after a mission, or during a debrief, or while answering an exfiltration call from him.
I'd also love to see Hunley doing his best to look after Ethan while they're in agent/handler mode, while they're pining or dating or just generally having a Lot Of Emotions About Each Other outside of work. Hunley comforting Ethan over the phone, or picking him up at the airport after a particularly awful mission, and Ethan growing to trust him and respect his advice (even if he doesn't always take it) and look forward to seeing him, even for debriefs and mission reports he knows are going to be difficult to get through. I'd love to see how they work together to save the world and/or to make the IMF better, and how they form a bond that's stronger than any agent-handler dynamics they've each had before.
• Intelligence community and inter-agency relations
We get a few hints as to what the CIA thinks of the IMF, not only via Erika Sloane in Fallout, but also via Hunley's assertions at the beginning of Rogue Nation. We also get Hunley's new point of view, when he tells Ethan he
• Medical aftermaths of canonical or non-canonical missions
Ethan's been hurt pretty badly after a lot of the canon missions, and we very rarely get to see him in recovery or being looked after. Luther was hurt in the first mission of Fallout, and Hunley was stabbed to near-death by Walker afterwards. I'd be down to read the medical aftermath of any canonical or non-canonical mission - show me the injuries and illnesses, the realistic recovery times, show me the medical reports if you feel so inclined! And of course, if it strikes your fancy, please show me Ethan, Luther and/or Hunley looking after each other till they're well again.
• Honeypot missions and aftermaths
The IMF seems to have never gone as far as actual seduction, but flirtation as a form of intelligence-gathering has very much been played with. Ethan has historically been okay with heavy flirtation with targets/adversaries in order to get things he wants (Max, and he coaches Jane in the art of flirtation with Brij Nath), but has never gone as far as touch with anyone who's not fully in the know. We've seen his reaction to the White Widow kissing him to claim him - which was a pointed non-reaction of discomfort, and decidedly not what consent looks like on him. I would be down to read Ethan having to flirt his way out of a situation that goes wrong, and having to call for exfiltration (or find a different way to achieve his goal) when it ends up being more than he's comfortable with. (I'd prefer this not end up at full on dub/noncon, but rather heavy groping or kisses that Ethan has to find his way out of.) I'd very much like to see Hunley as the comforter in this situation; I don't think Ethan would talk about why he called for exfil unless he had to, and with Hunley being his handler, he would indeed have to tell him exactly what went down. Hunley would certainly notice him being shaken, too.
I am good with similar things having happened before, and Ethan having been met with less than sympathetic superiors, but I would like Hunley to hold the opinion that Ethan did the right thing by getting out of Dodge, and be indignant that he came to harm. I'm also very down for this particular trauma being the catalyst that finally gets them together.
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Oblivion (2013)
Characters:
Any Jack Harper (this includes canon Jacks and original Jacks)
Any Vika Olsen
Drones
Ships I love: Jack 52/Julia, any Jack/any Jack, any Jack/any Vika, any Vika/any Vika, threesomes in any combination of Jacks and Vikas
Ships I DNW: Jack 49/Jack 52
Unhealthy/dubiously consensual/nonconsensual dynamics I like to see explored: Vika/Jack, both canonical ones and potential original ones
Worldbuilding Tags:
• Pack dynamics/"interpersonal" dynamics among the drones
• Trust and "interpersonal" dynamics between the drones and their technicians
• Drones' POV of their technicians and their lives
I love and adore how the drones are shot as though they have a sentient point of view, how they seem to act like animals or people or otherwise sentient beings. Jack, too, treats them as though they're living/sentient - he seems to perceive emotion from them, speaks to them as though he understands them / is having a conversation with them that is verbal on his side and nonverbally responded to on theirs. (He also calls one 'she' at one point, which is why I'm calling all of them that.)
We get to know two drones in this way - drone 166 is businesslike, dedicated to completing whatever her instructions (from the Tet) are at all costs, curt and rather ruthless - she blasts off immediately after Jack repairs her without so much as acknowledging him, has to be convinced multiple times not to hurt him during his rescue of the Odyssey, and later repeatedly bodyslams his ship to ground it and injure him. (We know her directive at this latter point is to capture him and Julia, not to harm them both, but she is demonstrably hotheaded.) By contrast, drone 172 is anxious and frightened when she wakes up tied down in the Scavs' custody, but while she thrashes in fear she does not lash out or attempt to harm anyone, and in fact is calmed and reassured by the very sight of Jack. I'm here for exploration of either of these drones' POV, the 166 and 172 of any other territories than 49's and how they exist in their day-to-day lives, any other drones' POV of their techs and their lives, and I'm also super here for the drones' opinions of each other and how they express those opinions. Drone pack dynamics / ways in which they are sentient/animal-like / ways in which they are alien lifeforms with alien worldviews? Drone body language? Drone nonverbal communication? Drones acting as service animals post-Tet explosion? Drones' interpretations of Sally's orders? Drones who resent their techs for having power over them vs drones who are grateful to their techs for fixing them when they're hurting? Drones, perhaps, who realize their techs are sad and a little bit trapped, and try to understand, or try to take advantage, or try to comfort them? DRONES.
• Jack's abuse at the hands of Vika
• Healthy vs unhealthy Jack/Vika relationships
Jack 49 is a lovely man who's had a lot of awful things happen to him. I imagine many other Jacks are equally lovely, and may have suffered just as much.
49's story is filled with people expecting him to be someone he's not - Vika expects him to be her perfect partner, Julia expects him to be her dead husband, the Scavs expect him to be a mindless killing machine (and Beech expects him to be the dead hero he remembers, too). With that in mind, I'm deeply interested in 49 surviving and learning to live as himself - learning who he really is as Jack 49, and that he deserves to be loved as Jack 49. I'm very here for him realizing what he went through with Vika 49 was abuse and he didn't deserve it, and I'm also very here for him falling in love with another Jack who is protective of him and never lets him go through anything like that again.
I'm here for 49 surviving that final scene somehow, perhaps with permanent injuries (maybe he ends up with a limp, having to walk with a cane), and slowly healing both physically and emotionally.
I love OG Vika, but the two Vikas we meet in 2077 aren't good to their partners at all. We see Vika 49, who refuses to listen to Jack when he rambles, guilt-trips him, and trips him into the pool to forcibly make out with him to shut him up, and we see Vika 52, who isn't bothered when Jack is visibly injured and acting off as long as he does his job, and also guilts him into a kiss. It's not unreasonable to assume some (or most) Vikas' relationships with their Jacks might have been as bad or worse. I'm here for anything and everything exploring that. From 49 and 52 themselves and exploring the implications of canon, to any potential original Jack and Vika characters you might think of. The dub/noncon tags are with this in mind, for any Jack and Vika pair including the canon ones. For the physical abuse tag, Vika 49 and Vika 52 didn't seem to be physically abusive (rather tending towards coercion and insidious emotional and sexual abuse), but I could definitely see other Vikas going that far. I'd love to see a Jack who's gone through absolute hell at Vika's hands manage to finally leave her, and begin the slow, painful healing process after years of abuse.
I'm also really interested in Jack/Vika as a healthy relationship, but as the exception, not the rule - I'd love to see a healthy Jack/Vika pair who love each other deeply and support and look after each other even through hardship, but I'd especially like to see them in stark contrast to one or more Jacks who were deeply unhappy or left traumatized by their relationships with their Vikas.
• Different Jacks and their secret hideaways
• Different Jacks' salvaged libraries and how they shape their worldviews
• Survival and community post Tet explosion
• Fashion and culture post Tet explosion
I'd love some worldbuilding and exploration of the differences between the various Jacks as individual people. Please feel free to invent all the original Jacks and Vikas you desire, and show me how they're all distinct people despite their shared traits; show me how their life circumstances, the geography of their territories, the different books they found in ruins, shaped who they are. Show me how their special interests differ! Show me how some Jack/Vika relationships were better than others, and some worse. Show me how some of those relationships last through the Tet falling, and how some don't - and, indeed, how the Tet falling affects them all differently. Maybe some Jacks are permanently injured, and have (or have had) to learn to live with and make accommodations for their levels of ability. Maybe some Jacks and Vikas find each other and try to rebuild when the Tet comes down, and form a close-knit community that looks after its own when they need it.
As mentioned above, I'm very open to exploring healthy, loving Vika/Jack relationships (and how they remain strong through hardship!), but I'm especially here for exploration of those in contrast to the deeply unhealthy ones that leave so many Jacks scarred.
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The Hunt for Red October (1990)
Characters:
Jack Ryan
Bart Mancuso
Marko Ramius
Ships I love: any and all combinations of these three characters! Jack/Ramius, Jack/Mancuso, Ramius/Mancuso and Jack/Ramius/Mancuso are all wonderful!
Worldbuilding Tags:
• Debrief and mission reports after the film
I am very here for all the official conversations that have to be had at the end of this movie. I presume Admiral Greer and other CIA higher-ups are going to want to know exactly what happened from all the parties involved, and are also going to have to concoct an 'official version' of events, protect the Russian officers by placing them in appropriate locations under adequate witness protection, etc. I'm very here for the Admiral being a warm, supportive presence to all the main cast during debrief, especially Jack, Ramius and Mancuso, and I'm also very here for any discussions that might take place behind the scenes - for instance, as Jack, Ramius and Mancuso get to know each other while sequestered after the events of the film; or as Ramius and Mancuso look after Jack when he's exhausted and possibly hurting; or Mancuso's orders to the crew of the Dallas before she and the Red October part ways.
• Lasting effects of Jack Ryan's pre-canon spinal injury
There are subtle moments during the film where Jack's back injury is called attention to: in the shower on the Enterprise, he's shown with his back under the hot water, and later seems in quite a lot of pain when a beam falls on his back on the Red October. Clearly that injury still troubles him; I'd love to read about its lingering effects, whether immediately after the film or even years after that. I would be down for an exploration of what it's like for Jack to live with chronic pain and perhaps mobility issues, maybe even eventually getting a cane or needing to use a wheelchair. I would be very down for Ramius and/or Mancuso looking after him when he's hurting.
Cold and damp are not great for old injuries and chronic pain, and by the end of the film Jack's had a rough few days. I would love to see him trying his best to hide how much he's hurting when the action is over, but Ramius (and perhaps Mancuso, too) sees right through him, and takes care of him as best he can with the Red October's medical supplies. I'd even love a more dramatic collapse, with the captains finding out that way that they need to look after the boy.
Further in the future, I'd love to read a slice of life with Bart and/or Marko looking after Jack on a day when he's hurting - Jack having to learn to admit he's hurting, and Ramius and/or Mancuso making the effort to learn how to help him when he needs it, with hot water bottles and medication, it by coaxing him into a hot shower or whirlpool therapy tub until he feels better. I'd also love to see Jack navigating work life (or even political life!) with his mobility aids and chronic pain. I'd also be very down for an exploration of Ramius and/or Mancuso getting to know about Jack's fear of flying, about the trauma response it is, and perhaps one or both of them holding Jack's hand(s) on a plane, or holding him after a nightmare on the ground.
• The contrast between analyst duties and field work
I love that Jack is an analyst, extremely knowledgeable with regard to strategy and history, but has absolutely no knowledge of military activities and spycraft on an operational, tactical level. How does his understanding of day-to-day field agent work change and evolve in the years after the film? Does he gain a deeper sympathy for field agents, or does the perspective of his analyst work change? How does he approach field work when he inevitably ends up on other adventures in the future?
• Books and articles authored by Jack Ryan
Jack is a writer! He's also a dramatic, lyrical nerd! I'd love to read some of his work. Does he write a book about (the official story of) the Red October incident? Does his official biography of Ramius write lush, lyrical descriptions as though he's Alaska State Trooper Ken Marsh, with Marko laughing about it as he reads it later with Jack nestled in his arms? Does he eventually write a book or article about Bart Mancuso, and is that how Bart figures out he has a crush on him - or are they already together, and does Bart blush at the effusive praise that Jack heaps on him but also kiss him a lot?
I'd love to see an article or an excerpt from a book that Jack wrote about Ramius, and/or one that he wrote about Mancuso. Either way, he's clearly in love with the subject - perhaps obliviously, or perhaps he's in a relationship with the subject and just can't talk about it in the article/book. Alternatively, this book excerpt or article coming to light years later when Jack is the President and Ramius and/or Mancuso is/are his husband/s, and the internet losing their entire minds over how head over heels President Ryan already was for his husband(s) way back around like, 1986-1996.
• Jack Ryan's eventual presidency
Since book!Jack Ryan eventually becomes President of the United States and this Jack Ryan is fairly different from book!Jack Ryan, I am very here for an exploration of this Jack's journey to the presidency and his time in office. (Unlike book!Ryan and Ford!Ryan, I feel as though this Jack doesn't need to get there via a senior position in the CIA - perhaps his general idealism would lead him to politics earlier in his career than that.) I'd doubly love to see it against a backdrop of his chronic pain and mobility issues and learning to live with them, and I'd especially especially love it with his supportive, badass husband(s) by his side.
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Men in Black (Original Trilogy)
Characters:
Agent Kay
Agent Jay
Princess Lauranna
Ships I love: Kay/Lauranna, Jay/Laura
Ships I DNW: Jay/Kay
Worldbuilding Tags:
• admin and inner workings of MIB as an agency
There's a lot of fascinating background detail in the MIB universe. What does a day in the life of someone working at the immigration desk look like? What does a day in the life of the loafing Worms look like? What are the different jobs you can have at MIB? What does Zed's day look like, dealing with all the administrative functions and all the paperwork? What about the field agents and agent handlers? What official procedures and hoops does an alien landing on Earth for the first time have to jump through?
• Agent Kay's career
Kay canonically joined MIB at its very inception, in 1961. There's some wiggle room for how old he is - if he is TLJ's age, that means he joined MIB at fifteen years old (which is a reading I could see working!), but even if he is a little older, he clearly still joined MIB very young indeed. I'd love to see the trajectory of his career, alongside the development of the agency itself. What jobs did Kay do in the early days, when hardly anyone at MIB even knew what they were doing? How did he help shape the agency's policies and worldviews? Kay is clearly compassionate toward refugees and disadvantaged folk in general, and chooses Jay for his lack of Alien Racism; I would love to see young Kay clash with his fellow agents who don't want to do the right thing, leading to older Kay teaching younger agents to do the right thing. I'd also love to see how Kay's great skill as a field agent does not translate At All to being good at administration, and that perhaps that's why he's still in the field after all these years.
I'd also love exploration of any of the variety of other MIB duties Kay's done over the years, including diplomacy and protecting Zarthan royalty, which brings us to:
• interplanetary diplomacy
• Kay and Lauranna's secret relationship
How did Kay and Lauranna meet? How did they fall in love? Was Kay a diplomat helping her negotiate treaties? Was he a bodyguard, protecting her from potential assassins whose aim was destabilizing Zartha and its adjacent planets? What was the backdrop of galactic politics against which the two of them fell in love and had a child? How did they keep their relationship secret before tragedy struck?
(Since it is canon that Laura is Lauranna's daughter, this is an exception to my pregnancy DNW. However, I would still prefer pregnancy not to be the focus of the fic.)
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Minority Report (2002)
Characters:
John Anderton
Ships I love: John/Danny Witwer
Unhealthy/dubiously consensual/nonconsensual dynamics I like to see explored: Lamar Burgess/John, Lara/John
Worldbuilding Tags:
• Medical and psychological aftermath of halo incarceration
Post-canon, I'm really interested in how John deals and how he recovers. I'm here for John suffering through aftereffects of the halo (neurological symptoms, maybe migraines, auras, nightmares, flashbacks, days when he's trapped back in that world of torment and can't make it out, not knowing what's real) and dealing with suddenly being blind in one eye, as well as the loss of everything that's helped him survive the past six years. I'm very here for medical fallout of literally everything he's just been through, including the traumatic eye surgery - vision issues, light sensitivity, lingering pain, having to get used to new levels of vision and associated adjustment issues, anything in that vein. I'm also very here for his addiction getting worse until it reaches breaking point and he has to suffer through getting clean, withdrawal symptoms and all.
I would also love to read about how other people who've been haloed recover from it all and try to pick up their lives afterwards. Maybe through John's eyes realizing the horrors he's been inflicting on people as a Precrime officer (as he also experiences and processes those horrors himself firsthand), or maybe through the eyes of another halo survivor watching the trials post-film and hearing John's evidence, learning he was haloed too and went through what they did as well. I'm very down for them thinking it serves him right. Maybe they arrive at some kind of sympathy for him after hearing his life laid bare during his statements; maybe they don't.
I would definitely be up for reading, say, John's medical report post-film detailing his symptoms and recovery, or something along those lines! I am also very here for John keeping in touch with Agatha and the twins, for all of them to still be friends and stay supportive of each other while they're all healing and finding ways to go on living.
• Neuroin addiction and recovery
• Rebuilding and recovery post film
It annoys me deeply that John's addiction was brushed away and ~magically cured~ at the end of the film for the sake of a pasted-on babies ever after ending. I don't read the happiness of that ending as in any way real or lasting. I am here for any and all exploration of John's addiction, relapse, recovery, and how hard his journey is - feel free to go as dark as you like, as long as there's some hope at the end for him to recover and he happy again. If you want to show me what neuroin actually does, what its effects are, what makes John reach for it in the first place, how he lives with it in the day to day, and how he finally gets clean, I am absolutely down for that.
John and Lara's relationship doesn't have to end happily. In fact, I'd prefer their happy ending to be breaking up and slowly learning to live better lives while not tied to each other. They're both very heavy on denial as a coping mechanism, so I could see John doing his best to hide how badly he's relapsing from her, and Lara in turn trying to pretend that everything's okay, both steadfastly ignoring how very much John's mental health is not okay. (I could see Lara being deep enough in that denial to pressure John into things he doesn't want to do, sexually or otherwise, and John for his part also being deep enough in denial to go along with what she wants and acquiesce, even if it just makes him feel worse.) Maybe it takes a particularly severe relapse or PTSD episode, or even a severe self-harm incident, for John to realize he can't stay with her any more, that he can't subject her or himself to the life they're currently leading. I would like to see him have that revelation, and leave so that they both can heal.
Consent issues or no, I could see John kind of running away from Lara - not leaving her in the lurch, but certainly having a deeply stressful conversation telling her he can't do this any more, and then getting as far away from her and the MPD as he can. Does he hole up in his apartment hoping he'll eventually feel better? Does he go to Agatha and the twins if he realizes he's possibly too sick to be alone? Does he just go somewhere offbeat and cut off contact with everyone until somebody starts to worry (is that somebody Danny Witwer - assuming this is a universe in which Danny Witwer Didn't Die)? Does he go through withdrawal alone and eventually come out okay, or does Witwer find him during and hold him through the shakes? Do things get bad enough that Witwer has to drag him to hospital despite his protests and newfound distrust of the system? Does he even get good treatment if they do, or are the medics in this universe just as cruel and uncaring as the police?
Speaking of which, I'm super here for John quitting the MPD and finding something else to do. He's probably had a revelation about the system he used to trust, and he's probably disqualified anyway now because of the blindness in that eye and his other symptoms post-halo. I'd love to see him reconstruct his life when he gets better, adjust to a new normal with essentially a chronic illness if the effects of the halo get better but never fully leave. I'd certainly be down to see him do it with Danny at his side, and both of them learning not just how to be with each other and look after each other but also how to be people, not just bland colourless law-enforcement officers in their bland colourless law-enforcement world.
• Police brutality/abuse of authority before/during/post Precrime
As I mentioned above, John has clearly had a revelation about the system he was part of - not only that it was based on a heinous crime in the first place, but that it's wrong to arrest someone and essentially put them in stasis for their entire life, for something they didn't do. There wasn't much compassion to Precrime's arrests, either; the weapons they used to catch and subdue their would-be perpetrators were pretty brutal, and there is that line about how everybody runs.
This universe is clearly an authoritarian, cynical one. Even when John is chief of Precrime, he's implied to be very much a cog in a machine, following procedure to the letter and never thinking about it, never quite having the ability to think about it. It's implied he was just a low-level cop before, with not much power, and even now that he has some social standing he's still kind of small-time, not really respected by the Feds or the non-Precrime police or anyone from Lamar's fancy high-class social circle. He doesn't have much of a life, and nearly all the social privilege he has is because he's a cop. So what happens after the film, when he is no longer one? When he's the one to bring Precrime tumbling down, going from its poster boy to acknowledging all the horrors of it, all the horrors he was complicit in? How does the world react? How does his former team react (do they agree with him or disagree? do some of them see him as a traitor to them?) How do the former haloed react? Does he appear to give evidence at the hearings to shut Precrime down, while still processing everything that's happened, still battling addiction and suffering the aftereffects of the halo? How does he process all the awful things he's done, up to and including killing Leo Crow? How does he deal with hearing the testimony of, or meeting, those he harmed? Does he apologize? Does he listen to their pain and do his best to help? Does he feel he has to atone in some way?
I would also be very here for exploration of systemic apathy/cruelty in the specific light of John having lost whatever little social power he had as a cop, and now being just an ordinary guy...who has an addiction and at least one disability. How do the cops treat neuroin addicts if they're found out? How do the cops treat a random guy who's half blind and suffering PTSD flashbacks or blackouts post-halo? How do the cops treat this guy when they specifically know he's not only the once Precrime Golden Boy they were all jealous of, but also the reason Precrime was dissolved, leaving its officers either out of a job or having to be absorbed into other departments?
Relatedly, how does the healthcare system in this world deal with someone of John's social status who presents with neuroin addiction/overdose/withdrawal and/or mental health symptoms? Is the healthcare system as cruel and uncaring as the cops? Does John have to go through withdrawal or PTSD or general halo aftereffects on his own, fearing that if a health official figures out what he's dealing with it'll go on his record and he might be committed against his will? Is he treated grudgingly, as though if he weren't a public name by now because of Precrime and the trials he would have just been left to die?
• Manipulation of John & other Precrime officers by Lamar Burgess
The dynamic John has with Lamar Burgess seems to indicate that he trusts him deeply as a mentor figure, but also that that trust is based on Burgess having been the only person he could lean on when he was torn apart and suffering after the death of his son. Burgess knows John intimately well, says he chose him specially to be Precrime's chief/general poster boy, knows about his neuroin addiction, and seems to have been pretty entwined with him and his mental health struggles for the past six years. John, still deeply unstable and miserable, invariably turns to him in times of trouble, and then we find out Burgess has been lying and manipulating his trust the whole time. It's not a stretch to think Burgess may have been manipulative and string-pulling in general as a boss, and specifically toward his Precrime officers: the sales pitch John gives Danny while introducing the department is just that, a sales pitch, and it sounds a lot like he was sold it six years ago using the same talking points, and was vulnerable to those talking points because he lost his son in a way that Precrime could have prevented. Lamar uses John's grief to sway him, frame him, hurt him and make him hurt others, multiple times in the film; it's not too far of a leap to think he saw an opportunity when Sean was taken, took advantage of John's overwhelming grief to manipulate him and has been intentionally feeding that grief, enabling his drug habit, and keeping him emotionally unstable ever since.
I'm here for any and all exploration of how truly awful Lamar was to John, all while keeping both Lara and John himself convinced that he only had John's best interests in mind. I'm especially interested in this turning sexual, with fucked up, manipulative Lamar/John at any time from six years before the film to during - either implicit with Lamar offering John emotional support and implying romance, offering intimate touch but it never reaching the level of kissing or sex, or full-blown Lamar taking advantage of John when he's vulnerable with grief, making him dependent on him emotionally and for dope, thoroughly messing him up. I could see John having a massive praise kink, and Lamar taking full advantage of that to get him to do more and more work for Precrime as well as sexual favours for him. Maybe Lamar starts him off slow, asking for small favours that gradually turn more and more sexual, and John, adrift and lost and overwhelmed with grief for his dead son with no chance to heal, believes Lamar is his only friend and feels like he can't refuse him anything for fear of losing his support. Maybe Lamar offers romance, starts off kissing John tenderly, and then pushes him away, only touching him when he wants to get off, and leaves John desperately wondering what he did wrong, how he can get his affection back. He might pretend to help John with his grief, but really says 'well-meaning' things that keep him deliberately in pain and unable to heal. Maybe he even enables John's addiction by pretending to help, but really sending him to dealers who give him stronger stuff to keep him hooked. Possibly whenever he notices John's doing better, whether with regard to addiction or to mental health, he makes sure to very gently say things that sound concerned and well-meaning, but really deliberately reopen so many wounds that he knows John will be using that night. Maybe he even convinces himself he's doing it for the good of humanity, keeping John able to do his important work as a Precrime officer so potential killers can get caught.
I'd like any kissing or sex to happen after John and Lara separate, but for the Burgesses this particular scenario would stand as an exception to my infidelity DNW as well - Mrs Burgess can know and not mind, or not know, as you see fit. If she does, I'd like John to be conflicted; if she doesn't I'd like him to be absolutely destroyed by it but still helpless to stop or resist Lamar's advances.
I'm very here for John having to process all of this after the film, and heal from it just as much as he's healing from everything else. I'm also very here for him discovering he's not the only one Lamar manipulated - maybe Jad and Fletch and the other Precrime officers all had similar traumas or fears that Lamar could take advantage of to run a tight ship in the department. Maybe they all form a support group and work toward healing in their own ways.
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The Shadow (1994)
Characters:
Lamont Cranston
Ships I love: Lamont/Margo Lane
Ships I DNW: Lamont/Shiwan Khan
Worldbuilding Tags:
• Supernatural injuries
This tag is a license to go full-on with the hurt/comfort casefic. Lamont is used to using his superpowers to deal with very non-supernatural things - normal people committing crimes and getting up to awful things - but clearly there are strange forces in this universe, as demonstrated by Shiwan Khan showing up. What kind of supernatural injuries are there in this universe that could instantly throw Lamont out of his element, and pose a real threat to his crime-stopping ability and perhaps his life? Does he fall ill or end up in pain after touching a cursed object? Does he get cursed by someone who clocks who he is? Does he get stabbed with a supernaturally-powered blade that halts his powers, or slowly spreads venom through him, or just prevents him from healing? Does he get injured telepathically, someone targeting him by sending crippling pain over telepath radio? A new powerful telepath on the block injuring someone else (or themselves) in order to harm Lamont - or in order to lure him into a trap? How does the situation resolve? I'd love to see Margo, Mo and the butler help solve the case, slowly taking over more and more while Lamont gets worse, looking after him as best they can and also taking out the enemy with whatever little help he can manage, and then helping him recover afterwards.
• Telepathy and mind manipulation
What makes telepathy work in the Shadow universe, and how does it go wrong? We know that supposedly anyone can learn to use the part of the brain involved in telepathy; can anyone teach it, or can learning from an inexpert teacher end up hurting the learner? I'd love to see Margo learning how to use telepathy, with Lamont insisting she take it very slow so she doesn't hurt herself - and maybe also insisting that because he's afraid he might accidentally hurt her.
I'd also love to see how telepathy interacts with telekinesis in this universe - Lamont seems to accidentally break things in his sleep sometimes, which makes me wonder how often that's happened and why. I'd love some exploration of the Shadow superpowers in this vein, and how they work (and how they can go wrong) - perhaps with Lamont losing control of them when he's unconscious while hurt or ill, resulting in things breaking, flying around the room, people accidentally getting mind-controlled into doing odd things, maybe someone getting mildly injured, and Lamont being overwhelmed with guilt and hiding himself away when he's losing control for years until Margo realizes she's the only one who can help. I'd also love to see the effects of Lamont sometimes overusing his powers and working himself to exhaustion - perhaps it gives him migraines or gets him sick, leaving him shaky for a few days afterward, or exhausts him to the point of burnout, and this too has been going on for years before Margo walks into his life and realizes he's a whole idiot who can't sustain this way of working forever. Perhaps his occasional bouts of overusing-powers-sickness have been mistaken as hangovers or other debauchery by his uncle/butler/etc, and he's done nothing to disabuse them of the notion because it suits him for them to assume he's an empty-headed layabout. (Perhaps someone finds him in a gutter one morning too deeply unconscious to make it home, and it makes the tabloids and his uncle gives him a Stern Talking-To that he has to pretend he's taking to heart, while Margo knows the real reason and worries and shows up to domme him into letting her look after him.)
Speaking of Margo domming Lamont into letting her look after him, that's the exact dynamic for them that I love. Margo is super assertive, knows exactly what she wants at all times, is very very sexual and horny on main, and she's also very generous with comfort when Lamont needs it. Lamont, meanwhile, is all haunted and racked with guilt for his past, and afraid he'll hurt her, and also kind of awkward and embarrassed by her boldness; embarrassed to be wanted as much as she wants him. I'd love to see her taking him in hand and showing him how to let go of his guilt and nervousness and place his trust in her - him all reverent and worshipful, her patiently finding out what he needs (even if it's a long-term project, and even if what he needs is pain or bondage - perhaps especially if it is!), and maybe her giving him lots of praise and aftercare as a reward for being good for her. I also think Lamont might, in his self-flagellating way, sometimes go too far in asking for pain, and Margo might have to figure out when those times are, take care of him and reassure him, and figure out how to help him stop doing that.
D/s or no, I really love the idea of Margo putting Lamont in shibari while he's sick, perhaps because they've found it helps keep his powers or power-induced sickness/headaches/burnout in check, perhaps as a simple exercise in comforting touch. I love the idea of Lamont just...not being able to deal with tenderness and being loved, especially so when he's ill or hurt, and Margo having to kiss away tears of sensory overstimulation/general overwhelmedness. Lamont just being very used to curling up and riding out illness/injury alone, and Margo refusing to let him do that and giving him lots of gentle touch and kisses, is such a soft spot for me, as is the fact that she can read his mind and hear his distress from miles away, so he literally cannot hide any kind of suffering from her.
• The Shadow's Agent Network
We don't hear much about the Shadow's agent network in canon - just that his agents are everywhere, and that they're inducted into the network when he saves their lives. We do see that while most of them know Lamont as a fellow agent, Mo is the only one who knows Lamont is the Shadow himself. Does this mean Mo is the first person Lamont ever saved? Or does it mean that at some point Mo has rescued Lamont - helped the Shadow get to safety, get medical help maybe, when he was so injured that there was no hiding his identity? How do the agents' shifts work - I presume the ones who work full time, spending shifts at the message centre and such, are handsomely compensated for it - but since they don't know who Lamont is, how do they get their payment? Do they have their own suspicions, maybe, as to who the Shadow is? I would also love to see the agent network come into play in a casefic, directed by Mo and/or Margo in a strategy to help save or look after Lamont.
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Thank you for creating for me! I hope you have fun with it, and a great exchange. 💛
