General Likes:

❤ Stylistic / Thematic Stuff:

• Imagery / textures / objects / descriptive detail
• Settings / spaces / histories / worldbuilding
• Missing scenes / episode tags / set pieces / one-shots / 5+1
• Travel / adventure / epic
• Gothic / darkness / all senses of "haunted" / suspense
• Mythic elements / magical realism / high fantasy
• Non-linear narrative / unreliable narrators / trope inversions

❤ Character Tropes:

• Self-discipline / controlled emotions / tough characters / competency / self-sufficiency
• Confessions / reveals / in vino veritas / stoic character’s mask slips
• Moral complexity / flawed characters / hard choices / gray areas
• Loyalty / devotion / protectiveness / sacrifice
• Isolation / alienation / otherness / outside-looking-in
• Disguises / lies / masks / secrets / complex identities
• Passage of time / change and adaptation / lost chances / looking back

❤ Shippy Stuff:

• Complicated relationships / conflicted loyalties / trust issues / unstable power dynamics
• Preslash / pining / friends to lovers / first times
• Forced proximity / trapped together / sharing a room, bed, etc.
• Platonic intimacy / indirect touches (smoking off someone else's cigarette, wearing their jacket, etc.)
• Established relationships / domestic moments / mutual understandings / shared history
• Separation / estrangement / conflict

❤ Hurt/Comfort Tropes:

• Sickfic in general (exhaustion / fainting / vomiting / fever / stomachaches / headaches / common cold...)
• Emotional breakdowns / characters being overwhelmed
• Holding / carrying / supporting / manly shoulder-clasping / etc.
• Medical attention, of whatever kind
• Comfort rejected / hidden injuries / "everything’s fine" / iron woobies being iron
• Hurt-no-comfort / solo characters powering through (or trying to, with whatever degree of success)

Do-Not-Wants:

Please avoid:

❌ Explicit sex (non-explicit is fine; fade-to-black is fine; pretty much anything above the waist is fine)

❌ AU, including setting-change AU and things like soulmates, wingfic, etc. (canon divergence is totally fine, canon-typical weird sci-fi is fine, ditto canon-typical wuxia elements like magical items, weapons with mysterious powers, poisons or magical injuries, etc.)

❌ Focus on unrequested pairings (you're welcome to mention any canonical relationships, wives/concubines, parents or other implied background pairings, or random OCs — just don't make them a major focus)

❌ Non-canon pet names like "baby," "honey," etc. (canonical nicknames/diminutives are fine)

❌ Crossover or fusion with an unrelated canon (fusions/blends between versions of the same canon are fine, with the following exception)

❌ Crossover or fusion between Star Trek: TOS and the Star Trek: AOS reboots (please keep things in the ST:TOS universe!)

狄仁傑之通天帝國 | Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame (2010)

Requested characters: Solo: 狄仁傑 | Di Renjie • Worldbuilding

Opt-Ins: Any Nominated Length • Non-Linear Narrative • Any In-Universe Documents That Fit the Canon Setting

    

Canon Intro: Detective Dee is a fantasy-historical wuxia film that follows the martial-arts-and-sleuthing adventures of Di Renjie (a fictional Chinese detective-hero who has appeared in various types of popular media since the 18th century, and was originally very loosely based on a renowned judge of the early Tang Dynasty).

To me this movie has always felt like it really wanted to be China’s answer to the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, and it's a pity it didn’t quite get there, because it had so much potential! It’s got lovely sets and costumes, an awesome fantasy-historical setting, and a fascinating cast of characters. I would have loved for this film’s plot to have spanned a whole miniseries, with all the character development and worldbuilding and plot-unfolding that would have entailed, rather than being limited to a couple of hours of somewhat chaotic, action-heavy film time. But I guess that’s what fanfic is for! :)

Where to find it: Depending on your location, you may be able to watch it for free on Tubi or Pluto. It’s also available to rent or buy on Amazon, Vudu, Sling, and iTunes.

Note on the prequels: There are two, but most of my prompts don’t presume familiarity with them. If you want to check them out, they’re also online, but not free. The first one, Young Detective Dee: Rise of the Sea Dragon (2013) is available on Vudu. The second, Detective Dee: The Four Heavenly Kings (2018), is on Amazon, Vudu, and YouTube.

Thoughts/Prompts:

• I really love the idea of the Phantom Bazaar, and was disappointed that we see so little of it in the film. Spooky underground city, caves, underground rivers, Stygian ferryman, creepy magical black-market bazaar, all in an ancient wuxia setting with shape-shifting and monsters... I want a whole miniseries just about this. Anyway, I’d be happy to see any story or other media that further develops the Underground City, whether in terms of its physical features or its culture, inhabitants, visitors, merchandise, history, etc. It seems like Di Renjie is already pretty familiar with the place, but we never hear anything about why. What brought him there before?
• More specifically, I’d love to see a post-canon story about Di Renjie living in the Phantom Bazaar. Is there any hope that he can be cured? Is Wang experimenting to try to cure him? What is Di Renjie doing in the meantime? Has he retired? Is he still solving mysteries? Is Wang teaching him the ways of transfiguration?
• Casefic! This could be post-canon (maybe Di Renjie has been cured, or maybe he’s just working at night and/or remotely from within the Phantom Bazaar), or it could be canon-concurrent, if you want to expand on the case that he solves during the film (or have him on some other side case at the same time, or whatever). Magic and monsters are canon here, so mythical or horror-tending mysteries are welcome!
• Please tell me why Di Renjie has so many hats. (I love all of them.)
• Pre-canon fic, whether casefic or otherwise, would be great too. Di Renjie (with or without Shatuo) must have had plenty of other adventures during the ~12 years between the end of the second prequel and his being charged with treason. I'm open to his relationship with Shatuo as either platonic or slash, if you want to keep them together.
• Following from that last thought, one idea in particular: In the second prequel, Di Renjie develops some kind of mysterious illness that is never explained, and never really relevant to anything. When asked about it at the end of the film, he says it’s caused by a "demon" inside him. (The way the final battle plays out might lead one to infer that an internal "demon" must be a metaphor for hatred, but there’s never any indication that Di Renjie hates anyone, so... ???) Anyway, whenever Di Renjie has any kind of serious bout of this mystery illness, Shatuo has to look after him, which is an invitation to h/c if I ever saw one. How is he ultimately cured?

鹿鼎記 - 金庸 | The Deer and the Cauldron - Louis Cha

Requested characters: Kangxi/Wei Xiaobao • Kangxi & Wei Xiaobao • Worldbuilding

Opt-ins: (two separate requests; see below)

  

Canon Intro: This was Jin Yong (aka Louis Cha)’s final novel, a delightfully genre-subversive wuxia anti-epic. In brief, the story traces the adventures of a street-urchin trickster protagonist, Wei Xiaobao, as he (in one reviewer’s words) "traipses around the countryside, avoiding problems and creating even more of them." In typical trickster-myth fashion, chaos and hijinks (and shameless womanizing) make up a good part of the action — but the real core of the story is the improbable and complicated relationship between Wei Xiaobao and the young Emperor of China.

There’s wrestling. There’s gazing. There’s hand-holding. There’s "I just want to stay with you forever."

In a word, if you’ve got your slash goggles even halfway on, there’s a heck of a lot of subtext. They make for a great friendship pairing too, though, and I love all the surrounding historical and fantasy-historical content as well.

I'm making two separate exchange requests for this fandom, one for fic about the pairing (either slash or platonic) and one for worldbuilding (with lots of medium opt-ins selected). There are separate prompt lists for each request below, but feel free to combine them! You're also welcome to use the prompts from my request for the TVB adaptation.

Where to find it:

• A fan-translation of the complete novel is available to read for free online. (Side note: it is very long, and, uh, probably needs content warnings for... everything, basically?)
• A professional English translation, in three volumes, somewhat abridged, is available to buy on Amazon. (Same warnings apply.)
• For a much shorter (but less coherent) read, here’s a link with transcriptions of all the scenes in the novel that feature both Kangxi and Wei Xiaobao.
• Even shorter: Wikipedia’s general plot summary is pretty good. (You can also check out the review/recap of the book in my journal, though it's mostly just a lot of slashy quotes and then some discussion of differences between the novel and the 1984 TVB adaptation.)

Request #1: Kangxi/Wei Xiaobao • Kangxi & Wei Xiaobao

Opt-Ins: Any Nominated Length • Non-Linear Narrative • Unreliable Narrator

Prompts:

• I’d love to see what sort of mischief these two usually get up to when they’re not busy dealing with palace intrigue or national politics. They apparently spend time together in the Upper Library nearly every day, and the Emperor also seems to rather frequently invite Wei Xiaobao into his private quarters. What are they up to?
• It’s noted repeatedly that the Emperor dislikes being cooped up in the palace and envies Wei Xiaobao’s freedom. Meanwhile, Wei Xiaobao seems to have no trouble at all smuggling people into or out of the palace gates even in broad daylight, as long as he can dress them up as eunuchs or guards or whatever. Would he consider trying to smuggle the Emperor himself out for a few hours, in pursuit of some adventure, or just for a visit to town? Would the Emperor be tempted by such a possibility?
• Sort of reversing the above: there’s a scene where Wei Xiaobao has a talk with a eunuch in the kitchens and hears that as a rule of the palace, no "rare or unusual food" can be offered to any of the imperial family (because "if one of them were to suffer the slightest little sickness after eating it, it would be off with our heads"); the eunuch says he's worried that the Emperor has "the curiosity of youth" and might be perilously attracted to foreign and exotic experiences. Now, granted, what Wei Xiaobao is actually up to is a lot worse than anything the eunuch suspects — but regardless of that, this whole exchange kind of makes me want to see him actually sneaking exotic food (or really any other forbidden/exciting thing) into the palace for the Emperor (who as usual has to rely on his street-urchin friend to supply the adventures his attendants keep trying to protect him from).
• On a similar note, just in general I’d love to see instances of Wei Xiaobao corrupting the Emperor with low-class or forbidden amusements, e.g. gambling, cursing/obscenities, drinking, ribald storytelling, sneaking around the palace, etc. With whatever result, really.
• So, the wrestling scenes in this novel certainly involve a lot of, uh, entanglement and mutual gazing? And mutual obsession? E.g. "For both boys their daily [wrestling] bouts became something of an addiction: if they missed a day they became positively unwell." Which, apart from being a hard-to-resist shipping invitation, also suggests that they did, at least occasionally, miss a day, with... like, actual health consequences? I confess I want to know more about all of this.
• It would be great to see some kind of hurt/comfort between these two, or any variation on the trope. They seem well set up for it. Kangxi, in spite of being very controlled and dignified in front of everyone else, often gets quite emotional around Wei Xiaobao, and seems to generally look to him for support when he has any problems. Wei Xiaobao also has his own sources of angst, and on top of that he spends like 80% of the novel in some condition of recent injury or under the influence of some kind of poison.

Request #2: Worldbuilding (any)

Worldbuilding Opt-Ins: Any Nominated Length • Any In-Universe Documents That Fit the Canon Setting • Bureaucratic Paperwork • Excerpts from a Character's Journal/Notebook • Field Report • In-Universe Essay • Legal Documents • Epistolary • Diary Entry • Any Type of Essay • Any Technical Drawing

Worldbuilding Prompts:

• I love the historical aspects of the novel, and am not at all familiar with this period of Chinese history otherwise, so any kind of historical details you can introduce into a fanwork would be amazing, whether that means sketches of period-typical costuming, architectural details or floorplans, a hierarchy of court titles, dice game rules, or a meta discussion of anachronisms in some particular scene or plot arc. In short, if you’re someone who has historical knowledge about 17th-century China and would enjoy putting it into some kind of fanwork format, please do!
• I’m also open to completely fictional worldbuilding! There are a lot of events and objects that get hints of backstory but are never fully explained in the novel. For example, what exactly is the history behind the impenetrable vest that Wei Xaobao acquires from among Oboi’s possessions? Or the seemingly magical knife? What’s the story with the German priest Schall, whose life the Emperor says he saved when he was ten years old? Backstory about Hai Dafu and the Old Emperor’s retreat to the mountains? What happened to the scholars from the opening chapter?
• Sort of combining the above, I’d love to see fanworks in the form of “historical” documents that treat the canon as history, whether from a post-canon or canon-concurrent timeframe — e.g. a memorial to the throne from Cao Yin, a page from a history text, or something like information cards from a museum display of artifacts from the events of the novel (Wu Sangui’s marble screen, the golden bowl Shi Lang gives Wei Xiaobao, the crystal dice the Emperor sends as a gift, etc.). Or other kinds of documents? Folk ballads about Chen Jinnan? The imperial doctor’s medical report on Dolong after his stabbing?
• I’d be interested to see journals, memoirs, or letters from minor characters who live in the palace complex (including random unnamed guards or eunuchs or maids), or other people who might be privy to information we don’t get in the novel. This could tie into worldbuilding about particular locations or items or processes (the workings of the Imperial Catering Department, the assortment of weird poisons in Hai Dafu’s medical box) or it could be an outsider-viewpoint angle for looking at either the Emperor or Wei Xiaobao (or their relationship, if you want to blend this request with my pairing requests—but I’m totally fine with just a perspective on one or the other of them individually, too).
• If by chance you’re just reading this prompt list because there’s some particular unconventional medium that you want to try out and you’re wondering if you could do it for this fandom, then I’d say as long as it fits the canon setting in some way (i.e. doesn’t require some kind of extravagant AU to make sense), go for it! :)

Note on Names: For character names, place names, etc., feel free to use whatever transcription style you prefer. I've opted for standard/pinyin transliteration here (Kangxi, Wei Xiaobao, etc.), but if you want to use the names from John Minford’s translation (Trinket, Laurel, Misty, etc.), that’s fine too.

Note on language: Although I am not by any means fluent in Chinese, I can read traditional characters, so if you wanted to incorporate Chinese text into images or other documents, that’s totally fine. (For that matter, it would even be fine if you wanted to write a whole fic in Chinese, although I would probably miss some nuances of expression, and it might take me longer to read and comment. ;)

鹿鼎記 | The Duke of Mount Deer (Hong Kong 1984)

Requested characters: Hong-hei Emperor/Wai Siu-bou • Hong-hei Emperor & Wai Siu-bou

Opt-Ins: Any Nominated Length • Screenplay • Non-Linear Narrative • Unreliable Narrator • Any In-Universe Documents That Fit the Canon Setting

    

Canon Intro: Okay, yes, I know this series is more than a bit dated, with its low-budget production values, flimsy props, absurd plot devices, and recurring misogyny. BUT. It's still such an absolute gem. Like the novel it was based on (above), it centers around the improbable and complicated relationship between a trickster street-kid and the maturing boy-Emperor whom he unexpectedly befriends. As a bonus, it also stars Tony Leung and Andy Lau back when they were both very young and very adorable (questionable wigs notwithstanding).

One thing I love about this show is how well-meaning and yet deeply flawed both of the main characters are, and the continual strain of politics on their friendship. There are some intense loyalty tropes here, right alongside a lot of deception and mutual distrust and conflict. I love seeing how they struggle to sustain the fiction of an equal friendship in spite of the massive power imbalance between them — e.g. the way the Emperor seems to increasingly fall back on boyish displays of intimacy the more their friendship deteriorates, like referring to himself as "Little Yuen" or going out of his way to make physical contact — and how it becomes increasingly difficult to make out how much of this is genuine and how much is performance.

I basically love every single canon interaction between these two, so if you just want to expand on a scene or event that happened, or a different version of an event that happened, or a different time when the same thing happened again, or whatever, those are all great. :) I like the fluffy scenes where they’re just fooling around or getting up to mischief together; I like the darker scenes where their trust issues, identity issues, or power-dynamic issues take the foreground. Some more specific prompt ideas are below. Feel free to take prompts from my request for the novel version of the story as well.

Where to find it: All 40 episodes are viewable with English subtitles here (and also on TVB's official YouTube channel, but only with traditional Chinese subtitles). As a preview, you can also take a glance at the screencap-illustrated recap of the series I posted in my journal a few years ago.

Thoughts/Prompts:

• These two come from very different worlds, and I love seeing them try to connect, successfully or not. I’d love to see a story about some instance of this — e.g. maybe Wai Siu-bou is willing to let the Emperor give him some basic reading/writing lessons, or teach him to play chess? Or, on the other side, maybe the Emperor is willing to let Wai Siu-bou get him drunk, or teach him to play dice?
• So there’s that one scene where Wai Siu-bou rushes to the Emperor’s room in the middle of the night, and the Emperor tells the guards to let him in, and then invites him to sleep there. Does Wai Siu-bou ever take him up on this offer? (I mean, it’s hardly the only time these two end up staying up late together in the Emperor’s quarters — especially since it looks like Wai Siu-bou, as the Emperor’s personal attendant, ends up at least temporarily with duties like helping him dress and undress...)
• I love all the scenes where either character gets very protective or solicitous about the other one (e.g. Wai Siu-bou physically using himself as a shield to protect the Emperor from assassination), and as you may have guessed from my "likes" list, h/c is one of my favorite tropes, so basically I’ll be delighted with any excuse you can come up with for one or the other of these two to be in some kind of distress — physical, emotional, mundane or fantastical, however plausible or implausible. Honestly my all-time favorite fanfic trope is just your standard run-of-the-mill h/c setup where one character is ill or injured and the other one helps them recover or just stays with them while they weather it out. Plot totally optional. The Emperor is ill and summons Wai Siu-bou to his room because he wants company/diversion? The Emperor finds out Wai Siu-bou is injured and pays him a visit in his quarters? The Emperor accidentally hurts Wai Siu-bou during a wrestling match? Wai Siu-bou finds out the Emperor hasn't been sleeping well and wants to help?
• I feel like there are potentially any number of "trapped together" plots just waiting to happen here, what with our heroes regularly sneaking around together all over the palace compound, especially at night. It might be fun to see them sneak around just for the adventure of it, for once?
• I’d love to see a post-canon reunion between these two, maybe many years later, when they’re older and have lived very separate lives. Maybe Wai Siu-bou ends up in some new crisis or under arrest, and the Emperor gets wind of it and decides to intervene? How would they react to seeing each other again? How estranged would they be, or how naturally would they fall back into familiarity? How easy, or difficult, would it be for them to separate again?
• Wai Siu-bou seems really proud of his massage-giving skills, and rather eager to try them out on the Emperor — who, for his own part, doesn’t seem all that resistant to the idea (except maybe insofar as they happened to be outside and potentially in public view at the time). Further development on this topic? [Note: I got a wonderful treat based on this prompt a couple of years ago, which I loved and honestly would be delighted to read 10k more of. :D]

Note on Names: For character names, etc., whatever transliteration style you prefer is fine, Mandarin or Cantonese (e.g. 韋小寶 can be "Wei Xiaobao," "Wei Xiao Bao," "Wai Siu Po," "Wai Siu-bou," etc.).

Star Trek: The Original Series

Requested characters: James T. Kirk/Spock • James T. Kirk & Spock • James T. Kirk & Leonard "Bones" McCoy & Spock

Opt-Ins: Any Nominated Length • Screenplay • Non-Linear Narrative

    

Canon Intro: All right, well, obviously I don’t need to introduce this show. ;) But allow me a moment to babble about how it may be ridiculous but there are so many things I love about it.

The relationship (platonic or otherwise) between Kirk and Spock is high on that list, and so is Dr. McCoy making appearances in whatever capacity. I mean, I pretty much adore the whole main cast (if you want to throw in a background plot with Sulu or Scotty or Uhura or Chekov, I’ll be delighted—ditto Sarek and/or Amanda), but I’m especially here for Kirk/Spock, or Kirk & Spock, or Spock & McCoy, or Kirk & McCoy, or all three of them together. I love all their mutual reliance and trust and banter and conflict, how attached they all are to each other, and at the same time their sense of duty and responsibility to the ship and the crew and Starfleet, and all the damage and drama they all take all the damn time, and how endlessly resilient they are.

I love what a hot mess Kirk can be and how he somehow always manages to hold things together anyway. I love the continual tug-of-war between reason and feeling, as it plays out both externally between Spock and McCoy and internally for everyone individually. I love when Kirk gets overconfident and it bites him in the ass; I love the moments when he doubts himself or questions his own motives or fears his command powers are slipping (especially if they actually are), and also the moments when he gets reckless and Spock or McCoy has to step in and do damage control.

In general, I love all the moral ambiguity and dubious choices on the show, even when they don’t get anywhere near the depth of exploration they deserve. Kirk’s relentless obsession with the idea that mankind “wasn’t meant for paradise” and that in order to be human one has to struggle and suffer and overcome (which I guess explains why instead of soberly commanding from his ship like a reasonable captain he spends so much of his time gallivanting around on crazy planets wrestling monsters with only half his shirt on). I love Spock being eminently Vulcan, or trying hard to be Vulcan under difficult conditions, or being maybe not actually as Vulcan as he thinks, and I love watching Kirk react to all of it. (That bit in “Journey to Babel” where Spock’s response to Kirk showing concern for him is to start rattling off irrelevant numerical data as loudly as he can, and the way Kirk watches him while this happens, gets what’s going on, and goes along with it. <3 ) I love McCoy sputtering over either or both of them being idiots.

I also love pretty much any ridiculous plot device that results in Spock collapsing and Kirk holding him up or carrying him around. Vice versa is also good. Variations involving McCoy—also good!

Some prompts are below, but additionally, feel free to just look at my general likes list and go from there!

Where to find it: The series is currently available to stream on all kinds of online platforms, though I think all of them require some form of subscription or payment. For example: Amazon Prime, Hulu, Paramount, Vudu, YouTube...

Thoughts/Prompts:

• As far as hurt/comfort goes, I’ll take whatever you’ve got, whether it’s canon-typical crack-taken-seriously (giant brain-cell viruses! inter-dimensional transporter malfunctions! zapped by sentient electrical forcefields!) or something more subtle, realistic, or slice-of-life (Kirk angsting over perceived personal failures or past traumas, Spock emphatically Not Angsting and definitely not having illogical human emotions or identity crises, McCoy having to practically force medical attention on his superior officers who think they’re indestructible, anybody being intoxicated, anybody hiding injury/illness because there’s a crisis going on and they can’t afford to step down from their posts right now...)
• Relatedly, anything with Kirk having to make difficult moral choices or reflect on them, conflict between official responsibilities and personal relationships, handling disasters, losing control of the ship... basically whatever you want to arrange to give him a hard time. (Or, alternatively: the same difficult decisions, but with Spock in command. And, inevitably, McCoy yelling at him.)
• I’d love to see some kind of Lovecraftian cosmic horror take (or Borgesian dark-magical-realism take, etc.) on this fandom. Admittedly, our heroes don’t seem especially susceptible to cosmic horror as an emotion, but I feel like they could be, and surely if there’s anywhere you’re going to find truly eldritch and alien abominations, or utterly mind-destroying unfathomable otherness, that place is in space. I’d be up for the whole crew (or any subset thereof) being part of this.
• For more of a slash focus, maybe something with Kirk and Spock navigating their rather different personal needs, emotional and otherwise. I’m less interested in the sexual/biological aspects of their interspecies relationship, and more interested in the more everyday differences that might trip them up as they try to understand each other. One of the things I really enjoy on the show is how both of them seem so highly attuned to each other despite their differences, and how far each of them seems willing to accommodate the other, even if it doesn’t come naturally. But I’d also be interested to see times when these efforts failed, or times it went too far and became uncomfortable for the party doing the accommodating.
• Sort of related to the above, I really like the idea of exploring the interspecies nature of their relationship from Spock’s viewpoint, with Kirk as the one who seems “alien” and difficult to fathom. Granted, Spock grew up with a (very) human mother, so maybe he’s exaggerating or in denial when he talks about how hard he finds it to understand human behavior—but it does seem like his upbringing was essentially Vulcan, as his physiology seems to be substantially Vulcan, and there are at least moments when Kirk appears to be a genuine enigma to him. (The reverse, with Kirk having feelings about Spock’s alienness, is great too.)
• Post-original-series, the end of the five-year mission: the Enterprise is no longer Kirk’s ship, his crew is being split up/decommissioned, Spock is going back to Vulcan (why?)... I can’t help thinking Kirk would not handle any of this very well. How does it play out? (Unhappy/ambiguous endings are totally fine, though obviously by no means required.)