Gen Freeform Exchange Letter 2024

Thank you for writing or drawing for me! I am within_a_dream on AO3, and you can read my previous letters here if you want to see some of my previous exchange requests! I have requested both fic and art for all fandoms.

Feel free to grab prompts from previous letters if you want – my DNWs have changed over the years, but my general likes and fandom prompts pretty much haven’t.

You’re welcome to include your favorite characters in addition to my requested characters and relationships, and for my solo character requests, I especially encourage you to have my requested character interacting with your fave/s!

Don’t feel bound to my prompts if none of them catch your interest – I’ll be happy with anything about my ships that doesn’t contain my DNWs!

DNWs

• Pregnancy, childbirth, oviposition - mentions of canonical pregnancy are fine, but I don’t want art showing visibly pregnant characters or fics going into detail about pregnancy, related medical concerns, h/c related to pregnancy, etc.


• Removal of genitals


• AUs I DNW: Modern/mundane AUs, soulmate AUs (soulbonds are welcome!), BDSM AUs, omegaverse

Fic Likes

• I love all tenses and POVs!


• Fic about canonical children, Accidental Child Acquisition of OC children (especially for characters who are not at all parental and have no idea what to do with kids)


• Casefic, with a loose definition of "case" that encompasses mysteries for mystery fandoms, paranormal investigations for fantasy canons, espionage for spy canons, etc


• Ghost stories! Particular favorites include the "ghostly hitchhiker" urban legend and the setup where characters need to spend the night in a haunted house for Reasons


• Recovery or aftermath – of canonical traumatic events or noncanonical torture, rape, murder attempts, etc


• Whump, hurt/comfort, hurt/no comfort


• 5+1 fics


• Epistolary fic


• Always-a-woman AUs (cis or trans women welcome!)


• Trans headcanons, trans characters, character-is-trans AUs


• Gay, bi, aroace, queer, etc headcanons


• Internal or external homophobia

Art Likes

• I love any art styles and media!


• Disheveled characters (whether from fights or anything else)


• Clothing/costume porn


• Limited color palettes


• Blood, bruises, marks, injuries

Benjamin January mysteries

I am so behind on my reading so I still haven’t read Death and Cider, but I hope to have finished it by work reveals.

Relationships:

• Solo: Benjamin January

Freeforms:

• Alternate Universe - Always a Different Gender – so I’m really into seeing how Ben as a woman might change canon. Does she disguise herself as a man to go to medical school, or is her entire career path different? How might her approach to solving mysteries be different? Her relationships with her family? Nonbinary Ben equally welcome, but I have fewer specific prompts/questions in that case


• Alternate Universe - The Old Guard-Style Immortality - I am enamored with the idea of Ben dying of cholera pre-canon and then awakening as an immortal, and other than that I am happy to see literally anything in this AU. (If you’re not familiar with The Old Guard, basically it’s immortals throughout history who realize they’re immortal when they die and come back to life, and can then keep coming back to life from even the worst of injuries, and try to do good in the world through time). I would love to see him getting to witness more of history, especially the abolition of slavery and the progression of civil rights, and advancements in medicine. I am down for OC immortals, Ben as the only immortal, or other characters also being immortals (Ben being drawn back to New Orleans by immortal Hannibal or Rose or Shaw etc would be pretty fun!)


• Ghosts – I just really love ghost stories, and Ben is especially fun as a ghost story protagonist to me. Him seeing the ghost of someone whose death he’s investigating would be especially fun.


• Wounded Doctor Character Has To Instruct Non-Doctor on How To Treat Their Injuries

Les Mis – Valjean & Cosette

I’m requesting the musical because my request is due to the current US touring production reigniting my love for the fandom, but I’ve read the novel if you’d like to mix canons or write/draw novel-canon instead! I don’t have a preferred cast for appearances art-wise.

Relationships:

• Cosette Fauchelevent & Jean Valjean (Les Mis -S/B)

Freeforms:

• Aftermath of Canon Trauma - so we just totally skip from Valjean’s acquisition of Cosette to Cosette as a late teen, and I really want more of the time in between those two moments! Cosette getting used to having a loving guardian, Cosette dealing with the trauma of her time with the Thenardiers, Valjean doing his best. I have a lot of tags to this effect. I’m also totally down for more Valjean being traumatized from his time in prison too!


• Character Raises a Child


• Character With Abusive Childhood Adjusts to Non-Abusive Current Life


• Childhood Trauma


• Clumsy But Earnest Attempt at Doing a Child's Hair


• Hurt/Comfort - Two Characters Traumatized In Different Ways & Trying to Help Each Other


• The Process of Healing From Past Trauma


• Trans Character – I am down for any take on trans Cosette or trans Valjean here, but the thing that spurred me to request this tag was imagining trans girl Cosette and the new dimensions that would add to Valjean getting her a doll and new dresses. I’m down for pure fluff, looks at French queer and trans culture of the time/s, plottier looks at how Cosette and/or Valjean being trans would impact Valjean’s life on the run and/or the Thenardiers recognizing Cosette, or anything else! Basically the only thing I don’t want is Valjean not accepting trans!Cosette’s identity or vice versa.


• Trauma - A tries to gently touch B; B flinches like they're about to be hit


• Traumatized Character Learning to Trust Others

Les Mis – Les Amis

I’m requesting the musical because my request is due to the current US touring production reigniting my love for the fandom, but I’ve read the novel if you’d like to mix canons or write/draw novel-canon instead! I don’t have a preferred cast for appearances art-wise.

Relationships:

• Group: Group: Les Amis de l'ABC (Les Mis – S/B) – I love any or all of Les Amis so pick your favorite/s! Feel free to include Marius as well

Freeforms:

• Alternate Universe - Always a Different Gender – I just really love genderbend AUs and would love to see more women or nonbinary characters amongst Les Amis! Feel free to combine with other tags, just draw me what characters would look like if they weren’t men, do an in-depth examination of how the revolutionaries’ lives and politics would be different if they were a different gender, or anything else


• Canonically dead character lives (but is still badly hurt) – I love everyone-lives or not-everyone-dies AUs, but I especially love when the survivor/s are left with serious and/or disabling injuries


• Rape Aftermath – I really love rape aftermath and/or recovery works in general, but one of my favorite types is gen rape aftermath and/or recovery where the victim is comforted by their friends, and I just want more of this plot for any of Les Amis. I really am down for anything, but a few favorite things include post-rape medical care, character trying to hide what happened from their friends, trauma coming back to affect them even after the character thinks they are or should be “fully recovered”, platonic bedsharing and/or friendly touch to help with trauma

Queen’s Thief

Relationships:

• Pheris Erondites - I was not expecting to come out of Return of the Thief loving Pheris so much. I want so many more fanworks about him! I want to see more of what he does post-canon, and I want him to be happy after his incredibly shitty childhood. I also really love the exploration of disability and the multiple disabled characters in canon and would love to see more of that in fics.

Freeforms:

• Aftermath of Canon Trauma – his early childhood, his experiences during the war, or both


• Character is Excited to Learn – I am especially fond of Pheris’s love of math, but anything is great!


• Character With Abusive Childhood Adjusts to Non-Abusive Current Life


• Childhood Trauma


• The Process of Healing From Past Trauma


• What character thinks is a funny anecdote horrifies their friends &/or loved ones

Radiant Emperor

Relationships:

• Solo: General Ouyang

Freeforms:

• Becoming a better person through the power of friendship - ‘better person’ is relative here since it’s not like most of Ouyang’s potential friends are good people, but I think a friendship with, say, Zhu and Ma could at least help with the misogyny and self-loathing


• Canonically dead character lives (but is still badly hurt) – and for my other 3 tags, I just think it would be really fun if Ouyang lives and has to deal with a) achieving the revenge that’s driven him since childhood and finding it hollow, and b) the big reveal about his dad/his family. What will he do with himself now that his sacrifices have been made meaningless? I leave that up to you, dear author/artist


• Character expected to die but didn't and now has no idea how to live anymore


• Surviving Canon Death with Nonetheless Life-Altering Consequences and Injuries

Downton Abbey

Relationships:

• Solo: Thomas Barrow – I enjoy his relationships with any of the canon characters, and feel free to do something OC-centric as well

Freeforms:

• Character Finds Support In Queer Community – for this and “Queer Gen”, I would just really love to see Thomas find a queer community and friends. You can jump off the other gay characters he meets in either of the movies, or OCs, or anything else you’d like! I didn’t request “Character A takes newly-out Character B to a gay bar” because the dynamic wasn’t quite right for Thomas and for Edwardian England, but I would also love to see him get to go to gay clubs, bars, gathering places, etc.


• Queer Gen


• Rape Aftermath – and I also love Thomas whump! Would prefer OC rapist, and I’m also especially into Thomas thinking no one will be sympathetic/everyone else will blame him for the rape and finding to his surprise that his fellow servants are much more compassionate than he’d expected. Thomas & Anna interaction would be especially fun if set after Anna’s rape

The Old Guard (Movie)

I’ve read the comics, so if you want to draw on comics canon that doesn’t contradict movie canon, feel free! If you haven’t, solely-movie canon is of course welcome.

Relationships:

• Creator’s Choice of Immortal – I love all of the characters, and am really just interested in more set in this world! So pick your fave/s, and also feel free to set things in your favorite historical era, bring in your favorite historical figures, bring in some OCs, or anything else

Freeforms:

• Blood and Gore – as a huge gore fan, I love the potential for really gnarly injuries that the immortality and regeneration/healing allows for! An art piece or a fic that’s just going ham on horrible injuries with minimal plot is very welcome


• Gratuitous Historical Detail – I always want more of the characters throughout history. I have a loose definition of “gratuitous” here, I just want some historical set dressing at minimum.


• Hurt/Comfort - Gratuitously described violence/injuries


• learning new languages – I am especially into the development of languages over long periods of time, with the characters having to pick up newer languages, maybe returning to a country they haven’t been to for centuries and finding out they talk like ancient literature, the characters learning each other’s languages, something really deep-diving into linguistic nerdery with Andy’s first language being proto-Indo-European or something...go wild! Or something modern with Nile picking up her fellow immortals’ native languages


• Mission Fic

Baldur’s Gate – Rolan

Fandom-specific DNW:

• Mystra portrayed as grooming Gale or having started their relationship when he was underage (I love Mystra/Gale as a toxic/bad relationship otherwise! And other underage sex or characters being groomed is welcome too.) For these tags, I want Rolan as the abused party rather than Gale, and I don’t want Gale relating to Rolan by comparing Mystra to Lorroakan.

Relationships:

• In general this request is geared towards the Rolan & Lorroakan relationship and its aftermath, although I’m totally down for you using someone or something else to fuck Rolan up if you’d rather! I love Rolan being self-reliant to a fault and not wanting to let on what’s going on to others, and also Lorroakan telling Rolan that everything he’s doing is just normal wizard apprentice stuff (possibly with a fantasy-racist side of “of course a tiefling couldn’t be expected to understand our fine magical traditions”). Canon physical/emotional abuse is great, adding in sexual abuse/rape also great.


• Cal & Lia & Rolan (BG3) – I just love these three and I want more of them interacting! I’m especially into Cal and Lia having to be careful not to be too loud about how what’s happening to Rolan is fucked up, lest he cut them off


• Gale & Rolan (BG3) – I am so into Gale being Rolan’s new magic teacher post-Lorroakan, and/or Rolan telling Gale about the Totally Normal Magical Lessons Lorroakan is giving him and Gale being like “um wtf I am rescuing you from this man immediately”

Freeforms:

• Aftermath of Canon Trauma


• Character hiding abuse gets found out


• Enemy branded A as their property; B accidentally sees the mark on A's skin


• Hurt/Comfort - Character Doesn't Expect Tenderness But Gets It Anyway


• Hurt/Comfort - Downplaying traumatic events and/or injuries


• Hurt/Comfort - hurt character hates showing vulnerability

Baldur’s Gate – Lae’zel & Hatched Githyanki Egg

Relationships:

• Lae’zel & Hatched Githyanki Egg - I will love any and all kidfic/art that you want to do of Lae’zel and a baby or older child Githyanki! But if you want to get more angsty and Thematic about it, I also think there’s a lot of potential in Lae’zel, once she’s charged with raising a child, trying to figure out what it actually means to be gith now that she knows the truth about Vlaaketh, and what parts of her upbringing she wants to continue vs which parts she doesn’t want to pass on to a new generation.

Freeforms

• Character does not feel ready to raise a child; does a good job anyway


• Character Raises a Child


• Kidfic

The Gilded Age (TV)

Relationships:

• Gladys Russell & Oscar van Rhijn (Gilded Age) – so I just desperately want a canon-divergenge AU where Gladys realizes she’s a lesbian and she and Oscar get married so they can both live their dream gay lives in NYC without Gladys’s mom stifling her. Does Gladys end up saying something revealing to Oscar when he’s courting her? Does Oscar just have good gaydar? Does Gladys come out to her dad and he decides that he’s going to find his daughter the perfect gay husband if it’s the last thing he does? Do you have another idea for how this marriage happens? Go wild, I just lovelovelove lavender marriages and want anything that runs with this premise.

Freeforms:

• Characters in a lavender marriage of convenience getting to know each other


• Platonic marriage of convenience