Dear Yuletide Writer

[carabas]

Hello! Thank you for writing for me and for sharing one of these fandoms!

I'm DeCarabas on AO3 and carabas on tumblr. I hope this letter is enough to give you a starting point if you need one, but if you’ve got your own idea for this fandom already, fantastic, do that - what I want most is to see someone else's spin on my favorite characters.

I'm easy to please - I like gen and shipfic equally, I like fluff and angst and darkfics and everything in between, any rating, long or short, plot-filled adventures or trope-filled pining or worldbuilding or character studies or hurt-no-comfort or smut - whatever style of fic you like to write, anything with these characters will make me happy.

Some general likes/prompts: Shapeshifting, possession, magical mishaps, mad science mishaps - pretty much anything playing with the quirks of magical or supernatural settings. Dreams. Altered states. Telepathic connections. Crossovers with history or mythology or fairy tales, or a crossover between any of my four requested fandoms. Folklore references. Holiday fic, any holiday. Road trips. Immortality. Reincarnation. Identity porn, playing with secret identities and alter egos or anything where a person is in some sense two people, or where two people are in some sense one person. Fake dating. Established relationships. Relationships that transform you into something stranger. One-sided pining. Loyalty, and oaths of loyalty, and conflicted loyalties. Competency, admiring someone's skills, admiring someone's enthusiasm or absorption in something they're good at. Sharing a bed. Huddling for warmth. Possessiveness, marking, bite marks. Stockholm syndrome. Voyeurism and exhibitionism. Mirrors. Body worship. Voice kink. Blood kink. Xeno. Nonpenetrative sex. Blindfolding as an expression of trust.

Some things I'd rather not get/DNWs: Mundane AUs. Pet names that weren't used in canon (canon ones are fine). Anything set in the year 2020 or 2021 or about COVID (but if you're writing Vampyr then anything about the Spanish flu or the quarantine going on during canon is completely fine and encouraged). For Malevolent, DNW John getting his own separate body.

If you're completely stuck on whatever fandom we matched on and want to try picking up another, Guo Jingming's Painted Skin is the quickest at just half an hour long - it's based on a series of two movies which I also recommend, but it's an AU that can be taken on its own, featuring a human and a fox demon who exchange hearts. Malevolent is a Lovecraft-type podcast with 16 episodes out so far, featuring an investigator whose eyes have been possessed by a mysterious creature, leaving him relying on this creature to narrate what's going on around them as they try to survive together. Vampyr is the longest canon I'm requesting as a plot-heavy video game, but there are a variety of Let's Plays on YouTube - it's the story of a doctor-turned-vampire in the 1918 flu pandemic. And although I thoroughly recommend Sleep No More to everyone, an immersive Macbeth in a 1930s hotel that feels like a waking dream, unfortunately you have to be physically in New York or Shanghai to see it, presuming it's open.


畫皮: 郭敬明版 | Painted Skin: The Guo Jingming Edition (2020)
Characters: Wang Sheng, Xiao Wei

This short film was incredible. I came out of the original Painted Skin movies going yes, good, but what if even more demon/human identity swap angst? Just really dig your teeth into that! Let them stay in each other's skins a little longer! Throw in some reincarnation pain maybe! And then this short film fulfilled all those wishes like a gift for me specifically. I couldn't be more delighted. And yet it just makes me want another story to lean into those things even more.

I very much ship Xiao Wei/Wang Sheng, and I want to hear everything about swapping hearts and trading roles, about wanting what the other has, seeing the world through each other's eyes, feeling what the other used to feel, becoming each other, about being inextricably linked and transformed by each other. What happened between demon!Wang Sheng fleeing and his body being found? AU where Wang Sheng lived on as a demon a little longer? Or what happens when he reincarnates - would Wang Sheng's next incarnation have a human heart or a demon one, will he be drawn to Xiao Wei the way he'd hoped to be drawn to Pei Rong? Or will he find Pei Rong again even though the lock of hair wasn't hers - Xiao Wei/Wang Sheng/Pei Rong reincarnation OT3? I ship every possible combination of characters in this film. I love Xiao Yi's loyalty to Xiao Wei, and he was so discomforted with the way Xiao Wei changed - how would he feel about demon!Wang Sheng's change? Or how did Wang Sheng get the lantern with Xiao Wei's tail, and did Xiao Wei know it was there before he came to their home? I'll love any story about these two.


Malevolent (Podcast)
Characters: Arthur Lester, John

I only just heard of this podcast through the Yuletide promo post, but I've fallen hard, I caught up in a matter of days and just started listening again from the beginning. Brilliant concept for an audio show. I'm following along with the public episodes, so you can expect me to be up to date with those but not with the Patreon updates when you post your story, if that's relevant - please feel free to ignore any new canon developments that happen after the Yuletide writing period starts.

A few things I love in particular: all the moments when Arthur's being hunted by something he can't see, but with this constant voice in his head to guide him - it's something I find even more comforting than those moments when John is actually trying to tell Arthur to relax, just the act of John and Arthur focused on problem-solving their way out of a dangerous situation together. That this guiding voice is the thing that stole Arthur's sight to begin with just adds to the fun, especially since John's early advice was often along the lines of "Go it alone! Trust no one! Kill that guy!" and otherwise generally likely to keep Arthur from ever having a normal life again. And I'm charmed by Arthur as the dedicated professional investigator who clearly enjoys his work, enticed and invigorated and at his most upbeat whenever he's got a puzzle to solve and thinks the pieces are starting to fall into place, and his unfailing habit of chasing down any hint of lore regardless of the danger. (Yes, Arthur, follow that serial killer into his serial killer lair, maybe he has something useful to say about hearing voices! No flaws in this plan.) He never seems to really get used to having his life put in danger despite John's talk of how he's changed, and yet he (and the patrons) keeps choosing to run after the most dangerous scraps of information every time - and meanwhile poor John has to watch all his terrible choices. I love their fuck-you snarling at each other when one vehemently wants something the other one doesn't, the frustrations of bodysharing, and the way John gets increasingly testy when Arthur keeps asking questions John doesn't have the answers to - and I love every time they casually refer to Arthur's body as "ours."

I'm up for anything in this fandom. Something scary would be lovely, I'll never tire of them being hunted - maybe a situation where John temporarily loses his sight too? Or something sexy would be lovely, and yes, I ship Arthur/John - maybe something involving mirrors, or Arthur's got a bit of a voice kink? Or something seasonal would be lovely - what do cultists and/or terrifying eldritch gods get up to around the solstice? Or a canon divergence AU, since the canon's got such an emphasis on making choices - what would have happened if Arthur had made a different choice somewhere along the way? Like was there more to learn from that "flower bulb" in the desert, or what would have happened if they didn't kill the widow on the island? The song that Arthur played in the music store would have required two hands, so what was that like for John, what is playing the piano like for Arthur now that he's got a complicated relationship with his own left hand? (And if Arthur already had a complicated relationship with the piano, possibly due to the Faroe-related things he doesn't want to talk about, how does John's unconflicted enjoyment of it affect him?) Crossover with the The Music of Erich Zann? Or worldbuilding, maybe bringing in more details from Lovecraft or from the 1930s? Or if you want to write something weird and experimental, maybe some choose-your-own-adventure aspect, I am opting in - interactive fiction, poetry, epistolary, digressions about music theory, something meta acknowledging that someone else (Patreon) is really making Arthur's choices for him, the script of a madness-inducing play, whatever, I'm up for it.


Sleep No More - Punchdrunk

Characters: J. Fulton, Hecate

I'm fascinated by the cunning man and his shop on the witch-haunted street, and I would love to hear more about his interactions with Hecate and her witches, in whatever form that takes. What I want most of all is to hear your own spin on these characters, I'm far more interested in your headcanons than mine here - I love hearing infinite variations of this story (the Macbeth story, the Sleep No More story, Fulton's story specifically), and I love how different Fulton can be when played by different actors.

But if you want a starting point, the combination of characters I'm requesting is largely inspired by a particular moment that stuck with me from my second trip to the McKittrick, when I spotted Fulton watching the rave from the doorway. I can't describe his expression as he watched Macbeth with the witches. It wasn't just horror - more like pain. And when he turned and ran from it, he kept one hand pressed to the side of his neck in a way that made me think of phantom pain from an old wound, or a witch's mark. He may be trying to protect the town from Hecate's influence, but I'd love a story where maybe he hasn't been entirely untouched by that influence himself in the past. Did he even know his protective magic before he encountered her and her witches, or did he deliberately seek her out to learn more, or did he only learn those protective tricks as a way to free himself when he'd gotten in over his head with her? And I'd be equally interested in Hecate/Fulton or Hecate's witches/Fulton or gen interpretations here.

More in general, there's a lot about Fulton I'm curious about. Particularly how he can go on with his daily life on that street while carrying out this sort of doomed one-man struggle against the witches, hopelessly outgunned. (...Well, by 'daily life' I mean his eternal loop, I suppose - but is that how it seems to him? Or for that matter, I have seen the holiday decorations in the McKittrick during a winter visit - are there seasonal changes in the loop? What do the witches get up to during the solstice, or the cunning man?) And I'm curious about Fulton's connection to the funeral home, and why he seems to be playing undertaker as well as tailor. It seems like more of a safe place for him than his own shop; the funeral home's the place that he barricades, and where he hides and watches the street, and I like that a place for tending to the dead is the closest he comes to a sanctuary - as opposed to a chapel, for example. Any use of folklore or occult lore will delight me. I've only seen the New York version but I love the story of White Snake, so I'd love to see anything about the Shanghai-specific characters and about Fulton in Fahai's role. Or as an exception to my "nothing set in 2020/2021" DNW, I'd be interested in some kind of story about the hotel being closed. And I like Fulton/Bargarran too, so feel free to include Bargarran, or Agnes, or Hecate's various servants, or any of the other people involved in Fulton's life - I'm fascinated by everything about these characters.

Vampyr (Video Game)

Characters: Jonathan Reid, Edgar Swansea

I love Edgar's delight in all things vampire and in the accomplished Dr. Reid specifically, and I'd love to see more of their relationship, platonic or otherwise. On my first playthrough, I assumed Edgar was a romance option and that I'd just somehow picked the wrong dialogue options to have gotten locked into a different romance. With his enthusiasm over morbid subjects, his vampire fannishness is thoroughly endearing, and he's just so giddily delighted that the great Dr. Reid has become a vampire. "A gift from heaven"! And meanwhile here's Jonathan, lost and confused and abandoned by his maker and wandering about covered in bloodstains, the perfect time for Edgar to swoop in to his rescue, offering him shelter, acting as a source of information he desperately needs and welcoming him into Pembroke - giving him a place safe from the people who hunt him, a job that lets him blend into the mortal world, a houseplant in slight need of watering, and a whole building full of patients whom Edgar's trusting Jonathan with in full knowledge of Jonathan's endless vampiric thirst situation. Completely charming. And their odd power dynamic - Edgar in charge at Jonathan's hospital and with more knowledge of the world of vampires, and Jonathan as the actual vampire here and Edgar's eventual maker - is fun too.

So I'd love to see more of their dynamic in any form. Something early in the game playing on the fact that Edgar is one of the very few mortals in on Jonathan's secrets, knowing he's alive while Jonathan's own family believes he's dead, aware enough of Jonathan's killings (if any) to comment on them and yet never throwing Jonathan out of the hospital for them? Or something where Edgar gets to indulge in his vampire kink or simply finds Jonathan's looming intimidating vampire monologue routine inappropriately hot? He's part of a vampire-watching club and all, so let him have some vampire-watching voyeurism. How would any particular scene in the game have played out differently if Edgar really was a romance option? Maybe something with vampire!Edgar, with the voice of Jonathan as his maker in Edgar's mind? Myrddin had some ominous comments about the likelihood of Edgar causing trouble in the Brotherhood now that he's been turned - was he right about that or is Edgar just Myrddin's least favorite of Jonathan's potential progeny? Something following up on one of the endings where Jonathan doesn't stay with Elisabeth, or one where he does and Edgar remains as fascinated by Jonathan's research as always?

As far as pacifism/evil goes, any version of Jonathan is good, please feel free to go as pacifist/evil as you like or as your story needs. But my favorite version of Jonathan is when he's somewhere in the middle, when it's not a completely pacifist or completely evil run, the ending where he's left alone and brooding - so when Jonathan has his share of civilian blood on his hands but still has enough of a conscience not to revel in indiscriminate slaughter, how does he relate to his progeny, with Edgar's slight mad scientist tendencies and his refusal to treat vampirism as the punishment Jonathan intended it as? And if you don't go completely pacifist, I'm really fond of the game mechanic that rewards you with more XP the more you've gotten to know an NPC's secrets before eating them, sort of incentivizing Jonathan to become the kind of vampire who stalks an intended victim over time - I'd love anything exploring how that mechanic plays with Jonathan's personality, or with Edgar's once he's turned. I'm also a fan of all the edible NPCs, so please feel free to include any of them if you'd like. I also really like the theme of living with the consequences of your choices, even and especially consequences you didn't predict, even and especially when you were trying to do the right thing (apologies to the pillars I tried and failed to spare in my first playthrough). Or really, absolutely anything with these characters.