the deep moans round with many voices

Time for more Three Sentence Ficathon fills!

Here is the old ficathon post (still open for fills and comments! just not new prompts), and here is the new ficathon post (open for everything).

Also, look! Five of these actually fit the structural restrictions, and the last is only over by one sentence instead of who even knows how many. ;)

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( 49. ) For rokosourobouros: Homestuck, Rose, Umbrella Academy AU , written 2/19/20

I Know a Secret (200 words)

Four sentences.

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Number Three's gift is illumination; her code name, Seer, strikes her as fairly self-explanatory: she can look at a person, a place, or a situation and simply know their secrets. It's not a combat gift, but the Baroness deploys her for reconnaissance before and during missions, and for public relations management whenever a bit of blackmail might come in handy; her fighting skills she earned through painful trial and error, self-crafted thorns to protect the fragile blossoms of her gift and her heart.

The one person whose secrets she can't read is the Baroness herself; when she's a child, this is a comfort, a bastion of silence in a world that constantly screams data into her mind, but the older she grows, the more Number Three -- or Rose, she should learn to say, now that Mother has given them all names -- grows paranoid of that gaping chasm where a person with a thousand thoughts and wishes ought to be.

When she blackmails her way free of that oppressive house and its deadly secrets, it's with information she learned the hard way, and her hedge of thorns has grown so tall and sharp not even her siblings can touch her anymore.

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( 50. ) For sideways: Books of the Raksura, Consolation & Jade, role models, written 2/19/20

Echoes and Reflections (180 words)

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"I know they look to me, that I need to have answers -- or at least know how to find answers -- but it's hard when all I have is the old consort's stories to say what's good and what the flight was like under the progenitor to say what's bad," Consolation said, kicking furrows in the rough bark of a mountain thorn's branch with her disemboweling claw.

"You've learned to ask instead of just taking," Jade said, all her spines held carefully neutral; "That's a good first step, and I'm sure your flight can feel that you care and want them to be safe and happy."

"Asking only helps if someone answers," Consolation said, kicking free another slab of bark, and it struck Jade suddenly that this must be an echo of how Pearl had felt when Jade was young and first stretching her wings into her role as daughter-queen, though at least she'd never tried to steal anyone else's consort; she flicked one spine in acknowledgment and said, "You're right; so ask me, and today I'll do what I can."

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( 51. ) For mad_madam_m: Any, any, "The world is filled with crazy men in love", written 2/19/20

Solve the Right Problem (70 words)

Original fiction, because reasons.

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"So what if he's sick with love -- the world is full of crazy men who think they're in love, or maybe even really are in love, but none of their suffering obligates the targets of their obsessions to do one single thing they don't wish to."

"But he said he'll kill himself unless you--"

"That's a problem for a suicide hotline, not for me," she said, and shut the door.

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( 52. ) For anonymous: Harry Potter, any, justice delayed is justice denied, written 2/19/20

And for All the Wrong Reasons (55 words)

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After the war's end, Sirius is pardoned -- or rather, Sirius finally, posthumously, receives the trial he was denied. The decision, naturally, is innocent of all charges: even aside from the overwhelming evidence of Pettigrew's guilt, nobody wants to go on record thwarting their savior Harry Potter.

Harry burns the verdict over his godfather's empty grave.

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( 53. ) For kalira: Girl Genius, any Heterodyne, out of balance, written 2/20/20

Weights and Measures (130 words)

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"Mathematics is about balance, each side of an equation set exactly against the other until they line up like perfectly chosen weights on a scale, so naturally I thought a kinesthetic aid might be a useful teaching tool," Saturnus said.

"Mmm," Teodora said, as she eyed the gaping hole in her kitchen floor (and several levels of cellar and "secret" tunnels beneath); the twisted, broken levers and trays hanging empty above it; and her two sons playing happily in the corner with no notion of how close they'd come to death were it not for their unofficial Jaeger bodyguards' quick reflexes. "I can see the logic, but perhaps the next iteration should be at one tenth scale and shut down automatically if our children start experimenting with imaginary numbers."

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( 54. ) For last_haven: Sailor Moon, any, I will never believe in anything again, written 2/20/20

That's What Friends Are For (70 words)

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"That implies that you believe that you won't ever believe in anything again, which renders the entire idea self-contradictory," Ami said, carefully deadpan.

Minako groaned and flopped sideways onto her friend, making sure to sprawl her arms across Ami's textbook. "I love you forever, you're one of the people I trust most in all the world, and I would die for you, but please stop spoiling my drama with logic."

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The question at this point is not whether I'll make it to sixty fills; it's whether I'll make it to seventy-two (6 x 12). It's going to be a multiple of six either way, because I have a Thing about patterns, but the Ficathon seems to be slowing down a bit, new prompts have leaned toward fandom-specific prompts for canons I don't know, and I really should be focusing on some of my other projects. But hey, I have the rest of the year for those other stories, and there are still nine days left in February. I'm sure I can keep knocking off a couple-three fills per day. *wry*

Summary: A nebulous future-fic about psychic freeloaders and ways to remove them. (800 words)

Note: Written 9/3/18 for sheliak, in response to the prompt: Agatha Heterodyne (and/or Gil, and/or Tarvek), in order to be resurrected one must first die. It is also a genprompt_bingo fill for the square suicide. (Nobody actually dies in this story.)

[ETA: the AO3 crosspost is now up!]

( Makes You Stronger )

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And that is that for my latest genprompt_bingo card! \o/

1. As of Monday, the smoke shop is now closing at 6pm (Mon-Sat) until our final day. Boss Lady looked at the hourly sales figures and figured there was no real point being open until 7pm just for two cigarette sales, one newspaper, and maybe a few random snacks. (For reference, cigarettes, newspapers, and lottery all have terrible profit margins -- 6% for lottery, 7% for cigarettes (assuming you sell at state minimum, which we do), and 6-10% for newspapers.)

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2. More smoke shop news: on Tuesday, the air conditioner's compressor blew out. :-( The landlords called a heat & AC company, but the fix could not be done until Thursday at the earliest because not all the relevant parts were in stock. I got a text from Boss Lady yesterday telling me that we had no AC and I should wear shorts... which confused me slightly, since I wasn't at work today either, and I certainly hope the problem will be fixed on Friday.

Also, I don't own any shorts. No really. None. I strongly dislike the way tight shorts feel and the way loose shorts look, so I don't wear them. Aside from three years of soccer in high school, I haven't worn shorts since I was twelve or thirteen.

(I don't like tight pants either, FYI. I just really dislike tight fabric around my thighs. It's sweaty and itchy and makes me feel like a dehydrating sausage, and I don't give a shit about trying to look sexy, so why bother flattering my butt and legs if it just makes me want to claw the fabric off and wrap a handy curtain around my waist as a makeshift skirt? /end digression.)

Anyway, I guess I'll discover the state of the air conditioning tomorrow.

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3. I have been gleefully plunging through the archive of Girl Genius, which I think makes that the third fandom Asuka has (inadvertently) dragged me into. I have also been gleefully plunging through the AO3 fic archive for that series. Spoilers, schmoilers. Who cares! It's fun!

I may say something more coherent about the series once I catch up to the current pages. Or not. But for now, I am enjoying it immensely. :-D

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4. Today I headed up to Cornell to do a couple tiny pieces of research for my dad's encyclopedia project. They're still in the editing phase, and Dad asked if I could find the birthdates of two scientists; one neglected to provide his birthday in a biographical article that he wrote himself, and also gave his birthplace as a local region name that does not actually have any legal validity; the other they had a year for, but no exact date or place. I was able to find the date and location for the first person, but nothing definite on the latter.

It always fascinates me that there are places that have names, but that aren't towns and/or don't have their own post office or ZIP codes, and don't appear on maps either. For example, near where I grew up, there is a place called Convent Station. It is named after, unsurprisingly, a train station built near a convent. If you say, "I'm going to Convent Station," anyone local will know what you mean... but it's not a town, it has no ZIP code, and generally it has no legal status as a place. Kind of a glorified neighborhood. Anyway, that won't do for an encyclopedia, apparently, since places like that are hard to find and/or verify. (Not being legally incorporated, they presumably cannot hold records like birth certificates.)

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5. I meant to make pot roast yesterday, but I forgot to buy the necessary red wine on my way home from my adult RE program at church in the evening. And then today I forgot again. So I will pick that up tomorrow after work.

In the meantime, I've been working my way through the random leftovers Mom brought. First was a peculiar soup -- vegetarian meatballs in chicken broth with white beans and carrot and cheese and spinach leaves. That made two meals. The white chicken chili also made two meals. Now I am eating some baked chicken with a weird breading, supplemented by broccoli I bought myself and steamed tonight. And after that, there's some kind of pork in broth; I don't remember the details.

I find it amusing that Mom apparently thinks I would starve and/or get scurvy if she didn't supplement my diet now and then. Or maybe it's just that, even years later, she's still used to cooking for four instead of for two, and enjoys giving leftovers to family. (Hmm. I should ask Vicky if she gets leftover deliveries as well, or if Mom thinks she can handle her own cooking. Vicky, unlike me, actually enjoys cooking for its own sake instead of regarding it as an annoying and tedious interval that separates being hungry from being able to eat dinner.)