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).

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( 55. ) For betony: Howl series, Howl/Sophie, she comes in colors everywhere, written 2/21/20

And Set Such Colour There (130 words)

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One of the tribulations of sharing a bathroom and a magical workroom with Howl was that he was both extremely vain and bad at organizing his things, which frequently led to annoyances like hair dyes left on the shelf with rare and expensive spell ingredients, or failed experimental potions clogging the shower drain.

And then, very occasionally, more drastic problems reared their metaphorical head -- or rather, Sophie's head, which was now covered in hair dyed every shade of the rainbow and possibly several others that didn't, strictly speaking, exist in the human range of vision.

"I don't see why you're complaining," Howl said; "Consider my feelings for a minute -- how on earth am I meant to find a suit that won't clash hideously with at least part of your hair?"

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( 56. ) For anonymous: Harry Potter, muggleborn students, the benefits and/or hardships of continuing to keep up with muggle schoolwork (especially math), written 2/21/20

Mathemagics (105 words)

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"Why do you bother?" Alice's roommates asked every now and then, when she theatrically collapsed over her trigonometry textbook or painstakingly worked and reworked physics and chemistry equations late into the night; "It's not like you need any of that to go into charms or potions professionally."

"Yes, but I need to understand all this in order to get a degree in electrical engineering," Alice responded, "and I need that because you can't jam magic and science together and expect the results to work if you only understand one side. And I am going to make a cell phone that runs on magic, or else."

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( 57. ) For anonymous: Any, any, "if things get any better I'll have to hire somebody to help me enjoy it", written 2/21/20

Eutrophication (155 words)

Fandom = The Magnus Archives.

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"Help you undo the apocalypse? Why on earth should I do that? Look around you, Jon. The world is so easy to twist now, so many minds strained almost past bearing; I hardly need to do more than whisper and they tip over the edge and lose themselves forever. If things get any better, I'll have to hire somebody to help me enjoy it."

"It won't last, Helen. When the world is so easy to twist that everyone is already half-broken, there's nothing left to offer contrast. Even the most careful monster can't keep victims from burning out eventually -- trust me, I know -- and when every human's hope is exhausted, what's left for them to fear? What's left for us to eat?"

A long, crackling sigh, echoing despite the lack of surfaces to reflect the sound. "Yes. I know. But not just yet. Let me enjoy myself a little longer before you close the doors."

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( 58. ) For anonymous: Any, any, but still I have trouble with/ most days and nights, written 2/21/20

Circadian Arrhythmia (200 words)

Fandom = The Magnus Archives

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Denise sleeps in the daytime now -- the dark is out of the question, since it literally grew fangs and claws and tried to eat her, and electric lights are either too harsh or too feeble to burn away her fear -- and it's wreaking havoc on her schedule and her health. What she really needs is to find a night job, some kind of shift work where she goes in at dinner and leaves at sunrise, but good luck finding an office job with that kind of schedule; instead, she's been studying a bit of programming in the empty, tooth-clenched hours between sundown and sunrise, and maybe soon she'll be able to wrangle some kind of telecommuting thing or gig work where they don't care about when you clock in or out so long as your projects are done on time.

Until then, she collapses into bed the moment she gets home, only to wake in terror as the streetlights blink on; mainlines caffeine through the nights; and as dawn creeps gray and tremulous through her curtains, snatches a few more precious hours of escape into a world where the worst a shadow has done is sway unexpectedly with the wind.

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( 59. ) For syrena_of_the_lake: Any, any, cow tools (based on the Far Side cartoon), written 2/22/20

Traditional Pursuits (130 words)

Fandom = Chronicles of Narnia

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"But what are they for?" people constantly asked Alberta when they stopped by her booth at the monthly fair to prod and turn and wave about the various pieces of ceramic and wooden hoof-work she had on display.

"They're for solving Cow problems," Alberta said serenely each time, before gathering up her wares (their number sometimes slightly reduced; she did occasionally have Bovine customers, or people who bought her work as some type of artistic statement) into two panniers and heading home.

There was something wonderfully relaxing about private jokes, to say nothing of the meditative aspect of shaping and then destroying random bits of junk; but really, how could so many otherwise intelligent Narnians fail to notice that the only items her fellow Cows ever purchased were the back-scratchers?

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( 60. ) For syrena_of_the_lake: Firefly, any, whisky for my men and beer for my horses, written 2/22/20

Don't Explain the Metaphor (100 words)

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"More efficient to give beer to my men and whiskey to my engines," Kaylee said with a smile made loose and easy by an evening of good food and good sex, followed by Simon letting her curl up and cuddle with only token protest. "Volatiles'll fuck up a combustion engine's pipes pretty damn quick, not like pure ethanol, but until then you'll get at least a little bang for your buck. Beer's so watery you could practically use it to put out fires -- oh! -- which I guess is why you'd be giving it to your horses in the first place."

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Sixty fills! \o/

And now I am going to finish my tea before heading off to Not the IRS for a short afternoon shift with one confirmed appointment, because jobs keep happening even when you'd rather stay home and play with words. *wry*