Dai, Cousins!

This will be your final reminder: go sign up!

It might be more accurate to say that sign-ups will not be officially closed until tomorrow ~10am EST, when I am awake to start working on assignments, but don't wait too long, banking on the chances that I will oversleep my alarm, etc. -- you might miss out!

I'll put up a post tomorrow to let you know when sign-ups have been completed and when assignments have been sent out. In the meantime: did I mention you ought to sign up? :)

So you want to sign up for dai_stiho's first Friend/Ship exchange? You've come to the right place!

In the spirit of the Young Wizards books, this exchange isn't just focused on romantic pairings -- we want to celebrate the friendships and familial relationships that are so important in these books just as much as any romantic relationships that are present. As Roshaun so aptly puts it in Wizards at War, “For so high and honorable an estate, ‘just’ seems a poor modifier to choose.” What better way to celebrate Valentine's Day than to write -- and read! -- fic that focuses on the complex relationships between these characters we know and love?

The Rules

In case anyone hasn't participated in an exchange before, the idea is simple: you write a story for someone, and you receive a story from someone else! You'll receive a set of friend/ships and prompts to work from based on the friend/ships you offered to write.

To sign up for this exchange, you just need to leave a comment on this post in the following format:

<b>LJ Name:</b>
<b>Email:</b>
<b>Requests:</b>
1.
2.
3.
<b>Offers:</b>
1.
2.
3.
<b>More information (optional):</b>

You must request three friend/ship pairings and leave short prompts for each, and offer at least three friend/ship pairings that you would be willing to write. In order to save time and space, in this challenge a slash (/) between character names will be used to designate a romantic pairing, an ampersand (&) will be used to designate a friendship pairing, and both used together (&/) will designate that the requester is fine with gen or ship fic for the pairing.

Here's what my sign-up looks like (rusting_roses and I will be writing for each other, as well as pinch-hitting):

LJ Name: readingredhead
Email: readingredhead07@yahoo.com
Requests:
1. Dairine&/Carmela; tired of being on the outside
2. Nita&Ronan; Kit's busy with something or other and Nita finds herself taking his place and helping Ronan out on an assignment.
3. Lone Power&/One's Champion; "People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint -- it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly...timey wimey...stuff." Their relationship only makes sense out-of-order.
Offers: any (I will write any pairing, gen or ship fic!)
More information (optional): my Tumblr (http://linguaphile.tumblr.com/), especially my most recent Yuletide Letter (http://linguaphile.tumblr.com/post/12901282554/yuletide-letter)

A quick note about offers: It is perfectly okay to offer more than three friend/ships, to offer a pairing as friends only or as ship only (to be designated by & and or /), to offer to write any friend/ship pairings, and to offer to write "any pairing except x/y" (ex. "any pairing except Nita/Ronan," etc.). It is also okay to request and offer multi pairings (ex. Kit&Ronan&Darryl), but for the sake of matching please only request one multi pairing per sign-up and please limit the pairing to three characters! 

The "more information" section is an opportunity for you to tell your writer what specific things you like or don't like in fic, if you have any triggers your writer should avoid, etc. -- essentially to provide general information beyond the pairings and short prompts. This can either be a sentence or two written in the sign-up, or links to journal posts or other sites where you may have already discussed some of your fic preferences (if you do include links to journal posts, please ensure those posts are not friends-locked!). Note that although we ask you to provide prompts and allow you to provide further information, as a writer your only requirement is to produce a story of over 1000 words about the friend/ship pairing requested; writing to the prompt is lovely, but if you just can't make it work for you, it's not required.

All comments will be screened (we wouldn't want to give away who requested/offered what!), but you will receive an email once your sign-up has been added to our sign-up list to confirm that we've got you down for the challenge.

The Timeline

Sign-ups are open now (!) and will run until midnight EST on Saturday, January 14. As soon as sign-ups close, rusting_roses and I will start matching writers with their recipients and emailing out assignments; these should all be sent by the end of the day Sunday, January 15. 

Once you receive your assignment, it's time to start writing! Unlike the previous challenge, there won't be assigned due dates; we just ask that these fics be posted sometime between Valentine's Day on February 14th and the last day of the month, February 29th. As the posting window gets closer, we'll post more information about betas, pinch-hitters, and protocol for defaulting, so keep watching this comm!

As always, feel free to comment with any questions, or get in touch with me or rusting_roses directly! Looking forward to seeing your requests!

Thanks to everyone who participated in this first of many Young Wizards fic challenges on this comm! This post lists all the stories that were written for this challenge, organized by prompt. If for some reason you've been left off the list, or if you want to add information to your story's listing here (like a summary if yours was originally the same as the prompt), please let me know and I'll fix it as soon as I can.

1. Any non-wizard who knows about wizardry; assisting from the sidelines

On the Corner of Irrationality and Insight by objectsinmotion
Rating: PG
Word count: 1185
Pairing: Nita/Kit (background)
Summary: Sometimes it takes somebody outside the problem to see the solution.

2. Nita's college roommates get used to the weird people who seem to appear in their room out of nowhere (and occasionally injured).

So Your Roommate is a Wizard by phoenix_laugh
Rating: PG
Word Count: 5890
Pairings: Nita/Kit, Dairine/Roshaun
Summary: Jess isn't sure what's going on with her roommate, but it's been an odd semester. Excerpts from the journal of Jessica Schultz.

4. Carmela: Her parents dealt with wizardry pretty well, and they dealt with her intergalactic chocolate smuggling pretty well, so you would think coming out as queer wouldn't be a big deal, right?

The Missing Word (or, The Language of Sex) by rusting_roses
Rating: PG-13
Warning: language, sexual themes
Word Count: 10200
Pairing: gen, though could technically be seen as Carmela/Sker'ret, Carmela/Mamvish and Carmela/Dairine
Summary: For Carmela, language is a gift, but she's quickly finding that sometimes, there are no words for the more indefinable parts of life.

8. Dairine finally meets Darth Vader.

Not Here, Not Today by indy1776
Rating: G
Word count: 1209

9. Nita: Shades of grey

Shades of Grey by shadowsinfire
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 1200
Summary: A nightmare prompts Nita to wonder how a wizard should deal with the lives they've taken.

14. The Lone Power: playing by the rules

To the Stars by ladylunas
Rating: PG
Word count: 2800
Pairing: mild OFC/OFC
Summary: When humanity goes to the stars, the Lone Power is there to hinder it. It is up to one wizard to make a choice that will change everything. For Caitlin, there is no choice.

17. Three encounters in a café

Three Encounters in a Café by readingredhead
Rating: G
Word Count: 1600
Summary: The Lone Power walks into a café. Thrice.

24. Wizardry from the view of and outsider.

All the Strangeness in the Air by teacup_of_doom
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1917
Summary: A police officer is sent to investigate some strange reports coming from the local middle school. Set during SYWTBAW.

28. Darryl: What kind of wizardries does Darryl do? What's a typical job for him?

Familiar Stars by araine
Rating: PG
Word count: 1230
Summary: There’s a clearing that Darryl likes, not far from Niagara. The trees open up in a pattern that looks like a lopsided diamond, and unless it’s high noon the sun shines through the foliage to tint everything green and soft gold.

30. Nita/Kit: After certain events at the end of A Wizard of Mars, they find themselves having to take a look at their new relationship.

A Wizard's Romance by lyras
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 3000
Pairing: Nita/Kit

31. Nita/Kit: The college years. How does it effect their relationship?

Verse, So Barren of New Pride by araine
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 14,500
Pairings: Nita/Kit, implied Dairine/Roshaun
Summary: Sometimes, people fall apart from each other; how they fit back together is the hard part.

33. Carl telling Tom about Nita's role as the Silent Lord during Deep Wizardry

Hard Truths by lectin_gaezat
Rating: PG
Word count: 1500

34. Tom/Carl: Nita/Kit and/or Dairine/Roshaun: Going to the seniors for relationship advice.

This (is How it Works) by rusting_roses
Rating: PG-13
Warning: language, sexual themes
Word Count: 6000
Pairing: Tom/Carl, background Nita/Kit and Dairine/Roshaun
Summary: Five times that Tom and Carl were asked for advice, and one time when they weren't. The trials and tribulations of relationships amongst wizards.

35. Tom/Carl: What's it like mentoring all these kids and knowing that they face such danger?

Mountain High, River Low by teacup_of_doom
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 13,958
Pairings: Tom/Carl
Summary: Tom and Carl watching and mentoring Nita and Kit through So You Want To Be A Wizard, Deep Wizardry, Wizards at War, and the day the kids go off to college.

41. Nelaid/Miril: With the apparent death of Roshaun, Wellakh is changing—and so is Dairine.

Ladies of the Lands of the Sun by readingredhead
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 14500
Pairing: background Nelaid/Miril and Kit/Nita, semi-sort-of-implied Dairine/Roshaun
Summary: In the summer following Roshaun’s disappearance, Dairine spends more and more time on Wellakh, while Miril struggles to control the political unrest that’s forcing her to remember some parts of her past she would rather forget.

45. A lot of missing kids go missing on Ordeals. A law enforcement team (crossover of your choice or OC) discovers a pattern.

The Lost, Forgotten, and Still Not Home by objectsinmotion
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 8000
Summary: One hot summer afternoon, Alexis Castle takes the Wizard’s Oath. Now she’s missing, and her father is frantic. But she’s not the only one who’s disappeared…

48. This statement from shitmystudentswrite.tumblr.com as an AU, thanks to the Lone Power's interference in the timeline: "Rome went on to conquer other territories and planets."

A Battle of Seers by animus_wyrmis
Rating: PG
Word count: 1100
Summary: Aeneas and the Cumaean Sybil journey into the Underworld. Things go a little differently.

49. Doctor Who Crossover: While researching ways people can "cheat" death, Dairine stumbles across information on Time Lords and recognizes The Man in the Bar. She decides to go find him.

Best Friends, Not Forgotten by indy1776
Rating: G
Word count: 1749

52. Doctor Who Crossover: Carmela takes lunch/tea/whatever with a time traveling alien.

Snack Time by phoenix_laugh
Rating: G
Word Count: 1860
Summary: Carmela spends a pleasant half-hour talking over a snack with a stranger.