Hurt/Comfort Exchange 2020

[narya_flame]

Dear Writer,

Hi! Thank you for making a gift for me, and for reading my letter. I do a lot of swaps and hurt/comfort is always high on my “yes please!” list, so I'm excited to see it get an exchange all to itself.

I haven't given prompts for each individual tag or this letter would be longer than my eventual fic, though I've included a few thoughts for each character group as inspiration. These are totally optional so please go in a different direction if that's what your story wants you to do – and don't read anything into the length of prompts and whether I've requested a certain fandom or group of characters before. If it's in my signup, I definitely want it!

Please note that these are all fic requests – I'm perfectly OK reading about some things that are likely to squick me out if I see them drawn or painted, such as broken bones.

 

General Likes

 

• Complex character dynamics
• Conflicting motivations
• Found families/families of choice
• Grief and tragedy
• Hope, redemption and reconciliation
• In-world myths and legends
• Unusual perspectives, minor characters, original characters and textual ghosts
• Unreliable narrators and quirky narrative structures – for example, epistolary, fragmented narratives, stories told through found documents, framing devices, stories told out of chronological order
• Worldbuilding details
• Objects and places with special significance – a “sense of history”
• Ghosts, literal and metaphorical
• Food, drink and celebration
• Battle scenes and/or aftermath
• Storytelling, riddles and poetry
• Candlelight
• Roaring fires
• Libraries, archives and other knowledge repositories
• Fusions of science and magic
• Shining a light into places canon doesn't show us, or barely touches on – going off the edge of the map
• Suggestion and implication, whether this is hints of backstory, a figure hiding in the shadows, or a slightly ambiguous ending – I love it when my imagination can get to work filling in the gaps

 

Relationship Likes

 

• Developing friendships and budding romances
• Banter and teasing
• Bedsharing; huddling for warmth
• “The little things” - light brushes with fingertips, smiles across a room...
• Forehead kisses
• Fierce loyalty and devotion, to the point of one character doing something incredibly stupid to help or save somebody they love
• Hurt/comfort (of course – and feel free to go heavy on the hurt, e.g. slow recovery from a serious illness or injury)
• Situational relationships – enemies having to work together, or people who wouldn't normally be drawn to each other forming a bond through circumstance
• Emotional reunions after long separations
• Friendship developing into romance
• Enemies/rivals to lovers/friends
• Tempestuous, complex or unhealthy relationships; passionate encounters between individuals who would be terrible together long term, but can't resist each other in the here and now
• Quiet moments between people who care about each other, especially during or after huge events shaking their world

 

Smut Likes

 

No obligation at all here – write whatever you're comfortable with.

 

• Breath play
• Blood play
• Knifeplay
• Biting and scratching
• Helplessness
• Bathing
• Hair brushing/washing/braiding
• Sex exploring power dynamics and/or deeply informed by characters' history together
• Neck kissing
• “Thank god you're alive” sex; sex after serious injury
• Gags; blindfolds; light bondage
• Aftercare
• Sensation play
• Piercings
• Differing experience levels
• Enthusiastic consent
• Reading erotic literature together
• Orgasm delay/denial

 

Darker Stuff

 

If your muse takes you down a more disturbing path, I'm fine with that. I do appreciate stories and artwork that deal with more difficult themes, although as with the smutty stuff, there's no expectation to go here if you don't want to.
 

 

• Hurt without comfort, including terminal illness or fatal injury (possibly not that relevant here as the focus for this exchange is hurt WITH comfort, but feel free to include it as background or a secondary plot if you like)
• Mental illness, including depression and suicidal thoughts
• Substance abuse
• Death and grief
• Torture
• Psychological manipulation and abuse
• Unhealthy relationships/relationships with troubling dynamics, including obsession, jealousy and co-dependency
• Possession
• Dark magic and curses
• Corruption and decay
• Sentient nature
• Resurrection and necromancy
• Being trapped in a small dark space, possibly with something terrifying lurking nearby
• Ghost and horror stories

DNWs

 

• AU that significantly alters the characters or worldbuilding, or takes the characters out of their canon setting (although canon divergence is more than welcome, and actively encouraged in the case of the Avengers request!)
• Character bashing
• Childbirth, pregnancy (except a passing mention) and menstruation
• Crackfic
• Explicitly described rape/noncon
• Focus on bodily functions and fluids (blood from injuries is OK)
• Unrequested kinks
• Vomiting, flatulence, burping or other stomach upset-related issues

 

Requests

 

The Avengers (Marvel Movies)

 

Clint Barton/Laura Barton/Natasha Romanoff/Loki (hurt Loki)

 

Tags - Accept Injury to Protect Someone; Apocalypse; Blaming Themself for the Other Character Being Injured; Bonding Over Shared Trauma; Came back from dead the same but traumatized by having died + the circumstances of their death; Character is temporarily blinded and is taken care of by partner(s)/family; Character Lies About What They Remember; Emotional Hurt/Comfort; Flashbacks; Grief; Grief/Mourning; Guilt; Magical Exhaustion; Nightmares; Rebuilding Relationship After Major Betrayal; Regret; Sharing a Bed; Slow Recovery

 

My favourite messy superhero found family/polymuddle. I have a fandom specific DNW of permanent character deaths for this request, including Nat and Loki's canonical fates from Endgame and Infinity War – I am completely fine with you dealing with the fallout of the “snap”, I think there are some fascinating worldbuilding and character development possibilities there, but please either don't have Nat and Loki die at all, or make their deaths somehow reversible.

Alternatively, feel free to write this as a pre-Infinity War AU – in which case, how did this relationship setup happen? What's Loki up to (he's always up to something) and whose side is he on? I love Wanda so feel free to include her for extra magical goodness and found family vibes (though if you do this I'd prefer she wasn't shipped with any of the tagged characters, particularly not Clint or Laura).

 

The Forgotten Realms

 

Original Drow Character & Original Human Character (hurt Drow)

 

Tags – Amnesia; Amputation; Bilingual/Second language speaker too overwhelmed by pain/fever/emotion to keep up shared language; Bleeding through the Bandages; Blood Loss; Broken Bones; Character Lies About What They Remember; Character's Past Trauma Is Revealed Against Their Will; Cleaning/treating wounds; Collapsing from exhaustion; Concussion; Exhaustion; Flashbacks; Hair matted with blood; Head Injury; Injured/sick in the wilderness; Permanent Injury; Protectiveness; Rescue; Scars; Slow Recovery

 

I fell in love with the Forgotten Realms setting when I started DMing a 5e campaign. I'm weirdly fascinated by the drow and their underground kingdom; there are some really rich lore and worldbuilding details to mine there, if you're so inclined. I'm also interested in the dynamics of this relationship – how do the characters meet, and how do they react to each other? Maybe the human was a prisoner in Menzoberranzan, the drow OC somehow grew fond of them, and was hurt in an attempt to help them escape? Or maybe the human found the drow in the wilderness and took pity on them?

I'd be especially interested in this not being an easy relationship to start off with, with an element of wariness and second-guessing. No strong preferences on gender for either character, and I don't mind where the human OC is from, so let your imagination run wild.

 

The Hobbit (Jackson Movies)

 

Meludir/Original Character (hurt OC)

 

Tags - A accidentally injures B; Bathing Together; Belligerent Patient; Broken Bones; Burn Injuries/Scars; Captured; Emotional Hurt/Comfort; Grief; Grief/Mourning; Nightmares; Physically Injured Character Comforting Emotionally Distressed Character; Physically Injured Character Giving Medical Instructions to Save Their Own Life; Recovering from the loss of a loved one

 

Ah, Meludir...I have a weakness for one-line wonders and walk-ons. He has such a sweet face and he seems to invite being protected and looked after, but for this exchange, it would be nice to see him taking care of someone else. I don't have any specific prompts beyond what I've pulled out of the tag set, and I have no strong preferences about the OC, so pick your favourite idea from the tags and have fun!

 

The Silmarillion – J. R. R. Tolkien

 

Anairë/Eärwen/Finarfin (hurt Finarfin)

 

Tags - Emotional Breakdown; Emotional Hurt/Comfort; Exhaustion; Grief; Grief/Mourning; Guilt; Nightmares; Regret

 

In my head I'm picturing this as something that happened in the aftermath of the Darkening, but if your idea is different then by all means run with it; I've never read a fic with this OT3 and I would love anything about them!

 

Middle-earth – J. R. R. Tolkien

 

Amroth (Lord of the Rings - Tolkien) & Original Avari Character (Silmarillion) (hurt Amroth)

 

Tags – Amnesia; Amputation; Believing Others Consider Them An Inferior Substitute for Someone Else; Broken Bones; Canonically Dead Character Survives; Character's Past Trauma Is Revealed Against Their Will; Collapsing from exhaustion; Concussion; Delirium; Disfiguring Scars; Drowning; Exhaustion; Flashbacks; Forehead Kisses; Hair matted with blood; Head Injury; Hypothermia; Nightmares; Permanent Injury; Shoulder Injuries; Slow Recovery

 

I'd envisaged this as a version of events where Amroth lives, though probably with some serious injuries and trauma. It's entirely up to you whether you'd like to give him a happy ending and let him find his way back to Nimrodel, or whether fate has something else in store for him.