The Avatar_500 Jump Start Posting And Comments Meme

[attackfish]

Alright, I'm unwilling to let avatar_500 go without a fight, so I am going to incentivize participation.  Write and post a fic for Round 65 - Air, and I'll fill a drabble request of yours.  Comment on all of the fics in the round (everybody said they wanted more comments), and at the end of the round, link me to all of the comments and I'll fill a request for you.  Do both, and I will fulfill three requests for commentfic.

The rules for posting to avatar_500 can be found here.

You don't have to belong to avatar_500 or have ever participated in it before to earn a request for commenting, and if you do want to join to post a fic for the round, all you have to do is click the "join the community" button, and you're in, easy.

About which I will not write (so don't request):

Ty Zula
NC-17
Incest
Ships where one party is much older or younger than the other(s)
Rape
Other people's OCs

Other than that, everything is fair game.

The deadline to post fic is Saturday December 1st at 11:00 PM EST.  The deadline to post comments is  Saturday December 8th at 11:00 PM EST.

Fics in The Round So Far:

Marking Boundaries by attackfish
The Need to be Seen by lalunatique
Playtime at Air Temple Island by wolfs_lament 
What Are the Odds? by c3childs
Wrong by chordatesrock
Four Element - Air- Third Stanza byclockwerkchaos
How Tenzin Met Pema by lavanyasix


Fills:

Forwolfs_lament:
   For a story: Hufflepuff Zuko, Secret Tunnel

For chordatesrock:
   For a story: Holding This Breath: the Aftermath of Kidnapping Aang
   For commenting on everyone's fics: Quiet Shadowed Places: the Cooler
   Bonus: Zuko/Toph, all grown up and surviving state dinners

For lalunatique:
   For commenting on everyone's fics: Ty Lee and Suki - Sake

For somariel:
   For commenting on everyone's fics: The Grand Lotus puts out a call

For: c3childs:
   For a story: Hama - Katara wasn't her first pupil  *Warning for violence and death*
   For commenting on everyone's fics: Amon - the vigilante of Republic City
   Bonus:  Yakone - he owns Republic City

For lavanyasix:
   For a story: Lin Realizes Toph is a dirty cop
   For commenting on everyone's fics: Pre-series - Korra encounters prejudice due to being half Northern and half Southern
   Bonus:  Ozai marries his son off into an insultingly low-ranked colonial noble family. Zuko/Kori

Comments

For Stories

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

Comment here with a link to the avatar_500 post for your story and a prompt/request for me to answer.

For Comments

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

Post here with the links for each of the comments you've posted to the stories in this round, and a prompt/request for me to answer.

For Bonus Fills

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

After you have qualified for and requested fics for writing a story and commending on all of the other stories, comment here with another prompt/fic for me to answer.

[lalunatique.livejournal.com]

I have a separate question: What's your policy on reposting? I have a 300-word story (http://avatar-contest.livejournal.com/161059.html) posted to another contest and I think it fits this prompt. I thought about doing a new story for this prompt but I can't think of anything more interesting than what I already did.

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

Ordinarily, I would say that you would have had to have posted it after the beginning of round 65, but given how desperate we are right now for fills, I am willing to make an exception. But you have to either link to your journal entry, or post it to the community. No linking to the post on the other community.

[lalunatique.livejournal.com]

Cool, thanks! I'll post this evening, it'll be a way to fill the entry quota for this round. And I won't put in a commentfic request for this one, just for the comments I'll make to other entries.

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

Okay. As soon as you post it, I'll add it to the list to get comments.

Re: For Comments

[lalunatique.livejournal.com]

Placeholder post before deadline, will comment and edit add more links if new entries come in.

For Marking Boundaries (http://attackfish.livejournal.com/111425.html?thread=1359681#t1359681)

For What Are the Odds? (http://avatar-500.livejournal.com/225572.html?thread=710436#t710436)

For Playtime at Air Temple Island (http://wolfs-lament.livejournal.com/790.html?thread=534#t534)

Request: I'm thinking Ty Lee/Suki with the prompt "sake" (the drink), though I might change my mind before the deadline. The additional challenge is to NOT to make the characters all giggly and boozy, and for them not to have a drunken ill-advised romp (though I'm fine with sex per se). Can be gen, though I have a slight preference for slash.

Re: For Comments

[chordatesrock.livejournal.com]

My comment on The Need to Be Seen (http://lalunatique.livejournal.com/28869.html?thread=225221#t225221)

My comment on Marking Boundaries (http://attackfish.livejournal.com/111425.html?thread=1367105#t1367105)

My comment on Playtime at Air Temple Island (http://wolfs-lament.livejournal.com/790.html?thread=3094#t3094)

My comment on What are the Odds? (http://avatar-500.livejournal.com/225572.html?thread=712740#t712740)

If someone posts another fill after this, do I have to post another comment? And if I post a fill, do I need to comment on it? Are AUs allowed for this challenge? And will you do this again next time?

My request is for the Quiet Shadowed Places verse, whichever of the following appeals to you most:
1. Crossroads of Destiny
2. The initial meeting of Zuko and Aang at the South Pole or something from that first episode
3. If it happens in QSPverse, then the episodes set on the Rock; otherwise, whatever was happening at that time instead
4. Going and learning from the dragons

(ETA: Oh, and I can't read your format guidelines. LJ gives me an error message.)

Re: For Comments

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

Sorry it took me this long to answer. I had to get to an actual computer instead of my cell phone, so I could send you links. The rules and format guidelines for posting an entry to an avatar 500 round can be found here: http://avatar-500.livejournal.com/profile . Yes you do have to post comments to any new fills for this round, and post links to them here.

Some of those requests of yours, I've actually filled for other people.

First episode Zuko and Sokka meeting at the South Pole (Aang and Zuko's meeting is pretty much identical to canon): http://attackfish.livejournal.com/65620.html?thread=692052#t692052

Firebending Masters: http://attackfish.livejournal.com/65620.html?thread=665428#t665428

Re: For Comments

[chordatesrock.livejournal.com]

It's like Christmas came early, except that I still get to have Christmas next month! :) I guess you'll pick from 1 and 3 then?

Re: For Stories

[chordatesrock.livejournal.com]

Wrong by chordatesrock, for avatar-500 prompt #65. (http://avatar-500.livejournal.com/226185.html)

That horrible universe where the Northern Water Tribe captured Zuko: what ever happened with his attempt to kidnap Aang?

Re: For Bonus Fills

[chordatesrock.livejournal.com]

Kindle the Wind: anything at all.

Re: For Bonus Fills

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

The Kindle the Wind Meme is still open, indefinitely, so you should probably ask something else here and think of some prompts for KtW and ask them on that meme. I plan to do a lot more fills for that as soon as I finish this one %&$# White Collar novella that keeps getting longer every time I look at it.

Re: For Bonus Fills

[chordatesrock.livejournal.com]

...Now it's like Christmas AND my birthday.

Okay, something (and I don't care how you make it work) involving Firelord Azula or (unless it runs afoul of your age difference rule) Zuko/Toph, whichever you prefer.

Re: For Comments

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

I'm about to make Christmas even better then, because I've also got Zuko finding out he's blind: http://attackfish.livejournal.com/65620.html?thread=697684#t697684 Zuko teaching Aang at the Western Air Temple: http://attackfish.livejournal.com/69433.html?thread=758841#t758841 and Zuko and Azula's Agni Kai: http://attackfish.livejournal.com/65620.html?thread=666196#t666196

Yes. I have Plans for #3.

Re: For Stories

[wolfs-lament.livejournal.com]

Playtime at Air Temple Island (http://avatar-500.livejournal.com/225470.html)

Can I request Hufflepuff Zuko? Toph and Zuko in an unintentional adventure, or coming back to the house dorm after Toph has lost a bunch of points and Zuko getting caught up in it.

Secret Tunnel!

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

Hufflepuff Zuko is always request-able! This takes place in their fourth year.

~*~

"Well I didn't know they kept an army of animated suits of armor down there." Toph folded her arms and smirked. "Not my fault."

Zuko scowled back at her which she was totally oblivious to. "I don't think anybody else knew either, but most people know better than to go of running down every secret tunnel they come across!"

Toph set her jaw and sat down on the bench, arms still folded. "You didn't have to come."

"Yes I did, you dragged me in with you."

"You could have climbed out again." She shrugged, grinning and spreading her arms wide. "It was only a few feet."

Zuko had seen the look on her face, when the stairstep had vanished, and she had stepped down onto thin air, when she had grabbed his arm reflexively and held onto him as she fell. "Just help me get these seedbeds manured."

She grabbed the spare trowel and pulled it out of the manure with a nice, heavy load. "Admit it, you had fun."

Zuko's good eye bulged. "No I didn't, we had to run for our lives!"

"See?" said Toph triumphantly. "Fun."

"Ugh," Zuko replied. He was on his hands and knees, spreading manure in a greenhouse on a Saturday morning. He didn't want to deal with it.

"Personally, I don't know why they gave us detention," Toph said innocently, blinking her eyes. "They shouldn't leave vanishing staircases like that over tunnels that poor helpless little blind girls like me could have fallen into."

"Give it a rest," he groaned. "Nobody buys that anymore." Except for Zuko, especially when he knew he shouldn't. And there she was, saying the same thing Longbottom and Smith had said to him, about how he didn't have to go with her, and he stood there, unable to tell them yes, yes he did, because Toph was going down that tunnel, and what would she do without him if there was something in the tunnel with her. And she had, needed him, hadn't she? "You lost us a hundred points."

"Hey, I lost us fifty. You lost us the other fifty." She grinned again, wild, and carefree, and unafraid. "Anyway, they should be glad we found those suits of armor before some first year did."

Zuko picked up another trowel full of manure and spread it over the bed. "Most first years aren't stupid enough to poke something they find down a dark corridor with their wand."

The manure hit him right between the shoulder blades.

"You've got to be kidding me," he yelped, grabbing a handful of manure to throw back at her.

Now I have that song stuck in my head...

[wolfs-lament.livejournal.com]

Yay, Toph and Zuko antics! Thank you!

Hope they don't lose extra points for throwing manure around. Why do I have a feeling Hufflepuff don't do very well in the inter-house competition (I've forgotten what the overall competition is called)?

So is Smith their house master, or does he just take perverse pleasure in dealing out negative house points to Zuko?

Zuko had seen the look on her face, when the stairstep had vanished, and she had stepped down onto thin air, when she had grabbed his arm reflexively and held onto him as she fell. I love this bit so much! Toph's talking tough after the fact and Zuko's not going to call her out on it.

I think this has been addressed before, but are all the Gaang and the Dangerous Ladies in the same year?

Through the mountains, secret secret secret tunnel!

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

They do. And they have led every house but their own to victory at least once.

Smith is their head of house, but he doesn't really take perverse pleasure in taking points from Zuko, so much as he bullies everybody except his favorites, and he's convinced Zuko's no good.

Part of what I love so much about writing this verse is just Toph and Zuko as besties. The dynamics there are wonderful.

Yes, the Gaang and the Dangerous Ladies are all in the same year, just to make things easier on me. The crew of war orphans, however, are more spread out.

Re: For Comments

[chordatesrock.livejournal.com]

My comment on How Tenzin Met Pema (http://avatar-500.livejournal.com/227534.html?view=714958#t714958)

My comment on Four Elements - Air - Third Stanza (http://avatar-500.livejournal.com/226680.html?thread=714616#t714616)

Quiet Shadowed Places - The Cooler

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

Zuko breathed out a thin stream of flame that curled like ash in the freezing air. In front of him, the fire glowed on his senses, spinning and spiraling until it touched the boundaries of his prison. He felt it lapping at the wall, fluttering against it like a living thing, or like a piece of himself, and he held onto it.

His breath flew out of him in a rush and coated the walls in a wave of fire, seeking, mapping, bright in the way he could almost see it. It flickered and danced up the walls, finding the ridges and bumps of the bolts he had to unfasten, and then climbed higher, to the cooler's flat ceiling before he let them dissipate, leaving the tiny room ice cold again.

And he held that picture in his mind, of what the room had to look like, and what it had looked like to him under his fire, but without the fire, it felt suddenly suffocatingly small, and dark, and very, very cold.

He sighed and grabbed the wrench Sokka had passed to him. The heat from the other boy's hands had long since vanished, and Zuko's own hands stung as he held it. He braced himself against the wall and bit off a curse at the cold that raced into him from that tiny point of contact. But he had a job to do. He wasn't just in there to shiver away until the guards decided he had been punished enough. He had put himself in there. This was his choice, and by his will. He left his hand against the wall, and let heat roll down it, and loosened bolt after bolt until the icy wall itself grew warm under his hands and lit up in his senses again.

Zuko/Toph

[attackfish.livejournal.com]

The age rule is really about characters who are old enough to be other characters' parents. I'm quite fond of Toko, though I age them up some.

~*~

The floor tiles of the banquet hall rose up to close around his boots. "Not so fast!"

"What?" Zuko shouted, whirling around and trying instinctively to pivot his feet, and listed dangerously sideways before he managed to right himself.

Tough brought her hands down, and the floor tiles shrank back into their normal flat surface, and marched forward to poke her finger into his ribs. "You might be the big, fancy Firelord back home, but this is my city."

Zuko stared, and blinked, and stood there for a moment. "I'm going to tell Sokka you said that."

"That this is my city? Good. Tell Councilman Sokka-" She stuck her nose in the air as she said their friend's title as mock-grandly as she could manage. "-Whose city this is. He needs all the reminders he can get."

He sighed. "Sure, Toph, now excuse me, but I'm going to sit down and-"

"Oh no you don't." Toph poked him again, harder. "This banquet has assigned seating, and you are nowhere near your seat."

Zuko glanced down at the card with his name on it next to the seat he was about to take. "Uh..."

Toph put her hands on his back and started pushing him. "You're sitting over there, with me, and a bunch of..." She sneered, "Prominent business owners."

"I'm sitting here with the ambassador from the Northern Water Tribe so that we can discuss tariffs while pretending we've never held a meeting."

"You will not leave me alone with these people, because I will hit somebody, and then I'll have to arrest myself," she hissed.

He gave in and started walking in the direction she wanted him to. "I don't remember you ever being this concerned with the rules before."

"I am when I make them."

Zuko rolled his eyes. "Figures."

Toph stepped forward to stan beside him and lowered her voice. "I'm naked under my armor."

Zuko did his best to glare at her. "And how does that feel?"

"Kind of sticky." She shrugged. "I'm sweating like crazy in here."

"That's great." Zuko nodded slowly, unsure of what to say to that. "Really sexy. Uh, I'll just-"

She elbowed him in the ribs. "Are you coming back to my place tonight, or not?"

"Uh, yeah, I guess." He closed his eyes, and opened them again.

"Wow, Zuko, you're so decisive," she said with a smirk. "You must be unbeatable at the bargaining table."

"Very funny."

She grabbed his arm and slung her own around it. "So why do you sighted people find this whole naked-under-my-whatever thing sexy anyway? It's not like you can see any more than you usually can."

"I'm really not sure." Zuko scratched his head. "But we can try to figure it out tonight, if you want."

"Of course I do. That's why I asked you to come over. Moron, what would you do without me?"

"You know, Toph, I really don't know." He said softly, then smiled. "But a really important Republic City official told me I'm here tonight to keep you from getting yourself arrested."

She squeezed his arm. "Just so you know, if you fail, you have to break me out of prison."

He squeezed back. "Deal."

Re: Quiet Shadowed Places - The Cooler

[chordatesrock.livejournal.com]

This reminds me strongly of canon, in that it seems they're using approximately the same plan and Zuko seems to feel about the same way about it. Interesting.

Re: Zuko/Toph

[chordatesrock.livejournal.com]

What will Zuko say to the Water Tribe ambassador, I wonder? I like this a lot. It's very funny and Toph is very... Toph. Thank you. :)