Aurora's Sundry Notes

I finally got around to posting my torchwood_fest fic on AO3, so let me share it here as well.

Taste of Spice (2782 words) by AuroraCloud
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Torchwood
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones
Characters: Jack Harkness, Ianto Jones
Additional Tags: Season/Series 01, Angst, cakes, POV Ianto Jones, Angst with a Happy Ending
Summary: On a dark December evening, Ianto Jones isn't feeling exactly cheerful, and his relationship with Jack is just confusing. Still, there can be unexpected benefits to spicy cakes.


My third Jack/Ianto fic, and my third Torchwood-only fic (ie. not Doctor Who crossover), and also the one I am the happiest with to date. Late Series 1 Jack/Ianto is interesting to explore, because their relationship is, as I see it, still in a very complicated no-man's-land, they've got issues, and it's wonderful to try to work out all that and figure how it might go and how they might react to this or that. And generally, more I write these two, the more I enjoy exploring them. Also, dear shopfront did a wonderful job beta-reading this story for me.

This fic is getting really well received on the archive so far; I'm not used to this many hits, kudos and comments in under 24 hours, not with my fic. Nice!

Dear Rare Pair Fest writer,


Awesome, you’ve offered to write for one of these fandoms and pairings I’m really into! Can’t wait to see what you create! So don’t worry. I’m sure I’ll be thrilled with what I get.

NOW FINISHED UPDATING. SORRY IT TOOK FOREVER. Life just kind of happened and I was too exhausted to string many sensible sentences together. I'm not sure I'm still capable, but I'll do my best to write what I'm going to write here. So this should be the final state of this letter, unless I notice some typos and such I want to fix.

Fic likes: I love femslash, slash, het, and am fine with various polyamorous scenarios for any of these relationships. I love hurt/comfort, adventures, daily life moments and domesticity, angst (but hopefully with a happy/comforting ending), fluff, porn (though preferably so that the sex tells something about the characters), first times, established relationships, kisses, space, history, loyalty, found family, characters coming to accept some previously neglected/repressed part of themselves, canon divergence AUs (various ”what if”s changing some event or element of the canon but still keeping the world basically the same) etc. etc. Really a lot of things, so feel free to let your imagination roam as long as you respect my Do Not Wants / dislikes.

Many of these characters come equipped with teams, friends etc. and I’m very fine with these making an appearance in the story, should it work out for the story. There can be no sex or a little sex or lots of sex, however you like. Any rating from General to really really Explicit is fine.

Do Not Wants/Dislikes: graphic violence, gore and torture, non-con, sexual abuse, character bashing, mpreg, wildly different AUs of the coffee shop / high school / werewolf etc. variety. It depends a bit on the canon how much violence/torture/abuse I can deal with, but generally, please not higher level than the canon. That basically means that in Torchwood I can deal with worse stuff than others, because it comes with the canon. Also, no abuse/rape/consent issues between the requested characters or their canon significant other. Please no 2nd person POV, and in fic 1st person doesn’t work often either unless it’s in diary/epistolary format.

Now onto the pairings and requests. My request in italics and any additions in regular font. If I'm not adding much to the actual request, doesn't mean I care less about that pairing, just that I actually managed to say what I wanted before the sign-ups closed.

( Wayfarers (Becky Chambers) - Rosemary/Sissix )

( Parasol Protectorate - Genevieve Lefoux / Alexia Tarabotti  )

These books have been one of my favourite fun-and-fluffy-yet-smart with strong women and LGBT rep books for the past years. I love that unlike most steampunk I can find, it's not incredibly violent and depressing, yet manages to be more subversive and rebellious than looks on the surface. Alexia and Madame Lefoux are among the most delightful characters in the books (okay, I do adore Biffy and Lyall and Akeldama like any sensible person would) and some of my favourite sf/f ladies. I love that while Alexia is all sorts of kick-ass, she still is a woman of her era and confined by many of the standards of the Victorian ages, because let's face it, we all are affected by the mores of the society we grow up in. And I would absolutely love to see Geneviève make her defy those standards even more than she does. There's this undercurrent of attraction Alexia feels towards her, and the very obvious attraction she feels towards Alexia, and while Alexia and Lord Maccon are my favourite of Gail's het pairings (ie. the only one I do like), I still ship these two more. Feel free to either ignore Lord Maccon, have Alexia break up with him, have him never have entered her life, or have them enjoy a happy open relationship - everything is fine and nothing more preferable than the other.

I haven't yet read Romancing the Inventor, though it's on my to-order list, so might be I will before the stories go live. I'm fine with setting this story any time during the Parasol Protectorate books or after them. One possibility is also setting it during The Custard Protocol or after Imprudence - how would an older Alexia and Geneviève romance after everything else they've been through?


( Torchwood - Jack Harkness / Martha Jones )

( The Count of Monte Cristo - Euǵenie Danglars / Louise d'Armilly )

( Doctor Who / Torchwood - Tenth Doctor / Ianto Jones )

So, I've been meaning to write my main thoughts about Torchwood S1 for quite long already, but it got a bit long and I had trouble focusing to finish it. So by now I've also rewatched Doctor Who S3 (writing up my thoughts on the last few episodes might take a while, too) and started Torchwood S2. But I'll keep those separate from this post. Most of these thoughts were written before I started watching S2, so I'm just focusing on S1 now. Spoilers ahead, obviously. Kind of long.


( Torchwood S1 ramblings ahead )