Fandom Snowflake Challenge Day 3

In your own space, post a rec for at least three fanworks that you did not create. Leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so. See if you can rec fanworks that are less likely to be praised: tiny fandoms, rare pairings, fanworks other than stories, lesser-known kinks or tropes. Find fanworks that have few to no comments, or creators new to a particular fandom who maybe aren't well known or appreciated. Appreciate them.

They all turned out to be Giles/Ethan. I did not plan that. Honestly.

Indri's In the Morning of the Magicians covers how Giles and Ethan first met and the Eyghon business that got Randall killed. This story is just brilliant. First, for all that Rupert blames Ethan, they never would have raised Eyghon if both of them hadn't been there. Both Rupert and Ethan were essential in that causal chain, which I just find too amusing. It is so awesome when Rupert is shocked that Deidre blames him as much as she does Ethan. Second, Rupert is so bourgeois. He's not embracing the counter-cultural lifestyle; he's running away from home. Again, amusing and delightful. Third, they are all so wounded by this at the end, but it's Ethan's wounding ... Okay, I don't want to say Ethan's wounding is awesome or positive but this story explains why he's become such an isolated person. I adore this story for that. Yes, I did recently re-read this story and remind myself how awesome it is!

Trekker's Tarnished. Giles, after leaving Buffy for her own good, returns to Bath where he runs into Ethan. This story runs through Season 7 and past it, bringing the two of them together as a couple. It's very believable. SPOILER: Rupert doesn't completely trust Ethan until he thinks he's lost him for good.

Wolfling and Magpie's Of Old Mystics. Giles, head of the Council after season 7, rescues Ethan from an Initiative cell. They learn that they have a destiny and an apocalypse of their own. The previous two stories (Indri's and Trekker's) I first read this past year, actually only a few months ago, but this story has been one of my go-to stories for years now.

And since I've been rec'cing so much Giles/Ethan, KateKat1010 has a Giles/Ethan pic that makes me want to learn how to decorate my LJ page so I can put it up there. Note: there are other good images here, but only one Giles/Ethan. ;-)

5 stories I'm not posting to BtVS Top 5

I'm an idiot. My Toshiba - old computer, way to slow to play with now - has all my links for BtVS Top 5. Since I can't access those I wandered around aimlessly looking for new (to me) stories to link, not thinking until I went to post then that they needed to have been written in 2013. So Top Five stories I mostly stumbled across today and was going to post to BtVS Top Five.

1) Must Not Be Rushed by TheFoxinator. Written for SB Fags End Halloween challenge so Spike/Buffy.
There’s a dragon in the Hyperion lobby.

Well, there’s a dragon head in the Hyperion lobby. The rest of the dragon is curled up in the little garden out back.

2) Arcana by kindkit. Ethan in the hands of the Initiative.
It doesn't need magic to make a man disappear.

Ethan's disappearing, little by little, over days he can't track since there's no way to mark them on the walls. The walls are white, smooth, cold, and neither blood nor shit will stick to them. The plastic spoon from his meals won't leave a scratch.

3) January by kindkit. Ethan/OMC, Ethan/Giles.
Warnings: Nonconsensual sex, violence, sadism, magical badness.
The young man on the bed was struggling desperately against the manacles. His wrists and ankles would bruise from the unpadded steel. Ethan pictured blood-dark rings on that tanned young skin, encircling those strong bones. He looked the man over carefully, weighing possibilities, seeing a blank page ready to be marked. To be written upon. The story Ethan would write was old and not at all edifying, the grimmest of fairy tales. One nobody's granny ever told. A tale in which everyone was devoured, even the big bad wolf.

4) Fenrisulfr by antennapedia. Dawn/Ethan
Warning: I'm not sure how young Dawn is. She's finished high-school a year early which would then make this sex with an underaged girl.

Dawn put the book into her backpack and ran a hand over her hair. She looked up over the door as she went to leave, and saw another bas-relief of Janus. Bearded man, androgynous youth. God of gateways. Tacked up next to the door was a hand-lettered card. Help wanted. Dawn stopped, and yielded to impulse. She turned and walked over to the counter.

"I see you're looking for help," she said, directly, meeting the man's eyes. "I'm available, and I know about books. I'd like to fill out an application."

"Ah. Yes. I'm not sure you're, er, entirely qualified."

"Unqualified to do what? To run a cash register? Make espresso? Handle selling whatever's in the back room to your non-human customers?"

5) Broken English by Estephia. Giles/Ethan.
Giles exhales. His heart is racing. He feels like he’s burning up, in spite of the car’s AC. He stares at his whitening knuckles for several seconds until he realizes he’s gripping the steering wheel like a madman. Loosening his grip, Giles slowly turns his head to look at the apparition. A very solid apparition, for the man raps against the passenger window, producing a very real, solid sound that sends another jolt through Giles’s racing heart.

Giles takes a deep breath. At the push of a button, the window slides down.

“Knock, knock,” Ethan says, leaning forward to peer into the car. “Who’s there?”

“Ethan.” Giles’s voice is flat.

“The one and only.” Ethan is positively preening.

So, the image that has been imprinted on Giles’s brain ever since he saw the footage from Buffy’s comlink, the image of Ethan’s blood and brain splattered all over the prison cell wall - fake, nothing more. Another lie. He should have known. Giles grimaces at his own naivety. “Well, you certainly didn’t stay dead long.”