olymfics

[staygame]

olymfics 2019: someday, i'll show you the bullet i had for you (ikon, hanbin/jinhwan / song: shoot me by day6)

so i was asked to be a pinch hitter for this round and i think 80% of the reason i agreed to do it was the song, because "shoot me" is pretty straightforward and easy to interpret.

i knew from the pre-chorus lyrics (the way we talk to each other gets harsher and harsher) that i wanted to write about a good relationship going sour. i was initially hesitant to write hanbin/jinhwan because i had plans to write a long hanbin fic that wouldn't quite fit this prompt but would be too similar to my olymfics idea to write in the future. i briefly contemplated a seungjun/hyojin fic (not bc i think they have a bad relationship or anything, but it fit with the idea of a relationship crashing and burning after some time) before settling on the binhwan idea.

my main sources of inspiration were: the lyrics (your eyes are getting colder / the mood is getting heavier / i'm just quietly sitting here / trying to catch my breath), the postscript at the end of the mv (vicious words hurt like a bullet), the mv itself, and the vibe of the supplementary prompts. i knew that based on these things i wanted a confrontation scene that occurred in front of an audience (like the mv), with someone saying something downright cruel. it's been two years since i wrote this fic but i am pretty sure i started with the idea of a falling out and then expanded from there.

with the idea of a past falling out and present reconciliation, i decided to alternate between past and present. this is a cheat—it means you can skip any parts of the timeline you don't feel like writing, but i also like writing non-linear fics or anything that plays with format like adding epistolary elements.

the very first thing i wrote for this fic was a random line about someone mistaking a picture of hanbyul for hanbin's daughter.

this is still one of my favorite fics i've written. i like this opening scene, i like the scenes of hanbin and jinhwan working together, i like my oc, i mostly like the flow, i like the sex scene. i think the arguments i write tend to both ramp up and fizzle out quickly, which is a shame when the climax of the fic is a fight but eh, still a good effort overall.

olymfics 2021: someone has to leave first (fromis_9, saerom & hayoung / song: parting by onewe)

i signed up for this one on my own and even though "parting" was one of my top choices, when i was assigned it i had a small breakdown. see, i kind of really wanted to write boy group fic (bc it has literally been years since i produced any bg fic) and i couldn't really come up with any ideas for my ptg or onf ships that felt right for "parting". i'm not into angst for the sake of angst, so i didn't want to force it. instead, i kept coming back to the idea of the fromis_9 rigging scandal.

main sources of inspiration: lyrics (when the repeated clash between you and me winds down / you already turned your back on me / so before this asteroid hits the earth in a day / i'll tell you the things i haven't told you & when this small asteroid goes back in time and sees you / on that day, today and tomorrow / i'll tell you my true feelings without a lie) with this in mind, i thought of what would lead a character to feeling betrayed and this led me to imagining what it would be like if the person you felt the closest to was the one who led to your group disbanding.

love that i've written two harom fics so far without actually rly shipping harom myself but it felt like the best option for this scenario. there are definitely some fics i write because i want to write a specific pairing or dynamic, and some fics i've written because i want to portray a specific setup and i think then about who would work in it. this one was one of those.

i knew that i wanted to write a fic where the past alternates with the present, but i didn't want to do it the same way i did my other olymfics. the idea of the numbering came to me and it felt like it worked in relation to the lyric about going back in time and i liked that with the scenes i picked out, the past and the present kind of align in the last two scenes. the only reason there are nine scenes is for fromis_9, duh. here's a look at what my outline looked like.

other ties to the prompts: the stargazing scene and folklore tie-in were a reference to the lyrics, the brief bit where saerom is being interviewed by the staff writer is a reference to the supplementary prompt image with the abandoned chair.

it may not have come across effectively, but i was also inspired by this specific conversation about taylor swift i saw earlier this yr that said that she's the kind of straight girl who gets into really intense friendships with women that have the same emotional intensity as romantic relationships without the physical intimacy and when they fall apart, it ends the same as a breakup with a partner. i wanted saerom to feel that way about hayoung, but it turns out that's a level of ambiguity i don't think i'm equipped to pull off tbh!