#blind dates oc fest 2024

[latibvles]

“a real tough cookie with the whiskey breath.”

oh blind dates oc fest my beloved how i missed you. to the surprise of no one, because i cannot be quiet about anything ever : a MOTA OC this time around. i'm sure this bar probably has a name to be found somewhere on the internet, but until I come across it [ big cartoony shrug ]. anyways, here's Genevieve Laurent, or Gen, if you're friendly. @blind-dates-fest ♡

Tom’s is only a fifteen minute bike ride away. The pay is good, she gets to keep all her tips, and her boss, for lack of a better term — downright adores her.

That’s never been the reason why she’s stuck with it all this time, though. There were better paying jobs in equal distance, and if she really, really wanted to, she thinks she’d do a pretty okay job packing parachutes or something of a similar vein. Respectable work, her mother would call it, which was secret code for: work that will keep you out of trouble, and possibly off the street before midnight. But that was really what it came down to: whether Genevieve wanted to do it. And for all the respect she had for those women, she knew that wasn’t the thing that called to her — not like it did to Claire, who was now off in London with the best and brightest, working in the Foreign Office.

Whatever that meant.

Much more glamorous than Genevieve’s own station, and she’s fairly certain none of their mother’s letters are imploring Claire to quit anytime soon. She was almost apologetic, in a way, that she couldn’t entice her family with letters filled with omissions, with work so secret she could hardly speak of it — but the beer wouldn’t pour itself and somebody had to do it after all those hours in flight.

“Thought you were leaving me out to dry tonight, sweetheart,” There’s a solid hand gripping her shoulder and squeezing, and Tom gives her a smile that’s all crows feet and genuine appreciation. Of course, the place wasn’t actually called Tom’s — but the sign was so faded that she and the other girls just tended to refer to it by the name of their esteemed publican. Genevieve returns the smile.

“And miss out on all this? Wouldn’t dream of it.” As if to accent her point, there’s a wave of hoots and hollering from the floor beyond the bar — no doubt from a bet won or a game of darts coming to its speedy conclusion. The song of the end of the work day. He gives her shoulder a shake, then lets go.

“Do me a favor and take those whiskeys to the table in the back? I think Elsie’s got caught up out there,” she follows his gaze to one of the other girls on shift —Elsie’s smile is easy and the tray on the table is empty, but she’s chatting up a storm at a table of men in brown uniforms. And Genevieve can’t exactly blame her, because while they knew practically every member of the RAF who came in and out on their days off, Americans were a sight to behold. Which is probably why Tom is sending her to the table in the back, with the hopes that she’ll be speedy.

“Yessir,” Genevieve hums, taking the tray of glasses with little fuss, making her way across the bustling floor with practiced hustle.

It’s not the pay that keeps her here, or the warmth of her boss. Not even the fact that she could do every job in this place, if she had to.

Genevieve had a penchant for poking her nose into places for the thrill of it — and there really was no thrill quite like conversation with people who had time to kill and liquor in their systems.

She recognizes the RAF officer at the table: David Griffiths, who Claire knew better than Genevieve did. She’d laughed when Claire told her he joined the RAF, and as an officer, no less. He’d been meek before the war, to put it lightly — maybe that slate-colored uniform and dark blue tie gave him the confidence he once lacked, she didn’t know. And then a couple regulars from around town. So the one in a brown uniform as opposed to their English blue sticks out like a sore thumb, and her curiosity is piqued in spite of David’s attempt to draw her attention with his smile alone.

“Thought old Tom was keeping you in the back tonight.”

“You know, it’s much easier to simply say you missed me, Griffiths,” she hums, leaning over to set down the tray. “Whiskeys for the table, yeah?” David clears his throat and makes a show of adjusting his cuffs, flaunting the new insignia adorning his sleeve as he had for every promotion prior. Genevieve straightens out, wraps her arm around his shoulder to pick off a stray thread.

“Captain Griffiths, congratulations,” Genevieve acknowledges just for the sake of him, then diverts her attention to look over the table, eyes settling on the new face staring right back at her. His dark hair curls over his forehead, with a straight nose and a pretty pair of lips — the wings on his jacket are catching lamplight. The smile on his face is what’s got her the most curious. “And who’ve you brought to cause trouble in Tom’s respectable place of business?”

The smile grows, the stranger leans back in his seat.

“No trouble over here ma’am, not unless you hate singin’.” His voice is deep and gravelly and, well, very American. His tone goes up at the end of the sentence, like it’s a question she’s meant to answer, and Genevieve wonders if it still counts as a bait when she can recognize it for what it is. She raises her brows, David’s hand curls around her wrist loosely as if to remind her that he’s there.

“Only if it’s bad.”

“Best keep your mouth shut then, Major, wouldn’t want to cause a scene,” around them, the other men chuckle at David’s quip — Genevieve pulls her wrist from his barely-there grasp as the Major raises his glass to his lips, before waving a hand dismissively on the swallow.

“Don’t listen to him, I’m like a canary over here.” He draws out each syllable, his smile only growing. She doesn’t believe him for a second.

“Well, Major, make sure not to shatter any glasses with your tunes and you’ll have soothed all my worries,” He chuckles at that, sitting back in the chair and Genevieve looks him up and down rather shamelessly before patting Griffiths’ shoulder. “Enjoy your evening, boys.”

Genevieve knows the feeling well — that sensation of eyes tracking her every movement as she walks away. She’d call it a sixth sense, the way she can make the distinction between the slighted nature of Griffiths’ staring as opposed to the more welcome lingering look of the Major, who’s name she’d surely get by the end of the night. If Claire were here, she’d probably laugh, then apologize to Griffiths for her little sister’s fleeting attention span, accompanied with some remark about how Genevieve had a penchant for things shiny and new. Genevieve would beg to differ and say it was more like she had a penchant for the things she didn’t understand.

And so what if she liked the staring, and leaving the air more charged than she’d found it?

Regardless of the interaction, the night wears on, and so long as the taps are flowing Genevieve is busy enough to keep from staring at the back table for too long. At some point, they stand up and make their way toward the dartboard (and Elsie with them, who shoots her a wink from across the room that has her laughing and Tom groaning from their spots behind the bar). Luckily, she’s only gone for maybe fifteen minutes — and she comes back with orders for Tom, before scurrying over and leaning forward on the bar.

“Better straighten up over there, Genny,” Elsie leans forward further to tuck one of Genevieve’s stray hairs behind her ear.

“Back from your mission so soon?”

“Well I had to make sure the prize was in place.” Genevieve raises an inquisitive brow.

“And that means..?”

“It means—” Elsie is effectively cut off by another round of hollering, and Genevieve knows the grin on the other girl’s face all too well. Elsie turns around and she follows the girl’s eyes to several things. One, Griffiths walking out of the pub, two, Major Canary laughing as he makes his way over and three, a conglomerate of Irishmen clapping his shoulders and shaking them in congratulations. “Well now we know who the winner is. Good luck!”

Before Genevieve can get a word in, Elsie’s scurrying back over to Tom on the other end of the bar to grab the drinks he’s lined up. She turns her back to the floor, but still hears a heavy exhale as someone takes a seat behind her. Then she tilts her head to look, and makes little attempt to withhold her smile as the dots connect fairly quickly in her head.

“Major Canary,” Genevieve hums in greeting. “Am I getting you anything?”

“Whiskey’s fine,” He looks around, like he’s taking a survey of the room, then turns to rest both elbows on the polished wood as she grabs one of the glasses that’s already dried. “Think you got me in trouble with your boyfriend back there,” he laments with a grin, running his thumb over his bottom lip.

“Who, me?” Genevieve slides the glass along the countertop. “You might have the wrong girl, sir.”

“Oh? What makes you say that?” He takes that tone again — so clearly baiting her and Genevieve is, admittedly, a little too eager to take what he’s giving this time.

“Well for one, I don’t have a boyfriend,” she hums, holding up the pointer finger, and then her middle one, “And two, I’m willing to wager it was the dart game that got you in trouble, Major.” She slides the glass over the countertop, and he takes it. He’s closer now than he was at the table — she can finally make out that his eyes are blue, like the RAF uniforms.

“Yeah? How much are you willing to bet?”

“Well, how much did you earn in your game? Must’ve been a hefty sum for the Captain to walk out like that.” Genevieve leans forward on the bar now, tilting her head as she looks at him, already knowing the answer. His eyes flit over her face and down the length of her neck, following the curve of her shape before the bar cuts off his vantage point, then he goes back to returning her stare. He brings the glass to his lips, then licks off the excess before he opens his mouth again.

“A shot with the pretty girl serving drinks tonight? Pretty priceless if you ask me.”

“Well that’s a line if I’ve ever heard one,” Genevieve remarks with an airy laugh.

“But it made you laugh. Must be doing something right.” He counters, and she laughs again with a roll of her eyes. “See? Just did it again.” Genevieve shakes her head slightly.

“Well if my company’s so priceless why haven’t you asked my name yet? Bragging rights and all that.” It’s hardly the bait of their earlier conversation — but it’s something, and she wonders if he recognizes it for what it is, like she had at the table. He finishes off the glass, pushing it back to her with his fingertips and holding her gaze all-the-while.

“Well my bragging was gonna be making you laugh ‘till your boss throws me out, but I should probably get the name so I know who to ask for next time, right?” She takes his glass, and moves to fill it again — feeling both like the belle of a ball and like one of those wood logs in a fireplace crumbling into charcoals, giving off sparks. Somewhere in the back of her head, Claire is screaming at her to stop dancing so close to cliffsides before she takes a tumble she’ll regret, but right now she doesn’t feel any ground giving way beneath her feet.

“Genevieve. Gen, if you’re friendly.” She hums out, taking her time on his refill with the express purpose of keeping him there a little longer. The laugh he lets out is breathy, almost disbelieving, and she looks back up at him through her lashes. “Your turn, or should I just keep calling you Major Canary?”

“My turn, she says,” he mutters, probably more to himself than her even if she can hear it. She passes the glass back over. “Well if we’re being friendly it’s Bucky. Egan.” He exaggerates it — the word friendly, but Genevieve’s really hanging on the ‘if’. She feels almost like a kid picking apart words to prove her point. She should’ve been a lawyer. ‘If’ meant she had options, and maybe she feels a little prideful; to know she has control of where this thing goes. It’s a rush. The kind she wouldn’t get packing parachutes or up in an office. The kind only another person could give her.

The ground gives a little beneath her feet, but Genevieve is undeterred.

“But I take it you’re aiming for a little more than that, is that right, Bucky?”

The smug grin on his face is as much of an answer as any.

And it excites her down to her bones.

#masters of the air #john egan x ofc #masters of the air oc #mota fic #mota fanfic #mota fanfiction #blind dates oc fest 2024 #. genevieve laurent #...yes there's France lore #I’ve got lady pilots existing in my docs Now but By God Tom’s Girls stole my keys. I just think they’re neat #took a little inspo from a historical fiction book I read for Claire admittedly #shoutout bletchley park codebreakers #this one for all my little sisters with academically gifted big sisters [ raises hand ]

[mercurygray]

Mark your calendars - Blind Dates OC fest 2024

Back for its fourth year, Blind Dates will be running from February 4th to February 10th, 2024!

What is Blind Dates? Blind Dates is a festival/challenge that celebrates creating and writing original characters!

Using a random generator or method of your choice, pick a name for your new character. Then, write a short snippet that introduces them to the fandom property of your choice, and establishes them as a person worth paying attention to. (Bonus points if they play opposite to a canon character you don’t usually write, or are for a fandom you've never written for before. Blind dates for the muse, remember?)

The idea is to be quick, compelling, and efficient with character introduction. There’s no specific word count, but it shouldn’t be more than one or two thousand words. It’s an intro, a taster - something to establish your character and hook the reader into wanting more. And it’s just a project for the week or weekend - it doesn’t need to go anywhere or be a big production, just establish one really, really solid character that the reader can root for.

Last year we had seven different fandoms represented by twelve different characters and I'd love to see that number grow this year!

A full FAQ for the fest is now available here.

#blind dates oc fest 2024 #blind dates oc fest

[basilone]

Fandom: Masters of the Air Written for: @blind-dates-fest as my second 2024 entry! Introducing: Lucy Jones

Bubbles can’t fly like this.

It’s the first thing that pushes past the loop of flying today up in the sky today flying today that has been rampaging through his head since they sent for him. Harry needs to take only one look at Bubbles – miserable, shivering, looking pale and peaky – to know that his friend’s grounded by circumstances beyond his control. It’s a fact of life that Bubbles would be up there no problem if his stomach allowed for it, just as it is a fact that he’s huddled beneath a blanket looking mightily sorry for himself right now.

He pays Bubbles the same glowing compliment the man always pays him – you look like shit – and is rewarded for it with a supply hand-off and the worst news Harry’s heard all week.

“We’re leading the wing today.”

Harry’s somewhat proud of himself for not dropping any of his supplies. Even prouder of the fact that his voice doesn’t quite squeak, really, when he tells Bubbles he can’t just lead a wing. They can’t let him do that. They can’t just stick him up there and make that happen. Aren’t there rules to this sort of thing?

But Bubbles is talking already – talking mission, talking fact – and Harry’s got no choice but to try and commit it all to memory. He’s creating a visual in his head that he hopes Bubbles stored on paper in that hand-off somewhere. A map, a direction, anything beyond the vague sense of foreboding that resides in his gut and the near-gibberish that’s running its course in the back of his mind. Leading the wing. Leading the goddamn wing.

“Great Yarmouth,” he confirms once Bubbles finishes up. Harry feels as sick as Bubbles looks – all queasy inside – but he nods to make Bubbles feel better about handing off a bombing run like that. “Yeah.”

“Don’t be nervous.”

“And don’t stand so close to your buddy,” pipes up a new, rather upbeat voice somewhere to his left. “Unless you wanna get sick on the plane.”

The first thing Harry sees when he looks in the voice’s direction is a raised eyebrow that could rival his mother’s. The second thing he sees is a white uniform, pristine except for some faded pink stains at the sleeve cuffs, and dark hair pulled into a tight knot. Her face is passably familiar – dark eyes, button nose, little dimple in her chin – but Harry will be damned if he can remember a name to go with that.

“Nobody’s getting sick on the plane, Lu!” shouts Major Egan, clearly knowing the woman a hell of a lot better than Harry does. “Scout’s honor!”

“Boy, you’d better pray that’s true,” mutters the woman – Lu – loud enough for Harry to make out. “Don’t know what the hell you were thinking letting him on the damn plane in the first place. Sick as a dog and all. If this is a virus, John”– she remarks, now raising her voice for Major Egan to hear –“you are gonna regret that take-off like no tomorrow!”

“Hey, if we all get sick, can we be in your club?”

Harry decides he rather likes Lu when she heaves a deep sigh and stalks over to the jeep Bubbles is seated on. She is thoroughly ignoring the major, who’s standing behind her with his arms wide and looking almost as quizzical as Meatball does when DeMarco’s hiding his treats again. Lu slings her bag into the back of the jeep before stepping closer to Bubbles.

“When I drive you,” she says without preamble, “you lean backward as far as you can go. Tilt your head back and breathe. I’ll not have you sick up in my baby, all right?” She pats the jeep’s side almost lovingly. “Any move the jeep makes, you lean the other way. Breathe deep.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Does that help?” asks Harry, curious despite himself. “The breathing?”

“Eh, fifty fifty,” she says, wobbling her hand back and forth uncertainly. “Sure doesn’t hurt, though! Little trick one of the airsick girls taught us. She’s in ops now, but we owe her for that one.” Lu’s hand disappears into one of her pockets. “Got something else that might… Yeah… Hang on.”

“Lu, the club?” asks Egan again, coming to stand beside Harry. “Are we in or not?”

“Which club?”

“Y-Yeah,” shivers Bubbles, “what club?”

“No, John, you won’t be in my Lucy’s Losers club,” she remarks patiently as she pulls her hand out of her pocket to proudly show off a small bottle. “You’ll be chewing on this. Ginger. Keeps you from sicking up in your plane. Keeps whatever he’s got”– she nods at an increasingly morose-looking Bubbles –“at bay, too.” A pause. A frown. “I hope.”

“It’s probably just food poisoning…”

“That is in no way the reassurance you probably intended for it to be,” says Lu, frowning even more deeply at Bubbles as she holds the bottle out to them. “You’ve all been eating the same meals, for crying out loud. You, what’s your name?”

Harry blinks at her. “Me? It’s, uh, Harry. Harry Crosby. Ma’am.”

“Okay, Harry, you take the bottle. John’s going to be popping these like candy if left unsupervised, so I am entrusting you with it.” Her frown vanishes into a bright flash of a smile as Harry takes the bottle from her outstretched hand. He smiles back a little tremulously, not daring to hope that she’s just handed him his actual salvation. “There’s a good man. You hold on tight to that, okay?”

“Hold on to this, too,” says Bubbles, shoving something else into Harry’s increasingly full hands. It’s small, round, and entirely too fragile for Harry to be holding. He swallows as Bubbles clarifies. “Lucky snow globe.”

“Thanks?”

“Lu, if we still get sick despite the ginger and the breathing,” says Egan, clearly not feeling the same slight glimmer of hope that’s taken firm root in Harry’s belly despite his best efforts to remain calm, “I’m going to rename my plane.”

“You do that.”

“I’ll name it Lucy’s Losers. Can just see it now. Nice lettering on the side. Splash of color.”

“You’re forgetting I have friends in high places.”

“Your twin might disown you at last, though,” he counters, smiling. “Can just hear her now. Unbecoming of the Dorrance-Jones name and all that.”

“That’s not new,” snorts Lu, “but my boot up your ass is going to feel real new if you dare put my name on the side of a fortress, John Clarence Egan.”

“You’re not wearing boots, so I’ll be safe.”

“You’re not getting sick,” she warns, smiling back, “so the point is moot. Now go on, off with you. You’ve got a flight to catch, don’t ya?”

“Nurse’s orders,” grins Egan as he strides off toward their plane without so much as a farewell word for Lu and Bubbles beyond a wink. “You ever argue with those?”

“Can’t say I have, sir,” says Harry, trying to keep up while juggling multiple items in his hands. “Doesn’t seem smart to. Like arguing with your wife.” He hasn’t argued with Jean except for that one time she was stressing out over napkin placement at their wedding. Still, the point stands. “They know what’s good for us.” He holds the bottle up to the light. Squints at the pieces of ginger inside. “Worth a try?”

“I don’t get sick easily, but pass it around the plane. Just in case she’s right. It’s a bit of a ride to Norway.”

I’m gonna need all the help I can get. Harry nods. Clutches the bottle a little tighter. Leading the wing. Norway. He takes a deep breath. Then another. Follows Egan up into the fortress and prays Lucy Dorrance-Jones knows her way around queasy stomachs.

It can’t get worse, surely?

#blind dates oc fest 2024 #masters of the air #oc: lucy #harry crosby #john egan #joseph 'bubbles' payne #basilonefic #surprise surprise THERE'S TWO OF THEM #actually the Dorrance-Jones clan is very big indeed

[6thofapril1917]

Funny Girl

BLIND DATES FEST 2024

Introducing: Magdalena "Maggie" Zielinski (ft. Ken Lemmons) I'm so excited to be participating in @blind-dates-fest 2024! Thank you to @mercurygray for hosting. I didn't even realize this was happening until today, but I just knew I had to participate. Meet Maggie, your new favorite ground crew girl - I hope you guys love her as much as I do. Show: Masters of the Air

“And that’s how you clean a hardstand.”

Maggie whooped as she watched the fuel go up in flames. Somehow, despite hardstand cleaning being a near-daily occurrence in the ground crew’s lives, watching the oil burn off the concrete never really lost its allure.

“That’s one hot bastard!” the boy next to Lemmons yelled, voice full of a wonder entirely at odds with the profanity that spilled from his lips. Maggie burst out laughing.

“What’s so funny?” a small, oh-so-English voice asked.

“Nothing, Grace,” she replied, trying desperately to smother her laughter. “Now try to keep your head still for me, okay?”

For an air base, Thorpe Abbotts sure had a lot of children running around. And by god, had those kids already seen enough war to last a lifetime.

So, in between fixing engines and cleaning hardstands, she and the rest of the ground crew did their best to make sure that their childhood memories wouldn’t entirely consist of air raids and rationing.

Grace was a sweet, shy little girl with a mop of shiny brown hair and perpetually dirty knees. That afternoon, she’d scurried up to Maggie and asked her, voice barely louder than a whisper, if Maggie could please plait her hair the way she plaits hers because she thinks it’s really pretty and she’s tried to do it herself but it never looks quite right.

Maggie had obliged, obviously—how on earth could she ever say no? Besides, she was glad that at least someone on base appreciated her hairstyle. She knew her two twin braids weren’t the most fashionable hairdo on earth, but they kept the hair out of her eyes better than anything else she’d tried. Lord knew there was nothing worse than having to constantly swipe flyaways out of your face when repairing a fort.

Her hands made light work of Grace’s hair. For all that it looked wild and unkempt, it was surprisingly soft. She tied off each braid with a little piece of cord—she wished she had ribbons, but this would have to do for now.

“All done,” she said as she finished tying the last knot. “You look swell.”

Grace turned and smiled, missing teeth and all. 

“Thank you!” she cried.

“No problem, sweetheart,” Maggie replied. “I don’t got a mirror for you, but I think Helen might have one. Maybe you can convince her to give you a donut, too.”

She didn’t have to tell her twice. The girl leapt off of the stack of crates which the two were sitting on and bolted off, braids flapping in the wind.

“That was pretty damn sweet of you, Zielinski.” 

Ken Lemmons had just finished shooing the two boys off the hardstand as the fuel fire quickly petered out. 

Maggie looked up. Had any other man on base told her that, she would have assumed he was making fun of her. With Lemmons, there was never any doubt that the man was being genuine. It was just the way he was.

“Well, not all of us can teach the kids to swear and light things on fire,” she replied.

Lemmons chuckled.

“Hey, you thought it was funny, too. I’m pretty sure the whole base could hear you cackling.”

“Oh, please, I wasn’t that loud, was I?” she asked, face flushing. “Oh, who am I kidding. Getting that little Englishman to curse was the funniest thing I’ve seen all week.”

Lemmons began to snicker. It was contagious. Before she knew it, Maggie was laughing to.

“C’mon,” he said, holding out a hand. “The forts’ll be back any minute. We’d better get ready.”

“Yeah,” Maggie replied, accepting his outstretched hand and hopping off the crates. “I suppose we should.”

#blind dates oc fest 2024 #masters of the air #mota #maggie zielinski #ken lemmons #ch: maggie #fic #dispatches #notes from the front

[jump-wings]

I'm thrilled to share my OC for @mercurygray 's Blind Dates OC Fest 2024! I decided to mix things up and dive into some darker vibe with my new OC. It was a fun challenge to incorporate elements from the Masters of the Air into my writing. It is about 2k word. There is no warning and spoiler from MotA. Hope you dig meeting Ana and Moonshadow! @blind-dates-fest

Near the Thorpe Abbotts Air Base in East Anglia, there is Moonshadow Hall, surrounded by massive dark green trees, where the sun, animals, insects, and even hope rarely visit, and where even the souls of people gather dust from inactivity. If you walk through the wooded area and along the dirt road, you'll come to the moss-covered, slippery, stone staircase of thirty-three steps leading up to Moonshadow. Climbing up the stairs and passing through the heavy wooden doors with the dark hue of walnut, you'll arrive at the vast entrance with its pallid green crying walls. Continuing on, if you follow the pale green corridors that have housed people who have known little of love for generations, you'll find yourself in a wide living room adorned with the same-colored walls as the corridors, filled with ancient, menacing-looking furniture and faded carpets. Despite its large windows, little light

enters this room, and if you look carefully, behind one of the grandiose chairs, leaning against the wall, arms wrapped around her knees, head buried in the space between her arms, you'll see Eliana Holloway. She was one of the middle children of the Holloway Family, who had lived in this ominous place where nobody else ventured for generations. She was mostly known as Ana. She had dark, deep brown eyes devoid of any emotion, inherited by everyone in the Holloway family for generations. She was sad, not caused by anything specific. It was a eternal sadness she thinks she was born with.

Even as new children were born, as they grew up, aged, or even died, Moonshadow, where time seemed to have somehow stopped, was on the verge of joining the great mansions opened for military use since the war began. Yet it still resisted to avoid falling to the army. It could remain as the only big estate in Britain untouched even by the second great war of the century. But somehow, the outside real life had begun to make itself known with windows rattling from the sounds of low-flying bombers. Those passing by were not just RAF planes anymore. Americans had also arrived.

Ana lifted her head. She looked at the windows rattled by the passing plane. Perhaps it was her uncle Robert Lucian Halloway’s plane passing by.

There was a legend in the village. It was said that there was only one Halloway. All born Halloways were a kind of reincarnation of him. Although each baby was born with its unique soul, the darkness of Moonshadow would kill their souls, and then, despite appearing in different forms, different genders, they would always remain the same person.

The first and only person to prove that this wasn't always the case for the village was Robert. He had left for college on a sunny day when the sun shone on Moonshadow, and never returned. Unlike the fate of all other Halloways who left for college or any other reason, the cursed atmosphere of the house couldn't draw him back. He managed to escape from Moonshadow. For the first few years after college, nobody from the family or the village knew where he was living, until a short letter containing information about him being an officer in the RAF was added to the breakfast table discussion like a new condiment.

Since then, he had visited Moonshadow for up to ten days a year.

Until now. Robert’s unit had been assigned to Thorpe Abbotts. It wasn't clear whether he would stay at the base or at home, but it was certain that they would see more of him this year. He was expected to arrive within the week.

The inhabitants of Moonshadow were creatures of the night, open to light. They were whispers confined within their own heads, walking the corridors of Moonshadow, mostly within the limits of its woods, forced to take refuge in the darkness of Moonshadow.

Apart from the postal carriers who brought letters, very rarely did anyone else visit Moonshadow. The news that Robert would bring with him two close friends from the RAF and three newly acquainted American pilots for dinner sent a shroud over the house's nocturnal creatures like a mist. It intensified the usual restlessness of the house.

"How could he do something so thoughtless? Without asking us? We are not ready in any way," Felicity, Ana's mother, was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. She paced around the living room, turning around, thinking aloud. The little children imitated their mothers, whispering things like "Yes, exactly," and nodding their heads.

Ana knew from the moment she heard the news that such an event would erupt in the house, and her mother would be dragged into a slow and resolute fit of anger. "Yes, Robert, how could you do something so thoughtless?" she thought to herself. She quickly glanced at the door of the room without her mother noticing. She had to slip away before becoming the target of her mother's anger. Her mother's voice was rising, her gestures becoming more aggressive as she spoke. Time was running out. All her nerves were on edge. Her mother started walking back towards the windows, grumbling. Now was the time. Ana sprang into action. With the speed of a hawk developed over the years, she slid out of the door with perfection. She couldn't go to her room; she would be found there. Without slowing down, she flew to the music room.

The music room was one of the most forgotten rooms in Moonshadow, seldom visited by anyone. In the middle of the room stood a piano from the beginning of the century, but as far as Ana knew, nobody in the house currently knew how to play it. Ana pressed her foot onto the cracked leather seat of the piano, trying not to touch the keys of the untuned piano as she climbed on top of it. She couldn't afford to make a sound and risk being caught. She stretched out on the cold, dusty wood. She began to hum the limited songs she had heard throughout her twenty years of life. The ghosts of the silent, forgotten melodies of the grand music box filled the room.

Leaving her mother in such a situation and fleeing no longer seemed difficult to Ana. In fact, there was a toxic sense of satisfaction deep inside her. Since childhood, she had tasted her mother's dissatisfaction in every way possible. Once her mother got angry, which happened quite often, her anger grew and turned into a bundle of complaints, threats, and a hatred towards everyone and everything, and if someone dared to respond to her or tried to calm her down, it would turn into an endless fight.

It was indifference. It was a trait Ana had secretly developed without noticing. She had been horrified when she first realized that she didn't care about her mother's feelings. She had felt like the worst person in the world. But now, she was indifferent even to that feeling of horror.

Ana's mother and three servants spent a week trying to restore Moonshadow to its former glory. Everything was cleaned and rearranged under Ana's mother's supervision. The rooms have been rearranged to accommodate strangers, with Moonshadow's most unworn-looking furnitures.

The creatures of the night emerged from their shadows, descended the stairs, and awaited the arrival of the strangers, donning their best attire. The whole family was as tense and stern as Ana's grandfather, Victor Halloway, in the photograph taken while he was waiting in the trenches during the Great War. The enemies were approaching.

The heavy walnut doors opened with the reluctance of the creatures of the night, and the strangers entered the house. Their black, polished, Oxford-style low-heeled lace-up shoes echoed on the ancient wooden floors, waking them with a groan.

The strangers were ushered into the room prepared for the reception before dinner. Robert politely introduced the strangers to the family members. As small talk ensued, appetizers were eaten, and drinks were consumed, the pilots began to take on personalities.

Ross and Tristan were young RAF pilots. They had met Robert on the first day of their training, and they had been friends ever since. They were both from Norflok.

Americans Buck and Bucky, didn't resemble each other in appearance or personality as much as their names suggested. Buck was blond, while Bucky was a brunette. Buck didn't drink, but Bucky did. Buck was quiet and serious, whereas Bucky was playful and talkative. Biddick had a sincere smile. His eyes were a blue mixture of determination and the kindness of an angel.

Ana watched her father converse with two of the guests near fireplace. It turned out that Thomas Halloway wasn't as incapable of putting two words together as she had thought. Ana sat silently on the couch with her cousins George and Beatrice, who were a few years older than her. While the adults of the house - her mother, aunt, grandfather, and another uncle - managed to engage in conversation somehow, they seemed invisible.

Ana felt like the most pitiful kind of creature of the night. She was like a transparent creature living in a loneliness unknown to anyone else, dwelling in the depths where nobody knew. She discovered that she didn't know how to adapt to talking to people, didn't even know how to start a conversation with someone, and didn't even have the strength to talk to the guests in her own home.

As she brought the glass to her lips, a new kind of hatred spread within her. This hatred fed on the cruel distinction between family members who could and couldn't converse. Until that moment, Ana hadn't realized how much she and her cousins had been raised behind closed doors. Everyone in the family was disconnected from life outside Moonshadow, but it seemed that some family members had created this loneliness for themselves, while others were born into it.

Ana decided to fight. She wouldn't surrender. She stood up. She thought going to her uncle and his friends, Biddick and Bucky, was the right choice. As she approached them, she suddenly felt all her courage leap out of the window. She changed her course and headed for the table where the drinks were. Why did I do this now? Everyone will think I'm weird. As she filled her glass with something, she glanced around the room without anyone noticing. Nobody seemed to have noticed. I can do this. I can go to near them. I want to do this. I can.

Leaving the drink table with the glass she held onto like a lifeline, she headed to where her uncle and his friends were talking. She stood silently beside them, beginning to listen to their conversation. She couldn't lift her eyes from the ground. She couldn't remember ever feeling so tense in her life. Her knuckles had turned white from gripping the glass tightly, and her teeth had started to ache from clenching them together. She couldn't follow the conversation, couldn't understand anything that was being said until her uncle asked for permission and left. Watching her uncle leave, Ana felt like a child abandoned in the middle of the street. Alone in the midst of dangers.

"Really big house," Biddick said cheerfully to Ana. The two pilots had turned to Ana after Robert left, trying to start a conversation with her.

Ana scanned the room as if seeing her own house for the first time. Her aim was to gain some time. She tried to think of something to say in return. Whatever she said had to be normal. It shouldn't be silly, condescending, or boastful; it shouldn't offend him or make him angry. But the more she tried to think of something to say, the emptier her mind became. She felt she had to say something now. With a forced polite smile, she said the first thing that came to her mind. "Yes, it is," she said, immediately lowering her head towards her glass.

I hope he doesn't ask another question, but I hope he does. She felt both a strong desire to engage in conversation with the pilots and a desire to disappear right then and there. Biddick decided he needed to say something to keep the conversation going.

You bet it is, Ana wanted to silence her inner voice.

"Yes, indeed," she almost whispered. She couldn't bring herself to look into the pilots' eyes again. The young man shifted uncomfortably in his seat. He thought the girl didn't want to talk to him. He didn't want to bother her any further. Had he said something stupid? He decided not to prolong it.

While Ana wondered if he would say something else, she held her breath without even realizing it. The young man didn't say anything else to her; he said something to his friend. In the meantime, her uncle's return provided her with a few seconds of relief. She was filled with a deep sense of self-pity.

She had really wanted to talk to the pilots. But she had missed her chance; it was over now. That's how she felt. She thought she had bothered him. She had made him feel bad about himself. She cursed herself inwardly. The feeling of self-pity turned into anger directed at herself. What a clumsy person she was. She couldn't put two words together. How stupid she was. Muttering "Excuse me," she walked away from them. She left the sweet light emanating from the lamp in the room. She disappeared into the dark corridors of Moonshadow.

#blind dates oc fest 2024 #masters of the air #john egan #curtis biddick #buck cleven #to find #masters of the air oc

[noneedtoamputate]

Blind Dates 2024: Patsy Harangody

Pasty is the secretary you wish had, but she's not going to put up with your foolishness - even if you were the most beloved Marine officer in the PTO.

A shout out to @shoshiwrites for being an absolute peach and for beta reading my fic. All remaining errors are entirely my own. And thanks to @mercurygray for being my Andy Haldane sounding board and for creating and running the @blind-dates-fest for all of us to enjoy.

Fandom: The Pacific (AU, postwar)

September 1947

Chicago, Illinois

He didn’t interrupt while she finished typing a memo. That was the first thing Patsy Harangody noticed about Andy Haldane, before she even got a proper look at him. Most of the coaches at the University of Chicago simply walked up to her desk and started talking, even if she was in the middle of work. At the very least, they faked a cough to get her attention, as if she couldn’t see them out of the corner of her eye. But Andy Haldane pretended to be interested in a photograph on the wall until he saw her pull the sheet of paper out of the typewriter.

“Welcome to Chicago, Coach Haldane,” she said after he introduced himself. She could tell by his accent he wasn’t just new to the university but the city as well. “Please take a seat until Mr. Carlson is ready to meet with you.” She gestured to a nearby chair. “Coffee?” she asked as he sat down. 

“No, thank you,” and he trailed off as he looked at her finger. “No thank you, Miss Harangody.” The nameplate on her desk simply read Patricia Harangody, not giving away her marital status. While she addressed visitors with their titles - coach or mister, sometimes dean or professor - rarely did anyone return the respect. Just Patricia. Just Patsy. Just a secretary.

She opened a drawer and took out a file, pretending to look over its contents. Instead, she watched him continue his recon exercise. She saw him look at the photos on her desk, one of her family on the steps of their apartment and the one with Ginny and Abigail and Flo when they had leave and took the train down from Washington to Virginia Beach. He took in the sorry plant struggling to stay alive despite her best efforts and the sociology textbook she bought last week, storing these pieces of information away, in case they could help him later. He looked up at the clock on the wall behind her and compared its time with his wristwatch, frowning ever so slightly at Mr. Carlson’s lack of punctuality.

“Any words of advice before I go in there?” She looked up from her reading and saw him smiling at her. 

As the newest assistant football coach, it was now his job to meet with Don Carlson, the assistant athletic director, twice weekly - on Mondays to report on the game just played over the weekend, and on Thursdays to preview the game ahead  The assignment always fell to the newest coach, just as her position fell to the newest secretary, as it was common knowledge that Don Carlson was the stupidest man employed by the University of Chicago. 

Patsy could only guess what he had heard about her boss, and while she certainly had strong opinions, she wasn’t about to share them with a stranger, no matter how polite he was and how nice a smile he had. If she shared anything negative about Don Carlson and it got back to him, it would be her job on the line, not Andy Haldane’s. 

“Coach Haldane, please understand how important discretion is to being a successful secretary. While I haven’t seen your resume, I’m confident you have the education and work experience befitting a University of Chicago football coach. I have no doubt the meeting will go just fine.”

She caught him off guard for a moment, but he nodded, a sign of respect for what she refused to say.

Seconds later, Mr. Carlson came bumbling out of his office. “Coach Haldane, Don Carlson,” he said as he shook the younger man’s hand.” He turned to his secretary. “Patsy, why didn’t you tell me Coach Haldane was waiting?”

Patsy looked at the new coach, and she tilted her head to the side ever so slightly and rolled her eyes. 

I didn’t tell him you were waiting because he specifically told me not to interrupt him. He said he wanted to show you who was in charge here.

No actual words were exchanged, but he seemed to understand. 

“A pleasure meeting you, MIss Harangody,” he said before he walked into the office. 

When he walked out forty-five minutes later, he gave her a look.

What the hell was that? he silently asked her.

She shrugged her shoulders and looked down so she didn’t start laughing. He shook his head and walked out of the office, still in a daze.

The next morning, Patsy saw Coach Haldane on her walk from the train station to the athletic department office. 

“Miss Harangody,” he called out. “Do you have a minute?”

“Not really. I took a later train than usual this morning.” He nodded, understanding but seemingly disappointed at the same time. “You’re welcome to join me,” she added, and he smiled as they walked side by side.

Patsy loved this time of year, when you could almost smell the leaves change colors in the brisk morning air and motivated students gathered around the Gothic-style buildings, talking about classes and classmates. 

“It makes you almost forget we’re in Chicago,” he said. 

“What does?” she asked. 

“The trees and the buildings. The parks and the lake.” He waved his hand in the direction of the water. 

It was like he just read her thoughts. She felt unsettled and intrigued in equal measure.

“Were you in intelligence during the war?” she asked. 

He laughed. “Hardly. And my lack of intelligence is why I wanted to talk with you.” He put his hands in his jacket pockets. “I put you in an awkward position yesterday. I shouldn’t have asked you to divulge anything about your supervisor. It was disrespectful and unprofessional of me. I hope you’ll accept my apology.”

“Of course, Coach Haldane. I’m sure it’s difficult being in a new place. I don’t begrudge you trying to get an advantage, but I’m glad you understand my situation,” she said.

“Thank you,” he said. He pulled out an envelope from his pocket. “These are for you. Two tickets to the game on Saturday. It’s one of the perks of the job, and you’re the only person I know here who isn’t part of the team.”

“I’m not sure about my weekend plans …” she trailed off. She didn’t care for football, but it felt rude admitting that to a football coach.

“Take them, just in case,” he said.

She grabbed the envelope. “Alright. Just in case.”

“Miss Harangody.” He looked at her a moment longer than necessary and walked on.

She walked into her building and saw Lorraine, her friend and a fellow secretary, in line for the elevator.

“Hiya, Pats,” Lorraine greeted her. “How’s things?”

She thought of the envelope in her purse, his patience before walking up to her desk and his apology when he knew he was in the wrong. Even if she didn’t like football, there were always the trees and the tailgate parties and the coach on the sideline who she knew would be scanning the crowd for the secretary who accepted his tickets. 

“I know it’s only Tuesday, but what are you doing on Saturday?” Patsy asked. “Two tickets to the football game just fell into my lap.”

#the pacific #the pacific fan #andy haldane #patsy harangody #blind dates oc fest 2024 #oc #original female character

[blind-dates-fest]

T-Minus Two Days!

Your Mod, being something of an overachiever, has already finished one of her Blind Dates for this year!

Once you've finished writing, you can post your submission for this year's fest here on tumblr using one of our pre-made banners or one of your own design, and tag the fest (@blind-dates-fest) in your post so that we don't miss any submissions!

You'll probably want to include the name of the character and the fandom that you're writing for at the top of your post. A word count is nice, though not necessary.

As a reminder, this is a pro-readmore blog and any submissions without a readmore will not be shared.

We will start reblogging these in earnest on February 10th for everyone to read!

#notes from the mod #blind dates oc fest 2024

[basilone]

Fandom: Masters of the Air Written for: @blind-dates-fest as my 2024 entry! Introducing: Cressida Dorrance-Jones, with sidenote entries for Valerie Hodges and Evelyn Carter.

"That's not a sawmill up there, Buck." The blonde woman's voice is even. Matter of fact. Cuts through the haze of several men talking at once, long enough to make their whole table go quiet. The look on her face is too serene to be accusatory. "That was a goddamn meat grinder."

Major Cleven – Buck – does not dissent. "Yeah." There's a barely-there sigh lurking in that one admission, as if he is only now releasing his breath. His crew seems to almost exhale at the same time he does. Following his lead even when on the ground, especially after he fixes each of them with a swift look. "Now we know."

"And I need to know everything about that meat grinder," interjects Cressida, unfolding the last part of the map out on the table. Sets her coffee cup on the part of the map that always seems to have a mind to curl back up and leave her hanging out to dry. "Rule of the table: you talk only when I address you. Rule of the table: you dig deep when I ask for clarification. Rule of the table: you paint the whole picture as you saw it up there. Understood?"

There's a scuffle under the table. A swift motion of feet that almost reaches her legs before aiming a little more to her right. The blonde woman is all but sinking down into her seat, tip of her tongue poking out of her mouth as she puts in just a bit more effort.

"Ow!" The blue-eyed lieutenant beside her jolts in his seat. Fixes the blonde with a glare. "Val, seriously?"

"Understood, ma'am," rasps Valerie Hodges, sitting up straight again now that her goal's seemingly been accomplished. Cressida makes a mental note of the fact that the woman doesn't object to the shortening of her name. "I have some notes, if they help?"

"You're the navigator?"

"Radio ops, sorry," comes the unapologetic grin, right before a small notepad is shoved her way. "I've marked the time Curt here"– a nod at the lieutenant she just kicked in the shins –"started to shout in my ears about flak. Hit that earlier than I'd thought, then had the fighters come in hot on the tails of that."

Cressida glances down at a sequence of numbers that would not have been amiss in an actual navigator's log. Notes the shakiness of the sevens and fives, followed by quick dashes and dots. Her eyebrow quirks up despite herself. It's not every day a log comes back with partial encoding on it that would slow the Germans down for all of a minute.

"Unorthodox," she remarks out loud, "but perhaps helpful." She'll allow it, if only because Val's well-aimed kick seems to have halted the lieutenant's previous staring in its tracks. "You were wheels up here," she continues, indicating their starting point on the map, "and headed to Bremen through the pre-marked blue path here"– a new map for every mission, no matter the complaints from supplies –"which would put the flak here."

"Earlier," says the Major, not even glancing up at her for confirmation the way other pilots do. "Right around there"– comes the mark of his finger that lingers just long enough for her to confirm it with a swift cross of her pencil –"which I know because we weren't the first to get the hit."

"Had enough time to confirm the fact that we were in some deep shit now," laughs the lieutenant, even when none of his bravado remotely reaches his eyes. "First to get hit was Bonny Lass. Luck of the Irish, and all."

"Bonny Lass was on our right wing at two o'clock, bearing east."

"Two fifteen."

Cressida narrows her eyes at the lack of accuracy. Her pencil hovers just between two and two fifteen on the east scale as the back-and-forth between lieutenant and one of the waist gunners does not seem to be dying down. They're not at raised voices yet like the table in the back clearly is – Rollins can never keep his table under control after mission for long – but letting them work it out between them is going to save her a spot of trouble once she actually does need to put her foot down. New tables are like this, sometimes. First time up, first time down. It’s never an easy deal, and she’s got enough sense to not make it harder than it needs to be.

"Two ten." The Major's voice is decisive. "Mark that. Miss Demeanor and the rest of that cluster was on our left flank when Bonny Lass was hit."

"Miss got her wing clipped about five minutes following that, is that right?" asks Cressida, making out a five and the Morse abbreviation for Miss Demeanor on Val's notes. Nods around the table have her marking out a half-moon clip on the map. "When did the fighters come in?"

"When the flak died."

"Yeah."

"There was a minute or two of nothing," allows the lieutenant, "and they swept in so damn fast from that bank of clouds."

"They were already wheels up?" Cressida arches her brow. "Unusual if so," she remarks, remembering the sit-downs with the fighter pilot crew that had scoped out the area prior to the bombing run. Charlotte Rivers, in particular, had been adamant about a ground base rise. "Where would you put them on the map, Lieutenant?"

"Curt, please," he repeats like he did when she was first introduced to him not ten minutes ago. "I'd put them here, ma'am."

"They came from the ground," corrects Evelyn Carter decisively, tapping a spot just beside Curt's indication. "Straight up from there, I saw them clear enough." Her finger stands out dark against Curt's paler hand, so much so that Cressida wonders how the young woman ever passed muster long enough to not be drafted into the Tuskegee side of the war. "They like to hide in the cloud banks, right? Damn bastards thought they could get high enough to be clear of me that way. Clipped one of them on the tail as they went past here, though."

"You got another on the wing."

"Nah, he was too steady on, think I missed him."

"One-Eye missing her prize? Never!"

"It's not a clean turkey shoot, asshole," laughs the young woman who was introduced to her as both Evelyn Carter and the moniker One-Eye. Both her dark eyes, despite her laughter, remain rather hollow as she looks around the table. "They were so much faster than I'd thought."

"A familiar comment," allows Cressida, now that the table's murmuring assent. It's not her habit to comfort anyone at this table, but sometimes it helps move matters along to let them know their experience is not a standalone. "We know they're fast. They work in teams that allow refuel. In comparison, our fortress is the fattest turkey they'll get to shoot at."

"Whole Thanksgiving dish," snorts Val beside her. "Hey, Major, when are we going up for seconds?"

"Eyes front," snaps Cressida, tapping the smaller woman's shoulder until she stops grinning up at Major Egan. Egan's just about the last one she needs to interrupt the table read. "Fighters came in there, who was at the helm?"

"Bunny?"

"Not Veal, at least?"

"Wasn't it Ferret?"

"Jesus Christ, what was your formation? Don't tell me you all lost your minds up there and broke it?" Cressida's voice rises above the din of confusion. She slaps the table for good measure. "Eyes on this map, navigator starts talking, radio ops can comment, the rest of you are mouth shut and watching for now. Got it?"

"Hell of an iron fist you’ve got there, Cressida."

"Stop talking, John," she says, not even bothering to glance up at him.

"We got it, Captain Dorrance-Jones," affirms Major Cleven, sending her the smallest of what appears to be an apologetic smile. She decides she likes him just a little bit more for not getting too friendly with her the way Egan so clearly wants to be. "We didn't lose our heads, ma'am. Formation was solid up there.” His next words ring out with a hint of warning. “Let's focus, guys."

Cressida leans forward over the map as their navigator finally breaks his silence and hauls out a sheet of notes she should have already had in her hands five minutes ago. Marks all the spaces the man indicates, aided swiftly by Val's insistent corrections and the Major's nods of allowance. A failed mission is still a mission. Sometimes even more so, or so she's stood and argued with John Egan in this room at least once before.

"Co-pilot, what was your bearing after mission aborted?" she asks, still feeling Egan's eyes on her back as she fixes the lieutenant beside her with the best of her beadiest stares. "Was there a system status check at some point in the interval of abort and recalculated bearing?"

"Not a full check. Engineer was putting out a small fire."

"Literal or figurative?"

"Figurative."

"Stop saying fire if it is figurative," sighs Cressida, making a small note in the margin of her own paper. "God knows we've had enough real ones on board."

John Egan's snort is a skosh louder than she'd like it to be. She's not sure if that derision is the thing that quietens her table again, or if it's finally sunken in that there could have been a lot of things on fire that somehow miraculously weren't. She grabs her coffee mug. Takes a rather large gulp of too-black, too-bitter coffee that she solely drinks to stay awake. Sets it down on the curling end of the map.

"Let's try again, shall we?" she asks nobody in particular as she grabs a red pen. Get the story out first. The facts straight. Done. Dusted. Now get the things that never make it into the official report. "This time, there'll be more questions about what you saw up there. If you have a thought, say it. If you have a hunch about anything, now's the time. Don't worry about sounding stupid, you hear? I'll decide how stupid it is after I hear it."

"She'll do the thinking part," says Egan, tapping the side of his head just as she shoots him another glare.

"That excuses you from the room, Major, wouldn't you say?" She jerks her head toward the door. "Co-pilot, radio ops, eyes front, don't make me tell you twice," she says to the restless lieutenants at either side of her. "You were wheels up at..."

#blind dates oc fest 2024 #masters of the air #oc: cressida #oc: val #oc: one-eye #john egan #curtis biddick #gale cleven #basilonefic

[noneedtoamputate]

Thinking about writing Haldane for the Blind Dates OC Fest. Anyone want to share some of your HCs or ideas for Andy? I love his character in The Pacific, but I'd love to know what everyone thinks about him outside of war (and AU after the war).

#andy haldane #the pacific #the pacific fic #blind dates oc fest 2024

[mercurygray]

Can you explain more about Blind Dates

Is is limited places

Is it only mutuals

Is everything reblogged on a special place or your blog

Will I gain more followers/traction

👍

Hello, Kind Anonymous Friend, and welcome!

Blind Dates is a festival/writing challenge that celebrates the fun of making up new original characters. The idea is to be quick, compelling, and efficient with character introduction.

After you've come up with your new character concept, write a short snippet that introduces them to the fandom property of your choice, and establishes them as a person worth paying attention to. (Bonus points if they play opposite to a canon character you don’t usually write, or are for a fandom you've never written for before. Blind dates for the muse, remember?)

There’s no specific word count, but it shouldn’t be more than one or two thousand words. It’s an intro, a taster - something to establish your character and hook the reader into wanting more. And it’s just a project for the week or weekend - it doesn’t need to go anywhere or be a big production, just establish one really, really solid character that the reader can root for.

Are there limited spots in Blind Dates? Nope - this is open to anyone who enjoys the challenge of coming up with a new character from scratch! Most participants are here because they like the unique challenge this presents!

Do I have to be following you or anyone else to participate? Nope! Many of the people who participate are my mutuals, but that's certainly not a requirement. You don't even have to work in a fandom I like.

Is everything reblogged somewhere special or on your blog? In past years, each submission for the fest has been reblogged to my personal blog, and has also been compiled in an annual masterlist - but now that we're in year four, I've decided we're in need of an upgrade, so @blind-dates-fest will be reblogging all of this year's submissions as well.

Will I gain more followers or traction? To be completely honest - no, probably not. I like to think of this as a...a networking event, more than anything else. You get an excuse to write something new and small and manageable, and other people get a chance to read some new and small and manageable things. Maybe you'll meet someone else whose writing you really admire! Maybe you'll get an idea for a new project! I can't promise or guarantee anything in this regard. I want to stress that this challenge is to come up with a new character, not 'advertise' an existing one. If that's your only reason for thinking about participating, this may not be the event for you.

#kind anonymous friend #blind dates OC fest 2024 #asked and answered

[mercurygray]

Blind Dates 2024: Capt. Marion Brennan, WAC

My second submission for this year's @blind-dates-fest! I'd love to introduce you all to Marion Brennan.

Fandom: Masters of the Air (2023) The waiting was the worst part.

She’d been overseas for nearly a year now, and she could take everything else that came with the job in stride - the bloody faces, the vomit, the smell of piss and fear seeping out of flight suits, the way a boy tried to steady his shaking hands so that his buddies wouldn’t see that he was still scared. But the waiting was always fresh, always raw - and the fear returned anew each time the planes went up, and each time they came back down.

And when they came back down, she went to work. Except for today.

Marion surveyed the names on the large blackboard on the other side of the Operations Room, reading each one over as though she didn’t already know them all by heart. Her boys, day in and day out. Move them around, re-assign and re-group them, but she would know them even when their own mothers wouldn’t. Because I see them when no mother should - and hear the things no mother should ever have to hear.

Did you take any flak? Did you see any chutes?

And was he on the radio? What heading was that? Tell me what the plane’s condition was.

What time was that?

"Why, it’s barbaric," one of the new women had said once, after watching a particularly grueling session in the interrogation rooms. (Marion had made the flight engineer tell his part of the story twice, blood already clotting his face from a wound under his helmet, his face white with exhaustion.) "Making them tell you all that all over again. Those boys have just been through hell and you make them do it twice?"

Out loud, she explained about accurate after-action reports, finding coordinates for downed airmen, establishing times of death and declaring Killed In Action status. But it was more than that. If I have to explain it, you’ll never understand, Marion wanted to say. They come in bloody and shaking and afraid, and when we are done they leave the mission with me, and my girls, and I let them return to the world unburdened.

And who will do that for them in Telergma?

She knew the whole base was on edge. It was one thing to send out a task force knowing that they would come back to you, that after eight hours inside the inferno there was something you could do to ease their way in the world by bandaging a wound or patching a wing or serving a cup of coffee. But this waiting? This was the worst sort of waiting imaginable, because no one knew what they would find there. Was there an ambulance? Hot coffee? A bed with clean sheets?

When you land there, who will count you in? Who is there to care?

“Captain Brennan.” Marion turned away from the ops board to see Colonel Harding standing in the doorway. He looked like he’d slept in his uniform - a first, for him. Army Air Corps COs didn’t just fall asleep on couches, and men from West Point even less so. “I didn’t think you took shifts in this room.”

It was a polite way of saying that she wasn’t where she was supposed to be - and he was right. Captains didn’t take night shifts in the ops room - even female captains, whom Man and the Army had decreed a somewhat lesser species. She tugged a little at her jacket. “I sent Sergeant Wilcox along to bed - the poor girl was nearly asleep in her chair and I didn’t think she was much use to anyone in that state. ”

Harding didn’t seem to think much of that. “That shift change was hours ago. Where was her relief?”

More bad news. Marion took a breath and braced for impact. “Sergeant Hastings has the flu, and Wilcox thought she could use the rest. She didn't want to leave the post unmanned. I told her to go to bed. I can answer a telephone as well as the next woman.”

She waited for the blow to fall, but it didn’t come. If anything, Harding looked...impressed. “That was kind of you, Captain.”

Kind! What a word. But Harding wasn’t made of stone. Everyone was worrying about this one, and he knew it. It was one of the things that made him a good leader - that he had his nose in the wind, as it were, instead of being unreachable in his office with his reports. Still. Kind wasn’t a word you were supposed to use for officers. “It was also against regulations,” Marion acknowledged, trying to be as matter-of fact about it as she could. “You can write me up for it tomorrow morning  if you feel it's appropriate.”

Harding actually laughed at that, and she realized, belatedly, that it wasn’t a sound she heard very often. (And why should she? Most of the time they spent together was reviewing debriefing reports.) “Do I already have a reputation for being that much of a hard-ass, Captain?” He winced and paused. “My apologies. My language.”

And just where do you think I’ve been the last twelve months, Colonel? Curse as much as you like - I won’t break for hearing it. “I've heard worse, sir,” she assured him. “Regulations exist for a reason, and as the CO you're responsible for maintaining order and making sure your instructions are followed. Including watch rotations. It might be good to set an example. ” He looked impressed by the answer - possibly more than he needed to be. “My father was a West-Pointer, sir. Career Army, too.”

That, at least, impressed him where it needed to. “Is that so?” He studied her for a moment, processing this new information. “I can see that, now that you've said it. Is that how you got here?”

She nodded. “We moved a lot as a kid, and when I turned 18...Army life was all I knew. I started as a clerk, and worked hard, got a few promotions here and there, and when they let us put in for overseas assignments...” She let that hang for a moment, smiling as she thought about what she’d been spared because she hadn’t gotten what she wanted all those years ago. “I never did make it to Manila, or Maui, but maybe that’s for the best. Hamilton Field was about as far West as I got.”

She wasn’t in the habit of giving her life story out around the base - her girls needed a leader more than they needed a friend, and the scant four or five years she had on most of them was only good for so much, where authority was concerned. But it felt right that Harding ought to know a little something. After all, wasn’t he the one coming in with a reputation behind him, and the shoes of the former CO to fill? Everyone knew that he’d been at West Point, that he’d coached football, that he’d come to Thorpe Abbotts by way of Palm Beach and Spokane, Washington.

“And you still like the work? Little bit different than what you’d be doing at home.”

“Free a man to fight” looks different from here, that’s for sure. After everything she’d seen, everything she’d heard, she could say that much. “I do, sir. It’s important - making sure that the facts are straight, that we’ve learned everything we can before it fades out.” She had another thought, and paused, considering whether or not she should share. “I think they tell things differently, to a woman. They used to try and be more precise - cut around the edges a little wide so I wouldn’t see the bad parts. I think they know that we’re all used to it, by now.” I’ve been in every single op this wing has flown - turret, tail, and cockpit. I fly them in my sleep.

Harding nodded, considering all of it in that thoughtful way of his - a coach reviewing game-day footage to look for his next play.

There was some movement, at the door of the ops room - a woman coming in and realizing, late, that the person she was looking for wasn’t there. Marion spoke up. “Lieutenant Callaway, can I help you with something?”

The lieutenant's face was plainly guilty - a daughter caught sneaking in the front door with her shoes off - but she was trying valiantly to play it cool. It almost made Marion smile. "I was just...wondering if there was any news yet, ma'am. My shift's just starting and I ...thought I'd tell the girls, if we’d heard. Sergeant Wilcox said she'd tell me, if she...got news."

"Sergeant Wilcox was sent to bed," Marion replied. (Was that why she’d stayed on duty past her time? Because she wanted to be there to report out to Callaway?) "There's been nothing so far. We'll send a runner to Tower if we hear anything."

Callway nodded, obviously disappointed by this news and more unnerved than she had a reason to be, and she left looking a little shaken. Marion looked over at the Colonel and saw he was studying the lieutenant's exit with mild interest.

"Something there you think I ought to know about, Captain?" He asked, his expression thoughtful and vague.

Marion knew what he meant. A total ban on fraternization was impossible, given the confines of the base, but there had to be some separation of church and state, and making girlfriends out of her officers was a good way to undermine productivity. Still, if Cordelia Callaway had a beau, Marion knew she also had enough brains to keep it to herself, and she wasn't about to go spoiling that for her. She was a good egg, at the end of the day - maybe just the thing one of those fly boys needed to keep himself on the straight and narrow. "They all care a little, Colonel. I think it's impossible to live like this and not to." That's the strange thing about the army, isn't it? You get assigned to a place and suddenly you've got a whole band of brothers you never asked for.

Brothers, husbands, sons. Everything to everyone - one big, mad, teeming family.

Another noise at the door - Sergeant Dacre, a tiny mouse of a woman, nearly squeaked when she saw her CO and her supervisor in deep conversation, the lights half-off and the day just beginning.

“Oh, I’m so sorry, sir, I thought Sergeant Wilcox...”

“Captain Brennan was just leaving, Sergeant,” Harding said with a knowledgeable smile. (They were starting to teach that earlier - how to be a softer touch with the women. Marion could remember officers who would have shouted at Dacre to get her ass inside and moved her to tears.) “I don’t think we’ll need to do anything in the way of reprimands, Captain Brennan - for any of the business,” he added, being intentionally vague while Dacre readied her station. “But tell that Hastings girl she ought to get herself on the sick list, if she’s thinking she can just get out of work for a cold.”

“It’ll be the first thing I do, Colonel.”

The phone buzzed, and Harding swooped to answer it before Dacre could get her hand in. “Yes? Yes.” A visible sign of relief crossed his face, and she saw his shoulders relax. “Yes, very glad to hear it. We’ll look for those directly. Yes, thank you. Good-bye.” He put the phone back in its cradle and beamed. “Ground Control has them at Telergma. No details yet but - someone made it through.” He took a deep breath, still smiling. “I’ll get it out on the PA but you’d better tell Callaway out at Tower first. An officer doesn’t break her word.”

She almost smiled at him for that. The worst part, over. Now the details would come, but she could face that like she always did. “Of course, sir.' A pause, and - "I hope you have a good morning, sir.”

“And you, Brennan.”

Someone appeared with coffee, the room whirring into life as the day rotation came on board, and Marion took her leave, pausing at the door to look back at Harding, now studying the map with renewed enthusiasm.

Hughlin never made much of a father, she thought. All that waiting nearly did him in. But I think you’ll do just fine.

--

So that's Marion! She and the version of MOTA she inhabits can be perceived as being adjacent to the alternate history in my fic The Darkening Sky.

If you'd like to meet Cordelia Callaway, you can read more of my writing for her here at her tag on tumblr.

#blind dates 2024 #blind dates fest #marion brennan #meet my originals #masters of the air OC

[mercurygray]

Blind Dates Fest 2024 - Freda Torvaldsen, ARCS

A few days ago I asked for MOTA prompts, and @junojelli delivered:

A MOTA scene prompt for you: a new arrival is amongst the clubmobile ladies at the local pub one evening. Of course, it would only be right that they give her the lowdown on the men they can see in the bar, and the recent gossip on possible nocturnal escapades of course 😏

So! An extra Blind Date! You can learn more about @blind-dates-fest at their blog.

Fandom: Masters of the Air

It was only a matter of time before the subject came up.

“Can’t say I’ve ever met a Freda before.”

It was always like this, her first day in a new assignment, where you been, where you from, what do you do. And then inevitably someone would work around to the obvious. So... what’s a name like Torvaldsen doing with a name like Freda?

“And neither had my mother,” Freda said with a resigned smile, sitting down heavily and nodding thankfully to one of the other girls for the beer. “After my father and brother were both Peters I think she just wanted something interesting.” She shrugged. “She told me once she found the name in a short story in a woman’s magazine. Never got confused with another girl in class, though! Fred’s just fine, for every day use. It’ll get tossed in eventually, so we may as well start there.”

Fred was easy - approachable, even. A good way to start a conversation, a quick, easy joke to set everyone on the same level. Who’s on shift today, girls? Rose, Laura, and Fred. Wait, Fred? And she’d stick her head out from wherever she was hiding, and the boys would all have a laugh that Fred was really a twenty-six year old blonde from Madison, Wisconsin with a big smile, and not the paunchy driver from Brooklyn they all pictured when they heard the name. She didn’t mind the jokes, really - it made the whole job easier. So what’s your name, solider? You have a nickname, too? Where you from? The whole reason she was there, in three questions or less - to make the average G.I. feel at home, seen, valued and wanted.

“Where’d you say you were, before this?” Helen asked. At least, she thought it was Helen - or was it Ellen? Honestly, Tatty had run through the team of three pretty quickly this morning and she might have misheard. Tatty, of course, was easy to remember - Katherine Spaatz, with a last name the papers wouldn’t soon forget and a face that liked being photographed. Mary Boyle was the other, a sparkling-eyed Irish girl from Des Moines who looked like just the kind the fellows all liked to spin around a dance more than once. She couldn’t remember the name of the girl she was replacing, either - not that that mattered much. She was going home with the one non-communicable disease the Red Cross didn’t want to deal with - pregnant, Mary had mouthed across the table when they’d first met this morning, her fresh off the bus from London and Tatty skating artfully around the subject.

“Did a spell at the canteen in Washington, another couple months in London in a few different spots,” Freda offered. “I guess I’m a professional replacement at this point - which is either a compliment or a curse. You’ll have to tell me which.”

“Well, we’re happy to have you, for as long as we’ve got,” Tatty said with a nod. “Did they tell you what the work would be like? Working a base is different than canteen service.”

“The hours, for a start,” Mary said, rolling her eyes.

“If they’re running a mission, they’re up and at ‘em at 4:30 for a 5 am briefing, which means -”

“Service ready for 4:45,” Freda filled in, nodding along. “Means we’ll be starting about...three thirty, maybe, to have everything hot and ready?”

“Will that be a problem?” Tatty asked, her eyes dark and decisive across the table.

Freda shook her head. “Always was more of a morning person. How long are they usually out for?”

“Longer runs...six, seven, eight hours at a time? Tower will give us a ring when they’re expected back in, and then we rack up donuts and coffee in the interrogation hut. You’ll need to be sharp on that shift,” Tatty warned. “They don’t always come back looking pretty.”

“Doctor’s usually on hand to evaluate anyone who can walk. If they’re still standing he’ll turn ‘em loose on the interrogation team,” Mary explained. “Captain Brennan and her girls run that room - she’s nice, you’ll like her.”

“You’re not there to make small talk for that one - pass out coffee and get ‘em to their table as quick as you can. Each crew runs through the whole mission - what they saw, who they shot at, bombs dropped. The after-action report. Once they’re done, they’re free to leave, and so are we. We’ll do dishes and clean-up, and then get the coffee urns ready to drive ‘round to the crews. Can you drive?”

“Well enough for Wisconsin,” Freda offered with a shrug. “We had a Ford I could grind through.” She didn’t say anything about the last time someone had asked her if she knew how to drive, and how she’d nearly run over the campus mascot trying to muscle a Clubmobile into a turn.

“Sounds like you’ll be driving our Jeep, then. We’ve got one assigned to us.”

Freda nodded, trying to maintain serenity. Well, that’s all right. A Jeep’s not a remodeled London bus, and it sure as hell doesn’t drive like one.

“The planes are parked out on hardstands and the crew basically live out there while they’re working,” Tatty went on, “So we take coffee and sandwiches around once the planes come back in. They’re good guys out there - better than the flyboys, sometimes.”

“Now, Tatty, don’t go turning her head the wrong way,” Mary interjected, before Freda could ask what a hardstand was. “They’re all nice. Just take some getting used to.”

“Anyone I’ll need to watch out for?” Freda asked, glancing around the club, which was gradually beginning to fill for the evening - officers in their Class As, the gilt on their wings like sunshine, laughter like a river. The knucklehead who knocked up your friend, for instance?

Tatty made a gesture across the room towards the biggest group. “The tall one horsing around with the dartboard is John Egan - Major Egan, rather. Or Bucky, if you want nicknames. He’s mostly harmless, but he’ll flirt with anything. Just give as good as you get and you’ll be fine. Man next to him is Major Gale Cleven - also Buck - who you’ll wish was single and isn’t.”

“He’s got a girl back home in Wyoming,” Helen (Ellen?) put in, her smile a little wistful. “Ask him about her sometime.”

“Man with the permanent frown is Major William Veal - Bill, sometimes. He’s all business, you’ll never see him dance, so don’t ask. Tall fellow next to him with the lighter curly hair is Major Jack Kidd, also mostly business.”

Freda’s eyebrows went up. “Mostly?” Now there’s a word with a story.

It was Tatty’s turn to smile. “We think he might be sweet on Mary, when he lets himself.”

Mary rolled her eyes. “Only because the rest of you gang up on him!”

“Those are the squadron commanders, anyway - the other pilots and navigators and crews report to them. It’s a lot of names,” Tatty said, almost dismissive.

Notice how she didn’t say I’d learn them, Freda thought to herself. They’d told her that much in London, when she’d gotten her assignment. Don’t get too attached to your post, or the soldiers there. They can change or leave at any time. It’s a war, not a weekend.

“Ladies! And how are we all on this fine evening, eh?” Here it was - faces up. Freda found her smile and turned to see who it was - a young man with black hair and blue eyes and a smile just this side of mischievous. And this one is named Trouble, I’ll bet. First lieutenant with flying wings - a pilot. “You all over here plottin’ somethin’ we fellas need to be made aware of?”

“Just introducing the new girl around, Curt.” Tatty gestured to Freda, on the other side of the table, who raised a hand and nodded hello.

Trouble (Curt?) smiled a little wider, his hand on Tatty’s shoulder, leaning closer over the table. “Oh, the new girl, eh? And does the new girl have a name?

“New girl answers to Fred,” Freda said with a patient smile, trying not to smile too hard at the patently obvious big-city, big-spender feeling rolling off of the lieutenant in waves. New Yorkers. You could run them off a press like that. It was funny, sometimes, how much they tried not to be types - but she’d known far too many men like him. That was the trouble with canteen service - you saw so many they all started to look the same. “And she’s not looking for another drink, before the lieutenant starts asking.”

“Tough customer!” He laughed at that. “Curtis Biddick, at your service, Fred. Now, if any one of these jokers starts anything or gets fresh, you come find me, alright?” He pointed, for emphasis, and she took note of the knuckles of his hand, the shortness of his nails. “Gotta take care of our girls, you know, since you’re always taking care of us.”

“I’ll certainly keep it in mind, Lieutenant.”

Biddick waved the rank away like it was a fly he were swatting. “Now, none of this lieutenant crap, Fred. My friends call me Curt.” He fixed his eye on her and she smiled, and nodded - heard and acknowledged. Confident they had an understanding, he clapped Tatty’s shoulder again and stood up. “Tatty. Mary. Helen. Fred. Yous all have a good night, now.”

“Well, there you are, Fred. If Biddick likes you you’re set. He was serious about finding him, too - he’s the company boxing champion.”

“Of course he is,” Freda said with a smile, finally able to place where she’d seen hands like that before. And a total sweetheart underneath all of it, if I read him right.

And a soldier, something in her head reminded her. That’s the trouble with working a base - they won’t just be here for a night. You’ll have learn their names, and their girlfriends, see them day in and day out - until one day you don’t.

She took a deep breath and a sip of her beer, still glancing around the room, at the laughing men at the dartboard, the craps game, the piano, everyone alive and free and full of life. Maybe it had been a bad idea to start with names.

---

Eagle-eyed readers will notice that I have name-dropped several new characters in here; one of them, Marion, is my other Blind Date this year. You'll meet her on Saturday!

#i have written a thing #blind dates fest 2024 #freda torvaldsen #1940s girl gang #also i feel it is incumbent upon me to tell you she and curtis are not a thing #don't get your hopes up #masters of the air OC

[mercurygray]

A fun announcement as we near the end of January - Blind Dates now has its own blog!

@blind-dates-fest is now live to collect all of your hard work for this year's fest and keep track of some of the old work as well. I've queued up the last three years of prompt submissions, as well as some askbox memes, to run over the next several weeks.

Several of you may have noticed likes and reblogs as I got the hang of running a sideblog - and there may be more to come in the future.

I may be moved to wrestle with a custom desktop theme in the future, but for now it's doing what it needs to.

#blind dates oc prompt fest #blind dates #blind dates fest 2024

[noneedtoamputate]

End of Month Roundup - February 2024

Stuff I've Been Reading:

Almost done with Masters of the Air by Donald Miller.

Reading a hockey romance that isn't too good but fulfills one of the prompts for the 2024 PopSugar Reading Challenge.

I'm rereading and commenting on the Pulling Heartbreak Out of Hats series by ReallyLilyReally over on A03. It's a Winters/Talbert/Nixon OT3 fic, and I can't recommend it enough.

Stuff I've Been Watching:

Masters of the Air. I have opinions. Not enough ground crew. Not enough women. Love Rosie and still love Harry, too. It's not his fault. I feel like the pacing is off and I have no idea how they are going to wrap everything up with only two more episodes.

Started Feud: Capote Versus the Swans. I am not caught up, but I have read all about "La Cote Basque" and the backlash after its publication, so it's been great to see it on screen.

Stuff I've Been Making

I created a new OFC, Patsy Harangody, for the Blind Dates OC Fest right before Valentine's Day. I'm really proud how it turned out, and I can tell the difference in my writing since I started back over the summer. I love her, so look out for more and feel free to send in prompts for her.

Every Beautiful Thing Chapter 9 is coming along slowly but steadily. I can't believe it was December since I last updated the fic, but real life has gotten in the way. I feel like I might be able to finally catch my breath a bit since the beginning of the year (knock on wood).

I'm also planning an OFC for MotA. More soon, I hope.

#personal #wip