Let's chat about h/c today!

[frith_in_thorns]

To go with naye's lovely post about comfort tropes, tell me your favourite kinds of hurt for your fictional characters! Do you have ones you like to read but not write, or vice versa? Are there some you will read endlessly in any fandom you're in? Are there some h/c tropes you can bash out a 2k oneshot for at the drop of a hat?

Also, do you find you're equal-opportunity with your hurt, or do you hoard it all for one particular character or character archetype?

I'll start, and say that I'm really into hurt resulting in altered-state, as provided by many things but especially concussion/drugged/fever etc. It's something I find endlessly enjoyable to write -- the vulnerability caused by the skewed perspective, and how that plays out in character interactions, but also I... just like... the hurt bit itself *gg* And currently I have a definite Thing for Shen Wei magically exhausting himself and coughing blood and stumbling in a floppy way and having to be supported by Zhao Yunlan. (I don't suppose this is a revelation to anyone. But I'm so glad to know that I'm not alone!)

Anyway, please share your own likes! And recs!

(This is a positivity-only post. Very uninterested in hearing how h/c is OOC or a moral failing or how some people write it badly or whatever, thanks.)

Comments

[frith_in_thorns]

I like emotional h/c but only if it's really very... dialled up to 11? Like, I'm not massively into reading gentle comfort about someone having a distressing day, but calming someone down after a panic attack or someone being completely in shock from a traumatic event are GREAT. I mean, in general I'm mainly into dramatic, genuinely life-threatening h/c much more than any other sort, I'm just not a very restrained person in fiction!

All the other things on your list, absolutely! :D You are so right about altitude sickness, I don't think I've seen it done in a fic either but it has so much great potential.

And yes to concussions being a favourite. Headaches are my least favourite things in real life, I don't really know why they're so endlessly fun to read about in fic! And of course the confused/blurry aspect of it is always wonderful. (I just tried to think of how many concussion fics I have written in my fannish life. I don't think I'm remembering all of them. It's A Lot XD)

[sholio]

Yeah, it's basically the "dialed up to 11" kind for me too. It's okay if the dialed-up events are in the past -- like, someone having a nightmare and opening up about a horribly traumatic thing that happened to them 5 years ago totally does it. And even the gentle "having a bad day and someone being nice to them" thing can do it for me, but usually there needs to be a subtext of "... but no one is EVER nice to them like this and they think they don't deserve it and they're so SHOCKED that anyone would".

Everyone needs to write altitude sickness; we need to make it a thing. :D (I did write it once so far in my current fandom, which was what made me realize that I've never seen anyone else do it prior to that. WHY IS IT NOT A THING. It's such good h/c.)

[alexseanchai]

Vathara gave Toph altitude sickness in Embers. But I would not recommend reading Embers just for that, since it's well into the story, not a terribly significant plot point, and a 760K Avatar: the Last Airbender AU.

I recommend Embers for many other reasons, though. So!