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otemporanerys · 2 years

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SpecReqs Recs!

This year, I took part in the Spectre Requisitions @spectre-requisitions-exchange Rare Pair exchange! While I can’t reveal which fic(s) I wrote (yet), there is SO MUCH GOOD SHIT, FRIENDS (full collection here). So I thought I’d throw together a few of my faves from the first day of frantic reading.

Mass Effect Trilogy

Hearts and Stars - James/Ashley, 4.1k, Mature

Five times James and Ashley sleep together and one time they don't.

I adored this fic so much: friends-to-lovers who keep having casual hookups, but it genuinely does feel like a friendship. There’s helping each other through rough times, getting wistful at weddings, all the good stuff. Vega is so sweet in this.

The Incident with the Elevator - Kaidan/Miranda, 4.9k, General

Oh no, they're stranded. In an elevator together. For hours. No choice but to...get to know each other.

Doesn’t go where you’d think sadly. Really nice rapport-building between Kaidan and Miranda, who I sneakily really love together.

Slivers of Time - Female Shepard/Wrex, 8.9k, Mature *

Shepard was alive, dammit, and Wrex would do whatever it took to bring her home. A look backwards at Shepard's recovery, life, and happiness after the Reapers were defeated - as seen by an old krogan.

Yooooooooo this fic is so perfectly bittersweet - also GREAT supporting turns from Zaeed and Jack. The ending is *chef’s kiss* (The M is mainly for violence, apologies Wrexfuckers.)

Stay - Samara/Nihlus, 14.2k, Explicit

While hunting down her daughter, Samara encounters a Spectre who has killed an innocent. The Spectre flees into the wilderness, and the pursuit ends up being more than either of them bargained for.

SCREAMING, CRYING, YELLING. It’s not only the Samara/Nihlus hatesex you always never knew you wanted, but it’s part horror, part devastating character study, part unlikely connection between lonely, broken souls. Run, don’t walk.

To Catch a Thief - Samantha/Kasumi, 3.3k, Mature *

Samantha Traynor is rather stuck on the enigmatic "Master Thief" working alongside her on her latest project for the Alliance. But can she catch the thief for herself?

Cute, hot, EXCELLENT Samantha. I need a Leverage-style TV show of this yesterday.

Mass Effect Andromeda

Be Kind, Rewind - Peebee/Female Ryder, 2.6k, Teen

In a quiet moment, Ryder and Peebee share memories of their respective childhoods.

I’m not as big into MEA as some, but I think Peebee’s romance is way underrated and this really captures their energy. Very sweet melding, but with an edge of playfulness.

I would also like to give a quick shout-out to my gift fics (thank you nonnies):

Fly Along With Me, I Can’t Quite Make It Alone: Kaidan/Garrus, 5.3k, Explicit

“I quit C-Sec today, Kaidan. I’m going to Omega.” He pauses and looks Kaidan square in the eye. “You could come with me.”

Takes One to Know One: Female Shepard/Aria, 7.5k, Teen

“Nice to see you, too,” Aria drawled. “Even if it took you entirely too long.”

“I believe she told you to fuck off,” the bartender said in a mild tone.

Shepard rather wanted both of them to fuck off.

“Humor me, Shepard,” Aria said coolly. “You owe me that much.”

Thanks to the hard work the mods put into making this exchange happen, and to the other participants for creating so much brilliant fic and art - please go forth and comment/kudos!

(* In the interests of full disclosure, I do know who wrote these, but that doesn’t change the fact that they’re good)

#fic rec #mass effect fan fiction #mass effect fan fic #spectre requisitions #spectre requisitions exchange #mass effect #mass effect rare pair exchange #specreqs2022

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crescentbunny · 2 years

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Slivers of Time

Ao3 Link

So I participated in treat giving in this years @spectre-requisitions-exchange

This was my gift to some fellow Shepard x Wrex fans. If you are looking for an ace coded un-traditional love story - this is it.

“A look backwards at Shepard's recovery, life, and happiness after the Reapers were defeated - as seen by an old krogan.”

Snippet:

Weeks turned into years in the span of a sigh for him - a typical phenomenon for someone his age. But certain things were still vivid - like the day they’d unloaded Shepard’s stretcher from the Normandy’s shuttle. The amount of people at the landing strip stretched on farther than his eyes could see, turning into a dark blur against the vivid orange sky of earth's setting sun as he looked out over them. Salarians, krogan, asari, turians, batarians, elcore, vorcha - all intermixed with the humans in a blend of colors and shapes and heights that knew no end, straight to the horizon line.

They had all stood so quietly he hadn’t expected anyone was outside the shuttle’s door until he saw it for himself. As Shepard was hovered over the tarmac, strapped to the machines keeping her alive while they moved her, the crowd shifted in a wave across bodies. Every individual that he could see had raised a hand to their foreheads in a human salute.

He didn’t know what signaled them, but clapping nearest the perimeter began, growing and swelling into a deafening din of noise - applause, stomping, whooping. Thousands of voices came together for her.

If krogans cried like humans did, he probably could have right then. It was a shame she’d been unconscious for it.

#shrex #femshep x wrex #mass effect fanfic #mass effect fanfiction #specreqs2022 #spectre requisitions exchange 2022 #cbunwrites

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punchsomeoneforme-willyou · 2 years

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I had the pleasure of participating in the @spectre-requisitions-exchange this year. Aaand since authors/artists have been revealed, please enjoy this Jack/Tali piece I had a great time painting :D

I also received an absolutely wonderful fic about my femShep and Jack by the amazing @commander-krios (thank you so much again, I loved it) which you can find here:

https://archiveofourown.org/collections/SpecReqs2022/works/37752610

#mass effect #mass effect trilogy #jack subject zero #tali vas normandy #jack/tali #my art #mass effect fanart #femshep/jack

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spectre-requisitions-exchange · 2 years

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NOMINATIONS ARE LIVE!!!!

Time to get to nominating this year’s delicious rare pairs! Please note nominations must come through this AO3 Link!!!!

When nominating, please fill in “Mass Effect – All Media Types” in the fandom box.

As a reminder, both gen (&) and romantic (/) relationship tags are allowed for this exchange. Any relationship that fulfills the criteria below the cut is eligible! If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask the mods via our inbox or on our discord!

Please see eligibility rules, a how-to guide to nominating, and commonly asked questions below.

ELIGIBILITY RULES:

A pairing must have 200 or less works when viewed with completed works OR

NEW: A pairing may have over 200 works, but when viewed with completed works and otp:true parameters, the amount of remaining works is both under 200 and less than 1/3rd of the total number of works.

For Example:

* If Adrian Victus/Steve Cortez has 138 works, then it will be accepted as it has less than 200 works. No further filtering is needed.

* If Volus God (Self-Declared)/Liara’s Hanar Half-Sister has over 200 works, but when searched with opt:true, only has 5 works, it would be allowed as it would have met the under the 1:3rd ratio rule.

* If Brooks/Krogan Wondering About Fish on the Citadel has 200 works, but when searched with otp: true and completed works parameters, has 100 works, then it would not be allowed, as the ratio between the completed works and completed works with just the pairing (the otp:true component) would be too high to qualify. This new rule is meant to help pairings that are commonly used as “side pairings” but rarely are featured in works where they are the focus.

If you have any questions on those rules or you just want to hang out and talk Mass Effect pairs beyond the most popular ones, consider joining us at our Discord server. It’s a great place to hang out and talk rare pairs.

HOW TO NOMINATE:

1) Go to the Ao3 Tagset Page for Spectre Requisitions while logged into Ao3. A tagset is what most Ao3 fan exchanges use to determine what relationships (in Spec Rec’s case) or other criteria are used for an exchange.

If a pairing is not nominated, it will not be able to be used for sign-ups, regardless of whether it would have been eligible otherwise. (Example: Suvi/Chakwas, while certainly being eligible as far as total works go, won’t be an option to ask for if it’s not nominated during the nominations period.)

If you don’t have an Ao3 account, contact the mods, we’ll be happy to help you get one with an invite link!

If you do have an AO3 account and you’re logged in, you should see this button in the corner that says “Nominate”:

2) Click the Nominate Button.

You should wind up with a page that looks like this, with 1 fandom tag and lots of relationship fields to fill out:

3) Fill out the Nominations Sheet.

For fandom, please use “Mass Effect - All Media Types”. We only use Mass Effect - All Media Types because it gives us the highest chance of getting that sweet, sweet Mass Effect content in there regardless of potentially sticky couples (for example: crossovers between a book and a game, or between the Mass Effect Trilogy and Andromeda, or crossovers between other media and Mass Effect) and because Ao3 frankly doesn’t like it when we have couples wandering through different fandoms in the tagset. For relationships, any pairing/threesome/moresome that meets the eligibility rules. For most pairings, Ao3 should help autocomplete it for you -- but if you come up with a very original pairing (or AO3 is feeling unhelpful), it may require you to type in the full thing. If it does not auto-complete, don’t worry - you can still submit it! Pairings should be in alphabetical order of names. One pairing per line, please!

4) Submit your Nominations! Just click the button on the bottom, and you should be off off and away!

COMMONLY ASKED QUESTIONS:

How can I tell what is under 200 completed fics? I’m not a mind reader, C-sec officer!

You can search AO3′s tags here to find pairings for a given character (canonical only gives you pairings big enough that Ao3 has declared them canonical categories). It should look something like this:

If you see a number under 200 here, you’re golden! Submit away. If it’s over 200 here, however, don’t despair - check the completed works. For example, let’s look at this hypothetical couple, Garrus/Tali (note that the numbers here are made up to illustrate a point):

Doesn’t look eligible if you just do a tag search. However, if you click the tag and then do a search for completed works only and you might be surprised!

To do this search for completed works, look at the “Sort and Filter” sidebar and scroll down until you reach the “More Options” field and under “All Works”:

Click complete works only. And in this case, you’d find this couple is, in fact, eligible!

However, let’s say you look at the couple and find they are still over 200, as in the example below?

Well, there is one last thing to check:

Go back to the sidebar, then down to More Options and scroll down to “Search within results”:

OTP: True will show you ONLY the works that are tagged with JUST the target couple. When you sort and filter, you will see a total. In this example’s case, that number is 30:

What this means is that off the 204 works in Garrus/Tali right now, only 30 only focus on Garrus/Tali as a couple. As a result, the ratio of otp:true works to completed works is less than 1/3rd of the total, and the couple would be allowed to participate.

What if I accidentally nominate something that’s not eligible? Will I get in trouble?

Nah. You might wind up with it being rejected, but we assume most people operate in good faith in their nominations. If we reject a couple, we will always put it in the spreadsheet for the year linked on the sidebar with a reason why, and you are always free to come to us with questions if you’re not sure what that is.

How many things can I nominate?

10 pairings - so choose carefully what you’d like to see and write. That covers both Andromeda and Trilogy, all the novels, comics, etc.

Can I nominate, even if I’m not sure I’ll sign up or don’t plan on signing up?

Of course! Nominating isn’t a binding process - you’re only voting for what you’d like to see. You don’t have to sign up after nominating things - in fact, nominations are anonymous, so we can’t tell what you’ve nominated.

Are there any special rules/restrictions on what I can/can’t nominate?

Only the eligibility rules.

How do I search the OTP:true thing?

Look at the sidebar on Ao3, scroll down to “search within results” and type in otp:true:

Can I nominate transgender or nonbinary Shepards/Ryders?

Yes! All Shepards and Ryders are welcome. For Nonbinary Shepards/Ryders, please nominate them under Nonbinary Shepard/Ryder. For transgender Shepards/Ryders, please nominate them until the preferred gender presentation and when you sign up for the exchange, please put in your sign-up that you would like that version of the character to be considered trans.

(Please note that if you only want a trans version of a character, to write in a DNW (Do Not Want) in your request for the cis version of the character; otherwise, you will be interpreted as open to both cis and trans “Female Shepard/Ryder” or “Male Shepard/Ryder”.)

Can I nominate Original Characters?

Yes - ish. We allow original characters who are defined enough to give the person who matches on the original character something to go on, but not so much so they have to do an exhaustive amount of research on a fanon character. For example:

Allowable OC nominations:

Female Asari Spectre/Female Cerberus Agent - both these roles are defined in terms of what category of pairing they want (f/f), and the two roles give someone an idea of who these people are without being excessively limiting.

Not-so-allowable:

Communications Officer/Male Original Character: both of these are too vague. We’re not sure whether this person wants a male, female, nonbinary, or other gender for the Communication’s Officer; Male Original Character is so nebulously defined that we’re not sure just who that might be.

Female Shepard/Batarian(s) - We don’t know who these batarians are, or how many of them there are. “Five Male Batarian Pilots” tells us a lot more.

Male Shepard/Legion/Ebony Raven Darkmayne (My OC) - While we encourage you to add details about your Shepards or other OCs, it’s very hard to write for original characters someone else has formed. Please nominate your OC in more generic terms (ex Male Shepard/Legion/Female Original Goffic Hogwarts Student). You can add in names and descriptions in optional details in your sign up, but this way the writer or artist has more wiggle room for what will suit their fic or art, and you have more options of matching more people since you aren’t limited to one interpretation of a concept.

A good rule of thumb is if you can sum up an OC in more than one and less than five non-name nouns, it’s probably a valid nomination.

Can I nominate crossovers?

Yes! Crossovers between different Mass Effect properties are welcome and and are crossovers between ! Just please, if the character you’re crossing over doesn’t hail from a Mass Effect canon, add in the canon next to the character name, eg “Darth Vader (Star Wars)/Garrus Vakarian.”

What if I have more than ten to nominate???

We will allow people to request a couple extra nominations if they need the space; it’s a big, big universe after all. If you have exhausted your sign-up, please PM us or talk to us on the discord about adding in extra pairings. In order to keep things fair for everyone and not have one person’s pairings dominating the space, please limit your extra requests to no more than 5.

#specreqs2022 #specreqsnominations

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spectre-requisitions-exchange · 2 years

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Assignments are OUT!

Please check your Ao3 assignments page or the email you have associated with Ao3 and see who you were assigned to! There were NO initial pinch hits this year. If any pinch hitters are required, we will advertise when they become available both on our tumblr and DW comms.

We have done our best to try to ensure that everyone has a good match, but if there is an issue with yours, please contact us. We will handle things discretely and privately.

Since assignments have gone out, there are a couple things we’d like all authors and artists out there to keep in mind:

You are only committing to writing or drawing one thing for your assigned recipient. That means, of the 3+ ideas they have offered, you are committing to writing one. If they asked for two pairings in the same line, you’re obligated to write only one of the two (your choice). Can you do more? Absolutely. Are you obligated to? Absolutely not.

Please remember that the spirit of this exchange is all rare pairs, all the time. Do not use the exchange to try to write/draw a mega-popular pairing, with a less-popular pairing in the background. We do not allow backdoor mega-pairings to dominate works in this exchange.

Please do not post your fic or art on Tumblr/DeviantArt/etc until the exchange has been revealed. It is imperative that everyone gets their gifts at the same time.

Please don’t contact your recipient directly. If you have questions you want to ask them, please contact us! We are happy to be intermediaries for you!

If you are writing a story/drawing a picture that features elements Ao3 has default warnings for, such as underage/non-con/etc, remember to tag your stories for such elements to advertise it to those that want to see it and to respect those that don’t. If you do not wish to do this or feel like you can’t tag a fic or artwork without spoiling the nature of a twist you’d prefer remain unspoiled, please use the “Choose Not to Warn” option so viewers can make the choice themselves whether or not they want to take a chance on seeing potentially upsetting content.

You are obligated to respect your recipient’s DNW/squicks, but optional details are otherwise that - optional.

Please be careful to not reveal who your recipient is. Posting “I’m so excited about my assignment!” is fine; posting “I’m so excited about writing Thane/Garrus for my best friend @participant!” is not.

If you have any questions or comments, be sure to let us know!

#specreqs2022 #specreqsassignments #mass effect #spectre requisitions

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spectre-requisitions-exchange · 2 years

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Reveals will be delayed by one hour to allow everyone time to finish. We apologize for the late notice.

#specreqs2022 #specreqsreveals

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spectre-requisitions-exchange · 2 years

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This may be a really dumb question but I've never done an exchange before and am still learning ao3. How do you post to the exchange and do so anonymously? I don't really understand that part of the rules and didn't see it mentioned in the FAQ.

Hi there! We are happy to answer questions. After assignments go out, there will be a checkbox on any new work you create to fulfill the assignment for this exchange. You will also be able to see your assignment on your sidebar and complete it from there. The way the anonymous part works is that the entire collection is anonymous until the moderators reveal it. Any fic/art submitted to the collection will automatically be listed as anonymous. When it's time for author reveals, the entire collection will be de-anoned at once. Please let us know if you need more explanation!

#specreqs2022 #specreqsquestions #specreqsassignments

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spectre-requisitions-exchange · 2 years

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Nominations - More detail needed!

We have a few nominations where we need more detail before we can approve them. Please reach out through Tumblr, Discord, or email ([email protected]) to let us know. You can also just edit your nominations directly.

Irikah Krios/Thane Krios/Shepard -- The version with Male Shepard is already in the tagset; did you want Female Shepard or Nonbinary Shepard?

Kaidan Alenko/Shepard Clone -- Please specify male, female, or nonbinary

Karin Chakwas/OC Hierarchy Doctor -- Did you mean Turian Hierarchy? Also, do you want to specify gender or leave it open?

Original Quarian Character(s) & Original Geth Character(s) -- Did you want to specify gender for the original Quarian(s)?

#specreqs2022 #specreqsnominations

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spectre-requisitions-exchange · 2 years

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Pinch Hit #2 - CLAIMED

Please send an ask through Tumblr or email [email protected] to claim. This pinch hit will be due Sunday, March 27th at 10:00 PM EST.

Pairings: Female Shepard/Adrien Victus, Lorik Qui'in/Female Shepard, Tarquin Victus/Ashley Williams, Rolan Quarn/Female Shepard, Septimus Oraka/Hannah Shepard, Hannah Shepard/Adrien Victus, Chellick/Chloe Michel, Sparatus/Adrien Victus, Fanart, Fanfiction

Request 1 by Rose_colored_galaxy

Female Shepard/Adrien Victus, Lorik Qui'in/Female Shepard, Fanart, Fanfiction

Femshep deserves to be spoiled rotten because she has been through so much, and somehow these two give me that exact vibe.

But feel free to let your imagination run wild with other ideas.

Can be fluff, smut, both. Any rating.

DNWs: angst without happy ending, foot fetish, inflation kink, scat, non-con, piss kink, AUs that significantly change the plot (ex. Highschool AU)

Request 2 by Rose_colored_galaxy

Tarquin Victus/Ashley Williams, Rolan Quarn/Female Shepard, Fanart, Fanfiction

An AU where Tarquin survives.

These two have so much in common once you start thinking about it. Real "kick their asses, honey, I'll hold your poetry books" feels.

Bonus points for Tarquin going all 'turian-eyed' when Ashley isn't looking.

But this is just how I see it, don't feel restricted by it.

For Rolan/Shepard, something involving a cat and mouse game that ends in a kiss (or more, what you're comfortable with). Again, just an idea, feel free to let loose.

Any rating.

DNWs: angst without happy ending, foot fetish, inflation kink, scat, non-con, piss kink, AUs that significantly change the plot (ex. Highschool AU)

Request 3 by Rose_colored_galaxy

Septimus Oraka/Hannah Shepard, Hannah Shepard/Adrien Victus, Fanart, Fanfiction

Maybe they met during FCW? Enemies to lovers? 30 years of pining? 'Shepard, very important question. Is your mom single?'. The possibilities...

Any rating.

DNWs: angst without happy ending, foot fetish, inflation kink, scat, non-con, piss kink, AUs that significantly change the plot (ex. Highschool AU)

Request 4 by Rose_colored_galaxy

Chellick/Chloe Michel, Sparatus/Adrien Victus, Fanart, Fanfiction

Following the "I should get a raise just for dealing with this guy (affectionately)" line of thought.

Because Chellick likes to live dangerously and tempt fate.

And we all know Sparatus very likely almost had a stroke when he heard Victus is the new Primarch.

Any rating.

DNWs: angst without happy ending, foot fetish, inflation kink, scat, non-con, piss kink, AUs that significantly change the plot (ex. Highschool AU)

#specreqs2022 #specreqsassignments #specreqspinchhits

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spectre-requisitions-exchange · 2 years

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Nominations - Another Follow-Up

Once again, we have some nominations that we can’t approve as is. Please reach out through Tumblr, Discord, or email ([email protected]) to let us know. You can also just edit your nominations directly.

Non-binary Nihlus Kryik/Saren Arterius We are not allowing nominations of non-binary characters other than Shepard and Ryder. We feel that adding nonbinary to canon character nominations is too restrictive and makes it much less likely that someone will match. We would encourage you to put in your likes/prompts that you are interested in a nonbinary Nihlus, but it cannot be part of the nominated relationship. Saren/Nihlus is already in the tagset. We will leave this one as pending so that you can edit to include another relationship you’d like to see.

Original or Canon Ardat-Yakshi/Original Ardat-Yakshi We will be approving this one as Original Ardat-Yakshi/Original Ardat-Yakshi. If you would like to nominate any of the canon Ardat-Yakshi with an OC and do not have spots, let us know and we can add it in. Sparatus/Original Turian ST&R Non-combat Agent (IE: Intel or R&D) We think that you mean Sparatus/Original Non-Combat Turian Spectre, is that right? The part about Intel/R&D should be included in your prompt for this relationship. We would also like to know whether you have a gender preference; if you would be happy with any gender, then we can approve Sparatus/Original Non-Combat Turian Spectre.

#specreqs2022 #specreqsnominations #specreqsquestions

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spectre-requisitions-exchange · 2 years

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Pinch Hit #3 - CLAIMED!

This has been claimed, thank you! Please send an ask through Tumblr or email [email protected] to claim. This pinch hit will be due Sunday, March 27th at 10:00 PM EST.

This is a fan-fiction only request.

Couples are: Kaidan Alenko/Male Ryder | Scott/Male Shepard, Female Shepard/Ashley Williams, Liara T'Soni/Ashley Williams

Request 1 by CypressSunn Kaidan Alenko/Male Ryder | Scott/Male Shepard, Fanfiction

General Likes: Accidentally fell in love with the mission target • Amnesia • Angst • Banter • Break up to make up • Character driven stories • Communication difficulties • Enemies to lovers • Explicit fic • Fake dating • Friends to lovers • Genre fic • Intimacy • Jealousy and infidelity • Lived-in settings • Loyalty • Marrieds • Relationship negotiations • Secret relationship • Smut • Snowed-in together • Soulmates

DNW: Abuse • Character bashing • Eroticising racial features • First/second person POV • Genderswap • Humiliation • Incest • Infantilization • Mentions of menstruation or virginity • Mundane AUs • Sex without attraction, unaroused sexual partners • Unrequited feelings • Unrequested kinks (excretory play, a/b/o, belly kink, sounding, ect) • Underage sex (meaning 17 or younger)

Request 2 by CypressSunn Female Shepard/Ashley Williams, Fanfiction

Request 3 by CypressSunn Liara T'Soni/Ashley Williams, Fanfiction

#specreqs2022 #specreqsassignments #specreqspinchhits

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