Summary: Stories written for the hlh_shortcuts holiday story exchange created by amand_r.
Categories: Short Stories Characters: Alexa Bond, Amanda, Amy Thomas, Brian Cullen, Byron, Caspian, Cassandra, Connor, Consone, Cory Raines, Darius, Dr. Anne, Duncan, Fitzcairn, Joe, Kastagir, Kronos, Matthew McCormick, Methos, Nick Wolfe, Original Character

Summary: I'm probably going to go to Hell for this one...

In Futurama you can survive decapitation by having your head put in a jar on life support. It's common to have celebrities appear on TV that way.

What if it was an Immortal that came up with the technology and is using it to offer other Immortals an alternative to permanent death?

The challenge is to write a story on this premise set in the Futurama world. I'd prefer humour for this one, for obvious reasons, any length but it'll probably work best as a short or ficlet.
Categories: Short Stories Characters: None

Summary: Here's a crossover fic challenge. Here's a Highlander/Stargate: SG1 crossover challenge. You have 5 to pick from. (1) Methos used to be Pierce Adams an Archeologist who was friends with Daniel's parents. After their deaths he took Daniel to live with him and raised him as a son. He encourages his facination with history. They live together for a few years before he "dies" in a very public scene. Daniel is placed somewhere else before Methos could get back to him. Now at the SGC Daniel is called on to invite Adam Pierson to join up. (2) General Hammond and General Carter meet Adam Pierson but they think he looks an awful lot like their translator in Vietnam, one Michael Adamson. (3) While at the cult house, Seth brings in an old enemy of his to show his followers what happens to those against him. He calls him Daedalus but the man keeps insisting his name is Adam Pierson. Later Seth kills him in front of SG1 and to there surprise he wakes up after everything is over. (4) Thor claims the SGC needs to find the current incarnation of Leonidas as he was the one who lead the rebellion against RA. He gives them a device to find him. It leads them to a mild mannered researcher named Adam Pierson who is an old schoolmate of Daniel's. (5) Your own Highlander/ STargate SG1 crossover with Methos as a major player. Have Fun. No SLASH preferably.
Categories: Short Stories, Novels, Ficlets, Novellas Characters: Methos

Summary: OK... Let's keep Richie Ryan alive.

In Ian M. Banks' Culture SF novels The Culture is a galaxy-spanning civilization which discovered Earth in the 1970s (The State of the Art), took a look, and decided to leave us to get more civilised. But we know that their Special Circumstances agency recruits agents on primitive worlds, often ones that have had no overt contact with The Culture (Use of Weapons). Worlds like Earth, for example. So let's say that Special Circumstances hears about Earth and comes headhunting (in the employment sense) in the nineties, and discovers the existence of immortals. Someone who can survive being shot etc. would make a wonderful agent; there are a few problems, of course, such as not being able to make use of any of the Culture's advanced implants (I'm guessing that a regenerating immortal would reject them) or plastic surgery, but on the whole it would be a definite plus.

Now The Culture doesn't want to take anyone off Earth who is likely to be missed, but they have good cloning technology. As in being able to regrow someone's body from their head after they have been decapitated (again in Use of Weapons). Given the number of Immortals decapitated every year, it shouldn't take too long for them to be able to get hold of a head or two.

So let's assume that a few seconds after Richie was decapitated his head rolls out of view, and is promptly displaced (transported) up to a Special Circumstances ship, placed in stasis, then connected to life support. Months pass as the body is regrown, and eventually a new Richie Ryan is born. Problem solved, and we can have a Richie Ryan: Culture Agent spinoff series.

The snag, I suspect, is that he's no longer an Immortal - his killer got his Quickening, and I can't see any obvious way to get it back, unless there's some sort of residue left in the head, and if that was the case the heads of all of the decapitated Immortals would presumably be growing new bodies, which is something we don't see on the show. But this snag apart it's one way to get Richie back into play. Or any other character from Highlander who is decapitated, of course. And whoever it is will still be a highly trained swordsman and warrior, in all probability, so very useful to Special Circumstances.

I've said "Novellas" as category but any length will be fine. I'd strongly suggest reading at least a couple of the Culture novels before writing this, they're immense fun.
Categories: Novellas Characters: Richie

Summary: Write a fic from the POV of a watcher, or Watcher. We have plenty of examples in canon (Joe Dawson, James Horton, that nameless guy who tried to pull an axe on Carl Robinson in "Run For Your Life," and the guy who wanted the Methuselah Stone to be immortal all come to mind) or write an original character and see what they think about all this.
Categories: Short Stories, Novels, Ficlets, Poetry, Novellas Characters: Amy Thomas, Joe, Original Character(s), Other canon character(s)