What Does Future Fic Mean?
Fic TypeFic set years after canon's timeline — the characters older, the dust settled, the question 'where are they in ten years' answered at length. The genre of afterwards.
Future Fic in Practice
Future fic projects past canon's endpoint rather than diverging inside it: the academy students as veterans, the war's survivors at the twenty-year reunion, the will-they couple long since married with the mortgage to prove it. The genre serves several distinct appetites — epilogue hunger for couples canon barely confirmed, curiosity about characters aged into new life stages, and the bittersweet register of revisiting a beloved ensemble after time has scattered them. For ongoing canons, future fic carries built-in jossing risk, which authors accept philosophically; a sequel can overwrite the premise overnight, and the tag quietly accumulates timestamped alternate futures with each canon installment. Kid fic frequently lives here, as do retirement domesticity and next-generation stories starring the characters' children.
Example usage
"The future fic checks in on the whole squad fifteen years later, and the reunion dinner scene is worth the whole word count."
Related Terms
Kid Fic
Fic centered on characters raising, acquiring, or being children — the couple with a baby, the team adopting an orphan, canon recast with the cast as parents. A venerable genre with zine-era roots.
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Established Relationship
A fic in which the couple is already together when the story begins — no getting-together arc, just the relationship in progress. The tag tells readers the pining is over before page one.
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Canon Compliant
A fic that fits within canon without contradicting it — filling gaps, expanding scenes, or exploring time the source material skipped. Everything canon says happened still happens.
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Jossed
When new canon contradicts a fan theory, headcanon, or fic — your interpretation has been jossed. Named for Joss Whedon, whose plot twists routinely demolished fan speculation.
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Curtainfic
Domestic fic in which the central couple does cozy household things — the name evokes them literally shopping for curtains. Low stakes, high comfort, deeply settled intimacy.
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