Challenge #10: In your own space, talk about one of your fandom firsts. This could be your first fandom, your first fandom friend, the first fanwork you created, the first fanwork you interacted with... The options are endless!

I think it was in 2017 that I read my first Arrowverse fanfic, RedHead's "Seventy Three Seconds".

I had actually been watching Arrow since it started in the fall of 2012 (and found it impressively like the Green Arrow reboot in The Longbow Hunters comic book miniseries of 1987); and in 2014, when they'd used a guest appearance of Barry Allen to launch a sister series starring The Flash, I'd promptly tried that as well. Admittedly, I was a bit flummoxed by a brunette Barry; but the first season was extremely good. Compellingly so: I watched every episode eagerly, and rewatched the whole season as soon as it was over. Even so, I didn't bother to seek out fanfic.

It was not until a couple of years later, when I was checking out the "Recent changes" page on Fanlore, that I had a look at some alteration or other to the article on Flash fandom, spotted a link to "Seventy-Three Seconds", and clicked on in idle curiosity. So I read my first ColdFlash story. It was a stunner.

After that, I perused the AO3 collection (and there were already quite a lot of ColdFlash stories, so it took me some time). "Seventy Three Seconds" was quite an early one: actually written during the first season. Its characterization of Captain Cold is consistent with those early episodes, and very compelling. Fanfic slashing Captain Cold and the Flash quickly shifted to a softer, more romantic view of their relationship—not to mention many varied types of AUs. Some of those are also very well written. Not to mention long: quite a few are novels.

Eventually, I wrote some Flash fic of my own, as well as Legends of Tomorrow fic; and Captain Cold and the Flash certainly feature in quite a few of my stories. More & than / in terms of their relationship; but that's just the way I write.