Tenfour
| Pairing | |
|---|---|
| Pairing: | Tender Sky/Fourteen Fifteen |
| Alternative name(s): | |
| Gender category: | Nonbinary |
| Fandom: | Friends at the Table: Twilight Mirage |
| Canonical?: | No |
| Prevalence: | Common |
| Archives: | |
| Other: | |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Tenfour is a popular Friends at the Table ship featuring the Twilight Mirage PCs Fourteen Fifteen and Tender Sky.
Canon
In canon, Fourteen and Tender are coworkers and friends who work together on a small covert ops team in a far-future utopian society. Fourteen is a "body-swapping assassin" who has begun to lose memories each time they die and assume a new body; one of the memories they lost most recently pre-canon pertains to the nature of their relationship with Tender. They know that Tender is important in some way and that they must keep her in their sights, and they assume that this means they lost memories of an important friendship with her. In fact, what they have forgotten is that they were sent by their handlers to kill her.
History
The shippy potential of Fourteen's lost memories of (and mistaken beliefs about) Tender gripped Friends at the Table fans very early on in the season:
i just think “body-swapping assassin who’s forgotten they were supposed to kill someone and just knows they always want to be close to her so they have a meeting place to find her again after they die” is the most compelling relationship hook i can think of and it makes me feel like a werewolf in the moonlight when i think about it, that’s all
As a result, Tenfour was a popular ship from the beginning, and it has remained popular, including among fanartists and other fanwork creators, in the years since the season's end. For example, it tied with another Twilight Mirage ship for the fourth-most requested ship in the 2023 round of Secret Samol, which ran five years after Twilight Mirage ended.[2]
Creator Response
The cast of the show was well aware of the popularity of Tenfour among fans. In the season's post-mortem episode, Tender and Fourteen's players commented on the ship, giving fans their blessings and half-jokingly apologizing for not making it canon:
I know there's a lot of Tender/Fourteen fans out there and I would like to issue a public apology [laughs] for having to, like... the most potent player character ship in the show, when the entire point of my character was non-commitment.Ali Acampora, Tender's player [3]
On the one hand, what Austin said earlier, about like, "Yo, you can just do whatever you want with headcanons and things. Like, just go right ahead. In fact, go right ahead, with blessings." But like, I think, for me, Fourteen was always a character who was interested in cultivating relationships with people that, perhaps because of their condition, or perhaps just because of the person that they were, was about finding connection with people that wasn't necessarily romantic. Um, we have known Fourteen to be like a hell of a flirt, but I think especially in the case of Fourteen, I think that is sometimes independent from wanting to pursue romantic relationships with people.Jack de Quidt, Fourteen's player [3]
Common Tropes in Fanworks
Example Fanworks
Fanart
- fourteen cooling off in tender's bar (; by ootron. A Tenfour piece set in Tender's bar.[4]
- A laceration sufficiently deep by dancy-nrew. Fourteen Fifteen and a Tenfour moment.[5]
- Untitled Secret Samol art by jesscookie. Another piece set in Tender's bar, this time with the rest of the season's cast in the background.[6]
Fanfic
- the cat who got the whipped cream by bluecloak. Popular canon-setting coffee shop AU.
- Synthesis by homsantoft. PWP exploring the erotic side of Fourteen frequently changing bodies.
- i'd like to be a note/the kind you could sing by ConsoleCowboy. Fake dating fic written for Secret Samol.
Other Fanworks
Archives and Communities
Other Fannish Resources
- Fourteen Fifteen page on FatTWiki (canon resource)
- Tender Sky page on FatTWiki (canon resource)
References
- ^ @seafleece (Aug 12, 2020): i just think “body-swapping assassin who’s forgotten they were supposed to kill someone.... Tumblr post. Accessed February 12, 2024. (archive link)
- ^ Secret Samol 2023 Ship Request Count. Airtable. Accessed February 12, 2024. (archive link)
- ^ a b Twilight Mirage 68: The Twilight Mirage Post Mortem (Sep 10, 2018). Friends at the Table.
- ^ @ootron (Jan 31, 2021): fourteen cooling off in tender's bar (;. Tumblr post. Accessed February 12, 2024. (archive link)
- ^ @dancy-nrew (Dec 4, 2022): A laceration sufficiently deep. Tumblr post. Accessed February 6, 2024. (archive link)
- ^ @jesscookie (Jan 31, 2021): 2020 secret samol.... Tumblr post. Accessed February 12, 2024.
- ^ @tangleofgold (Jan 30, 2022): already posted it on twitter but here’s my gift for @fourteenfifteen for secret samol!! Tumblr post. Accessed February 12, 2024. (archive link)