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Attack on Slough House (keep it up, I know you can) by Sandpiper1967
Fandoms: Slow Horses (TV), Slough House - Mick Herron
05 Mar 2026
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A short (I think) fic about an attack on Slough House. Mainly River-centric but with others mixed in :)
Series
- Part 1 of Slough House Collection
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{The highly (?) anticipated sequel of The Aldersgate School Files}
University; tall order at the best of times, let alone when it’s Cambridge.
Everything is going exactly to plan - Any day now River would be getting scouted for M.I.5, but in the meantime, a History and Politics degree from St John’s College Cambridge wouldn’t hurt, and even better, his boyfriend is studying right beside him. What he hadn’t counted on is that people aren’t as kind in the real world as back home, and all of a sudden life isn’t so easy all the time.
James can’t believe his luck! He proved his dad wrong and secured himself a place in St John’s studying Political Science and no one could ever take that away from him. Even if River is acting kind of weird.
It’s sink or swim time for River and James.
Series
- Part 4 of Aldersgate School Files
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“It’s for you, River,” his grandfather says, “it’s your mother.”
River pours down the steps and wrenches the phone into his own hands.
“Careful, River,” his grandfather says, and leaves the room.
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Four times River calls his mother, and two times she calls him. -
Don't Talk To Strangers by countessrivers
Fandoms: Slow Horses (TV), Slough House - Mick Herron
03 Mar 2026
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"This assassin has no obvious ideological motivation. All the targets are different ages, sexes, ethnicities, occupations. They didn’t know each other. There’s no clear connection linking them other than being the types of people someone would believably pay a decent amount of money to get rid of. But the deaths themselves, they don’t have a signature, but there’s a certain...style to them.”
James toys with the corner of the file, only half aware he’s doing so.
“I’ve got a dozen different countries in there and deaths dating back years, and I don’t know exactly how long they’ve been working but they’re not slowing down, and I just think that’s...interesting.”
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“Getting desperate, are you?”
“Don’t flatter yourself, Cartwrong.”
“Hm, but am I? Wrong, I mean.” River shifts, lying down as he talks, one leg pulled up, the other hanging off the sofa. "You've got nobody else to talk to? On a Friday?"
“So what if I don’t.”
River Cartwright has enough on his plate– a psychopath for a father, a sick grandparent, a house to sell, an absent friend slash co-worker, and a dead ex-best friend. Actually, scratch that last one. Unfortunately, Spider Webb is still alive and still on River's contact list. James Webb is not doing great. He goes for long walks at night, dreams of ghosts, and the only constant in his life is the dog he watches for his mother. No surprise then, that the phone call with River from months ago still has such a hold on him. Repeating the same mistake, he begins to wonder if there’s something worth salvaging here after all. Through a series of encounters, they rebuild their old connection, leading River to discover that death might have a way of rearranging more than just one’s priorities. That’s how it starts– sharing a call, sharing a meal, sharing a bed.
Series
- Part 2 of Water Striders
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小河的地下恋情意外被兰姆发现后，被迫替老板买饭（双份面条的七号套餐）途中的倒霉经历。
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Ponte dei Sighs by FabulousDarling
Fandoms: Slow Horses (TV), Slough House - Mick Herron
26 Feb 2026
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Catherine Standish never asked to be sent into the field — and certainly not partnered with Jackson Lamb. But a dead agent drags them to Venice: a city of canals, masks, and secrets better left underwater.
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In which Sasha absolutely, definitely, seriously, does not have a crush on River Cartwright.
[Season 3 – ?]
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I need to know if your heart is racing too by PoemAboutCitylights
Fandoms: Slow Horses (TV), Slough House - Mick Herron
26 Feb 2026
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“You do realise it would make you one of us, don’t you? And that my shitty little job would also be your shitty little job, then?”
Spider scrunches up his nose, “Don’t be a blockhead, River. We all know you’ll live and rot at Slough House and that sort of ambitionless life just isn’t for me.”
River’s fingertips begin to twitch again but he forces himself to keep his voice down.
“And still you want to work with us.”__
Or: Spider is back from the dead and River has to deal with it
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so i'll continue to continue by samwife for CakeBatterOnABrickWall
Fandoms: Slow Horses (TV)
24 Feb 2026
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{Why me? She thinks.
She’d actually asked him that the first time.
‘Why the fuck would you come to me?’
‘Because you believe. You’ll listen.’ He’d answered.But she hadn’t opened up her mind for him, he wasn’t the one she’d tried to bring back.}
aka louisa and ghost spider
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River Cartwright doesn't like sex, and he doesn't like dating. Somehow, an ill-fated conversation with Spider, the first close friend he makes as an adult, where he tries to explain this results in River finding himself in a friends-with-benefits arrangement that he doesn't remember agreeing to, doesn't want, and can't find a way out of.
It's not like it's... it's not like it isn't his fault. That's what River tells himself. He lets it happen, after all, so who else can be to blame? He doesn't get to be traumatized by this. It's not like he was raped. Later on, when people start finding out, they have a different opinion. To them, it's clear that this is in fact exactly what happened.
OR: Five times someone learned about what Spider did to River, and one person who already knew. Ft. repulsed aroace River, a heap of internalized victim blaming and aphobia, and the pain of not having the words to describe who you are and what's happened to you.
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River gets blown up in the document storage facility, but with More Medically Plausible Consequences. An episode tag of sorts to 3x06 Footprints.
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James "Spider" Webb is pretty sure that River Cartwright is a good connection to have. He is not exactly wrong.
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you could write me someday, and I hope you will by tenderhooked
Fandoms: Slow Horses (TV)
22 Feb 2026
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Granddad’s hands had always been leather, worn thick with lines. They’d held a callousness that had somehow never touched River when they held him.
[ or: river, and grief, and home. ]
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Everything he needs by Madame_Isabel
Fandoms: Slow Horses (TV), The Day of the Jackal (TV)
20 Feb 2026
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He brushes a stray tear off River’s cheek with his thumb. “You’re a good man. You deserve to have someone be there for you.”
For a second River thinks he’s going to cry again, in a sort of happy way this time.
“Hey,” he whispers, stroking River’s face. “It’s okay. I’ve got you.”
River thinks his luck has finally changed. It hasn’t.
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River says goodbye. Based on the teaser for s6
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run back like a dog by softkitties
Fandoms: Slow Horses (TV), Slough House - Mick Herron
18 Feb 2026
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He’s not sure if it’s the realisation of what exact kind of situation he’s in or just his delayed response to the freezing wind outside that sends a racking shiver down his body (though it could very well be from the feeling of hands, cold and calloused, wrapped around his neck, however short that time was). He’s stuck, trapped in a cabin who-fucking-knows-where with only his psychopathic dad for company.
Once River’s had enough of attempting to crawl out of his skin, his father finds it in him to speak. “Meant to put that on while you were out,” he rumbles with his low, American drawl. “Morning, son.”
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river finds himself unwillingly inducted into one of frank's more dehumanising training regimes
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River slumps against the cubicle wall, staring at the black lacework of grime on the bathroom ceiling and hoping that the dampness seeping into the seat of his jeans is water. His throat is raw; the acrid smell of vomit still itches at his nostrils.
Spider is dead.
He can feel himself rejecting the notion. Spider (James- his brain supplies unhelpfully -he was James first) has always been so present; smarmy and cocksure and thoroughly untrustworthy. River had somehow pictured himself dealing with his irritating presence for the rest of his life.
The problem with knowing people, he thinks, is that it doesn’t matter who they become – you never really stop missing who they used to be.
His hatred of Spider has been wrapped up in mourning for years.
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Spider lives. River isn't sure how to feel about it.
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“Watch where you’re fucking going, before you end up as roadkill.” The man warned with a harsh tone, but without raising his hand.
River quickly tried to apologise, but all he could manage was a fragile “Sorry, sir-“
“Drop the ‘sir’, I’m not your parole officer. It’s Lamb.” River assumed that wasn’t his first name, so he stuck to the safe option of ‘Mr Lamb’ for a while.
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or; what if it was Lamb who raised River after his mother abandoned him -
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James meets River one day at work, and their single conversation sparks something of an obsession.