We are excited to introduce our next shining star for the Creator Spotlight… @Dunloth! This is a member’s only activity where we reach out to one of the talented people in our community each month to find out all about them and their kakairu creations, and then show them off to the world!
We hope you enjoy learning about Dunloth & her creations as much as we did. Please give her some love 
Pronouns: She, they
Type of Creator (artist, writer, both, etc.): writer
Where to find them:
1. How long have you been creating KakaIru fanworks?
I posted my first KakaIru fic in July 2014, Attached (a one-shot I wrote that same day in a burst). I posted my second fic five years later, Looking at you, my first multichapter fic ever, through April and May 2019. Since then I’ve been posting KakaIru more regularly.
2. What are you working on right now?
A multichapter KakaIru soulmates AU, Dreamscape. I’ve posted the first seven chapters, and I have several more chapters already written, but I would like to finish the full fic before posting more chapters. It’s my longest fic until now. I started it and published the first chapter for the 2020 KakaIru Mini Bang, with the prompt Soulmates.
3. What is your favourite trope to create for?
Pining and get-together stories, with a bit of angst—or more than a bit.
4. Which of your creations is your favourite, and why?
There’s not a clear favorite, but I’m very fond of Stranded, a multichapter space pirates AU. I had a lot of fun writing it! I tried to make a more complex plot than I usually do, and more worldbuilding, and I like how it came out.
5. Do you have any WIPs you’re excited about?
Yes! The one I mentioned on question 2, Dreamscape. In fact it’s my only WIP, I’m not good at working in several fics at the same time, unless they’re one-shots.
6. Do you have any original characters? If so, tell us about them!
Not many. I can think of two: Oyone, a medic working for Iruka’s enemies in Stranded; and in my Dreamscape WIP, Granny Chie, an elder of the plane of ninja dogs where Kakashi’s ninken come from—I really like this one, I hope readers will like her as well when I get to publish the chapters where she appears.
7. What was your hardest piece to create, and why?
My current Dreamscape WIP. The plot is a bit twisted, with time skips and some time travel. I don’t want to confuse the readers with the non-linear parts. I want to fix any plot holes and make all the pieces click in the end. I need to create an ending that doesn’t feel disappointing after all I made Kakashi and Iruka go through. My fics tend to end right after the characters get together, but I don’t want to write such a sudden ending for a long fic like this, and I’m having trouble to find an ending that feels satisfying enough and not rushed. I think I’ll eventually get there but it’s making me struggle.
8. Do you have any favourite scenes from something you’ve created?
I don’t have any clear favorites, but I’m fond of many scenes: from Looking at you, a scene where Kakashi lowers his barriers and kisses Iruka in the worst moment. Also in that fic, I like Kakashi’s dialogues with Gai, Yamato and Genma. From So close and yet so far, there’s a bittersweet wedding scene I love. From Pillow talk for fake lovers, there’s a scene where Iruka is trying not to be angry at Kakashi and also to resist his charm while they’re having breakfast in a luxury garden, undercover on a mission. From Stranded, I’m really happy with the spaceship fight scene where Kakashi rams through Akatsuki’s planet blockade. Oops, I really could go on like this for a long time. I had so much fun writing those fics!
9. Where does your inspiration come from?
I daydream too much, and I’ve been doing it for many years, so much that my inner world sometimes feels more real than reality to me. I’m a big fan of sci-fi and fantasy books. Music is very important to me and makes me feel a lot of things. These are my main inspiration sources.
10. Which of your creations is the most meaningful to you, and why?
I think the whole set of my fics are meaningful to me, because writing is a big escape mechanism for me, and it feels incredibly rewarding. The writing process is satisfying and hard in equal parts, and sometimes it’s frustrating—but the feeling of posting a fic and looking at the finished work up there in AO3, oh, that’s just an amazing feeling. Writing is very meaningful to me. In that sense I would say that my most meaningful fic is probably the first one I posted, many years ago, in a different fandom, in an old Buffyverse forum where we were only a couple dozens of people, back when AO3 wasn’t a thing.
Regarding KakaIru, my most meaningful fic was my first KakaIru one, Attached (it was also my first fic in English). And after that, my first multichapter, Looking at you, because being able to write a longer story had been a long time aspiration, and with that fic I felt very accomplished, like a whole world of writing was opening its doors and welcoming me. Or at least it felt a bit like that, and it was a great feeling. I hope writing never stops making me feel things like this.