fan fiction index
Welcome to my El Jay.
My website is where (very nearly all) my fiction lives.
Below are drabbles (stories of 100 words exactly), snippets (100-1000 words) and commentfic (things written for fun in comments) what have not been archived anywhere else (yet).
Drabbles from this meme.
for infiniteviking: Abby Sciuto
Gibbs and Ducky are the ones who get it.
For example, McGee gave her candy skulls for Hallowe'en, and was treated to a lecture on customs associated with the Day of the Dead.
Kate used to get her Emily pencils.
Tony thinks she listens to hardcore German goth industrial (she doesn't).
Ziva worries it's just morbid fascination with death, and walking McGee's dog at the cemetery is disrespectful.
But Ducky started the tradition of black roses, because he understands the beauty of living and dead things. While Gibbs understands how the skull-and-crossbones anklets with black ribbons make her feel pretty.
for medie: Pike
When Pike first sets foot in his quarters aboard Starbase 12, his cases have already been delivered from the cargo bay. Uniforms hang in the closet, his cartons of books sit next to low shelves. The container marked "fragile" sits unopened beneath the row of windows. He removes the contents carefully. The bottle is dusty--it sat for years on the mantle at his parents' house, and he forgot to dust it before packing. The wooden sloop-of-war inside the bottle is pristine, USS Constellation carved into the plaque at its base. When he sets it on his desk, he's home.
for sinkwriter: Timothy McGee
McGee has a routine. When he gets home, he locks his sidearm in its box before grabbing Jethro's leash. The German shepherd dog dances with anticipation as McGee hooks the lead to his collar. He calls Sarah so she can tell him about her day as Jethro pulls him along, tongue lolling. He feeds Jethro, then himself, and writes for two hours. Television, then bed, the dog curled on the floor at the foot of the bed.
Sometimes he goes days--even weeks--without seeing the look on Kate's face beneath the neat round hole when he closes his eyes.
Edison and Theora
He's only been in her bed once, and that was the day they met. He'd woke groggy, bone-weary, gash across his forehead itching, and safe. She'd been relieved, amused, and annoyed. He'd never been in her bed since, but he thinks about it every once in a while as she guides him from place to place, his perfectly controlled Control. She commands, and he follows. Trust, friendship, and something else they don't talk about behind their actions. He wonders if he'd follow her voice right back to the mountain of pillows and scattered soft toys without hesitation, his actions automatic.
Gibbs/Abby
Eleven years of birthday dinners and he's never anything but a perfect gentleman as he escorts her from his car to her door.
She remembers how, after way too much sambuca one year she'd given him a liquorice-flavoured kiss. It hadn't been a quick peck. Full on arms around his neck, breasts pressed up against his chest, mapping the inside of his mouth with her tongue good-night kiss.
His hands had stayed at his sides, and he'd only smiled at her fondly when she'd stepped back.
"Night, Abbs," he'd said.
"Night, Gibbs."
She didn't drink sambuca anymore.
But he does.
for thistlerose: Stormer
Sometimes she wakes up with a tune. She'll beat out the time on the wall of her shower, tapping her foot as she sips her coffee, and by the time she pulls into her space at Stinger Sound she's got the opening bars, the chorus, and has almost nailed the verses.
Those are the good days.
Bad days she'll spend in the basement with her piano, crumpled pages overflowing the basket, uncooperative chords mocking her. She'll cry and scream and keep hammering away at it until she's got a melody.
But every day is better than waiting tables back home.
for boosette: Pike/Number One
In command decisions he carefully weighs opinions, and when appropriate, follows her advice. She has no problems following his orders. It's part of what makes them an efficient team. They can handle life-threatening situations without raised voices, yet she's nearly brought to tears of frustration trying to schedule their first leave together.
As a captain, he's excellent. As a lover, he's amazing. As a man, he's infuriating. Afterwards, he makes it up to her in creative ways. But it never gets any easier. They push each other's buttons in ways no-one else can.
Still, she decides he's worth it.
(Barely.)
for syredronning: Pike/Chapel
He's always had a weakness for blondes.
It's hard to tell from his vantage point--flat on his back on the biobed--but she looks tall. The uniform does little to disguise her slim hips and pert breasts. As Enterprise limps home on impulse power, he has plenty of time to imagine what she looks like under that uniform. Considering until sixteen hours ago he was her captain, he should feel ashamed.
He doesn't.
He listens to her give orders--crisp, efficient, in charge--and he likes the sound of her voice. He's not sure why.
He falls asleep smiling.
for corellianjedi: Hodgins/Abby
When Marty told Jack Hodgins that Abby Sciuto was hot, what he'd failed to mention was that she was hot specifically in a January, 1955 Playboy centrefold kind of way.
It wasn't just the perfect bangs, black curls, red lips, and curves. It was more than the black dress that was sexy yet modest, chunky mary-janes with enough of a heel that Jack felt himself willing himself to be taller in a way he hadn't since he first realised he had a thing for Angela.
But it was the stockings with the seams up the back that got to him.
for mechturtle: Uhura
Whenever they are on leave, she takes taxis instead of just beaming down to their destination. She likes to talk to the hacks in their native languages, on those brief trips from wherever they are staying.
She'll go for days without speaking Standard except on the ship, and comes back with her tricorder loaded with cheap tourist phrasebooks even though she complains (often) they're inaccurate and a poor substitute for total immersion.
Spock watches her spend her free time updating the Translator matrices with amusement at first, then gratitude as it becomes clear how much Enterprise benefits from her obsession.
for possibly_thrice: Pike/Gaila
The Academy ballroom can accommodate a thousand, which is just enough for the senior officers from Enterprise, Yorktown, and Intrepid plus the Admiralty, and assorted partners, to be that touch too warm.
The food is rubber chicken, but the band's decent.
Commander Scott has had Gaila on his arm for most of the night, leaving a clutch of officers by the bar alternately grousing and awe-struck.
The Yorktown's captain isn't surprised when Gaila cuts in to steal a dance from the Admiral.
Her lips graze his ear as she whispers "Glad to see you're not drinking alone anymore."
He grins.
for thepouncer: Gibbs
He buys coffee once a month from a grocery an hour's drive away. It's a run-down looking place, with linolium floors that while clean are cracked and worn. The owners are Lebanese and the grandfather doesn't speak English.
One wall is taken up with containers of different roasts of bean, and a noisy grinder. The French roast beans are dark and gleaming as the daughter with henna'd hair and a wide smile weighs them on a metal scale.
She always tries to make small talk, and he almost never says a word.
She thinks he takes his coffee buying seriously.
Star Trek: The Original Series - Rated PG
Originally posted at where_no_woman
Prompt: I've got better things to do than survive
Pike doesn't order her to do it. She does it all on her own.
She listens to him agree to a life of servitude, fathering children with a woman who is nothing more than a fantasy, all to spare her and Colt. She listens to him agree to his descendants being sentenced to lives as artisans and technicians and farmers with no hope of a future in the stars--all to prop up a dying culture--and her hands move to the phaser on her belt almost without thinking.
The scraping sound of the gain control as she twisted it around past the red line made him turn to her, alarm replaced in a split second with the tightening of his jaw as the weapon began to whine as the powercell starts to overload.
Colt swallows hard, her eyes wide with fear. But she stands her ground nonetheless, braver than Number One thought she would be, when she first offered the yeoman the opportunity to bow out of the landing party.
"It's wrong to create a whole race of humans to live as slaves," she says quietly.
The Talosian can read her mind. It shouldn't have to ask her if she is bluffing.
Later, when Pike has her sign off on the paperwork declaring Talos IV off-limits before sending it back to Comsol's aide, he lays a hand on her shoulder in the Briefing Room. She stays, waiting for Spock, Colt, and Tyler to file back out to the bridge.
"What you did down there--"
"You'd have done the same, Captain."
"I'm not so sure," he admits, and she can see what it costs him. She doesn't need him to say this--not after what he'd tried to do, just to ensure her and Colt's safety. But he says it anyway. "It took courage."
"It wasn't courage, sir." She almost shrugs. "Whatever it was, it wasn't courage."
Star Trek (2009) - Rated PG through PG-13
Originally posted at Journey to Drabble:
Prompt: McCoy, fatherhood
"You're where?" Joanna's eyes had grown enormous.
Leonard leaned closer to the terminal to whisper almost conspiratorially "In space."
"Where in space?"
"Really far away."
"How far away?"
"You know how long it takes to get to Atlanta in the flyer from your Neela's house in Adelaide?"
She nodded solemnly, dark curls bobbing. It scared him how quick she was growing. She was five now--but before he knew it, she'd be twenty five and he'd be a creaky old bastard, demanding grandchildren. He wasn't sure he was ready for any of that yet.
"It's gonna take us four whole days to get where we're going. And that's with us going so fast, you wouldn't even be able to see us."
"Wow."
"Yep."
"I don't want you to be far away, daddy."
McCoy swallowed past the sudden lump in his throat. "I know, baby."
Prompt: Kirk/Gaila, sweet little lies
Everyone knows about Orion girls.
It's the stuff of legend. Boys too young to shave across the length and breadth of the Galaxy have awakened from dreams of expanses of green skin beneath their hands to find themselves alone, with laundry to do, since the first deep-space explorers came back with tales of lithe, passionate alien slave-girls.
Jim Kirk couldn't quite believe it when the new cadet class arrived from Orientation, and beneath a mop of fire-red curls an Orion girl smiled at him, batting her eyes from across the canteen. He'd choked on his lunch, and Leonard had thumped him hard on the back three times, asking if he needed the Heimlich or just a cold shower.
It didn't take much to find a place at her table, sliding his moulded plastic tray across the tan Formica as suavely as he could--until the momentum sent his apple rolling across the table onto the floor.
As she'd bent down to retrieve it, he'd got a glimpse of how flexible she was--how all those curves were put together to make up a whole that was more than the sum of their parts and he'd damn near forgot his own name.
Everyone knows, but Jim gains first-hand knowledge. And it's more than carnal, and a lifetime of experience packed into twenty minutes in a supply closet and he'll have bruises on the small of his back from where a metal shelf proved just sturdy enough. And he tells her that if he's not careful he could really fall for her.
"Really?" she says right before he cracks his head hard enough to see stars as she does this thing that he's pretty sure isn't even legal on at least 16 Federation member worlds with the tip of her tongue. "That is so weird."
"You mean you don't love me too?" he asks, crushed, and she rolls her eyes.
Everyone knows about Orion girls.
And Orion girls all know about Jim Kirk.
Prompt: Spock Prime and Sarek, upon this rock
Sarek barely registers the doorchime. Deep in meditation, it registers almost a full minute later. Extinguishing the flame, he rises slowly, padding barefoot across the floor of the Academy guest quarters.
As the door slides open, he finds an elder, perhaps seventy years his senior. His clothing is not of Vulcan, thought it is austere and well-made.
"Peace, and long life," the stranger says in a voice that his familiar.
"Live long and prosper," Sarek says by rote, his right hand making the salute almost without conscious thought. He steps aside, to allow the elder to enter.
"I am sorry--I believe we have not met."
"We have met. Many times."
"That is quite impossible. I have no recollection of you."
"Do you remember when your son first travelled into the Forge, for his ordeal?"
"Selek?" Sarek is confused. The young vulcan kinsman who had saved the life of his and Amanda's only son had been twenty years his junior. And bears little resemblance to the man before him.
"Yes. And no." The elder shows a disturbing lack of restraint as one corner his mouth lifted in a sad smile. Sarek wondered if he suffered from Bendii syndrome, to openly display so much on his heavily lined face.
"I grieve with thee," he finally said, laying his hand upon Sarek's.
With that touch, Sarek understands.
And two men--father and son, elder and junior--began to plan the future of their people, bound by their love of the same human schoolteacher, lost to them both before her time.
NCIS - Rated PG-13 through R
Originally posted at Porn Battle #7
Pigtails (prompt: remember)
In the bar after work her first day, Gibbs had asked Burley what the new ballistics expert's pigtails made him think of.
"Handles," Stan had said without hesitation, and Gibbs hadn't actually needed to slap Burley him upside the head. Realising what he's just said, and to whom, Stan had turned a shade of crimson Gibbs hadn't seen before or since. The half-empty pitcher of beer on the table hadn't been any excuse, but Gibbs let it slide, pretending he hadn't understood exactly what Stan meant.
But the image had burned into his brain in an instant, and nine birthday dinners later it hadn't gone away. It was still the dirty little thought he had alone in the dark, waking up in the wee hours inside the shell of his boat, his mouth sour with the after-effects of too much Jack, and the taste of sawdust in the back of his throat.
Even when Hollis was encroaching on his half of the bed while the birds sang outside and he woke up hard, it's not the woman ten feet away he thought of as he wrapped his hand around his cock while the bathroom mirror clouded with steam. He thinks of red, red lips, and comes all over his hand, breathing in the steam with short, panting breaths.
It's been ten years, and sometimes when he saunters into her lab, Caf-Pow in hand, and she grins at him impishly, it's still the first thing he thinks of. Even when he's pressing a chaste kiss to her cheek, behind his eyes for just a flash of a second, she's on her knees.
It's dirty, and it's wrong, and he should just cut that shit out, because it's Abby for Christ's sake. But Gibbs has a sneaking suspicion Abby hasn't changed her hairstyle in the past decade precisely because somehow, in that spooky kooky way of hers, she knows.
Which is why, every now and then, when he reaches out to tug on a pigtail and she smiles back at him not-so-chastely, he wonders how wrong it would actually be.
Originally posted at Porn Battle #7
Live Wire (prompt: energy)
There's a trap Gibbs refuses to fall into. It's too easy to think of her as young and innocent--even with the bawdy reminisces of fetish-loving boytoys and all-night raves. She's got a child's sense of wonder, but it's shining brightly in grown woman's body, with a grown woman's appetites, and the short skirts and the hair in plaits isn't about holding onto her youth.
Abby fizzes like a Fourth of July sparkler.
And when all the sparks have been thrown off, there's a red coal that smokes and can burn you far worse than the bright lights ever could and that's what he thinks of as he presses her back against the curved rib of an unfinished boat with the single bulb hanging from his basement ceiling throwing off harsh shadows. Her laughter against his neck is whiskey-soaked and not a little girl's laugh. Her long fingers hook through the beltloops of his rumpled grey slacks and pull his hips flush with hers and all her red lipstick is gone now. Probably on his neck and collar and there's a smudge on his thumb that she sucks clean, her tongue swirling around the digit before she let's his hand drift down to skim her collarbone.
Her shoulders are round beneath his palms. She thrums like a live wire along the length of him, grinding against him because she knows what she wants and she'll get it if she's not careful. And they're not. Caution's in the rear-view, moving away at speed and he doesn't give a damn anymore. He tastes bourbon on her tongue, and a laugh catches in her throat as he nudges her knees apart and grips her hips, lifting her so she's on her toes. Even with the boots. And he'll leave marks if he's not careful, and she likes that, so he just might.
She leaves marks of her own. But that's alright too.
Originally posted at Porn Battle #7
Rule 12 (prompt: dynamics)
McGee can't quite figure out why Rule 12 doesn't/didn't/wouldn't/hasn't applied to him and Abby.
At first he thought it was because, when they started seeing each other, he was still stationed out at Norfolk. He wasn't a part of the team yet, so Gibbs' Rules hadn't applied to him. Then he found out from Tony that as far as Gibbs was concerned, The Rules applied to everyone--whether they were on his team, or not.
Then he thought it was because Abby hadn't told Gibbs that they were actually officially dating. That had gone right out the window when Gibbs had asked him if he'd slept in the coffin, and Abby had cheerfully pointed out he'd done more than just sleep in the coffin. The doors of the lift had closed before he could have died of embarrassment right there in the squadroom, but later, over cheese fries and Caf-Pows in the canteen, the thought had struck him...
a) Gibbs had known about the coffin. Which implied he had been to Abby's place.
b) Gibbs was perfectly comfortable discussing Abby's sex life with her and her current partner.
c) Rule 12 may not in fact apply to Abby.
d) if Rule 12 did not apply to Abby, then it was conceivable that the reason Gibbs knew about the coffin was because Gibbs, too, had done more than sleep in the coffin.
This promptly broke McGee's brain, and he tried desperately to overwrite that sector with something harmless like the Numa Numa song, before it scarred him for life.
Originally posted for More Joy Day
Rule 27
Abby was sitting in front of her monitor when Gibbs entered, Caf-Pow in hand.
It was after midnight on a Friday, and the building was nearly empty. DiNozzo and Ziva had gone home, even Ducky and Palmer had left Autopsy. But music still blared out of the speakers in Abby's Lab.
"What have you got for me, Abbs?"
She twisted on her chair, twirling the end of one pigtail around her finger. "Major Mass Spec found traces of amorphous silicon dioxide, and I'm running it against the soil samples from the area where the body was found. That'll tell us if she was killed there, or just dumped."
"DiNozzo's still checking out the girlfriend's alibi. It can wait til morning. Why don't you head home?"
"I have my futon." She gestured vaguely towards the ballistics lab on the other side of the glass.
Gibbs put a finger to her lips, and pointedly stared down at her bare feet beneath her buttoned-up labcoat. Her toenails were painted with dark red varnish, and she wiggled her toes experimentally.
"Rule 27, Abbs," he said with a smile as he pressed a kiss to her cheek.
"Go home, McGee," he called over his shoulder as he walked out of the lab, hands in his pockets.
Abby pressed both hands to her mouth, stifling giggles. After 15 Mississippi's, the length of time it took Gibbs to get from the door of the lab to the elevator, Tim popped up behind the glass. His hair was sticking up from pulling on his tee-shirt over his head, and his shirt was mis-buttoned.
"How did he know I was in here?"
"He's Gibbs." Abby shrugged, and skipped over to him. Her red plaid trousers were in a pile on top her boots, the chains and buckles clinking against each other as she reached down into the pile to pull out her white cotton socks.
"What's Rule 27?" McGee asked as she waved happy warm feet at him.
"No sex in the lab."
Tim thought about that for a minute, two questions obviously warring with one another. In the end, he went with the one least likely to get him headslapped.
"What about mould sex?" he finally asked.
The Middleman - Rated PG
The Post-Plagiarist Conflagration
"Would you like to do the honours?" Lacey asked as she handed Wendy her lighter.
Pip's paintings were stacked haphazardly in the centre of the roof, the strong smell of gasoline wafting in the breeze, the entire scene illuminated by VIPER sign.
"I dunno, Lace. Canvas is expensive. I could probably paint over--"
"Nuh-uh. No way. This will be cathartic, in a I-can't-believe-that-scuzzball-ripped-me-off-and-then-tried-to-blackmail-me-by-threatening-to-kick-my-family-out-of-his-father's-building-and-I-can't-set-him-on-fire-so-this-is-the-next-best-thing-kind of way."
"Lacey's right, Wendy Watson," Noser said, laying a hand on her shoulder. "He took you for everything that you had."
"And kicked you out on your own," Lacey added.
"Am I happy? Am I satisfied?"
"There are plenty of ways that you can hurt a man and bring him to the ground," came a voice from the doorway.
"Yo, Wendy's Boss."
"Hello, Mr Noser. Lacey." The Middleman favoured Wendy's roommate with a warm smile. "I thought I might find you up here, Dubby."
"How?"
"I deduced it was most likely you had removed the offending copies of your original artwork from the gallery's dumpster and would want to destroy them. I caught the distinctive smell of kerosene, mixed with Brut and tempera and just a hit of Pip's hair gel as I came into the hallway."
"So you came to stop us?"
"Hounds of Lucifer, no!" He held out a bag of marshmallows, and three Hershey bars. "I just thought... well, if you didn't mind..."
Wendy rolled her eyes. "Yes, you can roast marshmallows over the burning remains of Pip's copies of my work."
"Excellent!" The Middleman rubbed his hands together, his deep soulful eyes alight with childlike glee. "Can I ask you something?"
Wendy's eyes narrowed. "That... you know... thing from the gallery opening worn off?" she whispered, so Lacey and Noser couldn't hear. However, Lacey and Noser were busy getting marshmallows impaled on the end of the barbecue forks the Middleman had thoughtfully thought to provide along with the makings for s'mores.
"The effects are temporary, I assure you."
"Sure. Fire away."
"What did you paint, before you joined--"
Wendy coughed.
"--The Jolly Fats Weehawkin Temp Agency in the pursuit of emotionally satisfying short-term employment?"
She looked down at the lighter still clutched in her fingers. "Asian dudes in aeroplanes."
"Interesting."
She flicked open the DC3 Zippo, and bent down to hold it to the corner of the gun-toting gorilla copy. The entire stack went up in flames, and Wendy held her hands out to warm them in the fire's glow.
"Yeah. I like my new period better."
Sarah Connor Chronicles - Rated PG
Thirst
Derek wasn't sure what triggered it, but it was like a switch got flipped inside his head. One minute he was wrestling with Sarah for the last cold beer, and the next his was unable to focus on anything but the curve of her hip beneath his hand.
He let her go, made some joke, and went outside. The night air in the desert was cool, and the chains of the swings were creaking in the breeze.
He stared down at his hands, trying to remember the last time he'd touched a woman for the sake of just feeling skin on skin.
He ached with want, and had no intention of having. But the dull ache, the itch to touch and feel was sweet in and of itself. He hadn't in so long, it was like he'd forgot how to be human. And he knew that the memory of that bit of skin above her belt and below the frayed hem of her tee-shirt would end up like that damn picture Kyle had kept in his pocket if he wasn't careful. So much could and would and couldn't happen.
He felt eyes boring into his back, and turned to see the machine watching him from the kitchen window. He could hear voices through the screen door--Sarah telling John to get off the internet and go to bed. School night.
Simple Mom-stuff. From a woman who had taught her son how to clean and load guns along with his A-B-Cs. How to make pipe-bombs along with macaroni collages. He assumed there had been macaroni-collages. He hoped there had been, once. Kyle had made those. Spray-painted with flaking gold paint. It had been a life-time ago, but at the same time, somewhere in the valley, they were magnetted to a fridge. Or would be. Time displacement made his head hurt.
He wondered what Sarah Connor had been like, before her world had become his world. He couldn't imagine the Sarah Connor his baby brother would have known, 16 years ago. He only knew the tough-as-nails warrior commander avenging angel who burned grilled cheese sandwiches, and he almost believed would kill him if he lied to her again.
And, dammit, he was still thirsty.
Firefly - Rated PG through PG-13
Originally posted at ff_friday
right and wrong
She was pretty sure she was going to die.
Granted, she'd never actually heard of anyone dying of pleasure. But she was certain that if it were possible, she was doing it. Every stroke of his hands, his tongue, his everything, she felt herself tighten like a spring. Grasping handfuls of satin sheets, she arched her back, sure there would be nothing left of her once that spring snapped.
He kissed her, long and hard, five-o-clock shadow scratching her cheek as she breathed out in a sigh, limbs shaking and heart so loud in her ears she thought it might explode.
"So, you're the one with all the fancy schoolin' here--did I do anything wrong?" Mal's blue eyes, sleepy and half closed, still sparkled with mirth. "You can tell me--I won't be offended or anything.'"
"No. You did it right." Inara laughed at the fact that her heart was still beating. "You did it just right."
challenge: Money
"Money. This girl is worth a lot of money. I mean a lot. You kill me, there's nothing," Dobson said, leaning forward slightly, trying to look earnest despite the fact that his hands were duct-taped behind his back. "But if you help me out, you'll have enough to buy your own ship. A better one than this piece of crap."
Jayne bit back a laugh. He didn't want to be no captain of a lashî smuggling ship. That was too much work--and he'd have to find himself a crew, and that was all sorts of trouble he didn't want or need.
He liked where he was, truth be told. Even with the last two jobs being weak tea, he was still making more money on Serenity than he ever had, running with Marco's gang. And Zoe and Mal were decent to work with. He could always ignore Wash when the little man pissed him off, which was often, but not often enough to make him ready to pummel him. And he ain't never had a little sister like Kaylee, who was a half-decent cook, always had a smile on her face even when they were running on spent cells and like to die at any second, and was probably a nice bit of trim--even though he'd never thus far had the pleasure.
He wasn't all that happy about the fact that this sumbitch had put a bullet into Kaylee. That had, as Mal would say, an effect on the landscape. And if the preacher hadn't gotten to him first, Dobson wouldn't be in any position to be offering him anything right about now.
Fact was, he was comfortable here. He didn't want to have to go back to fighting his way up a whole new pecking order. But he sure as hell didn't want to have to be top dog either. He'd shot enough "leaders" clean through the heart in his day to know that you stood a much better chance of surviving if you're not the #1 guy. Hell, Mal had taken more than a few bullets since Jayne had signed on, and not to mention having to suck it up and let guttertrash like Badger act like his lord and master. Jayne wouldn't have hesitated for a second to gut the bastard right then and there, for backing off of a job he had set them on in the first place, and leaving them to twist.
But somebody had to make nice with the fences. Somebody had to plan all the jobs, and Jayne may want to wipe that superior smirk of Mal's face now and then--but the fact was, Mal was the captain on account of he was the best man for the job. Zoe was his lieutenant in everything but name, and that left Jayne with a lot of free time on his hands to do whatever the hell he wanted, so long as it didn't bring the law down on their heads.
"Does helping you out mean turning on the Captain?" he finally asked.
"Yes, it does."
Jayne nodded slowly, considering this.
He liked having his own room, and a seat at the table. Even when he got sent to his room like some ruttin' eight year old, and Mal playing daddy. It was better'n he'd had before. Might be the best he ever got.
His fist flew out, connecting with Lawrence's jaw with a solid and satisfying crack. He spun, and then pitched over onto his side, out like a light. Fresh blood welled from the cut over his eye, where the preacher had laid him out.
Jayne sheathed his knife, chuckling to himself as he stepped out the door and waved at the grim Shepherd Book, who was glaring at him still from where he stood outside his own quarters.
What would he do with his own ship, anyhow?
Smallville - Rated PG
Originally posted at wednesday100
Challenge: alternative universes
Christmas at Chinon
If his brother were here, everything would be different.
Lionel had never wanted sons--he'd wanted heirs he could mould and shape in the fire, then purge the impurities in the forge.
He didn't want love--he wanted obedience, loyalty, and above all, complete worship from his successor.
He didn't want a son. He wanted a shadow.
Julian sobbed into his pillow, praying that none of the servants could hear him through the thick stone walls of the Smallville manor house.
Everything would be different if his brother were here.
But Alexander hadn't been here for a very long time.
Challenge: Clark uses his superpowers for a purpose other than rescue.
Speed
He rarely left Kansas.
For one, his mom would freak if he left for school one morning and suddenly around suppertime called from Ohio. Dad would probably just give him "The Lecture" (Clark had it memorised by now) then ask about his chores.
So, when he ran, he stayed inside state lines.
He waited for nightfall. Harder to be spotted after the sun went down. He zipped through endless wheat fields which rustled in his wake, tipped silver by moonlight, and laughed. Gloried in the rush of wind past his face--the roar in his ears.
It was like flying.
Challenge: Through the eyes of any Smallville character, describe their favourite person, place, or thing.
Favourite Things
The mug was cracked. She'd glued the handle back on when her dad had put it into the dishwasher crooked once. He'd offered to buy her another, but Chloe had just taken all the pieces and disappeared into her room with the superglue. The yellow Planet mug had been her sixth birthday present, grabbed at the airport as Gabe had been flying back from Gotham on his first post-divorce business trip. Her first birthday without her mother. Chipped here and there, she still drank her coffee out of it every morning.
Sometimes, a new thing couldn't replace an old one.
Challenge: A meeting in secret.
Boy's Club
It's not that they're excluding her, exactly. She would kick their asses if she knew about their "club", and no one is suicidal enough to purposely put her in a killing mood. So they meet at the diner instead of the Talon.
"I don't get what she sees in him." Chad picks at flaking black polish on his thumbnail.
Pete shrugs. "Dude--he's my best friend and I still don't get it."
"She deserves better." Mike glances at his watch to make sure there's time to get back to the medical centre before lunch is up. "You know?"
Heinrich sighs.
Challenge: two characters go shopping.
The Alley
"Chloe, I really don't think this is my kind--"
"Oooh! Check out the boots!"
"-I mean, some of these t-shirts--"
"Can you believe girls actually wear these?"
"--and did you see the size of the holes in that guy's ears?"
"Chad keeps talking about that--it's a little beyond the chick with the gun at the Claire's, though."
"There's a shopping centre we passed, with a Limited and I think they had a Borders--"
"Oh! Emily! They have Emily shirts!"
"Who?"
"And Lenore! C'mon, Lana--you gotta try on the PVC Catholic school-girl outfit."
"...help me..."
Challenge: Mothers
The first birthday Caroline had missed had been Chloe's nineth. She'd gotten a card a week later, postmarked the day after her birthday. Damning evidence, no doubt the result of a phone call from Gabe after Chloe had cried herself to sleep after cake and ice-cream.
The first chance for forgiveness Caroline had missed had slid by in a haze of painkillers. In a hospital room filled with the scent of wildflowers, Gabe had held her hand and told her her mother was away on business and couldn't be reached. Chloe had closed her eyes, nodded, and let her go.
Challenge: Smallville without the subtext
Weights and Measures
Food, phone calls, online access, bathroom breaks--everything measured.
No one believed Jodi hadn't fasted, stuck her fingers down her throat, or taken pills. But here, at least, people looked at her with pity--instead of fear.
They saw her--skin stretched over bones, flesh melted away by the "foreign substance" in her blood--and measured her by the freshman who came home twenty pounds lighter, hair falling out, rather than the boy who threw a car through the roof of his house. Or the man who set the school on fire with his thoughts.
She didn't mind being measured.
My website is where (very nearly all) my fiction lives.
Below are drabbles (stories of 100 words exactly), snippets (100-1000 words) and commentfic (things written for fun in comments) what have not been archived anywhere else (yet).
Drabbles from this meme.
for infiniteviking: Abby Sciuto
Gibbs and Ducky are the ones who get it.
For example, McGee gave her candy skulls for Hallowe'en, and was treated to a lecture on customs associated with the Day of the Dead.
Kate used to get her Emily pencils.
Tony thinks she listens to hardcore German goth industrial (she doesn't).
Ziva worries it's just morbid fascination with death, and walking McGee's dog at the cemetery is disrespectful.
But Ducky started the tradition of black roses, because he understands the beauty of living and dead things. While Gibbs understands how the skull-and-crossbones anklets with black ribbons make her feel pretty.
for medie: Pike
When Pike first sets foot in his quarters aboard Starbase 12, his cases have already been delivered from the cargo bay. Uniforms hang in the closet, his cartons of books sit next to low shelves. The container marked "fragile" sits unopened beneath the row of windows. He removes the contents carefully. The bottle is dusty--it sat for years on the mantle at his parents' house, and he forgot to dust it before packing. The wooden sloop-of-war inside the bottle is pristine, USS Constellation carved into the plaque at its base. When he sets it on his desk, he's home.
for sinkwriter: Timothy McGee
McGee has a routine. When he gets home, he locks his sidearm in its box before grabbing Jethro's leash. The German shepherd dog dances with anticipation as McGee hooks the lead to his collar. He calls Sarah so she can tell him about her day as Jethro pulls him along, tongue lolling. He feeds Jethro, then himself, and writes for two hours. Television, then bed, the dog curled on the floor at the foot of the bed.
Sometimes he goes days--even weeks--without seeing the look on Kate's face beneath the neat round hole when he closes his eyes.
Edison and Theora
He's only been in her bed once, and that was the day they met. He'd woke groggy, bone-weary, gash across his forehead itching, and safe. She'd been relieved, amused, and annoyed. He'd never been in her bed since, but he thinks about it every once in a while as she guides him from place to place, his perfectly controlled Control. She commands, and he follows. Trust, friendship, and something else they don't talk about behind their actions. He wonders if he'd follow her voice right back to the mountain of pillows and scattered soft toys without hesitation, his actions automatic.
Gibbs/Abby
Eleven years of birthday dinners and he's never anything but a perfect gentleman as he escorts her from his car to her door.
She remembers how, after way too much sambuca one year she'd given him a liquorice-flavoured kiss. It hadn't been a quick peck. Full on arms around his neck, breasts pressed up against his chest, mapping the inside of his mouth with her tongue good-night kiss.
His hands had stayed at his sides, and he'd only smiled at her fondly when she'd stepped back.
"Night, Abbs," he'd said.
"Night, Gibbs."
She didn't drink sambuca anymore.
But he does.
for thistlerose: Stormer
Sometimes she wakes up with a tune. She'll beat out the time on the wall of her shower, tapping her foot as she sips her coffee, and by the time she pulls into her space at Stinger Sound she's got the opening bars, the chorus, and has almost nailed the verses.
Those are the good days.
Bad days she'll spend in the basement with her piano, crumpled pages overflowing the basket, uncooperative chords mocking her. She'll cry and scream and keep hammering away at it until she's got a melody.
But every day is better than waiting tables back home.
for boosette: Pike/Number One
In command decisions he carefully weighs opinions, and when appropriate, follows her advice. She has no problems following his orders. It's part of what makes them an efficient team. They can handle life-threatening situations without raised voices, yet she's nearly brought to tears of frustration trying to schedule their first leave together.
As a captain, he's excellent. As a lover, he's amazing. As a man, he's infuriating. Afterwards, he makes it up to her in creative ways. But it never gets any easier. They push each other's buttons in ways no-one else can.
Still, she decides he's worth it.
(Barely.)
for syredronning: Pike/Chapel
He's always had a weakness for blondes.
It's hard to tell from his vantage point--flat on his back on the biobed--but she looks tall. The uniform does little to disguise her slim hips and pert breasts. As Enterprise limps home on impulse power, he has plenty of time to imagine what she looks like under that uniform. Considering until sixteen hours ago he was her captain, he should feel ashamed.
He doesn't.
He listens to her give orders--crisp, efficient, in charge--and he likes the sound of her voice. He's not sure why.
He falls asleep smiling.
for corellianjedi: Hodgins/Abby
When Marty told Jack Hodgins that Abby Sciuto was hot, what he'd failed to mention was that she was hot specifically in a January, 1955 Playboy centrefold kind of way.
It wasn't just the perfect bangs, black curls, red lips, and curves. It was more than the black dress that was sexy yet modest, chunky mary-janes with enough of a heel that Jack felt himself willing himself to be taller in a way he hadn't since he first realised he had a thing for Angela.
But it was the stockings with the seams up the back that got to him.
for mechturtle: Uhura
Whenever they are on leave, she takes taxis instead of just beaming down to their destination. She likes to talk to the hacks in their native languages, on those brief trips from wherever they are staying.
She'll go for days without speaking Standard except on the ship, and comes back with her tricorder loaded with cheap tourist phrasebooks even though she complains (often) they're inaccurate and a poor substitute for total immersion.
Spock watches her spend her free time updating the Translator matrices with amusement at first, then gratitude as it becomes clear how much Enterprise benefits from her obsession.
for possibly_thrice: Pike/Gaila
The Academy ballroom can accommodate a thousand, which is just enough for the senior officers from Enterprise, Yorktown, and Intrepid plus the Admiralty, and assorted partners, to be that touch too warm.
The food is rubber chicken, but the band's decent.
Commander Scott has had Gaila on his arm for most of the night, leaving a clutch of officers by the bar alternately grousing and awe-struck.
The Yorktown's captain isn't surprised when Gaila cuts in to steal a dance from the Admiral.
Her lips graze his ear as she whispers "Glad to see you're not drinking alone anymore."
He grins.
for thepouncer: Gibbs
He buys coffee once a month from a grocery an hour's drive away. It's a run-down looking place, with linolium floors that while clean are cracked and worn. The owners are Lebanese and the grandfather doesn't speak English.
One wall is taken up with containers of different roasts of bean, and a noisy grinder. The French roast beans are dark and gleaming as the daughter with henna'd hair and a wide smile weighs them on a metal scale.
She always tries to make small talk, and he almost never says a word.
She thinks he takes his coffee buying seriously.
Star Trek: The Original Series - Rated PG
Originally posted at where_no_woman
Prompt: I've got better things to do than survive
Pike doesn't order her to do it. She does it all on her own.
She listens to him agree to a life of servitude, fathering children with a woman who is nothing more than a fantasy, all to spare her and Colt. She listens to him agree to his descendants being sentenced to lives as artisans and technicians and farmers with no hope of a future in the stars--all to prop up a dying culture--and her hands move to the phaser on her belt almost without thinking.
The scraping sound of the gain control as she twisted it around past the red line made him turn to her, alarm replaced in a split second with the tightening of his jaw as the weapon began to whine as the powercell starts to overload.
Colt swallows hard, her eyes wide with fear. But she stands her ground nonetheless, braver than Number One thought she would be, when she first offered the yeoman the opportunity to bow out of the landing party.
"It's wrong to create a whole race of humans to live as slaves," she says quietly.
The Talosian can read her mind. It shouldn't have to ask her if she is bluffing.
Later, when Pike has her sign off on the paperwork declaring Talos IV off-limits before sending it back to Comsol's aide, he lays a hand on her shoulder in the Briefing Room. She stays, waiting for Spock, Colt, and Tyler to file back out to the bridge.
"What you did down there--"
"You'd have done the same, Captain."
"I'm not so sure," he admits, and she can see what it costs him. She doesn't need him to say this--not after what he'd tried to do, just to ensure her and Colt's safety. But he says it anyway. "It took courage."
"It wasn't courage, sir." She almost shrugs. "Whatever it was, it wasn't courage."
Star Trek (2009) - Rated PG through PG-13
Originally posted at Journey to Drabble:
Prompt: McCoy, fatherhood
"You're where?" Joanna's eyes had grown enormous.
Leonard leaned closer to the terminal to whisper almost conspiratorially "In space."
"Where in space?"
"Really far away."
"How far away?"
"You know how long it takes to get to Atlanta in the flyer from your Neela's house in Adelaide?"
She nodded solemnly, dark curls bobbing. It scared him how quick she was growing. She was five now--but before he knew it, she'd be twenty five and he'd be a creaky old bastard, demanding grandchildren. He wasn't sure he was ready for any of that yet.
"It's gonna take us four whole days to get where we're going. And that's with us going so fast, you wouldn't even be able to see us."
"Wow."
"Yep."
"I don't want you to be far away, daddy."
McCoy swallowed past the sudden lump in his throat. "I know, baby."
Prompt: Kirk/Gaila, sweet little lies
Everyone knows about Orion girls.
It's the stuff of legend. Boys too young to shave across the length and breadth of the Galaxy have awakened from dreams of expanses of green skin beneath their hands to find themselves alone, with laundry to do, since the first deep-space explorers came back with tales of lithe, passionate alien slave-girls.
Jim Kirk couldn't quite believe it when the new cadet class arrived from Orientation, and beneath a mop of fire-red curls an Orion girl smiled at him, batting her eyes from across the canteen. He'd choked on his lunch, and Leonard had thumped him hard on the back three times, asking if he needed the Heimlich or just a cold shower.
It didn't take much to find a place at her table, sliding his moulded plastic tray across the tan Formica as suavely as he could--until the momentum sent his apple rolling across the table onto the floor.
As she'd bent down to retrieve it, he'd got a glimpse of how flexible she was--how all those curves were put together to make up a whole that was more than the sum of their parts and he'd damn near forgot his own name.
Everyone knows, but Jim gains first-hand knowledge. And it's more than carnal, and a lifetime of experience packed into twenty minutes in a supply closet and he'll have bruises on the small of his back from where a metal shelf proved just sturdy enough. And he tells her that if he's not careful he could really fall for her.
"Really?" she says right before he cracks his head hard enough to see stars as she does this thing that he's pretty sure isn't even legal on at least 16 Federation member worlds with the tip of her tongue. "That is so weird."
"You mean you don't love me too?" he asks, crushed, and she rolls her eyes.
Everyone knows about Orion girls.
And Orion girls all know about Jim Kirk.
Prompt: Spock Prime and Sarek, upon this rock
Sarek barely registers the doorchime. Deep in meditation, it registers almost a full minute later. Extinguishing the flame, he rises slowly, padding barefoot across the floor of the Academy guest quarters.
As the door slides open, he finds an elder, perhaps seventy years his senior. His clothing is not of Vulcan, thought it is austere and well-made.
"Peace, and long life," the stranger says in a voice that his familiar.
"Live long and prosper," Sarek says by rote, his right hand making the salute almost without conscious thought. He steps aside, to allow the elder to enter.
"I am sorry--I believe we have not met."
"We have met. Many times."
"That is quite impossible. I have no recollection of you."
"Do you remember when your son first travelled into the Forge, for his ordeal?"
"Selek?" Sarek is confused. The young vulcan kinsman who had saved the life of his and Amanda's only son had been twenty years his junior. And bears little resemblance to the man before him.
"Yes. And no." The elder shows a disturbing lack of restraint as one corner his mouth lifted in a sad smile. Sarek wondered if he suffered from Bendii syndrome, to openly display so much on his heavily lined face.
"I grieve with thee," he finally said, laying his hand upon Sarek's.
With that touch, Sarek understands.
And two men--father and son, elder and junior--began to plan the future of their people, bound by their love of the same human schoolteacher, lost to them both before her time.
NCIS - Rated PG-13 through R
Originally posted at Porn Battle #7
Pigtails (prompt: remember)
In the bar after work her first day, Gibbs had asked Burley what the new ballistics expert's pigtails made him think of.
"Handles," Stan had said without hesitation, and Gibbs hadn't actually needed to slap Burley him upside the head. Realising what he's just said, and to whom, Stan had turned a shade of crimson Gibbs hadn't seen before or since. The half-empty pitcher of beer on the table hadn't been any excuse, but Gibbs let it slide, pretending he hadn't understood exactly what Stan meant.
But the image had burned into his brain in an instant, and nine birthday dinners later it hadn't gone away. It was still the dirty little thought he had alone in the dark, waking up in the wee hours inside the shell of his boat, his mouth sour with the after-effects of too much Jack, and the taste of sawdust in the back of his throat.
Even when Hollis was encroaching on his half of the bed while the birds sang outside and he woke up hard, it's not the woman ten feet away he thought of as he wrapped his hand around his cock while the bathroom mirror clouded with steam. He thinks of red, red lips, and comes all over his hand, breathing in the steam with short, panting breaths.
It's been ten years, and sometimes when he saunters into her lab, Caf-Pow in hand, and she grins at him impishly, it's still the first thing he thinks of. Even when he's pressing a chaste kiss to her cheek, behind his eyes for just a flash of a second, she's on her knees.
It's dirty, and it's wrong, and he should just cut that shit out, because it's Abby for Christ's sake. But Gibbs has a sneaking suspicion Abby hasn't changed her hairstyle in the past decade precisely because somehow, in that spooky kooky way of hers, she knows.
Which is why, every now and then, when he reaches out to tug on a pigtail and she smiles back at him not-so-chastely, he wonders how wrong it would actually be.
Originally posted at Porn Battle #7
Live Wire (prompt: energy)
There's a trap Gibbs refuses to fall into. It's too easy to think of her as young and innocent--even with the bawdy reminisces of fetish-loving boytoys and all-night raves. She's got a child's sense of wonder, but it's shining brightly in grown woman's body, with a grown woman's appetites, and the short skirts and the hair in plaits isn't about holding onto her youth.
Abby fizzes like a Fourth of July sparkler.
And when all the sparks have been thrown off, there's a red coal that smokes and can burn you far worse than the bright lights ever could and that's what he thinks of as he presses her back against the curved rib of an unfinished boat with the single bulb hanging from his basement ceiling throwing off harsh shadows. Her laughter against his neck is whiskey-soaked and not a little girl's laugh. Her long fingers hook through the beltloops of his rumpled grey slacks and pull his hips flush with hers and all her red lipstick is gone now. Probably on his neck and collar and there's a smudge on his thumb that she sucks clean, her tongue swirling around the digit before she let's his hand drift down to skim her collarbone.
Her shoulders are round beneath his palms. She thrums like a live wire along the length of him, grinding against him because she knows what she wants and she'll get it if she's not careful. And they're not. Caution's in the rear-view, moving away at speed and he doesn't give a damn anymore. He tastes bourbon on her tongue, and a laugh catches in her throat as he nudges her knees apart and grips her hips, lifting her so she's on her toes. Even with the boots. And he'll leave marks if he's not careful, and she likes that, so he just might.
She leaves marks of her own. But that's alright too.
Originally posted at Porn Battle #7
Rule 12 (prompt: dynamics)
McGee can't quite figure out why Rule 12 doesn't/didn't/wouldn't/hasn't applied to him and Abby.
At first he thought it was because, when they started seeing each other, he was still stationed out at Norfolk. He wasn't a part of the team yet, so Gibbs' Rules hadn't applied to him. Then he found out from Tony that as far as Gibbs was concerned, The Rules applied to everyone--whether they were on his team, or not.
Then he thought it was because Abby hadn't told Gibbs that they were actually officially dating. That had gone right out the window when Gibbs had asked him if he'd slept in the coffin, and Abby had cheerfully pointed out he'd done more than just sleep in the coffin. The doors of the lift had closed before he could have died of embarrassment right there in the squadroom, but later, over cheese fries and Caf-Pows in the canteen, the thought had struck him...
a) Gibbs had known about the coffin. Which implied he had been to Abby's place.
b) Gibbs was perfectly comfortable discussing Abby's sex life with her and her current partner.
c) Rule 12 may not in fact apply to Abby.
d) if Rule 12 did not apply to Abby, then it was conceivable that the reason Gibbs knew about the coffin was because Gibbs, too, had done more than sleep in the coffin.
This promptly broke McGee's brain, and he tried desperately to overwrite that sector with something harmless like the Numa Numa song, before it scarred him for life.
Originally posted for More Joy Day
Rule 27
Abby was sitting in front of her monitor when Gibbs entered, Caf-Pow in hand.
It was after midnight on a Friday, and the building was nearly empty. DiNozzo and Ziva had gone home, even Ducky and Palmer had left Autopsy. But music still blared out of the speakers in Abby's Lab.
"What have you got for me, Abbs?"
She twisted on her chair, twirling the end of one pigtail around her finger. "Major Mass Spec found traces of amorphous silicon dioxide, and I'm running it against the soil samples from the area where the body was found. That'll tell us if she was killed there, or just dumped."
"DiNozzo's still checking out the girlfriend's alibi. It can wait til morning. Why don't you head home?"
"I have my futon." She gestured vaguely towards the ballistics lab on the other side of the glass.
Gibbs put a finger to her lips, and pointedly stared down at her bare feet beneath her buttoned-up labcoat. Her toenails were painted with dark red varnish, and she wiggled her toes experimentally.
"Rule 27, Abbs," he said with a smile as he pressed a kiss to her cheek.
"Go home, McGee," he called over his shoulder as he walked out of the lab, hands in his pockets.
Abby pressed both hands to her mouth, stifling giggles. After 15 Mississippi's, the length of time it took Gibbs to get from the door of the lab to the elevator, Tim popped up behind the glass. His hair was sticking up from pulling on his tee-shirt over his head, and his shirt was mis-buttoned.
"How did he know I was in here?"
"He's Gibbs." Abby shrugged, and skipped over to him. Her red plaid trousers were in a pile on top her boots, the chains and buckles clinking against each other as she reached down into the pile to pull out her white cotton socks.
"What's Rule 27?" McGee asked as she waved happy warm feet at him.
"No sex in the lab."
Tim thought about that for a minute, two questions obviously warring with one another. In the end, he went with the one least likely to get him headslapped.
"What about mould sex?" he finally asked.
The Middleman - Rated PG
The Post-Plagiarist Conflagration
"Would you like to do the honours?" Lacey asked as she handed Wendy her lighter.
Pip's paintings were stacked haphazardly in the centre of the roof, the strong smell of gasoline wafting in the breeze, the entire scene illuminated by VIPER sign.
"I dunno, Lace. Canvas is expensive. I could probably paint over--"
"Nuh-uh. No way. This will be cathartic, in a I-can't-believe-that-scuzzball-ripped-me-off-and-then-tried-to-blackmail-me-by-threatening-to-kick-my-family-out-of-his-father's-building-and-I-can't-set-him-on-fire-so-this-is-the-next-best-thing-kind of way."
"Lacey's right, Wendy Watson," Noser said, laying a hand on her shoulder. "He took you for everything that you had."
"And kicked you out on your own," Lacey added.
"Am I happy? Am I satisfied?"
"There are plenty of ways that you can hurt a man and bring him to the ground," came a voice from the doorway.
"Yo, Wendy's Boss."
"Hello, Mr Noser. Lacey." The Middleman favoured Wendy's roommate with a warm smile. "I thought I might find you up here, Dubby."
"How?"
"I deduced it was most likely you had removed the offending copies of your original artwork from the gallery's dumpster and would want to destroy them. I caught the distinctive smell of kerosene, mixed with Brut and tempera and just a hit of Pip's hair gel as I came into the hallway."
"So you came to stop us?"
"Hounds of Lucifer, no!" He held out a bag of marshmallows, and three Hershey bars. "I just thought... well, if you didn't mind..."
Wendy rolled her eyes. "Yes, you can roast marshmallows over the burning remains of Pip's copies of my work."
"Excellent!" The Middleman rubbed his hands together, his deep soulful eyes alight with childlike glee. "Can I ask you something?"
Wendy's eyes narrowed. "That... you know... thing from the gallery opening worn off?" she whispered, so Lacey and Noser couldn't hear. However, Lacey and Noser were busy getting marshmallows impaled on the end of the barbecue forks the Middleman had thoughtfully thought to provide along with the makings for s'mores.
"The effects are temporary, I assure you."
"Sure. Fire away."
"What did you paint, before you joined--"
Wendy coughed.
"--The Jolly Fats Weehawkin Temp Agency in the pursuit of emotionally satisfying short-term employment?"
She looked down at the lighter still clutched in her fingers. "Asian dudes in aeroplanes."
"Interesting."
She flicked open the DC3 Zippo, and bent down to hold it to the corner of the gun-toting gorilla copy. The entire stack went up in flames, and Wendy held her hands out to warm them in the fire's glow.
"Yeah. I like my new period better."
Sarah Connor Chronicles - Rated PG
Thirst
Derek wasn't sure what triggered it, but it was like a switch got flipped inside his head. One minute he was wrestling with Sarah for the last cold beer, and the next his was unable to focus on anything but the curve of her hip beneath his hand.
He let her go, made some joke, and went outside. The night air in the desert was cool, and the chains of the swings were creaking in the breeze.
He stared down at his hands, trying to remember the last time he'd touched a woman for the sake of just feeling skin on skin.
He ached with want, and had no intention of having. But the dull ache, the itch to touch and feel was sweet in and of itself. He hadn't in so long, it was like he'd forgot how to be human. And he knew that the memory of that bit of skin above her belt and below the frayed hem of her tee-shirt would end up like that damn picture Kyle had kept in his pocket if he wasn't careful. So much could and would and couldn't happen.
He felt eyes boring into his back, and turned to see the machine watching him from the kitchen window. He could hear voices through the screen door--Sarah telling John to get off the internet and go to bed. School night.
Simple Mom-stuff. From a woman who had taught her son how to clean and load guns along with his A-B-Cs. How to make pipe-bombs along with macaroni collages. He assumed there had been macaroni-collages. He hoped there had been, once. Kyle had made those. Spray-painted with flaking gold paint. It had been a life-time ago, but at the same time, somewhere in the valley, they were magnetted to a fridge. Or would be. Time displacement made his head hurt.
He wondered what Sarah Connor had been like, before her world had become his world. He couldn't imagine the Sarah Connor his baby brother would have known, 16 years ago. He only knew the tough-as-nails warrior commander avenging angel who burned grilled cheese sandwiches, and he almost believed would kill him if he lied to her again.
And, dammit, he was still thirsty.
Firefly - Rated PG through PG-13
Originally posted at ff_friday
right and wrong
She was pretty sure she was going to die.
Granted, she'd never actually heard of anyone dying of pleasure. But she was certain that if it were possible, she was doing it. Every stroke of his hands, his tongue, his everything, she felt herself tighten like a spring. Grasping handfuls of satin sheets, she arched her back, sure there would be nothing left of her once that spring snapped.
He kissed her, long and hard, five-o-clock shadow scratching her cheek as she breathed out in a sigh, limbs shaking and heart so loud in her ears she thought it might explode.
"So, you're the one with all the fancy schoolin' here--did I do anything wrong?" Mal's blue eyes, sleepy and half closed, still sparkled with mirth. "You can tell me--I won't be offended or anything.'"
"No. You did it right." Inara laughed at the fact that her heart was still beating. "You did it just right."
challenge: Money
"Money. This girl is worth a lot of money. I mean a lot. You kill me, there's nothing," Dobson said, leaning forward slightly, trying to look earnest despite the fact that his hands were duct-taped behind his back. "But if you help me out, you'll have enough to buy your own ship. A better one than this piece of crap."
Jayne bit back a laugh. He didn't want to be no captain of a lashî smuggling ship. That was too much work--and he'd have to find himself a crew, and that was all sorts of trouble he didn't want or need.
He liked where he was, truth be told. Even with the last two jobs being weak tea, he was still making more money on Serenity than he ever had, running with Marco's gang. And Zoe and Mal were decent to work with. He could always ignore Wash when the little man pissed him off, which was often, but not often enough to make him ready to pummel him. And he ain't never had a little sister like Kaylee, who was a half-decent cook, always had a smile on her face even when they were running on spent cells and like to die at any second, and was probably a nice bit of trim--even though he'd never thus far had the pleasure.
He wasn't all that happy about the fact that this sumbitch had put a bullet into Kaylee. That had, as Mal would say, an effect on the landscape. And if the preacher hadn't gotten to him first, Dobson wouldn't be in any position to be offering him anything right about now.
Fact was, he was comfortable here. He didn't want to have to go back to fighting his way up a whole new pecking order. But he sure as hell didn't want to have to be top dog either. He'd shot enough "leaders" clean through the heart in his day to know that you stood a much better chance of surviving if you're not the #1 guy. Hell, Mal had taken more than a few bullets since Jayne had signed on, and not to mention having to suck it up and let guttertrash like Badger act like his lord and master. Jayne wouldn't have hesitated for a second to gut the bastard right then and there, for backing off of a job he had set them on in the first place, and leaving them to twist.
But somebody had to make nice with the fences. Somebody had to plan all the jobs, and Jayne may want to wipe that superior smirk of Mal's face now and then--but the fact was, Mal was the captain on account of he was the best man for the job. Zoe was his lieutenant in everything but name, and that left Jayne with a lot of free time on his hands to do whatever the hell he wanted, so long as it didn't bring the law down on their heads.
"Does helping you out mean turning on the Captain?" he finally asked.
"Yes, it does."
Jayne nodded slowly, considering this.
He liked having his own room, and a seat at the table. Even when he got sent to his room like some ruttin' eight year old, and Mal playing daddy. It was better'n he'd had before. Might be the best he ever got.
His fist flew out, connecting with Lawrence's jaw with a solid and satisfying crack. He spun, and then pitched over onto his side, out like a light. Fresh blood welled from the cut over his eye, where the preacher had laid him out.
Jayne sheathed his knife, chuckling to himself as he stepped out the door and waved at the grim Shepherd Book, who was glaring at him still from where he stood outside his own quarters.
What would he do with his own ship, anyhow?
Smallville - Rated PG
Originally posted at wednesday100
Challenge: alternative universes
Christmas at Chinon
If his brother were here, everything would be different.
Lionel had never wanted sons--he'd wanted heirs he could mould and shape in the fire, then purge the impurities in the forge.
He didn't want love--he wanted obedience, loyalty, and above all, complete worship from his successor.
He didn't want a son. He wanted a shadow.
Julian sobbed into his pillow, praying that none of the servants could hear him through the thick stone walls of the Smallville manor house.
Everything would be different if his brother were here.
But Alexander hadn't been here for a very long time.
Challenge: Clark uses his superpowers for a purpose other than rescue.
Speed
He rarely left Kansas.
For one, his mom would freak if he left for school one morning and suddenly around suppertime called from Ohio. Dad would probably just give him "The Lecture" (Clark had it memorised by now) then ask about his chores.
So, when he ran, he stayed inside state lines.
He waited for nightfall. Harder to be spotted after the sun went down. He zipped through endless wheat fields which rustled in his wake, tipped silver by moonlight, and laughed. Gloried in the rush of wind past his face--the roar in his ears.
It was like flying.
Challenge: Through the eyes of any Smallville character, describe their favourite person, place, or thing.
Favourite Things
The mug was cracked. She'd glued the handle back on when her dad had put it into the dishwasher crooked once. He'd offered to buy her another, but Chloe had just taken all the pieces and disappeared into her room with the superglue. The yellow Planet mug had been her sixth birthday present, grabbed at the airport as Gabe had been flying back from Gotham on his first post-divorce business trip. Her first birthday without her mother. Chipped here and there, she still drank her coffee out of it every morning.
Sometimes, a new thing couldn't replace an old one.
Challenge: A meeting in secret.
Boy's Club
It's not that they're excluding her, exactly. She would kick their asses if she knew about their "club", and no one is suicidal enough to purposely put her in a killing mood. So they meet at the diner instead of the Talon.
"I don't get what she sees in him." Chad picks at flaking black polish on his thumbnail.
Pete shrugs. "Dude--he's my best friend and I still don't get it."
"She deserves better." Mike glances at his watch to make sure there's time to get back to the medical centre before lunch is up. "You know?"
Heinrich sighs.
Challenge: two characters go shopping.
The Alley
"Chloe, I really don't think this is my kind--"
"Oooh! Check out the boots!"
"-I mean, some of these t-shirts--"
"Can you believe girls actually wear these?"
"--and did you see the size of the holes in that guy's ears?"
"Chad keeps talking about that--it's a little beyond the chick with the gun at the Claire's, though."
"There's a shopping centre we passed, with a Limited and I think they had a Borders--"
"Oh! Emily! They have Emily shirts!"
"Who?"
"And Lenore! C'mon, Lana--you gotta try on the PVC Catholic school-girl outfit."
"...help me..."
Challenge: Mothers
The first birthday Caroline had missed had been Chloe's nineth. She'd gotten a card a week later, postmarked the day after her birthday. Damning evidence, no doubt the result of a phone call from Gabe after Chloe had cried herself to sleep after cake and ice-cream.
The first chance for forgiveness Caroline had missed had slid by in a haze of painkillers. In a hospital room filled with the scent of wildflowers, Gabe had held her hand and told her her mother was away on business and couldn't be reached. Chloe had closed her eyes, nodded, and let her go.
Challenge: Smallville without the subtext
Weights and Measures
Food, phone calls, online access, bathroom breaks--everything measured.
No one believed Jodi hadn't fasted, stuck her fingers down her throat, or taken pills. But here, at least, people looked at her with pity--instead of fear.
They saw her--skin stretched over bones, flesh melted away by the "foreign substance" in her blood--and measured her by the freshman who came home twenty pounds lighter, hair falling out, rather than the boy who threw a car through the roof of his house. Or the man who set the school on fire with his thoughts.
She didn't mind being measured.