If it's the 17th, that can only mean...

[in_the_blue]

Writing Challenge!

Welcome to the sixth seventh monthly writing challenge. Go all of us who've contributed! It's one of my favorite times of the month... because it forces me to be creative, and it lets me read some amazing short work on a regular basis.

This month's theme, in honor of sff_corgi, is serenity. Not the movie, the word.

From Cambridge Dictionaries Online:

serene
adjective
peaceful and calm; troubled by nothing:
She has a lovely serene face.

serenely
adverb
She smiled serenely and said nothing.

serenity
noun [U]
I admired her serenity in the midst of so much chaos.

---

Rules (remember, they're more like guidelines):

• Fandom: any, so long as it's one you know well.


• Word count: 400 or less


• Main theme: Serenity.


• Ratings: No restrictions.


• Duration: Challenge opens today and closes at 11:59 p.m. Monday, October 24. A week and a day because I like it that way.

Post your short-fics as comments to this entry. Feel free to do as few or as many as you want, and if you see one you really like, be sure to leave a review or a comment.

"My aim is to put down on paper what I see and what I feel in the best and simplest way." --Ernest Hemingway

Curious about previous writing challenges? Go here to find them.

Comments

[steahl.livejournal.com]

Title: Safe from the eyes of man
Canon: Black Jewels Trilogy
Rating: G
Summary: Surreal on a day off. Reposted with cut! Mun apologizes, as she was mostly asleep while typing...

For such a long lived race as her own, it wasn't a surprise that simple things, common place things were often overlooked, bypassed, ignored. The days seemed to blur together, one into another until the date and the season no longer seemed to matter. Days invariably slid into years, years into decades...so many jobs. So many contracts. So many satisfied customers.

She prided herself on that fact, not letting customers down. It was one thing she clung to in this world where her greatest weapons were stealth and attraction. It was so easy to lose self-respect when one played the bedroom arts, when one frequented the Red Moon houses to establish contacts and screens...

But, even assassins must rest upon occasion. Even she. Safely tucked away in Deje's house, one of the better Red moon houses she knew of. Safe, and secure enough to stop taking the foul brew that controlled her moon days and simply let nature take it's course. As always, the first and second days were torture; glad payment for the very fact of being born female...but the third day, the third day she always seemed to treasure.

Why?

Because...she could simply be. Exist, observe, term it what you would. Surreal could lay aside the daggers and silks and just sit here calmly sipping tea in a battered bath robe. She could allow her mind to go blank for so small a time, so precious, so rare. She could take the time to re-examine all the mundane things that the long lived forgot...

...or not as she chose. She had a book in hand, and yet, she didn't feel the need to focus on the printed pages. Didn't feel the need to do anything. No pressing concerns, no worries for today. Not a common thing for her. Nor was the smile upon her face.

Certainly she smirked or bared her teeth depending on the situation, and certainly there were men who lived there nights dreaming of her carefully crafted smile for them...how shocked they would be to see her now. Earthy, relaxed, mundane even. Shocked indeed that such a vixen as she could seem so...serene and content with her lot. Certainly she would laugh to hear such an opinion expressed...but she didn't need to worry. There were high walls about this garden, and locks between her and the outside world. She could enjoy this peace alone.

Which was, perhaps, one of the greatest freedoms she knew.

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

I don't know this canon, but it doesn't matter: in this short piece, I can still get a read on the setting and the character. It's very nicely done! Thanks for playing.

[steahl.livejournal.com]

*rubs eyes* Meh, not really. Next challenge I'll attempt sleep before typing. Thank you though.

Fandom: Harry Potter / featuring Charlie Weasley

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

Charlie runs his hand through his hair then looks up at the sun: he’ll wait five more minutes then Apparate away. After flunking his first Apparation test he’s always been so careful about intention and result when he does it. Apparating’s still the best and quickest way to get from here to there and back again.

The Romanian Longhorn Reserve is great for many reasons. There’s no place better to study dragons, and not just Longhorns. They’re all here, from Peruvian Vipertooths to huge Hungarian Horntails. The Carpathians are their resting spot, a place not many wizards think to look, never mind travel to. The weather changes with the blink of an eye: he’s seen days go from sunny to fogged under in less than five minutes, and magic’s got nothing to do with it.

And everything to do with it.

Those few in the know also understand that it’s a hell of a place to hide people, not just dragons. There are three Order members here now; Charlie’s recruited the other two. Slowly, carefully, and over time, though at first he resented Dumbledore’s assignment. He remembers the words: "Charlie, I need you in Romania. Keep an eye out for good wizards and witches; I trust your judgment. We have proof of happenings in Albania and surrounding areas; you’re closest. Bring other people in, but do it slowly."

It isn’t really in Charlie’s nature to do things slowly, but he knows he can. A Muggle prayer floats across his brain, refusing to give way:

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
Courage to change the things I can,
And wisdom to know the difference.

He knows the difference between right and wrong, requests and orders, wanting to stay where the action is and working behind the scenes.

He knows being here is more than just necessary: it’s close to ideal. He gets to do what he loves -- play with dragons -- and also help the Order. Even if it means it looks like he isn’t doing anything at all: he knows and Dumbledore knows.

And the dragons know. They’re good that way. Again, Charlie squints up at the sun: this contact isn’t going to show. That’s all right. Recruiting’s hit or miss.

He turns to Apparate back to the Reserve, serene acceptance in his heart. With people, as with dragons, the key word is patience.

Re: Fandom: Harry Potter / featuring Charlie Weasley

[sff-corgi.livejournal.com]

That's a nice unexpected combination, Mister Dragon-Action-Wizard being quiet and slow. Other Quillish Charlie-fics I've read have that touch of pepper to them, too, but this is a situation where pepper is just the wrong spice [/metaphorsRus].

Re: Fandom: Harry Potter / featuring Charlie Weasley

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

It was a good challenge to write Charlie in a forced-slow situation like that. I really didn't know what he wanted to talk about until he started, but it came out as that acceptance of the situation he both wanted and didn't want to be in. I always wondered how he felt about being told to stay in Romania and do quiet work for the Order there. I hope JKR doesn't forget about him again in Book 7.

[maevemoon.livejournal.com]

I did not know if I would be able to join because I am not officially of any fandom, but for what it's worth, you might want to look at this (http://www.livejournal.com/users/maevemoon/23985.html).

:)

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

Well, you're of the "Sounds Like a Breakfast Cereal" and Dogstar fandoms, and that's grand! Please post it here. I love it and want other people to read it!

[maevemoon.livejournal.com]

Fandom: Sounds Like A Breakfast Cereal/Dogstar Academy
Word Count: I haven't the faintest idea; h311ybean has a headache.
Rating: *blushes* PG, I suppose.

Everywhere you look, you will see flowers, ruffles or pink-and-white. Sometimes all of these at the same time. But in the middle of it all, sprawled on my flowered, ruffled, pink and white bed, is a softly snoring young man in black shorts with colorful cartoon dogs gamboling all over them.

Even asleep, Hex appears so loud and angular and masculine compared to his surroundings. Those dogs on his shorts clash horribly with the cabbage roses splashed on my sheets. The snuffling noises he sometimes makes aren't the type of thing one would normally hear in a lady's bed. And he just seems so very hard and solid against the pillows. The only thing he has in common with the fairy princesses who sleep in beds like mine is that he is, like most of them, blond and blue-eyed.

An ordinary observer (and I hope that there are none) would think that Hex looks dreadfully out of place here. But I am not an ordinary observer.

Rather than thinking that he looks out of place, I think that Hex looks right. His presence in my bedroom adds an amusing discordant note to the overall picture, in the same way that he adds an interesting, unique and absolutely necessary element to my life. He has taught me that it's all right to laugh and get angry and be naughty. And by encouraging me to live and act and feel emotion that he has brought me peace.

Hex Holmstrom completes me.

An ordinary observer would think that Hex looks dreadfully out of place in my bed and in my life. But I would not have it any other way.