(no subject)
May. 31st, 2010 11:23 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
in_the_blueKeep a poor girl from smoking cigarettes and watching Captain Kangaroo getting bored?
First eight people who comment with a prompt, I'll write you a ficlet. You know my interests and fandoms, so have at it.
Edited to add: YOU PEOPLE HAVE LOST ON THE BRAIN!Don't let the number of comments fool you. I have room for more.
First eight people who comment with a prompt, I'll write you a ficlet. You know my interests and fandoms, so have at it.
Edited to add: YOU PEOPLE HAVE LOST ON THE BRAIN!
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2010-05-31 06:53 pm (UTC)Kate, Sawyer, Jack, the Kwons, Sayid, and Hurley weren't touched by Jacob. They were visited by either angel!Six or angel!Gaius.
Kate
Date: 2010-05-31 08:25 pm (UTC)My love and I in a small cafe.
Then a stranger came along,
And everything went wrong.
Now there's three cigarettes in the ashtray.
Okay, this is it: she gives Tom the signal. This is the big moment and they say practice makes perfect. Tom's the perfect lookout, too, that little airplane tucked away, and that lady talking about her farm is another really good distraction. The lunchboxes are right... over... here.
That's it, that's the one, the New Kids on the Block one. Reaching out, she almost has it in her hand when she hears a grownup's voice. Crap! Busted!
"Of course, one has to make a choice in all things he or she does. But let me give you a small piece of advice, young lady."
The guy's smoking a cigarette and he's dressed like a total dork in that suit -- who dresses like that? no one -- and he looks all greasy and stupid, but she's not afraid. She's not afraid in the least. Defiant arms fold over her chest; her lower lip pouts menacingly.
"I don't take advice from strangers."
"Only lunchboxes, I see." He waves his fingers as if dismissing the entire notion. "Now, it couldn't possibly make the least bit of difference to me if you steal a lunchbox or if you don't. That's not where my interest lies. The advice I have for you is far more critical than that." A line of smoke floats up toward the store's ceiling and as much as she doesn't want to watch it, she can't help it. It's like time's stood still for just a moment.
How did he know she was going to steal one of these? Who is he? It doesn't really matter. "Critical, huh? Spit it out, seeing as how you just blew my opportunity." The neighbor woman finishes paying for her stuff; Tom fidgets by the door and the look he gives her is a pleading one.
The weird old man laughs and leans forward, and he smells like smoke and rose petals and fresh rain and she doesn't know why. "Don't tell anyone, but New Kids on the Block will be so passé in a few short years. The lunchbox you really want to steal is this one." He points to a Super Mario Brothers box; she can't help but snort aloud.
"That's stupid. I don't want that."
"Oh, but you will in about twenty years, Miss Austen. It will be worth a small fortune." Conspiratorially, he leans forward. "Go ahead. Now's your opportunity. Bury it away for a time. You'll thank me later."
"You're weird and dumb. Go away."
He does. Just like that he vanishes; Tom gives her the hurry up! sign. She doesn't want a dumb Super Mario Brothers lunchbox -- she wants New Kids on the Block -- but he said... so what's she supposed to do?
While the shopkeeper's back is turned she puts both in her backpack, grabs Tom by the hand, and runs out of the store giggling. It's a beautiful sunny day, the kind that's just perfect for climbing trees.
Re: Kate
Date: 2010-06-01 02:31 am (UTC)Little Kate is a fantastically little no-nonsense opportunist about her New Kids lunchbox. I love that she took both lunchboxes. I love that she thinks Gaius looks "all greasy and stupid," I think Gaius's voice here is pretty impressive, and I love this exchange:
"I don't take advice from strangers."
"Only lunchboxes, I see."
Leaving all of my more general comments here, I'll also say that I love the impressions Six and Gaius leave on each character. This was a delight to read.
Re: Kate
Date: 2010-06-01 03:42 am (UTC)All in all, it was much easier for me to write Gaius than Six. Once I'd decided to redo each scene, all I had to figure out was which angel was the more appropriate and what the differences would/should/could be.
Little Kate was a lot of fun to write. More tough than nervous, more eye-rolling than rule-following, I could just see her dishing it back out to Gaius. I don't know what difference not getting caught shoplifting will make to her future, but I do know it was a good day for trees.
Little Sawyer could have gone one of two ways. I do like that he's internally defiant with Six and I think in this crossover reality he might still go back and rewrite his letter a lot of times over the course of his life, but being empowered to erase it might change him in so many ways. I don't know. It's all hypothetical. He's still going to be told to be tough and get over things, of course.
Sun and Jin: I couldn't resist putting in both Six and Gaius, so I'm glad you liked that it went that way. I have to say that Jin's his Korean is excellent is one of my very favorite lines, canonically, so I was pretty thrilled to be able to use it. I like that Six and Gaius ended up being the antithesis of what Sun wanted her relationship to be with Jin, and that they were both forgotten afterward. Setting it at the wedding meant I really couldn't change it too much because of the constraints of the day, but it was fun finessing the details.
Jack was going to be seduced by Six one way or another (she had to try it with someone, and Gaius wasn't available). I figured he was the most likely candidate, and she did make a pretty good substitute for an Apollo bar. I also couldn't resist his do I know you? line because he uses that canonically a number of times, and to do it after making out with her at the hospital kind of cracked me up (along with the icon; I'm shy on Jack icons).
I knew that in this version of things Nadia wasn't going to get hit by a car, not that it couldn't happen again later. Just not in my fic: I needed a reason for Sayid not to get distracted to the point of losing Nadia and since they were just talking about their anniversary trip, it made sense to me that Sayid would be less likely to talk to a hooker-looking lady. This one actually started in my mind with him deciding blondes weren't his thing, in part because I never really believed in Sayid/Shannon and in part because he probably really needs to be in control in most given situations.
Hurley... I just love. Much of his dialog is ripped straight from canon, but he was all... dude, I don't know what your deal is, but leave me alone with Gaius. He might have thought himself crazy (and here there was no confirmation from the Jacob substitute that he wasn't, mostly because Gaius always pretty much doubted his own sanity) but he knew this other guy was. And echoing canon for him, it was inevitable that the cab driver wouldn't see Gaius there at all.
Thanks for the prompt! I loved it, and it definitely kept me from smoking cigarettes and watching Captain Kangaroo all day. ♥
Sawyer
Date: 2010-05-31 09:04 pm (UTC)"I'm very sorry about your mother and father, James."
She's pretty and he doesn't know her, but there's lots of people here he doesn't know. He wonders what she wants, and how come she don't just go away and leave him alone.
"You ain't got a pen on you, do you?"
"Oh, you don't want a pen." She reaches over and smooths down his hair like mommy used to do and that almost makes him cry again 'cause he can't believe she's gone, but like his Uncle Doug says, ain't nothin' to do about it but be a man, understand what things have to do with you and what things don't, and get on with things except only he ain't got the slightest idea what getting on with things means. He's just a kid, and they're still deciding what to do with him.
"What do you mean I don't want a pen? Can't you see I'm writing here?"
The lady laughs and it's a soft laugh, not all mean and angry or fake and loud or full of concern like they shouldn't ought to be laughin' around him since his parents died, not that kind of laugh. "Pens are permanent. But I do have this." Drawing a pencil out of her purse, she hands it to him. "It's got a good strong eraser on it too."
"What do I need an eraser for, lady?" His eyes fill with tears but he blinks 'em back. Like Uncle Doug said, it's been an e-motional day all around.
When she stands she's real tall, real pretty, and she leans over and pats him on the head. "Sometimes we want to hold onto the past and sometimes we want to let it go. Have faith in yourself, James, and have faith in God's will. Listen to what you know in your heart, not to what anyone else tells you."
Yeah, like you, he almost says. Right now he don't have much faith in God or in His will, but he takes the pencil and a moment to think about what she's said and starts up writing again.
Dear Mr. Sawyer, he writes, You don't know who I am, but I know who you are, and what you done.
"Hey, lady? What do you know about God's will? You think it was God's will killed my mommy and my dad?"
She's gone when he looks up and all the grownups are too busy to notice, so he reads what he wrote, studies his pencil for a minute, then erases everything on the page. When his Uncle Doug comes up and asks what he's writing, his answer is honest.
"Nothin'. Uncle Doug?"
"Yeah? Come on, Jimmy, we gotta get to the cemetery."
"You believe in angels?"
"Angels and demons, Jimmy, I believe in 'em both."
He takes his uncle's hand, dependent for a moment before remembering he's eight years old now and can stand on his own.
"Good."
Re: Sawyer
Date: 2010-06-01 02:43 am (UTC)I like the pencil instead of the pen and the question about God's will that he asks Six but never gets an answer to followed by the queston he asked his uncle. I love the mostly unconscious struggle between tragic orphaned Jimmy and independent little tough guy.
Sun and Jin
Date: 2010-05-31 09:33 pm (UTC)All they have to do now is get through the receiving line.
Every auntie of hers asks when they will start a family, every uncle gives Jin that knowing wink and pat on the shoulder -- as if no two people have ever been married before and as if the two of them have no concept of the intimacy that lies before them on their wedding night -- and every friend gives congratulations and every stranger... strangers? It's not unheard of; they look like they belong and they look like they do not belong.
"We'd like to offer you our..." The eccentrically-dressed man rolls his eyes as if the words are a trial "...blessing. Aren't there any more appropriate words to use after all this time? Blessing gets so old and overused. Sadly, it's also still the best word for the job." The last bit is said to the woman on his arm; smoke from his cigarette wafts up and away. Curiously enough, it doesn't smell terrible like most cigarettes. It must be a foreign brand.
"Don't listen to him. Never listen to him." The woman, tall and slender and formidable, shakes her head at her companion. "Your love is a very special thing." Her voice is steady and unwavering. Sun looks from the odd couple to her new husband, her brows raised in question, his shrug back at her confirmation that he's as surprised as she is.
"Thank you." Sun smiles and bows; Jin does the same. "It was good of you to be here today."
This time the woman answers. "Goodness is a concept that's hard-won, Mrs. Kwon. Hold it close and layer it with faith. Faith in God, faith in each other."
"Enough with the God business already," interrupts the man, eyes rolling in amusement, his smile leveled at the newlyweds. "You'd think after all this time she would give it up, wouldn't you? I mean, honestly. Pushing one's agenda on everybody gets so old after a while."
"Shut up, Gaius." The pretty foreign woman digs her elbow into her companion's side; he feigns discomfort at it but they bow, and with a low don't ever take it for granted that could be meant for her situation with Jin as newlyweds or as some old comfortable argument between the westerners, they move away.
"Who were they?" The question bears asking; doesn't her new husband hold all the answers?
Jin's response, smile still plastered on his face -- the receiving line is far from ended, after all -- shakes his head. "I don't know, but their Korean is excellent."
Associates of her father's then: if she remembers, she'll ask him later but it isn't so very important. The words they said are relegated to the back of her thoughts: she is ready for the day to be over and for her new life with her husband to begin. That is all that matters.
They will never be like the bickering foreign couple. It's a promise she makes to herself right away, and one she intends to keep.
Re: Sun and Jin
Date: 2010-06-01 02:53 am (UTC)Hahaha. I'd kind of hoped that if you went this route, writing each encounter, that you'd have both Six and Gaius in this one (and as someone who's not a fan of either character, I'm just as surprised as anyone that I'm saying something like that, heh). It works kind of beautifully. I like their bickering, and I love Sun insisting to herself that they will never be like Six and Gaius. As much as I'd enjoyed the key differences in these encounters versus the canon Jacob encounters, I like the similarities in this one (plus Gaius thinking pushing agendas is getting old).
Jack
Date: 2010-05-31 10:13 pm (UTC)Distraught -- for the first time, he thinks he knows exactly why his father drinks so much -- and momentarily left feeling entirely helpless, he doesn't even notice the woman approaching until she's literally right on him. Her hands wrap around his neck, her body not an inch from his. She speaks into his mouth like she could siphon the breath right from his body, she's that close, and her perfume has to be the single headiest thing he's ever smelled.
Did he die and go to heaven? The way he responds to her touch is practically automatic. Life hasn't been going his way lately and he could really use this distraction; his arms wrap around her waist, one hand moving up her back, the other moving down it, and when she leans in just that much more closely to kiss him he kisses her back, no holds barred. It's sweet and wonderful and heavenly and the words just what the doctor ordered make him laugh silently. The only reason he breaks contact at all is to come up for air.
"You don't want the Apollo bar," she breathes in a voice like vintage port over crushed velvet. "Trust me."
He knows he doesn't want it, not any more, but the side of him that's more science than faith forces a step back. She's the most beautiful woman he's ever seen: tall and lanky, model-thin, perfect blue eyes, a mouth like a rose. This is so very right, but it's also so very wrong and he has to pull away from her. He has to do it. He has to ask.
"Excuse me. Do I know you?"
Re: Jack
Date: 2010-06-01 03:02 am (UTC)And what great insert-this-story-into-canon foreshadowing with the line about him thinking that for the first time he understands why his father drinks so much. His attraction to her is perfectly palpable.
(Coupled with your icon, I have to giggle.)
Sayid
Date: 2010-05-31 10:28 pm (UTC)"Paris or Rome?"
Nadia giggles, flirtatious. It's so satisfying to see her so happy. "No."
"Florence?" Insistent, he wants to find a destination that they can both enjoy. He's taken on the role of being the one to plan things in this marriage, and he doesn't mind it at all. It suits him, and Nadia hasn't minded ceding this small bit of control to him. She's still as headstrong and determined and forceful as always, but he's long said that together they make a formidable pair.
She's still lost in the moment, just glad to have this day. "It doesn't matter, as long as we're together!"
"Yes, it does! It's our anniversary, we have to find the perfect place." It's as much wishful thinking on his part as anything, but the settlement left him with money to burn. What better way than to take the woman he loves to a romantic destination?
"Can we settle for finding my sunglasses?" They stop at the street corner and she laughs again; the thing with her sunglasses has been a running joke for them all day. First she misplaced them leaving the house, and then at the coffee shop, and then couldn't find them at the bank when all the while the sunglasses were sitting right on top of her head, and now who knows where they are? One would think it a comedy routine she's planned.
The light changes; she starts across the street but he reaches for her arm as a very pretty woman taps him on the shoulder.
"Excuse me, sir? Could you help me? I'm sorry, I think I'm lost. Are you from Los Angeles?"
Sayid looks her up; he looks her down. That dress, the makeup, the height of her heels: he has no use for this kind of thing. The prostitutes in this town are getting more brazen: he's out with his wife in broad daylight, for heaven's sake. Not the easy target people make him out to be, he shakes his head emphatically.
"Sorry. Blondes aren't my type." Taking Nadia by the arm, they move off down the street to the next corner. "Budapest. I hear it's spectacular at this time of year."
Re: Sayid
Date: 2010-06-01 03:09 am (UTC)Sayid and Nadia in happy times makes me happy, and I like that she doesn't get hit by a car at the end. It's almost a fix-it fic, and they are lovely together.
Hurley
Date: 2010-05-31 10:53 pm (UTC)"Dude. There's no smoking in the cab."
Lowering his sunglasses, the dark-haired man with the scraggly beard flashes him a look of pure amusement. "Carry on. The driver won't even notice. I'm only going up the street a little way."
"You are? I mean... doesn't it, like, bother you that a guy walking out of jail gets into your cab with you?"
"Why should it bother me?" As if the cab contains all the room in the universe, the guy unfolds his legs and refolds them. There's a feeling of absolutely infinite space around him. "I wasn't the one in jail. I haven't been in jail for centuries upon centuries, but that isn't something you need to know about, nor would it make the least bit of sense to you if I did tell you about it, never mind that it wasn't precisely me who was in jail in the first place. Details."
"Yeah? Well, I was there 'cause I killed three people. But I didn't really." There's something just plain wrong about this guy, but then again, when you're crazy everything either seems wrong or so wrong it's right and he stopped trying to figure it out after they got back from the island. Nothing's made sense since then, except he has so much money he doesn't know what to do with it any more. Even jail couldn't rip that feeling of wrongness out of him, and he tried. He wanted to get arrested. It was worth losing the Hot Pocket. "But I am crazy. And cursed. I mean, ever since I played Leonard's numbers."
The guy in the suit waves his hand. "They're just numbers. Sequential, yes, and significant perhaps, in ways you can't yet understand. But the bottom line is that all numbers are just numbers, and all curses can be turned round and made into blessings. What if you weren't cursed? What if you were blessed instead?
Okay, he thinks. He's had enough.
"Dude. One crazy person per cab, all right? I think it's like... a cosmic law or something. Driver, over here." When the car stops, he hops out, leans into the driver's window, and gives him a bunch extra. "You know where the Santa Rose Mental Health Institute is?"
The driver nods.
"Take that guy in the back there, tell Dr. Stillman that Hugo sent him. Can you do that for me?"
"Sure, pal." Once again the driver nods and pockets the cash gladly: the back seat is, of course, empty. It's the last time he picks up a fare outside County.
Re: Hurley
Date: 2010-06-01 03:18 am (UTC)Hurley's voice is shockingly good, and I don't think I could be any more pleased with the idea of him telling the cab driver to take Gaius to Santa Rosa. The ending's perfect.
This was all beautifully done, ma'am, and I think you should be very proud of it.