[Fic] Three Sentence Ficathon Fills, part 3 - various fandoms

[edenfalling]

Here are six more fills from the current Three Sentence Ficathon, aka "My god, it's full of semicolons!" One of them is five sentences, but shush, at least I'm trying. (Two are also strict-form drabbles, because I just like drabbles, okay.)

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12. For jjhunter: Charlotte's Web, Charlotte A. Cavatica, PWC (penmanship to webmanship conversion), written 2/16/15.

Needs Must (100 words exactly) [AO3 version]

Before she settled over Wilbur's stall, Charlotte traveled widely: she tiptoed across windblown, rain-mottled newspapers, studied schoolbooks left abandoned on the grass in favor of less sedentary pursuits, deciphered letters written in hands both elegant and crabbed, each with their own fonts to appreciate, and she thinks it a terrible shame that the structure of her webs combines so poorly with the elegant, swooping lines of cursive script. But the number of support strands needed to hold curves would distract the eye from her message, and for Wilbur's sake the message must be clear.

Charlotte sighs: block letters it is.

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13. For samueljames: White Collar, El/Neal/Peter, Neal wants to submit but a previous Dom(me) ignored his safeword so he is understandably nervous, written 2/18/15.

Twice Shy (125 words) [AO3 version]

"What's your safeword?" El asks as she and Peter sandwich Neal on the lamp-lit sheets of their bed, their hands stroking firm and sure over his naked skin.

Neal swallows, feels the ghostly tatters of shame and desperation and pleasure turned to stomach-churning nausea wrap around him like an unwanted embrace: his own mind ignoring his wishes in perfect mirror mimicry of the reason he doesn't do this anymore, no matter how badly he needs to let go, to turn off, to hand over the keys to his deepest self and trust someone else to carry him for a while.

"Betrayal," he says, and buries his face in Peter's thigh so he won't have to see the pity bloom in his lovers' eyes.

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14. For rthstewart: Narnia/LotR, Galadriel, Jadis, the price of peace, written 2/20/15.

Negative Example (150 words) [AO3 version]

This can be read as a prequel to As the Storm and the Lightning.

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All worlds find a Ring, soon or late, and no Ring serves aught but destruction; this Galadriel has seen time and again in the waters of her mirror, watching worlds shudder and burn, whether they fall into shadow or emerge into the bare threads of hope that sprout in ash.

One world, however, does neither; it is bright, clean, ordered, and bursting with life; and beneath that painted mask it hides a greater horror than any she has yet seen, for she who holds its Ring, she who spoke the Deplorable Word and stopped, the last syllable swallowed, its power consumed, killed her world as surely as if it had turned to dust in truth; her people are soulless now, and each new child is emptied with its first breath to feed the unfinished spell inside their queen.

When the Ring comes her way at last, Galadriel remembers herself long enough to grant her own world a cleaner death.

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15. For snickfic: BtVS, Faith/Giles, daggers and sheaths, written 2/21/15.

Missed Connections (225 words) [AO3 version]

Faith is sitting on a gravestone when Giles finds her, kicking her heels against the time-worn stone and picking her nails with a saw-toothed dagger that he recognizes, without surprise, as belonging to the Hriswath demon she and Buffy killed last night; she doesn't look up when he leans against a neighboring stone, just says, "Let's pretend I said I'm sorry and skip the whole heartfelt talk, 'kay?"

Giles looks at this girl like an unsheathed blade left out to rust and chip in a hostile world; sees the defensive set of her shoulders, the I'll-fuck-you-up-first bravado she wears like a second skin; and wishes for a moment that he had the time and energy to be the Watcher she deserves -- he has been where she is now, though for different reasons, and he'd prefer not to see her continue headlong down that path until she hits the same fatal wall that he's regretted for decades -- but he has Buffy to think of; Slayers don't share well; and surely Wesley will pull his head out of his arse in time to win Faith's trust.

"Your knife will last longer with proper care," he says instead of all the moral judgments she's braced to weather, and as he hands her the empty sheath he slipped from the demon's belt, he hopes she hears the message underneath the simple words.

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16. For alexseanchai: Sailor Moon Classic, Chibiusa, crown, written 2/21/15.

Rosebuds While Ye May (100 words exactly) [AO3 version]

When she travels to the past, the sight of her mother and aunts without their court clothes and tiaras is almost stranger than the glorious, dirty, bustling rush of a Tokyo built of steel and brick and glass rather than shining crystal.

And yet, there's weight to a crown beyond the physical, however delicate and beautiful its design: a symbol of duty, a warning of power, a tacit shackle of expectations that must be met and matched.

In a sunlit park where nobody knows or fears her name, Chibiusa twirls to feel the wind on her bare forehead, and smiles.

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17. For isabelquinn: Narnia, any, Bism, written 2/21/15.

Further Down and Further In (175 words) [AO3 version]

This is the secret the dwarfs keep to themselves: the earth is alive. Not just the forests and waters and fertile loam of the surface, which anyone can see, but the deep stone itself breathes and grows; the earth has a heartbeat and veins of molten fire that run like blood. In the first days of the world, while Aslan's song still echoed in the rock, a handful of dwarfs dug too deep, following a chain of rubies that glowed ever brighter the deeper they delved, until their mine cracked and gaped like an open wound and they peered into the fiery depths to see strangers peering upward in return. Those who leapt downward never returned.

These days their many-times-great nieces and nephews harvest the fruits of that deep, living realm the way other Narnians harvest meat and grain, and if now and again a dwarf hears the rushing song of living gold, or sees the shine of jewels that swell and drip with juice, nobody follows when they venture ever-downward into the heart of stone.

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I have one more (much longer) fill that I'm going to post separately because of Reasons. Technically it should be #15, but I'm calling it #18 to keep this post's numbering internally consistent.

Comments

[branchandroot]

All your bits to do with Galadriel and the Ring are absolutely terrifying. *two thumbs up*

[edenfalling]

As I think I said to someone in regard to the first Galadriel-and-the-Ring ficlet, sometimes it's very cathartic to write a good apocalypse. :-)

[autumnia]

Ooh, I liked the Faith/Giles fill you wrote! I saw that prompt but couldn't come up with anything good and I think you did a much better job than I could have on it. You captured both characters so beautifully and perfectly in those short sentences. Heh, Wesley never did really get better as a Watcher; general demon hunter with Angel Investigations yes, Watcher not really.

[edenfalling]

Thank you! It ended up much less shippy than I initially planned, mostly because I was thinking about ways they parallel each other and my brain suddenly jumped from post-series to season three, during which Faith is young enough that trying to ship her with Giles would squick me. So it goes, I guess.

And yeah, Wesley had many and various talents -- demon hunting, magic, research, obsession, looking good while scruffy and desperate, etc. -- but he never did learn how to be a useful and supportive Watcher.