Sestina: McKay during "The Hive"
My latest effort to pull out of the "everything I touch turns to crap" mode that I've been in for the last several weeks is to try some more sestinas without worrying about how tight or original they are. It seems to be working. The one I started last night about John Sheppard has stalled halfway through, but here's another I managed to write today.
For those of you unfamiliar with the show: It's Rodney McKay during "The Hive," the second half of a two-parter in Season Two where the team (Sheppard, Rodney, Teyla and Ronon) gets captured by evil!Ford (former team member gone bad), forced to take Wraith enzyme ( = steroids), and coerced into participating in what is essentially a suicide mission to blow up a hive ship (huge spaceship teeming with nasty life-sucking aliens). Rodney gets left behind as collateral, and when the team doesn't make it back for many hours, he takes a massive dose of enzyme in order to overcome his guards and get back to Atlantis to tell the others what's going on and save the rest of his team. Red-faced and frenetic, he babbles and gesticulates like Wilson on speed without actually managing to communicate that Sheppard, Teyla and Ronon are trapped on a hive ship. He passes out before Elizabeth (the boss) can understand what he's saying. Later (after everyone is rescued, yay) he tells Elizabeth that while he was on the enzyme, he felt that he was perfectly lucid and it was everyone else who wasn't making any sense.
I like this one because it uses the end words to return to the same thought over and over, rather than inventing an entirely new meaning or context each time. Characters on drugs help, apparently.
Concrit welcome!
ETA: x-posted to sga_flashfic for the Wordless Challenge, here.
Title: An Unanticipated Side Effect of Dosing Oneself with Wraith Enzyme to Deliver an Important Message
Character: Rodney/team gen
Rating: PG
Word Count: 513
A/N: Many thanks to daasgrrl, elynittria and synn for concrit.
It was very strange. The whole time I was under the influence of the enzyme, it felt like I was, ah, I was perfectly lucid-eloquent, even. That it was you who wasn't making any sense or listening to reason.
- McKay, "The Hive"
Three goons down (pow! whamm! crunch!) and a bottle of enzyme
coursing through his bloodstream and the DHD fixed and at last Rodney
has made it back to Atlantis so he can explain the very important
situation, the, the whatsit, the crisis, that's got Sheppard
and Teyla and Ronon stuck on the Wraith hive ship
with crazy-man Ford where they have to be rescued before they die
and oh my God they're going to die but they can't die, they won't die
because they're all still hopped up on the enzyme
and it's not like there'd be a short supply of it on a hive ship
what with all the Wraith and all and oh look here's Elizabeth so Rodney
opens his mouth to tell her about Ronon and Teyla and Sheppard
and Ford and the dart and the unbelievably bad plan because it's important,
it's so, so important, huh, that's a strange word, im-por-tant,
and what was he saying again? Oh right, right, they're all going to die
if they haven't died already, between Ford being crazy and Sheppard
being heroic and Ronon and Teyla probably going through enzyme
withdrawal by now which is exactly what's going to happen to Rodney
very soon so he really really has to tell Elizabeth about the hive ship
before he collapses because three quarters of his team being on a hive ship
having the life sucked out of them is a very bad thing, ergo it's important
they get them out, so why is everyone just standing around? Hello? Is Rodney
speaking Ancient here? Why is Elizabeth staring at him when his team's about to die,
dammit? He knows everyone around him is some shade of stupid but the enzyme
must make it worse somehow because they don't understand that Sheppard
and Teyla and Ronon are in mortal danger and for once Sheppard's
charm isn't going to save them because charm doesn't work on a hive ship
full of Wraith with their, their webs and their ridiculous teeth and their enzyme,
mm, enzyme, is it hot in here? It feels hot in here. Wait, there's something important
he has to tell Elizabeth, even though his heart's beating so fast he thinks he might die
of a heart attack before he convinces these people to get moving, and then Rodney
finds himself being led away from the gate while Elizabeth says Rodney,
Rodney, slow down-no no no no no they're going the wrong way, Sheppard
and the others are through the gate that way where they're going to die
of unnatural old age in a dark and dusty cell in a forgotten corner of a hive ship
because their expedition leader couldn't comprehend how important
it was to-to-oh, hello, woozy, ooh, look at the pretty colours. Enzyme
crash, Rodney thinks, and drops helpless to the floor while on the hive ship
Teyla, Sheppard and Ronon could be counting on him to do this single stupid important
thing. Haunted by the image of his friends' faces as they die, he succumbs to the enzyme.
For those of you unfamiliar with the show: It's Rodney McKay during "The Hive," the second half of a two-parter in Season Two where the team (Sheppard, Rodney, Teyla and Ronon) gets captured by evil!Ford (former team member gone bad), forced to take Wraith enzyme ( = steroids), and coerced into participating in what is essentially a suicide mission to blow up a hive ship (huge spaceship teeming with nasty life-sucking aliens). Rodney gets left behind as collateral, and when the team doesn't make it back for many hours, he takes a massive dose of enzyme in order to overcome his guards and get back to Atlantis to tell the others what's going on and save the rest of his team. Red-faced and frenetic, he babbles and gesticulates like Wilson on speed without actually managing to communicate that Sheppard, Teyla and Ronon are trapped on a hive ship. He passes out before Elizabeth (the boss) can understand what he's saying. Later (after everyone is rescued, yay) he tells Elizabeth that while he was on the enzyme, he felt that he was perfectly lucid and it was everyone else who wasn't making any sense.
I like this one because it uses the end words to return to the same thought over and over, rather than inventing an entirely new meaning or context each time. Characters on drugs help, apparently.
Concrit welcome!
ETA: x-posted to sga_flashfic for the Wordless Challenge, here.
Title: An Unanticipated Side Effect of Dosing Oneself with Wraith Enzyme to Deliver an Important Message
Character: Rodney/team gen
Rating: PG
Word Count: 513
A/N: Many thanks to daasgrrl, elynittria and synn for concrit.
It was very strange. The whole time I was under the influence of the enzyme, it felt like I was, ah, I was perfectly lucid-eloquent, even. That it was you who wasn't making any sense or listening to reason.
- McKay, "The Hive"
Three goons down (pow! whamm! crunch!) and a bottle of enzyme
coursing through his bloodstream and the DHD fixed and at last Rodney
has made it back to Atlantis so he can explain the very important
situation, the, the whatsit, the crisis, that's got Sheppard
and Teyla and Ronon stuck on the Wraith hive ship
with crazy-man Ford where they have to be rescued before they die
and oh my God they're going to die but they can't die, they won't die
because they're all still hopped up on the enzyme
and it's not like there'd be a short supply of it on a hive ship
what with all the Wraith and all and oh look here's Elizabeth so Rodney
opens his mouth to tell her about Ronon and Teyla and Sheppard
and Ford and the dart and the unbelievably bad plan because it's important,
it's so, so important, huh, that's a strange word, im-por-tant,
and what was he saying again? Oh right, right, they're all going to die
if they haven't died already, between Ford being crazy and Sheppard
being heroic and Ronon and Teyla probably going through enzyme
withdrawal by now which is exactly what's going to happen to Rodney
very soon so he really really has to tell Elizabeth about the hive ship
before he collapses because three quarters of his team being on a hive ship
having the life sucked out of them is a very bad thing, ergo it's important
they get them out, so why is everyone just standing around? Hello? Is Rodney
speaking Ancient here? Why is Elizabeth staring at him when his team's about to die,
dammit? He knows everyone around him is some shade of stupid but the enzyme
must make it worse somehow because they don't understand that Sheppard
and Teyla and Ronon are in mortal danger and for once Sheppard's
charm isn't going to save them because charm doesn't work on a hive ship
full of Wraith with their, their webs and their ridiculous teeth and their enzyme,
mm, enzyme, is it hot in here? It feels hot in here. Wait, there's something important
he has to tell Elizabeth, even though his heart's beating so fast he thinks he might die
of a heart attack before he convinces these people to get moving, and then Rodney
finds himself being led away from the gate while Elizabeth says Rodney,
Rodney, slow down-no no no no no they're going the wrong way, Sheppard
and the others are through the gate that way where they're going to die
of unnatural old age in a dark and dusty cell in a forgotten corner of a hive ship
because their expedition leader couldn't comprehend how important
it was to-to-oh, hello, woozy, ooh, look at the pretty colours. Enzyme
crash, Rodney thinks, and drops helpless to the floor while on the hive ship
Teyla, Sheppard and Ronon could be counting on him to do this single stupid important
thing. Haunted by the image of his friends' faces as they die, he succumbs to the enzyme.