(no subject)
Not much new today.
It still feels like late winter here. Still have annoying allergies. There's still an ongoing drama with my husband's job that is feeding my headache. But all this will pass.
But I did have a lovely Mother's Day that was shared with friends and family this past weekend. Even though the weather did not lend itself to the outdoor activities we had planned, we still had a very nice gathering and all the mothers felt loved, which is the way it should be.
As work as been slow this week, I wrote fic yesterday in one of my more bored moments. I'm really trying to seize on those windows of time when I can write, and actually accomplish something. Although I would have preferred it to be toward one of my RL fic projects---or even the XF WIP that's been dangling for far too long---what came out was a short "Firefly" fic.
I wasn't exactly looking for another fandom, but it seems that "Firefly" has jumped up and grabbed me. Although I've been dabbling here and there, reading bits of fic (and even writing a snippet or two for SG-1) for SG-1, BSG, and the occasional Harry Potter (the fine work of toniann being a prime HP example), nothing has engaged me to the point of actively participating in another fandom since XF. But these characters are rich and full with lots of room for speculation, and there's a nice mix of angst, humor, and crackling dialogue that appeals to me.
This was for a prompt at a Firefly challenge community, ff_friday, and I actually took the plunge and posted. If you're a Firefly fan and you've seen the Big Damn Movie ::spoiler alert!!::, I'd love to share it with you. I've posted it in a new journal, jadehawthorne (using another pen name that I used for short vignettes in the XF fandom) that I've designated for Firefly fic, should I decide to write more of it. I'll also post it here behind the cut, if you're interested. We'll see where this leads...
Title: Marking Time
Author: Jade Hawthorne
Characters: Zoe, Zoe/Wash, Inara, set post-Serenity.
For the ff_Friday prompt challenge #120, 100-1000 words about “bells.”
Rating: G
Disclaimer: Not mine, just playin'.
Word Count: 455
Note: This is my first Firefly fic, although I've written in the XF fandom in the past. Not sure why this came out as Zoe, but it turned out she had something to say about bells.
The chimes wake her tonight. As soft as the bells are, they still startle her sometimes, even after this long. Eyes bleary, she looks out what passes for a window at the stars sprinkled over the deafening black.
There's no time in space. Not as a person knows it with her feet on the ground. No change in the light to mark the hour, no clear difference between day and night. Just hollow darkness out here in the black, from one end to another. She had to adjust to that long ago.
Back when it was just her and Mal, it didn't matter so much. There was no time at all and all the time in the world. So much work to get the ship up and running, so much scrambling to find jobs, so much waiting between heists, so much patching to keep it all going. They just did back then. Not much use for time.
Then a wisecracking pilot came along and suddenly she thought about time again. Wanted more of it. More time to feel his arms around her. More time to listen to him talk. Sure can talk, that Wash... More time to live like regular folk; time to have what regular folk have.
Setting up defenses on a hot and dusty moon. Keeping other people's children safe. Now's not the right time for us...
Never will be. Not now.
Now it all runs together again. No need to mark time. Past, present, future---not much changes. Only differences are a succession of meals and stops on clusters of moons that all look the same. Otherwise, it's all one long curtain of black.
Some of them pass the time by telling stories, laughing, talking. She doesn't. She ain't ready yet. She discusses plans with the Captain. She does the job. When they're not working, she haunts her quarters and tries not to think about him.
Inara meant well giving her a gift. It ain't her fault she's not ready for any kind of gesture. "It's not much, Zoe. But it's something that comforted me once when I found myself alone out here. I hope it brings some beauty into your life now."
The chimes ring like a clock, shimmering delicately every hour. Inara had them set to some official Guild time, and Zoe hasn't changed it. She doesn't know if she's made peace with measuring time again, not sure if she's ready to count the hours since her world shattered.
But the companion's right. There is something comforting about the sound of those soft bells, something about the way they dance on the air. They remind her of a leaf somehow… something like a leaf on the wind.
It still feels like late winter here. Still have annoying allergies. There's still an ongoing drama with my husband's job that is feeding my headache. But all this will pass.
But I did have a lovely Mother's Day that was shared with friends and family this past weekend. Even though the weather did not lend itself to the outdoor activities we had planned, we still had a very nice gathering and all the mothers felt loved, which is the way it should be.
As work as been slow this week, I wrote fic yesterday in one of my more bored moments. I'm really trying to seize on those windows of time when I can write, and actually accomplish something. Although I would have preferred it to be toward one of my RL fic projects---or even the XF WIP that's been dangling for far too long---what came out was a short "Firefly" fic.
I wasn't exactly looking for another fandom, but it seems that "Firefly" has jumped up and grabbed me. Although I've been dabbling here and there, reading bits of fic (and even writing a snippet or two for SG-1) for SG-1, BSG, and the occasional Harry Potter (the fine work of toniann being a prime HP example), nothing has engaged me to the point of actively participating in another fandom since XF. But these characters are rich and full with lots of room for speculation, and there's a nice mix of angst, humor, and crackling dialogue that appeals to me.
This was for a prompt at a Firefly challenge community, ff_friday, and I actually took the plunge and posted. If you're a Firefly fan and you've seen the Big Damn Movie ::spoiler alert!!::, I'd love to share it with you. I've posted it in a new journal, jadehawthorne (using another pen name that I used for short vignettes in the XF fandom) that I've designated for Firefly fic, should I decide to write more of it. I'll also post it here behind the cut, if you're interested. We'll see where this leads...
Title: Marking Time
Author: Jade Hawthorne
Characters: Zoe, Zoe/Wash, Inara, set post-Serenity.
For the ff_Friday prompt challenge #120, 100-1000 words about “bells.”
Rating: G
Disclaimer: Not mine, just playin'.
Word Count: 455
Note: This is my first Firefly fic, although I've written in the XF fandom in the past. Not sure why this came out as Zoe, but it turned out she had something to say about bells.
The chimes wake her tonight. As soft as the bells are, they still startle her sometimes, even after this long. Eyes bleary, she looks out what passes for a window at the stars sprinkled over the deafening black.
There's no time in space. Not as a person knows it with her feet on the ground. No change in the light to mark the hour, no clear difference between day and night. Just hollow darkness out here in the black, from one end to another. She had to adjust to that long ago.
Back when it was just her and Mal, it didn't matter so much. There was no time at all and all the time in the world. So much work to get the ship up and running, so much scrambling to find jobs, so much waiting between heists, so much patching to keep it all going. They just did back then. Not much use for time.
Then a wisecracking pilot came along and suddenly she thought about time again. Wanted more of it. More time to feel his arms around her. More time to listen to him talk. Sure can talk, that Wash... More time to live like regular folk; time to have what regular folk have.
Setting up defenses on a hot and dusty moon. Keeping other people's children safe. Now's not the right time for us...
Never will be. Not now.
Now it all runs together again. No need to mark time. Past, present, future---not much changes. Only differences are a succession of meals and stops on clusters of moons that all look the same. Otherwise, it's all one long curtain of black.
Some of them pass the time by telling stories, laughing, talking. She doesn't. She ain't ready yet. She discusses plans with the Captain. She does the job. When they're not working, she haunts her quarters and tries not to think about him.
Inara meant well giving her a gift. It ain't her fault she's not ready for any kind of gesture. "It's not much, Zoe. But it's something that comforted me once when I found myself alone out here. I hope it brings some beauty into your life now."
The chimes ring like a clock, shimmering delicately every hour. Inara had them set to some official Guild time, and Zoe hasn't changed it. She doesn't know if she's made peace with measuring time again, not sure if she's ready to count the hours since her world shattered.
But the companion's right. There is something comforting about the sound of those soft bells, something about the way they dance on the air. They remind her of a leaf somehow… something like a leaf on the wind.