Trope Fics, Part Three
The rest of the fics I wrote for this last challenge. Just want to say: Team Ducks? Stay classy. <3 (And I don't think any of us are stupid. Lurve you guys!)
Death: He Had a Name
Leonard didn’t know exactly how it happened, but one moment Sheldon was lecturing them about the proper spicy mustard for his shredded chicken and the next they were plunked right into the middle of the battle of Hogwarts.
Even stranger, they seemed to know every one of their comrades. He’d just been fighting back to back with Fred Weasley, and they’d been cracking wise like they’d been friends for years.
Howard was currently backing up some guy named Cormac, Raj had run off to help the Patil twins, Penny was having a hell of a time with Hagrid, and Sheldon was keeping right up with Hermione.
They all managed to eventually converge together and make their way toward the Shrieking Shack. There had been rumors that Voldemort was keeping an eye on things from there.
Leonard really didn’t want to see him.
“Hey Sheldon? While I figure we should just keep playing along with this and hope we’re not all suddenly insane, I feel that I have to ask something.”
“What is it Leonard?”
“Since when can we do magic?”
Sheldon looked perplexed for once.
“Alas, I feel that is yet another mystery that I will have to look into once we all get home.”
Leonard couldn’t help but think that it would be a miracle if they got home.
. . .
The last thing he remembered was a horrible pair of red, slitted eyes.
. . .
“Oh, what a pity. Seems your friend took the hit for you.”
Sheldon couldn’t look away from Leonard. He’d taken the Avada Kedavra for him. His best friend had died. For him.
He felt unimaginable fury at the high, cold laughter that rang throughout the shack.
“His name was Leonard.”
“What’s that, you insignificant little ant?”
“HIS. NAME. WAS. LEONARD.”
The rest was a blur. There was a flash of green light and then they were all back in the boys’ living room.
Sheldon found himself clinging to Leonard and strangely unable to let go.
Death: It's Always Sunny at Funerals
Sheldon remained long after the rest of the mourners had gone away.
No doubt they were all back at the church hall, laughing and talking and enjoying one another’s company.
He sat by the grave, staring off into nothing.
He’d never been one for idle chit chat, and it was beyond him how people could engage in such banalities on so solemn an occasion.
For no particular reason, he found himself talking.
“It should be pouring rain, you know. You were the person I was closest to. Well, until Penny anyway. It’s a shame she never got to meet you. I think you would have loved her. I really do. I should have told you while I still had the chance, Meemaw.”
“It’s not too late you know,” Penny said, coming up and sitting down the ground next to him.
“How long have you been standing there? You’ll get your nice dress all dirty you know.”
“It’s okay. You’re getting your nice suit all dirty. We’ll match this way.”
He didn’t say anything, but he entwined his fingers with hers and sighed deeply.
“You know it’s sunny today because Meemaw is happy up there in Heaven, right?”
“Penny, you know that is most likely pure hokum.”
“Maybe. What does your heart tell you though?”
He thought of Sundays at Meemaw’s house. Her sugar cookies. How tightly she used to hug him.
“That you’re probably right Penny. She’s up in Heaven.”
She leaned forward and kissed him softly.
“I love you Sheldon.”
“Thank you for staying with me Penny.”
They sat there until the sun went down and it was too dark to see.
Death: Jacob Marley Apparel (ghost appears in clothes it died in)
“Penny, I cannot believe you talked me into this,” Sheldon grumbled, adjusting the camera strap on his hand and getting a reading from his EMF meter.
“Well, I wasn’t about to do it alone!” she huffed back, clinging to his arm like it was the last life preserver on a sinking ship.
They were on a Ghost Hunting expedition on board the Queen Mary. There’d been a local contest for people to accompany Jason and Grant on their landmark fifth investigation of the old ship, and Penny had convinced all the guys to sign up with her.
They’d never expected to win.
She and Sheldon were currently exploring the old first class cabins. It was their domain for the night.
Leonard was investigating the wheelhouse with Jason and Grant. The three of them had really hit it off.
Raj and Howard were in steerage with Tango. Neither of them had been looking forward to this outing. As it turned out, they were both deathly afraid of ghosts.
Penny was herself a believer. She’d seen one ghost before, and had been scared of them ever since. She was glad she had Sheldon. He was the biggest skeptic she had ever known.
She should have known that they were going to see something.
Of course the ghosts would show up to the person who had been mocking them all night.
They’d been taking a break in one of the first class cabins. Penny sat in an arm chair and Sheldon perched on the arm at her insistence. She didn’t want him far from her.
Suddenly, Sheldon lurched to the side and fell into her lap with a loud “Oomph!”
“Sheldon! What the…?”
“Something pushed me!”
They both looked up at the same time.
They both wished they hadn’t.
To Sheldon’s credit, he got the whole thing on tape.
There was a woman in red standing there. Her dress had once been fine and fashionable but now hung in sad tatters about her. She looked exactly like a corpse should after being dead for about a hundred years.
She was glaring at Sheldon.
“Hokum indeed, young man.”
Their screams brought the others running.
Sheldon and Penny had to sleep with the lights on for the next month.
Death: King in the Mountain
Penny had always known that her destiny was a great one.
From a very small age, there had been something different about her. For one thing, she had light eyes and golden hair, whereas the rest of her clan was dark.
Unlike other girls her age, she had never chosen a suitor or employed her considerable skills to the pursuit of feminine tasks. Instead, she had honed her skills as a warrior and could best the greatest sword masters in the land.
She had strange powers as well. She could sense danger long before it reached her, and her strength would be the envy of a goddess.
Surely these gifts were not without purpose. Wyrd was never without a purpose.
Still, when she had been called upon to fulfill the prophecy, it had been the last thing she had been expecting.
. . .
“The golden one will come to awaken the Dark King when the land is in peril and needs a champion. Pink will touch white and an alliance will be forged that will return light to the Realm of Albion.”
Penny recited to prophecy over and over as she made her journey.
Her only clue as to her destination was that the Dark King was sleeping on an island in the middle of a lake in a tomb of glass and ivory.
The only place she knew that answered that description was very far indeed.
She hated traveling alone.
. . .
Turns out, Dark King was sort of a misnomer. He was the Dark King because he had lovely dark hair.
Penny knew that first hand now. She lifted the lid from his fancy casket and looked upon him for the first time.
His dark locks were curled about his shoulders, looking tousled with sleep.
He didn’t look a day over thirty, despite having slept for a thousand years.
She lowered her pink lips to his pale, white ones and pressed a kiss to them.
His eyes fluttered open and for the first time, blue met green.
Funny, the prophecy had never mentioned love at first sight.
Death: Dead Man's Chest (again)
Penny had to squint to see the map properly. There wasn’t much of a moon that night, so she was having a hard time.
It was very frustrating. She’d come thousands of miles, across treacherous seas, and survived a mutiny, a kraken attack, a terrible storm, and riding the waves in a rinky dink row boat, but she had finally made it to the Isla de Muerta.
Just like she’d promised Sheldon.
They’d put together a voyage to find the chest of Davy Jones. It had always been a dream of Sheldon’s and Penny had wanted to make it come true more than anything. Her husband had meant everything to her, and when they had gotten separated at sea, she had been more determined than ever to see their journey through to the end. She owed him that much.
She did her best to ignore the snide voice in the back of her mind that kept telling her he was dead; that they’d never see each other again.
Stupid voice.
At last, she came to the spot she had been looking for. She took her shovel from the small sack she carried on her back and set to digging.
She made sure to keep her pistol close and ready. Just in case.
It felt like hours had passed before she felt the shovel strike something solid, but in reality it had probably been just a little while.
She hauled the chest up out of the ground and set it down with a groan.
“Davy Jones has an enlarged heart,” she grumbled.
She sat back on her haunches to rest for a moment.
It was then that she heard the labored breathing behind her.
“Fascinating, but so much for ‘fifteen men on a dead man’s chest.’”
She had never expected to hear that voice again.
She turned around and tackled her husband down to the sand, peppering his face with kisses.
Death: You Shall Not Pass
Captain London had never thought she’d see the day: she was working alongside Captain Cooper.
They and the other members of the Brethren Court were facing down Davy Jones and his ghastly army for control of the seas.
Captain London was worried: Jones had the goddess Calypso on his side.
Captain Cooper was not: he had Captain London by his side. Calypso would be cowering in fear before the day was out.
. . .
Things did not go according to plan.
The Court had lost nearly everyone, save Captains London, Cooper, Hofstadter, Wolowitz, and Koothrapali.
Jones had them cornered. He had pushed his forces through their ranks until he had seized the majority of the small island. The Brethren were literally standing upon the edge of a precipice.
This would be their last rally.
The Brethren stood strong in the face of their fate.
Jones came forth and addressed them for the last time.
“Tell me, do you fear death?” he taunted, a smug smile on his awful squid face.
His only answer was a long line of steely glares.
“Very well, then.”
Jones gave an almighty roar and held his sword high in the air, a command for his fish men to charge and go in for the kill.
The Brethren joined hands and stood, backs straight and eyes glowing with fierce pride.
Captain Cooper squeezed Captain London’s hand.
“I’ve always loved you, you know.”
She smirked up at him.
“See you in the Locker, Moon Pie.”
. . .
One cabin boy survived to tell the tale, and future generations would go on to turn it into legend, especially the Brethren Court’s last cries of “You shall not pass!” as they fought to their last breath.
Fate/Prophecy
The oracle’s eyes rolled into the back of her head and an unearthly voice began to issue forth from her throat:
“The golden one will come when the moon’s confection receives the Black Spot. Gold will erase the darkness and Jones will fall. Only when the golden one comes will control return to those who once ruled the Spanish Main.”
Captain Cooper scoffed.
“Hokum.”
. . .
Five years later, Sheldon received the Black Spot.
“I’m sorry Moon Pie, but this damn thing is not going to come out. You belong to Jones now. The Main will be his,” Meemaw sighed.
Her grandson had always been getting into all kinds of trouble, but this was by far the worst yet.
Sheldon had a moment where the words “moon’s confection” and “golden one” crossed his mind before a maid fell from the heavens and right onto him.
. . .
Her name was Penny London and she had been hiding in the crow’s nest, having snuck on board back in Southampton in order to escape an unfortunate marriage.
Sheldon held firm to his belief that it was purely coincidence that her hair was more golden than the sun.
. . .
He changed his tune when she held the heart of Davy Jones in her hand and a dagger in the other.
They’d come a long way over the last two years.
They’d discovered that Penny came from pirate royalty, and it was high time she reclaimed her ancient rights to the Spanish Main. Jones had been allowed free reign for far too long.
“Wait! Penny! You can’t!”
If she stabbed the heart, she would be the one to have to captain the Dutchman.
Sheldon seized the dagger from her hand and stabbed the heart himself.
. . .
Ten years. Ten years of ruling alone and then Sheldon would come home to her.
It wasn’t so long to wait, really.
Death: Due to the Dead (one last time)
“You cowards! You stinking, bloody cowards!”
Penny had never been in such a rage.
If not for her, Sheldon would have had to face the dragon alone. The entire comitatus had stayed behind and let him go into the cave.
Penny, the one just woman, had bravely followed and slain the beast herself when her king had succumbed to the heat of the beast’s fury.
He’d died in her arms in the mouth of that cave.
“Penny, take the treasure and give it to the people. It’s theirs now.”
She failed to check her tears.
“Fine price to pay for such a trifling thing,” she choked out. “The people would much rather have you.”
He gave his usual breathy laugh.
“My time has passed. You must lead them now. You’re the only one who can. Hrothgar’s sons will come soon, and try to take the land. They think nothing of the debts of their father, and seek only to gain what should never be theirs. Make the people ready. Fight.”
“Yes, my king.”
“Tell stories of me, Penny. Do not forget me.”
“Never. Your name shall ring through these halls long after the rest of us are gone.”
He had seemed satisfied with this.
. . .
A woman wailed a mournful dirge.
The rest was silence.
No one had wanted the treasure. It was on the pyre with the fallen warrior who had given so much. It was the only tribute his people could pay him.
The clouds rolled in and the Danes came to shore.
Heaven swallowed the smoke.