The Doctora and the Thief (Seven Beacons) : Sweet : PG
Title: The Doctora and the Thief
Universe: Seven Beacons
Characters: Flash, Nerea
Prompt: Sweet
Word Count: 819
Rating: PG
Summary: She’d looked like such a sweet girl. (Character study)
--
When he’d seen her she looked like such a sweet girl, all that long silky pale-blue hair swirling around her tiny face, large glasses that broadcast every time she blinked or squinted. She was tiny, mostly hair and glasses and the layers of ruffle on her skirts - which were mostly dirty-edged and fraying - and she couldn’t really fight. She’d looked adorable. Flash had fallen at once. Such a sweet little face. She’d certainly be the type of girl who was plied by his grins and charms and soft little movements and maybe he’d snick something from one of the gaemlin, some pretty little gem or something, and give it to her with uncharacteristic generosity. They’d needed a sweet girl in this group anyway, what with that overbearing General Morgan and the bossy but always right Armenise the Amazon: Flash Hermes, surrounded by women and yet in absolute hell. Nerea had seemed like a sweet little godsend.
But Nerea Levia wasn’t a sweet little girl. It wasn’t that she wasn’t kind - she was nice by default - and it wasn’t that she didn’t giggle, sometimes, when he told a joke and she wasn’t cowering. She wore skirts and had long hair, true. But she wasn’t really the kind of girl Flash had expected. She wasn’t really girl-y at all.
And - to make things worse - she wasn’t the opposite either: one of those overbearing, tough-as-nails, over-compensating women who were strong just to prove to men that they could be, like that Little Miss Obsessive Lady General Morgan “Raven” I’ve Got A Sword Up My Rear DeLumens. Flash could usually lump women he met on an axis between these two extremes. But Nerea was - well.
She didn’t really fall anywhere on the axis between warrior-woman and sweet little girl. She was a scientist, a creature of her own kind, having raised herself by herself on the strength of books and equations and her own grim shining intelligence. She was terrified of what she was: scared of everything, of her own brains, of the power dormant inside her, of her changeling nature. And yet she was brilliant, piecing things together before she’d even realized she was speaking. She could’ve calculated his every movement, Flash was certain, if she’d gathered enough data points. It was terrifying, and intriguing.
She’d met every one of his compliments and proven pick-up lines with the same stare she’d given that broken relay: inquisitive, purely scientific confusion and curiosity. Those large eyes of hers had looked as if they’d been trying to pick apart his words, weigh the worth of each individual letter as if she could piece together his meaning. She hadn’t understood because she’d been looking at him like - as an observation, not an interaction; a doctora instead of a girl.
So he’d fumbled. He’d stammered. And Nerea had calmly and quietly ignored him as she pieced together the old, decaying relay. This was the most fascinating: that even ill as she was, broken and bleeding, retching in the corner - Nerea was driven to peace by the abandoned bits of a machine that she could fix. It wasn’t Flash’s witty banter and soothing smiles that had made her feel better: no, it was Morgan’s order to fix some dusty old junky machine that had made her eyes light up and her body regain its focus.
No, Nerea Levia wasn’t anything near the sweet little girl she appeared to be. She was a woman of science - which to Flash was only slightly more unusual than a man of science, honestly. Flash was a man of the world, who prided himself on worldly knowledge: why Amazons wore hairpieces, for example, or which Fire Clans actually got along He’d traveled the world and learned all sorts of things about the way it worked. But he’d never learned things on the level Nerea had: she knew things about the very equations that governed Armenise’s magic, the magickal constants which allowed a beacon to protect its city. She could piece together shards of scrap into a working relay to talk to a king a continent away. She didn’t know anything about personal interaction, or communication, or - anything worldly, like Flash did. She barely got it when he winked at her. She was too busy with the numbers in her head.
So Flash backed away and watched as Nerea, still sick, set the last piece into place. The hybrida crystal in the relay lit up instantly and, even around the pain, the girl allowed herself a small secret smile. The general gave her a curt congratulations and began tapping away at the glowing crystal, sending her messages in code across the magick-lines through the earth.
Flash was watching, though - he stole that smile. (He was a thief.) And he’d figure her out, eventually.
Notes: An interlude during Part I. . Remember the thoughts on women are not mine: they’re, er, Flash’s thoughts.
seven-beacons: NaNoWriMo 2005/2006. Journal for writings, userinfo for background and intro.
Universe: Seven Beacons
Characters: Flash, Nerea
Prompt: Sweet
Word Count: 819
Rating: PG
Summary: She’d looked like such a sweet girl. (Character study)
--
When he’d seen her she looked like such a sweet girl, all that long silky pale-blue hair swirling around her tiny face, large glasses that broadcast every time she blinked or squinted. She was tiny, mostly hair and glasses and the layers of ruffle on her skirts - which were mostly dirty-edged and fraying - and she couldn’t really fight. She’d looked adorable. Flash had fallen at once. Such a sweet little face. She’d certainly be the type of girl who was plied by his grins and charms and soft little movements and maybe he’d snick something from one of the gaemlin, some pretty little gem or something, and give it to her with uncharacteristic generosity. They’d needed a sweet girl in this group anyway, what with that overbearing General Morgan and the bossy but always right Armenise the Amazon: Flash Hermes, surrounded by women and yet in absolute hell. Nerea had seemed like a sweet little godsend.
But Nerea Levia wasn’t a sweet little girl. It wasn’t that she wasn’t kind - she was nice by default - and it wasn’t that she didn’t giggle, sometimes, when he told a joke and she wasn’t cowering. She wore skirts and had long hair, true. But she wasn’t really the kind of girl Flash had expected. She wasn’t really girl-y at all.
And - to make things worse - she wasn’t the opposite either: one of those overbearing, tough-as-nails, over-compensating women who were strong just to prove to men that they could be, like that Little Miss Obsessive Lady General Morgan “Raven” I’ve Got A Sword Up My Rear DeLumens. Flash could usually lump women he met on an axis between these two extremes. But Nerea was - well.
She didn’t really fall anywhere on the axis between warrior-woman and sweet little girl. She was a scientist, a creature of her own kind, having raised herself by herself on the strength of books and equations and her own grim shining intelligence. She was terrified of what she was: scared of everything, of her own brains, of the power dormant inside her, of her changeling nature. And yet she was brilliant, piecing things together before she’d even realized she was speaking. She could’ve calculated his every movement, Flash was certain, if she’d gathered enough data points. It was terrifying, and intriguing.
She’d met every one of his compliments and proven pick-up lines with the same stare she’d given that broken relay: inquisitive, purely scientific confusion and curiosity. Those large eyes of hers had looked as if they’d been trying to pick apart his words, weigh the worth of each individual letter as if she could piece together his meaning. She hadn’t understood because she’d been looking at him like - as an observation, not an interaction; a doctora instead of a girl.
So he’d fumbled. He’d stammered. And Nerea had calmly and quietly ignored him as she pieced together the old, decaying relay. This was the most fascinating: that even ill as she was, broken and bleeding, retching in the corner - Nerea was driven to peace by the abandoned bits of a machine that she could fix. It wasn’t Flash’s witty banter and soothing smiles that had made her feel better: no, it was Morgan’s order to fix some dusty old junky machine that had made her eyes light up and her body regain its focus.
No, Nerea Levia wasn’t anything near the sweet little girl she appeared to be. She was a woman of science - which to Flash was only slightly more unusual than a man of science, honestly. Flash was a man of the world, who prided himself on worldly knowledge: why Amazons wore hairpieces, for example, or which Fire Clans actually got along He’d traveled the world and learned all sorts of things about the way it worked. But he’d never learned things on the level Nerea had: she knew things about the very equations that governed Armenise’s magic, the magickal constants which allowed a beacon to protect its city. She could piece together shards of scrap into a working relay to talk to a king a continent away. She didn’t know anything about personal interaction, or communication, or - anything worldly, like Flash did. She barely got it when he winked at her. She was too busy with the numbers in her head.
So Flash backed away and watched as Nerea, still sick, set the last piece into place. The hybrida crystal in the relay lit up instantly and, even around the pain, the girl allowed herself a small secret smile. The general gave her a curt congratulations and began tapping away at the glowing crystal, sending her messages in code across the magick-lines through the earth.
Flash was watching, though - he stole that smile. (He was a thief.) And he’d figure her out, eventually.
Notes: An interlude during Part I. . Remember the thoughts on women are not mine: they’re, er, Flash’s thoughts.
seven-beacons: NaNoWriMo 2005/2006. Journal for writings, userinfo for background and intro.