Drabble Requests Post
I'm taking requests here over on paperclipbitch (post is f-locked; sorry) and here are the results of the first lot.
Ashes To Ashes
For burnmybridges | prompt: One man on a lonely platform. Show fear as he turns to hide (Visage, Fade To Grey)
Show Fear As He Turns To Hide | Gene | 300 words | spoilers for season 3
Everyone has their choice. That’s the way it works; everyone has their choice, for better or for worse, for heaven or for stinging, bright-coloured damnation. There’s cheating of course, because everyone bloody cheats; it wouldn’t make it a game if they didn’t.
He never had a choice and he’s always known it; from the moment he ended up here in this in-between place that isn’t anywhere but is his, he’s known that he was never going anywhere else. He’s lived through a handful of decades and he’ll live through a handful more and probably another handful more on top of that because he’s fucking good at this and he’ll be careful for that long at least until the rug is dragged from beneath his feet and he goes wherever it is you go when you made the decision that the options available to you weren’t the right ones.
Everyone ends up somewhere. That’s really the only rule here. Everyone somewhere; it’s always about the paperwork.
He knows where he isn’t going; it will never be his place to walk into a warm smoke-filled pub and order a beer with a little too much head because Nelson never did figure out how to do it. He will never find out what comes next, if that pub and the jukebox that stuck unless you kicked it are all that’s left, or if there’s something after that. That will never be his and maybe the curiosity will kill him one day and maybe it won’t.
Luigi has a bottle of cheap wine in one hand and his expression is almost sympathetic, but he hasn’t decided if Luigi is even real yet and it’s too late and he’s too tired for all of this tonight.
He shrugs into his coat and doesn’t look back.
Bandom RPF
For dimestore_romeo | follow-up to Let Me Shake Up Your World | prompt: “Is that a gun in your pocket or are you just pleased to see me?”
I Know Your Type | Gabe Saporta, Vicky-T Asher[/Greta Salpeter] | 300 words
Gabe does less time in prison than he’s supposed to, which Victoria was expecting because she’s not an idiot and Gabe’s got a list of connections taller than Ryland.
Pete warns both her and Greta about potential repercussions, but he doesn’t look all that worried and in reality Victoria spends most of the meeting discreetly flirting with Greta via delicately significant eyebrow raises. They’re apparently not that discreet, though, because Pete sighs and tells them it’ll serve them right if they wind up encased in concrete (which they won’t, because Gabe has never done that; it would bring down the whole party vibe, after all) and sends them out with an eyeroll of frustrated authority that he can’t really carry off.
Victoria doesn’t jump when a long arm slides around her shoulders because part of her has been expecting it for weeks. She sips at her martini and glances towards the bar where Greta is supposed to be buying her another one. Greta’s looking back already - cop instincts or something - but her smile is relaxed, calm.
She leans back into the touch. “Is that a gun in your pocket or are you just pleased to see me?” she drawls, low.
Gabe laughs, white teeth catching the light. “I’m always pleased to see you, Vicky-T,” he tells her. “And please, my dick’s definitely bigger than a gun.”
He slides sinuously into the seat opposite hers, all dark eyes and easy laughter. “It’s good to see you again,” he breezes, but the weird thing is, Victoria thinks he means it. Gabe follows her eyeline to the bar and Greta, who is wearing a tiny black dress.
“Damn, Vicky-T,” he says, and: “good work.”
He doesn’t offer a threesome immediately and Victoria decides this means he’s learned something. She looks back to Greta to find she’s already buying an extra martini, and tips her head back and laughs.
Britannia High
For finkpishnets | prompt: I came here to make you dance tonight, I don't care if I'm a guilty pleasure for you (Cobra Starship, Guilty Pleasure)
'Cause I Know How To Take It | Jez/BB | 300 words | AU
“Your double life is crazy awesome,” BB tells Jez, and then when Jez quirks an eyebrow in a face streaked with sweat and glitter eyeliner, he pretends he was asking if he wanted a drink.
Jez shakes his head, which BB knew already because Jez has to wear a suit tomorrow and talk about numbers and it’s a waste of a pair of hips but that’s another one of those thoughts BB keeps to himself these days. Jez gave up the fight for a career in the arts when it came down to that or being disowned, and BB can’t blame him; he doesn’t have parents and his brother’s one bad decision away from either a bodybag or a prison cell, and he’d cling to what family he had left too.
They met months ago in a club like this one but with better music; Jez was the best dancer there and when they got to know each other a little better, he confessed it all to BB. How he’s going to take over his father’s business, how he pretends that he’s the good little son while sneaking out in too-tight jeans and dancing his nights away because it’s all he can have. BB can’t tell if Jez respects him for turning his life over to the arts, or if he pities him a little; Jez won’t ever tell him, either way.
The beat is loud and sexy and heavy and their hips slide together like they were made to, and BB avoids Jez’s bitten-red mouth and doesn’t think about it because Jez is being the good little son and dating an economist and if his dance moves and a faintly guilty smile are all BB gets of him, then that’s all he’ll take.
It’s enough. It has to be.
Glee
For jacklemmon | prompt: the tide is high but I'm holding on (Blondie, The Tide Is High)
But I'm Holding On | Puck/Kurt | 300 words | Cracky Mermaid AU
“I don’t know why you’re so bothered about shoes,” Puck says, “seeing as how you don’t have feet.”
Kurt rolls his eyes, which seem too large for his face, big Disney eyes and fuck, that’s a thought. “You’re so narrow minded,” he responds, stealing the September Vogue Puck had to steal from Quinn and pretend it was for his sister and it so blatantly wasn’t, and she gave him this stupid knowing grin.
He sighs and watches Kurt leafing through Vogue, keeping it carefully above the water. Puck doesn’t even know how his life has expanded to include teenage mermaids who live in pools in their dad’s backyard. It was definitely the weirdest shit he’d ever discovered in his pool-cleaning career.
Kurt is humming to himself while he leafs past the adverts, and Puck wonders again why Kurt is so invested in clothes and make-up when he lives in water, although he does have a scarf tied at a jaunty angle around his neck. Which is weird. Puck doesn’t know a lot about teenage mermaids (he totally wiki-ed it when he first found out Kurt existed though) but he does know that not a lot of them wear jaunty scarves worth a shitload of money.
“See if I bring you girl magazines again,” he mutters, kicking water in Kurt’s direction. Kurt shrieks and tries to protect both himself and Vogue, which is stupid because Kurt can’t not get his hair wet. He’s a freaking mermaid (or merman, or whatever).
Kurt just grins at him with too many perfect teeth, and Puck sighs and mumbles: “I don’t even know why I come over here”.
He kind of does, though; Kurt has big distracting eyes and spends far too much time mostly naked and dripping wet and, well, Puck’s really only human.
For linnet_melody | prompt: The Princess and the Pea
The Princess and the Pea | Puck/Kurt | 300 words
Kurt is of the opinion that if his life were a television programme he’d watch it with the delicious schadenfreude he does Gossip Girl, grinning as the characters’ lives fall apart.
It’s hard to find it as funny when his own life is falling apart, but that’s probably just as well; it’s one thing to be prone to histrionics and another thing entirely to be prone to masochism.
Mercedes asks him about the attitude one day when they’re out shopping, draping themselves with scarves.
“It’s an audition process,” Kurt explains, and Mercedes just arches an eyebrow at him, universally recognised signal for boy, are you huffing hairspray again?
Maybe Kurt’s just been screwed up by reading too many fairy stories as a kid; the general impression he got was that if you want the right princess, you make them work for it. Ok, so piling up mattresses and vegetables and inviting a guy over for a sleepover isn’t really a possibility, but Kurt figures if they can deal with him being a bitch most of the time he’s halfway there.
Mostly, though, it just gets him put in dumpsters. At least until the day he’s being crowded up against the lockers by half the football team and spitting out vitriol about last season’s pants and their lamentable haircuts, and he catches sight of Puck at the back of the crowd, not quite joining in, the corner of Puck’s mouth lifting at his comments.
Mr Schuester and his Woefully Inadequate Idealism are coming down the hall so the team leave him alone after one last shove, but he sees Puck darting something that’s almost a smile over his shoulder. There’s potential there.
Kurt narrows his eyes in thought and decides to not ever tell Puck he’s the princess in this scenario.
Inception
For princess_aleera | prompt: "You mustn't be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling."
The Logistics of 'Bigger' | Eames/Arthur/Cobb | 300 words
“This wasn’t actually what I meant, by the way.” Eames’ voice drifts in at the worst possible moment, because Eames was apparently created for the sole purpose of saying the worst possible things at the worst possible moments.
Arthur hisses because he was locked safely in his apartment with the PASSIV, and he knows this isn’t his subconscious suddenly deciding to throw a spanner in the works because his subconscious is trained not to pull shit like this.
He doesn’t bother saying how did you get in here or even why are you in here because those are not questions that Eames will ever answer.
Instead, he says: “well, maybe you could be more specific next time you’re antagonising me.”
Eames makes an amused sound and observes: “I thought you’d be less wound up with a hand down your pants. Clearly not. I underestimated your inability to get that stick out of your ass.”
That has a thoughtful number of meanings, and Arthur is not thinking about any of them because it would be really great if Eames would leave.
“You get bonus points for Cobb, though,” Eames adds cheerfully. “I mean, not because it’s particularly creative - because it’s not, by the way - but it’s an enjoyable level of crazy, you know, recreating your ex-colleague for pornographic purposes.”
Arthur closes his eyes and doesn’t say anything, and Dream Cobb is still pressed sinuously to his back. It’s distracting. “Ok,” he mutters, “you said I should dream bigger, I failed at that, can you go?”
He’s startled when the only answer he gets is a warm mouth pressing to his. Cobb is behind him.
“This is dreaming bigger,” Eames whispers like it’s a fucking secret he’s deigning to let Arthur in on, “but don’t worry. I’ll stay and help you out.”
For therandomgirlie | prompt: You can move me if you want to (Ingrid Michaelson, Mountain and the Sea)
Mountain and the Sea | Eames/Arthur | 300 words
Arthur is boring in all the ways that matter and simultaneously none of them, and Eames rebukes him for his apparent lack of imagination like it’s personally offensive only because he knows Arthur is holding himself back and why and he’s relieved and disappointed by it all.
He’s too good at damage control and it makes Eames a little angry because if he’d been better at it years ago then maybe he’d have something to fall back on. He doesn’t have to keep running for the same reasons Cobb does and he was never one for standing still and waiting for the sky to fall in on him, but there’s a sharp difference between making a choice and simply having nowhere to go. One day this won’t be fun anymore and fuck knows what he’ll do then.
Eames isn’t a masochist or prone to introspection outside of the bottom of a bottle, so it isn’t guilt he feels the first time Arthur kisses him, shoving him against a wall and biting like he has a point to prove. It’s angry, like Arthur is determined to have the last word in an argument that neither of them will ever start, but Eames doesn’t even try to stop him. He doesn’t try to explain that he knows Arthur already, that he knows and it was for him to shift, not Arthur. That he should have broken first; was planning on it, in fact, or at least had something resembling a plan that was almost entirely improvisation because he’s a professional and the best plans always are.
He could still try and explain it all to Arthur, but he never will. Maybe one day Arthur will know him well enough to figure it out for himself; maybe one day Eames will let him.
For merle_p | prompt: "Care to explain why I'm wearing a wedding dress in your dream?"
Wedding Bells | Eames/Arthur | 300 words
Arthur has mostly stopped acting like every little thing is the end of the world without Cobb there - which is good, frankly, because it wasn’t as though Cobb was a paragon of normality or stability or organisation, and Eames would hate to have to remind Arthur of this and get punched again - although he’s still prone to overreaction. It’s hard to tell when Arthur is overreacting because he doesn’t shout or flail around or do any of the other things that normal people who aren’t pretending to be robots do, but Eames knows him well enough to read hysteria in his narrowed eyes.
It’s definitely hysteria right now.
This isn’t Eames’ fault; mostly. After all, the Arthur in his dream was meant to be a manifestation of his subconscious that smiled way more than the normal one and was considerably more flexible. No damage done to anyone and if you’re not technically supposed to recreate real people in the dream world, well, that’s not Eames’ fault. He’s always been awful at following rules, particularly ones labelled for your own good.
Anyway, dream-Arthur’s eyes got all clear and narrowed and Eames decides he’s not going to be the one in the wrong here, because Arthur’s the one who arrived in his dream without knocking.
“Care to explain why I’m wearing a wedding dress in your dream?” Arthur demands, voice shivering.
“I would’ve thought that was obvious, darling,” he replies, because there’s nothing like winding up Arthur.
Arthur glares down at his white meringue of a dress - it’s a little excessive, but Eames quite likes it - and huffs in an annoyed fashion.
“I’d look much better in ivory,” he mutters, and Eames arches an eyebrow before smirking and making the necessary adjustments.
Arthur sighs, but doesn’t argue, so it’s practically a win.
Sarah Jane Adventures
For allyndra | prompt: The sky may fall the sea may split/You may say that isn't it/I may be right you may disagree/Same old story same old me (Razorlight, I Can't Stop This Feeling I've Got)
Same Old Story, Same Old Me | Clyde/Luke | 300 words | futurefic
Luke could do better than this. Clyde knows, because even though they both did the whole uni thing and then UNIT recruited them within minutes of graduation, Luke got hired because he’s got a brain about the size of a planet. Clyde just got hired because it’s second-nature by now; after all, he didn’t have a Saturday job growing up, he had saving the world.
He’s never said it aloud because Clyde isn’t one for introspection or self-pity anywhere someone might see it, but Luke deserves to be around people who are brighter and better and faster than he will ever be. It’s just that Luke, for all his calculations and perceptiveness and ability to spot trouble coming before trouble has even thought about coming in the first place, has completely failed to notice. And Clyde is never going to tell him because Clyde is selfish and jealous and clingy and it’s kind of amazing that no one has pointed this out to him yet.
Luke smells like chemicals and whiteboard markers when he comes back to the crappy little flat they share - you think you’d making a fortune saving the world, but you don’t - and leans over Clyde’s shoulder to look at today’s panels in the comic book he erratically writes; of course not based on their life experiences because he likes being alive, but loosely similar, if you squint.
“I like it,” he says, and: “did you make dinner?”
Clyde swallows a smile and says yes; Luke presses a kiss to his cheek, a whisper of I love you before he wanders off to their cupboard-sized kitchen. It’s stupidly domestic and Clyde loves it more than he thought he could love anything. Luke really could do better than him, but Clyde will never be the one to tell him.
Sherlock
For schythr | prompt: You shimmy shook my bone leaving me stranded all in love on my own/Do you think of me? Where am I now? Baby where do I sleep?/Feel so good but I'm old, 2000 years of chasing's taking its toll. (Kings of Leon, Closer)
Leaving Me Stranded | Sherlock/John | 300 words | AU
When he closes his eyes it’s always long white fingers wrapped around chipped mugs of cheap late-night coffee, used nicotine patches folded in half and left forgotten on the shelves of bookcases.
John thinks this isn’t any crazier than he’s been before, anyway. In the scheme of things.
Therapy is never any different and he doesn’t ever go by choice; waits for this century’s friends and colleagues to push him. He never tells the truth because that really wouldn’t end well. John’s crazy but not in the way that they think and anyway it’s not as though he can ever open his mouth and say for some reason I don’t seem to be able to die in a way that isn’t going to end in needles.
Fascinating, Sherlock says behind him, and John turns too fast, to see nothing at all.
John’s been crazy, been lost, sat in rooms with nothing in them with his hands folded in his lap and his leg aching though it wasn’t actually hurt, so he knows that this time he isn’t mad. All he really knows is that Sherlock was too brilliant to let Moriarty kill him and that Sherlock is still out there somewhere, coming back or perhaps he was never gone to begin with.
Mortality implies a certain lack of imagination is written across his mirror when he wakes up one morning, and it rather makes sense that Sherlock was doing something other than practicing superiority in his room.
(John swears Mycroft is still around too; he catches sight of him sometimes, corner of his eye, never long enough to be sure.)
He looked for a while, travelled and asked and despaired; then he remembered Sherlock never worked well when pushed, and now he just lives his too-long life and he waits.
Torchwood
For scripps | Follow-up to If You Pass Go, Do Not Collect £200
Chance Card | Owen/Ianto | 300 words
Ianto doesn’t look him in the eye for bordering on three weeks.
Owen is more ok with this than he’ll ever admit to anyone; it’s something to do with readjusting, with smiling instead of just baring his teeth, with curling his fingers into his palms and no longer dealing with his problems with broken bricks.
Jack doesn’t know because they haven’t told him, but he can probably guess things from the bruised curve of Owen’s mouth and the ugly, badly-healed scars littering his skin. Maybe it’s the guilt that keeps him from speaking up, from demanding something from Owen other than a perfunctory report filled with lies.
Owen rejects the therapist’s number he finds on a post-it in the autopsy bay, crumpling it in his fist and disposing of it just before Ianto brings him a latte made the way he likes it, too hot and quietly bitter.
You don’t get to judge me, Owen thinks, you don’t. Not anymore.
Ianto doesn’t look up, doesn’t say anything, doesn’t linger. Owen wants to call him back but he doesn’t know how to; he pictures lunging and dragging him back hard enough to bruise, to hurt, but it’s all too much and he closes his eyes and stays absolutely still, blood spattering across the inside of his vision.
It’s Ianto who catches up with him days later, too, when they’re chasing a Weevil that got loose and Owen forgets that they treat them with dignity nowadays. His mouth is bleeding and his knuckles are split and it’s entirely possible that the Weevil is dead; Ianto drags him away, hands around his wrists, finds them a dark deserted alley and leaves the mess for Jack and kisses Owen until he stops shaking and then kisses him even when he doesn’t need to anymore.
For rhain | Follow-up to If You Pass Go, Do Not Collect £200
Go To Jail | Owen/Ianto | 300 words
“I don’t know anymore, Owen,” Ianto says, which at least sounds enough like the truth that it might be. They’ve both spent too much time avoiding looking at each other, avoiding touching on too many months.
Owen still wakes up in the night sometimes, biting back memories. He always thought Torchwood was a career in killing people but there’s safety in the distance of the end of a gun and there are some days when none of it seems worth anything anymore.
“You never know,” he says aloud, because he’s tired of Ianto looking judgemental and helpless and angry all the time. He’s not even sure who Ianto is angry with anymore; Owen’s beginning to suspect it’s not him. “Make up your fucking mind.”
Ianto’s head snaps up, and there are too many lines between them and a lot of them have been crossed but not all of them have, and it’s impossible to tell what’s too far anymore.
“We really should tell Jack,” Ianto mumbles; and fuck, yes, it’s always about Jack, even though Owen knows exactly how to smash a man’s teeth out with a cobblestone and that isn’t even the worst of his skills.
“Will you?” he asks, words shattering.
Ianto moves, sliding onto Owen’s lap in too many sinuous lines and Owen stays absolutely still, afraid to even touch him, afraid he’ll cross the line into violence without realising.
Ianto leans their foreheads together and Owen listens to their joined breathing, jagged and not quite deep enough.
“No,” Ianto mumbles, mouth pressed somewhere by his cheek. “No.”
Owen takes another breath and wonders if this is Ianto’s decision, if it’s made. If this is where they are now.
“Ok,” he mumbles, and curls his shaking fingers into the sharp collar of Ianto’s shirt.
Ianto lets him.
Ashes To Ashes
For burnmybridges | prompt: One man on a lonely platform. Show fear as he turns to hide (Visage, Fade To Grey)
Show Fear As He Turns To Hide | Gene | 300 words | spoilers for season 3
Everyone has their choice. That’s the way it works; everyone has their choice, for better or for worse, for heaven or for stinging, bright-coloured damnation. There’s cheating of course, because everyone bloody cheats; it wouldn’t make it a game if they didn’t.
He never had a choice and he’s always known it; from the moment he ended up here in this in-between place that isn’t anywhere but is his, he’s known that he was never going anywhere else. He’s lived through a handful of decades and he’ll live through a handful more and probably another handful more on top of that because he’s fucking good at this and he’ll be careful for that long at least until the rug is dragged from beneath his feet and he goes wherever it is you go when you made the decision that the options available to you weren’t the right ones.
Everyone ends up somewhere. That’s really the only rule here. Everyone somewhere; it’s always about the paperwork.
He knows where he isn’t going; it will never be his place to walk into a warm smoke-filled pub and order a beer with a little too much head because Nelson never did figure out how to do it. He will never find out what comes next, if that pub and the jukebox that stuck unless you kicked it are all that’s left, or if there’s something after that. That will never be his and maybe the curiosity will kill him one day and maybe it won’t.
Luigi has a bottle of cheap wine in one hand and his expression is almost sympathetic, but he hasn’t decided if Luigi is even real yet and it’s too late and he’s too tired for all of this tonight.
He shrugs into his coat and doesn’t look back.
Bandom RPF
For dimestore_romeo | follow-up to Let Me Shake Up Your World | prompt: “Is that a gun in your pocket or are you just pleased to see me?”
I Know Your Type | Gabe Saporta, Vicky-T Asher[/Greta Salpeter] | 300 words
Gabe does less time in prison than he’s supposed to, which Victoria was expecting because she’s not an idiot and Gabe’s got a list of connections taller than Ryland.
Pete warns both her and Greta about potential repercussions, but he doesn’t look all that worried and in reality Victoria spends most of the meeting discreetly flirting with Greta via delicately significant eyebrow raises. They’re apparently not that discreet, though, because Pete sighs and tells them it’ll serve them right if they wind up encased in concrete (which they won’t, because Gabe has never done that; it would bring down the whole party vibe, after all) and sends them out with an eyeroll of frustrated authority that he can’t really carry off.
Victoria doesn’t jump when a long arm slides around her shoulders because part of her has been expecting it for weeks. She sips at her martini and glances towards the bar where Greta is supposed to be buying her another one. Greta’s looking back already - cop instincts or something - but her smile is relaxed, calm.
She leans back into the touch. “Is that a gun in your pocket or are you just pleased to see me?” she drawls, low.
Gabe laughs, white teeth catching the light. “I’m always pleased to see you, Vicky-T,” he tells her. “And please, my dick’s definitely bigger than a gun.”
He slides sinuously into the seat opposite hers, all dark eyes and easy laughter. “It’s good to see you again,” he breezes, but the weird thing is, Victoria thinks he means it. Gabe follows her eyeline to the bar and Greta, who is wearing a tiny black dress.
“Damn, Vicky-T,” he says, and: “good work.”
He doesn’t offer a threesome immediately and Victoria decides this means he’s learned something. She looks back to Greta to find she’s already buying an extra martini, and tips her head back and laughs.
Britannia High
For finkpishnets | prompt: I came here to make you dance tonight, I don't care if I'm a guilty pleasure for you (Cobra Starship, Guilty Pleasure)
'Cause I Know How To Take It | Jez/BB | 300 words | AU
“Your double life is crazy awesome,” BB tells Jez, and then when Jez quirks an eyebrow in a face streaked with sweat and glitter eyeliner, he pretends he was asking if he wanted a drink.
Jez shakes his head, which BB knew already because Jez has to wear a suit tomorrow and talk about numbers and it’s a waste of a pair of hips but that’s another one of those thoughts BB keeps to himself these days. Jez gave up the fight for a career in the arts when it came down to that or being disowned, and BB can’t blame him; he doesn’t have parents and his brother’s one bad decision away from either a bodybag or a prison cell, and he’d cling to what family he had left too.
They met months ago in a club like this one but with better music; Jez was the best dancer there and when they got to know each other a little better, he confessed it all to BB. How he’s going to take over his father’s business, how he pretends that he’s the good little son while sneaking out in too-tight jeans and dancing his nights away because it’s all he can have. BB can’t tell if Jez respects him for turning his life over to the arts, or if he pities him a little; Jez won’t ever tell him, either way.
The beat is loud and sexy and heavy and their hips slide together like they were made to, and BB avoids Jez’s bitten-red mouth and doesn’t think about it because Jez is being the good little son and dating an economist and if his dance moves and a faintly guilty smile are all BB gets of him, then that’s all he’ll take.
It’s enough. It has to be.
Glee
For jacklemmon | prompt: the tide is high but I'm holding on (Blondie, The Tide Is High)
But I'm Holding On | Puck/Kurt | 300 words | Cracky Mermaid AU
“I don’t know why you’re so bothered about shoes,” Puck says, “seeing as how you don’t have feet.”
Kurt rolls his eyes, which seem too large for his face, big Disney eyes and fuck, that’s a thought. “You’re so narrow minded,” he responds, stealing the September Vogue Puck had to steal from Quinn and pretend it was for his sister and it so blatantly wasn’t, and she gave him this stupid knowing grin.
He sighs and watches Kurt leafing through Vogue, keeping it carefully above the water. Puck doesn’t even know how his life has expanded to include teenage mermaids who live in pools in their dad’s backyard. It was definitely the weirdest shit he’d ever discovered in his pool-cleaning career.
Kurt is humming to himself while he leafs past the adverts, and Puck wonders again why Kurt is so invested in clothes and make-up when he lives in water, although he does have a scarf tied at a jaunty angle around his neck. Which is weird. Puck doesn’t know a lot about teenage mermaids (he totally wiki-ed it when he first found out Kurt existed though) but he does know that not a lot of them wear jaunty scarves worth a shitload of money.
“See if I bring you girl magazines again,” he mutters, kicking water in Kurt’s direction. Kurt shrieks and tries to protect both himself and Vogue, which is stupid because Kurt can’t not get his hair wet. He’s a freaking mermaid (or merman, or whatever).
Kurt just grins at him with too many perfect teeth, and Puck sighs and mumbles: “I don’t even know why I come over here”.
He kind of does, though; Kurt has big distracting eyes and spends far too much time mostly naked and dripping wet and, well, Puck’s really only human.
For linnet_melody | prompt: The Princess and the Pea
The Princess and the Pea | Puck/Kurt | 300 words
Kurt is of the opinion that if his life were a television programme he’d watch it with the delicious schadenfreude he does Gossip Girl, grinning as the characters’ lives fall apart.
It’s hard to find it as funny when his own life is falling apart, but that’s probably just as well; it’s one thing to be prone to histrionics and another thing entirely to be prone to masochism.
Mercedes asks him about the attitude one day when they’re out shopping, draping themselves with scarves.
“It’s an audition process,” Kurt explains, and Mercedes just arches an eyebrow at him, universally recognised signal for boy, are you huffing hairspray again?
Maybe Kurt’s just been screwed up by reading too many fairy stories as a kid; the general impression he got was that if you want the right princess, you make them work for it. Ok, so piling up mattresses and vegetables and inviting a guy over for a sleepover isn’t really a possibility, but Kurt figures if they can deal with him being a bitch most of the time he’s halfway there.
Mostly, though, it just gets him put in dumpsters. At least until the day he’s being crowded up against the lockers by half the football team and spitting out vitriol about last season’s pants and their lamentable haircuts, and he catches sight of Puck at the back of the crowd, not quite joining in, the corner of Puck’s mouth lifting at his comments.
Mr Schuester and his Woefully Inadequate Idealism are coming down the hall so the team leave him alone after one last shove, but he sees Puck darting something that’s almost a smile over his shoulder. There’s potential there.
Kurt narrows his eyes in thought and decides to not ever tell Puck he’s the princess in this scenario.
Inception
For princess_aleera | prompt: "You mustn't be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling."
The Logistics of 'Bigger' | Eames/Arthur/Cobb | 300 words
“This wasn’t actually what I meant, by the way.” Eames’ voice drifts in at the worst possible moment, because Eames was apparently created for the sole purpose of saying the worst possible things at the worst possible moments.
Arthur hisses because he was locked safely in his apartment with the PASSIV, and he knows this isn’t his subconscious suddenly deciding to throw a spanner in the works because his subconscious is trained not to pull shit like this.
He doesn’t bother saying how did you get in here or even why are you in here because those are not questions that Eames will ever answer.
Instead, he says: “well, maybe you could be more specific next time you’re antagonising me.”
Eames makes an amused sound and observes: “I thought you’d be less wound up with a hand down your pants. Clearly not. I underestimated your inability to get that stick out of your ass.”
That has a thoughtful number of meanings, and Arthur is not thinking about any of them because it would be really great if Eames would leave.
“You get bonus points for Cobb, though,” Eames adds cheerfully. “I mean, not because it’s particularly creative - because it’s not, by the way - but it’s an enjoyable level of crazy, you know, recreating your ex-colleague for pornographic purposes.”
Arthur closes his eyes and doesn’t say anything, and Dream Cobb is still pressed sinuously to his back. It’s distracting. “Ok,” he mutters, “you said I should dream bigger, I failed at that, can you go?”
He’s startled when the only answer he gets is a warm mouth pressing to his. Cobb is behind him.
“This is dreaming bigger,” Eames whispers like it’s a fucking secret he’s deigning to let Arthur in on, “but don’t worry. I’ll stay and help you out.”
For therandomgirlie | prompt: You can move me if you want to (Ingrid Michaelson, Mountain and the Sea)
Mountain and the Sea | Eames/Arthur | 300 words
Arthur is boring in all the ways that matter and simultaneously none of them, and Eames rebukes him for his apparent lack of imagination like it’s personally offensive only because he knows Arthur is holding himself back and why and he’s relieved and disappointed by it all.
He’s too good at damage control and it makes Eames a little angry because if he’d been better at it years ago then maybe he’d have something to fall back on. He doesn’t have to keep running for the same reasons Cobb does and he was never one for standing still and waiting for the sky to fall in on him, but there’s a sharp difference between making a choice and simply having nowhere to go. One day this won’t be fun anymore and fuck knows what he’ll do then.
Eames isn’t a masochist or prone to introspection outside of the bottom of a bottle, so it isn’t guilt he feels the first time Arthur kisses him, shoving him against a wall and biting like he has a point to prove. It’s angry, like Arthur is determined to have the last word in an argument that neither of them will ever start, but Eames doesn’t even try to stop him. He doesn’t try to explain that he knows Arthur already, that he knows and it was for him to shift, not Arthur. That he should have broken first; was planning on it, in fact, or at least had something resembling a plan that was almost entirely improvisation because he’s a professional and the best plans always are.
He could still try and explain it all to Arthur, but he never will. Maybe one day Arthur will know him well enough to figure it out for himself; maybe one day Eames will let him.
For merle_p | prompt: "Care to explain why I'm wearing a wedding dress in your dream?"
Wedding Bells | Eames/Arthur | 300 words
Arthur has mostly stopped acting like every little thing is the end of the world without Cobb there - which is good, frankly, because it wasn’t as though Cobb was a paragon of normality or stability or organisation, and Eames would hate to have to remind Arthur of this and get punched again - although he’s still prone to overreaction. It’s hard to tell when Arthur is overreacting because he doesn’t shout or flail around or do any of the other things that normal people who aren’t pretending to be robots do, but Eames knows him well enough to read hysteria in his narrowed eyes.
It’s definitely hysteria right now.
This isn’t Eames’ fault; mostly. After all, the Arthur in his dream was meant to be a manifestation of his subconscious that smiled way more than the normal one and was considerably more flexible. No damage done to anyone and if you’re not technically supposed to recreate real people in the dream world, well, that’s not Eames’ fault. He’s always been awful at following rules, particularly ones labelled for your own good.
Anyway, dream-Arthur’s eyes got all clear and narrowed and Eames decides he’s not going to be the one in the wrong here, because Arthur’s the one who arrived in his dream without knocking.
“Care to explain why I’m wearing a wedding dress in your dream?” Arthur demands, voice shivering.
“I would’ve thought that was obvious, darling,” he replies, because there’s nothing like winding up Arthur.
Arthur glares down at his white meringue of a dress - it’s a little excessive, but Eames quite likes it - and huffs in an annoyed fashion.
“I’d look much better in ivory,” he mutters, and Eames arches an eyebrow before smirking and making the necessary adjustments.
Arthur sighs, but doesn’t argue, so it’s practically a win.
Sarah Jane Adventures
For allyndra | prompt: The sky may fall the sea may split/You may say that isn't it/I may be right you may disagree/Same old story same old me (Razorlight, I Can't Stop This Feeling I've Got)
Same Old Story, Same Old Me | Clyde/Luke | 300 words | futurefic
Luke could do better than this. Clyde knows, because even though they both did the whole uni thing and then UNIT recruited them within minutes of graduation, Luke got hired because he’s got a brain about the size of a planet. Clyde just got hired because it’s second-nature by now; after all, he didn’t have a Saturday job growing up, he had saving the world.
He’s never said it aloud because Clyde isn’t one for introspection or self-pity anywhere someone might see it, but Luke deserves to be around people who are brighter and better and faster than he will ever be. It’s just that Luke, for all his calculations and perceptiveness and ability to spot trouble coming before trouble has even thought about coming in the first place, has completely failed to notice. And Clyde is never going to tell him because Clyde is selfish and jealous and clingy and it’s kind of amazing that no one has pointed this out to him yet.
Luke smells like chemicals and whiteboard markers when he comes back to the crappy little flat they share - you think you’d making a fortune saving the world, but you don’t - and leans over Clyde’s shoulder to look at today’s panels in the comic book he erratically writes; of course not based on their life experiences because he likes being alive, but loosely similar, if you squint.
“I like it,” he says, and: “did you make dinner?”
Clyde swallows a smile and says yes; Luke presses a kiss to his cheek, a whisper of I love you before he wanders off to their cupboard-sized kitchen. It’s stupidly domestic and Clyde loves it more than he thought he could love anything. Luke really could do better than him, but Clyde will never be the one to tell him.
Sherlock
For schythr | prompt: You shimmy shook my bone leaving me stranded all in love on my own/Do you think of me? Where am I now? Baby where do I sleep?/Feel so good but I'm old, 2000 years of chasing's taking its toll. (Kings of Leon, Closer)
Leaving Me Stranded | Sherlock/John | 300 words | AU
When he closes his eyes it’s always long white fingers wrapped around chipped mugs of cheap late-night coffee, used nicotine patches folded in half and left forgotten on the shelves of bookcases.
John thinks this isn’t any crazier than he’s been before, anyway. In the scheme of things.
Therapy is never any different and he doesn’t ever go by choice; waits for this century’s friends and colleagues to push him. He never tells the truth because that really wouldn’t end well. John’s crazy but not in the way that they think and anyway it’s not as though he can ever open his mouth and say for some reason I don’t seem to be able to die in a way that isn’t going to end in needles.
Fascinating, Sherlock says behind him, and John turns too fast, to see nothing at all.
John’s been crazy, been lost, sat in rooms with nothing in them with his hands folded in his lap and his leg aching though it wasn’t actually hurt, so he knows that this time he isn’t mad. All he really knows is that Sherlock was too brilliant to let Moriarty kill him and that Sherlock is still out there somewhere, coming back or perhaps he was never gone to begin with.
Mortality implies a certain lack of imagination is written across his mirror when he wakes up one morning, and it rather makes sense that Sherlock was doing something other than practicing superiority in his room.
(John swears Mycroft is still around too; he catches sight of him sometimes, corner of his eye, never long enough to be sure.)
He looked for a while, travelled and asked and despaired; then he remembered Sherlock never worked well when pushed, and now he just lives his too-long life and he waits.
Torchwood
For scripps | Follow-up to If You Pass Go, Do Not Collect £200
Chance Card | Owen/Ianto | 300 words
Ianto doesn’t look him in the eye for bordering on three weeks.
Owen is more ok with this than he’ll ever admit to anyone; it’s something to do with readjusting, with smiling instead of just baring his teeth, with curling his fingers into his palms and no longer dealing with his problems with broken bricks.
Jack doesn’t know because they haven’t told him, but he can probably guess things from the bruised curve of Owen’s mouth and the ugly, badly-healed scars littering his skin. Maybe it’s the guilt that keeps him from speaking up, from demanding something from Owen other than a perfunctory report filled with lies.
Owen rejects the therapist’s number he finds on a post-it in the autopsy bay, crumpling it in his fist and disposing of it just before Ianto brings him a latte made the way he likes it, too hot and quietly bitter.
You don’t get to judge me, Owen thinks, you don’t. Not anymore.
Ianto doesn’t look up, doesn’t say anything, doesn’t linger. Owen wants to call him back but he doesn’t know how to; he pictures lunging and dragging him back hard enough to bruise, to hurt, but it’s all too much and he closes his eyes and stays absolutely still, blood spattering across the inside of his vision.
It’s Ianto who catches up with him days later, too, when they’re chasing a Weevil that got loose and Owen forgets that they treat them with dignity nowadays. His mouth is bleeding and his knuckles are split and it’s entirely possible that the Weevil is dead; Ianto drags him away, hands around his wrists, finds them a dark deserted alley and leaves the mess for Jack and kisses Owen until he stops shaking and then kisses him even when he doesn’t need to anymore.
For rhain | Follow-up to If You Pass Go, Do Not Collect £200
Go To Jail | Owen/Ianto | 300 words
“I don’t know anymore, Owen,” Ianto says, which at least sounds enough like the truth that it might be. They’ve both spent too much time avoiding looking at each other, avoiding touching on too many months.
Owen still wakes up in the night sometimes, biting back memories. He always thought Torchwood was a career in killing people but there’s safety in the distance of the end of a gun and there are some days when none of it seems worth anything anymore.
“You never know,” he says aloud, because he’s tired of Ianto looking judgemental and helpless and angry all the time. He’s not even sure who Ianto is angry with anymore; Owen’s beginning to suspect it’s not him. “Make up your fucking mind.”
Ianto’s head snaps up, and there are too many lines between them and a lot of them have been crossed but not all of them have, and it’s impossible to tell what’s too far anymore.
“We really should tell Jack,” Ianto mumbles; and fuck, yes, it’s always about Jack, even though Owen knows exactly how to smash a man’s teeth out with a cobblestone and that isn’t even the worst of his skills.
“Will you?” he asks, words shattering.
Ianto moves, sliding onto Owen’s lap in too many sinuous lines and Owen stays absolutely still, afraid to even touch him, afraid he’ll cross the line into violence without realising.
Ianto leans their foreheads together and Owen listens to their joined breathing, jagged and not quite deep enough.
“No,” Ianto mumbles, mouth pressed somewhere by his cheek. “No.”
Owen takes another breath and wonders if this is Ianto’s decision, if it’s made. If this is where they are now.
“Ok,” he mumbles, and curls his shaking fingers into the sharp collar of Ianto’s shirt.
Ianto lets him.