Winter Theme - Firefly - Simon, River
Fandom: Firefly
Rating: G
Character: Simon, River
Word Count: 386
Prompt:
Lest I should prize you not, you elude me in a thousand ways.
Lest I should mix you with the crowd, you stand aside.
Simon watches his sister from across the room. The galley is small but he still feels like he's a thousand light years away from her. Distance, he has come to discover, is more a matter of intellect than physical relation.
It's like... flying a ship, he thinks, fumbling for what he can recall of Wash at the board. Or flying two ships. Or a ship and a planet. He pauses his train of thought, momentarily wound up in a metaphor that has no real meaning to him, then sighs and continues, trying to dissect the feeling and make it real.
Distance is meaningless without that second ship to measure yourself against.
That's close enough to what he means and he contents himself with it. Distance has no meaning without someone to be distant from.
River.
His gut clenches and his chest aches, and he distracts himself by sorting out the physiological reactions, naming each and assigning meaning based on category and intensity. It soothes him, the hypnotic repetition of biochemical reactions learned in medical school, and allows him to regain his perspective.
Perspective is all about distance, too. What you perceive of a ship depends upon your distance from it.
Simon sighs to himself and chases a bit of stew across his bowl with a hunk of bread. Malcolm would take entirely too much pleasure in mocking him, if he knew his thoughts. He's a doctor, not a pilot, and he has no idea why his mind is throwing up images of ships and plants and flying.
He blames Malcolm but then, he blames Malcolm for everything. The firefight on the last planet, when they tried to pick up supplies. The calluses on River's hands, where there shouldn't be any. Even the week old bread is his fault.
River.
What is his distance from her? Is it measured in light years? In temporal years? In experience? In pain? What's the unit of measure? What's the perspective? Is he seeing no more of her than a ship passing another whose running lights are off? What do her lights illuminate? What do her shadows conceal?
He looks up from his plate and stares at her across the room. She's humming to herself and passing an apple from hand to hand, and he's never felt so far from her.
Rating: G
Character: Simon, River
Word Count: 386
Prompt:
Lest I should prize you not, you elude me in a thousand ways.
Lest I should mix you with the crowd, you stand aside.
Simon watches his sister from across the room. The galley is small but he still feels like he's a thousand light years away from her. Distance, he has come to discover, is more a matter of intellect than physical relation.
It's like... flying a ship, he thinks, fumbling for what he can recall of Wash at the board. Or flying two ships. Or a ship and a planet. He pauses his train of thought, momentarily wound up in a metaphor that has no real meaning to him, then sighs and continues, trying to dissect the feeling and make it real.
Distance is meaningless without that second ship to measure yourself against.
That's close enough to what he means and he contents himself with it. Distance has no meaning without someone to be distant from.
River.
His gut clenches and his chest aches, and he distracts himself by sorting out the physiological reactions, naming each and assigning meaning based on category and intensity. It soothes him, the hypnotic repetition of biochemical reactions learned in medical school, and allows him to regain his perspective.
Perspective is all about distance, too. What you perceive of a ship depends upon your distance from it.
Simon sighs to himself and chases a bit of stew across his bowl with a hunk of bread. Malcolm would take entirely too much pleasure in mocking him, if he knew his thoughts. He's a doctor, not a pilot, and he has no idea why his mind is throwing up images of ships and plants and flying.
He blames Malcolm but then, he blames Malcolm for everything. The firefight on the last planet, when they tried to pick up supplies. The calluses on River's hands, where there shouldn't be any. Even the week old bread is his fault.
River.
What is his distance from her? Is it measured in light years? In temporal years? In experience? In pain? What's the unit of measure? What's the perspective? Is he seeing no more of her than a ship passing another whose running lights are off? What do her lights illuminate? What do her shadows conceal?
He looks up from his plate and stares at her across the room. She's humming to herself and passing an apple from hand to hand, and he's never felt so far from her.