Another drabble dump
I'm putting the labels under cuts too because there's a lot. Fandoms are Doctor Who (1), Torchwood (2), Firefly (1), Harry Potter (1), Merlin (1), and Animorphs (2).
Title: Splendid Is
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: The Doctor
Spoilers: None
Words: 100
Prompt: #344: Splendid
Rating: G
Summary: Splendid is so many things.
Splendid is a word he enjoys. It rolls off the tongue and puts a positive spin on everything, and if there’s one thing he needs it’s a little optimism.
Splendid is the beauty his companions see in everything. It’s the way their eyes light up as they visit places they could never have dreamed of. It’s the swaying mountains of Felspoon and the white hole in Althrace and the marketplaces of Hyspero.
Splendid is a word, but more than that it’s a feeling, that little fragment of happiness he carries around in his hearts when he doesn’t have anything else.
*
Title: Cold Wire
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters/Pairings: Tosh; one-sided Owen/Tosh
Spoilers: None
Words: 100
Rating: PG
Summary: Computers are all coding and wires and software. People are so much harder.
She buries herself in work, in computers, because computers are harmless. Computers do what you expect them to and they expect nothing in return.
Computers have wires and software and hardware and coding and electricity and they’re cold. They’re emotionless and thoughtless and cold.
Owen, Owen is flesh and blood. Owen wants things, Owen needs things - but he doesn’t want her. Doesn’t need her. She’s his colleague, nothing more, and why does that hurt?
Computers are simple. As long as the hardware is set up right you can do anything. People are harder.
Computers are cold. Owen is colder.
*
Title: Bones
Fandom: Firefly
Characters: Simon/Kaylee
Spoilers: None
Words: 116
Rating: PG
Prompt: Geeks: Firefly, Simon/Anyone, practical knowledge of anatomy
It's a quiet day, just traveling, and one of the rare times that any of them get a break from the shooting and thieving and general madness that they seem to find themselves in the middle of on a regular basis.
He's not quite sure how it happens but they're on the couch together, and the next thing he knows her head is in his lap and she's half asleep. He reaches down and wipes a smudge of grease from her cheek, and she smiles, one hand drifting up to press against his heartbeat. He catches it and rubs it slowly, murmuring the names of the bones as he comes to them until she falls asleep.
*
Title: Sixteen
Fandom: Harry Potter
Characters: Narcissa, Draco
Spoilers: HBP
Words: 100
Rating: PG
Summary: She devoted herself to the Dark Lord but she's wanted to leave since he took her son.
She tells him she’s proud of him and then rolls down his sleeve so she doesn’t have to look at the ugly black mark blemishing the skin of her perfect son, but even when it’s hidden she can’t stop herself from staring because she knows it’s there.
When he leaves for Hogwarts that year she can’t bring herself to wave at the train because it’s all she can do to keep her hands from shaking. She thinks it doesn’t matter because he’s not looking out the window anyway but he is and he turns away from the glass in shame.
*
Title: Shine Down
Fandom: Animorphs
Characters: Naomi, Jean, Eva, Loren
Spoilers: #54
Words: 272
Rating: PG
Prompt: Parents: Animorphs; Naomi, Loren, Jean, Eva; Lord make me a rainbow, I’ll shine down on my mother / She'll know I’m safe with you when she stands under my colors, oh and / Life ain't always what you think it ought to be, no / ain't even grey, but she buries her baby ('If I Die Young', The Band Perry)
Naomi had pictured a world without Rachel as dim and dark and gray.
But it wasn't, not really. It was bright, just bright enough to cause a small ache behind her eyes but not quite bright enough to justify getting up and turning off the lights.
Jean had had the fears of any mother, but she never let herself think about how she would react to losing one of her sons because she was scared of the answer.
They had been the rope that tied her to shore, kept her tethered to solid ground. Now she had lost both and she found herself adrift, floating through a world that no longer held her children and wondering when she was going to sink.
Eva had lost her son long ago, when Edriss had left without even allowing her to say good bye, and what difference did it make that she had lost him again?
Of course it made a difference. Of course it did. But Eva was strong from years of fighting a slug in her head and she could almost - almost - fool herself into thinking it didn’t.
Loren never had a son, so she never thought about losing him.
And once he was gone she didn't know how she was supposed to react. How can you love someone you've only known a few months, how can you love a son you don't remember? She gazed at the sky, at the rainbow that stretched from horizon to horizon. She was using her son's first, last, and only gift to her to watch over the place he loved most, and that was enough.
*
Title: Father for a Day
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: Ten, Jenny
Spoilers: 4x06 "The Doctor's Daughter"
Words: 74
Rating: PG
Prompt: Parents: Doctor Who, 10 and Jenny, Father for a day
He'd only known her for a minute, but already he knew more about her than she did. He'd only known her for an hour, but already she had broken him out of jail. He'd only known her for two hours and already she'd adopted his moral views. He'd only known her for three hours and already she'd died for him.
He was only her father for a day, but it hurt just the same.
*
Title: Never Once
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Toshiko
Spoilers: None
Words: 189
Rating: PG
Prompt: Geeks: Torchwood, Toshiko, playing with computers as a child
She's six and allowed to play with her grandfather's new computer, just for a few minutes. But later that night she comes downstairs and turns it back on, hacking in and spending another hour exploring the technology before falling asleep with her cheek pressed to the keyboard.
She's eleven and they've just moved to Britain. (Her mother says "back" to Britain but she can't remember being born so it's just "there" to her.) Her father buys her a computer, brand new, and when she asks why he tells her, "Oh, no reason" but she knows he's just trying to make up for the move and it works. She loses herself in the keys and coding for hours at a time and it only makes it harder for her to make friends.
She's sixteen and trying to figure out what she wants to do with her life. She thinks about programming and maths and innovation, imagines inventing something new and extraordinary and having her name written down forever. Never once does she think of sonic devices and aliens and men who can't die. Never once does she think of Torchwood.
*
Title: Today
Fandom: Animorphs
Characters: Rachel; briefly Jake, Tobias, and Rachel's family
Spoilers: #53
Words: 152
Rating: PG
Prompt: Fantasy: Animorphs, any, maybe this time it will actually be over
She listens as he explains his plan and then she nods, because does she have a choice?
She says good-bye to her family, and tells them she loves them, because she doesn't say it enough, even now. She tells Tobias too, but she can't tell them where she's going and says she's just going for a walk, she'll be back soon. She wonders if she will.
She morphs and flies away and the only way she can keep herself from turning around and going back is by thinking, this is it, this is it, this is when it ends. This is the all or nothing. Today it ends, please let it end.
Because she loves the fighting and the blood but she hates the dying, over and over and over and only coming back when she turns weak and defenseless and human again even though she's not really human anymore at all.
*
Title: Playing Magic
Fandom: Merlin
Characters: Morgana, Merlin
Spoilers: None
Words: 228
Rating: PG
Prompt: Fantasy: Merlin, Morgana/Merlin, modern AU, she likes to pretend she's the real Morgan le Fay and he's the real Merlin (only they are)
The first time she hears of Camelot, she's seven.
She's shown the movie "The Sword in the Stone" and when she learns that the weird old man is called Merlin she laughs and shows it to her Merlin. He tells her in no uncertain terms that he will never be that old and wrinkly and they leave it at that.
The next time she learns of the Round Table they're ten. The teacher gives them a chapter book to read and when they meet Morgan le Fay for the first time Merlin grins and elbows her in the side. They agree that it's funny but Merlin thinks it's just a coincidence.
She doesn't let it go, though: she's a sorceress for Halloween that year and she's disappointed when Merlin turns up as a knight instead of a wizard. On the playground they play at magic whenever she can bully him into it and when they've grown out of pretend she still does it secretly, alone.
She makes up her own magic and creates rules for it, and secret words, and tries to make up a written language but she's never been good at runes.
She was seven the first time, and ten the second. It's not until they're well into their teens that it happens so that Merlin can't deny it and when it does, she only smiles.
Title: Splendid Is
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: The Doctor
Spoilers: None
Words: 100
Prompt: #344: Splendid
Rating: G
Summary: Splendid is so many things.
Splendid is a word he enjoys. It rolls off the tongue and puts a positive spin on everything, and if there’s one thing he needs it’s a little optimism.
Splendid is the beauty his companions see in everything. It’s the way their eyes light up as they visit places they could never have dreamed of. It’s the swaying mountains of Felspoon and the white hole in Althrace and the marketplaces of Hyspero.
Splendid is a word, but more than that it’s a feeling, that little fragment of happiness he carries around in his hearts when he doesn’t have anything else.
*
Title: Cold Wire
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters/Pairings: Tosh; one-sided Owen/Tosh
Spoilers: None
Words: 100
Rating: PG
Summary: Computers are all coding and wires and software. People are so much harder.
She buries herself in work, in computers, because computers are harmless. Computers do what you expect them to and they expect nothing in return.
Computers have wires and software and hardware and coding and electricity and they’re cold. They’re emotionless and thoughtless and cold.
Owen, Owen is flesh and blood. Owen wants things, Owen needs things - but he doesn’t want her. Doesn’t need her. She’s his colleague, nothing more, and why does that hurt?
Computers are simple. As long as the hardware is set up right you can do anything. People are harder.
Computers are cold. Owen is colder.
*
Title: Bones
Fandom: Firefly
Characters: Simon/Kaylee
Spoilers: None
Words: 116
Rating: PG
Prompt: Geeks: Firefly, Simon/Anyone, practical knowledge of anatomy
It's a quiet day, just traveling, and one of the rare times that any of them get a break from the shooting and thieving and general madness that they seem to find themselves in the middle of on a regular basis.
He's not quite sure how it happens but they're on the couch together, and the next thing he knows her head is in his lap and she's half asleep. He reaches down and wipes a smudge of grease from her cheek, and she smiles, one hand drifting up to press against his heartbeat. He catches it and rubs it slowly, murmuring the names of the bones as he comes to them until she falls asleep.
*
Title: Sixteen
Fandom: Harry Potter
Characters: Narcissa, Draco
Spoilers: HBP
Words: 100
Rating: PG
Summary: She devoted herself to the Dark Lord but she's wanted to leave since he took her son.
She tells him she’s proud of him and then rolls down his sleeve so she doesn’t have to look at the ugly black mark blemishing the skin of her perfect son, but even when it’s hidden she can’t stop herself from staring because she knows it’s there.
When he leaves for Hogwarts that year she can’t bring herself to wave at the train because it’s all she can do to keep her hands from shaking. She thinks it doesn’t matter because he’s not looking out the window anyway but he is and he turns away from the glass in shame.
*
Title: Shine Down
Fandom: Animorphs
Characters: Naomi, Jean, Eva, Loren
Spoilers: #54
Words: 272
Rating: PG
Prompt: Parents: Animorphs; Naomi, Loren, Jean, Eva; Lord make me a rainbow, I’ll shine down on my mother / She'll know I’m safe with you when she stands under my colors, oh and / Life ain't always what you think it ought to be, no / ain't even grey, but she buries her baby ('If I Die Young', The Band Perry)
Naomi had pictured a world without Rachel as dim and dark and gray.
But it wasn't, not really. It was bright, just bright enough to cause a small ache behind her eyes but not quite bright enough to justify getting up and turning off the lights.
Jean had had the fears of any mother, but she never let herself think about how she would react to losing one of her sons because she was scared of the answer.
They had been the rope that tied her to shore, kept her tethered to solid ground. Now she had lost both and she found herself adrift, floating through a world that no longer held her children and wondering when she was going to sink.
Eva had lost her son long ago, when Edriss had left without even allowing her to say good bye, and what difference did it make that she had lost him again?
Of course it made a difference. Of course it did. But Eva was strong from years of fighting a slug in her head and she could almost - almost - fool herself into thinking it didn’t.
Loren never had a son, so she never thought about losing him.
And once he was gone she didn't know how she was supposed to react. How can you love someone you've only known a few months, how can you love a son you don't remember? She gazed at the sky, at the rainbow that stretched from horizon to horizon. She was using her son's first, last, and only gift to her to watch over the place he loved most, and that was enough.
*
Title: Father for a Day
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: Ten, Jenny
Spoilers: 4x06 "The Doctor's Daughter"
Words: 74
Rating: PG
Prompt: Parents: Doctor Who, 10 and Jenny, Father for a day
He'd only known her for a minute, but already he knew more about her than she did. He'd only known her for an hour, but already she had broken him out of jail. He'd only known her for two hours and already she'd adopted his moral views. He'd only known her for three hours and already she'd died for him.
He was only her father for a day, but it hurt just the same.
*
Title: Never Once
Fandom: Torchwood
Characters: Toshiko
Spoilers: None
Words: 189
Rating: PG
Prompt: Geeks: Torchwood, Toshiko, playing with computers as a child
She's six and allowed to play with her grandfather's new computer, just for a few minutes. But later that night she comes downstairs and turns it back on, hacking in and spending another hour exploring the technology before falling asleep with her cheek pressed to the keyboard.
She's eleven and they've just moved to Britain. (Her mother says "back" to Britain but she can't remember being born so it's just "there" to her.) Her father buys her a computer, brand new, and when she asks why he tells her, "Oh, no reason" but she knows he's just trying to make up for the move and it works. She loses herself in the keys and coding for hours at a time and it only makes it harder for her to make friends.
She's sixteen and trying to figure out what she wants to do with her life. She thinks about programming and maths and innovation, imagines inventing something new and extraordinary and having her name written down forever. Never once does she think of sonic devices and aliens and men who can't die. Never once does she think of Torchwood.
*
Title: Today
Fandom: Animorphs
Characters: Rachel; briefly Jake, Tobias, and Rachel's family
Spoilers: #53
Words: 152
Rating: PG
Prompt: Fantasy: Animorphs, any, maybe this time it will actually be over
She listens as he explains his plan and then she nods, because does she have a choice?
She says good-bye to her family, and tells them she loves them, because she doesn't say it enough, even now. She tells Tobias too, but she can't tell them where she's going and says she's just going for a walk, she'll be back soon. She wonders if she will.
She morphs and flies away and the only way she can keep herself from turning around and going back is by thinking, this is it, this is it, this is when it ends. This is the all or nothing. Today it ends, please let it end.
Because she loves the fighting and the blood but she hates the dying, over and over and over and only coming back when she turns weak and defenseless and human again even though she's not really human anymore at all.
*
Title: Playing Magic
Fandom: Merlin
Characters: Morgana, Merlin
Spoilers: None
Words: 228
Rating: PG
Prompt: Fantasy: Merlin, Morgana/Merlin, modern AU, she likes to pretend she's the real Morgan le Fay and he's the real Merlin (only they are)
The first time she hears of Camelot, she's seven.
She's shown the movie "The Sword in the Stone" and when she learns that the weird old man is called Merlin she laughs and shows it to her Merlin. He tells her in no uncertain terms that he will never be that old and wrinkly and they leave it at that.
The next time she learns of the Round Table they're ten. The teacher gives them a chapter book to read and when they meet Morgan le Fay for the first time Merlin grins and elbows her in the side. They agree that it's funny but Merlin thinks it's just a coincidence.
She doesn't let it go, though: she's a sorceress for Halloween that year and she's disappointed when Merlin turns up as a knight instead of a wizard. On the playground they play at magic whenever she can bully him into it and when they've grown out of pretend she still does it secretly, alone.
She makes up her own magic and creates rules for it, and secret words, and tries to make up a written language but she's never been good at runes.
She was seven the first time, and ten the second. It's not until they're well into their teens that it happens so that Merlin can't deny it and when it does, she only smiles.