an angstioplasty, if you will
I've been working on the title meme this evening, and homg I swear, every single story I write is running through Angstcity, USA, and poor scrunchy has been forced to read all of them. For that is her lot in life, and her burden to bear.
scrunchy: Awwwwwwww!!!
scrunchy: ANGSTY STORIES, SLODWICK
me: IT HAS BEEN LOGJAMMED IN MY HEART I GUESS?
me: This is why I shouldn't wait so long between stories.
scrunchy: This meme has been like an angioplasty.
scrunchy: Opening up your angsty ... valves.
So, yes. Here are the stories I completed this evening. I hope you like them?
For cosmic:
Other Lies Told
It occurred to him, standing at at the edge of an island, in the middle of a vast ocean, on a planet populated solely by a sort of giant, monocular fish, as the midday suns shone brightly down on the TARDIS and Martha lazed on a blanket spread on the sand, ten or a dozen thousand years into her future--it occurred to him that by now, Rose would have lived her whole life; she'd probably married Mickey and had herself a brood of miniature Mickeys, and then slowly grown old, her blonde hair fading to silver and thinning like cobwebs or spun sugar; and finally, she'd have died. Standing there with the steady pulse of the surf and the sunlight so warm and intense it was like experiencing a whole summer in the Caribbean at once, only without the tan or cancer risk, The Doctor found his eyes stinging with tears.
Martha didn't ask any questions when he announced they were leaving, instead just looking at him, staring long and square in his eyes until he nearly looked away, and then she simply gathered up the blanket and her things and walked back to the TARDIS. He followed, with his hands in his pockets and sand in his shoes. She didn't ask questions anymore, he knew, because she never liked hearing lies.
***
~223 words, Doctor Who, minor spoilers for current series
For dolimir_k:
Dead Again
As John emerged from the event horizon, he knew, with the sort of absolute conviction that one has in dreams, and apparently, in death, that this was both Atlantis and not Atlantis. It was dark outside the stained-glass windows, and the patterns in the glass were all wrong. The soft amber glow of the liquid-like surface of the gate was the only light in the room, but he could make out a woman at the top of the stairs.
"Hello," he said, smiling casually.
"You again? So soon?" Her voice echoed a little in the emptiness, and he could hear her smile. John knew her right away; he hadn't seen her face before, with that damn bug hanging from his neck, but the voice was unmistakeable. "I wasn't expecting you for quite some time."
He climbed the stairs slowly, taking her in. She was tall, with short dark hair and pale, pale skin; her features were angular and severe, but she was smiling. Her dress was long, golden, and it shimmered in the light of the gate. She stood out like a candleflame in the shadows.
He spread his hands and shrugged. "What can I say? I guess I just wanted to put a face with the name."
The change was immediate and shocking. Her smile melted away, and it seemed suddenly as though she was much larger, impossibly large, taking up all the space in the room. John froze, a moment of frantic disconnect gripping his brain as she appeared to be two things at once, both the tragic beauty and something hulking and dark and sinister.
"You think you know my name, John Ellis Sheppard?" Her voice had changed, too, like two voices, broadcasting on overlapping frequencies. It was horrible. "I am called always and forever. I am called the end of all things. I can see your whole life; I can see you, through you, into you."
She stepped closer, and John felt the cold hit him like a blow, knocking him back. Her eyes were shining and insane. "I am Death, John Sheppard, and you are not supposed to be here."
***
~362 words, Stargate Atlantis
For sameoldhope:
It Never Hurts to be Damned (And It Might Help)
Sylar woke up in the silence, convinced he heard the fading echo of something.
He ran his hands over his face, panting, willing his pulse to normal. The hotel room was dark; a sliver of light was visible through the curtains that wouldn't quite close. He'd fallen asleep on the top of the itchy bedspread, still wearing his shoes and his jacket and his jeans. The air conditioner rattled and blew next to the bed, but the air was stagnant and oppressive.
He hefted himself up and maneuvered around the bed to the bathroom. The light was bright, and he blinked as his eyes adjusted. It was a small room lined in tiles that might once have been white, but were now slightly yellow and fragile. A crack ran up the wall beside the door, floor to ceiling, with smaller cracks branching out from it like veins.
Sylar pissed into the stained toilet for a long time, then flushed and moved to the sink. The pipes clanged and water sputtered out in a random bursts, and as he rubbed his hands under the stream, he looked up at his reflection in the mirror. And he froze.
The face staring back at him was not his own.
It was the kid from Texas, the one who had tackled him. The dark hair and big eyes. Thin and wiry in a way Sylar was not. He raised his hand to his face, and watched the kid touch his own face. He could feel stubble he couldn't see; he could see a scar he couldn't feel. It was fascinating, in a profoundly disturbing way.
The kid pulled at his lips with his fingers, just as Sylar did, both of them spreading their mouths open. From somewhere down deep, Sylar heard the groan start; it unfurled out of him, growing louder and harsher and more panicked as it continued, broadcast from his open mouth. His fingers dug into his cheeks painfully.
He could taste blood in his mouth.
The groan went on and on, slowly graduating in pitch until it sounded inhuman, like microphone feedback, with no end in sight. The mirror cracked, and suddenly there were two kids staring back at him, matching mouths screaming in stereo. He dragged his hands away from his face, and gripped onto the sink, his fingers white with strain. The porcelain cracked, a dozen tiny veins spreading under his hands.
Sylar couldn't stop himself, knew he couldn't, and the sound of the scream was painful now; in the back of his mind, part of his mind wondered if this was what would finally kill him. In a flash of brilliance, he tilted his body back and then threw himself forward. The kid matched his moves, and when their foreheads connected with the mirror, for a moment, they were as one.
The mirror shattered when he hit, crushed inwards in a beautiful circular pattern, and shards of broken glass dug into his face. His knees buckled under him, but he managed to stay upright, leaning heavily on the sink and panting. He looked at the mangled mirror and he smiled weakly; a hundred tiny kids smiled back, faces torn and streaked with blood. Then they all licked their lips.
Peter woke up in the silence, convinced he heard the fading echo of something.
He could taste blood in his mouth.
***
~576 words, Heroes, disturbing content
For musesfool:
leave our tracks untraceable
Jack slowed as he crested hill. Then he stopped the car completely and turned off the ignition. Then he sat for a while, staring through the windshield.
Eureka was gone.
The houses and the street signs and the absurdly intellectual statuary, gone. The police station and Café Diem and Henry's, gone. All of it gone, as though a giant hand had come down from the sky and erased everything and everyone. Like it had never been there at all. What had been a town two days ago was now a rolling green pasture. There were even wildflowers.
He got out of the car and started walking on the double-yellow, right down the middle of the road. It was a nothing but a pastoral valley now, the sort of place you'd remark on as you drove through without stopping. Wow, this sure is pretty out here, isn't it? Birds sang in the distance, where the forest began again on the far side. There was nothing at all to betray the town that had been there once.
Jack wasn't sure what he expected. He walked the road for a mile, then turned and walked it back, sort of half-heartedly hoping he'd find it was another mirage, meant to keep people from seeing the town, like a form of lock-down or something. When he got back to his car, he turned and walked the road again, at the very far edge this time. He reached his hands out, skimming over the impossibly tall grass that grew along the watery ditch.
He pulled out his cell phone and tried dialing every number he had stored. Allison and Henry and Jo, Vincent and Fargo, even Nathan and Taggart. All he got was a voice that sounded mysteriously like SARA telling him the number was not assigned, and asking him to dial more carefully in the future. Then the signal died.
Everything was just... gone. He stood in front of his car as the sun sank lower in the sky, his hands folded behind his head, his brow furrowed. If someone had taken a picture of him at that moment, they could print that photo next to "confounded" in the dictionary.
Eventually, when the sky was fading from indigo to plum to black, and the crickets started to sing, he got back in the car. A quick three-point turn and he was driving back the way he'd come, back towards the interstate that would eventually lead him back to his ex-wife's house, as the place that had he had come to call home grew smaller and smaller in his rear-view mirror.
***
~442 words, Eureka
For chicklet73:
You and Me of the 10,000 Wars
The last day of Atlantis' life, Teyla walked the blistered hallways in silence. She let her fingers drift over the surface of the peeling walls. Large pieces of black paint cracked off the wall and fell to the floor, like withered leaves in autumn. She did not look back.
Through the mess halll, where tables no longer were. Through Elizabeth's office--and she would always think of it that way--where the roof had caved in, and a long green vine now wound down through empty window frames. The walls were crumbling in the jumper bay, letting sunshine and salty ocean air into the dark, dusty corners.
Her friends had all died so very long ago, and the city was a ruin. Teyla knew it was time, progress must be made, life goes on. They would all have wanted her to let them go.
She stood in the gateroom, near the broken ring. Ten thousand years under the ocean, it had been safe (as a tomb), but just eight hundred years on this bright little planet had worn Atlantis down, sapped her strength. Teyla would have shared her own, if she could.
The Rhiadens thought it was an eyesore, but Teyla had known Atlantis in her prime. She knew the elegance of those glittering spires reflected in the ocean; she'd seen the blues and greens and golds before they'd faded or been burned away. Teyla--who still looked the same, felt the same as she had the day she'd first set foot on Atlantis--she remembered. But a different wisdom shone in her eyes now, and there were finally streaks of white appearing in her hair.
She said a short prayer, a blessing and a goodbye, then returned to her ship outside. As the last of them, it fell to her she to witness the death of Atlantis, and in a strange way, it gave her hope for herself.
***
~320 words, Stargate Atlantis
scrunchy: Awwwwwwww!!!
scrunchy: ANGSTY STORIES, SLODWICK
me: IT HAS BEEN LOGJAMMED IN MY HEART I GUESS?
me: This is why I shouldn't wait so long between stories.
scrunchy: This meme has been like an angioplasty.
scrunchy: Opening up your angsty ... valves.
So, yes. Here are the stories I completed this evening. I hope you like them?
For cosmic:
Other Lies Told
It occurred to him, standing at at the edge of an island, in the middle of a vast ocean, on a planet populated solely by a sort of giant, monocular fish, as the midday suns shone brightly down on the TARDIS and Martha lazed on a blanket spread on the sand, ten or a dozen thousand years into her future--it occurred to him that by now, Rose would have lived her whole life; she'd probably married Mickey and had herself a brood of miniature Mickeys, and then slowly grown old, her blonde hair fading to silver and thinning like cobwebs or spun sugar; and finally, she'd have died. Standing there with the steady pulse of the surf and the sunlight so warm and intense it was like experiencing a whole summer in the Caribbean at once, only without the tan or cancer risk, The Doctor found his eyes stinging with tears.
Martha didn't ask any questions when he announced they were leaving, instead just looking at him, staring long and square in his eyes until he nearly looked away, and then she simply gathered up the blanket and her things and walked back to the TARDIS. He followed, with his hands in his pockets and sand in his shoes. She didn't ask questions anymore, he knew, because she never liked hearing lies.
***
~223 words, Doctor Who, minor spoilers for current series
For dolimir_k:
Dead Again
As John emerged from the event horizon, he knew, with the sort of absolute conviction that one has in dreams, and apparently, in death, that this was both Atlantis and not Atlantis. It was dark outside the stained-glass windows, and the patterns in the glass were all wrong. The soft amber glow of the liquid-like surface of the gate was the only light in the room, but he could make out a woman at the top of the stairs.
"Hello," he said, smiling casually.
"You again? So soon?" Her voice echoed a little in the emptiness, and he could hear her smile. John knew her right away; he hadn't seen her face before, with that damn bug hanging from his neck, but the voice was unmistakeable. "I wasn't expecting you for quite some time."
He climbed the stairs slowly, taking her in. She was tall, with short dark hair and pale, pale skin; her features were angular and severe, but she was smiling. Her dress was long, golden, and it shimmered in the light of the gate. She stood out like a candleflame in the shadows.
He spread his hands and shrugged. "What can I say? I guess I just wanted to put a face with the name."
The change was immediate and shocking. Her smile melted away, and it seemed suddenly as though she was much larger, impossibly large, taking up all the space in the room. John froze, a moment of frantic disconnect gripping his brain as she appeared to be two things at once, both the tragic beauty and something hulking and dark and sinister.
"You think you know my name, John Ellis Sheppard?" Her voice had changed, too, like two voices, broadcasting on overlapping frequencies. It was horrible. "I am called always and forever. I am called the end of all things. I can see your whole life; I can see you, through you, into you."
She stepped closer, and John felt the cold hit him like a blow, knocking him back. Her eyes were shining and insane. "I am Death, John Sheppard, and you are not supposed to be here."
***
~362 words, Stargate Atlantis
For sameoldhope:
It Never Hurts to be Damned (And It Might Help)
Sylar woke up in the silence, convinced he heard the fading echo of something.
He ran his hands over his face, panting, willing his pulse to normal. The hotel room was dark; a sliver of light was visible through the curtains that wouldn't quite close. He'd fallen asleep on the top of the itchy bedspread, still wearing his shoes and his jacket and his jeans. The air conditioner rattled and blew next to the bed, but the air was stagnant and oppressive.
He hefted himself up and maneuvered around the bed to the bathroom. The light was bright, and he blinked as his eyes adjusted. It was a small room lined in tiles that might once have been white, but were now slightly yellow and fragile. A crack ran up the wall beside the door, floor to ceiling, with smaller cracks branching out from it like veins.
Sylar pissed into the stained toilet for a long time, then flushed and moved to the sink. The pipes clanged and water sputtered out in a random bursts, and as he rubbed his hands under the stream, he looked up at his reflection in the mirror. And he froze.
The face staring back at him was not his own.
It was the kid from Texas, the one who had tackled him. The dark hair and big eyes. Thin and wiry in a way Sylar was not. He raised his hand to his face, and watched the kid touch his own face. He could feel stubble he couldn't see; he could see a scar he couldn't feel. It was fascinating, in a profoundly disturbing way.
The kid pulled at his lips with his fingers, just as Sylar did, both of them spreading their mouths open. From somewhere down deep, Sylar heard the groan start; it unfurled out of him, growing louder and harsher and more panicked as it continued, broadcast from his open mouth. His fingers dug into his cheeks painfully.
He could taste blood in his mouth.
The groan went on and on, slowly graduating in pitch until it sounded inhuman, like microphone feedback, with no end in sight. The mirror cracked, and suddenly there were two kids staring back at him, matching mouths screaming in stereo. He dragged his hands away from his face, and gripped onto the sink, his fingers white with strain. The porcelain cracked, a dozen tiny veins spreading under his hands.
Sylar couldn't stop himself, knew he couldn't, and the sound of the scream was painful now; in the back of his mind, part of his mind wondered if this was what would finally kill him. In a flash of brilliance, he tilted his body back and then threw himself forward. The kid matched his moves, and when their foreheads connected with the mirror, for a moment, they were as one.
The mirror shattered when he hit, crushed inwards in a beautiful circular pattern, and shards of broken glass dug into his face. His knees buckled under him, but he managed to stay upright, leaning heavily on the sink and panting. He looked at the mangled mirror and he smiled weakly; a hundred tiny kids smiled back, faces torn and streaked with blood. Then they all licked their lips.
Peter woke up in the silence, convinced he heard the fading echo of something.
He could taste blood in his mouth.
***
~576 words, Heroes, disturbing content
For musesfool:
leave our tracks untraceable
Jack slowed as he crested hill. Then he stopped the car completely and turned off the ignition. Then he sat for a while, staring through the windshield.
Eureka was gone.
The houses and the street signs and the absurdly intellectual statuary, gone. The police station and Café Diem and Henry's, gone. All of it gone, as though a giant hand had come down from the sky and erased everything and everyone. Like it had never been there at all. What had been a town two days ago was now a rolling green pasture. There were even wildflowers.
He got out of the car and started walking on the double-yellow, right down the middle of the road. It was a nothing but a pastoral valley now, the sort of place you'd remark on as you drove through without stopping. Wow, this sure is pretty out here, isn't it? Birds sang in the distance, where the forest began again on the far side. There was nothing at all to betray the town that had been there once.
Jack wasn't sure what he expected. He walked the road for a mile, then turned and walked it back, sort of half-heartedly hoping he'd find it was another mirage, meant to keep people from seeing the town, like a form of lock-down or something. When he got back to his car, he turned and walked the road again, at the very far edge this time. He reached his hands out, skimming over the impossibly tall grass that grew along the watery ditch.
He pulled out his cell phone and tried dialing every number he had stored. Allison and Henry and Jo, Vincent and Fargo, even Nathan and Taggart. All he got was a voice that sounded mysteriously like SARA telling him the number was not assigned, and asking him to dial more carefully in the future. Then the signal died.
Everything was just... gone. He stood in front of his car as the sun sank lower in the sky, his hands folded behind his head, his brow furrowed. If someone had taken a picture of him at that moment, they could print that photo next to "confounded" in the dictionary.
Eventually, when the sky was fading from indigo to plum to black, and the crickets started to sing, he got back in the car. A quick three-point turn and he was driving back the way he'd come, back towards the interstate that would eventually lead him back to his ex-wife's house, as the place that had he had come to call home grew smaller and smaller in his rear-view mirror.
***
~442 words, Eureka
For chicklet73:
You and Me of the 10,000 Wars
The last day of Atlantis' life, Teyla walked the blistered hallways in silence. She let her fingers drift over the surface of the peeling walls. Large pieces of black paint cracked off the wall and fell to the floor, like withered leaves in autumn. She did not look back.
Through the mess halll, where tables no longer were. Through Elizabeth's office--and she would always think of it that way--where the roof had caved in, and a long green vine now wound down through empty window frames. The walls were crumbling in the jumper bay, letting sunshine and salty ocean air into the dark, dusty corners.
Her friends had all died so very long ago, and the city was a ruin. Teyla knew it was time, progress must be made, life goes on. They would all have wanted her to let them go.
She stood in the gateroom, near the broken ring. Ten thousand years under the ocean, it had been safe (as a tomb), but just eight hundred years on this bright little planet had worn Atlantis down, sapped her strength. Teyla would have shared her own, if she could.
The Rhiadens thought it was an eyesore, but Teyla had known Atlantis in her prime. She knew the elegance of those glittering spires reflected in the ocean; she'd seen the blues and greens and golds before they'd faded or been burned away. Teyla--who still looked the same, felt the same as she had the day she'd first set foot on Atlantis--she remembered. But a different wisdom shone in her eyes now, and there were finally streaks of white appearing in her hair.
She said a short prayer, a blessing and a goodbye, then returned to her ship outside. As the last of them, it fell to her she to witness the death of Atlantis, and in a strange way, it gave her hope for herself.
***
~320 words, Stargate Atlantis