a land I heard of
once in a lullaby
rating: g
characters: Darcy Lewis, Thor, Jane Foster
relationships: Darcy & Jane [friendship]
summary: Instead of New Mexico, they have Kansas. An Oz-ish slant AU.
author's note: Title and theme come from Somewhere over the Rainbow by Judy Garland.
dedication: Science has proven that today has been a shitty day for a lot of people. cybermathwitch and anuna_81, this one's for you.
Darcy wanders through the wreckage after the skies clear, aimlessly picking up the shattered pieces of her neighborhood and examining them before opening her fingers to let them fall back down. The shock wears off after a time, leaving her with shaking hands and a fracturing numbness that she holds onto with desperation. Breaking down, falling apart, would mean understanding that the half-standing ruin of their house was all that was left of their lives. So instead she sits down on the untouched porch steps, surrounded by the desolation and rubble, and lifts her eyes to the clouds scurrying over the horizon, leaving wreckage and the ghost of a rainbow in their wake.
“Somewhere, over the rainbow,” she hums absent-mindedly, distanced from the devastation. “Bluebirds fly. Birds fly over the rainbow, why, oh why…”
The firefighter who has been picking his way through the twisted remains pauses in front of her, dust streaked through the sweat on his face and turning his blond hair gray. There is an understanding in his eyes that is hard to look at.
“Ms. Darcy, do you want to go help Ms. Jane?”
She stares at the transforming clouds, billowing gray masses shifting to white as the sunlight changes, and opens her mouth as though to reply.
No words come out.
Christopher, known to his crew as ‘Thor’, holds out his hand. Her fingers alight on his after a moment, tentative at first before they hold on with an iron grip, and when she stands her focus has returned, for better or worse, to the here and now.
They find Jane with her hair in a splinter-laced ponytail and her tank top covered in grime, sorting determinedly through the heaps behind their house.
“We’re going to make something of this,” she tells them with pressed lips, and shoves another beam off of a pile. Beside her is a neatly sorted stack, too small for all the areas she’s already worked through, gleaming with broken circuits and salvaged wiring. On top of it sits the bedazzled photo album Darcy had made her when they were younger, wrapped in the tattered remains of a plaid shirt.
Darcy makes a soft noise in the back of her throat, letting go of Thor’s hand, and takes a breath. She steps away, choosing an undisturbed mound to focus on, and begins to tug a sheet out from the debris. Thor stays, working with them until the sun is beginning to set and it’s time to return to the emergency camp, making their way back down avenues that used to be streets.
The two women fall asleep on cots they’ve pushed together, their bundle of goods tucked underneath, because Darcy doesn’t think she’ll be able to sleep if she can’t hear the sound of Jane’s breathing. Long after her closest friend has fallen into an exhausted rest, curled up around their linked hands with her head pillowed on her arm, Darcy lies awake in the dim lighting, facing the possibility that she could have lost the only home she had - and being reassured by each sighing breath that she has not.
The tornado hadn’t taken away the one place where the clouds, literal or not, were always far behind her.
She closes her eyes sometime after midnight, and sleeps without dreaming for the first time in days.
rating: g
characters: Darcy Lewis, Thor, Jane Foster
relationships: Darcy & Jane [friendship]
summary: Instead of New Mexico, they have Kansas. An Oz-ish slant AU.
author's note: Title and theme come from Somewhere over the Rainbow by Judy Garland.
dedication: Science has proven that today has been a shitty day for a lot of people. cybermathwitch and anuna_81, this one's for you.
Darcy wanders through the wreckage after the skies clear, aimlessly picking up the shattered pieces of her neighborhood and examining them before opening her fingers to let them fall back down. The shock wears off after a time, leaving her with shaking hands and a fracturing numbness that she holds onto with desperation. Breaking down, falling apart, would mean understanding that the half-standing ruin of their house was all that was left of their lives. So instead she sits down on the untouched porch steps, surrounded by the desolation and rubble, and lifts her eyes to the clouds scurrying over the horizon, leaving wreckage and the ghost of a rainbow in their wake.
“Somewhere, over the rainbow,” she hums absent-mindedly, distanced from the devastation. “Bluebirds fly. Birds fly over the rainbow, why, oh why…”
The firefighter who has been picking his way through the twisted remains pauses in front of her, dust streaked through the sweat on his face and turning his blond hair gray. There is an understanding in his eyes that is hard to look at.
“Ms. Darcy, do you want to go help Ms. Jane?”
She stares at the transforming clouds, billowing gray masses shifting to white as the sunlight changes, and opens her mouth as though to reply.
No words come out.
Christopher, known to his crew as ‘Thor’, holds out his hand. Her fingers alight on his after a moment, tentative at first before they hold on with an iron grip, and when she stands her focus has returned, for better or worse, to the here and now.
They find Jane with her hair in a splinter-laced ponytail and her tank top covered in grime, sorting determinedly through the heaps behind their house.
“We’re going to make something of this,” she tells them with pressed lips, and shoves another beam off of a pile. Beside her is a neatly sorted stack, too small for all the areas she’s already worked through, gleaming with broken circuits and salvaged wiring. On top of it sits the bedazzled photo album Darcy had made her when they were younger, wrapped in the tattered remains of a plaid shirt.
Darcy makes a soft noise in the back of her throat, letting go of Thor’s hand, and takes a breath. She steps away, choosing an undisturbed mound to focus on, and begins to tug a sheet out from the debris. Thor stays, working with them until the sun is beginning to set and it’s time to return to the emergency camp, making their way back down avenues that used to be streets.
The two women fall asleep on cots they’ve pushed together, their bundle of goods tucked underneath, because Darcy doesn’t think she’ll be able to sleep if she can’t hear the sound of Jane’s breathing. Long after her closest friend has fallen into an exhausted rest, curled up around their linked hands with her head pillowed on her arm, Darcy lies awake in the dim lighting, facing the possibility that she could have lost the only home she had - and being reassured by each sighing breath that she has not.
The tornado hadn’t taken away the one place where the clouds, literal or not, were always far behind her.
She closes her eyes sometime after midnight, and sleeps without dreaming for the first time in days.