(Dollhouse/Firefly) A Girl's Fairytale for xover_exchange
Title: A Girl’s Fairytale
Author: midnight-malaga
Fandoms: Dollhouse/Firefly
Characters River, Simon, brief mentions of crew
Pairings: None
Rating: PG
Wordcount: 1602
Spoilers: Post BDM for Firefly, None for Dollhouse
Disclaimer: Dollhouse and Firefly belong to their respective creators.
A/N: Thanks Rachel, especially for helping me fix my terrible use of html coding. You were a big help.
Summary: River is given to the Dollhouse, and the girl named River disappears into the odd fleeting thought present in an otherwise perfect doll.
Once upon a time
There was a girl who was empty…
Flash
There was a girl who was a fighter…
Flash
A girl who was a sister…
Flash
A daughter…
Flash
A dancer… Flash Singer… Flash Saint… Flash Sinner… Flash Student… Flash Friend…
Flash.
Once upon a time, there was…
A beginning. The girl is in class with students twice her age, getting perfect grades. Her teachers love her and envy her in equal measure, because it all comes so easily love and hate, kissing cousins, close as lust and jealousy . If she just waited a few years, was a little older, maybe she wouldn’t be so hated by her peers. Maybe if she wasn’t so beautiful, so talented, so clever, they would have something to comfort themselves with when they were beaten by her. Maybe. Maybe not.
Instead, they whisper. Jealous, spiteful comments, which, as whispers always do in the dark, lightless lifeless dark with whispers flying through , make their quick and quiet way to the ears of those who most concern themselves with such things. And there it would have stopped, or at least been forgotten, were not one of the listeners the girl’s mother.
And the evil mother left them in the woods and the father turned his eyes and pretended not to see
The three important number, symbolic number, fairy godparents, wise men, wishes, Graces, furies sat before a woman who was kind, and pretty, and had chips of ice for her eyes. She smiled at the girl and took her hand with a cool one of her own and made her a girl, no longer the girl. And the couple, who were not her parents, a girl has no parents, smiled and cried crocodile tears that lied as they fell. They left, and a girl not the girl, never the girl tilted her head and walked down the stairs and tried to be her best.
She looked in the mirror, and a face not her own stared back and she asked it every day if she was beautiful, and the answer was always yes… until it wasn’t
She was the perfect doll, moldable into whatever the client required. One night a dancer, an unknown who swept across a gleaming stage and performed more beautifully than any prima ballerina ever before.
The next, a thief, slim and agile enough to fit through any vent, able to pick locks and crack safes with laughable ease.
The daughter of a couple who was childless, cosseted and fussed over and spoiled in every possible way.
A date, her first prom. Shining with joy on the arm of the man she loved didn’t know, never knew, boy she would never have smiled at before she glittered more brightly than any other.
She couldn’t guess her name, not with a thousand guesses, and alone, in the dark, she cried, because without the name she would lose that which was most important to her
The days flickered by rapidly, a girl lying in a cool blue chair in a cool blue room, men with feng le hair and cool blue gloves adjust wires and tabs and then pain, incredible pain, needles and fire and blood dripping in Rorschach blots of agonizing torture where nothing she does is true or real, all lies, beautiful lies she thinks she fell asleep. She’s told she fell asleep. Did she fall asleep?
A girl dresses and exercises and smiles and eats and sleeps because that is what a girl should do inside a girl is the girl who dances and laughs and cries and thinks and does all the things a girl shouldn’t.
An odd request came in - for a doll who fit the girl’s description but could look after herself, was intelligent and playful and who would act as a younger sister but more, more than siblings, closer than blood, closer than life and death to the client.
Then the prince came and took her hand from where she stood amongst all the women and she danced all evening in shoes made of mirrors
He called a girl River and she remembered remembered. It made her cry and laugh because now she was a real girl who stood on her own two feet underneath a yellow sun with blue eyes wide open and brown hair hanging free as a bird, free as a river.
They got on a ship. Home flying towards fighting and bullets and death no matter what direction they went. Big brother was useful, and he loved being useful. Patching wounds on the outside unable to fix wounds on the inside. Bad ruled here, not evil, backed up by Amazon queen and Alpha joker, growling watchdog protecting the loving sun and all the family-crew. Every part of her was filled to the brim, bursting over with life and joy, ice-planets and Serenity.
But she had no purpose. She was an aimless River, winding her way through the world and put to no use. She had always been put to a use, and for once it seemed her and her brother were related after all because she simply could not stand it either.
The girl learned quickly, as she always had. As though she were simply remembering something she had always known. She was just as much of a genius, as graceful and quick, but all her skills were changed and twisted, warped into the ideals of the men who changed her.
She was asleep for so long that the world had changed, as though a hundred years had passed while she was locked in her tower
Then the girl disappeared in a swirling blaze of colors and sounds, tentacles pulling at the edges of her mind and uncovering Technicolor secrets best kept hidden. She felt herself slipping under.
The girl closed her eyelids and a girl opened them. It was all the girl could do to watch as a pale leg flashed out from under a deep blue dress to catch a man in his fragile throat. Next a slim arm blocks a hit while a sharp knee is brought up hard into a groin. Everything she had learned was slipping away, leaving the sheer, visceral pleasure of adrenaline and the twin scents of flesh and blood lingering in her mouth.
Two strong arms reach around, restraining and threatening no threat! No threat! A hand reaches down and grips and the girl notes that yes, they were man parts, not that of a girl at all and twists. The heavy cloth is dropped as the threat retreats with a yelp and a foot glides out, smooth path arcing toward a curved in stomach, connecting hard and fast.
Words are shouted down from above, and the girl instantly translates them as the body of a girl topples over, landing on hard ground, limbs akimbo. That’s for chickens to laugh at .
She awakens in a cell, and she is the girl once more, but she can still feel someone else, many someone elses lurking under her skin, waiting to burst out and rend her apart in the process. She shivers, feeling the cool metal bulkhead through her thin summer dress, and closes her eyes, hoping never to wake again.
The touch of a warm hand sends her eyes shooting open, but she makes no other move as her brother’s face comes close to hers. He speaks, but the words are garbled and unclear, so she smiles pretty smiles, hiding sharp fangs and deadly poisons and tells him she doesn’t understand. No one understands. Not ever. Not her.
Something carries her forward, a secret with more power than they will ever know not her secret, shouldn’t be forced to carry it . She shows them what she means, gun in hand and heart in throat, hoping that they comprehend.
When they do, they promise to fight, carrying her standard high and screaming their defiance into the restless wind. The wind pulls away the best and brightest, to float high above the clouds, but even the dull lights shine proud in the dark places they find themselves.
Scrabbling at doors come old enemies and the girl crouches down, muscles trembling and fear infusing every part of herself. Guns shout with angry voices and she watches the bullets spin their leisurely paths to bury deep in once human flesh. The creatures fall, stumbling back under the weight of their hatred.
Pulled back by a rough hand on her dress, the girl cocks her head and looks around the quiet room. Pretty Kaylee, clinging to Simon like he was the only safe anchor in the noisy storm that her life has become. Jayne crouches by Zoe, ready to protect the fierce woman from her own desire to die. The girl understands what she must do, and smiles at her brother.
“You take care of me, Simon. You’ve always taken care of me.” Everything in River’s mind is simple, with a clarity she hasn’t had since before the Dollhouse. “My turn.”
River dives through swiftly closing blast doors and grabs the med-kit her brother needs, throwing it back to him. For the first time, she voluntarily relinquishes control, letting a nameless girl with River’s face take over and face the monsters, and for the last time, River allows herself the luxury of distraction. She smiles as her fists take up weapons and shed blood, and tells herself a story.
Once upon a time, there was a girl named River…
-END-
Author: midnight-malaga
Fandoms: Dollhouse/Firefly
Characters River, Simon, brief mentions of crew
Pairings: None
Rating: PG
Wordcount: 1602
Spoilers: Post BDM for Firefly, None for Dollhouse
Disclaimer: Dollhouse and Firefly belong to their respective creators.
A/N: Thanks Rachel, especially for helping me fix my terrible use of html coding. You were a big help.
Summary: River is given to the Dollhouse, and the girl named River disappears into the odd fleeting thought present in an otherwise perfect doll.
Once upon a time
There was a girl who was empty…
Flash
There was a girl who was a fighter…
Flash
A girl who was a sister…
Flash
A daughter…
Flash
A dancer… Flash Singer… Flash Saint… Flash Sinner… Flash Student… Flash Friend…
Flash.
Once upon a time, there was…
A beginning. The girl is in class with students twice her age, getting perfect grades. Her teachers love her and envy her in equal measure, because it all comes so easily love and hate, kissing cousins, close as lust and jealousy . If she just waited a few years, was a little older, maybe she wouldn’t be so hated by her peers. Maybe if she wasn’t so beautiful, so talented, so clever, they would have something to comfort themselves with when they were beaten by her. Maybe. Maybe not.
Instead, they whisper. Jealous, spiteful comments, which, as whispers always do in the dark, lightless lifeless dark with whispers flying through , make their quick and quiet way to the ears of those who most concern themselves with such things. And there it would have stopped, or at least been forgotten, were not one of the listeners the girl’s mother.
And the evil mother left them in the woods and the father turned his eyes and pretended not to see
The three important number, symbolic number, fairy godparents, wise men, wishes, Graces, furies sat before a woman who was kind, and pretty, and had chips of ice for her eyes. She smiled at the girl and took her hand with a cool one of her own and made her a girl, no longer the girl. And the couple, who were not her parents, a girl has no parents, smiled and cried crocodile tears that lied as they fell. They left, and a girl not the girl, never the girl tilted her head and walked down the stairs and tried to be her best.
She looked in the mirror, and a face not her own stared back and she asked it every day if she was beautiful, and the answer was always yes… until it wasn’t
She was the perfect doll, moldable into whatever the client required. One night a dancer, an unknown who swept across a gleaming stage and performed more beautifully than any prima ballerina ever before.
The next, a thief, slim and agile enough to fit through any vent, able to pick locks and crack safes with laughable ease.
The daughter of a couple who was childless, cosseted and fussed over and spoiled in every possible way.
A date, her first prom. Shining with joy on the arm of the man she loved didn’t know, never knew, boy she would never have smiled at before she glittered more brightly than any other.
She couldn’t guess her name, not with a thousand guesses, and alone, in the dark, she cried, because without the name she would lose that which was most important to her
The days flickered by rapidly, a girl lying in a cool blue chair in a cool blue room, men with feng le hair and cool blue gloves adjust wires and tabs and then pain, incredible pain, needles and fire and blood dripping in Rorschach blots of agonizing torture where nothing she does is true or real, all lies, beautiful lies she thinks she fell asleep. She’s told she fell asleep. Did she fall asleep?
A girl dresses and exercises and smiles and eats and sleeps because that is what a girl should do inside a girl is the girl who dances and laughs and cries and thinks and does all the things a girl shouldn’t.
An odd request came in - for a doll who fit the girl’s description but could look after herself, was intelligent and playful and who would act as a younger sister but more, more than siblings, closer than blood, closer than life and death to the client.
Then the prince came and took her hand from where she stood amongst all the women and she danced all evening in shoes made of mirrors
He called a girl River and she remembered remembered. It made her cry and laugh because now she was a real girl who stood on her own two feet underneath a yellow sun with blue eyes wide open and brown hair hanging free as a bird, free as a river.
They got on a ship. Home flying towards fighting and bullets and death no matter what direction they went. Big brother was useful, and he loved being useful. Patching wounds on the outside unable to fix wounds on the inside. Bad ruled here, not evil, backed up by Amazon queen and Alpha joker, growling watchdog protecting the loving sun and all the family-crew. Every part of her was filled to the brim, bursting over with life and joy, ice-planets and Serenity.
But she had no purpose. She was an aimless River, winding her way through the world and put to no use. She had always been put to a use, and for once it seemed her and her brother were related after all because she simply could not stand it either.
The girl learned quickly, as she always had. As though she were simply remembering something she had always known. She was just as much of a genius, as graceful and quick, but all her skills were changed and twisted, warped into the ideals of the men who changed her.
She was asleep for so long that the world had changed, as though a hundred years had passed while she was locked in her tower
Then the girl disappeared in a swirling blaze of colors and sounds, tentacles pulling at the edges of her mind and uncovering Technicolor secrets best kept hidden. She felt herself slipping under.
The girl closed her eyelids and a girl opened them. It was all the girl could do to watch as a pale leg flashed out from under a deep blue dress to catch a man in his fragile throat. Next a slim arm blocks a hit while a sharp knee is brought up hard into a groin. Everything she had learned was slipping away, leaving the sheer, visceral pleasure of adrenaline and the twin scents of flesh and blood lingering in her mouth.
Two strong arms reach around, restraining and threatening no threat! No threat! A hand reaches down and grips and the girl notes that yes, they were man parts, not that of a girl at all and twists. The heavy cloth is dropped as the threat retreats with a yelp and a foot glides out, smooth path arcing toward a curved in stomach, connecting hard and fast.
Words are shouted down from above, and the girl instantly translates them as the body of a girl topples over, landing on hard ground, limbs akimbo. That’s for chickens to laugh at .
She awakens in a cell, and she is the girl once more, but she can still feel someone else, many someone elses lurking under her skin, waiting to burst out and rend her apart in the process. She shivers, feeling the cool metal bulkhead through her thin summer dress, and closes her eyes, hoping never to wake again.
The touch of a warm hand sends her eyes shooting open, but she makes no other move as her brother’s face comes close to hers. He speaks, but the words are garbled and unclear, so she smiles pretty smiles, hiding sharp fangs and deadly poisons and tells him she doesn’t understand. No one understands. Not ever. Not her.
Something carries her forward, a secret with more power than they will ever know not her secret, shouldn’t be forced to carry it . She shows them what she means, gun in hand and heart in throat, hoping that they comprehend.
When they do, they promise to fight, carrying her standard high and screaming their defiance into the restless wind. The wind pulls away the best and brightest, to float high above the clouds, but even the dull lights shine proud in the dark places they find themselves.
Scrabbling at doors come old enemies and the girl crouches down, muscles trembling and fear infusing every part of herself. Guns shout with angry voices and she watches the bullets spin their leisurely paths to bury deep in once human flesh. The creatures fall, stumbling back under the weight of their hatred.
Pulled back by a rough hand on her dress, the girl cocks her head and looks around the quiet room. Pretty Kaylee, clinging to Simon like he was the only safe anchor in the noisy storm that her life has become. Jayne crouches by Zoe, ready to protect the fierce woman from her own desire to die. The girl understands what she must do, and smiles at her brother.
“You take care of me, Simon. You’ve always taken care of me.” Everything in River’s mind is simple, with a clarity she hasn’t had since before the Dollhouse. “My turn.”
River dives through swiftly closing blast doors and grabs the med-kit her brother needs, throwing it back to him. For the first time, she voluntarily relinquishes control, letting a nameless girl with River’s face take over and face the monsters, and for the last time, River allows herself the luxury of distraction. She smiles as her fists take up weapons and shed blood, and tells herself a story.
Once upon a time, there was a girl named River…
-END-