Fanfic: Two broken Christmas stories for Slipstreamborne
#1
Series: Watchmen
Characters: Joey, mention of old!Bernie
Pairings: -
Rating: PG13 (language!)
Summary: Joey doesn't really like December. (The plot is supposed to lead her to giving hobo Wanda a cab ride, which in turn leads to hesitant friendship, and ends with Christmas eve or night spent in the cab together.)
~
“It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas,
“Everywhere you go;
Take a look in the five and ten-”
Hardly December, and the radio has been blasting this Christmas crap non-stop. There doesn't seem to be a single station that's free from this chipper holiday tyranny.
For unexplained reasons, Joey can't stand Christmas music. Maybe it's because she's heard it all so many times. They never come up with anything new; just the traditional junk that drills itself into people's heads, generation after generation. Or maybe it's because Christmas has always been kind of lonely for Joey, and the songs make her realize that whether it's this year or the next, she's not going to have a very happy holiday.
It's not that she's got nobody to spend it with, mind. But she's a cab driver, and a lotta people gotta get to a lotta places during the holidays. Lonely men need to go to bars. Single mothers need to haul their kids to the grandparent's place. One-night-standers need to get to their hotels. Joey would spend Christmas at home if she could, with her girlfriend, but rent is due and she can't afford to take a day off.
Despite herself, Joey begins singing along to the songs on the radio. Even to the ones she hates. She can't help it, really. They've been being drilled into the heads of children for generations, and dammit, they're catchy.
“...Joyful, all ye nations riiiiise, join the triumph of the skiiies~ Shiit I really hate this song, man I'm really glad I wore this thoooong. Hahaha!”
The impromptu mutilation of the song's lyrics is a little more hilarious to her than it should be. Clearly it's time for a break.
She's on the right side of town, so after stopping for a coffee Joey walks down the block to the news vendor. Like usual, the old guy who sells the paper is yammering about the headlines at anyone who's pausing long enough to make a purchase. No one's really listening to him, of course, but he talks anyway. Joey likes him. He makes her think of the endearingly obnoxious uncle at family gatherings, or the grandpa who constantly pulls coins out the the kid's ears, despite the fact that they all know it's a bullshit trick. In an unspoken way, Joey's adopted him. His stand is the only one she shops at, if she can help it.
-------
#2
Series: Watchmen
Characters: Nite Owl, Rorschach
Pairings: ???, profit.
Rating: PG13 (nightmares!)
Summary: Dan has some metaphoric nightmares, and Rorschach lives them. (The idea behind this one was to lead up to some hurt!Ror, which would obviously end with Christmasy comfort!Dan. I stopped writing this one because it was getting a little too grim to be a practical Christmas gift. D: )
~
It's snowing outside, and the flakes are all a dingy grey as they fall.
There's only a week left before Christmas, and the city is plastered with commercial holiday cheer. There are lights in the trees, glitter mixing with the dirty slush in the streets, songs about Rudolph and his exploits drifting from every shop door. People pass each other in the streets, they smile and wish one another a Merry Christmas, and are wished Happy Holidays in return. None of them smile with their eyes. Red, white, green, tacky sweaters, embroidered snowflakes, nativity scene in the park. All of it blinking and flashing and singing. Promises of yet another beautiful, familial winter, heaps of presents, hot cocoa.
Christmas is only skin-deep in New York.
Down the street there is a Santa ringing a hand bell. The sound of it jangles in an offensive clash against the drifting Christmas music. His red suit is too small, and fraying, dirty. Once-white hems are matted and falling off at the seams, while the rest of the suit is threadbare and patched in mismatched shades of red, maroon, magenta. The Santa is balding beneath his hat, and his beard is short, stubbly, the color of mop water. He rings his bell and smells like last night's liquor and cigarettes. No one drops money in his battered green bucket.
Pre-Christmas is probably the hardest time of the year for vigilantes. Crimes seem to escalate to a relentless constant. Prostitutes offer holiday company to the lonesome. The depressed wealth snort snowy power through their candy-striped straws and sit back as the addictive cheer eats holes into their brains. Desperate men with too many children and too little money go on midnight shopping sprees, and pay with shattered windows, crowbars, bullets in shop owners. Mobsters dole out 'Christmas bonuses' in the way of cement shoes and ghastly neckties. Like dominoes falling against each other in an ever-widening pattern, each day closer to Christmas brings more crime than the one before it. One man goes to prison, two more drop out the the crisp winter blue and start shooting.
Archimedes hovers indifferently above all of this; a small, machine-thrumming world that's set apart from the plastic facade the city has put on. Up here, there are no sirens to be heard, no Santas to offend the senses, and Rudolph's nose does not glow bright. Up here it's just the hum of the ship, the comfortable warm, and the grey snow drifting quietly down to the cityscape. Tired as he is, Nite Owl can almost convince himself that the scenery is beautiful. Beautiful, perhaps, the same way an apple rotting from the inside might still appear delicious. But take a bite, and it's just a mouthful of worms and fermented juices, and a taste that lingers on the tongue, in the nose, sickly sweet. It's only pretty on the surface.
Beauty is only skin-deep, Nite Owl thinks sleepily to himself, thoughts trailing slowly away from coherency. The city's skin is just lying to us, tricking us into loving something horrible. Sometimes we even believe her. Sometimes we're all fooled by her pretty face, from far enough away.
He nods to himself, pleased with the perfect sense it all makes. What a bitch New York can be. What a lying, pretty bitch.
Nite Owl's chin drops to his chest as Archie lulls him to sleep. It's been a hard couple of days. He'll only close his eyes for a moment.
-
She's glamorous and blonde and tall. It must be night out, because her smile makes everything seem dazzlingly brighter. Her teeth are white and straight, her lips are ruby red, slick and full and heart-shaped. It's cold here, snowing, but Dan is almost certain that the woman has nothing on beneath her thigh-length coat.
The blonde sticks out a hip, runs a hand through her movie-star hair. She's smiling right at him. Dan can't help but smile back.
“Hey,” she says, flirtatious. She moves towards him with silky grace and swaying hips. Dan can smell her perfume, like flowers and candy. He smells something else too; There's a faint miasma of garbage and rot. He can't tell where it's coming from, and he tries to ignore it.
The blonde puts her hands on his shoulders and smiles at him with bedroom eyes. “Don't you wanna open your Christmas present?” she asks, sultry. She has gold ribbon tied around her waist, big bow in front. It's the only thing keeping her coat closed. Dan swallows hard and touches the knot-
“Whore.”
The word is a harsh grating behind Dan, and dark ink pools past him to swarm over the pretty blonde. Dan thinks he sees shapes in the blackness that overcomes her. A vengeful spirit, a black dog with rabies, a violent, faceless man.
The man jerks an arm out, thrusts some makeshift weapon- a pen? A spoon?- into the blonde's midriff. Something makes a wet popping sound, and a dark spot forms on the woman's coat. Suddenly she's bleeding needles, gutter slime, rat corpses. There's that rotten smell again, stronger now, and this time her perfume just isn't heavy enough. The stink hits Dan like a punch to the gut. He tries hard not to vomit, but God, he can taste it in the back of his throat. She's rotten inside, all worms and fermentation and sickness.
The man steps back and peels off a sodden, reeking glove, looks at Dan with an expression that shifts fluidly between disdain and sad understanding. “Daniel.” he says, “She eats people. Eats them alive. They die alone in the filth of her bowels.” His face shifts into an unreadable symmetry then, and Dan gets the impression of a door slamming shut. The man's voice is final. “You deserve more than she's offering.”
Behind him the blonde is opening her mouth, wide as it can possibly go. Wider. Something dark and thick is oozing down her chin, dripping to her chest and into her cleavage. She gurgles for a moment, tongue working in the cavern of her mouth, and finally she spits, “You bastard. It's Christmas, you bastard!”
She lurches forward, wrapping her mouth around the man's face. His expression shifts like liquid from shock to disgust to fear to hate. His hands go up, but it's too late, too late. And Dan is watching with detached horror, like it's a bad movie, and the last thing he thinks is, 'He was right. She eats them alive. He was right.'
The blonde swallows and licks her lips with satisfaction. Her belly is flat beneath her stained coat, and the man is gone. Only the stink and the pretty smile remain.
-
Nite Owl jerks awake, drawing a sharp breath as his head snaps up. His heart is racing and for a moment he's lost, looking wildly around and trying to figure out where the hell he is. Archie thrums soothingly at him, and familiarity eventually seeps it's way back in. He's above the city, he's in the owlship, of course, of course. Nite Owl pulls off his goggles, pushes the cowl from his face. He feels deeply unsettled, down in the pit of his stomach, can't place exactly why. Something feels foul and wrong.
Outside, it's still snowing.
-
People are smiling, he writes. The paper is damp and dirty from the falling snow. Laughing, singing. They spend their money, they buy their plastic happiness. It's all just a cheap, empty shell with a pretty bow. The city dresses up, pretends it's young and good, tells everyone a story with a happy ending, sends them to bed with a sugar smile. No one seems to realize that in six days it's all back to normal. The pretty bows are gone, and the city's still just a whore that beats her children.
He pauses in his writing to pull up the collar of his trench coat, to shield himself a fraction more from the bitter wind. His mask is pushed up over the bridge of his nose, -he knows no one will see him here- and he gnaws at the end of his pencil before continuing.
I know her. I know the game she plays. These people are so ready to fall in line, but I will not be distracted by the empty, winter stories of a clean and peaceful world. Peace does not come in ribbons and wrapping.
Rorschach looks over the words he's written without really reading them. There was something more he meant to write, but it's eluding him now, lost under a train of grim metaphoric ranting. Staring at the pages isn't helping, so he closes the journal, tucking it and the pencil back into his pocket.
When he stands his body is stiff, muscles complaining of the cold, of crouching too long against unforgiving brick. He grimaces and pulls the mask down over his chin. The aches and chill retreat to a distant place.
The city has not rested during his break. He needs to make up for lost time.
Out on the street the shoddy Santa's bell is jangling slower, with a kind of tired hopelessness. People walk past and avoid looking at him, trying to pretend there's no guilt when they fail to drop a quarter, drop a dime, into his bucket. Rorschach looks down on the scene with a grim satisfaction.
There's the reality, he thinks. A piece of grime picked out of the glitter. Rotting wall beneath fresh paint.
He leaves the rooftop via the fire escape, dropping down into a cheerless alley. He lets himself get swallowed in its shadows, and it gives him all its secrets.
The night is still very young, and the city never sleeps.
Series: Watchmen
Characters: Joey, mention of old!Bernie
Pairings: -
Rating: PG13 (language!)
Summary: Joey doesn't really like December. (The plot is supposed to lead her to giving hobo Wanda a cab ride, which in turn leads to hesitant friendship, and ends with Christmas eve or night spent in the cab together.)
~
“It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas,
“Everywhere you go;
Take a look in the five and ten-”
Hardly December, and the radio has been blasting this Christmas crap non-stop. There doesn't seem to be a single station that's free from this chipper holiday tyranny.
For unexplained reasons, Joey can't stand Christmas music. Maybe it's because she's heard it all so many times. They never come up with anything new; just the traditional junk that drills itself into people's heads, generation after generation. Or maybe it's because Christmas has always been kind of lonely for Joey, and the songs make her realize that whether it's this year or the next, she's not going to have a very happy holiday.
It's not that she's got nobody to spend it with, mind. But she's a cab driver, and a lotta people gotta get to a lotta places during the holidays. Lonely men need to go to bars. Single mothers need to haul their kids to the grandparent's place. One-night-standers need to get to their hotels. Joey would spend Christmas at home if she could, with her girlfriend, but rent is due and she can't afford to take a day off.
Despite herself, Joey begins singing along to the songs on the radio. Even to the ones she hates. She can't help it, really. They've been being drilled into the heads of children for generations, and dammit, they're catchy.
“...Joyful, all ye nations riiiiise, join the triumph of the skiiies~ Shiit I really hate this song, man I'm really glad I wore this thoooong. Hahaha!”
The impromptu mutilation of the song's lyrics is a little more hilarious to her than it should be. Clearly it's time for a break.
She's on the right side of town, so after stopping for a coffee Joey walks down the block to the news vendor. Like usual, the old guy who sells the paper is yammering about the headlines at anyone who's pausing long enough to make a purchase. No one's really listening to him, of course, but he talks anyway. Joey likes him. He makes her think of the endearingly obnoxious uncle at family gatherings, or the grandpa who constantly pulls coins out the the kid's ears, despite the fact that they all know it's a bullshit trick. In an unspoken way, Joey's adopted him. His stand is the only one she shops at, if she can help it.
-------
#2
Series: Watchmen
Characters: Nite Owl, Rorschach
Pairings: ???, profit.
Rating: PG13 (nightmares!)
Summary: Dan has some metaphoric nightmares, and Rorschach lives them. (The idea behind this one was to lead up to some hurt!Ror, which would obviously end with Christmasy comfort!Dan. I stopped writing this one because it was getting a little too grim to be a practical Christmas gift. D: )
~
It's snowing outside, and the flakes are all a dingy grey as they fall.
There's only a week left before Christmas, and the city is plastered with commercial holiday cheer. There are lights in the trees, glitter mixing with the dirty slush in the streets, songs about Rudolph and his exploits drifting from every shop door. People pass each other in the streets, they smile and wish one another a Merry Christmas, and are wished Happy Holidays in return. None of them smile with their eyes. Red, white, green, tacky sweaters, embroidered snowflakes, nativity scene in the park. All of it blinking and flashing and singing. Promises of yet another beautiful, familial winter, heaps of presents, hot cocoa.
Christmas is only skin-deep in New York.
Down the street there is a Santa ringing a hand bell. The sound of it jangles in an offensive clash against the drifting Christmas music. His red suit is too small, and fraying, dirty. Once-white hems are matted and falling off at the seams, while the rest of the suit is threadbare and patched in mismatched shades of red, maroon, magenta. The Santa is balding beneath his hat, and his beard is short, stubbly, the color of mop water. He rings his bell and smells like last night's liquor and cigarettes. No one drops money in his battered green bucket.
Pre-Christmas is probably the hardest time of the year for vigilantes. Crimes seem to escalate to a relentless constant. Prostitutes offer holiday company to the lonesome. The depressed wealth snort snowy power through their candy-striped straws and sit back as the addictive cheer eats holes into their brains. Desperate men with too many children and too little money go on midnight shopping sprees, and pay with shattered windows, crowbars, bullets in shop owners. Mobsters dole out 'Christmas bonuses' in the way of cement shoes and ghastly neckties. Like dominoes falling against each other in an ever-widening pattern, each day closer to Christmas brings more crime than the one before it. One man goes to prison, two more drop out the the crisp winter blue and start shooting.
Archimedes hovers indifferently above all of this; a small, machine-thrumming world that's set apart from the plastic facade the city has put on. Up here, there are no sirens to be heard, no Santas to offend the senses, and Rudolph's nose does not glow bright. Up here it's just the hum of the ship, the comfortable warm, and the grey snow drifting quietly down to the cityscape. Tired as he is, Nite Owl can almost convince himself that the scenery is beautiful. Beautiful, perhaps, the same way an apple rotting from the inside might still appear delicious. But take a bite, and it's just a mouthful of worms and fermented juices, and a taste that lingers on the tongue, in the nose, sickly sweet. It's only pretty on the surface.
Beauty is only skin-deep, Nite Owl thinks sleepily to himself, thoughts trailing slowly away from coherency. The city's skin is just lying to us, tricking us into loving something horrible. Sometimes we even believe her. Sometimes we're all fooled by her pretty face, from far enough away.
He nods to himself, pleased with the perfect sense it all makes. What a bitch New York can be. What a lying, pretty bitch.
Nite Owl's chin drops to his chest as Archie lulls him to sleep. It's been a hard couple of days. He'll only close his eyes for a moment.
-
She's glamorous and blonde and tall. It must be night out, because her smile makes everything seem dazzlingly brighter. Her teeth are white and straight, her lips are ruby red, slick and full and heart-shaped. It's cold here, snowing, but Dan is almost certain that the woman has nothing on beneath her thigh-length coat.
The blonde sticks out a hip, runs a hand through her movie-star hair. She's smiling right at him. Dan can't help but smile back.
“Hey,” she says, flirtatious. She moves towards him with silky grace and swaying hips. Dan can smell her perfume, like flowers and candy. He smells something else too; There's a faint miasma of garbage and rot. He can't tell where it's coming from, and he tries to ignore it.
The blonde puts her hands on his shoulders and smiles at him with bedroom eyes. “Don't you wanna open your Christmas present?” she asks, sultry. She has gold ribbon tied around her waist, big bow in front. It's the only thing keeping her coat closed. Dan swallows hard and touches the knot-
“Whore.”
The word is a harsh grating behind Dan, and dark ink pools past him to swarm over the pretty blonde. Dan thinks he sees shapes in the blackness that overcomes her. A vengeful spirit, a black dog with rabies, a violent, faceless man.
The man jerks an arm out, thrusts some makeshift weapon- a pen? A spoon?- into the blonde's midriff. Something makes a wet popping sound, and a dark spot forms on the woman's coat. Suddenly she's bleeding needles, gutter slime, rat corpses. There's that rotten smell again, stronger now, and this time her perfume just isn't heavy enough. The stink hits Dan like a punch to the gut. He tries hard not to vomit, but God, he can taste it in the back of his throat. She's rotten inside, all worms and fermentation and sickness.
The man steps back and peels off a sodden, reeking glove, looks at Dan with an expression that shifts fluidly between disdain and sad understanding. “Daniel.” he says, “She eats people. Eats them alive. They die alone in the filth of her bowels.” His face shifts into an unreadable symmetry then, and Dan gets the impression of a door slamming shut. The man's voice is final. “You deserve more than she's offering.”
Behind him the blonde is opening her mouth, wide as it can possibly go. Wider. Something dark and thick is oozing down her chin, dripping to her chest and into her cleavage. She gurgles for a moment, tongue working in the cavern of her mouth, and finally she spits, “You bastard. It's Christmas, you bastard!”
She lurches forward, wrapping her mouth around the man's face. His expression shifts like liquid from shock to disgust to fear to hate. His hands go up, but it's too late, too late. And Dan is watching with detached horror, like it's a bad movie, and the last thing he thinks is, 'He was right. She eats them alive. He was right.'
The blonde swallows and licks her lips with satisfaction. Her belly is flat beneath her stained coat, and the man is gone. Only the stink and the pretty smile remain.
-
Nite Owl jerks awake, drawing a sharp breath as his head snaps up. His heart is racing and for a moment he's lost, looking wildly around and trying to figure out where the hell he is. Archie thrums soothingly at him, and familiarity eventually seeps it's way back in. He's above the city, he's in the owlship, of course, of course. Nite Owl pulls off his goggles, pushes the cowl from his face. He feels deeply unsettled, down in the pit of his stomach, can't place exactly why. Something feels foul and wrong.
Outside, it's still snowing.
-
People are smiling, he writes. The paper is damp and dirty from the falling snow. Laughing, singing. They spend their money, they buy their plastic happiness. It's all just a cheap, empty shell with a pretty bow. The city dresses up, pretends it's young and good, tells everyone a story with a happy ending, sends them to bed with a sugar smile. No one seems to realize that in six days it's all back to normal. The pretty bows are gone, and the city's still just a whore that beats her children.
He pauses in his writing to pull up the collar of his trench coat, to shield himself a fraction more from the bitter wind. His mask is pushed up over the bridge of his nose, -he knows no one will see him here- and he gnaws at the end of his pencil before continuing.
I know her. I know the game she plays. These people are so ready to fall in line, but I will not be distracted by the empty, winter stories of a clean and peaceful world. Peace does not come in ribbons and wrapping.
Rorschach looks over the words he's written without really reading them. There was something more he meant to write, but it's eluding him now, lost under a train of grim metaphoric ranting. Staring at the pages isn't helping, so he closes the journal, tucking it and the pencil back into his pocket.
When he stands his body is stiff, muscles complaining of the cold, of crouching too long against unforgiving brick. He grimaces and pulls the mask down over his chin. The aches and chill retreat to a distant place.
The city has not rested during his break. He needs to make up for lost time.
Out on the street the shoddy Santa's bell is jangling slower, with a kind of tired hopelessness. People walk past and avoid looking at him, trying to pretend there's no guilt when they fail to drop a quarter, drop a dime, into his bucket. Rorschach looks down on the scene with a grim satisfaction.
There's the reality, he thinks. A piece of grime picked out of the glitter. Rotting wall beneath fresh paint.
He leaves the rooftop via the fire escape, dropping down into a cheerless alley. He lets himself get swallowed in its shadows, and it gives him all its secrets.
The night is still very young, and the city never sleeps.