Archiving older fic: A Farewell to Files
Title: A Farewell to Files (or 'Ernest Writes Some Fanfic')
Author: Eve11
Category: H (filk/badfic)
Spoilers: none, but it might help if you know anything about "A Farewell to
Arms" or have read or studied anything by Ernest Hemingway.
Summary: Just what the title says. Melanie put up a challenge for a
Noromo-type badfic and I thought of this.
disclaimer: not mine, yada yada yada.
A Farewell to Files
or
Ernest Writes Some Fanfic
a Badfic by Eve11
*************************
It was night. It was hot.
It was a hot, dark night, and the wind wasn't blowing. That didn't bother Henry Frederick at all. Henry liked the heat, it made him think of the fire of gin and better times. It made him want to go for a drink down at Pedro's, but he was on duty and it would be wrong to park his ambulance outside of that bar for the night and turn off his radio and pour glass after glass after glass of Pedro's two-dollar vodka and then try to forget about her face by talking about the weather with whatever sad, sagging woman happened to be sitting next to him. And it wouldn't work, either. He couldn't forget Catherine. Not since she cared for him after his war injury.
He lit a cigarette and crossed the hospital parking lot. He thought about Catherine. He thought she loved him and he thought he might love her and then he thought about them together and then he watched the end of his lit cigarette glow as he inhaled.
It started to rain.
Henry's partner was named Louis Armstrong. Louis was a fat white guy with greasy hair. His brow was always set in what looked like a squint or a grimace. Henry didn't think Louis ever listened to any music, let alone jazz, and so his name was lost on Louis. Louis played chess. That didn't impress Henry.
Louis was waiting in the passenger seat of the ambulance. He looked at Henry as Henry opened the door and got in and shut the door behind him. Henry started the ambulance. He thought about Catherine again.
It rained harder.
"Dispatch to 125 Highland Park," Louis said.
"Better get moving."
"Stop that."
"Stop what?"
"Stop doing that."
"What am I doing?"
"You're thinking of her."
"You're right."
"I can see it in your eyes."
"I said you're right, you know."
"You should get a drink."
They pulled out of the parking lot onto the road. Henry thought about Catherine's eyes.
The rain came down in torrents.
"Watch out for that tree," Louis said.
Henry tried to see the road but it was all a blur. He thought maybe Catherine would cry for him if he died in an ambulance on a dark, hot, wet night, and maybe it would always remind her of him. But he knew it would never happen.
"The tree. . ." Louis said.
They never hit the tree, because at that moment, the ambulance was struck by lightning. That didn't impress Henry either.
**
The moon was out. It was bright for two in the morning. Agent Fox Mulder hated bright nights. Night was supposed to be dark, and bright nights made him think of alien abductions. He looked up at the sky. He ignored the flashing lights and the mull of the accident scene, and instead he thought about how tiny this world was in the middle of such a huge star-filled universe and how man could never be completely alone in such a place, it was more like being in a room with a woman you could never talk to or touch and not knowing her name but recognizing the sweet smell of her perfume and missing it whenever she was gone.
Dana Scully tapped him on the shoulder. He looked at her and she looked back.
"The accident," she said. She pointed at the smoldering ambulance.
"That was one freak thunderstorm."
"Why are we here?"
He often wondered about that.
"I often wonder about that," he said aloud.
"That's not what I meant."
He looked into her eyes again and saw she was angry. He realized it was two in the morning and he had probably woken her up when he called her here and then he saw that her lipstick was slightly smudged and he decided he'd better give her a good answer.
"I told you already. A freak thunderstorm."
"That fried an ambulance. So what?"
Scully watched the CSU team zip up the bodybag. She didn't know why she let Mulder call her out here. She didn't know why she came, it was like something out of a dime store novel, some cheap version of loyalty but she knew she couldn't help herself, and part of her hated it and part of her needed it. She should have hung up the phone. She should have gone back to sleep.
"So I don't know yet," Mulder answered. He looked at the body bag.
"Stop being so mad and stupid." She hated herself for saying that but part her felt good. They stood there in the road. They looked at the lonely body bag. Then Mulder got an idea.
"Don't EMT's work in pairs?"
"What are you getting at?"
"What if he had a partner and that partner is some kind of genetic freak ambulance driver who can influence the weather with his thoughts alone but he has no control over it and it rains whenever he's depressed but he can never completely escape it because that would be the easy way out and he's trapped between feelings of inadequacy and guilt and an overdeveloped, often overpowering machismo archetype?"
"Oh yeah," she said. She picked at her coat. She hated wool, it fuzzed up when it was old. "Real original."
"He's in love with a woman he can never have -- he needs her comfort and despises it."
She rolled her eyes and then arched an eyebrow.
"A tragically flawed man in a twisted nurture/love relationship with a woman who is in his eyes perfection that neither can attain? Geez, why didn't I think of that. . . ?"
She started to look into his eyes but then for some reason she couldn't bring herself to do it and so she looked away. He looked at the ambulance again and thought about the storm and everything else in his life in a long, short second.
"I bet he's impotent, too," he said. "I think I need a drink."
**
He sat at the bar.
He thought. He sat at the bar and thought, and he tried with each glass of vodka to stop thinking.
Catherine was pregnant. She told him right before he left for his shift, how she wanted him to know even though there was no way it was his, and now his partner was dead. The ice clinked in his glass and he thought next time he wouldn't get ice.
He heard the rain before he saw it. Pedro got him another glass, then another bottle.
The rain continued.
**
"I took care of him after the war," Catherine said. "He was injured very badly."
Mulder looked at Scully and Scully looked at Mulder and then they looked at Catherine and everyone looked at each other.
"You're pregnant, aren't you?" Scully asked.
"Yes."
"I could see it in your eyes."
"It's not his. He's impotent, from the war."
Catherine looked at the ceiling. Mulder wondered if Scully would ever admit when he was right and she was wrong, or if she did, if he would ever be able to tell she was admitting it. She did that sometimes, and he thought maybe in another lifetime they might have been able to meet in a dark bar and let the night take them where it would and then they would wake up the next morning without even knowing the other's name. He wondered if he had just doomed her with his thoughts.
"We need to find Mr. Frederick," Scully said.
Catherine cursed the day she met Henry Frederick. She thought about all of their struggles and her life and how even after all of this she would still be willing to follow him.
"Pedro's," she said. "I'll take you."
**
The rain was coming down in sheets. He knew it would only get worse. But he did nothing except tip the bottle and pour another drink.
He thought about Catherine, about how he had doomed her when he met her, and how she would have had a better life if he had never seen her. A woman came and sat next to him.
"Wow, what a storm outside," she said.
"Happens."
"Mind if I join you?"
"Yes."
"I'll do it anyway."
"I know."
He didn't really mind her. She reminded him of Catherine. He heard the distant roll of thunder. It got closer and closer.
**
They were fifteen feet from the door of Pedro's. They didn't make it inside in time. Scully thought it was a coincidence. Mulder thought it was fate, and something worse. The lightning bolt left nothing of Catherine except her shoes.
Mulder and Scully stood in the rain, outside of the bar, and watched Henry Frederick come outside. He was used to the storms. He looked at the shoes, white Rockports with arch support for long shifts. He knew.
"This is how it's supposed to go," he said. He sat down next to the shoes in the rain.
Mulder turned away. Scully turned away.
They both thought the same thing, but neither one would ever know it because that was the way things were, but it didn't stop it from happening that they managed to think the whole thing was mad and stupid, but neither one wanted to admit that down in the deepest depths of their hearts, they were afraid, and they didn't know why.
"Let's get out of here," Mulder said.
Scully nodded. When it came down to it, she always agreed with him, even though she never would admit it. She put out a hand to test the drops.
"Let's go before it starts raining harder."
******
Author: Eve11
Category: H (filk/badfic)
Spoilers: none, but it might help if you know anything about "A Farewell to
Arms" or have read or studied anything by Ernest Hemingway.
Summary: Just what the title says. Melanie put up a challenge for a
Noromo-type badfic and I thought of this.
disclaimer: not mine, yada yada yada.
A Farewell to Files
or
Ernest Writes Some Fanfic
a Badfic by Eve11
*************************
It was night. It was hot.
It was a hot, dark night, and the wind wasn't blowing. That didn't bother Henry Frederick at all. Henry liked the heat, it made him think of the fire of gin and better times. It made him want to go for a drink down at Pedro's, but he was on duty and it would be wrong to park his ambulance outside of that bar for the night and turn off his radio and pour glass after glass after glass of Pedro's two-dollar vodka and then try to forget about her face by talking about the weather with whatever sad, sagging woman happened to be sitting next to him. And it wouldn't work, either. He couldn't forget Catherine. Not since she cared for him after his war injury.
He lit a cigarette and crossed the hospital parking lot. He thought about Catherine. He thought she loved him and he thought he might love her and then he thought about them together and then he watched the end of his lit cigarette glow as he inhaled.
It started to rain.
Henry's partner was named Louis Armstrong. Louis was a fat white guy with greasy hair. His brow was always set in what looked like a squint or a grimace. Henry didn't think Louis ever listened to any music, let alone jazz, and so his name was lost on Louis. Louis played chess. That didn't impress Henry.
Louis was waiting in the passenger seat of the ambulance. He looked at Henry as Henry opened the door and got in and shut the door behind him. Henry started the ambulance. He thought about Catherine again.
It rained harder.
"Dispatch to 125 Highland Park," Louis said.
"Better get moving."
"Stop that."
"Stop what?"
"Stop doing that."
"What am I doing?"
"You're thinking of her."
"You're right."
"I can see it in your eyes."
"I said you're right, you know."
"You should get a drink."
They pulled out of the parking lot onto the road. Henry thought about Catherine's eyes.
The rain came down in torrents.
"Watch out for that tree," Louis said.
Henry tried to see the road but it was all a blur. He thought maybe Catherine would cry for him if he died in an ambulance on a dark, hot, wet night, and maybe it would always remind her of him. But he knew it would never happen.
"The tree. . ." Louis said.
They never hit the tree, because at that moment, the ambulance was struck by lightning. That didn't impress Henry either.
**
The moon was out. It was bright for two in the morning. Agent Fox Mulder hated bright nights. Night was supposed to be dark, and bright nights made him think of alien abductions. He looked up at the sky. He ignored the flashing lights and the mull of the accident scene, and instead he thought about how tiny this world was in the middle of such a huge star-filled universe and how man could never be completely alone in such a place, it was more like being in a room with a woman you could never talk to or touch and not knowing her name but recognizing the sweet smell of her perfume and missing it whenever she was gone.
Dana Scully tapped him on the shoulder. He looked at her and she looked back.
"The accident," she said. She pointed at the smoldering ambulance.
"That was one freak thunderstorm."
"Why are we here?"
He often wondered about that.
"I often wonder about that," he said aloud.
"That's not what I meant."
He looked into her eyes again and saw she was angry. He realized it was two in the morning and he had probably woken her up when he called her here and then he saw that her lipstick was slightly smudged and he decided he'd better give her a good answer.
"I told you already. A freak thunderstorm."
"That fried an ambulance. So what?"
Scully watched the CSU team zip up the bodybag. She didn't know why she let Mulder call her out here. She didn't know why she came, it was like something out of a dime store novel, some cheap version of loyalty but she knew she couldn't help herself, and part of her hated it and part of her needed it. She should have hung up the phone. She should have gone back to sleep.
"So I don't know yet," Mulder answered. He looked at the body bag.
"Stop being so mad and stupid." She hated herself for saying that but part her felt good. They stood there in the road. They looked at the lonely body bag. Then Mulder got an idea.
"Don't EMT's work in pairs?"
"What are you getting at?"
"What if he had a partner and that partner is some kind of genetic freak ambulance driver who can influence the weather with his thoughts alone but he has no control over it and it rains whenever he's depressed but he can never completely escape it because that would be the easy way out and he's trapped between feelings of inadequacy and guilt and an overdeveloped, often overpowering machismo archetype?"
"Oh yeah," she said. She picked at her coat. She hated wool, it fuzzed up when it was old. "Real original."
"He's in love with a woman he can never have -- he needs her comfort and despises it."
She rolled her eyes and then arched an eyebrow.
"A tragically flawed man in a twisted nurture/love relationship with a woman who is in his eyes perfection that neither can attain? Geez, why didn't I think of that. . . ?"
She started to look into his eyes but then for some reason she couldn't bring herself to do it and so she looked away. He looked at the ambulance again and thought about the storm and everything else in his life in a long, short second.
"I bet he's impotent, too," he said. "I think I need a drink."
**
He sat at the bar.
He thought. He sat at the bar and thought, and he tried with each glass of vodka to stop thinking.
Catherine was pregnant. She told him right before he left for his shift, how she wanted him to know even though there was no way it was his, and now his partner was dead. The ice clinked in his glass and he thought next time he wouldn't get ice.
He heard the rain before he saw it. Pedro got him another glass, then another bottle.
The rain continued.
**
"I took care of him after the war," Catherine said. "He was injured very badly."
Mulder looked at Scully and Scully looked at Mulder and then they looked at Catherine and everyone looked at each other.
"You're pregnant, aren't you?" Scully asked.
"Yes."
"I could see it in your eyes."
"It's not his. He's impotent, from the war."
Catherine looked at the ceiling. Mulder wondered if Scully would ever admit when he was right and she was wrong, or if she did, if he would ever be able to tell she was admitting it. She did that sometimes, and he thought maybe in another lifetime they might have been able to meet in a dark bar and let the night take them where it would and then they would wake up the next morning without even knowing the other's name. He wondered if he had just doomed her with his thoughts.
"We need to find Mr. Frederick," Scully said.
Catherine cursed the day she met Henry Frederick. She thought about all of their struggles and her life and how even after all of this she would still be willing to follow him.
"Pedro's," she said. "I'll take you."
**
The rain was coming down in sheets. He knew it would only get worse. But he did nothing except tip the bottle and pour another drink.
He thought about Catherine, about how he had doomed her when he met her, and how she would have had a better life if he had never seen her. A woman came and sat next to him.
"Wow, what a storm outside," she said.
"Happens."
"Mind if I join you?"
"Yes."
"I'll do it anyway."
"I know."
He didn't really mind her. She reminded him of Catherine. He heard the distant roll of thunder. It got closer and closer.
**
They were fifteen feet from the door of Pedro's. They didn't make it inside in time. Scully thought it was a coincidence. Mulder thought it was fate, and something worse. The lightning bolt left nothing of Catherine except her shoes.
Mulder and Scully stood in the rain, outside of the bar, and watched Henry Frederick come outside. He was used to the storms. He looked at the shoes, white Rockports with arch support for long shifts. He knew.
"This is how it's supposed to go," he said. He sat down next to the shoes in the rain.
Mulder turned away. Scully turned away.
They both thought the same thing, but neither one would ever know it because that was the way things were, but it didn't stop it from happening that they managed to think the whole thing was mad and stupid, but neither one wanted to admit that down in the deepest depths of their hearts, they were afraid, and they didn't know why.
"Let's get out of here," Mulder said.
Scully nodded. When it came down to it, she always agreed with him, even though she never would admit it. She put out a hand to test the drops.
"Let's go before it starts raining harder."
******