[ficlets] meme responses, Marvel & DC
Jaysus, I wrote a lot yesterday. These are all about PG-13. I think.
DC
For jubilancy:
A Caesar who was only slumming
When Dick has realized that Bruce will postpone his duties to Gotham for this time together, when their ties hung loose on their necks and their cushions sagged beneath them, he leaned his head against the couch's back.
Because he is Dick, supremely confident in everything but their partnership, accepting that realization, believing that this time together would not vanish, took him a long time.
Bruce breathed through the passage of that time. Mindfully, as the expression went, conscious of the loose warmth of Dick's body beside his own, aware of Dick's presence on a level only slightly above the atomic scale.
In profile, Dick's face seemed to relax. His jaw loosened, his hair slipped off his forehead. Bruce had only to extend his fingers, should he decide to touch that hair, that fine down over Dick's strong jaw.
Like a bat out of hell: Bruce had emerged from that cave, months ago now, to find Tim, and soup, and a monk awaiting him. Behind him lay the carcasses of demons, turning quickly to dust, the desiccated vows of vengeance, and fears that scuttled out his pores.
He came, however, to rest only now, as Dick turned his head. The smile Dick wore was a faint palimpsest of his old grin, but no less beautiful for its dimmed age. Bruce exhaled, his fingers curling around the nape of Dick's neck. His responding smile was lost in the sudden, acrobatic speed of their kiss.
Dick trusted the world, all save Bruce; Bruce, opening and emerging even as he reclined, had never trusted anything but Dick.
For inlovewithnight because she said it couldn't be done:
"Walker." Kon bobs up at the far side of the pool. His eyes darting, he waits a moment, then sinks back down.
"Texas Ranger!" Bart calls from the rafters, his hair dripping and skin pink.
Tim turns the page of last weekend's Daily Planet Sunday magazine. "You're playing it wrong."
"Walker," Kon says, this time from the shallow end.
"Texas Ranger!" Bart chirps in reply. His descent on a churning cyclone of air ruffles the pages of Tim's magazine before lifting it and sending it flying into the pool. "Oh, sorry! Wait, I'm not sorry, *you* should be sorry, *you're* the one playing it wrong."
Kon pulls himself out of the pool, water streaming off his broad shoulders. "Yeah, dude. You're -"
Tim silences him with a lifted eyebrow.
The tactic, however, does not work on Bart. Possibly this is because Bart's moving too fast, circling Tim and plucking at his clothes, leaving puddles as he goes. "You're not even *naked*, Tim! This is not how you play poolgames."
Tim's lounge-chair creaks as Kon sits on the end. His knees are apart as he draws a tiny hand towel over his genitals. Tim would avert his eyes, but that means looking at Bart's pink-and-gold body, and that's not much better.
"It's pretty easy," Kon says and leans in. "Hide in the water -"
"- or out of it, if you can fly or otherwise manipulate gravity!"
Kon nods sagely. "- or out of it, and you call out, and -"
Tim crosses his arms tightly, just as Bart flops against him, wet and wiggly as a (pink) seal, rubbing his hair against Tim's shirt. Tim swallows and says, "Who's supposed to find you?"
"Uh," Kon says.
"Um," Bart says, then bounces back up. "Tim's it! Walker!"
Kon flies low over the pool. "Texas Ranger!"
For petronelle:
And she's not the President anymore, which is the worst part.
It's the little things, really. Lois will tell anyone who asks - and several who don't - just how fond she became of the White House and its kitchens, staffed 24-7. The coffee was divine, the pages and secretaries both deferential and efficient, and the *power*...
The power was not such a little thing, of course. She's more than pleased with what she accomplished, all she set in motion, but still she dreams.
She can import coffee, hire a secretary. And Clark, she resolves, will wear a tuxedo every day.
For sister_wolf:
"You know, the most impressive part about this whole thing is that Flash actually managed to talk three alien races into working together," Clark said, adjusting the flowered headband in his hair.
Still too gobsmacked to move from the ground, Barry frowned. "You say that as if..."
Batman put his hand on Barry's shoulder, then took a deep whiff from his own bouquet. "He didn't mean anything." He smelled his flowers again; Barry wasn't sure, but the petals looked as if they were *reaching* for Batman's face. Smiling, Batman added in a whisper, "He likes you."
Clark's headband slipped off his spitcurl again. "That was a secret!"
Barry scooted back on his rump. If his legs would just cooperate, he could turn tail and *run*.
Run to where? They were stuck here on Mogo (who wouldn't return *any* distress beacons), Batman and Superman had just exchanged flowers before a crowd of admiring aliens, and Barry was --. "Would you two *stop* that?"
Slowly, reluctantly, breaking the kiss, Batman cupped Clark's face and gazed into his eyes before glancing at Barry. "Stop what? It's our wedding night."
"*Ours*," Clark said and cleared his throat. "Ours."
Barry waved his hand, wishing that he could just *erase* them. "Oh, no. No, you don't. I said I'd be maid of -"
"Matron, technically," Batman said, the pedantic little snot.
"- *Matron* of honor, and that got the algae-people off our backs, but -" Barry blinked, knowing full well he was babbling like young Wallace after too much Saturday matinee candy. Clark had gone down on one knee, offering his large, pink palm to Barry.
He really was a handsome fellow, Barry had to admit. Broad-shouldered, with that earnest squint to his blue eyes, and the flowers set off his black hair quite nicely.
"Barrence," Clark said, and reached back to draw Batman in. "You're our husband. We are yours. Ours is -"
"You're goofy on the alien hippies and their flowers!" Flushing despite himself, Barry dropped his head between his knees and tried to catch his breath.
A dark shape neared, out of the corner of his eye, and Batman's cape settled around Barry's shoulders. His voice was raspy in Barry's ear, his tongue quick, and Barry shivered. "Don't tell me you've never thought about. Kinsey estimated that -"
"His statistical methods are very suspect," Barry said, yet he was taking Clark's hand and turning to kiss the side of Batman's jaw. "You can't trust a scientist who doesn't -"
"Oh, this is *beautiful*," Clark said, wrapping his arms around Barry and Batman and lifting them into the air. "What a *trip*."
Barry Allen was always late. He was *famous* for it. Now, it seeemed, as he twisted happily and breathlessly in the tangle of Super-arms and Bat-gropes, he was a late-bloomer, too.
Marvel
For caia_comica:
They had just met on Exiles' Island, and Steve, though trapped by the Cosmic Cube in the Red Skull's body, was training Sam to fight with him against Skull's former henchmen. Sam remembers the day clearly - the vault of blue sky overhead, the murmur of wind through the palms. Best of all, he remembers how Steve sat on the creek's bank, feet soaking in the bright water, and told him about friendship. About heroing.
Perched on Sam's shoulder, Redwing listened as closely as Sam did, his talons flexing and gripping in time with the wind. Sam crouched a little ways back, letting the wind dry his face, watching the moisture evaporate from Steve's bare shoulders.
He'd get a costume later. Now, he and Steve were naked as the day he and the Red Skull were born, and he planted his fist in the sand, leaning in. Redwing beat his wings and lifted into the air.
Steve seemed as oblivious then as, later, he would prove himself not to be. When Sam kissed the base of his neck, Steve finished his story (...and my friend fell). Only as the wind kicked up and a cloud slid off the sun did he turn his head and rest his cheek against Sam's.
As beginnings went, it was better than Eden.
For callmesandy:
[CA v.1 #131, the one where Bucky comes back]
They're driving to the ocean. Just the two of them, all over again, Steve's motorcycle humming, the sea breeze ripping against their faces.
Coming out of a sharp curve, Steve checks over his shoulder. Bucky hugs him tighter, matches his lean. His eyes are closed, lashes like penstrokes in the bright Pacific sun, a smile as old as anything on his lips.
On the beach, their boots are scattered and gloves tossed away as they run. The bloodwarm water covers their feet, beats against their calves. It's impossible to believe it could ever freeze, ever carry them apart, ever again.
For inlovewithnight:
He’s a soldier, for all that he’s left his uniform behind. Bucky rises with the dawn, makes his bed with hospital corners, runs in steel-toed boots that would make another's shins ache.
His uniform hangs in Zemo's case and in the Smithsonian, on the backs of others - Rick Jones, Jack Monroe, Lemar Hoskins - or changed into something unrecognizable on Eli Bradley.
Bucky's left arm is Wakandan steel and American ingenuity, his brain is scrambled with big band music and Soviet instructions, half-forgotten memories and Fury's growl, but his heart is red and true.
Steve believes that. In him.
For dorrie6:
The bundle's brown paper was tattered in places, as though its journey had been especially rough, and from the look of the owl who'd left it, that seemed a fair assumption.
Despite Redwing's disapproving squawks, Sam took the owl up to the cages on the roof for rest and as many mice as it could eat.
On the fire escape, Teddy nudged the package with his toe. "Dude."
"I know." Billy dropped to a crouch, blue light seeping from his pursed lips as he murmured. Iwanttoseewhat'sinside,Iwanttoseewhat'sinside...
"Careful what you wish for, son." Cap reached through the open window, between Billy's legs - blushing green as asparagus, Teddy had to look away from *that* - and grabbed the package.
"Hey!" Teddy went to grab the package from Cap's hand. "That's -"
"It's not for me," Billy said. Sadly, Teddy thought, and Cap must have heard it, too, because he was patting Billy's knee at the same time Teddy was wrapping his arm around Billy's shoulders. "I thought..."
"You read too many books." Cap winked at them as he tore open the package. "Developed a taste for these during the war," he continued, shaking out a handful of Fizzing Wizzbees and offering them to the boys. "Grandson of an old war friend sends them to me when he remembers. Try 'em."
"No, thank you." Billy wouldn't look up, not even when Teddy laced their fingers together and squeezed.
"Well, a'course *you* two can fly any time you want," Cap said around a mouthful. "If you change your mind, come and get 'em."
When they were alone again, Billy rested his cheek against Teddy's shoulder. "Stupid. I really thought..."
"You're too old for Hogwarts," Teddy reminded him.
Scraps of brown paper blew through the window. One, with R.J. Lupin written on it in iron-gall ink, twisted across Billy's foot.
He sighed and met Teddy's gaze. "They could take exchange students, right?"
Teddy kissed Billy's temple and held him tighter. "You're not going anywhere."
For jubilancy, employing the best first-line *ever*:
"Dick!" Buffeted by the sudden breeze, Teddy leaps to his feet and grabs for whatever's in reach - bedclothes, a curtain, Billy's shirt - to cover himself. "You freaking *ass*!"
Tommy's cackle lingers in the air long after he has sped away.
"I'll get him --" Teddy shivers into Skrull-form and beats at the air with his wings.
"Don't." Billy sits up on the bed and extends his hand. His fingers brush cool against Teddy's palm.
He might just as well have spoken a spell; Teddy sinks down next to him, human skin shifting over the green, wings folding away. Billy's face is still red, and hot, when he kisses Teddy's shoulder and scoots closer.
"Where were we?"
"Mm." Billy moves their hands down Teddy's stomach. "Right about here."
*
In case you missed it, Bucky got a cockpiercing and Tim explored the gender spectrum last night.
I have the best flist *ever*, as yesterday's meme responses prove beyond a shadow of a doubt. And, two recs for the one of the world's strangest, saddest and yet most compelling ships, Bucky/Nick Fury: Jube's drabble and Caia's scorching porn.
DC
For jubilancy:
A Caesar who was only slumming
When Dick has realized that Bruce will postpone his duties to Gotham for this time together, when their ties hung loose on their necks and their cushions sagged beneath them, he leaned his head against the couch's back.
Because he is Dick, supremely confident in everything but their partnership, accepting that realization, believing that this time together would not vanish, took him a long time.
Bruce breathed through the passage of that time. Mindfully, as the expression went, conscious of the loose warmth of Dick's body beside his own, aware of Dick's presence on a level only slightly above the atomic scale.
In profile, Dick's face seemed to relax. His jaw loosened, his hair slipped off his forehead. Bruce had only to extend his fingers, should he decide to touch that hair, that fine down over Dick's strong jaw.
Like a bat out of hell: Bruce had emerged from that cave, months ago now, to find Tim, and soup, and a monk awaiting him. Behind him lay the carcasses of demons, turning quickly to dust, the desiccated vows of vengeance, and fears that scuttled out his pores.
He came, however, to rest only now, as Dick turned his head. The smile Dick wore was a faint palimpsest of his old grin, but no less beautiful for its dimmed age. Bruce exhaled, his fingers curling around the nape of Dick's neck. His responding smile was lost in the sudden, acrobatic speed of their kiss.
Dick trusted the world, all save Bruce; Bruce, opening and emerging even as he reclined, had never trusted anything but Dick.
For inlovewithnight because she said it couldn't be done:
"Walker." Kon bobs up at the far side of the pool. His eyes darting, he waits a moment, then sinks back down.
"Texas Ranger!" Bart calls from the rafters, his hair dripping and skin pink.
Tim turns the page of last weekend's Daily Planet Sunday magazine. "You're playing it wrong."
"Walker," Kon says, this time from the shallow end.
"Texas Ranger!" Bart chirps in reply. His descent on a churning cyclone of air ruffles the pages of Tim's magazine before lifting it and sending it flying into the pool. "Oh, sorry! Wait, I'm not sorry, *you* should be sorry, *you're* the one playing it wrong."
Kon pulls himself out of the pool, water streaming off his broad shoulders. "Yeah, dude. You're -"
Tim silences him with a lifted eyebrow.
The tactic, however, does not work on Bart. Possibly this is because Bart's moving too fast, circling Tim and plucking at his clothes, leaving puddles as he goes. "You're not even *naked*, Tim! This is not how you play poolgames."
Tim's lounge-chair creaks as Kon sits on the end. His knees are apart as he draws a tiny hand towel over his genitals. Tim would avert his eyes, but that means looking at Bart's pink-and-gold body, and that's not much better.
"It's pretty easy," Kon says and leans in. "Hide in the water -"
"- or out of it, if you can fly or otherwise manipulate gravity!"
Kon nods sagely. "- or out of it, and you call out, and -"
Tim crosses his arms tightly, just as Bart flops against him, wet and wiggly as a (pink) seal, rubbing his hair against Tim's shirt. Tim swallows and says, "Who's supposed to find you?"
"Uh," Kon says.
"Um," Bart says, then bounces back up. "Tim's it! Walker!"
Kon flies low over the pool. "Texas Ranger!"
For petronelle:
And she's not the President anymore, which is the worst part.
It's the little things, really. Lois will tell anyone who asks - and several who don't - just how fond she became of the White House and its kitchens, staffed 24-7. The coffee was divine, the pages and secretaries both deferential and efficient, and the *power*...
The power was not such a little thing, of course. She's more than pleased with what she accomplished, all she set in motion, but still she dreams.
She can import coffee, hire a secretary. And Clark, she resolves, will wear a tuxedo every day.
For sister_wolf:
"You know, the most impressive part about this whole thing is that Flash actually managed to talk three alien races into working together," Clark said, adjusting the flowered headband in his hair.
Still too gobsmacked to move from the ground, Barry frowned. "You say that as if..."
Batman put his hand on Barry's shoulder, then took a deep whiff from his own bouquet. "He didn't mean anything." He smelled his flowers again; Barry wasn't sure, but the petals looked as if they were *reaching* for Batman's face. Smiling, Batman added in a whisper, "He likes you."
Clark's headband slipped off his spitcurl again. "That was a secret!"
Barry scooted back on his rump. If his legs would just cooperate, he could turn tail and *run*.
Run to where? They were stuck here on Mogo (who wouldn't return *any* distress beacons), Batman and Superman had just exchanged flowers before a crowd of admiring aliens, and Barry was --. "Would you two *stop* that?"
Slowly, reluctantly, breaking the kiss, Batman cupped Clark's face and gazed into his eyes before glancing at Barry. "Stop what? It's our wedding night."
"*Ours*," Clark said and cleared his throat. "Ours."
Barry waved his hand, wishing that he could just *erase* them. "Oh, no. No, you don't. I said I'd be maid of -"
"Matron, technically," Batman said, the pedantic little snot.
"- *Matron* of honor, and that got the algae-people off our backs, but -" Barry blinked, knowing full well he was babbling like young Wallace after too much Saturday matinee candy. Clark had gone down on one knee, offering his large, pink palm to Barry.
He really was a handsome fellow, Barry had to admit. Broad-shouldered, with that earnest squint to his blue eyes, and the flowers set off his black hair quite nicely.
"Barrence," Clark said, and reached back to draw Batman in. "You're our husband. We are yours. Ours is -"
"You're goofy on the alien hippies and their flowers!" Flushing despite himself, Barry dropped his head between his knees and tried to catch his breath.
A dark shape neared, out of the corner of his eye, and Batman's cape settled around Barry's shoulders. His voice was raspy in Barry's ear, his tongue quick, and Barry shivered. "Don't tell me you've never thought about. Kinsey estimated that -"
"His statistical methods are very suspect," Barry said, yet he was taking Clark's hand and turning to kiss the side of Batman's jaw. "You can't trust a scientist who doesn't -"
"Oh, this is *beautiful*," Clark said, wrapping his arms around Barry and Batman and lifting them into the air. "What a *trip*."
Barry Allen was always late. He was *famous* for it. Now, it seeemed, as he twisted happily and breathlessly in the tangle of Super-arms and Bat-gropes, he was a late-bloomer, too.
Marvel
For caia_comica:
They had just met on Exiles' Island, and Steve, though trapped by the Cosmic Cube in the Red Skull's body, was training Sam to fight with him against Skull's former henchmen. Sam remembers the day clearly - the vault of blue sky overhead, the murmur of wind through the palms. Best of all, he remembers how Steve sat on the creek's bank, feet soaking in the bright water, and told him about friendship. About heroing.
Perched on Sam's shoulder, Redwing listened as closely as Sam did, his talons flexing and gripping in time with the wind. Sam crouched a little ways back, letting the wind dry his face, watching the moisture evaporate from Steve's bare shoulders.
He'd get a costume later. Now, he and Steve were naked as the day he and the Red Skull were born, and he planted his fist in the sand, leaning in. Redwing beat his wings and lifted into the air.
Steve seemed as oblivious then as, later, he would prove himself not to be. When Sam kissed the base of his neck, Steve finished his story (...and my friend fell). Only as the wind kicked up and a cloud slid off the sun did he turn his head and rest his cheek against Sam's.
As beginnings went, it was better than Eden.
For callmesandy:
[CA v.1 #131, the one where Bucky comes back]
They're driving to the ocean. Just the two of them, all over again, Steve's motorcycle humming, the sea breeze ripping against their faces.
Coming out of a sharp curve, Steve checks over his shoulder. Bucky hugs him tighter, matches his lean. His eyes are closed, lashes like penstrokes in the bright Pacific sun, a smile as old as anything on his lips.
On the beach, their boots are scattered and gloves tossed away as they run. The bloodwarm water covers their feet, beats against their calves. It's impossible to believe it could ever freeze, ever carry them apart, ever again.
For inlovewithnight:
He’s a soldier, for all that he’s left his uniform behind. Bucky rises with the dawn, makes his bed with hospital corners, runs in steel-toed boots that would make another's shins ache.
His uniform hangs in Zemo's case and in the Smithsonian, on the backs of others - Rick Jones, Jack Monroe, Lemar Hoskins - or changed into something unrecognizable on Eli Bradley.
Bucky's left arm is Wakandan steel and American ingenuity, his brain is scrambled with big band music and Soviet instructions, half-forgotten memories and Fury's growl, but his heart is red and true.
Steve believes that. In him.
For dorrie6:
The bundle's brown paper was tattered in places, as though its journey had been especially rough, and from the look of the owl who'd left it, that seemed a fair assumption.
Despite Redwing's disapproving squawks, Sam took the owl up to the cages on the roof for rest and as many mice as it could eat.
On the fire escape, Teddy nudged the package with his toe. "Dude."
"I know." Billy dropped to a crouch, blue light seeping from his pursed lips as he murmured. Iwanttoseewhat'sinside,Iwanttoseewhat'sinside...
"Careful what you wish for, son." Cap reached through the open window, between Billy's legs - blushing green as asparagus, Teddy had to look away from *that* - and grabbed the package.
"Hey!" Teddy went to grab the package from Cap's hand. "That's -"
"It's not for me," Billy said. Sadly, Teddy thought, and Cap must have heard it, too, because he was patting Billy's knee at the same time Teddy was wrapping his arm around Billy's shoulders. "I thought..."
"You read too many books." Cap winked at them as he tore open the package. "Developed a taste for these during the war," he continued, shaking out a handful of Fizzing Wizzbees and offering them to the boys. "Grandson of an old war friend sends them to me when he remembers. Try 'em."
"No, thank you." Billy wouldn't look up, not even when Teddy laced their fingers together and squeezed.
"Well, a'course *you* two can fly any time you want," Cap said around a mouthful. "If you change your mind, come and get 'em."
When they were alone again, Billy rested his cheek against Teddy's shoulder. "Stupid. I really thought..."
"You're too old for Hogwarts," Teddy reminded him.
Scraps of brown paper blew through the window. One, with R.J. Lupin written on it in iron-gall ink, twisted across Billy's foot.
He sighed and met Teddy's gaze. "They could take exchange students, right?"
Teddy kissed Billy's temple and held him tighter. "You're not going anywhere."
For jubilancy, employing the best first-line *ever*:
"Dick!" Buffeted by the sudden breeze, Teddy leaps to his feet and grabs for whatever's in reach - bedclothes, a curtain, Billy's shirt - to cover himself. "You freaking *ass*!"
Tommy's cackle lingers in the air long after he has sped away.
"I'll get him --" Teddy shivers into Skrull-form and beats at the air with his wings.
"Don't." Billy sits up on the bed and extends his hand. His fingers brush cool against Teddy's palm.
He might just as well have spoken a spell; Teddy sinks down next to him, human skin shifting over the green, wings folding away. Billy's face is still red, and hot, when he kisses Teddy's shoulder and scoots closer.
"Where were we?"
"Mm." Billy moves their hands down Teddy's stomach. "Right about here."
*
In case you missed it, Bucky got a cockpiercing and Tim explored the gender spectrum last night.
I have the best flist *ever*, as yesterday's meme responses prove beyond a shadow of a doubt. And, two recs for the one of the world's strangest, saddest and yet most compelling ships, Bucky/Nick Fury: Jube's drabble and Caia's scorching porn.