38 Minutes Challenge: The Crane Wife by Brighid
Challenge: 38 Minutes
Title: The Crane Wife
Spoilers: Bits and pieces of season one.
Rating: PG-13
Author: Brighid
Summary: Cranes for long life, and for marriage.
Note: This is an odd thing for me. Timing wise? Inception of idea to final edit: 36 minutes. Title search: two minutes.
The Crane Wife
)0(
She folds the first twenty-eight her first night on Atlantis, sitting between two cargo containers in a storage room. She is supposed to be sleeping but she can't stop the way her heart is beating, the dull echo of it like a drum inside her head. Alise Dumais finds her there and crouches down in front of her.
"Are you all right, Miko?" she asks, her long fingers plucking fretfully at the small pile of folded paper scraps. "What are you doing?"
"Cranes," Miko replies. "I am folding cranes."
"Hmm." Alise cocks her head to the side and that is something Miko thinks that she will never become accustomed to, the incredibly pale wideness of western eyes. It is a wonder they can keep any secrets at all. "Show me how?" Alise asks, sinking into something like lotus. Miko slides over a handful of the candy wrappers the young lieutenant had given her, and begins showing Dumais the careful, precise folds.
"Cranes are long life," she says and Alise laughs.
"Then let us make as many of the little fuckers as we can," Alise says. Her long fingers are sure and agile and catch on quickly. By the time they run out of scraps Miko has folded twenty-eight and Alise fourteen, the whole time deliberately not thinking of aliens who consumed you from the inside out.
)0(
The sick bay is quiet and empty except for Doctor McKay, who is still paralysed by the blast from the Wraith stunner. He is also, apparently sleeping, so Miko doesn't say anything to wake him, just pulls the wheeling table over and sorts out her scraps of labels and wrappers and old graph sheets and then starts folding. The gestures, over time, have become somewhat ritualized. She has an order to them, a way of doing things. Her rational mind knows that she is doing this to exert some sort of control, that she is attempting to find order in chaos. Since it keeps her from crying in her sleep, she feels it is a wise course.
When Doctor McKay begins to stir awake, she gathers up her nineteen cranes, making her total about two hundred and three. The two hundred and fourth one, a bright crimson Starburst wrapper Dumais had collected from Peter Lo, one of the botanists, she leaves on Doctor McKay's pillow.
She is gone before he even opens his eyes.
)0(
The top of Miko's chest of drawers is covered in cranes. She had lost count last night in the making of them; she will have to recount today. She hears Alise's fist on the door so she thinks hard, and the door opens. Alise is smiling so very wide, and in her left hand she holds pale pink squares of paper.
"Teyla brought these back from PXN-997. Ealon, I think she called it. They make paper! Tonnes of it!" She leans in and hugs Miko hard enough that Miko feels the breath forced from her lungs. "So, we make cranes, we watch bad movies?"
"I have tea," Miko says, quietly. "Oolong. And sugar."
So they drink tea, and watch movies and they fold pale pink birds until their fingers are sore. And then Alise leans forward to reach for a straying crane, but she brushes against Miko. She stops. Brushes again, her hand moving backwards to touch the thick coil of Miko's hair.
Miko's body flushes warm and cold. When Alise bends her head down to kiss her it tastes like tea, and there are wings underneath her ribcage, beating so hard she thinks that she might break.
Later, she does.
)0(
Miko is at her station in the lab when Doctor Weir finds her. She listens carefully, hearing nothing. She nods once, twice, then just walks away.
Somehow she finds herself in her quarters. There is a taste, like tea, only sweeter in her mouth. She sees the mound of cranes on her bureau top, and knocks them down, her delicate fingers breaking all their paper necks.
)0(
Mornings are always too early on Atlantis, and nights too late, Miko thinks, drinking a mug of hot mint tea and staring out the wide windows of the mess hall. The night sky is painted with stars.
"Excuse, please?" Miko turns her head and there is Doctor Zelenka standing quietly, a little uncertainly. "Dr. Ishiwa? May I sit down?" Miko nods.
"Yes, of course. Was there something you needed?" She leans forward slightly, thinking work would be better than going back to her quarters, to her bed.
Doctor Zelenka lifts his left hand and it is full of paper, in shades like the rainbow. "Rodney brought these to me, he said that Teyla asked him to pass them along." He looks uncertain, his fingers fidgeting so that the papers flap, stir the air.
Miko opens her mouth, but there are no words.
"You used to make little birds, with Dumais, yes?" Doctor Zelenka says, breaking into the silence. "They are beautiful. Dumais, she kept three by her computer. I asked about them. She said they were for peace, and for prayers to be answered. Was thinking, maybe, you could teach me."
Miko takes a single paper from his hand. It is creamy with touches of gold and yellow, like the throat of an orchid. She looks at it for a very long time, and then finally she sets the first fold. "Like this, Doctor Zelenka."
"I think, maybe, you could call me Radek?" he says, choosing an orange sheet and copying her exactly.
By morning they are still working in silence, with over sixty cranes between them.
There are wings inside of her, for the first time in over a month. Miko just breathes deeply, and lets herself feel them move.
)0(
End
Title: The Crane Wife
Spoilers: Bits and pieces of season one.
Rating: PG-13
Author: Brighid
Summary: Cranes for long life, and for marriage.
Note: This is an odd thing for me. Timing wise? Inception of idea to final edit: 36 minutes. Title search: two minutes.
The Crane Wife
)0(
She folds the first twenty-eight her first night on Atlantis, sitting between two cargo containers in a storage room. She is supposed to be sleeping but she can't stop the way her heart is beating, the dull echo of it like a drum inside her head. Alise Dumais finds her there and crouches down in front of her.
"Are you all right, Miko?" she asks, her long fingers plucking fretfully at the small pile of folded paper scraps. "What are you doing?"
"Cranes," Miko replies. "I am folding cranes."
"Hmm." Alise cocks her head to the side and that is something Miko thinks that she will never become accustomed to, the incredibly pale wideness of western eyes. It is a wonder they can keep any secrets at all. "Show me how?" Alise asks, sinking into something like lotus. Miko slides over a handful of the candy wrappers the young lieutenant had given her, and begins showing Dumais the careful, precise folds.
"Cranes are long life," she says and Alise laughs.
"Then let us make as many of the little fuckers as we can," Alise says. Her long fingers are sure and agile and catch on quickly. By the time they run out of scraps Miko has folded twenty-eight and Alise fourteen, the whole time deliberately not thinking of aliens who consumed you from the inside out.
)0(
The sick bay is quiet and empty except for Doctor McKay, who is still paralysed by the blast from the Wraith stunner. He is also, apparently sleeping, so Miko doesn't say anything to wake him, just pulls the wheeling table over and sorts out her scraps of labels and wrappers and old graph sheets and then starts folding. The gestures, over time, have become somewhat ritualized. She has an order to them, a way of doing things. Her rational mind knows that she is doing this to exert some sort of control, that she is attempting to find order in chaos. Since it keeps her from crying in her sleep, she feels it is a wise course.
When Doctor McKay begins to stir awake, she gathers up her nineteen cranes, making her total about two hundred and three. The two hundred and fourth one, a bright crimson Starburst wrapper Dumais had collected from Peter Lo, one of the botanists, she leaves on Doctor McKay's pillow.
She is gone before he even opens his eyes.
)0(
The top of Miko's chest of drawers is covered in cranes. She had lost count last night in the making of them; she will have to recount today. She hears Alise's fist on the door so she thinks hard, and the door opens. Alise is smiling so very wide, and in her left hand she holds pale pink squares of paper.
"Teyla brought these back from PXN-997. Ealon, I think she called it. They make paper! Tonnes of it!" She leans in and hugs Miko hard enough that Miko feels the breath forced from her lungs. "So, we make cranes, we watch bad movies?"
"I have tea," Miko says, quietly. "Oolong. And sugar."
So they drink tea, and watch movies and they fold pale pink birds until their fingers are sore. And then Alise leans forward to reach for a straying crane, but she brushes against Miko. She stops. Brushes again, her hand moving backwards to touch the thick coil of Miko's hair.
Miko's body flushes warm and cold. When Alise bends her head down to kiss her it tastes like tea, and there are wings underneath her ribcage, beating so hard she thinks that she might break.
Later, she does.
)0(
Miko is at her station in the lab when Doctor Weir finds her. She listens carefully, hearing nothing. She nods once, twice, then just walks away.
Somehow she finds herself in her quarters. There is a taste, like tea, only sweeter in her mouth. She sees the mound of cranes on her bureau top, and knocks them down, her delicate fingers breaking all their paper necks.
)0(
Mornings are always too early on Atlantis, and nights too late, Miko thinks, drinking a mug of hot mint tea and staring out the wide windows of the mess hall. The night sky is painted with stars.
"Excuse, please?" Miko turns her head and there is Doctor Zelenka standing quietly, a little uncertainly. "Dr. Ishiwa? May I sit down?" Miko nods.
"Yes, of course. Was there something you needed?" She leans forward slightly, thinking work would be better than going back to her quarters, to her bed.
Doctor Zelenka lifts his left hand and it is full of paper, in shades like the rainbow. "Rodney brought these to me, he said that Teyla asked him to pass them along." He looks uncertain, his fingers fidgeting so that the papers flap, stir the air.
Miko opens her mouth, but there are no words.
"You used to make little birds, with Dumais, yes?" Doctor Zelenka says, breaking into the silence. "They are beautiful. Dumais, she kept three by her computer. I asked about them. She said they were for peace, and for prayers to be answered. Was thinking, maybe, you could teach me."
Miko takes a single paper from his hand. It is creamy with touches of gold and yellow, like the throat of an orchid. She looks at it for a very long time, and then finally she sets the first fold. "Like this, Doctor Zelenka."
"I think, maybe, you could call me Radek?" he says, choosing an orange sheet and copying her exactly.
By morning they are still working in silence, with over sixty cranes between them.
There are wings inside of her, for the first time in over a month. Miko just breathes deeply, and lets herself feel them move.
)0(
End