Watchmen Summer Fic Drabbles
10 Drabbles, all about 100 words each. Written for the Watchmen Summer Fun Challenge at the Gunga-Diner over on deviantART.
Characters/Pairings: Ursula/Nurse, Hollis/Sally, Dan and Rorschach, Mothman and Dollar Bill, Nelson Gardner/Hooded Justice, Rorschach, Adrian Veidt and Bubastis, Laurie/Jon, Dan/Adrian, Sally/The Comedian
Rating: PG-13
Watchmen Summer Fic Drabbles
1. Pick a character, pairing.
2. Turn your music player on and turn it on random/shuffle.
3. Write a drabblet/ficlet related to each song that plays. You only have the time frame of the song to finish the drabble; you start when the song starts, and stop when it's over.
4. Do ten of these, then post them.
Apple Shampoo
Ursula/Nurse
We use apple shampoo. Outside it's sweltering. The city is in the midst of a heatwave. We drink lemonade, lie around in our undergarments, and at the hottest part of the day, we take cold bubble baths with apple shampoo.
At night, in the dark, it cools, and the vermin crawls out from the rock it hides under. At night, I have my costume, my calling, and my vengeance.
But during the day I have her and bubbles. We lock ourselves away from a cold and terrifying world.
Lillian
Hollis/Sally
His sister's name is Lillian. She has a handsome husband and two strong boys that will carry on their father's name.
She asks Hollis to spend the day at Coney Island with the family. He enjoys himself, watches the tourists with a policeman's eye, knocks down milk bottles with a baseball, even rides the bumper cars with his nephews. Amidst the cotton candy and the Ferris wheel rides, he can't help but long for red hair and flashing blue eyes, the yellow to brighten a drab, black and white world, things Lillian has, a simple life that doesn't belong to him.
Start the Machine
Dan and Rorschach
It's hot, even at night. Tinkering with the air conditioner all day leaves Dan feeling restless. Suiting up, he takes Archie out, opening the top hatch. He wants to feel the wind on his face.
The oppressive heat is a deterrent even to criminals, but he knows that his partner would still be out there, riffling through the city's garbage.
He scouts the alleys and the seediest parts of the crumbling city until he spies a vendor selling ice cream. He orders a double scoop of Butter Brickle. Maybe if he stands there long enough, someone will come along that he can share it with.
Maybe.
But all it does is melt.
Make You Smile
Mothman and Dollar Bill
Bill has never seen the ocean so Byron takes him to the Lewis family beach house in the Hamptons.
Amidst the rolling waves, they discover that Bill is the stronger swimmer. Everything is simplified here, just them and the sea. Bill gathers seashells, and Byron smiles at the pleasure a sand dollar brings to dimpled cheeks.
But it can't last. The city awaits.
On a moonless summer night, they count hundreds of stars, dreaming of the future. Shared plans; the world will be better soon. They'd make it so.
A Little's Enough
Nelson Gardner/Hooded Justice
He is cold and shut off, ruled by anger and passion. He spends days away from their home, and while he's away Nelson will cry, alone in their bed.
Watering the roses in the window boxes, he tries not to worry. He'll come back soon. He always does.
The flowers are wilting. The summer's too hot, and it's killing them prematurely.
He thinks of soft, quiet kisses, calm moments that are so rare between them that he's learned to appreciate them. He clings to them as time rolls on, and his lover never returns.
Degenerate
Rorschach
Children in wet clothing stand near open fire hydrants, the water chasing away the summer heat. Rorschach watches them from the safety of a fire escape. They splash and play, pushing makeshift boats along the waterlogged gutters.
The heat makes everything smell worse. He can't stand to be in his filthy apartment, so he's taken to sleeping outside, up high, where noone can see him.
Layers of clothing weigh him down, stick wetly to his back and under his arms.
He almost wants to be young again, become as helpless and weak as the children in the street, just to be able to join them. Back when life was simple, hard, but without stain.
Almost.
Voyeur
Adrian Veidt and Bubastis
In the cold of Antarctica, Bubastis will never know oppressive summer heat.
*
She is always watching, eyes steady and full of knowledge.
She is Adrian's only accomplice, she knows his routine, what he eats, when he sleeps.
She is the light in a dark, unsympathetic world. She is soft and affectionate. Her needs are simple, and she obeys without question.
He made her, but she is her own cat. So many anomalies, traits beyond the control of physics and engineering.
She is perfect and she is his. She is with him always.
Even after she's gone.
Distraction
Laurie/Jon
Laurie shops for swimming suits. She skips over anything yellow, since she associates that color with her mother.
Having been with Jon from a very young age, there are things that she knows she's missed out on. Road trips, hotel stays, lounging by the pool in a town that isn't their destination.
She goes with a black string bikini, and when she returns home, she models it for Jon.
His mind is elsewhere, thinking of things that she can't begin to understand. But Laurie is determined.
Dropping her top to the floor, she brushes his naked chest with her own. He feels amazing and just before her eyes slide shut she sees him look back at her, and really see her for the first time in weeks.
He might feel apathy regarding his own nudity, but he's never been able to look past hers.
Chapter 13
Dan/Adrian
Adrian likes to read to Dan in bed. Dan likes to listen.
His voice is soothing, his soft accent firing his words until all Dan has to do is close his eyes to see the story clearly.
A ceiling fan blows cool air along tangled limbs and designer sheets. The summer brings longer days, allotting a little more time for simple things.
Tonight they reach chapter 13, and as Adrian reads, Dan imagines, and traces hands through soft blond hair, loosely falling over a perfect brow.
No, It Isn't
Sally/The Comedian
They have one summer day. One day that shouldn't happen but does. He is no longer seventeen. And she thinks she's smarter and stronger.
He tries to see her again, but Sally refuses. One day can't change a lifetime of hurt and anger.
Weeks pass, and it becomes obvious that there will be permanent consequences for their actions.
Nothing changes. And everything does.