It’s odd, he thinks, trying to navigate the winter-cold halls toward Gaius room, how the people he sees standing in expressionless attention behind their masters can be so different in the privacy of their rooms. Perhaps something to do with growing up in service, or the years of practice he’s never had serving in the court. He knows they resent him sometimes, for taking a position that should have gone to one of them; apparently, serving a prince is something to be envied. He hadn’t known that.
It’s a secret world there, warmer than the formalities of court, and he’s glad he could go tonight. They might never be friends, but at least they now accept him, and sometimes, he imagines that one day that might be enough.
It takes him three tries to acknowledge he can’t find his key, and ten minutes of knocking before he acknowledges that Gaius’ warning he remember his key or spend the night outside was in earnest. Frowning, Merlin wraps his arms around himself, trying to work out a spell that opens doors and then remembers how the bodice of someone’s dress had come open in his hands and has to take a moment to breathe.
Right, so that’s not going to work.
Author’s Summary: Arthur’s biggest problem to date, Merlin thinks darkly as he carries yet another load of suspiciously not-really-dirty clothing down the stairs, is an unaccountable fear of anyone, anywhere, suspecting he’s capable of being other than a complete and utter prat.
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Lorne has a surreal moment of feeling like a carpool mom with a minivan, if the neighborhood kids were heavily armed and trained to kill. He’s still grinning to himself as he steers into the jumper bay.
The grin vanishes instantly when they touch down and he sees David waiting near the door, strangely pale and rocking nervously on his heels.
The Marines collect their gear and pile out, and Lorne calls, “Hey, Dr. Parrish. Be with you in a second,” in a carefully offhand tone. He busies himself checking ammunition boxes and making sure they’ve all cleared their weapons, and he doesn’t look at David again until the last lance corporal departs for the armory.
The instant the door shuts he’s across the bay in a handful of quick strides, already scanning David’s face for a clue. Something is seriously wrong for David to search him out during the day when they don’t have a work pretext. “What? What the hell is it?”
“Colonel Sheppard knows,” David says helplessly. “Nick, he knows everything.”
[ Unsingable Name ]
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There’s a box of Frosties on the kitchen table with a bottle of chocolate milk. Over by the oven, Connor seems to have found a waffle iron from somewhere – where, James has no idea. He’s pretty sure he’s never owned a waffle iron in his entire life.
You can’t have that for breakfast!
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Kirk’s been called a lot of things by a lot of people.
Stupid. Worthless. Unwanted. Bastard. Jackass. Whore.
Half-breed’s whore. Only bedded because no Vulcan will have him. Only wanted for his services and nothing else. Only there for one reason and one reason alone.
The last stings the most. But it isn’t the accuser who makes it so. It isn’t the Vulcans of the colony and their detached but cruel words who make the jabs cut so very deeply.
Instead, it’s his fellow recipient.
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“The way I see it, you’ve got two options.” Travis grins smugly. “Option A, you come down here and I show you exactly how grateful I am for the rescue.”
Beck swallows, needing to clear his throat but not wanting to give Travis that much satisfaction. “And Option B?”
Travis’s grin fades away. His gaze goes intense, like he’s trying to pull off a sultry movie-siren smolder. “Option B? I make you come down here.”
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“Archie?” David Cook said blearily. “What’re you doing in my room?”
“Oh, no,” Archie said, and fell out of bed.
He landed mostly on his side, with one foot and arm still tangled in the covers. He fought his way out of them.
Cook’s head appeared over the side of the bed. “Archie?”
“Still here.” Still naked. Oh, he was in so much trouble.
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Merlin had spent a week trying to think of a good way to phrase this, and failing, so he didn’t try. “What is the rule of succession in Camelot?”
Arthur gave him a narrow look, and bit off the rear half of a marzipan unicorn with perhaps excessive zeal. “Why do you ask?” His voice was ominous, and Merlin sighed.
“Oh, no reason,” Merlin tried without much conviction, and Arthur predictably rolled his eyes and gave him a shrewd a look, like he was trying to read Merlin’s mind. Merlin tried to look harmlessly curious, but was pretty sure that Arthur was not convinced. He was also sure Arthur knew exactly why he was asking, and he waited with resignation for Arthur to order him off to the stocks again.
“Why don’t you ask Geoffrey,” Arthur said after a minute, and Merlin let out his breath in a whuff of surprise that he wasn’t being told off outright.
“Er, well,” he said, not quite sure how Arthur was going to react to this part.
Arthur put the unicorn down, fully focused on him now.
“You already asked Geoffrey,” he said, without any surprise.
“He told me to go away,” Merlin admitted, warily, and Arthur smiled, what looked like in spite of himself.
Fascinating political intrigue, charming Arthur & Merlin interaction.
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Sometimes, control is not possible. It is a bitter lesson, but all lessons must be learned, regardless of personal inclination. Spock raises a resigned eyebrow, turns, and looks McCoy full in the face. “Really, doctor?” he challenges. He can hear his feeling in his voice, sense it in his expression.
McCoy is startled. His eyes search Spock’s face. Spock waits as one second passes, then several more. McCoy looks down, then up again at Spock with a soft, knowing smile. He is so close, so close, his hand still lingering on Spock’s shoulder–
“I know,” McCoy says gently. Control is a memory. “I’m worried about Jim too.”
Saved. McCoy has always combined unexpected insight with unexpected obtuseness. Spock turns away, not sure what his reaction is but wishing nevertheless to hide it. Of course he is worried about Jim. He’s always worried about Jim, but he’s used to that. Jim, at least, is capable of the most basic self-defense; he rarely comes to serious harm. The odds are excellent that he is seducing a 892-IV native by now.
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Mr. Crawford had determined to be exactly what his habits were not: steadfast and purposeful. The decision had been made swiftly, as he did everything. Fanny expected him to go to Everingham – therefore he would go. It became apparent that charm alone would not win her; so he would be responsible and honorable and eager to do his duty: whatever would make her think well of him, that he would become. There was a kind of challenge in it that he accepted with enthusiasm, and which mostly compensated for the loss of the other challenge he had been pursuing. He had fully intended to make Mrs. Rushworth in love with him again, just to serve her right for being so cold. And he couldn’t help but regret that her pride would remain victorious. There was an injustice in it that irked him. At the thought of Fanny’s eyes, though – he could see those eyes before him, gentle and trusting, and then hurt and disappointed. No, it was too great a risk. Her strict propriety must govern his actions, at least for a while. The conquering of Maria Rushworth must take second place to that.
Everingham (Part 2) (Part 3)
[ Archived at The Derbyshire Writers' Guild ]
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Author’s summary: The Ancients’ genes didn’t just confer the power to activate their technology. For ten percent of Earth’s population, like John Sheppard, the ATA gene also gave them Gifts: special abilities that made them admired, envied, and feared.
Sheppard was a Charmer, one of the feared ones, whose particular Gift let him create faith whenever he needed to be trusted or believed. But Sheppard didn’t trust himself not to destroy what he loved most. And somewhere along the line, amid the terror and chaos of the Expedition’s first year in the Pegasus Galaxy, what Sheppard loved most had become Rodney McKay.
McKay didn’t trust anyone. As soon as you started trusting people, you started counting on them, depending on them, and that was when you became vulnerable. And vulnerable things didn’t survive. So just when, exactly, had he started trusting Sheppard?
And what was going to happen, now that he did?