seldear | meme reply III

Name a pairing or character (that I'm familiar with, in a fandom I'm familiar with) and I will write the first paragraph or segment of a story for it.

For

coltsbane (II):

No Immunity
(Mini!WW/Mini!Bats)

He dreams of a girl who can beat him up, of a pretty girl with blue eyes and black hair, whose expression is both amused and pitying as he runs along the ground, unable to fly, unable to soar with her and the others.

A child has dreams of flying, of superpowers and flight, of fighting the bad guys and triumphing over evil. But this child who is him, cloaked in black and with the knowledge of his adult self, knows that there is no end to the evil, no true triumph over the darkness of human nature. He embodies that darkness in his clothing and his mindset, in his modus operandi and his thoughts, there is no escape from who he is and what has made him.

But the girl shyly flirts with him, devoid of the self-consciousness of her adult self. He does notice, he just chooses not to comment. And she's not his girlfriend, whether child or adult. A 'girlfriend' suggests that she's just a pretty ornament on the arm of a man.

This girl is and will be a woman whose personal strength cannot be measured, whose intelligence is formidable, and whose laugh will make men forget their sophisticated cool.

And he is no more immune to her attraction as a boy than he is as a man.

--

For

elaran and

ssmith_12:

Nature
(Sam/Jack)

She turns her face towards him as the sun sets over the desert, and he can see the swift-drying traces of her tears down her cheeks.

He hunkers down beside her in the sand, wincing as his knees protest. "I'm sorry."

It's little enough to offer her, but all he has. And in this land of desert sand, of brutal heat by day and bitter cold by night, they are all they have: each other and Teal'c and Daniel in this world that will not be theirs for another five thousand years.

He misses his time: his beer, his television, his Sunday college sports, his bed. He understands why, but he hates being here. She was right: it's his nature to do something about the situation, not stand back and watch.

She forgot one thing, though. It's not her nature to stand back and watch, either.

And earlier, she chastised them for doing something they shouldn't have: they intervened in a pregnant woman's beating by her husband. Daniel helped the woman, Teal'c gently menaced the husband, and Jack had an argument with Carter about their actions.

He said things he shouldn't have said. Cruel things about her being a weight around their necks and trapping them here, about being too cowardly to act for fear of changing the future, and other unkindnesses that a man should never say to the woman he loves.

But he knows that she felt the injustice of the moment, too. Her hands clenched around the handle of the grist as the first slap landed, and the expression on her face was deadly as she looked up into his eyes across the low table on which they'd been preparing their dinner.

Carter looks away from him now, choosing not to say anything.

It's not forgiveness, not quite. They're stranded five thousand years from forgiveness with no way home.

And Jack hates it.

He wishes he could hate her. It would make things simpler. Easier.

He can't. He's tried to hate her, and he can't.

It's not in his nature.

--

For

elaran (II):

Consolation
(Hermione and Blaise)

Hermione Granger consoled herself with one thought.

It could have been Draco Malfoy.

"Look, I don't want to be here any more than you do," she began.

"Save the speeches for Weasley, Granger," Blaise Zabini said, glancing over his shoulder with contemptuous briskness. "He'll appreciate your protests more."

She fumed. Quietly.

--

Still going!