![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mari4212I linked to them earlier, but I thought it would be good to keep copies easily found on my own journal.
Pride and Prejudice: You Can't Go Home Again They love their new lives.
She loves her husband and his new estate dearly. Jane tells herself this every so often, normally when he's run off again on a new impulse, and left her to talk with the tenant who always falls behind on his rents.
She loves her new role, Lizzy tells herself again, as she sits down with the housekeeper and the cook yet again to go over the traditional plans for the estate's harvest celebrations. She loves her husband, she reminds herself, as he once again starts teaching her to ride a horse, telling her again that she can't see all that Pemberley offers unless she rides out, that it's too far even for her to walk.
They love their new lives, Jane admits to herself, as she and Lizzy sit together in the Blue Parlor at Pemberley and catch each other up on gossip over tea. But sometimes she misses when it was just her and Lizzy, with no servants ferrying things in and out of the room, no other society matrons dropping by to chat. She misses being at home, sometimes, as much as she loves her husband.
And from the looks Lizzy gives, sometimes she misses it too.
L'Engleverse (Wrinkle in Time): Grace and Understanding
They told Mother, of course. Meg couldn't imagine not being able to tell her mother all about their quest to save Father.
They told her the basic story that night, after Sandy and Dennis had gone to bed and Calvin had left for his own home. Meg thought that only Charles Wallace told his full side of the story at that point. Parts of what she'd gone through were too much to tell all at once, too much to tell in front of Father and Charles Wallace, even for the parts they were there for. Listening to her father's story, she felt the same kind of absences and elisions as she had used, and knew that Father too would be telling a fuller story later, in private.
Mother called all four of them sick from school, telling them that she wanted them to have a full weekend free to spend with their father.
It was the Sunday at the end of the weekend when Meg finally had a chance to sit down with her mother in the lab. She toyed idly with a test tube, looking away as she finally admitted how afraid she'd been throughout, how much she'd wanted someone else to step in and rescue her family for her. And in the end, how it had felt to finally step up and do it, in spite of her fears and worries, knowing that she had to be the one.
Mother didn't say much in return, as she simply walked over to stand beside her, gave her a hug, and told her how proud she was of her daughter. Meg cried then, with the knowledge of how much had been at stake, and the fact that it was all over.
L'Engleverse (Austins):Letters
She goes to college, and they continue writing to each other, back and forth, as he works his way through his masters and doctorate. She ends up majoring in philosophy, though she'd begun as a literature student. She'd found that the lit classes spent too much time taking the books apart to fit theories, and not enough time simply reading and getting lost in the words. So she keeps her wonder in stories alive by not studying them, and instead debates the meaning of life and the existence of a mind or a soul. After her bachelor's she studies library science, and finds others who care as much for books and storytelling as she does there.
She quotes Descartes and Locke and Hume to Adam, sometimes because what they said was so brilliant and true that it cuts to the heart of her, sometimes because she cannot understand how they could have ever thought something so obviously false if they'd just looked around at people for a minute.
He responds back, sometimes with his own take on philosophers, but more often with raptures about how beautiful and intricate marine life could be, how the penguins they'd seen in Antarctica formed their social groups, more on dolphin communication, on the amazing intensity and beauty of a whale's song. Even when he finally focuses in on one field of study for his doctorate, there would still be the random facts about other animals that he'd picked up from the other grad students in their studies.
The letters seem almost at cross purposes, at times, each one writing more about their own passions than what the other person had sent, but Vicky thinks she truly fell in love with Adam, real adult love and not a crush, over those letters, as he made her feel the same love for science as he did, and as comments he made showed that he cared as much for her musings and poems as he did for his statistics and measurements.
L'Engleverse (Austins): Envy
Suzy envied Vicky for the longest time.
Vicky was glamorous, her last year in high school and into college. She'd gone to Antarctica, like Suzy had wanted to, had been through a part of South America that Suzy had fallen in love with after hearing her teacher's stories. She was tall and slim, and her hair was brown. She never got told that she was as cute as a button, or talked down to because she was blonde and blondes were ditzes. Mother and Father respected her, Grandfather had always had his most interesting conversations with Vicky. Even their brothers preferred Vicky, she felt. Rob had always worshiped her and followed her around, and since the summer Grandfather died, John had started confiding in her.
When Suzy started college, Vicky declared that she was going for a Masters in Library Science. The day that Suzy's teacher asked her to take an independent study with her on her research, Vicky announced her engagement to Adam.
She never stopped to think about how Vicky felt about it all, until the day she graduated with her Bachelors, Salutatorian of her class. Vicky was the first to reach her after the ceremony ended, hugged her tightly, and slipped a gaily-wrapped book into her hand. Opening it, she found it was a hard-bound copy of the biology research journal that her teacher had submitted their article to, with her name listed among the co-authors. Tucked inside the pages of the article was a handwritten poem, one that told about watching a golden-haired sister shine at everything she did, and how proud and amazed the author was to see her go so far beyond her wildest dreams.
She never felt quite so envious of her sister, after that.
Temeraire: Proof
Except for Granby, the men all wince back from her at times. She pretends she doesn't notice it, or that it would even matter if she did. She knows she is beautiful and strong, and better at fighting than everyone else around. She'll prove it to them someday. Just like she'll prove to Temeraire that she's just as good as he is, and better besides, because she's not afraid to go for all that she wants and needs. She'll let him give her an egg because she wants it, wants the child with both of their strengths to prove to everyone what they can do together.
She'll show the world how good she is, she knows it. No matter what anyone else might say.
Granby is the best, though, because he already knows and she doesn't have to prove it to him.
Tamora Pierce (Tortall): Risk-Taking
She's more terrified of this than anything else she's ever had to do. She could learn how to fight before she had to take to the battlefield, she knew how to teach magic, if just by remembering how others had taught her. She'd known what to do in confronting Duke Roger, either time. She'd known how to deal with snow before she'd gone to the roof of the world.
Mirthos, she'd even practiced how to be a lady and walk in a dress for months before she'd dared try it out.
But there was no way to learn how to be a mother to the child she now bore, except to do it, and hope not to fail too miserably.
Alanna hated leaving things to chance like this.
Tamora Pierce, Circle of Magic: Strength to Strength
She learned early how to be strong on the circus track. For the most part, the others in the troupe would support and protect you, but there was no guarantee, especially not when you hit the towns and cities. She learned fast to put up a tough shell and not let anyone in too deep.
But the problem with a strong defense is that it cuts you off from everyone. That winter, when it all went wrong, when her ankles healed, but not enough to continue performing, she found herself alone and desperate.
The temple dedicates who took her in were gentle and almost too soft to be believed, she thought, asking only that she help with the chores to earn her keep. When one of them discovered her magic while she sat spinning, they opened up even further to her.
Enraptured with the thought of learning more of the magic, and wanting desperately to understand what it was that made the dedicates the people they were, she became an novice, and then an initiate. So gradually that she barely realized it at the time, she found herself dropping her protective shell, and finding a new source of strength. Like stands of flax combed through and spun to become strong linen thread, relying on others, bending when necessary, she found she hurt less, needed less work to be calm and happy.
It was only when she befriended the newly named Dedicate Rosethorn that she realized how far she'd traveled from the woman she'd been before she became Lark. And how much stronger she was, by supposedly becoming weaker.
Merlin: Options
She sat down one day and considered her options about Arthur, very early on in their relationship. He tended to sweep her along in his choices if she didn't stop and think, and all of a sudden she'd find herself hosting a prince in her house, wondering why she no longer had a bed, and teaching a farmer dance steps. It was exhilarating and exhausting all at the same time, and she didn't want to find herself forever running to catch up, and only calling him on his assumptions after they'd all been made.
So, now. Now when Arthur wasn't around to distract her, she'd think clearly.
Option one was simple, that they did nothing. Arthur would become absorbed once again by his duties and other activities, training the knights and patrolling the borders, hunting and tormenting Merlin and a hundred other things. She'd continue serving Morgana and living her life in the town, spending quiet hours talking with Merlin or embroidering ribbons to sell for spending money and a little bit saved away, just in case. Eventually, Arthur would marry a lady or a princess, and she might marry as well, someone who she respected and liked, maybe even loved someday. It would be a good life, a respectable one with perhaps no great joys, but not as much risks or pain. It was, she thought, still the most likely of paths for her life to take, and she refused to bemoan the thought.
The second option was that Arthur would grow tired of a chaste courtship, and he would ask her to become more than what they were now, more than smiles in the hall and unmentioned memories of kisses, but far less than husband and wife. She likes to think that she would refuse such an offer, that she has enough dignity and self-worth to not become someone who no one would respect, either in town or court. She thinks that she would not throw away all of who she is to become his mistress. Better the first option than the loss of his respect for her, and her respect of him, in asking for that.
The third option is too impossible to put into words, but it is one which makes her heart leap any time she thinks on it. It is the one she sees in Arthur's stolen glances, in Merlin's wide, naive grins. She can't hope for it, but it steals into her heart nonetheless.
Merlin: Faces
Gwen learned how to sew from her mother, a seamstess at the palace. Step by step, painstakingly, Gwyneth had shown her each stitch, how to baste a seam to check for fit, how to do up a hem invisibly, how to sew on a patch and make it look like an intentional decoration, or how to make the patch disappear completely at a quick glance.
Two weeks after her mother died, the head seamstress at the palace agreed to let Gwen take her mother's place. It gave her a distraction from her grief.
She learned fast to hide what she was feeling and to concentrate on her work. The upper servants, the ones that served the nobles, didn't care if you missed your mother, or if the other new apprentice was jealous of you because the head seamstress liked your seaming. They didn't care if you'd stabbed your finger on a miss-judged needle, as long as you didn't bleed on the fabric and kept working.
Morgana arrived a year later. Her father had just died, and her entire wardrobe needed to be replaced with mourning clothes, as the nobles did it. Gwen had been assigned to take the first batch of dresses to her chambers for a fitting. When she reached the light, sunny room, she saw a pale girl, her face blotchy with tears, hair half-falling out of her braid, and she dropped the clothing to reach out and comfort the girl.
Something in her face must have gotten it across, the sudden surge of empathy. She was sure her expression told it all. I know, I've been there too. It hurts. It will get better someday.
King Uther may have been surprised when his new ward's first request was to have a seamstress's apprentice become her lady's maid, but Gwen wasn't.
Star Trek TNG: Aspects
She couldn't hear their thoughts, but their emotions gave them away. So many people, ambassadors, civilian scientists and administrators, even other Starfleet officers. They saw her face, they ogled her figure, and they dismissed Deanna Troi without thinking twice as a brainless bimbo, kept on as the captain's bit of pretty on the bridge.
Or they knew Laxwana, Daughter of the Fifth House, Holder of the Sacred Chalice of Rixx, and Heir to the Holy Rings of Betazed, and they assumed that any daughter of such a mother must be either a pampered princess who never had to work for anything, or an absolute nonentity, a nebbish, Crewman David had called it once, a woman so crushed before her mother's expansive personality that she ceased to exist on her own terms.
She dearly valued those who took her on her own terms, who saw beyond the face and the mother and the empathy and found the person within, the woman who loved chocolate a bit more than strictly necessary, the woman who loved abstract paintings and philosophy and music. The woman tough enough to ace the Starfleet survival training course, and land the detached saucer section of a Galaxy-class starship on unknown terrain after taking damage. The woman whose best friend is Beverly Crusher, who has fallen in love with several men, and been loved in return. The woman who never finds her own limits.
The woman who is Deanna Troi, not just a pretty face on a nice body.
Torchwood: Private Victory
The Hub was quiet, late at night. Gwen and Owen had gone home, and Ianto had said something about dragging Jack along and sleeping on a bed designed to hold more than one person.
...Tosh decided to stop that train of thought right there.
Even Myfanwy was quiet, curled up in her nest. She always seemed more active in the morning and evenings.
She didn't mind the emptiness and quiet. She'd sought them out on purpose. She loved them all, but her coworkers were, for the most part, incredibly noisy people. It made it hard to focus on the more subtle aspects of programing.
And she was so close to finishing that translation database, she could taste it. One last compilation, and it would be ready for a test drive tonight, in private. A last keystroke, and then the program was ready to go live.
She tested it out with a piece that Jack had already translated, to start with. Within a half an hour, the program popped onscreen with an approximate translation only subtly different from Jack's, along with a couple of highlighted passages with multiple possible meanings.
Now she was very glad she'd waited till she was alone in the Hub. It meant that when she started whooping and dancing around her computer in a victory celebration, no one was there to stare in shock.
Torchwood: Afternoons and Coffeespoons
So occasionally, Gwen thinks if she spend one more minute surrounded by men or talking about work, she's going to blow. And it's even more difficult to sit with her old girlfriends, because her life's completely different and impossible to explain, even if she were allowed to.
A lot of the time, she can tell Tosh feels the same way. She gets that pinched look about her eyes when Owen and Jack decide to spend a slow afternoon on fart jokes, and even Ianto starts tossing in a few.
They'll call it a day early, leave the boys to close up, and they'll go someplace together. A quiet pub without too many games on the telly or a pub quiz going, a boutique store with clothes that are ridiculously expensive, but fit the both of them so well that it's almost worth it, or some restaurant, casual enough for the both of them to pass in work clothes, but nicer than anything they'd order from at the Hub.
The only rules were no discussion of work or men. The first time, they'd stumbled a bit, until she brought up the argument she'd been having with Rhys's mother, who seriously must moonlight as Grendel's mother on weekends. Tosh had laughed herself silly as Gwen went on, mimicking her to-be mother-in-law's voice and mannerisms. Then Tosh had talked about her aunts and their constant talk about how she should just find a nice man and settle down, if she could find one now that she's so old. And the conversation had flowed from there.
Now, any time they headed out on their own, it was a matter of minutes before they were back on whatever conversation they'd been having the last time. And it was so much fun, being women and friends, not just co-workers.
Buffy: Element of Surprise
The truck backfired loudly, as they were pulling up to the latest vamp nest. Rona winced and muttered, "So much for the element of surprise," as she parked, grabbing a few more reloads for her crossbow.
Faith just laughed. "That just makes it more fun, you know. 'Sides, kicking the door in midway through the afternoon always seems to distract them anyways."
Rona grinned, then joined her at what looked like it was serving as the main doorway. "On three, then?"
To answer, Faith just started the countdown and shifted her balance. Their feet hit the doors at the same time, and the banging sound echoed through the cavernous space of the abandoned factory. Vampires throughout the room startled up from where they had been lounging, with one tripping over his feet in the process. A couple who had chosen a spot too close to the main doors had burns down their backs from the sunlight streaming in. Faith turned to Rona. "See, works every time."
A second to catch their breaths, and the fight was on.
NCIS: Average Day at the Office
She flips on the lights and turns the music on in three steps. Android Lust is best in the mornings, it always gets her up and moving. In front of the computer is her first Caff-Pow, Gibbs always leaves one for her in the mornings if he beats her in. He almost always does, unless she pulled an all-nighter for another team.
She starts the rounds of her babies. Major Mass Spec was almost done with an analysis of some foreign dirt from a crime scene, a red clay that stood out strongly against the gravel and sand of the local beach. The fingerprints scans were still running, though two results had popped up already, the victim's and one of the clerks from the ice cream stand two yards from where the body had been found. DNA was also in full gear, but it would most likely be running for the greater part of today as well, unless the program lucked out on matches early. Nothing new or useful yet.
She'd prepped slides of the tissue samples and fibers last night, but the case wasn't that big of a priority, so she'd headed out around nine, rather than do the microscopic studies overnight and end up with the eyestrain headache she always got after too many hours in her lab at a time. She popped the first one in, a swatch of the Lt.'s shirt that had been torn in the attack, and began to work.
NCIS: Revenants
She has two ghosts that follow her, no matter how far and fast she runs, no matter how busy her day. No matter how much good she does, they remain.
The first is a young girl, full of long coltish limbs and laughing eyes. Tali had always laughed well, full and ringing, or gasping in between as she caught her breath at the end of a race. They had been racing the day she'd died, Tali had outrun her to the end of the block, and turned to laugh her victory in Ziva's face when the bomb had struck. Tali had died laughing and happy until the very last second.
The second is a man in his full prime, tall, with dark hair and eyes that held more secrets than she'd ever known. She'd deceived herself, she knew, letting him get away with telling her less and less, while thinking that he was finally opening up to her. He died unaware, too busy gloating at Gibbs to pay attention to any sound she may have made.
She grieves for the both of them, her lost siblings. And in the long dark watches of the night, she wonders when she will finally join them.
SG-1: Christmas
She hadn't actually caught on to the fact that these Earth humans had a holiday coming up until it was almost upon her. Landry didn't believe in decorating the base, of course, and she didn't actually go up to the surface that often. For one, it had gotten rather cold the past few months, and for another, it wasn't all that fun unless she was going out with her teammates. Daniel made such interesting faces when she started ignoring their culture's silly customs. Even her teammates had failed to let her in on the matter. Daniel was always somewhat distracted and focused on his books, and Sam and Mitchell both seemed to forget about the rest of the world while they were at work.
Teal'c later told her that she could have found out about it had she watched television with her, but that was also rather boring. Especially as no one aside from Teal'c was ever interested in watching with her and explaining all the strange things that were apparently normal for Earth culture. Why would anyone care whether or not something was not butter? And what was a polar bear anyway, and why were people confused about it being on some random island? It seemed as good a place as any for whatever-it-was to be.
So really, the first thing she caught about this whole Christmas thing was when Mitchell informed her that 'since he was heading out to visit family, he might as well give her her present early.'
She'd been confused, but Vala had not gotten as far as she had in her life by ever letting on that she was confused. Or, for that matter, by turning down gifts. She simply graciously accepted it, cooed appropriately over the bracelet, which was, after all, a very pretty thing, and then headed off to find someone else to explain what the heck was going on.
Sam, she thought, was probably the best choice. Daniel rambled too much once he got started on anything about any culture, and Teal'c was often just as confused and amused about Earth customs as she was.
So when she burst into Sam's lab, the first words out of her mouth were, "So, what exactly is this Christmas thing about, anyway? And do I really get gifts out of it?"
She still wasn't sure why Sam started laughing until she choked. It was a perfectly reasonable question.
SG-1: Meaning and Missing
Her brother asks her, during one of their infrequent phone calls, if she regretted missing out on a marriage and family. She brushes it off at the time, laughing and asking him if he was looking to trade in his two teenagers for a free evening.
But the question still lingered in her mind after she'd hung up the phone. In her day-to-day life, no, she didn't miss anything, didn't regret anything. Her work was incredible, exhausting, thrilling, it challenged her every day. It was just in the quiet evenings, or the afternoons on their off weeks, when the house echoed strangely around her, absent of someone else to make noises and take up space near her. She didn't miss any one person, didn't regret moving on from any of the men she'd dated, but there were times when she wished for someone to be with her.
Then, the phone would ring, and it would be Cassie calling and wanting advice about something in college, or Jack wanting to complain about politics in Washington and why crosswords weren't as much fun without Daniel complaining about his creative answers. Or it would be Vala insisting that they needed a girls night out on the town, or Teal'c wanting to take her out to a concert. Somehow, a year ago, he'd decided that she would love listening to classical music with him, and he'd been right.
And before she knew it, her echoingly empty evening would be full of life and laughter. And she knew she wouldn't trade it for anything other life in the universe.
SGA: Trade Secrets
She has noticed a pattern of events when it comes her team's missions. All will be well, they will approach a group of people whom she has traded with successfully on many occasions, and she will already be anticipating with delight the tea that only that planet has to offer for trading sessions, or the roasted cheese and vegetables that another planet serves over crisp flatbread at the end of a successful bargain.
And then either John will promise something foolish, or Rodney will say something in exactly the wrong tone of voice, and it will all end in violence and a speedy run back towards the Gate, without so much as a single sip of the tea. She is not sure why, after two years of such missions, neither one of the Earth humans has learned to hold his tongue.
Ronon is never such a problem on these missions, a fact which she blesses. He knows the rhythms of trade as well as she does, what to reveal and what to conceal until later.
On this last mission, she notices John opening his mouth to speak far to early during the ritual silence the Talliarans demand before trade commences. She kicks out sideways and catches his shin, then shakes her head when he looks over with a wounded expression on his face.
The Talliarans make a delicious desert using ground nuts and honey, and she refuses to let John's impatience cheat her out of it.
Besides, Elizabeth had begged her to keep the men out of trouble for at least one mission.
SGA: Many Shades, the Same Color
Her mother died when she was a little girl, only lately learning to walk and to speak. She cannot remember her mother at all, only her father's voice, harsh with grief in her ear, as he tells her they must be strong. She nods her head, she always agrees with her father, but she does not understand yet.
When she is five, she is singing by herself outside their tent, and she is noticed by one of the elders. The woman takes her under her wing, teaches her to train her strong voice, and gives her tuttle-root soup and advice.
When she is eight, and finally big enough, she joins the older children in fighting practices. Her body is flexible and limber, quick to learn how to deliver each blow with the correct strength, not over-extending herself, but balancing until the moves flow like a dance.
Her father dies not long after, and she finally learns the strength he'd told her to have so many years ago, the patient endurance of accepting a loss you cannot erase.
Pride and Prejudice: You Can't Go Home Again They love their new lives.
She loves her husband and his new estate dearly. Jane tells herself this every so often, normally when he's run off again on a new impulse, and left her to talk with the tenant who always falls behind on his rents.
She loves her new role, Lizzy tells herself again, as she sits down with the housekeeper and the cook yet again to go over the traditional plans for the estate's harvest celebrations. She loves her husband, she reminds herself, as he once again starts teaching her to ride a horse, telling her again that she can't see all that Pemberley offers unless she rides out, that it's too far even for her to walk.
They love their new lives, Jane admits to herself, as she and Lizzy sit together in the Blue Parlor at Pemberley and catch each other up on gossip over tea. But sometimes she misses when it was just her and Lizzy, with no servants ferrying things in and out of the room, no other society matrons dropping by to chat. She misses being at home, sometimes, as much as she loves her husband.
And from the looks Lizzy gives, sometimes she misses it too.
L'Engleverse (Wrinkle in Time): Grace and Understanding
They told Mother, of course. Meg couldn't imagine not being able to tell her mother all about their quest to save Father.
They told her the basic story that night, after Sandy and Dennis had gone to bed and Calvin had left for his own home. Meg thought that only Charles Wallace told his full side of the story at that point. Parts of what she'd gone through were too much to tell all at once, too much to tell in front of Father and Charles Wallace, even for the parts they were there for. Listening to her father's story, she felt the same kind of absences and elisions as she had used, and knew that Father too would be telling a fuller story later, in private.
Mother called all four of them sick from school, telling them that she wanted them to have a full weekend free to spend with their father.
It was the Sunday at the end of the weekend when Meg finally had a chance to sit down with her mother in the lab. She toyed idly with a test tube, looking away as she finally admitted how afraid she'd been throughout, how much she'd wanted someone else to step in and rescue her family for her. And in the end, how it had felt to finally step up and do it, in spite of her fears and worries, knowing that she had to be the one.
Mother didn't say much in return, as she simply walked over to stand beside her, gave her a hug, and told her how proud she was of her daughter. Meg cried then, with the knowledge of how much had been at stake, and the fact that it was all over.
L'Engleverse (Austins):Letters
She goes to college, and they continue writing to each other, back and forth, as he works his way through his masters and doctorate. She ends up majoring in philosophy, though she'd begun as a literature student. She'd found that the lit classes spent too much time taking the books apart to fit theories, and not enough time simply reading and getting lost in the words. So she keeps her wonder in stories alive by not studying them, and instead debates the meaning of life and the existence of a mind or a soul. After her bachelor's she studies library science, and finds others who care as much for books and storytelling as she does there.
She quotes Descartes and Locke and Hume to Adam, sometimes because what they said was so brilliant and true that it cuts to the heart of her, sometimes because she cannot understand how they could have ever thought something so obviously false if they'd just looked around at people for a minute.
He responds back, sometimes with his own take on philosophers, but more often with raptures about how beautiful and intricate marine life could be, how the penguins they'd seen in Antarctica formed their social groups, more on dolphin communication, on the amazing intensity and beauty of a whale's song. Even when he finally focuses in on one field of study for his doctorate, there would still be the random facts about other animals that he'd picked up from the other grad students in their studies.
The letters seem almost at cross purposes, at times, each one writing more about their own passions than what the other person had sent, but Vicky thinks she truly fell in love with Adam, real adult love and not a crush, over those letters, as he made her feel the same love for science as he did, and as comments he made showed that he cared as much for her musings and poems as he did for his statistics and measurements.
L'Engleverse (Austins): Envy
Suzy envied Vicky for the longest time.
Vicky was glamorous, her last year in high school and into college. She'd gone to Antarctica, like Suzy had wanted to, had been through a part of South America that Suzy had fallen in love with after hearing her teacher's stories. She was tall and slim, and her hair was brown. She never got told that she was as cute as a button, or talked down to because she was blonde and blondes were ditzes. Mother and Father respected her, Grandfather had always had his most interesting conversations with Vicky. Even their brothers preferred Vicky, she felt. Rob had always worshiped her and followed her around, and since the summer Grandfather died, John had started confiding in her.
When Suzy started college, Vicky declared that she was going for a Masters in Library Science. The day that Suzy's teacher asked her to take an independent study with her on her research, Vicky announced her engagement to Adam.
She never stopped to think about how Vicky felt about it all, until the day she graduated with her Bachelors, Salutatorian of her class. Vicky was the first to reach her after the ceremony ended, hugged her tightly, and slipped a gaily-wrapped book into her hand. Opening it, she found it was a hard-bound copy of the biology research journal that her teacher had submitted their article to, with her name listed among the co-authors. Tucked inside the pages of the article was a handwritten poem, one that told about watching a golden-haired sister shine at everything she did, and how proud and amazed the author was to see her go so far beyond her wildest dreams.
She never felt quite so envious of her sister, after that.
Temeraire: Proof
Except for Granby, the men all wince back from her at times. She pretends she doesn't notice it, or that it would even matter if she did. She knows she is beautiful and strong, and better at fighting than everyone else around. She'll prove it to them someday. Just like she'll prove to Temeraire that she's just as good as he is, and better besides, because she's not afraid to go for all that she wants and needs. She'll let him give her an egg because she wants it, wants the child with both of their strengths to prove to everyone what they can do together.
She'll show the world how good she is, she knows it. No matter what anyone else might say.
Granby is the best, though, because he already knows and she doesn't have to prove it to him.
Tamora Pierce (Tortall): Risk-Taking
She's more terrified of this than anything else she's ever had to do. She could learn how to fight before she had to take to the battlefield, she knew how to teach magic, if just by remembering how others had taught her. She'd known what to do in confronting Duke Roger, either time. She'd known how to deal with snow before she'd gone to the roof of the world.
Mirthos, she'd even practiced how to be a lady and walk in a dress for months before she'd dared try it out.
But there was no way to learn how to be a mother to the child she now bore, except to do it, and hope not to fail too miserably.
Alanna hated leaving things to chance like this.
Tamora Pierce, Circle of Magic: Strength to Strength
She learned early how to be strong on the circus track. For the most part, the others in the troupe would support and protect you, but there was no guarantee, especially not when you hit the towns and cities. She learned fast to put up a tough shell and not let anyone in too deep.
But the problem with a strong defense is that it cuts you off from everyone. That winter, when it all went wrong, when her ankles healed, but not enough to continue performing, she found herself alone and desperate.
The temple dedicates who took her in were gentle and almost too soft to be believed, she thought, asking only that she help with the chores to earn her keep. When one of them discovered her magic while she sat spinning, they opened up even further to her.
Enraptured with the thought of learning more of the magic, and wanting desperately to understand what it was that made the dedicates the people they were, she became an novice, and then an initiate. So gradually that she barely realized it at the time, she found herself dropping her protective shell, and finding a new source of strength. Like stands of flax combed through and spun to become strong linen thread, relying on others, bending when necessary, she found she hurt less, needed less work to be calm and happy.
It was only when she befriended the newly named Dedicate Rosethorn that she realized how far she'd traveled from the woman she'd been before she became Lark. And how much stronger she was, by supposedly becoming weaker.
Merlin: Options
She sat down one day and considered her options about Arthur, very early on in their relationship. He tended to sweep her along in his choices if she didn't stop and think, and all of a sudden she'd find herself hosting a prince in her house, wondering why she no longer had a bed, and teaching a farmer dance steps. It was exhilarating and exhausting all at the same time, and she didn't want to find herself forever running to catch up, and only calling him on his assumptions after they'd all been made.
So, now. Now when Arthur wasn't around to distract her, she'd think clearly.
Option one was simple, that they did nothing. Arthur would become absorbed once again by his duties and other activities, training the knights and patrolling the borders, hunting and tormenting Merlin and a hundred other things. She'd continue serving Morgana and living her life in the town, spending quiet hours talking with Merlin or embroidering ribbons to sell for spending money and a little bit saved away, just in case. Eventually, Arthur would marry a lady or a princess, and she might marry as well, someone who she respected and liked, maybe even loved someday. It would be a good life, a respectable one with perhaps no great joys, but not as much risks or pain. It was, she thought, still the most likely of paths for her life to take, and she refused to bemoan the thought.
The second option was that Arthur would grow tired of a chaste courtship, and he would ask her to become more than what they were now, more than smiles in the hall and unmentioned memories of kisses, but far less than husband and wife. She likes to think that she would refuse such an offer, that she has enough dignity and self-worth to not become someone who no one would respect, either in town or court. She thinks that she would not throw away all of who she is to become his mistress. Better the first option than the loss of his respect for her, and her respect of him, in asking for that.
The third option is too impossible to put into words, but it is one which makes her heart leap any time she thinks on it. It is the one she sees in Arthur's stolen glances, in Merlin's wide, naive grins. She can't hope for it, but it steals into her heart nonetheless.
Merlin: Faces
Gwen learned how to sew from her mother, a seamstess at the palace. Step by step, painstakingly, Gwyneth had shown her each stitch, how to baste a seam to check for fit, how to do up a hem invisibly, how to sew on a patch and make it look like an intentional decoration, or how to make the patch disappear completely at a quick glance.
Two weeks after her mother died, the head seamstress at the palace agreed to let Gwen take her mother's place. It gave her a distraction from her grief.
She learned fast to hide what she was feeling and to concentrate on her work. The upper servants, the ones that served the nobles, didn't care if you missed your mother, or if the other new apprentice was jealous of you because the head seamstress liked your seaming. They didn't care if you'd stabbed your finger on a miss-judged needle, as long as you didn't bleed on the fabric and kept working.
Morgana arrived a year later. Her father had just died, and her entire wardrobe needed to be replaced with mourning clothes, as the nobles did it. Gwen had been assigned to take the first batch of dresses to her chambers for a fitting. When she reached the light, sunny room, she saw a pale girl, her face blotchy with tears, hair half-falling out of her braid, and she dropped the clothing to reach out and comfort the girl.
Something in her face must have gotten it across, the sudden surge of empathy. She was sure her expression told it all. I know, I've been there too. It hurts. It will get better someday.
King Uther may have been surprised when his new ward's first request was to have a seamstress's apprentice become her lady's maid, but Gwen wasn't.
Star Trek TNG: Aspects
She couldn't hear their thoughts, but their emotions gave them away. So many people, ambassadors, civilian scientists and administrators, even other Starfleet officers. They saw her face, they ogled her figure, and they dismissed Deanna Troi without thinking twice as a brainless bimbo, kept on as the captain's bit of pretty on the bridge.
Or they knew Laxwana, Daughter of the Fifth House, Holder of the Sacred Chalice of Rixx, and Heir to the Holy Rings of Betazed, and they assumed that any daughter of such a mother must be either a pampered princess who never had to work for anything, or an absolute nonentity, a nebbish, Crewman David had called it once, a woman so crushed before her mother's expansive personality that she ceased to exist on her own terms.
She dearly valued those who took her on her own terms, who saw beyond the face and the mother and the empathy and found the person within, the woman who loved chocolate a bit more than strictly necessary, the woman who loved abstract paintings and philosophy and music. The woman tough enough to ace the Starfleet survival training course, and land the detached saucer section of a Galaxy-class starship on unknown terrain after taking damage. The woman whose best friend is Beverly Crusher, who has fallen in love with several men, and been loved in return. The woman who never finds her own limits.
The woman who is Deanna Troi, not just a pretty face on a nice body.
Torchwood: Private Victory
The Hub was quiet, late at night. Gwen and Owen had gone home, and Ianto had said something about dragging Jack along and sleeping on a bed designed to hold more than one person.
...Tosh decided to stop that train of thought right there.
Even Myfanwy was quiet, curled up in her nest. She always seemed more active in the morning and evenings.
She didn't mind the emptiness and quiet. She'd sought them out on purpose. She loved them all, but her coworkers were, for the most part, incredibly noisy people. It made it hard to focus on the more subtle aspects of programing.
And she was so close to finishing that translation database, she could taste it. One last compilation, and it would be ready for a test drive tonight, in private. A last keystroke, and then the program was ready to go live.
She tested it out with a piece that Jack had already translated, to start with. Within a half an hour, the program popped onscreen with an approximate translation only subtly different from Jack's, along with a couple of highlighted passages with multiple possible meanings.
Now she was very glad she'd waited till she was alone in the Hub. It meant that when she started whooping and dancing around her computer in a victory celebration, no one was there to stare in shock.
Torchwood: Afternoons and Coffeespoons
So occasionally, Gwen thinks if she spend one more minute surrounded by men or talking about work, she's going to blow. And it's even more difficult to sit with her old girlfriends, because her life's completely different and impossible to explain, even if she were allowed to.
A lot of the time, she can tell Tosh feels the same way. She gets that pinched look about her eyes when Owen and Jack decide to spend a slow afternoon on fart jokes, and even Ianto starts tossing in a few.
They'll call it a day early, leave the boys to close up, and they'll go someplace together. A quiet pub without too many games on the telly or a pub quiz going, a boutique store with clothes that are ridiculously expensive, but fit the both of them so well that it's almost worth it, or some restaurant, casual enough for the both of them to pass in work clothes, but nicer than anything they'd order from at the Hub.
The only rules were no discussion of work or men. The first time, they'd stumbled a bit, until she brought up the argument she'd been having with Rhys's mother, who seriously must moonlight as Grendel's mother on weekends. Tosh had laughed herself silly as Gwen went on, mimicking her to-be mother-in-law's voice and mannerisms. Then Tosh had talked about her aunts and their constant talk about how she should just find a nice man and settle down, if she could find one now that she's so old. And the conversation had flowed from there.
Now, any time they headed out on their own, it was a matter of minutes before they were back on whatever conversation they'd been having the last time. And it was so much fun, being women and friends, not just co-workers.
Buffy: Element of Surprise
The truck backfired loudly, as they were pulling up to the latest vamp nest. Rona winced and muttered, "So much for the element of surprise," as she parked, grabbing a few more reloads for her crossbow.
Faith just laughed. "That just makes it more fun, you know. 'Sides, kicking the door in midway through the afternoon always seems to distract them anyways."
Rona grinned, then joined her at what looked like it was serving as the main doorway. "On three, then?"
To answer, Faith just started the countdown and shifted her balance. Their feet hit the doors at the same time, and the banging sound echoed through the cavernous space of the abandoned factory. Vampires throughout the room startled up from where they had been lounging, with one tripping over his feet in the process. A couple who had chosen a spot too close to the main doors had burns down their backs from the sunlight streaming in. Faith turned to Rona. "See, works every time."
A second to catch their breaths, and the fight was on.
NCIS: Average Day at the Office
She flips on the lights and turns the music on in three steps. Android Lust is best in the mornings, it always gets her up and moving. In front of the computer is her first Caff-Pow, Gibbs always leaves one for her in the mornings if he beats her in. He almost always does, unless she pulled an all-nighter for another team.
She starts the rounds of her babies. Major Mass Spec was almost done with an analysis of some foreign dirt from a crime scene, a red clay that stood out strongly against the gravel and sand of the local beach. The fingerprints scans were still running, though two results had popped up already, the victim's and one of the clerks from the ice cream stand two yards from where the body had been found. DNA was also in full gear, but it would most likely be running for the greater part of today as well, unless the program lucked out on matches early. Nothing new or useful yet.
She'd prepped slides of the tissue samples and fibers last night, but the case wasn't that big of a priority, so she'd headed out around nine, rather than do the microscopic studies overnight and end up with the eyestrain headache she always got after too many hours in her lab at a time. She popped the first one in, a swatch of the Lt.'s shirt that had been torn in the attack, and began to work.
NCIS: Revenants
She has two ghosts that follow her, no matter how far and fast she runs, no matter how busy her day. No matter how much good she does, they remain.
The first is a young girl, full of long coltish limbs and laughing eyes. Tali had always laughed well, full and ringing, or gasping in between as she caught her breath at the end of a race. They had been racing the day she'd died, Tali had outrun her to the end of the block, and turned to laugh her victory in Ziva's face when the bomb had struck. Tali had died laughing and happy until the very last second.
The second is a man in his full prime, tall, with dark hair and eyes that held more secrets than she'd ever known. She'd deceived herself, she knew, letting him get away with telling her less and less, while thinking that he was finally opening up to her. He died unaware, too busy gloating at Gibbs to pay attention to any sound she may have made.
She grieves for the both of them, her lost siblings. And in the long dark watches of the night, she wonders when she will finally join them.
SG-1: Christmas
She hadn't actually caught on to the fact that these Earth humans had a holiday coming up until it was almost upon her. Landry didn't believe in decorating the base, of course, and she didn't actually go up to the surface that often. For one, it had gotten rather cold the past few months, and for another, it wasn't all that fun unless she was going out with her teammates. Daniel made such interesting faces when she started ignoring their culture's silly customs. Even her teammates had failed to let her in on the matter. Daniel was always somewhat distracted and focused on his books, and Sam and Mitchell both seemed to forget about the rest of the world while they were at work.
Teal'c later told her that she could have found out about it had she watched television with her, but that was also rather boring. Especially as no one aside from Teal'c was ever interested in watching with her and explaining all the strange things that were apparently normal for Earth culture. Why would anyone care whether or not something was not butter? And what was a polar bear anyway, and why were people confused about it being on some random island? It seemed as good a place as any for whatever-it-was to be.
So really, the first thing she caught about this whole Christmas thing was when Mitchell informed her that 'since he was heading out to visit family, he might as well give her her present early.'
She'd been confused, but Vala had not gotten as far as she had in her life by ever letting on that she was confused. Or, for that matter, by turning down gifts. She simply graciously accepted it, cooed appropriately over the bracelet, which was, after all, a very pretty thing, and then headed off to find someone else to explain what the heck was going on.
Sam, she thought, was probably the best choice. Daniel rambled too much once he got started on anything about any culture, and Teal'c was often just as confused and amused about Earth customs as she was.
So when she burst into Sam's lab, the first words out of her mouth were, "So, what exactly is this Christmas thing about, anyway? And do I really get gifts out of it?"
She still wasn't sure why Sam started laughing until she choked. It was a perfectly reasonable question.
SG-1: Meaning and Missing
Her brother asks her, during one of their infrequent phone calls, if she regretted missing out on a marriage and family. She brushes it off at the time, laughing and asking him if he was looking to trade in his two teenagers for a free evening.
But the question still lingered in her mind after she'd hung up the phone. In her day-to-day life, no, she didn't miss anything, didn't regret anything. Her work was incredible, exhausting, thrilling, it challenged her every day. It was just in the quiet evenings, or the afternoons on their off weeks, when the house echoed strangely around her, absent of someone else to make noises and take up space near her. She didn't miss any one person, didn't regret moving on from any of the men she'd dated, but there were times when she wished for someone to be with her.
Then, the phone would ring, and it would be Cassie calling and wanting advice about something in college, or Jack wanting to complain about politics in Washington and why crosswords weren't as much fun without Daniel complaining about his creative answers. Or it would be Vala insisting that they needed a girls night out on the town, or Teal'c wanting to take her out to a concert. Somehow, a year ago, he'd decided that she would love listening to classical music with him, and he'd been right.
And before she knew it, her echoingly empty evening would be full of life and laughter. And she knew she wouldn't trade it for anything other life in the universe.
SGA: Trade Secrets
She has noticed a pattern of events when it comes her team's missions. All will be well, they will approach a group of people whom she has traded with successfully on many occasions, and she will already be anticipating with delight the tea that only that planet has to offer for trading sessions, or the roasted cheese and vegetables that another planet serves over crisp flatbread at the end of a successful bargain.
And then either John will promise something foolish, or Rodney will say something in exactly the wrong tone of voice, and it will all end in violence and a speedy run back towards the Gate, without so much as a single sip of the tea. She is not sure why, after two years of such missions, neither one of the Earth humans has learned to hold his tongue.
Ronon is never such a problem on these missions, a fact which she blesses. He knows the rhythms of trade as well as she does, what to reveal and what to conceal until later.
On this last mission, she notices John opening his mouth to speak far to early during the ritual silence the Talliarans demand before trade commences. She kicks out sideways and catches his shin, then shakes her head when he looks over with a wounded expression on his face.
The Talliarans make a delicious desert using ground nuts and honey, and she refuses to let John's impatience cheat her out of it.
Besides, Elizabeth had begged her to keep the men out of trouble for at least one mission.
SGA: Many Shades, the Same Color
Her mother died when she was a little girl, only lately learning to walk and to speak. She cannot remember her mother at all, only her father's voice, harsh with grief in her ear, as he tells her they must be strong. She nods her head, she always agrees with her father, but she does not understand yet.
When she is five, she is singing by herself outside their tent, and she is noticed by one of the elders. The woman takes her under her wing, teaches her to train her strong voice, and gives her tuttle-root soup and advice.
When she is eight, and finally big enough, she joins the older children in fighting practices. Her body is flexible and limber, quick to learn how to deliver each blow with the correct strength, not over-extending herself, but balancing until the moves flow like a dance.
Her father dies not long after, and she finally learns the strength he'd told her to have so many years ago, the patient endurance of accepting a loss you cannot erase.