one more fic for the night
Sep. 28th, 2005 10:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rivendellroseI'd meant to wait until the 30th to do any post-Serenity fic-writing, but the idea for this one attacked me this morning and wouldn't go away until I'd written it.
Title: "The Absence of Sound"
Fandom: Firefly
Warnings: MASSIVE SPOILERS FOR "SERENITY"!!!!! This is not a happy little fic, either. Fair warning.
There’s no more sound in the night - no more snoring, no more muttering, no more jokes as she settles in to sleep. The silence fills the whole ship, the ship that answered to his touch as easily as she herself did, rising and falling at his light nudge. She never realized before that she could feel jealous of a ship, but it wasn’t her his hands had been on when he died, it wasn’t her he’d brought to crashing completion with a look of triumph in his eyes, in his last moments.
It wasn’t as if she was afraid she’d been beaten out by a ship for her husband’s affections. She knew where she stood. But Serenity's hull seemed as empty without Wash as she felt in her body and heart, and the stillness on the boat’s bridge was as profound as the silence in their bunk. The absence of Wash was everywhere, as clearly as his presence had ever been - in the way those damned dinosaurs hadn’t been moved since he died, ‘cause nobody on the ship wanted to put them out of the order he’d last arranged them in. So every time she walked through that door, there was a collection of little plastic reminders waiting for her, waiting to tell her he wouldn’t be back. The hoop hung in the cargo bay untouched - nobody felt up to a game, and the sound of laughter wasn’t likely to be heard for a long time, yet, not with both Wash and the Shepherd gone. The dining room felt off-balance for one more empty chair, so Zoe’d pushed it out of the way that first night, carried it off into storage and thrown a blanket over it. She didn’t need an empty chair sitting next to her for a memorial, any more than she wanted to see River, genius and sweet enough girl though she was, flying Serenity. That was her husband’s job, and damned if she could watch someone else do it, sit in his chair like she belonged there. Not yet.
Loss had been written all over the ship, now. Absence of Book had become commonplace since he left for Haven, and Inara was back, now, for the moment at least, until she and Mal had another drag-out fight that sent her running off again, so that space didn’t feel so sharp, so stark. The lack of chatter at the dinner-table, the missing stories and banter, the quiet sound of chopsticks on stoneware without running commentary, sometimes whispered for her ears only, was enough to put her off any but the most necessary and perfunctory meals. Not to mention the other new lacking that had joined the crew since that day, the absence of awkward words and stilted pauses between Kaylee and Simon. The silence between them was golden, now, and it settled around Zoe like a noose, reminding her of times not so long past, when she and Wash had been that newly in love. She got the sense they tried to tone it down around her, and that made it worse, as if they didn’t think she could handle seeing love in another couple’s eyes, as if she couldn’t see it even when they cast their gazes down and hid their clasped hands under the table like a pair of lovesick teenagers.
She could be grateful, at least, that everyone knew not to speak, but that extra layer of muffling kindness between her and the world, the silence and the absence that made her want to scream just to fill it up with something, was becoming almost more stifling than empty words and helpless offers of sympathy might’ve felt. She’d have snarled at them to quit walking on eggshells with her, but even her temper seemed to have abandoned her, now. Cold, efficient, get the job done. Don’t think unless it’s for a job, don’t speak unless necessary, don’t feel - ever. Work. The military mask slipped back over her like a hangman’s shroud, but this death of the spirit was comforting, when her heart had already gone on ahead.
When Wash looked into the stars, he’d seen wonder and beauty and adventure embodied. His own sky growing up had been too full of clouds to see them, and so the endless lights of the black had never ceased to delight him, even after years of piloting. In the year and a handful of months they’d been together, she’d felt his enthusiasm fill the void of commonplace acceptance, and make her look at them with joy as well, if only because they made his eyes light up with such a passion. With him gone, Zoe found herself looking out to those lights with a new understanding, seeking them out for kinship as things he’d loved just as he’d loved her, things that had made him happy.
And when they reflected in her eyes, caught in tears she wouldn’t shed, the silence was reflected, too, because every fool who grew up in the black knew that there could be no sound in the endless void of space.
Title: "The Absence of Sound"
Fandom: Firefly
Warnings: MASSIVE SPOILERS FOR "SERENITY"!!!!! This is not a happy little fic, either. Fair warning.
There’s no more sound in the night - no more snoring, no more muttering, no more jokes as she settles in to sleep. The silence fills the whole ship, the ship that answered to his touch as easily as she herself did, rising and falling at his light nudge. She never realized before that she could feel jealous of a ship, but it wasn’t her his hands had been on when he died, it wasn’t her he’d brought to crashing completion with a look of triumph in his eyes, in his last moments.
It wasn’t as if she was afraid she’d been beaten out by a ship for her husband’s affections. She knew where she stood. But Serenity's hull seemed as empty without Wash as she felt in her body and heart, and the stillness on the boat’s bridge was as profound as the silence in their bunk. The absence of Wash was everywhere, as clearly as his presence had ever been - in the way those damned dinosaurs hadn’t been moved since he died, ‘cause nobody on the ship wanted to put them out of the order he’d last arranged them in. So every time she walked through that door, there was a collection of little plastic reminders waiting for her, waiting to tell her he wouldn’t be back. The hoop hung in the cargo bay untouched - nobody felt up to a game, and the sound of laughter wasn’t likely to be heard for a long time, yet, not with both Wash and the Shepherd gone. The dining room felt off-balance for one more empty chair, so Zoe’d pushed it out of the way that first night, carried it off into storage and thrown a blanket over it. She didn’t need an empty chair sitting next to her for a memorial, any more than she wanted to see River, genius and sweet enough girl though she was, flying Serenity. That was her husband’s job, and damned if she could watch someone else do it, sit in his chair like she belonged there. Not yet.
Loss had been written all over the ship, now. Absence of Book had become commonplace since he left for Haven, and Inara was back, now, for the moment at least, until she and Mal had another drag-out fight that sent her running off again, so that space didn’t feel so sharp, so stark. The lack of chatter at the dinner-table, the missing stories and banter, the quiet sound of chopsticks on stoneware without running commentary, sometimes whispered for her ears only, was enough to put her off any but the most necessary and perfunctory meals. Not to mention the other new lacking that had joined the crew since that day, the absence of awkward words and stilted pauses between Kaylee and Simon. The silence between them was golden, now, and it settled around Zoe like a noose, reminding her of times not so long past, when she and Wash had been that newly in love. She got the sense they tried to tone it down around her, and that made it worse, as if they didn’t think she could handle seeing love in another couple’s eyes, as if she couldn’t see it even when they cast their gazes down and hid their clasped hands under the table like a pair of lovesick teenagers.
She could be grateful, at least, that everyone knew not to speak, but that extra layer of muffling kindness between her and the world, the silence and the absence that made her want to scream just to fill it up with something, was becoming almost more stifling than empty words and helpless offers of sympathy might’ve felt. She’d have snarled at them to quit walking on eggshells with her, but even her temper seemed to have abandoned her, now. Cold, efficient, get the job done. Don’t think unless it’s for a job, don’t speak unless necessary, don’t feel - ever. Work. The military mask slipped back over her like a hangman’s shroud, but this death of the spirit was comforting, when her heart had already gone on ahead.
When Wash looked into the stars, he’d seen wonder and beauty and adventure embodied. His own sky growing up had been too full of clouds to see them, and so the endless lights of the black had never ceased to delight him, even after years of piloting. In the year and a handful of months they’d been together, she’d felt his enthusiasm fill the void of commonplace acceptance, and make her look at them with joy as well, if only because they made his eyes light up with such a passion. With him gone, Zoe found herself looking out to those lights with a new understanding, seeking them out for kinship as things he’d loved just as he’d loved her, things that had made him happy.
And when they reflected in her eyes, caught in tears she wouldn’t shed, the silence was reflected, too, because every fool who grew up in the black knew that there could be no sound in the endless void of space.
