gray day, but I'm hoping - also, fic
Oct. 15th, 2007 02:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rivendellroseHaving a tired and moody day at work, though it seems to be more of the weepy-moody rather than my usual I-kill-you-now-moody... which is sort of comforting, really. I'm less likely to do something stupid, since I'm better at controlling tears than my temper. Ironic, that.
Either way, I have hope of the food and break thing cheering things up, so... how about some fic? I apologize to the people I haven't quite managed to finish for yet... turns out the last few weeks have been less with the writing than I hoped. But I'm close! Also, apologies that the lengths on these are so erratic. I never can seem to keep length consistent.
So! Mathom-fics!
For![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
coramegan:
“Garak? Garak, are you...” The temperature in the small quarters was turned up noticeably higher even than Garak’s usual preference, and the humidity had somehow been raised to the point that Julian felt as though he was parting a physical veil of vapor. “Er... are you alright?”
“I’m fine, Doctor. We really must talk about your tendency to barge into my quarters, however. You could find me in any of a number of awkward and improprietous states, you know.”
Julian tilted his head, trying to follow the sound of his friend’s voice through the steam. “What have you done, Garak? This place feels like a sauna!”
“That’s the general idea. Please, Doctor, if you insist on coming in, let the door close behind you. You’re letting in a chill.”
A chill... in a room that has to be well above fifty degrees celsius. Only a Cardassian would worry about a draft in those conditions. He winced and unfastened his uniform jacket, folding it neatly on a chair found by touch. And then unzipped his under-tunic, as well, and rolled up the sleeves for a bit of extra airflow. “Alright, Garak. Now, what’s going on?”
“Whatever do you mean?”
That was the voice of a lie if ever Julian had heard one, and not even a good attempt at one. “Don’t try that cheery tone on me - you haven’t been in your shop for the last three days, and you didn’t return my calls when I tried to check on you after you didn’t show up to our lunch.”
“Ah.” The Cardassian sounded distinctly put-off, even slightly apologetic. “I didn’t realize it was Wednesday already. I will simply have to owe you.”
“No, you’ll have to... Ow! Your sofa wasn’t there the last time I came here!”
“I’m sorry that I rearranged my furniture without your permission, Doctor. I’ll be sure to clear all further reorganizations with you, alright? Now, please. I’m not in any state for company at the moment, I assure you.”
“Oh, no. The last time you put me off like this was that debacle with the implant, and I am not letting you put yourself through something like that again. I’m not leaving until I know what’s got you holed up in here, and...” Julian’s foot hit something that clanked dully, and he bent down to investigate. Smooth and slippery, vaguely cylindrical... wait, there was another one. And another... “Garak, are these bottles of kanar?”
“They were.” The man’s voice sounded almost miserable, now. “I’m afraid my order with Quark wasn’t quite generous enough for the endeavor. I underestimated.”
“There have to be at least... five bottles! Garak! Are you trying to drink yourself into a complete stupor?”
“Very astute, Doctor. I can see why you were at the top of your class in medical school,” the Cardassian sneered. “Please - if you’re not going to say something helpful, you might just as well leave.”
“I can’t be helpful if I don’t know what’s... oh my.” Julian had finally traced Garak’s voice, and the steam, to its origin. In the cramped bathroom attached to his living room, Garak had literally constructed an impromptu steam sauna, and was currently buried up to his neck in steaming-hot water that had been glazed with purple bubbles of some kind. He was also glaring at Julian with an intensity the doctor had never seen before. “I... er... I had no idea...”
“If you had been listening to me, rather than prattling on about your inane worries, perhaps you might have realized that there might be legitimate reasons for my decision not to come out and meet you at the door.”
Julian flinched. The haughty glare that accompanied those words was all the more painful for his knowledge that, yes, this time it was completely his fault. “I thought you might be in danger. You never tell me if you’re having some kind of legitimate medical trouble, and I...” He looked a bit closer, the fog around the other man dissipating somewhat because of the way his entrance had moved it around. “And I’m still not convinced, now that I think of it. Your skin is dry and dull, and it’s just not like you to lock yourself away from your shop. You’re not well, are you?”
“I’m fine, Doctor. This is a perfectly normal condition. Now go away.”
“Ohhh, no - if this is something medical, I need to pay attention to it! A normal contagion for one species can be the next interplanetary plague if it’s not properly observed.”
“Then by all means, sit at my bathside forever while I peel!” Garak snarled. “It’s not a contagion, Doctor. It’s... a private matter,” he finished quietly, staring at his hands, resting just above the bubbled film of the water. And sure enough, they did seem to be... peeling.
“You’re... my god, you’re shedding, aren’t you?”
If Julian had thought he’d been on the recieving end of withering stares from Garak before, here was proof that he’d had no idea how bad the situation could truly become. This look could have burned through the bulkheads if misdirected. Fortunately, at least by the chief’s frequent insistence, Julian’s head was harder than deuterium.
“What part of the concept private is not getting through to you, my dear doctor?”
“I’m sorry, I just... Federation science has theorized for years that Cardassians might possess that aspect of a reptilian metabolism, but there was no evidence that anyone could ever...”
There was that glare again.
“And of course there never will be, at least not from me,” Julian added quickly. “I would never use information from your medical file or our conversations together without your permission. It’s only that I... From a xenobiological standpoint, this is fascinating!”
“And from a personal standpoint it’s impossibly uncomfortable. I’m sorry to ruin your fun, Doctor, but unless you’re going to be of assistance, I’d very much appreciate being left alone to my misery.”
“Is it really that uncomfortable?”
“Let me think about that. Yes. I’d like to see you shed your entire upper epidermis, particularly under conditions that are hardly optimal.”
Realization dawned as Julian put together the heat with Garak’s frequent complaints about the coollness of the station’s standard environmental settings. “The temperature. And the steam. You need this to shed?”
Specific questions, oddly, seemed to calm his friend down. “Not need exactly... Either way the skin will eventually come off. But it’s a good deal less comfortable if the conditions aren’t right. Yet another way in which this station no longer offers ideal living conditions for a Cardassian. Too cold, too dry...” The Cardassian looked down at his hands again, clearly embarassed. “But that’s all been handled. It’s really not necessary for you to stay here, Doctor. As you can see, it’s merely a normal biological imperative. In any case, it’s too hot in here for you. I can’t imagine Constable Odo or Captain Sisko would be pleased with me if I told them that you just happened to pass out in my quarters.”
The words, and the disappearance of the adrenaline rush that had accompanied his fear for Garak, brought the heat rushing back to the forefront of Julian’s mind. Sweat was practically pouring down the small of his back, and his hair was plastered to his skull.
“Are you sure you’ll be alright? You don’t look very well...”
“I’m fine, Doctor. It’s simply a long and uncomfortable process that I had hoped not to have to deal with for another few years. As our metabolisms slow, shedding becomes less frequent, and with the temperature of the station... I had rather thought I might avoid it.”
“Maybe there’s something I can do...”
“Doctor. You’re going to be ill if you don’t leave.”
Julian snorted. “Please, Garak. I’ve been in hotter climates before, I was just... better dressed for those times. It’s... what, fifty degrees celsius in here?”
“More like sixty, if I’m recalling your system correctly,” Garak replied primly, as though that sort of temperature was a perfectly normal arrangement for one’s quarters. And probably it was, for a Cardassian, Julian reminded himself.
“Alright. Just... let me take this off.” The sweat-dampened under-tunic peeled from Julian’s skin rather like a parody of the shedding process Garak was going through. “Er... I hope you don’t mind, but it really is too warm in here for this sort of clothing. It won’t kill me, I just... need to make sure my skin can breathe. So to speak. Er... that’s mostly how humans cope with high temperatures,” he added, uncertain of how much Garak actually knew about human biology. The Cardassian was certainly eyeing his bared torso with a rather more interested look than Julian would have expected. Although to be fair, the doctor realized, he really hadn’t known what to expect from Cardassian physiology, either, before the situation with Garak’s implant had necessitated a first-person examination.
“Are you quite sure you’re alright, Doctor?”
Julian started a little and forced his attention back to the present, and away from the intriguing network of scales and bony ridges that showed through the murky purple water. “Of course. Why?”
“You’ve turned rather... pink. It looks unhealthy.”
“I... oh. Flushing. Er... human capillaries tend to become more highly active in intense heat.” Julian sat on the floor and began to pull off his boots. “Perfectly normal reaction. We only have to worry if I begin to turn pale, really.”
“What are you doing, Doctor?”
“Heat loss. Humans lose most of our excess body heat through our feet and the tops of our heads, so if I’m going to stay here with you, I need my boots off for better ventilation.”
“You really don’t need to stay.”
“Garak, I’m your friend, and I’m your doctor, for God’s sake. I assure you, this is...” Well, he couldn’t exactly say it was nothing he hadn’t seen before, could he? And that was unlikely to be Garak’s concern, anyway. Knowing the Cardassian emphasis on secrecy and xenophobia, it was probably just a matter of keeping aliens out of their private affairs. “I promise, I won’t tell anyone about what I’ve seen here. It’s only that you admit this isn’t going the way you’d expected, and I want to make sure nothing goes wrong.”
“It just itches, Doctor. It won’t kill me. Although I might wish it would,” Garak added in a low growl, scratching at his shoulder.
“Here, let me see if I can--”
“Doctor. One moment.” Garak’s voice sounded decidedly strained, and Julian pulled back, uncertain and unwilling to provoke his friend when he was already in distress. He’d been on the recieving end of the other man’s temper a few times, and it wasn’t something he was eager to relive just now.
“Yes?”
“You should... Forgive me, but I don’t think you quite apprehend what you’re suggesting.”
“It’s alright, Garak, I was only going to suggest that I could reach your back better than you can. If we get a scrub-brush or something...”
“I’m aware of what you meant, my dear doctor. And what I mean is that there are connotations to what you’re suggesting that I don’t think you’re aware of.”
It took a moment for the significance of Garak’s pause to sink in, along with the curious intensity of his eyes, but when it did Julian felt more than a little like a child who had tried to tell a grown-up joke he’d overheard and, in the process, had discovered it was a good deal more grown-up than he’d intended. “Connotations... oh. As in sexual connotations. This is usually something that a... lover would assist you with?”
“Precisely.” Garak smiled wanly. “On Cardassia, the process would usually occur once every five years or so - much more frequently for children and youths, of course - and a lover or close family member might sit with the individual and help them, if they needed it. A healthy adult doesn’t often require much help, but it can be a convenient respite, and a way to enjoy... uninterrupted companionable time, resting in the heat and water of a bath house.” The smile grew more distant and polite. “As dearly as I hold our friendship... I rather doubt that was the impression you wanted to give off.”
There was something in Garak’s expression just then, a wistfulness that struck Julian suddenly as significant. In an instant it was gone again, and if Julian had been any other than who (and what) he was, he would have doubted his senses, figured his mind was playing tricks on him in the heat and the dim light. But he’d learned long ago - shortly after the last of the genetic modifications came into effect - that his senses were more than trustworthy. After seven years of shared lunches and conversation, of near-death brushes and long chats about life, literature, and philosophy, every conversation he’d had with Garak now shifted.
“I never thought of it that way,” Julian admitted.
He wasn’t sure exactly what he was referring to, but Garak nodded as if he understood. “I rather thought you hadn’t.”
“Where does this... put us, then?”
Garak smiled. It was strange, to see such an oddly tender expression on his face, when moments ago he’d been growling at Julian to leave the room. “My dear doctor... as much as I would enjoy leading and nudging your thoughts in whatever direction I desire, I’m afraid that, in this case, the decision is entirely yours. I would hate to see what Chief O’Brien and Captain Sisko would do to me if they thought I had unduly pressured or manipulated you in a situation like this.”
“They wouldn’t...” Well, to be honest, yes, they probably would, if they were to find out. And with Garak’s eyes steadily focused on his, Julian could understand why. The man had clearly been a natural inquisitor.
When had that predatory and insightful expression joined the list of random things that got Julian’s blood pumping a bit faster than usual?
The answer came almost immediately, and gave Julian what he needed to continue with their conversation. “Do you have a scrub-brush of some kind? Even just a rough cloth would help, I expect.”
For a moment, he thought Garak would argue - the only time Julian had seen his friend more shocked was on the holosuite, when Julian had followed through on his threat to shoot Garak if he didn’t cooperate with the plan to rescue Dax and the others. Rather than respectful caution, however, this surprise melted into something a good deal more welcome.
“If you insist, Doctor. There’s a brush on the floor over there...”
With Bashir’s back turned, Garak smiled. Not exactly the seduction he would have imagined... but it would do just fine.
Forstormkpr:
“I never said we were stayin’ all day for this, Kaylee. Zoe, tell her I never said we was stayin’.”
Zoe looked measuringly first at Kaylee, then at her captain. “Never said we weren’t, either.”
“You... hey, now! You’re supposed to be on my side!”
“I just can’t see any harm in it, sir. We got the parts we need, got the supplies, Kaylee’s done all her repairs...”
“Yeah, so we should be shovin’ off this tin can and back into the black where we belong! No offense,” Mal offered with a big grin at an officious looking gentleman who looked askance at him after hearing that last sentence. “No sense hanging around just for... just for...”
“A holiday, sir?” Zoe crossed her arms and watched Mal closely. “We ain’t had a rest in months. This station is as friendly as any, and we just happened to dock during a real festival. I can’t see any harm in us all having a little fun.”
“Your husband put you up to this, didn’t he?”
“He might’a said something about wanting to watch the kites,” Zoe allowed. “And I might’a wanted to let him. But it’s your decision, sir...”
“There something you ain’t telling me, Zoe?”
“Only I know Inara’s already taken Simon and River to get treats for a picnic,” she explained calmly, “and Book is out having a little conference with some other shepherds and religious folk. Also, Jayne’s bet ten credits on one of the kites, and as much as I’d love to listen to him grouse if we leave without him seeing the end of the game, we’re gonna have a hell of a time dragging him out of the viewing gallery with his feet still attached.”
“So what you’re saying...” Mal spoke slowly, thinking this through. “Is that even if I decided for sure that we ain’t stayin’ for this thing, I’d have to take at least three hours to round everybody up, and by that point I might just as well have sat for the rest of the damned festival and eaten some annoying little sweets while I’m doing it. Is that right?”
“Just about, sir. Plus, Kaylee just snuck off into that crowd while you were talking to me.”
“Ah.” Mal stucks his hands in his pockets, rocked back on his heels for a minute, and seemed to be inspecting the lighting fixtures. “Couldn’t’a said something about that before she got out’a sight, could you, Zoe?”
“Girl moves fast when she wants to.” Zoe shrugged. “Besides, I got a husband gonna be real disappointed if he don’t see the kites.”
“Uh-huh. So where’s this picnic Inara’s putting together gonna be, then?”
* * *
“Back home, we always had crab for Double Ninth,” Simon said. “Broiled in the morning, and then carried in our basket to the hill. Remember that, River?”
“Little legs trying to climb out of the pot. They screamed while the water painted them red...” River lifted her head from poking around in the basket Inara had bought. “I like the teng-kao cakes better.”
“That’s good...” Inara reached delicately around the younger woman and pulled out a bottle delicately wrapped in basketry. “Kaylee, did you bring the cups like I asked?”
“We got drink?”
“Not for you, Jayne.” Inara accepted the little cups Kaylee handed her, and carefully unstoppered the little bottle.
“Why not me?”
“Because you’ve already drunk enough to power a small rocket,” Wash put in, circling back from the window during a less-than-thrilling moment between kite battles. “And because we’d rather not be kicked out before the game’s over.”
It was true, Mal thought - now that they were settled, even he would rather stick around and watch the show. Thanks to Inara’s quick thinking (and, admittedly, also to her diplomacy and gracious manners) the crew had managed to snag not a bad spot at all for watching the kites out the big gallery windows. And these weren’t the flimsy little paper diamonds he’d once or twice had occasion to play with back on the ranch on Shadow - these were huge constructions of the finest metal sheet, brightly painted and arrayed over delicate frameworks in the shapes of dragons and lions, frogs and butterflies and, in one particularly spectacular but not terribly mobile case, a giant whale.
Each kite was maneuvered by four or five tiny shuttles with one pilot a piece, tethered to a single portion of the larger armature (hence Wash’s intense interest in the proceeding - the flightwork involved was damned impressive even to Mal’s inexperienced eye). To make matters a bit more exciting, each of these tethers was specially designed so as to sever any other cable it came into contact with. One kite had already gone sailing off into space, having lost all its tethers, and another was hanging on by only two remaining lines. Jayne, too, was in high spirits. The kite he’d bet his money on - one shaped like a giant rooster - was still well in the running with three of its four original tethers still attached.
Inara had just begun to pour some kind of liquor into the little cups Kaylee’d brought, and Mal allowed himself to be momentarily distracted by the elegant curve of her hand, the way she smiled and gently teased River while she went about her work... When suddenly the whole pretty picture was ruined by Jayne shouting and flailing his arms.
“Rutting gôushî bùrú idiots!”
The rooster kite had lost two more strings at a single blow from a kite shaped like a giant carp.
“Gorram sonofa--whoa!”
Pottery crashed to the metal deckplates and shattered as Jayne’s wayward arm knocked five of the nine cups off Inara’s tray. River squealed and caught the remaining four much more quickly than Mal figured anybody ought to have been able to move, and Inara herself held tightly to her bottle of high-class booze, giving Jayne a look of sheer death.
“Everybody alright?” Book gently relieved River of the cups, patting her hair distractedly as she stared wide-eyed around, the sound apparently having knocked her out of the semi-cogency they’d all been enjoying from their little crazy girl that day. “There, see, River? Everyone’s fine...”
Jayne’s complaints died down to a mutter under Inara’s fierce eye, while Kaylee bent to examine the damage. “None of these are gonna be useable, now, ‘Nara,” she murmured, gathering shards of pottery into her hands and tucking them away in a nearby disposal unit.
“We’ll make do,” Zoe put in firmly. “Wash and I can share, and Simon and River, and...” She hesitated, looking at the remaining cups.
“And Jayne don’t get any,” Kaylee put in with a dark look at the mercenary.
Jayne stormed off, grumbling, probably to find someone to take out his frustrations on. Mal shook his head and watched him go. They didn’t have cash to be bailing the man out of holding, so he’d better at least have the sense to win anything he started, and not leave anybody conscious to press charges til after they’d left.
“Mal.”
He turned, surprised, and found Inara at his elbow, holding out the last of the little cups. The wine was palest pink, with tiny little flower petals floating in it.
“Y’got something in there...”
“They’re chrysanthemum petals, Mal. For long life.” She gave him an exasperated look. “Theyr’e supposed to be there.”
“Oh.” He looked around their small cluster. Wash had laid back, head leaned on Zoe’s thigh as he watched the gallery window with bright, delighted eyes while she threaded the fingers of one hand through his hair, holding their shared cup aloft in the other. River and Kaylee sat on either side of Simon, all three bickering good-naturedly about whether or not River was old enough to have strong wine, holiday or no, while Book stood nearby and sipped from his cup with a mild, paternal smile. One cup, two, three... “That’s the last one? Nah, you... you take it, I... y’know, gotta keep an eye on...”
“Just drink, Mal. There’s only about two sips’ worth in these things, anyway. Especially with how you drink.”
Mal wasn’t quite sure, but he thought she smiled as he raised the cup in salute to her, took the smallest of sips, and offered it back to her. Maybe Jayne was good for something, after all...
(All information on Double Ninth, an actual holiday on the Chinese calendar, is taken from The Folklore of World Holidays, 2nd ed, edited by Griffin and Shurgin. It’s a lovely, very useful book.)
Formiss_arel:
Time travel was not a native concept to the Daleks. The technology, stolen from the Time Lords, was still unfamiliar and somewhat unpredictable for them. And if the system was occasionally ‘exciting’ for its original inventors, well...
“AIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!”
Sploosh. Sploosh.
Sploosh.
...It could be downright dangerous for a Dalek.
“MY FUNCTIONS ARE IMPAIRED! MY FUNCTIONS ARE IMPAIRED!!!”
“You’re in the water, you idiot. Of course you’re impaired.” Dalek Sek splashed miserably next to his rapidly-sinking compatriots. Their attempted escape seemed to have failed rather drastically - appearing in mid-air above some... abominably huge body of liquid water. Liquid water was banned on Skaro. Dalek Sek could now understand why - the remaining members of the Cult of Skaro were barely managing to keep their eyepieces above the water, their thrusters alternately firing and then sputtering into helpless silence, doused by the disgusting alien liquid.
“CALLING FOR ASSISTANCE--”
“There’s no one here but a bunch of primative apes, you fool.” Sek flailed as a wave splushed over his head, and spat seawater. “Just keep quiet a moment while I think, both of you. And whatever you do, don’t discharge your weapons! You could electrocute all of us.”
“AN INFERIOR LIFEFORM IS ATTACKING DALEK SEK!!!”
Sek blinked, then looked up. Ah. Something green and slimy hung in his eye. “It appears to be a piece of plant matter.”
“INFERIOR LIFEFORMS MUST BE EX--”
“No! Don’t fire!!!”
Both inferior Daleks burbled slightly, but held their fire.
“WHAT COURSE OF ACTION SHOULD WE PURSUE?!”
“Just hold on, just--wait. I hear something. There’s something... some kind of craft is approaching.”
The lights on Dalek Thay’s armor brightened - this, at least, was a situation for which it was trained. “INFERIOR LIFEFORMS MUST--”
“Not this time,” Sek interrupted tightly. “This time, we’re going to play nice for a while. Once we’re safely out of this... water... then we shall exterminate them. And not before,” he added, recognizing that Jas and Caan were looking a bit shifty about the whole thing. Well... as shifty as they could while burbling and struggling not to sink. They would be trouble, he knew it... but for the moment, he had more pressing concerns.
The ship that appeared before them was... primative, but oddly appealing to Sek’s mind. For one thing, it was all green and slick, organic and therefore inferior, but... it reminded him rather of a Dalek without armor, and in that it was impressive.
“Man overboard!” Sek heard someone shout aboard the vessel, and the call was picked up by a chorus of other voices, rough and hoarse in a comfortingly familiar fashion. And after a moment, a rope flew from the ship and fell with a solid thwack onto the water beside Sek. He grabbed on, wrapping it around his arm and holding tight.
“There are four of us here!” he shouted.
“Grab on to’em, then, and wait ready to be pulled aboard!”
Sek considered this for a moment, then swam awkwardly over to Thay and tied the rope around the upper part of his armor, looping it through the grillwork so it would stay. Then he did the same for Caan and for Jas. Then he waited as they were slowly towed to the large vessel, and heaved up aboard.
“By the De’il himself, you lot sure are heavy,” someone grumbled as Sek cleared the railing. Sek ignored the voice long enough to spit more sea water back over the edge, and then turned to their unwitting rescuers, who... were not at all frightened by his appearance, because they themselves looked just as unlike to normal Humans.
“My... compatriots and I are... visitors to your world,” Sek offered, attempting to be gracious. “We, ah... seem to have lost our way.”
“Ye’ve lost more than that, me boys,” a booming voice announced. “Ye’re on the ship of Davy Jones! Death or the locker will ‘ave ye now!”
“The... locker?” Sek turned for a moment to Thay, who was just now being heaved up over the edge, and whom the unusual Humans were regarding with significant uncertainty.
“Aye, the locker. D’ye not know who I am?”
“No, I surely...” Sek turned back to the voice, and was astonished to find himself facing... a figure most like in appearance to himself. Different, surely - this creature was a sickly greenish hue, for one thing, like his ship, and his tentacles were all in the wrong alignment and entirely too long, but... but... “Who are you?”
“I am Davy Jones! The master of the sea, and the captain of the ship of the dead!”
“But... we’re not dead.”
The crew scuttled forward somewhat, and one of them sniffed in his general direction. Behind Sek, he heard Thay and Jas’s weapons begin to charge in defense.
“YOU WILL ACCEPT THE SUPREMACY OF THE DALEK SPECIES!!!”
That was Caan, of course. Sek closed his eye and took a deep breath. Caan always had been an idiot.
“The Dalek species?” The man before them - Jones he had said, and a suspiciously Human name that was - sputtered. “What are Daleks to me?”
Sek sighed. “I really wish you hadn’t asked that.”
“DALEKS ARE THE SUPERIOR SPECIES! WE WILL RULE THE UNIVERSE!!!”
“DALEKS WILL EXTERMINATE ALL INFERIOR LIFEFORMS, OR MAKE USE OF THEM FOR OUR DOMINATION!!!” Thay put in, clearly feeling left out of the proceedings.
“I’ll never get them to shut up, now. You’d better just hope they don’t--”
“EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!!!”
From three directions behind Sek, disruptor weapons discharged. Three of Davy Jones’ crew disappeared in puffs of smelly, slightly greasy smoke. Davy Jones’ claw tapped thoughtfully on the deck of his ship.
“Well... that is interesting...”
“Perhaps,” Sek began, stepping in front of his compatriots and raising his arms to signal the temporary abatement of their hostilities, “we should talk. Alone. My compatriots don’t take well to being surrounded, it... ignites certain instincts in our kind.”
“Y’are not dead, and y’aren’t of our realm, either, are ye?”
Sek took a distasteful look around him. Bright sunlight, endless, constantly moving blue water... disgustingly primative denizens... “Not at all.”
“Then we shall parlay,” Jones agreed, nodding decisively, although his tentacles belied a certain internal struggle that Sek rather suspected he was unaware of displaying. “We shall discuss your... unique predicament, and come to a bargain how I might help ye... and how ye might help me.”
“DALEKS DO NOT BARGAIN. DALEKS ONLY--”
“That will be quite nice, thank you,” Sek interrupted, giving the three inferior Daleks a significant look. If they were to get off this appalling planet, they would need time to recharge their circuits and repair whatever had gone wrong with the emergency time-jump. This ship and its crew could provide that, Sek guessed. And in any event, they were more familiar, more... similar than any Humans he’d heard of before. They warranted investigation.
If nothing else, he wanted to know how a Human had come by such... very fine tentacles.
LJ is mean and says "no." This will apparently have to be 2 posts. Please hold for more!
And!miss_arel drew me Dalek Sek and Davy Jones for my birthday, and it's gorgeous. Seriously, everybody who likes one or the other (or both!) should go see it here. It's beautiful. And it has background, which is more than I dreamed of expecting, being one of those people who knows exactly how tedious and time-consuming background is, and how much most artists hate it with the fiery passion of a thousand suns. ♥
Either way, I have hope of the food and break thing cheering things up, so... how about some fic? I apologize to the people I haven't quite managed to finish for yet... turns out the last few weeks have been less with the writing than I hoped. But I'm close! Also, apologies that the lengths on these are so erratic. I never can seem to keep length consistent.
So! Mathom-fics!
For
coramegan: “Garak? Garak, are you...” The temperature in the small quarters was turned up noticeably higher even than Garak’s usual preference, and the humidity had somehow been raised to the point that Julian felt as though he was parting a physical veil of vapor. “Er... are you alright?”
“I’m fine, Doctor. We really must talk about your tendency to barge into my quarters, however. You could find me in any of a number of awkward and improprietous states, you know.”
Julian tilted his head, trying to follow the sound of his friend’s voice through the steam. “What have you done, Garak? This place feels like a sauna!”
“That’s the general idea. Please, Doctor, if you insist on coming in, let the door close behind you. You’re letting in a chill.”
A chill... in a room that has to be well above fifty degrees celsius. Only a Cardassian would worry about a draft in those conditions. He winced and unfastened his uniform jacket, folding it neatly on a chair found by touch. And then unzipped his under-tunic, as well, and rolled up the sleeves for a bit of extra airflow. “Alright, Garak. Now, what’s going on?”
“Whatever do you mean?”
That was the voice of a lie if ever Julian had heard one, and not even a good attempt at one. “Don’t try that cheery tone on me - you haven’t been in your shop for the last three days, and you didn’t return my calls when I tried to check on you after you didn’t show up to our lunch.”
“Ah.” The Cardassian sounded distinctly put-off, even slightly apologetic. “I didn’t realize it was Wednesday already. I will simply have to owe you.”
“No, you’ll have to... Ow! Your sofa wasn’t there the last time I came here!”
“I’m sorry that I rearranged my furniture without your permission, Doctor. I’ll be sure to clear all further reorganizations with you, alright? Now, please. I’m not in any state for company at the moment, I assure you.”
“Oh, no. The last time you put me off like this was that debacle with the implant, and I am not letting you put yourself through something like that again. I’m not leaving until I know what’s got you holed up in here, and...” Julian’s foot hit something that clanked dully, and he bent down to investigate. Smooth and slippery, vaguely cylindrical... wait, there was another one. And another... “Garak, are these bottles of kanar?”
“They were.” The man’s voice sounded almost miserable, now. “I’m afraid my order with Quark wasn’t quite generous enough for the endeavor. I underestimated.”
“There have to be at least... five bottles! Garak! Are you trying to drink yourself into a complete stupor?”
“Very astute, Doctor. I can see why you were at the top of your class in medical school,” the Cardassian sneered. “Please - if you’re not going to say something helpful, you might just as well leave.”
“I can’t be helpful if I don’t know what’s... oh my.” Julian had finally traced Garak’s voice, and the steam, to its origin. In the cramped bathroom attached to his living room, Garak had literally constructed an impromptu steam sauna, and was currently buried up to his neck in steaming-hot water that had been glazed with purple bubbles of some kind. He was also glaring at Julian with an intensity the doctor had never seen before. “I... er... I had no idea...”
“If you had been listening to me, rather than prattling on about your inane worries, perhaps you might have realized that there might be legitimate reasons for my decision not to come out and meet you at the door.”
Julian flinched. The haughty glare that accompanied those words was all the more painful for his knowledge that, yes, this time it was completely his fault. “I thought you might be in danger. You never tell me if you’re having some kind of legitimate medical trouble, and I...” He looked a bit closer, the fog around the other man dissipating somewhat because of the way his entrance had moved it around. “And I’m still not convinced, now that I think of it. Your skin is dry and dull, and it’s just not like you to lock yourself away from your shop. You’re not well, are you?”
“I’m fine, Doctor. This is a perfectly normal condition. Now go away.”
“Ohhh, no - if this is something medical, I need to pay attention to it! A normal contagion for one species can be the next interplanetary plague if it’s not properly observed.”
“Then by all means, sit at my bathside forever while I peel!” Garak snarled. “It’s not a contagion, Doctor. It’s... a private matter,” he finished quietly, staring at his hands, resting just above the bubbled film of the water. And sure enough, they did seem to be... peeling.
“You’re... my god, you’re shedding, aren’t you?”
If Julian had thought he’d been on the recieving end of withering stares from Garak before, here was proof that he’d had no idea how bad the situation could truly become. This look could have burned through the bulkheads if misdirected. Fortunately, at least by the chief’s frequent insistence, Julian’s head was harder than deuterium.
“What part of the concept private is not getting through to you, my dear doctor?”
“I’m sorry, I just... Federation science has theorized for years that Cardassians might possess that aspect of a reptilian metabolism, but there was no evidence that anyone could ever...”
There was that glare again.
“And of course there never will be, at least not from me,” Julian added quickly. “I would never use information from your medical file or our conversations together without your permission. It’s only that I... From a xenobiological standpoint, this is fascinating!”
“And from a personal standpoint it’s impossibly uncomfortable. I’m sorry to ruin your fun, Doctor, but unless you’re going to be of assistance, I’d very much appreciate being left alone to my misery.”
“Is it really that uncomfortable?”
“Let me think about that. Yes. I’d like to see you shed your entire upper epidermis, particularly under conditions that are hardly optimal.”
Realization dawned as Julian put together the heat with Garak’s frequent complaints about the coollness of the station’s standard environmental settings. “The temperature. And the steam. You need this to shed?”
Specific questions, oddly, seemed to calm his friend down. “Not need exactly... Either way the skin will eventually come off. But it’s a good deal less comfortable if the conditions aren’t right. Yet another way in which this station no longer offers ideal living conditions for a Cardassian. Too cold, too dry...” The Cardassian looked down at his hands again, clearly embarassed. “But that’s all been handled. It’s really not necessary for you to stay here, Doctor. As you can see, it’s merely a normal biological imperative. In any case, it’s too hot in here for you. I can’t imagine Constable Odo or Captain Sisko would be pleased with me if I told them that you just happened to pass out in my quarters.”
The words, and the disappearance of the adrenaline rush that had accompanied his fear for Garak, brought the heat rushing back to the forefront of Julian’s mind. Sweat was practically pouring down the small of his back, and his hair was plastered to his skull.
“Are you sure you’ll be alright? You don’t look very well...”
“I’m fine, Doctor. It’s simply a long and uncomfortable process that I had hoped not to have to deal with for another few years. As our metabolisms slow, shedding becomes less frequent, and with the temperature of the station... I had rather thought I might avoid it.”
“Maybe there’s something I can do...”
“Doctor. You’re going to be ill if you don’t leave.”
Julian snorted. “Please, Garak. I’ve been in hotter climates before, I was just... better dressed for those times. It’s... what, fifty degrees celsius in here?”
“More like sixty, if I’m recalling your system correctly,” Garak replied primly, as though that sort of temperature was a perfectly normal arrangement for one’s quarters. And probably it was, for a Cardassian, Julian reminded himself.
“Alright. Just... let me take this off.” The sweat-dampened under-tunic peeled from Julian’s skin rather like a parody of the shedding process Garak was going through. “Er... I hope you don’t mind, but it really is too warm in here for this sort of clothing. It won’t kill me, I just... need to make sure my skin can breathe. So to speak. Er... that’s mostly how humans cope with high temperatures,” he added, uncertain of how much Garak actually knew about human biology. The Cardassian was certainly eyeing his bared torso with a rather more interested look than Julian would have expected. Although to be fair, the doctor realized, he really hadn’t known what to expect from Cardassian physiology, either, before the situation with Garak’s implant had necessitated a first-person examination.
“Are you quite sure you’re alright, Doctor?”
Julian started a little and forced his attention back to the present, and away from the intriguing network of scales and bony ridges that showed through the murky purple water. “Of course. Why?”
“You’ve turned rather... pink. It looks unhealthy.”
“I... oh. Flushing. Er... human capillaries tend to become more highly active in intense heat.” Julian sat on the floor and began to pull off his boots. “Perfectly normal reaction. We only have to worry if I begin to turn pale, really.”
“What are you doing, Doctor?”
“Heat loss. Humans lose most of our excess body heat through our feet and the tops of our heads, so if I’m going to stay here with you, I need my boots off for better ventilation.”
“You really don’t need to stay.”
“Garak, I’m your friend, and I’m your doctor, for God’s sake. I assure you, this is...” Well, he couldn’t exactly say it was nothing he hadn’t seen before, could he? And that was unlikely to be Garak’s concern, anyway. Knowing the Cardassian emphasis on secrecy and xenophobia, it was probably just a matter of keeping aliens out of their private affairs. “I promise, I won’t tell anyone about what I’ve seen here. It’s only that you admit this isn’t going the way you’d expected, and I want to make sure nothing goes wrong.”
“It just itches, Doctor. It won’t kill me. Although I might wish it would,” Garak added in a low growl, scratching at his shoulder.
“Here, let me see if I can--”
“Doctor. One moment.” Garak’s voice sounded decidedly strained, and Julian pulled back, uncertain and unwilling to provoke his friend when he was already in distress. He’d been on the recieving end of the other man’s temper a few times, and it wasn’t something he was eager to relive just now.
“Yes?”
“You should... Forgive me, but I don’t think you quite apprehend what you’re suggesting.”
“It’s alright, Garak, I was only going to suggest that I could reach your back better than you can. If we get a scrub-brush or something...”
“I’m aware of what you meant, my dear doctor. And what I mean is that there are connotations to what you’re suggesting that I don’t think you’re aware of.”
It took a moment for the significance of Garak’s pause to sink in, along with the curious intensity of his eyes, but when it did Julian felt more than a little like a child who had tried to tell a grown-up joke he’d overheard and, in the process, had discovered it was a good deal more grown-up than he’d intended. “Connotations... oh. As in sexual connotations. This is usually something that a... lover would assist you with?”
“Precisely.” Garak smiled wanly. “On Cardassia, the process would usually occur once every five years or so - much more frequently for children and youths, of course - and a lover or close family member might sit with the individual and help them, if they needed it. A healthy adult doesn’t often require much help, but it can be a convenient respite, and a way to enjoy... uninterrupted companionable time, resting in the heat and water of a bath house.” The smile grew more distant and polite. “As dearly as I hold our friendship... I rather doubt that was the impression you wanted to give off.”
There was something in Garak’s expression just then, a wistfulness that struck Julian suddenly as significant. In an instant it was gone again, and if Julian had been any other than who (and what) he was, he would have doubted his senses, figured his mind was playing tricks on him in the heat and the dim light. But he’d learned long ago - shortly after the last of the genetic modifications came into effect - that his senses were more than trustworthy. After seven years of shared lunches and conversation, of near-death brushes and long chats about life, literature, and philosophy, every conversation he’d had with Garak now shifted.
“I never thought of it that way,” Julian admitted.
He wasn’t sure exactly what he was referring to, but Garak nodded as if he understood. “I rather thought you hadn’t.”
“Where does this... put us, then?”
Garak smiled. It was strange, to see such an oddly tender expression on his face, when moments ago he’d been growling at Julian to leave the room. “My dear doctor... as much as I would enjoy leading and nudging your thoughts in whatever direction I desire, I’m afraid that, in this case, the decision is entirely yours. I would hate to see what Chief O’Brien and Captain Sisko would do to me if they thought I had unduly pressured or manipulated you in a situation like this.”
“They wouldn’t...” Well, to be honest, yes, they probably would, if they were to find out. And with Garak’s eyes steadily focused on his, Julian could understand why. The man had clearly been a natural inquisitor.
When had that predatory and insightful expression joined the list of random things that got Julian’s blood pumping a bit faster than usual?
The answer came almost immediately, and gave Julian what he needed to continue with their conversation. “Do you have a scrub-brush of some kind? Even just a rough cloth would help, I expect.”
For a moment, he thought Garak would argue - the only time Julian had seen his friend more shocked was on the holosuite, when Julian had followed through on his threat to shoot Garak if he didn’t cooperate with the plan to rescue Dax and the others. Rather than respectful caution, however, this surprise melted into something a good deal more welcome.
“If you insist, Doctor. There’s a brush on the floor over there...”
With Bashir’s back turned, Garak smiled. Not exactly the seduction he would have imagined... but it would do just fine.
For
stormkpr: “I never said we were stayin’ all day for this, Kaylee. Zoe, tell her I never said we was stayin’.”
Zoe looked measuringly first at Kaylee, then at her captain. “Never said we weren’t, either.”
“You... hey, now! You’re supposed to be on my side!”
“I just can’t see any harm in it, sir. We got the parts we need, got the supplies, Kaylee’s done all her repairs...”
“Yeah, so we should be shovin’ off this tin can and back into the black where we belong! No offense,” Mal offered with a big grin at an officious looking gentleman who looked askance at him after hearing that last sentence. “No sense hanging around just for... just for...”
“A holiday, sir?” Zoe crossed her arms and watched Mal closely. “We ain’t had a rest in months. This station is as friendly as any, and we just happened to dock during a real festival. I can’t see any harm in us all having a little fun.”
“Your husband put you up to this, didn’t he?”
“He might’a said something about wanting to watch the kites,” Zoe allowed. “And I might’a wanted to let him. But it’s your decision, sir...”
“There something you ain’t telling me, Zoe?”
“Only I know Inara’s already taken Simon and River to get treats for a picnic,” she explained calmly, “and Book is out having a little conference with some other shepherds and religious folk. Also, Jayne’s bet ten credits on one of the kites, and as much as I’d love to listen to him grouse if we leave without him seeing the end of the game, we’re gonna have a hell of a time dragging him out of the viewing gallery with his feet still attached.”
“So what you’re saying...” Mal spoke slowly, thinking this through. “Is that even if I decided for sure that we ain’t stayin’ for this thing, I’d have to take at least three hours to round everybody up, and by that point I might just as well have sat for the rest of the damned festival and eaten some annoying little sweets while I’m doing it. Is that right?”
“Just about, sir. Plus, Kaylee just snuck off into that crowd while you were talking to me.”
“Ah.” Mal stucks his hands in his pockets, rocked back on his heels for a minute, and seemed to be inspecting the lighting fixtures. “Couldn’t’a said something about that before she got out’a sight, could you, Zoe?”
“Girl moves fast when she wants to.” Zoe shrugged. “Besides, I got a husband gonna be real disappointed if he don’t see the kites.”
“Uh-huh. So where’s this picnic Inara’s putting together gonna be, then?”
* * *
“Back home, we always had crab for Double Ninth,” Simon said. “Broiled in the morning, and then carried in our basket to the hill. Remember that, River?”
“Little legs trying to climb out of the pot. They screamed while the water painted them red...” River lifted her head from poking around in the basket Inara had bought. “I like the teng-kao cakes better.”
“That’s good...” Inara reached delicately around the younger woman and pulled out a bottle delicately wrapped in basketry. “Kaylee, did you bring the cups like I asked?”
“We got drink?”
“Not for you, Jayne.” Inara accepted the little cups Kaylee handed her, and carefully unstoppered the little bottle.
“Why not me?”
“Because you’ve already drunk enough to power a small rocket,” Wash put in, circling back from the window during a less-than-thrilling moment between kite battles. “And because we’d rather not be kicked out before the game’s over.”
It was true, Mal thought - now that they were settled, even he would rather stick around and watch the show. Thanks to Inara’s quick thinking (and, admittedly, also to her diplomacy and gracious manners) the crew had managed to snag not a bad spot at all for watching the kites out the big gallery windows. And these weren’t the flimsy little paper diamonds he’d once or twice had occasion to play with back on the ranch on Shadow - these were huge constructions of the finest metal sheet, brightly painted and arrayed over delicate frameworks in the shapes of dragons and lions, frogs and butterflies and, in one particularly spectacular but not terribly mobile case, a giant whale.
Each kite was maneuvered by four or five tiny shuttles with one pilot a piece, tethered to a single portion of the larger armature (hence Wash’s intense interest in the proceeding - the flightwork involved was damned impressive even to Mal’s inexperienced eye). To make matters a bit more exciting, each of these tethers was specially designed so as to sever any other cable it came into contact with. One kite had already gone sailing off into space, having lost all its tethers, and another was hanging on by only two remaining lines. Jayne, too, was in high spirits. The kite he’d bet his money on - one shaped like a giant rooster - was still well in the running with three of its four original tethers still attached.
Inara had just begun to pour some kind of liquor into the little cups Kaylee’d brought, and Mal allowed himself to be momentarily distracted by the elegant curve of her hand, the way she smiled and gently teased River while she went about her work... When suddenly the whole pretty picture was ruined by Jayne shouting and flailing his arms.
“Rutting gôushî bùrú idiots!”
The rooster kite had lost two more strings at a single blow from a kite shaped like a giant carp.
“Gorram sonofa--whoa!”
Pottery crashed to the metal deckplates and shattered as Jayne’s wayward arm knocked five of the nine cups off Inara’s tray. River squealed and caught the remaining four much more quickly than Mal figured anybody ought to have been able to move, and Inara herself held tightly to her bottle of high-class booze, giving Jayne a look of sheer death.
“Everybody alright?” Book gently relieved River of the cups, patting her hair distractedly as she stared wide-eyed around, the sound apparently having knocked her out of the semi-cogency they’d all been enjoying from their little crazy girl that day. “There, see, River? Everyone’s fine...”
Jayne’s complaints died down to a mutter under Inara’s fierce eye, while Kaylee bent to examine the damage. “None of these are gonna be useable, now, ‘Nara,” she murmured, gathering shards of pottery into her hands and tucking them away in a nearby disposal unit.
“We’ll make do,” Zoe put in firmly. “Wash and I can share, and Simon and River, and...” She hesitated, looking at the remaining cups.
“And Jayne don’t get any,” Kaylee put in with a dark look at the mercenary.
Jayne stormed off, grumbling, probably to find someone to take out his frustrations on. Mal shook his head and watched him go. They didn’t have cash to be bailing the man out of holding, so he’d better at least have the sense to win anything he started, and not leave anybody conscious to press charges til after they’d left.
“Mal.”
He turned, surprised, and found Inara at his elbow, holding out the last of the little cups. The wine was palest pink, with tiny little flower petals floating in it.
“Y’got something in there...”
“They’re chrysanthemum petals, Mal. For long life.” She gave him an exasperated look. “Theyr’e supposed to be there.”
“Oh.” He looked around their small cluster. Wash had laid back, head leaned on Zoe’s thigh as he watched the gallery window with bright, delighted eyes while she threaded the fingers of one hand through his hair, holding their shared cup aloft in the other. River and Kaylee sat on either side of Simon, all three bickering good-naturedly about whether or not River was old enough to have strong wine, holiday or no, while Book stood nearby and sipped from his cup with a mild, paternal smile. One cup, two, three... “That’s the last one? Nah, you... you take it, I... y’know, gotta keep an eye on...”
“Just drink, Mal. There’s only about two sips’ worth in these things, anyway. Especially with how you drink.”
Mal wasn’t quite sure, but he thought she smiled as he raised the cup in salute to her, took the smallest of sips, and offered it back to her. Maybe Jayne was good for something, after all...
(All information on Double Ninth, an actual holiday on the Chinese calendar, is taken from The Folklore of World Holidays, 2nd ed, edited by Griffin and Shurgin. It’s a lovely, very useful book.)
For
miss_arel: Time travel was not a native concept to the Daleks. The technology, stolen from the Time Lords, was still unfamiliar and somewhat unpredictable for them. And if the system was occasionally ‘exciting’ for its original inventors, well...
“AIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!”
Sploosh. Sploosh.
Sploosh.
...It could be downright dangerous for a Dalek.
“MY FUNCTIONS ARE IMPAIRED! MY FUNCTIONS ARE IMPAIRED!!!”
“You’re in the water, you idiot. Of course you’re impaired.” Dalek Sek splashed miserably next to his rapidly-sinking compatriots. Their attempted escape seemed to have failed rather drastically - appearing in mid-air above some... abominably huge body of liquid water. Liquid water was banned on Skaro. Dalek Sek could now understand why - the remaining members of the Cult of Skaro were barely managing to keep their eyepieces above the water, their thrusters alternately firing and then sputtering into helpless silence, doused by the disgusting alien liquid.
“CALLING FOR ASSISTANCE--”
“There’s no one here but a bunch of primative apes, you fool.” Sek flailed as a wave splushed over his head, and spat seawater. “Just keep quiet a moment while I think, both of you. And whatever you do, don’t discharge your weapons! You could electrocute all of us.”
“AN INFERIOR LIFEFORM IS ATTACKING DALEK SEK!!!”
Sek blinked, then looked up. Ah. Something green and slimy hung in his eye. “It appears to be a piece of plant matter.”
“INFERIOR LIFEFORMS MUST BE EX--”
“No! Don’t fire!!!”
Both inferior Daleks burbled slightly, but held their fire.
“WHAT COURSE OF ACTION SHOULD WE PURSUE?!”
“Just hold on, just--wait. I hear something. There’s something... some kind of craft is approaching.”
The lights on Dalek Thay’s armor brightened - this, at least, was a situation for which it was trained. “INFERIOR LIFEFORMS MUST--”
“Not this time,” Sek interrupted tightly. “This time, we’re going to play nice for a while. Once we’re safely out of this... water... then we shall exterminate them. And not before,” he added, recognizing that Jas and Caan were looking a bit shifty about the whole thing. Well... as shifty as they could while burbling and struggling not to sink. They would be trouble, he knew it... but for the moment, he had more pressing concerns.
The ship that appeared before them was... primative, but oddly appealing to Sek’s mind. For one thing, it was all green and slick, organic and therefore inferior, but... it reminded him rather of a Dalek without armor, and in that it was impressive.
“Man overboard!” Sek heard someone shout aboard the vessel, and the call was picked up by a chorus of other voices, rough and hoarse in a comfortingly familiar fashion. And after a moment, a rope flew from the ship and fell with a solid thwack onto the water beside Sek. He grabbed on, wrapping it around his arm and holding tight.
“There are four of us here!” he shouted.
“Grab on to’em, then, and wait ready to be pulled aboard!”
Sek considered this for a moment, then swam awkwardly over to Thay and tied the rope around the upper part of his armor, looping it through the grillwork so it would stay. Then he did the same for Caan and for Jas. Then he waited as they were slowly towed to the large vessel, and heaved up aboard.
“By the De’il himself, you lot sure are heavy,” someone grumbled as Sek cleared the railing. Sek ignored the voice long enough to spit more sea water back over the edge, and then turned to their unwitting rescuers, who... were not at all frightened by his appearance, because they themselves looked just as unlike to normal Humans.
“My... compatriots and I are... visitors to your world,” Sek offered, attempting to be gracious. “We, ah... seem to have lost our way.”
“Ye’ve lost more than that, me boys,” a booming voice announced. “Ye’re on the ship of Davy Jones! Death or the locker will ‘ave ye now!”
“The... locker?” Sek turned for a moment to Thay, who was just now being heaved up over the edge, and whom the unusual Humans were regarding with significant uncertainty.
“Aye, the locker. D’ye not know who I am?”
“No, I surely...” Sek turned back to the voice, and was astonished to find himself facing... a figure most like in appearance to himself. Different, surely - this creature was a sickly greenish hue, for one thing, like his ship, and his tentacles were all in the wrong alignment and entirely too long, but... but... “Who are you?”
“I am Davy Jones! The master of the sea, and the captain of the ship of the dead!”
“But... we’re not dead.”
The crew scuttled forward somewhat, and one of them sniffed in his general direction. Behind Sek, he heard Thay and Jas’s weapons begin to charge in defense.
“YOU WILL ACCEPT THE SUPREMACY OF THE DALEK SPECIES!!!”
That was Caan, of course. Sek closed his eye and took a deep breath. Caan always had been an idiot.
“The Dalek species?” The man before them - Jones he had said, and a suspiciously Human name that was - sputtered. “What are Daleks to me?”
Sek sighed. “I really wish you hadn’t asked that.”
“DALEKS ARE THE SUPERIOR SPECIES! WE WILL RULE THE UNIVERSE!!!”
“DALEKS WILL EXTERMINATE ALL INFERIOR LIFEFORMS, OR MAKE USE OF THEM FOR OUR DOMINATION!!!” Thay put in, clearly feeling left out of the proceedings.
“I’ll never get them to shut up, now. You’d better just hope they don’t--”
“EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!!!”
From three directions behind Sek, disruptor weapons discharged. Three of Davy Jones’ crew disappeared in puffs of smelly, slightly greasy smoke. Davy Jones’ claw tapped thoughtfully on the deck of his ship.
“Well... that is interesting...”
“Perhaps,” Sek began, stepping in front of his compatriots and raising his arms to signal the temporary abatement of their hostilities, “we should talk. Alone. My compatriots don’t take well to being surrounded, it... ignites certain instincts in our kind.”
“Y’are not dead, and y’aren’t of our realm, either, are ye?”
Sek took a distasteful look around him. Bright sunlight, endless, constantly moving blue water... disgustingly primative denizens... “Not at all.”
“Then we shall parlay,” Jones agreed, nodding decisively, although his tentacles belied a certain internal struggle that Sek rather suspected he was unaware of displaying. “We shall discuss your... unique predicament, and come to a bargain how I might help ye... and how ye might help me.”
“DALEKS DO NOT BARGAIN. DALEKS ONLY--”
“That will be quite nice, thank you,” Sek interrupted, giving the three inferior Daleks a significant look. If they were to get off this appalling planet, they would need time to recharge their circuits and repair whatever had gone wrong with the emergency time-jump. This ship and its crew could provide that, Sek guessed. And in any event, they were more familiar, more... similar than any Humans he’d heard of before. They warranted investigation.
If nothing else, he wanted to know how a Human had come by such... very fine tentacles.
LJ is mean and says "no." This will apparently have to be 2 posts. Please hold for more!
And!
miss_arel drew me Dalek Sek and Davy Jones for my birthday, and it's gorgeous. Seriously, everybody who likes one or the other (or both!) should go see it here. It's beautiful. And it has background, which is more than I dreamed of expecting, being one of those people who knows exactly how tedious and time-consuming background is, and how much most artists hate it with the fiery passion of a thousand suns. ♥
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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Date: 2007-10-15 10:09 pm (UTC)Also it was great to see the Firfly crew sit back and relex, love Zoe's distraction of Mal at the begining. You are so awesome for writing all this great fic.
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Date: 2007-10-16 03:56 pm (UTC)Thanks! I had lots of fun writing all of them.
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Date: 2007-10-15 10:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 03:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-15 11:45 pm (UTC)Now I want to read a sequel, although at the rate this is going I'd almost expect it to be tentacle porn, which would be, um... interesting. XDThank you so much! You have made my day SO MUCH BETTER/ Am going to link to this in my drawing post, if you don't mind. ^^
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Date: 2007-10-15 11:51 pm (UTC)Dude, don't thank me - it was all you asking for the thing! I just sat around staring at a blank screen until suddenly I got the image of poor Thay or Caan or whichever it was popping into existence above the water, hovering for just a split-second, and then crash into the Caribbean. After that it all felt like transcription of something that already ought to exist. Most fun I've ever had writing a story. XD
I'm glad the dialogue sounded right to you - it's been a loooong time since I heard either Sek or Davy, so I was kinda worried.
And please do! I'm just glad you liked it!
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Date: 2007-10-16 12:21 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 12:32 am (UTC)The inferior lifeform attacking Sek still makes me laugh. I swear, writing Dalek dialogue is addictive. Once you start, you never want to stop! They're so cute and single-minded and dumb! ♥ Dalek Dork Brigade indeed!
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Date: 2007-10-16 12:36 am (UTC)There should be more Dalek-fic in general, I think. XD Especially when there's someone like Sek around to go "oh my god, my teammates are MORONS
why do I hang around with these people?"no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 12:42 am (UTC)Which just makes me wish more than usual that I could get BBC radio to work, because that image is just fantastic. Either way, I hope the Daleks just keep coming back... they're too much fun.
...And now I'm totally tempted to keep writing The Idiotic Adventures of Dalek Sek & Co. XD
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Date: 2007-10-16 12:47 am (UTC)The Daleks will always come back. Somehow, some way. The day they get rid of the Daleks for good will be the day the show ends, I swear. XD It's not Who without certain things. You need a Doctor, you need a companion, you need a TARDIS... and you need Daleks.
...And now I'm totally tempted to keep writing The Idiotic Adventures of Dalek Sek & Co.
I ENDORSE THIS PRODUCT OR SERVICE if only because it would give Sek SUCH a headache...
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Date: 2007-10-16 09:23 pm (UTC)I'm just sort of fascinated to see how they keep bringing them back. So far, it's all been very believable and fun, but now it looks like we just have... was it Caan? One of Sek's boys, anyway. I'll be interested to see how they manufacture a comeback out of that!
...I might just have to think about this, then. Because seriously. What other chance to I have to write Daleks being stupid? XD
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Date: 2007-10-17 07:13 am (UTC)fkgjsfkhj;skfhjadga;gha;hja; AWESOME I mean. *cough* Very good, very good. *dignified nod*
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Date: 2007-10-17 03:59 pm (UTC)XD
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Date: 2007-10-16 03:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-16 03:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-17 02:33 am (UTC)This made my evening. Seriously.
Have you seen/listened to a reconstruction of Evil of the Daleks? Because the only thing better than the Dalek Dork Brigade are the baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaby Daleks that the Doctor gets to play with in that episode. It's the best.
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Date: 2007-10-17 03:55 pm (UTC)Seriously, though, baby Daleks??? Is this... where is this? I must see it or hear it or... absolutely whatever is possible. Because that sounds beyond fantastic. ♥
Also, your icon? Totally perfect.
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Date: 2007-10-18 05:55 am (UTC)And thanks, decided I needed a New Who icon :)
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Date: 2007-10-19 12:06 am (UTC)Alpha, Beta, and Omega. Oh, that is so the Doctor. ♥
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Date: 2007-10-19 02:14 am (UTC)Two is wonderful! It's too bad so many of his serials got lost. I particularly like The Tomb of the Cybermen, The Invasion, and The Mind Robber. And The War Games, even though it's about a million episodes long. Well, ten.
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Date: 2007-10-19 03:54 pm (UTC)...Am I going to regret this affection for the baby Daleks? Do they get horribly killed by their people or something? *Wibbles*
I've heard so many good reviews of Troughton, it's just hard to get hold of his episodes. I think our local video place has some of them (they seem to have everything, it's great!), but not nearly as many as of the others. I'll take down that list - that'll make it easier next time we go in for tapes. ♥
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Date: 2007-10-17 04:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-17 03:57 pm (UTC)