I should really be asleep right now

[sarashina]

Thanks for all your kind words, guys. ♥ I'll reply to your comments individually when I return.

Which brings me to the point of this post! I will be leaving appallingly early tomorrow morning to go to D.C and meet my potential employers/check out my potential apartment! I'll be there until Saturday night. I will most likely have regular access to internet, but I'll be scarce.

I should, however, have a lot of downtime, and I'm looking to do some writing type things that are fun and will make me feel a little better about things in general. So I thought I'd open one of these up again, since it's been a while!

Name one or more of my original characters and a prompt, and I will write a drabble. It can be from any of my original fics, or any cowriting projects. ♥ Go crazy!

Okay, time to attempt sleep again. See you guys later!

Comments

[ruecian.livejournal.com]

Isha / It was my choice.

[evilsimon.livejournal.com]

Alex / Don't fire until you see the whites of their eyes

[noelleno.livejournal.com]

Xue / A little unsatisfied

Ilario / Not as planned

Cat / Perfect

[ruffwriter.livejournal.com]

The next time Xue is injured - legitimately this time, and not through his own stupidity - it's a shallow cut, but it bleeds like hell. He sits there in the snow, staring at it with an almost clinical detachment, for a few seconds, until two things occur to him. The first is that he should probably staunch the bleeding with something. The second is that his teammates are going to kill him.

At the very least, he has practice. He knows them. He knows how they'll react, and he can anticipate it, think up ways to satisfy them. He calmly waits out Xiao's silent treatment, smiles understandingly when it boils over, and waits for a lull in the tirade to say, "I'm sorry, Xiao." Xiao keeps lecturing him for the rest of the night, but there's no heat to it anymore.

Shikang is more practical. He believes in ratios. And since Xue's opponent got off worse than he did, it's a ratio he can get behind. He's more talkative than he's ever been, babbling about how Xue's small size is his greatest asset, how he can trick people into lowering their guard. Xue doesn't correct him - he smiles and says yes, that's exactly how it went. Shikang seems imposing, but really, he's the easiest to please.

He's wrong once, though. As he knelt in the snow, staring at the gash in his arm with an almost clinical detachment, how he would handle Jiaming never crossed his mind. Most of the time she just handles herself, with minimal effort from his end.

When she doesn't come back to her tent, Xue finds her in the surrounding woods around dawn, her mouth set in a thin line as she slashes long grooves across the trunk of a tree.

Xue starts forward and starts to call out to her, but without turning around, she snaps, "Quiet. I'm busy."

So Xue, unsure of what else to do, just stands there.

"... right there," she grits out, bracing one hand against the trunk. "I was standing right there."

Jiaming had been standing nearby, but all the same, that wasn't what she was talking about. Xue got the feeling she wasn't really talking about him at all. He's been a soldier just long enough to know what loss looks like, after all.

"Jiaming..." His legs feel a little shaky as he takes a step forward. For lack of anything better to say, he sighs, "It's cold out here."

That, of all things, gets her attention for some reason, and she turns around as if just noticing him. "... what the hell d'you think you're doing out here," she mutters at length. She grabs his arm and pulls. "C'mon. You can frolic in the snowdrifts later."

On a normal day, Xue takes insults as a sign that whatever's wrong isn't too serious. But today he finds himself a little unsatisfied.

Jiaming squints, trying to find her way back to camp in the hazy morning light, and Xue watches her as she drags him along. Xiao and Shikang have a button to be pushed - a magic word, something like that - and Xue has dozens more platitudes he could try. Sooner or later, he's bound to find the right one.

But he doubts Jiaming would be satisfied with that, either.

[ivory-and-horn.livejournal.com]

Kalinda / this had better be worth it

[glass-icarus.livejournal.com]

Alex and or Felix: shoulda left my phone at home cause this was a disaster! xD