5 things (Alias - Part 1)
6 Sep 2006 03:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kangeikoA whole buncha '5things' for the Alias fandom, done in fic format. Feedback welcome.
For![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
monanotlisa: (using the ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
fandom100 prompt #05 "outsides")
1. On parenting
He's sitting outside in the frigid air, rubbing his hands together for warmth and not daring to say anything at all. Beside him, Jack is unnaturally still, and Vaughn has to fight the urge to check that his lips have not turned blue. He'd always half-thought that Jack must be cold-blooded, and the memory shames him.
He shuffles his feet.
"Did she like it here?" He asks at last. He doesn't have to specify who 'she' is; what else does he have in common with Jack, of all people?
Jack is silent for so long that Vaughn begins to wonder if he's heard him at all. "She's never been here," he says at last. His words are slow, like he's pulling them out by the roots. "We had a holiday planned, but then her mother -" he hesitates. "Then Irina disappeared, and I wasn't around. So we had to cancel." He staring at the far side of the frozen lake, where small children are still valiantly trying to stay upright. Their parents are occasionally reaching over to grab them by their collars and unceremoniously straighten them; once they skate away, however, the small figures are once again pinwheeling, limbs flying open across the ice.
Vaughn stared at the smallest figure, still too small and rounded to resemble anything other than an orange starfish with a blue cap. He couldn't tell if it was a girl or a boy, but he supposed it didn't matter. It fluttered about the ice for a little bit, then decided that it had had enough and launched itself at the nearest adult.
He wondered if he was betraying a confidence.
He wondered if it mattered.
"She felt guilty," he said at last, eyes fixed on the orange child. The adults gathered around it, grabbing a limb and spinning it around. He could hear the delighted shrieks skip across the ice.
Jack shifted beside him. "I don't understand."
"Sydney. She felt guilty. I didn't know that this was the place she never made it to, but I - she told me about it. About the cancelled holiday, I mean." The blue cap flew off and one of the older children went racing after it. "She said she was so angry with you then, for abandoning her after her mother died."
Jack was perfectly still.
The cap replaced, the small orange-clad child was carried off the ice by one of the adults, still shrieking delightedly. "She also said how guilty she felt when she found out where you were during that time." He patted his hands together and turned to face Jack. "She felt guilty because she'd blamed you for something that wasn't your fault," he said at last.
Jack said nothing at all.
2. On priorities
"I need an extension," he told his supervisor.
She scowled. "You've had two extensions already," she pointed out, tapping her capped pen on the stack of grading papers. "Why do you need a third?"
Because people other than me decide my life.
Because I lie every time I sign my name on the frontispiece declaration.
Because I don't think that I'm going to be a teacher.
"Family emergency," he said, and looked appropriately stressed.
3. On curiosity
He visits Will in the hospital and brings him GQ and a box of chocolates. Will looks pale in his hospital gown, with his hair shaved off and various needles sticking out of his skin.
"You're here early," Will says in a raspy voice. They had taken him off the respirator a couple of days ago and although his lungs looked promising, his voice still had some way to go.
"I have an early flight and I didn't want to cut our visit short," Vaughn says, surrendering his gifts.
Will nods and slowly flicks his eyes over GQ, poking the chocolates and attempting a smile. Vaughn sits in a chair and watches.
He wonders if it's too early or too late to express his condolences for Francie. He wonders if it's too early or too late to talk about Sydney.
He wonders if it's too early or too late to say he wished he'd just told Will to keep his damn mouth shut and his pants zipped.
He thinks that maybe he needs to go to the gym before the flight and kick the shit out of a punchbag or two.
Two hours pass.
"Well, I'd better go," he says. Will nods, eyes hollow.
4. On brothers
Sometimes, Vaughn wonders what would happen if Weiss went bad. He knows that it'll never happen because Weiss going bad is just plain wrong and it doesn't make any sense in his brain. But that's what the Agency thought about Arvin Sloane at one time, he reminds himself, and look how that turned out.
If Weiss went bad - a hypothetical worst-case and unlikely scenario - Vaughn knows that he'd be the one heading the taskforce. He knows, because he's read Jack's file and he can pretty much figure the reasoning behind it. Or maybe - like Jack - he'd end up as a mole, smiling and hanging out with Eric like nothing had changed, like they hadn't changed.
(He watches Jack sometimes: grainy video footage of him having public meetings with Sloane, safe in their anonymity. They sit comfortably close, their bodies so familiar to each other that they no longer need that extra few inches of personal space. Not even Jack.
Sometimes, he even laughs.)
Weiss is lounging on his couch, eating nachos and shouting at the screen. "Can you believe that?" He leans across Vaughn and snags another beer, bracing himself across Vaughn's thighs. "That ref's not worth shit."
"You have no appreciation for the fine art of ice hockey," he says, laughing, and the thought fades.
5. On self-sacrifice
He was a little too slow, was all, and the dart caught him on the shoulder. One half-second faster, and it would have missed him and hit Sydney. So, really, it's better this way.
Vaughn is desperately trying to hang on to that thought as the world spins and sways as if it had become fixed on a carousel. Sydney's face swims into focus, or what he thinks might be her face; all he can see is a blur of pale skin framed by black. Her hair fans around her like a halo, and there are hands at his chest, easing him out of his clothing. His breath hitches and there is a tinny sound in his ears.
Everyone seems to be terribly far away, and he can feel himself fading. Colours swamp him, swarming and scuttling across each other. The tinny sound insensifies and he recognises that it's a woman screaming.
It's better this way, Vaughn thinks, but he can't really remember why that is, or what the alternative could be. It's better this way, and it is fading like woodsmoke in the air. The only thing that remains is the eerie impression that he's still speaking, long after his body cools.
Forluvarvinsloane:
1. They didn't bury her. The midwife said that they should; that it helps with the healing process. Emily didn't want to, though, and Arvin finally gave in. They handed over the tiny body and the nurses took it away, and after that, Emily doesn't know what happened.
She thinks she can guess. She thinks that she's happy with it, that when she hiccupped with pain and tears, she must have inhaled a little of her child, the ashes sinking deep within her.
(She wonders, though, what she would have put on that gravestone, if it had ever been made. She can see it in her mind's eye: slate grey and unforgiving, with sloping cravings of an angel's wings to sing her baby to rest.)
2. She should have spent more time with Laura before the accident, she's sure of it. God judges you like you judge others, Emily's mother had said, and somewhere in between church and Sunday school, it had sunk in. It was why she volunteered to be a dinner monitor, and why she walked home with Jenny Ellis, even after the boys shouted things about how Jenny's dad was no good and didn't belong in their town. It was why she gave Jenny a cutting from her mother's roses, and took the beating for it when it turned out she'd done it wrong and ruined half a bush.
God judges you like you judge others, and she held Sydney's hand during the funeral, watching an empty box being lowered into the ground.
3. When she was seventeen, she cut all her hair off and went for the shortest bob she could find. It was supposed to be rebellious and chic, but it looked muddled and strange poodle-like instead. It took her the better part of a year to grow it all back, and she hated every second of it.
It's strange. After all the pain of her illness, and of chemo, and of watching everyone around her slowly wilt because of it, the only real annoyance - the one thing she can focus on with a pure and unadulterated anger - is the red scarf tied carefully around her bare scalp.
She looks at herself in the mirror and wishes she'd savoured herself for a little longer.
4. She read History, in the end, and didn't do too badly overall. It wasn't anything spectacular, but it was a way to pass the time and work out what she wanted to do. She thinks that maybe she would have preferred to go someplace a little more liberal than Harvard, but her parents had insisted. No strange sandal-wearing campuses for their little girl, and she'd finally given in.
She does regret the experience a little.
Only a little, mind. Second year, she took the Italian History option and ending up sitting next to a cute guy with pale, closely cropped brown hair and round glasses. He held out his hand in greeting the moment she sat down.
"Hello," he said, and showed her the nicest smile she'd seen for ages. "My name's Arvin."
5. Once in her life, Emily regretted marrying Arvin Sloane. It was only the once, and it passed as quickly as it came.
By then, of course, it was too late.
Still to come:
5 things Dr. Barnett wishes she said to Arvin Sloane
5 things Arvin Sloane would change if he could
5 things Arvin Sloane has always wanted from Sydney
For
monanotlisa: (using the fandom100 prompt #05 "outsides") 1. On parenting
He's sitting outside in the frigid air, rubbing his hands together for warmth and not daring to say anything at all. Beside him, Jack is unnaturally still, and Vaughn has to fight the urge to check that his lips have not turned blue. He'd always half-thought that Jack must be cold-blooded, and the memory shames him.
He shuffles his feet.
"Did she like it here?" He asks at last. He doesn't have to specify who 'she' is; what else does he have in common with Jack, of all people?
Jack is silent for so long that Vaughn begins to wonder if he's heard him at all. "She's never been here," he says at last. His words are slow, like he's pulling them out by the roots. "We had a holiday planned, but then her mother -" he hesitates. "Then Irina disappeared, and I wasn't around. So we had to cancel." He staring at the far side of the frozen lake, where small children are still valiantly trying to stay upright. Their parents are occasionally reaching over to grab them by their collars and unceremoniously straighten them; once they skate away, however, the small figures are once again pinwheeling, limbs flying open across the ice.
Vaughn stared at the smallest figure, still too small and rounded to resemble anything other than an orange starfish with a blue cap. He couldn't tell if it was a girl or a boy, but he supposed it didn't matter. It fluttered about the ice for a little bit, then decided that it had had enough and launched itself at the nearest adult.
He wondered if he was betraying a confidence.
He wondered if it mattered.
"She felt guilty," he said at last, eyes fixed on the orange child. The adults gathered around it, grabbing a limb and spinning it around. He could hear the delighted shrieks skip across the ice.
Jack shifted beside him. "I don't understand."
"Sydney. She felt guilty. I didn't know that this was the place she never made it to, but I - she told me about it. About the cancelled holiday, I mean." The blue cap flew off and one of the older children went racing after it. "She said she was so angry with you then, for abandoning her after her mother died."
Jack was perfectly still.
The cap replaced, the small orange-clad child was carried off the ice by one of the adults, still shrieking delightedly. "She also said how guilty she felt when she found out where you were during that time." He patted his hands together and turned to face Jack. "She felt guilty because she'd blamed you for something that wasn't your fault," he said at last.
Jack said nothing at all.
2. On priorities
"I need an extension," he told his supervisor.
She scowled. "You've had two extensions already," she pointed out, tapping her capped pen on the stack of grading papers. "Why do you need a third?"
Because people other than me decide my life.
Because I lie every time I sign my name on the frontispiece declaration.
Because I don't think that I'm going to be a teacher.
"Family emergency," he said, and looked appropriately stressed.
3. On curiosity
He visits Will in the hospital and brings him GQ and a box of chocolates. Will looks pale in his hospital gown, with his hair shaved off and various needles sticking out of his skin.
"You're here early," Will says in a raspy voice. They had taken him off the respirator a couple of days ago and although his lungs looked promising, his voice still had some way to go.
"I have an early flight and I didn't want to cut our visit short," Vaughn says, surrendering his gifts.
Will nods and slowly flicks his eyes over GQ, poking the chocolates and attempting a smile. Vaughn sits in a chair and watches.
He wonders if it's too early or too late to express his condolences for Francie. He wonders if it's too early or too late to talk about Sydney.
He wonders if it's too early or too late to say he wished he'd just told Will to keep his damn mouth shut and his pants zipped.
He thinks that maybe he needs to go to the gym before the flight and kick the shit out of a punchbag or two.
Two hours pass.
"Well, I'd better go," he says. Will nods, eyes hollow.
4. On brothers
Sometimes, Vaughn wonders what would happen if Weiss went bad. He knows that it'll never happen because Weiss going bad is just plain wrong and it doesn't make any sense in his brain. But that's what the Agency thought about Arvin Sloane at one time, he reminds himself, and look how that turned out.
If Weiss went bad - a hypothetical worst-case and unlikely scenario - Vaughn knows that he'd be the one heading the taskforce. He knows, because he's read Jack's file and he can pretty much figure the reasoning behind it. Or maybe - like Jack - he'd end up as a mole, smiling and hanging out with Eric like nothing had changed, like they hadn't changed.
(He watches Jack sometimes: grainy video footage of him having public meetings with Sloane, safe in their anonymity. They sit comfortably close, their bodies so familiar to each other that they no longer need that extra few inches of personal space. Not even Jack.
Sometimes, he even laughs.)
Weiss is lounging on his couch, eating nachos and shouting at the screen. "Can you believe that?" He leans across Vaughn and snags another beer, bracing himself across Vaughn's thighs. "That ref's not worth shit."
"You have no appreciation for the fine art of ice hockey," he says, laughing, and the thought fades.
5. On self-sacrifice
He was a little too slow, was all, and the dart caught him on the shoulder. One half-second faster, and it would have missed him and hit Sydney. So, really, it's better this way.
Vaughn is desperately trying to hang on to that thought as the world spins and sways as if it had become fixed on a carousel. Sydney's face swims into focus, or what he thinks might be her face; all he can see is a blur of pale skin framed by black. Her hair fans around her like a halo, and there are hands at his chest, easing him out of his clothing. His breath hitches and there is a tinny sound in his ears.
Everyone seems to be terribly far away, and he can feel himself fading. Colours swamp him, swarming and scuttling across each other. The tinny sound insensifies and he recognises that it's a woman screaming.
It's better this way, Vaughn thinks, but he can't really remember why that is, or what the alternative could be. It's better this way, and it is fading like woodsmoke in the air. The only thing that remains is the eerie impression that he's still speaking, long after his body cools.
For
luvarvinsloane:1. They didn't bury her. The midwife said that they should; that it helps with the healing process. Emily didn't want to, though, and Arvin finally gave in. They handed over the tiny body and the nurses took it away, and after that, Emily doesn't know what happened.
She thinks she can guess. She thinks that she's happy with it, that when she hiccupped with pain and tears, she must have inhaled a little of her child, the ashes sinking deep within her.
(She wonders, though, what she would have put on that gravestone, if it had ever been made. She can see it in her mind's eye: slate grey and unforgiving, with sloping cravings of an angel's wings to sing her baby to rest.)
2. She should have spent more time with Laura before the accident, she's sure of it. God judges you like you judge others, Emily's mother had said, and somewhere in between church and Sunday school, it had sunk in. It was why she volunteered to be a dinner monitor, and why she walked home with Jenny Ellis, even after the boys shouted things about how Jenny's dad was no good and didn't belong in their town. It was why she gave Jenny a cutting from her mother's roses, and took the beating for it when it turned out she'd done it wrong and ruined half a bush.
God judges you like you judge others, and she held Sydney's hand during the funeral, watching an empty box being lowered into the ground.
3. When she was seventeen, she cut all her hair off and went for the shortest bob she could find. It was supposed to be rebellious and chic, but it looked muddled and strange poodle-like instead. It took her the better part of a year to grow it all back, and she hated every second of it.
It's strange. After all the pain of her illness, and of chemo, and of watching everyone around her slowly wilt because of it, the only real annoyance - the one thing she can focus on with a pure and unadulterated anger - is the red scarf tied carefully around her bare scalp.
She looks at herself in the mirror and wishes she'd savoured herself for a little longer.
4. She read History, in the end, and didn't do too badly overall. It wasn't anything spectacular, but it was a way to pass the time and work out what she wanted to do. She thinks that maybe she would have preferred to go someplace a little more liberal than Harvard, but her parents had insisted. No strange sandal-wearing campuses for their little girl, and she'd finally given in.
She does regret the experience a little.
Only a little, mind. Second year, she took the Italian History option and ending up sitting next to a cute guy with pale, closely cropped brown hair and round glasses. He held out his hand in greeting the moment she sat down.
"Hello," he said, and showed her the nicest smile she'd seen for ages. "My name's Arvin."
5. Once in her life, Emily regretted marrying Arvin Sloane. It was only the once, and it passed as quickly as it came.
By then, of course, it was too late.
Still to come:
5 things Dr. Barnett wishes she said to Arvin Sloane
5 things Arvin Sloane would change if he could
5 things Arvin Sloane has always wanted from Sydney