RULES: Post a sentence/paragraph scene (because I can) from every WIP you can find. No explanations allowed, just excerpt.

Two WIPs and three pieces that never went anywhere…

A/N: These five are actually old “unfinished” drabbles but that means in my lingo “never to be finished”. :/ I have made them part of the The Drabble series.

Fandom: Black Jewels

Rainier settles onto an arm of a chair. “I have counted up to six other estates in Dhemlan alone.”

“So many?” Surreal looks interested at this bit of news.

He warms to the subject. “Well, considering the wealth of your family—”

She rolls her eyes, but he ignores that.

“—and the long-established… business in Dhemlan, it’s no wonder that there are a number of estates employed and kept for the SaDiablos. Of course, going by the account ledgers alone—”

“There are seven family estates,” a deep, cultured voice interrupts from the doorway.

Rainier jumps up from his perch.

“Father tells me,” Prince Sadi adds with obvious amusement, “that Mephis made use of the estates for our family ‘business,’ I believe you called it.”

He tries not to blush. Sadi’s mouth twists at the corner in a half-smirk.

Surreal sighs. “Daemon, play nice.”

Sadi raises one elegant eyebrow at his cousin and second-in-command. “I am,” he replies mildly.

and

I.

Fandom: Star Trek TOS or AOS
Characters: unnamed Vulcan

“Lie.”

“False truth.”

“A conundrum,” the aging professor clarifies.

There is a murmur through the young audience. Some cadets are unsettled; some are tickled by the word ‘conundrum.’

“But, sir,” wonders a fresh-faced cadet sitting midway up the auditorium, “I thought Vulcans can’t lie.”

The man smiles. “Vulcans are creatures of truth; that is correct, young man. However, imagine yourself in a situation—life or death—that requires you to break a principle to which your culture adheres most strictly.”

The murmur grows to talking, to conversation and protest.

“Imagine it is not your own life at stake, but that of a friend—or lover.” Silence falls.

“Tell us the story,” another one says.

So he does.

II.

Fandom: Star Trek TOS or AOS Mirrorverse
Characters: Kirk

“So you thought you’d dump a load of Praxis shellfish into my dinner and I wouldn’t notice? …That my yeoman—who receives an hour in the agonizer booth for any mishaps with my meals—wouldn’t notice?”

“Yes, Sir,” The Romulan hangs his head.

Kirk turns to his First Officer. “I’m shocked at this Romulan’s stupidity. Aren’t your people competent enough to tackle an assassination?”

“I am Vulcan.”

“Irrelevant, since Romulans and Vulcans share a common ancestry.”

Spock takes the insult with little comment of his own, as always. Kirk cannot decide if his First Officer keeps silent out of caution, or if the Vulcan truly cares little for Kirk’s thoughts and opinions.

That Spock can follow orders is his only redeeming quality.

Unlike this foolish alien. The kind of half-assed stunt with which the spy attempted to kill a starship captain truly disgusts Kirk. He’d previously considered the Romulans to be a step above the scheming Orion slave traders… and well above the Klingons. They are steadily losing rank on Kirk’s scale of respect for his enemies.

“Remove the flesh from his fingers, McCoy. Slowly.”

The CMO shrugs and begins laying out the tools of his oft-barbaric trade.

As Kirk spins away, he tells the Vulcan, “Perhaps you should stay and watch, Mr. Spock. Take careful notes on how the Enterprise handles touch-telepathic nuisances.” The words such as yourself are unspoken but left hanging in the air at Kirk’s departure.

III.

Fandom: Star Trek TOS or AOS
Characters: Kirk, McCoy

“I need you, Bones. I can’t—I can’t do this without you.”

The man looks like he is sleeping but Kirk knows better.

“And I’m sorry that I didn’t l-listen. Oh God, if only I’d listened to you!”

Eyes open, a dark shade of green; they slowly, languidly, pinpoint the grieving man’s pale, shadowed face. Can those cloudy eyes see his heartbreak? Can that mind comprehend such a thing?

“Please,” he whispers as he runs a hand along a stubble-lined jaw.

“Please?” the other man’s mouth re-shapes the word tentatively.

There are tears trembling on his eyelashes. They shake loose, drop. He cannot smile, cannot rejoice that the man is awake. (It’s worse when he’s awake.)

He leans over, watching those eyes track his movements—unfocused, empty—and calls softly, “Bones, come back.”

That familiar voice rumbles, says, “I am here.”

He removes his hand slowly from the other, defeated. “Won’t you let him go?” A slow smile answers, ugly and wrong on that beloved face.

“No, I won’t.”

Jim chokes back his pain. Anger burned itself out long ago. Hope too. (How he wanted to hope!) He rises from the bed and steps back… and walks away as his heart breaks to pieces.

M’Benga is waiting, tools in hand. Christine Chapel is absent. So is Spock. Jim knows that he’ll never forget this moment as long as he lives, that it—and his responsibility—will haunt him for the rest of his life. Geoff is watching him, eyes sympathetic and equally pained.

James T. Kirk won’t be alone in this guilt.

He does not turn around for a last look at his Bones, at the body that belongs to Doctor Leonard McCoy but whose heart and soul are gone. Devoured.

“You have your orders.” The words ring hollow.

M’Benga swallows and drops his head. The Captain averts his eyes.

“Yes, Sir.”

Jim stays as witness. He’d rather run, run so far and long until he is too exhausted to recall his own name. But he cannot because he owes Bones this much; and he loves the man enough to not let him die alone (even though Leonard is already gone).

The end is painless, granted by this century’s medical advancements. As the last monitor goes flat, indicating a void of life, Jim sways on his feet and grips the bed railing to regain control of himself. If a moan of grief breaks free, no one will think unkindly of him.

M’Benga is talking. “Time of death—”

Jim isn’t listening. His legs bear him no more. As his body sinks to the floor, he thinks only of this moment and beyond, recognizing that from now until he dies…

…there shall be no Bones.

IV.

Fandom: Star Trek TOS or AOS
Characters: Kirk, McCoy

“If you go to the Bridge,” Bones tells him, “Spock will personally escort you back to your quarters.”

“Are you mutinying against me with my First Officer?”

“Damn hobgoblin and I both have the same clause in our contract; something about ‘preserving the Captain of the ship,'” Jim is reminded dryly. “Now go on.”

He is given a gentle shove out the door.

Jim lingers in the corridor for a moment; his blue eyes are remarkably warm. Then the man retreats to his quarters as ordered.

Those Neighborhood Hoodlums

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