Meme: icon ficlets
Jan. 11th, 2011 09:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rainsometimesSo! I got tagged - or rather, asked to be tagged - by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
scribe_protra a week or so back (*checks* uh, actually it was New Year's Eve - I'm even slower than I thought!) for a writing meme! This one is connected to user pics.
This is how the meme goes officially, though as you see below I didn't follow all of it:
1. Reply to this post, and I will pick six of your icons.
2. Make a post (including the meme info) and write a drabble about (each of) the icons I chose.
3. Other people can then comment to you and make their own posts.
4. This will create a never-ending cycle of icon glee.
Beside the icon glee, I think - though I could have this all wrong - that the point is to write something brief and fast without taking it too seriously. Unfortunately, I normally fail at brevity and quickness, so that failed, even though I cheated and askedscribe_protra to only pick four of my icons rather than six. And I wound up way over 100-word length for all of them - though I did hold on to the "not taking it too seriously" part. Anyway, it was still fun to do, and I'd love to pass it on in case anyone's interested.
If you do want to do this, please ask how many icons I should pick - since I only had four, I can hardly demand anyone else must write six!
Concrit is welcome as always - this is just for fun, but it's always good to get tips on wording, correction on typoes etc!
1.
Robin glanced up from her work on the old buried shield to look at Usopp over by the cave wall. He seemed to be holding up well, she noted with relief. His eyes were full of curiosity and wonder as he held up a lantern and gazed at the great walls around them.
This was the second time they visited the fabled Naïr caves, enormous, beautiful, and very, very old, whose collection of sunken ruins made it a must for archaeologists as well as geologists to visit. However, the locals were very strict that visitors kept silent while in there - not just due to traditional respect for a sacred place, but also practical fear of loud noises provoking cave-ins at some places. They also posted guards inside the caves to make sure this prohibition was respected.
Usopp had gone with her the first time, as did Nami and Chopper (who were both busy with other things today). As she could have predicted, Usopp had been the one most ill at ease with the forced silence, getting all itchy and uneasy to the point of mild panic, constantly gesturing wildly as if desperate to communicate even though it turned out there was nothing very urgent to say, frequently opening his mouth only to clam it shut immediately with a guilty hand.
Nevertheless, when she said she'd return down here he'd still offered to follow her again to keep her company and help carry tools and such. That had surprised her, to be honest.
So far he seemed to do much better this time, though. No wild gestures, and very little twitching.
A little curious, she took out a page of her notebook and tore it out. Feeling better today? she wrote at the top of the page. She handed the torn-out page and the pen over to him. Usopp blinked, looked briefly embarrassed and then met her eyes and shrugged. He grabbed the pen and wrote a reply: Training.
She considered this, chipped away at the shield for another minute, then wrote at the page again. For what?
Usopp sat down carefully beside her, sighing very softly as he stretched out his hands over his head. He wrote more slowly this time around before handing the piece of paper back. Listening, it said.
She raised her eyebrows at him questioningly. There was no need to write For what? a second time - he got what she meant, and opened his mouth for half a second before freezing, then smiled sheepishly at her amused smile.
Just listening. I think I could use the practice, he wrote. Robin read this, still feeling a little confused,but picked up her chisel and got to work again. Usopp adjusted the lamp and sat back, looking up at the glittering stone pillars, already different from this slight change in angle.
*
It was true that Usopp didn't much like silence, but, he thought now, wasn't that mostly in places where there would usually be plenty of noise - like most of the world? And particularly things like a home, a ship, a kitchen... or a city street or a village market. But these caves were always quiet. Silence lived here without having to scare anyone, without forcing the sounds away. That made it different.
There wasn't much to listen too, here, but wasn't that the point? By necessity, Robin worked very quietly as she scraped with a chisel, tested the hollowness of vessels and scritched down notes. In the distance, water dripped down from the ceiling, and a nearby local guard shifted position.
Usopp felt pretty proud of himself for being able to stand the silence so well, and listen to Robin work as if it was a piece of music. Very, very proud...
A minute or so later, he was fast asleep.
2.
"Don't you try to be cute with me," said the big guy with the walrus moustache who sat in the barstool next to Luffy. "I'm not just anybody, you know! They call me Big Ory, an' I'm part of Captain Bern's pirate crew, you know! And he's pretty much the most fearsome guy around!" Sanji, sitting on Luffy's other side, only raised an eyebrow and grinned quietly. The walrus-moustache went on, "You don't want Captain Bern mad at you! That guy doesn't even know the meaning of 'retreat' or 'surrender'!"
"Huh?" said Luffy, tilting his head and giving Big Ory a blank look. "Is he an idiot?"
Big Ory grew red with fury. "What the hell do you… what do you think you're…" he sputtered, grabbing Luffy by the vest and glaring at him.
"Well if he doesn't know those words he sounds like an idiot!" Luffy said. He pushed Big Ory away lightly, then undertook an explanatory tone. "To surrender means you give up and stop fighting. Retreating means you turn back and hide or run away, you stop attacking," he explained in a slow tone.
Big Ory opened and closed his mouth several times, while Sanji sniggered into his beer. "I didn't mean that he - I just meant that - point is, he rallied, glaring at Luffy, "that the Captain doesn't need to know those things because he's not going to do either."
"Oh," said Luffy, in a tone that was suddenly quiet. He drank from his glass, very slowly. "So that's how you think."
"Damn right I do!" snarled Big Ory. "And that's why..."
"So if someone was threatening to blow the head off someone important to him, then he wouldn't stop fighting?" Luffy sat down his glass on the bar, very softly. He didn't look at Sanji, but held his head low. Sanji swallowed at an old, sharp memory. "If he heard all the ones he cared for would get blown to dust by a whole fleet if he didn't give up, he wouldn't care at all?" Luffy drew with one finger slowly over the surface of the glass. "And if he and the whole rest of you were way in over your heads in a fight you had no way of winning, he'd just press on, not try to run to make everyone survive?" He lifted his head and looked at Big Ory again.
"Then he's wrong," he said simply. "Sometimes you have to give up and run away so you can fight again some other time. When you're stronger. Long as you're still alive, you can go back and win later."
3.
Calipha thinks that compared to some other people, she's pretty good at not wallowing in old defeats from the past. Of course a big failure will linger with you, it's only natural, especially when it's led to life-changing consequences due to an idiot former boss unable to take the blame for his own failures. It makes good sense to do a post-battle analysis in order to see how to improve. But getting blinded by vengeful thoughts and be obsessed with memories is stupid, she feels.
She really believes that for the most time, she has her feelings on her unfortunate fight with the navigator of the Strawhat Pirates under control. Besides, she can recognise it was largely her own fault for miscalculating - instead of just laying the girl flat with a kick and follow up with a few Rokougans, she wanted to use the chance to explore her new devil fruit powers, and to toy a bit with the orange-haired pirate who, while adorable, had seemed about as harmless as a kitten. It had been so long since she'd had the luxury of playing with a target before striking, and it was the pirates who were pressed for time, not her.
Well, it turned out she didn't really that luxury then, either. The kitten had sharp teeth.
"I control the weather in this room," the insolent girl had said so brashly. Hah, well, let her see how far her puny powers that only extend as far as a room will take her, Calipha tells herself. If it's true that the Strawhat is aiming for the New World, the orange-hair will not last long, going there.
She finds only a slight satisfaction in the thought. Is she growing sentimental, perhaps, or pridefully hoping for a re-match? Maybe it's just an aesthetic regret that the girl would be wasted like that, cute as she were. Or maybe it's even a wish to see such unusual abilities in a fight again, though that does sound unlike her.
When she steps into weaponry shops these days on new islands, she finds herself drawn to the long stafflike weapons, holding them up, weighing them and turning them over. Then she pushes up her glasses and puts them away. After all, none of them will dole out lightning.
4.
Yotsuba Koiwai, the brightest new star on Japan's financial heavens, whose brilliant instinct for reading the stock market had made her a business world sensation despite her mere five years in age, sat back in her cool office chair in her big office on the t112th floor and sipped some delicious orange juice from a straw. Suddenly, her cellphone rang.
"Hello, Koiwai here," she said nonchalantly.
"Aha!" came a chirpy, confident voice through the line. "It is you, Yotsuba! Just as suspected!"
Yotsuba shot up. "A-A-Asagi?!? H-how did you -"
"Found this cute little card at the floor of Ena's room. So mysterious, just a four-leaf clover and a phone number, but I thought it could be you!"
Incredible! Yotsuba couldn't believe how careless she'd been. She normally only kept her calling cards in her office clothes.
"I guess it's from a print club, huh?" Asagi went on. "Does this mean you've got your own cellphone now, or just borrowing your dad's?"
"I - well, um…" Yotsuba didn't know what to say. This was so bad! Either way, Asagi would probably mention the phone or the new number to Dad, and that was dangerous! Dad needed to keep his dear delusions that his little writings was what put a roof over their head and food on the table - he'd be crushed if he ever found out his five-year-old daughter's business deals actually paid nearly all of it. "It's Dad's, it's um, hm, his extra phone that he doesn't use much!" she finally managed, panicked.
"O~oh?" said Asagi, sounding even more curious. "So, he's got two? What luxury…"
"Y-yeah! But I, I can't talk anymore right now! I've gotta go do something! Bye!" said Yotsuba, quickly shutting her phone off before sinking down into her chair, wiping sweat from her forehead.
What was she to do? Maybe she could buy Asagi off, asking her to keep quiet about the phone in return for something really neat and expensive, like… like a swimmingpool or a mountain bike or a fridge full of that really good milk. But what if Asagi wanted more than that? She was so tough and cool, she might be able to bleed Yotsuba dry with blackmail. No… that wouldn't do…
Maybe, Yotsuba thought grimly as she ran a hand through her hair and put on her cool black shades, it was time she made Asagi an offer she couldn't refuse.
scribe_protra a week or so back (*checks* uh, actually it was New Year's Eve - I'm even slower than I thought!) for a writing meme! This one is connected to user pics. This is how the meme goes officially, though as you see below I didn't follow all of it:
1. Reply to this post, and I will pick six of your icons.
2. Make a post (including the meme info) and write a drabble about (each of) the icons I chose.
3. Other people can then comment to you and make their own posts.
4. This will create a never-ending cycle of icon glee.
Beside the icon glee, I think - though I could have this all wrong - that the point is to write something brief and fast without taking it too seriously. Unfortunately, I normally fail at brevity and quickness, so that failed, even though I cheated and asked
scribe_protra to only pick four of my icons rather than six. And I wound up way over 100-word length for all of them - though I did hold on to the "not taking it too seriously" part. Anyway, it was still fun to do, and I'd love to pass it on in case anyone's interested.If you do want to do this, please ask how many icons I should pick - since I only had four, I can hardly demand anyone else must write six!
Concrit is welcome as always - this is just for fun, but it's always good to get tips on wording, correction on typoes etc!
1.
Robin glanced up from her work on the old buried shield to look at Usopp over by the cave wall. He seemed to be holding up well, she noted with relief. His eyes were full of curiosity and wonder as he held up a lantern and gazed at the great walls around them.
This was the second time they visited the fabled Naïr caves, enormous, beautiful, and very, very old, whose collection of sunken ruins made it a must for archaeologists as well as geologists to visit. However, the locals were very strict that visitors kept silent while in there - not just due to traditional respect for a sacred place, but also practical fear of loud noises provoking cave-ins at some places. They also posted guards inside the caves to make sure this prohibition was respected.
Usopp had gone with her the first time, as did Nami and Chopper (who were both busy with other things today). As she could have predicted, Usopp had been the one most ill at ease with the forced silence, getting all itchy and uneasy to the point of mild panic, constantly gesturing wildly as if desperate to communicate even though it turned out there was nothing very urgent to say, frequently opening his mouth only to clam it shut immediately with a guilty hand.
Nevertheless, when she said she'd return down here he'd still offered to follow her again to keep her company and help carry tools and such. That had surprised her, to be honest.
So far he seemed to do much better this time, though. No wild gestures, and very little twitching.
A little curious, she took out a page of her notebook and tore it out. Feeling better today? she wrote at the top of the page. She handed the torn-out page and the pen over to him. Usopp blinked, looked briefly embarrassed and then met her eyes and shrugged. He grabbed the pen and wrote a reply: Training.
She considered this, chipped away at the shield for another minute, then wrote at the page again. For what?
Usopp sat down carefully beside her, sighing very softly as he stretched out his hands over his head. He wrote more slowly this time around before handing the piece of paper back. Listening, it said.
She raised her eyebrows at him questioningly. There was no need to write For what? a second time - he got what she meant, and opened his mouth for half a second before freezing, then smiled sheepishly at her amused smile.
Just listening. I think I could use the practice, he wrote. Robin read this, still feeling a little confused,but picked up her chisel and got to work again. Usopp adjusted the lamp and sat back, looking up at the glittering stone pillars, already different from this slight change in angle.
*
It was true that Usopp didn't much like silence, but, he thought now, wasn't that mostly in places where there would usually be plenty of noise - like most of the world? And particularly things like a home, a ship, a kitchen... or a city street or a village market. But these caves were always quiet. Silence lived here without having to scare anyone, without forcing the sounds away. That made it different.
There wasn't much to listen too, here, but wasn't that the point? By necessity, Robin worked very quietly as she scraped with a chisel, tested the hollowness of vessels and scritched down notes. In the distance, water dripped down from the ceiling, and a nearby local guard shifted position.
Usopp felt pretty proud of himself for being able to stand the silence so well, and listen to Robin work as if it was a piece of music. Very, very proud...
A minute or so later, he was fast asleep.
2.
"Don't you try to be cute with me," said the big guy with the walrus moustache who sat in the barstool next to Luffy. "I'm not just anybody, you know! They call me Big Ory, an' I'm part of Captain Bern's pirate crew, you know! And he's pretty much the most fearsome guy around!" Sanji, sitting on Luffy's other side, only raised an eyebrow and grinned quietly. The walrus-moustache went on, "You don't want Captain Bern mad at you! That guy doesn't even know the meaning of 'retreat' or 'surrender'!"
"Huh?" said Luffy, tilting his head and giving Big Ory a blank look. "Is he an idiot?"
Big Ory grew red with fury. "What the hell do you… what do you think you're…" he sputtered, grabbing Luffy by the vest and glaring at him.
"Well if he doesn't know those words he sounds like an idiot!" Luffy said. He pushed Big Ory away lightly, then undertook an explanatory tone. "To surrender means you give up and stop fighting. Retreating means you turn back and hide or run away, you stop attacking," he explained in a slow tone.
Big Ory opened and closed his mouth several times, while Sanji sniggered into his beer. "I didn't mean that he - I just meant that - point is, he rallied, glaring at Luffy, "that the Captain doesn't need to know those things because he's not going to do either."
"Oh," said Luffy, in a tone that was suddenly quiet. He drank from his glass, very slowly. "So that's how you think."
"Damn right I do!" snarled Big Ory. "And that's why..."
"So if someone was threatening to blow the head off someone important to him, then he wouldn't stop fighting?" Luffy sat down his glass on the bar, very softly. He didn't look at Sanji, but held his head low. Sanji swallowed at an old, sharp memory. "If he heard all the ones he cared for would get blown to dust by a whole fleet if he didn't give up, he wouldn't care at all?" Luffy drew with one finger slowly over the surface of the glass. "And if he and the whole rest of you were way in over your heads in a fight you had no way of winning, he'd just press on, not try to run to make everyone survive?" He lifted his head and looked at Big Ory again.
"Then he's wrong," he said simply. "Sometimes you have to give up and run away so you can fight again some other time. When you're stronger. Long as you're still alive, you can go back and win later."
3.
Calipha thinks that compared to some other people, she's pretty good at not wallowing in old defeats from the past. Of course a big failure will linger with you, it's only natural, especially when it's led to life-changing consequences due to an idiot former boss unable to take the blame for his own failures. It makes good sense to do a post-battle analysis in order to see how to improve. But getting blinded by vengeful thoughts and be obsessed with memories is stupid, she feels.
She really believes that for the most time, she has her feelings on her unfortunate fight with the navigator of the Strawhat Pirates under control. Besides, she can recognise it was largely her own fault for miscalculating - instead of just laying the girl flat with a kick and follow up with a few Rokougans, she wanted to use the chance to explore her new devil fruit powers, and to toy a bit with the orange-haired pirate who, while adorable, had seemed about as harmless as a kitten. It had been so long since she'd had the luxury of playing with a target before striking, and it was the pirates who were pressed for time, not her.
Well, it turned out she didn't really that luxury then, either. The kitten had sharp teeth.
"I control the weather in this room," the insolent girl had said so brashly. Hah, well, let her see how far her puny powers that only extend as far as a room will take her, Calipha tells herself. If it's true that the Strawhat is aiming for the New World, the orange-hair will not last long, going there.
She finds only a slight satisfaction in the thought. Is she growing sentimental, perhaps, or pridefully hoping for a re-match? Maybe it's just an aesthetic regret that the girl would be wasted like that, cute as she were. Or maybe it's even a wish to see such unusual abilities in a fight again, though that does sound unlike her.
When she steps into weaponry shops these days on new islands, she finds herself drawn to the long stafflike weapons, holding them up, weighing them and turning them over. Then she pushes up her glasses and puts them away. After all, none of them will dole out lightning.
4.
Yotsuba Koiwai, the brightest new star on Japan's financial heavens, whose brilliant instinct for reading the stock market had made her a business world sensation despite her mere five years in age, sat back in her cool office chair in her big office on the t112th floor and sipped some delicious orange juice from a straw. Suddenly, her cellphone rang.
"Hello, Koiwai here," she said nonchalantly.
"Aha!" came a chirpy, confident voice through the line. "It is you, Yotsuba! Just as suspected!"
Yotsuba shot up. "A-A-Asagi?!? H-how did you -"
"Found this cute little card at the floor of Ena's room. So mysterious, just a four-leaf clover and a phone number, but I thought it could be you!"
Incredible! Yotsuba couldn't believe how careless she'd been. She normally only kept her calling cards in her office clothes.
"I guess it's from a print club, huh?" Asagi went on. "Does this mean you've got your own cellphone now, or just borrowing your dad's?"
"I - well, um…" Yotsuba didn't know what to say. This was so bad! Either way, Asagi would probably mention the phone or the new number to Dad, and that was dangerous! Dad needed to keep his dear delusions that his little writings was what put a roof over their head and food on the table - he'd be crushed if he ever found out his five-year-old daughter's business deals actually paid nearly all of it. "It's Dad's, it's um, hm, his extra phone that he doesn't use much!" she finally managed, panicked.
"O~oh?" said Asagi, sounding even more curious. "So, he's got two? What luxury…"
"Y-yeah! But I, I can't talk anymore right now! I've gotta go do something! Bye!" said Yotsuba, quickly shutting her phone off before sinking down into her chair, wiping sweat from her forehead.
What was she to do? Maybe she could buy Asagi off, asking her to keep quiet about the phone in return for something really neat and expensive, like… like a swimmingpool or a mountain bike or a fridge full of that really good milk. But what if Asagi wanted more than that? She was so tough and cool, she might be able to bleed Yotsuba dry with blackmail. No… that wouldn't do…
Maybe, Yotsuba thought grimly as she ran a hand through her hair and put on her cool black shades, it was time she made Asagi an offer she couldn't refuse.