Drabbles and annoyances and celebrations, oh my

[winter]

First of all, happy International Women's Day!

Second, wtf's up with all the lists of OMGexpertise on little_details? Paging the mods, someone needs to put that comm on moderated for a day or two.

Third, yesterday. Okay, I fell asleep at 9.30 PM and slept until morning :P So instead, there are two drabbles today.

For alighiera, part of the fake-title challenge (though she didn't give me an actual title): Coldfire, shipboard, Gerald and Damien killing time.

NOVATLANTIS, DEAD OF NIGHT

The sea splashed softly against the sides of the ship, but the sound carried far in the night. Nothing else disturbed the silence on "God's Glory". Shadows moved over the faces of the moons.

Damien saw the figure approach, but didn't react. He knew the one person likely to prowl the deck at this time of night had good night vision.

He didn't hear footsteps, but he did see the booted feet stop next to his head.

"At this time of night, you're usually to be found in Mes Rasia's company," Gerald Tarrant remarked neutrally.

Damien wanted to say it was none of the Hunter's business, but for some reason it didn't quite come out that way. "She broke it off."

"Ah." Tarrant sat down gracefully, smoothing wrinkles from his clothes. "Getting drunk is a traditional way of dealing with something like that."

"Not much else to do here." Damien shrugged and gestured at the sky with the bottle. "It's that or watching the clouds. That one looks a little like the Matriarch when she's angry with someone."

"I think it looks more like a snarling cat."

The Hunter took the bottle from Damien's grasp without asking permission. Damien considered resisting, but all it'd gain him would be maybe a stain or two on Tarrant's clothes and at least a week of icy anger.

Not that he wanted the Hunter in a good mood, of course.

"The night sky was much more interesting on Earth," Tarrant continued. "The Core was only a streak of denser stars, but other stars were scattered all over the horizon. Men drew lines connecting them and named those constellations after legends."

"You talk like you've seen them."

"I have a few old star maps. There were whole systems of belief based on configurations of stars and planets."

"Figures." Damien took the wine back and concentrated on not telling whether it tasted any different now that Tarrant had drunk from it.

If any constellations were visible from Erna, he wondered, would any of them be named after the Hunter?

EDIT: Second version, canon-correct this time:

NOVATLANTIS, DEAD OF NIGHT, take 2

The sea splashed softly against the sides of the ship, but the sound carried far in the night. Nothing else disturbed the silence on the "Golden Glory". Shadows moved over the faces of the moons.

Damien saw the figure approach, but didn't react. He knew the one person likely to prowl the deck at this time of night had good night vision.

He didn't hear footsteps, but he did see the booted feet stop next to his head.

"At this time of night, you're usually to be found in Mes Rasia's company," Gerald Tarrant remarked neutrally.

Damien wanted to say it was none of the Hunter's business, but for some reason it didn't quite come out that way. "She broke it off."

"Ah." Tarrant sat down gracefully, smoothing wrinkles from his clothes. "Getting drunk is a traditional way of dealing with something like that."

"Not much else to do here." Damien shrugged and gestured at the sky with the bottle. "It's that or watching the clouds. That one looks a little like the Matriarch when she's angry with someone."

"I think it looks more like a snarling cat."

The Hunter took the bottle from Damien's grasp without asking permission. Damien considered resisting, but all it'd gain him would be maybe a stain or two on Tarrant's clothes and at least a week of icy anger.

Not that he wanted the Hunter in a good mood, of course.

"The night sky was much more interesting on Earth," Tarrant continued. "The Core was only a streak of denser stars, but other stars were scattered all over the horizon. Men drew lines connecting them and named this multitude of constellations after true legends, not our half-remembered scientists."

"You talk like you've seen them."

"I have a few old star maps. There were whole systems of belief based on configurations of stars and planets."

"Figures." Damien took the wine back and concentrated on not telling whether it tasted any different now that Tarrant had drunk from it.

If the people of Erna named constellations after legends, he wondered, would any of them be named after the Hunter?

For alice_montrose, part of the Vampire Celebration: Tanz der Vampire, Herbert, Alfred and stockings.

THE DRESSING-ROOM DILEMMAS

Alfred's eyes were wide as saucers. His lower lip was trembling.

"I am not wearing this!" he declared bravely.

Herbert pouted and dangled the lace stocking from his finger.

"No!" Alfred stomped his foot.

"And I suppose nothing I do will convince you otherwise?"

"Um - no?" Alfred took a step back.

Herbert bared his fangs. "Oh, a challenge."

Alfred squeaked as he was dropped arse-first onto the bed, his trousers disappearing in a whirl of lace and determined vampire. The squeak turned into a moan as Herbert truly got to work with fingers and tongue and teeth.

Some minutes later Herbert gave a final soothing lick to the reddened skin of Alfred's inner thigh as he fastened the last garter strap. "So what was that about stockings?"

"Mmmmm." Alfred was finding it hard to form coherent sounds.

"Good." Herbert smiled angelically as he approached the wardrobe again. "Now, the corset."

Comments

[winter]

Arago was a famous physician, so I guess Friedman was going with that theme (see Faraday :)). And damn, that makes the drabble even easier to fix *points up* :> Thank you!

(Naming themes in Coldfire are curious things, really. Friedman mentioned that this colony ship was packed with "colonists all from advanced English-speaking cultures, of Judeo-Christian background with moderate to minimal religious commitment". If so, where did all the Hindu names come from, from Sheva to Jaggonath?)

[mariem-1.livejournal.com]

C.S. Friedman explained the Hindu names at http://www.merentha.org/inn.asp :

"Now, as for the other elements. Well, one of the concepts I was working with is that the bulk of the colonists were from America, Canada, and perhaps Australia. Immigrant nations, in other words, with a tremendous mixing of peoples from all over the world. Yes, all of those colonists are the products of western education, and all have been assimilated into the Judeo-Christian setting (but note that strongly religious people of ANY persuasion were NOT included.) However, in America that still includes people whose ancestors came from all over the world, recently enough that some customs, folklore, language, and other tidbits of foreign culture remain. In addition, of course, their education includes the rest of the world, so they are not ignorant of Indian deities, for example."

"Lastly, these were educated people. Here's another tidbit that is not in the book (though I think it's hinted at.) When the data storage of the earth ship was destroyed n the first sacrifice, some people realized very quickly that they were in danger of losing their entire heritage. I imagine some of them working 24 hours a day to get people to write down EVERYTHING they remembered, from the history of earth to the stories they were told as children...ALL of it. Because once that founding generation died, anything not recorded was lost forever. Now, don't you think that in that mass of data there are the names of non-western gods and traditions? Don't you think a well-educated man of later centuries might draw upon them if he had to, say, name a bunch of cities? I mean, if you've decided to name all the cities of the North after gods of death and destruction (that IS in the book), and you're only using Judeo Christian gods, you run out after a very short time."

[winter]

I guess it means the books carried by the people who colonised the North were heavy on the Hindu gods, then ;-) Maybe it's different in America - over here the only reason I recognise most of those names is because I've read Zelazny's Lord of Light.