when i let go of your throat-sweet throttle

[novembersmith]

Mmmm, how better to procrastinate on life and my faux-Big Bang than with an icon meme?

1. Reply to this post, and I will pick six of your icons.
2. Make a post (including the meme info) and talk about the icons I chose. (ETA: I am using thesoftlyforgotten variant, in which you write a story snippet instead of talking willy nilly.)
3. Other people can then comment to you and make their own posts.
4. This will create a never-ending cycle of icon glee.

softlyforgotten chose my icons with what I feel is a slight degree of malice, but I will sally forth anyhow.



keywords: bitter savored blood to make me glad as gardens stand among the showers

Her brother stood knee-deep in the green of new reeds, and about him was born wind and dark clouds. He held in his hand lightning, and in his voice thunder, and in the far distance men trembled to hear it peal. "Sister," he said, fierce and petulent. "I did not need your help."

"That is what you said the last time, brother mine," Anat replied, and smiled bright. Here the river ran red with her victory, and behind her were sprawled the armies of El, drained and beautifully dead. As she waded towards him, her kirtle clung scarlet and wet to her thighs, and when she lifted her blood-bathed palms to cup the fullness of her breasts, her brother's eyes followed the movement. It was all as one, the flush of triumph in her veins, quick and hot.

"Our father will not seek to displace you again," she laughed, low and rich as honey-wine, and tossed her black head, and watched her brother's breath quicken. "Will you not cleanse me?" she asked, and stepped streaming from the river upon the dewed bank. Ba'al sighed, and bent to kiss her--he was so young, this day, so newly reborn, and his mouth was trembling. About them began to fall clean spring rain, and beyond the valley their people laughed and raised their hands to the wet sky, and knew peace had come once more to their land.


keywords: ride 'em cowboy

(AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT. *glares*)


"Oh, come on!" Josh said, outraged. "That is just--look, can't I keep just a few?"

"No," his father said testily. "They have displeased me. I wish to begin anew. Perhaps the little scurrying ones, this time."

"Oh, them," Josh said contemptuously. "They can barely even speak, I don't know what you're on about. What's the bloody point, when you've already got--"

"That is enough, Yeshua," came the thundering voice, and Josh rolled his eyes. Great, the whole thunder and lightning bit. "If you will cease this complaining, I suppose I may allow a few of your disciples passage into the new world. Yes," the voice mused. "Yes, this time with more feathers. That will be nice." And then he went bearding off in a snit to design something called aerodynamics, which, whatever, so long as he stayed out of the way for another couple millenia.

"What if," he said triumphantly to Bartholomew. "We, I dunno, dug a cave or something? Near one of those volcanowhatsits, so there's enough light, and then bob's your uncle, you escape the apocalypse!"

"Will there be cycads, mayhaps?" Bartholomew asked dubiously, and a few of his brothers and sisters chimed in hopefully, putting in a request for some of the lovely new flowering trees, and maybe a few horsetails.

"There may be," Josh said, and fiddled with his thumb, which stubbornly refused to be as green as his dad's; he supposed with a bit of practice he could at least manage a cycad or a magnolia or something. "I mean, I can definitely do manna. But none of the blasted skittering beasts are coming, and that is final."

Nearly sixty-five million years later, sometime after Josh had sulkily allowed that the scurrying mammal-things were occasionally alright, a few of the particularly mad ape creatures managed to wander down into his secret lair, splashing directly into the midst of one of the dinosaur lawn chess tournaments and making a great deal of noise about naming the new land Lindenbrockenforth, or some such nonsense.

"Do you mind?" Josh said crossly, and peered up the chimney vent anxiously, but his dad seemed not to have noticed the ruckus. He blew out a relieved breath--he was sure the old fart would figure out his son had hoodwinked him one of these days, but he'd rather put it off another couple millenia. He'd gotten in enough trouble over the unicorns.


keywords: i am the very model

It was the discongruity of it, Tharkay thought distantly, and ran his fingers along the fine lines of Laurence's jaw, rubbed a thumb over the flushed cheek. The contradiction of it, of seeing Laurence pant, his mouth falling open and his eyes glazed with want, of how he arched into Tharkay's kiss, and then of how he stood to attention at parade, spotless and perfect. Every line starched and every fold falling into place, inevitable as the pull of the tides. The perfect British gentleman--how many times had Tharkay seen his kind before?--no sign of this Laurence beneath, who with a slight wicked smile would hook his fine black boots around Tharkay's waist and arc up, making Tharkay have to close his eyes and go entirely still. God, the man was infuriating. And then there was the aviator, the naval man beneath that, with a soot-streaked brow and a fierce, savage tilt to his mouth, as quick with a sword and a pistol as he was with his orders, and his entire crew moved about him like a well-oiled machine, willing and eager to follow him, and that was beautiful too.

"You talk too much," Laurence managed to say, and rolled them over, stopped Tharkay's protest with a kiss, then began to strip off Tharkay's clothes methodically, unwrapping layers and peeling them back and pressing kisses as he went, until Tharkay forgot what it was like to be anything but hungry and naked and wanting, only--only when Laurence went to loosen his own cravat, Tharkay stopped him, caught his wrist.

"Leave it," he said hoarsely, and shuddered when realization crossed Laurence's face, followed by a slow, curving smile.

"I'll leave that to you, shall I?" Laurence said, smirking, and laughed when Tharkay lunged up and pressed himself against the fine linen, mouthed along the slivers of skin revealed between his jawline and the stiff, starched material.

"I want to watch you come apart," Tharkay said, and when Laurence shivered and went glassy-eyed, he smiled and proceeded.


keywords: a distant shore

"Do you smell that?" Toby's sister asked suddenly, the first thing she'd said in some time. John sighed heavily. He wished he hadn't agreed to show her about the manor. She was, he supposed, quite lovely, with snapping green eyes and curling blond hair, but the rest of the lads were out on a foxhunt now, and he was missing it. Meanwhile Toby's frigid sister wandered the libraries and portrait rooms with every evidence of enjoyment, though certainly not in his company. She refused to be drawn into a conversation of their acquaintences, or of the latest salon, or of anything at all, really--he almost thought she looked at him with disdain, which was pure rubbish. He would be the next lord, and was worth some thirty thousand pounds a year, which he very much doubted her illustrious brother could match. And now she was wittering on about the salt air, as though they were not fifty miles from the sea.

"What room is this?" she asked him distantly, and when he turned to give her a withering reply he was forced to stumble to an inelegant halt, catching his heel on the carpet and barking his shin on one of the damasked endtables. The girl was peering at a door he was almost quite certain he had never seen before--surely he would remember a door of such rough wood--why, one nearly got splinters just to look at it--and there was about the carpet in front of it a thick rime of salt. But the longer he looked at it, the more familiar it seemed, and he almost had it now--yes, it was Sir Edemeer who added the door, one of his bizarre fancies. Terribly embarrassing; they would have to have it walled over one day, without question.

"Come along, now, Miss Sutton, we haven't all day," he said irritably, and turned to go. He made it nearly to the entrance to the great hall before he realized she hadn't followed. She was still standing at the door, blasted female.

"The men are calling all the hands on deck," she said, gazing off into space like a lackwit, her slim gloved hand on the frame. "Do you hear them? There is to be a great battle soon, I can almost smell the powder of it."

"What do you know of powder?" he sneered, and lifted his chin. He could not believe the bint had refused him, earlier. "Lord, your brother is right, how they will ever find a husband for a mad bitch like you I can't imagine."

There was something queer about her gaze that made him uneasy, and the air about them seemed to tremble as though someone had stroke a crystal goblet with a wet finger.

"I expect you are right," she said, and he almost thought he saw her hair blow back in a stiff breeze--certainly it was disarrayed. Lord, what a mess the woman was. No beauty was worth this.

"I am going to hunt," he snapped, and she did not even turn to look at him, the blowsy wench, and his last glimpse of her was of her hand on the crude iron handle, and even as he turned and strode away, quick as it was possible to go and still remain decent, he heard the creaking of wood and a sound almost like thunder. Miss Sutton was never seen in England again, and a month later Sir John was hanged for his complicity in her murder, though despite repeated inquiries and interrogations he never did reveal where he had hidden the body or admit his guilt, only stammering again and again that she had been taken by the sea.

It was quite ridiculous, really. As though everyone did not know the sea was miles and miles from that place.


keywords: your expert double-exes

(So, uh, yeah! A modern!Temeraire AU, probably part of the highschool!verse... probably not what softlyforgotten intended from this icon. *g*)


"Do this for me," Jane said, and knew she'd won when he went all cross and red, folding his arms over his chest and looking off into the distance.

"I'll look ridiculous," Will grumbled, but went willingly when she pushed him into the chair by the mirror, and was even more willing when she swung herself in his lap, and she took a moment to take another few kisses, to let herself move her hips against him until they were both grinning and panting, and then, with Will red-cheeked and open-mouthed, she took up her make-up bag. She bit his lower lip once more, slow and tender, before pulling back and taking his chin in her hand.

"Don't move," she said sternly, and laughed when he rolled his eyes. "That counts as moving," she said, and picked out a color--bronze, she thought, definitely bronze.

"If you blind me, Temeraire will come after you," he told her, but he was still distracted by her new corset, by the closeness of her breasts, and it was only a few seconds and one smudge, wiped away with a wet thumb, and fuck, she was a genius.

"Look at you," she said, mouth dry. "No, wait--" she found the lipstick she wanted, waterproof and bright, bloody red. She was almost surprised when he obediently opened his mouth and let her paint it on, and she watched him shiver as she blew on his lips so the color would dry, would stay fresh and unsmeared.

"You're fucking gorgeous," she said, and watched him stare at himself in the mirror, pupils wide and blown, irises thin rings of blue.


keywords: check my teeth

"Gerard, who the fuck is this in your promo pic?" Brian said impatiently--Gerard was being more dreamy and artistic than usual, staring off into corners and smiling at nothing. Worse than a fucking cat, Christ. But he snapped to attention, a hundred percent there when Brian slid the stack of glossy photographs across the desk. The stack of glossy, expensive promotional pictures that now were fucking useless because there was some weirdo grinning midget involved.

"Uh," Gerard said, gone squeaky and huge-eyed. "Man, who the fuck uses real film now a days? Thought everyone went digital now, this is fucking retro." He perked up. "That's actually kind of cool, you know, like a whole different kind of art, even--"

They'd be here all day, and the AC in the room was on the fritz again, fucking hell. Not that Gerard would notice. Crazy fucker wore three layers of hoodies everywhere he went, black and purple in the August heat, beaming beatifically as though he weren't courting heatstroke. He ignored Gerard's digression on factory molding and thumped the air conditioner again. It wheezed asthmatically at him and went on producing the next ice age. Fuck, it wasn't his day.

"Gerard," Brian interrupted finally, slumping back in his chair and covering his face briefly with his hands. "I know art is important, but, see, photographers? They cost money, and you just wasted an entire session, so I'd really, truly, appreciate knowing who the fuck-up in this photo is so I know who to strangle. Besides you."

"Oh," his infuriatingly brilliant star artist said, fidgeting in his seat and toying with his creepy necklace, avoiding Brian's eyes. "I told you Mikey'd do the photographs for free, or we've got this friend of a friend, Jon Cuervo or something--no, it's Walker, isn't it? Jonny Walker, you're right--anyway, he's supposed to be, like, the second coming of Ansel Adams, and I bet--"

"Gerard, the last time Mikey did your pictures they were all of your fucking toes. And no, look, that's not the question--get the kid to send me an actual portfolio, though--but I want to know who this is."

There was a long pause.

"The janitor?" Gerard offered finally.

"The janitor," Brian said blankly. "The janitor has his hand down the back of your pants."

"Oh, I--um, maybe it's a fan? A rabid fan! Or, or--a ninja?" Even Gerard looked disgusted with himself for this, shooting a strange sideways look off into the corner of the room. "A ninja?" he repeated, sounding disbelieving, and Brian could have sworn he muttered 'you wish' under his breath.

"Look, you know what, you wanna have a boyfriend and not tell me about him, fine," Brian said, with what he thought was an admirable level of maturity, and he didn't take the slightest malicious satisfaction at the way Gerard flinched and looked hugely conflicted and guilty. "Whatever, I'm going for a soda. I'll be back in five, so if you could fucking keep your pants on a few minutes, I'd appreciate it."

Fucking weirdo exhibitionist diva liar artists who were clearly keeping goddamned secrets, as though Brian wouldn't sell the damn sun and moon for the kid, even if he did talk to empty rooms and imaginary friends, and coming up on him unawares should have been a fucking occupational hazard with the TMI moments. Shit, maybe the guy in the pics was a prostitute or something--he really, truly couldn't imagine Gerard Way, champion of human rights and sex workers, with a tiny punk whore, felt shitty for even thinking it, but he couldn't figure out why Gerard just wouldn't tell him. Fuck, he thought, and stood outside the door a moment longer, nursing his coke and thinking wistful thoughts of simpler times, representing cocaine-maddened guitarists and drunken solo singers. He was about to man up and go back in, just tell Gerard to drop the whole thing and bring in the whiskey kid for a photo shoot, when he heard it.

Fucking hell, he thought a little fondly. Kid was talking to himself again, but something made him pause, feeling strangely voyeuristic, and listen a moment longer.

"You are the least likely ninja of my entire life," Gerard was saying, and Brian knew the pouting expression that went along with that, but what he didn't know was the high pitched giggle that followed. "Look," Gerard said, in his pissiest voice. "We should just tell him."

"Hey, you wanna scrape the guy off the ceiling, be my fucking guest," a cheerful voice replied, and okay, that was fucking enough.

Brian stormed into the room and stopped dead. "What?" he said, suddenly dumbfounded. It had gotten even colder, somehow. "There was--there was someone here, I heard them."

"Yeah," Gerard said, not meeting his eyes, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly with a hand. "Look, don't--don't, like, faint or anything, but. Um. This is Frank."

"What, Frank the imaginary tag-a-long--" Brian trailed off, because somehow he'd missed the kid sitting on the end table by the window, one knee up, his dirty sneaker probably leaving muddy splotches all over his damn files, only--only--he could see the street through the kid's shoulders, see the blinds and the shadows of tall buildings, even the fucking shape of that weird bootcamp sticker Brian'd been idly peeling strips off all summer.

"Hey, Bri," the kid said, and beamed at him. "Fucking love your tattoos, dude."

Brian dropped his coke.

***

So, yeah! That is a snippet from the distant, distant future of my ghost!fic. One day I will actually fucking complete it, I swear.

ETA: WHY DOES EVERYTHING I WRITE WIND UP TEN THOUSAND TIMES LONGER THAN I INTENDED. SERIOUSLY, GUYS. WTF.