Tag Archive | giraffecall: 010214

Taking Chances

Jan5

This is to kelkyag‘s prompt to my December Origfic Bingo Card.

Genique is the protagonist of the Space-Accountant series.

This follows after Tradeoffs.

The Quartermaster, Marist Irio, had given Genique not only a well-tailored wardrobe but also some food for thought and some tips – and piles of bookkeeping.

She’d also given her references to several other people on the ship who had paperwork – the head Chef, for one, the head of Navigation, and the director of the Pit.

Everyone starts out in the Pit, but… Genique was under no illusions. Eventually, they would run out of paperwork that had been waiting, and she would go into the Pit. She’d given quite a bit of extra attention to the paperwork she did for the Pit. Drugs – sensation-enhancers, mostly, and contraceptives, some antibiotics. Drugs, and oil, and clothing – that last one surprised her. And cameras.

And, of course, people were skimming off the top, the sides, the bottom, and everywhere else. People were stealing from the pirate ship, and, if she hadn’t thrown her lot in with them, she’d have found it amusing.

As it was, she’d had to carefully ask the Master of the Pit, do you want me to note the places you’re stealing, or just make them less obvious? He’d patted her head and called her a good girl, which she really wanted to mind, but she’d noticed the way it had covered up a nervous surprise on the Pit director’s face.

That had been one sort of taking a chance (the second chance there had been in the way she’d not mentioned it directly to the First, and made sure when she did mention it, it was in a way that couldn’t be traced back to her, hopefully.

This was another kind of chance. She had dressed for dinner carefully, in the best of the jumpsuits that Marist Irio had tailored for her and the red silk Basi had gifted to her. She had done her hair, inasmuch as she could without spending money in the shop (the Head Chef had given her a wooden-handled brush that he’d pirated. Being bald, he had no need for it or the wooden barrettes he’d also given her), and used a tad of the cosmetics the Pit-Master had given her for her service. In short, she looked as good as she was going to get.

She strode into the lunch room and sat herself down, as if she belonged there, as if she had every belief that she was welcome. She smiled brightly and cheerfully, once sat, at the two young pirates already there. “Hello.” She offered them her hand. “I’m Genique. I’m the new bookkeeper.”


Next: Betting On It

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Team D, a story of Dragons Next Door for the Giraffe Bingo Card Call

Jan5

To [personal profile] kelkyag‘s prompt to my orig-fic card. This fills the “Cunning Plan” slot.

Juniper, Kelkathian, and Azdekious are part of my Dragons Next Door setting; its landing page is here.

“What… what the seventeen different sparks?” Kelkathian and Azdekious stared at each other, and then at the van they had suddenly found themselves in. “This isn’t team C.”

“This isn’t Team B.” Kelkathian gave a headshake, and wormed out of the backpack. Juniper was unconscious, looking for all the world as if she was napping at home in her bed. “Can’t be team A.”

“You’re telling me we were guarding against three teams of kidnappers…”

“And a fourth one came out of nowhere. I am indeed telling you that.” Kelkathian dropped carefully to the floor. The back of the van was filled with plumbing supplies, all of it with the appropriate level of wear for an actual plumber, but something about it still felt wrong to Kel.

“Is she waking up back there?” The voice came from the driver’s seat; Kel ducked into Juniper’s jacket while the passenger turned around. “I thought I heard something.”

“Must be dreaming, then, ’cause she’s still out like a light.”

“Hunh. Thought a rich kid would be harder to grab than that.”

Kel peeked over Junie’s pocket and saw the driver’s face – nothing exciting, nothing important, and her othersight told her he was nothing but human. Very human, strong and tough and so normal it was almost painful, but this wasn’t a dweomer or an elf or an elkin or really anything but a normal human kidnapper…

…who thought Juniper was a rich kid.

“You’re sure her parents have money?” The passenger seemed to have the same qualms about this plan that Kelkathian did.

“They live in Smokey Knoll. You tell me a human that could afford a house there who wasn’t filthy rich.”

The car screeched to a halt. “This is a Smokey Knoll kid?” The passenger’s voice was a hiss. That was your cunning plan? To grab a kid from Smokey Knoll?”

Next: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/632365.html

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/629631.html. You can comment here or there.

A Favorite Place, a story of Stranded World for the Giraffe Bingo Card Call

Jan5

To [personal profile] rix_scaedu‘s prompt to my Orig_fic Bingo card; this fills the “Favorite Place” square.


Autumn and Summer (and Bishop and Melinda) are characters in my Stranded World setting; this story is later in their lives than most of the stories.

“Let me show you this place.”

Summer watched her sister. She had been watching her sister much of her life, it seemed; the way she moved, the way she smiled, the way she seemed to dance through life without a care. She watched the way Autumn smiled with her mouth without smiling with her body; she watched the way she flirted shamelessly and almost never carried through, and the way, when she carried through, it was a dance of the body, without the heart.

Summer had been watching Autumn and Winter forever, picking and choosing what parts she wanted to emulate, and then parts she wanted to throw away (On some level, she knew that Spring did the same with all three of them, though with Spring it looked as if she was throwing away everything, just to confuse and confound them all).

This year, she was spending the summer, or at least part of it, with her sister and her own lovers, which lent a certain color-commentary feel to the whole art of watching Autumn.

“Is she…” Bishop whispered it in Summer’s ear, which cause Mellie to squirm closer on the other side.

“Hssst. Wait and see.” Summer adjusted her bodice – this silly Ren stuff Autumn insisted on; maybe this year she’d splurge on one that fit properly. Two, one for her and Mellie would look lovely in a wench dress, maybe…

“A place?” The man had been hanging around Autumn’s booth for the entire weekend; he’d wander away to hang out with his friends and slowly gravitate back to admire the art, to admire Autumn’s ink, to admire Autumn herself when she wasn’t looking. “But your booth?”

“Well.” Autumn’s breath hitched, the cut of her vest making it obvious. “You could always come back after the Faire closed. It’s prettier by moonlight, after all.”

“Mmmmm, look at the way he watches her.” Mellie was nearly purring. “Good thing we brought our own tent.”

Summer was smiling, but inside she was cheering, albeit a bit nervously. In all the years she had been coming to this Faire with her sister, never had she known Autumn to show a lover – or anyone but kin, actually – her favorite place.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/629191.html. You can comment here or there.

Unwelcome Guests – a story of Baram’s House Elves/Addergoole for the Giraffe Bingo Call Card

Jan4

To [personal profile] clare_dragonfly‘s prompt to my Orig_fic Bingo card; this fills the “Unwelcome Guest” square.

Baram and his family are part of the “Baram’s House Elves” sub-series of the Addergoole ‘verse, which can be found here; Baram is also a background character in Addergoole.

There wasn’t so much a war anymore, as far as they could tell.

They didn’t get any TV anymore, local or cable or anything else. The radio they heard these days was sporadic at best, and there would be weeks where there wasn’t anything at all.

But they hadn’t seen a returned god in several months, they hadn’t seen an army soldier in the last month, and they hadn’t seen another Ellehemaei in a couple weeks. They had gotten a couple human refugees – they were a standing house with a standing wall and hedge, burning lights and smoke in the chimney – but the girls fed and equipped them and sent them on their way, if they were over eighteen, and added them to the child collection, otherwise.

Baram liked it that way. He liked the quiet, and he’d found that he didn’t mind all the kids around. Liked them, actually, if he was going to be honest… and he had space in his head to be honest, now.

(Which might have been because of the children, actually, something else he said only in his own head.)

There wasn’t so much of a war anymore… but there wans’t so much of a world anymore, either. That bothered the girls, Baram’s angels, and it bothered the children, but it didn’t really bug Baram all that much. He had his family, he had his house, and nobody bothered them here.

“Boss! Someone’s at the door!” Alkyone’s voice echoed through the house. “Trouble, I think.”

“Trouble.” Baram liked his armchair. It was soft, and comfortable, and normal. But he levered himself out of it before he was finished saying Trouble? “Kids?”

“Got ’em.” Viatrix slapped the Swish-boy on the ass. “Aloysius, get the kids and take them down to the safe room.”

“Yes ma’am.” Jaelie’s boy did have some use, at least in a pinch.

“Sword.” It wasn’t the first time they’d had unwanted guests. Baram took the sword from Viatrix’s hand. “Jacket.” He shrugged it on. He was tough, all the way through, but there were things, they’d found, for which it didn’t hurt to have an extra level of protection. “Stake.” They weren’t vampire hunters… but they’d hunted vampires. “Okay. Door.”

Via swung the door open… and Baram shifted the sword into a guard position.

“Oh, come on, is that any way to greet an old classmate?” Ardell and Delaney stood on his stoop, leaning on each other’s shoulders and looking like they’d stepped out of a leather magazine.

Barm shifted his feet a bit further apart. “Yes.”

Continued: http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/675139.html

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/628825.html. You can comment here or there.

Time of Testing

Jan3

To @Dahob’s prompt to my origfic bingo card: this fills the [text/exam] square.

This may be in the “Space/Colonies” verse but I am uncertain.

“This is how we’ve tested since the dawn of time.”

Ruttiger’s mother, the Dame Anne Halloran, was adamant. Ruttiger himself was not quite as confident. “Are you sure it’s needed, mother? To test her for a witch…?” He was, after all, rather fond of the girl in question; he was also a pragmatic young man, and did not really wish to be tarred by association.

“I am certain.” Dame Halloran put down her booted foot with a thump. “She has shown all the signs.”

The girl in question was not in the room; that wouldn’t have been proper. Dame Halloran’s seven sisters had her in the back room of the chapel, going through the cleansing rituals that were nearly as old as the test.

“She’s still young. You could be mistaken.” Ruttiger really did want to be cautious. He was speaking hunched, shoulders forward; he was quite a bit taller than his mother, which was exactly what he didn’t want to remind her of at the moment.

“If she is so young as to be too young for the test, Ruttiger Mensen Halloran, then she is far too young for you to be stepping forward as her champion or her luger. You’re nearly a man grown.”

Nearly was both too close and good enough. Ruttiger sighed, and lowered his head in respect. “I worry about her, mother. I don’t want her hurt.”

“The test has been used since humankind was sprung here. It will be used until we are gone. It is the way things are, my son, and sooner or later you will have to accept it.” She patted his hand. “You will have daughters some day, and they will have to be tested, too, if they show the signs. They will have to stare at the fire, just as I did, just as Renia will. They will have to be tested for a witch. Don’t you want a wife who has passed the test herself?”

Ruttiger sighed. As always, his mother was right. She set the field of battle; it was easy for her to win. “Yes, mother.”

“Very good. Now go take your seat, young man. The testing is just about to begin.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/628251.html. You can comment here or there.