This was no fog bank

[ozzieworld]

For Ozzie to wake up coughing and spluttering wasn’t exactly new. To be coughing and spluttering without having drunk himself into a stupor, or having used narcotics was new. The headache he had wasn’t anything he’d taken lately, that much he was sure of.

He opened his eyes, looking around. Wherever the Silfen path had led him, the Pathfinder certainly was nowhere in sight. Not that he was surprised that the little raft had finally fallen apart after what it had been through.

Falling off the edge of the fucking world. Fucking Silfen, and their idea of a cosmic joke. Next time he saw any of them on High Angel, assuming he made his way back there, he was going to punch the first one he saw.

He scrubbed at his face. Dry. It had been some time since the three of them had toppled off the waterfall then. “Orion? Tochee?” he asked in a tentative voice, coughing as he tried to get his voice sounding somewhat normal again. He sat up, regretting it instantly as everything swam round about him. So far, this was no different to a bad trip. However, there was no boy, no furry alien with him, just a stranger on one of the other beds in this room, dressed in a really crappy looking uniform-type outfit, like something one of the Families might dress their servants in if they were feeling really really nostalgic for the old days.

Okay, so the Silfen had really done it this time. Ozzie groaned as he stood up, using his OCTattoos, trying to access the unisphere, all the while glancing at his surroundings. It seemed... quaint, lower tech than normal. As expected, the contact with the world at large failed, but the one thing he noted was his e-butler was slow in responding.

“Something’s different, Ozzie,” it said. Ozzie could hear it being sluggish, and frowned as it cut out entirely. That wasn’t supposed to happen. Once the organic tech was tattooed onto your skin (Ozzie’s was in a very delicate pattern down the side of his face, running under his shirt), that was it until your next rejuv – you could add to them, but not take them away, and your e-butler never failed. And since Ozzie came out of rejuv less than five years ago, this was unheard of. OC tech was supposed to be as close to perfect as possible, and the fact that it wasn’t working as it should was terrifying.

“What the fuck, man?”

Snark and snide

[the_iceman]

At first, Klaus thought he was dreaming. Having a nightmare, actually, would be more accurate. That would explain how sluggish he felt, and how the world seemed muted. Every colour was duller, he couldn't smell much of anything, and his body felt oddly irresponsive. Sitting up on the edge of the bed took a lot more effort than it should have, and where was he, anyway? A small cell, an open corridor, and a man on one of the other beds in the room. It wasn't like Klaus could hear his heartbeat or smell him, but he was breathing, at least, and Klaus had never seem him before.

( Cut for length )

“I think you and I both know that that was not what I was referring to,” Mycroft dead-panned, eyes still intently on the other. There was something else going on here, and it had nothing to do with social convention or polite conversation.

But then he smiled, sardonic and icy cold. “I’m from London, and yourself?” He said in a dry, badly disguised as cheerful, tone.

In the subjunctive - arrival

[its_a_gerund]

"Anybody else and I'd say we could have a drink," Dakin looked down at the desk he was sitting on, not at Irwin. He'd thought of this: of saying this to Irwin, of this exact moment. He'd thought of it more than he wanted to admit. "Is that a euphemism? Saying do you want a drink when you mean something else?"

His voice low, he could see Irwin new what he meant when he glanced at him. Good. "It is, yeah."

"Actually, forget the euphemism. I'm just kicking the tires on this one, but further to the drink, what I was really wondering was if there was any circumstances in which there was any chance of your sucking me off." Dakin liked that look Irwin was giving him. Pleased. As if he hadn't imagined this really happening and for a moment couldn't believe himself. "Or something similar. Actually that would please Hector.

"What?" Irwin's smile faded for a moment, replaced by confusion.

"Your sucking me off." Dakin couldn't help but look smug, crossing his arms over his chest, "It's a gerund. He likes gerunds. And your being scared shitless, that's another gerund." Dakin didn't move, watching Irwin turn to look out the window.

"I didn't know you were that way inclined-"

"Well, I'm not." He said simply, knowing that it wasn't entirely true. He didn't like boys, no, but Irwin, he was different. "It's the end of term, I've gotten into Oxford, I thought we might push the boat out."

Dakin stood, "anyway, I'll leave it on the table." He would have left it too, only, he couldn't. Not there. His carefully controlled proposition hadn't worked. "I don't understand this. Reckless, impulsive, immoral. How come there's such a difference between the way you teach and the way you live? Why are you so bold in argument and talking, but when it comes to the point - when it's something that's actually happening, I mean now you're so fucking careful." Dakin wished that Irwin would say something. Anything. "Is it because you're a teacher and I'm a boy?"

"Obviously, that," Irwin jumped on the excuse.

"But why? Who cares, I don't."

"You've already had one master who touches you-"

"Oh is that what it is?" Dakin didn't believe it, "it's that you don't want to be like Hector?" he crossed the room deliberately, stopping right before Irwin, not giving him nearly enough space. "Well, you won't be. You can't be, how could you be, Hector's a joke."

Irwin moved, not nearly far enough, Dakin noticed, "he isn't, he is-"

Dakin cut him off again. "That side of him is."

"Alright."

"Alright what?"

"Let's go for a drink," Irwin started to pull his diary from his pocket.

"Don't take out your sodding diary," Dakin couldn't believe it.

"Maybe next week," Irwin wouldn't look at him, flipping the pages.

"Next week?" Dakin laughed, "I don't get this, man. You can suck me off next week. I've heard of a crowded schedule but this is ridiculous." He paused, really looking at Irwin, meeting his eyes, "god we've got a long way to go. Do you ever take your glasses off?"

"Why?"

"It's a start." A start of something. A start at loosening up, for one.

"Not with me," Irwin said, shaking his head slightly, "taking off my glasses is the last thing I do."

That was very nearly a challenge, as Dakin chose to see it. "Yeah? I'll look forward to it. What d'you do on Sunday afternoons? What are you doing on this Sunday afternoon?"

"I was going to go through the accounts of Roche Abbey. It's a Cistercian house that's just to the south of Doncaster." Irwin stopped, slowly smiling as he realised what he was saying, "Only I think I've just had a better offer."

"I think you have." It hadn’t taken him nearly as long to get it through to Irwin as he thought it might have. Dakin smiled slowly, turning to leave. There was both a strength and satisfaction in this, in leaving when he had his agreement and the upper hand. "And we're not in the subjunctive either. It's going to happen."

That should have been it. He should have left with a self-satisfied smile, walking out through the school to his friends. Heading off with them, saying goodbyes. Instead he found himself groggy, in a small room he didn’t recognise wearing clothes that weren’t his. It wasn’t even a room, he thought, more a cell, and there was someone there with him. “What the bloody-”

a whole new world

[oneandtogether]

The feeling of vertigo accompanying a transporter engaging was familiar to Spock, but disorienting all the same. For a brief moment he thought-- hoped-- he might find himself on board the Enterprise, but as his senses returned to him he realized immediately that it was not so.

The room he found himself in was dark, but he could sense its size, and knew it to be vast. His night vision was decent, and he could see the shape of Amy to the side of him. He turned toward her, and as if in response to his movement, dim lights flickered on the edges of his vision, and began to turn on.

Spock's sense had been correct; the room was enormous. At least as tall as the Enterprise's shuttle bay, a hundred meters or more across, it vaulted over their heads toward a domed apex. At the four cardinal points of the room stood wide doorways with words mounted above; the closest read Cassia Concourse, but he could not make out the others. High up, the walls became great expanses of windows looking out on the pinpricked black of space. The low lights illuminated the room from the floor, giving it an eerie feel. Abandoned, Spock thought, though he had no reasoning to support his instinct.

They were standing on a small square dais big enough for themselves and perhaps two more people; presumably a transporter pad, though the control panel beside him did not respond when he touched it. Glancing at Amy, he stepped off it and began to walk around. His footsteps echoed, and he could hear Amy behind him also begin to explore.

He noted stands like kiosks, empty of merchandise; roped-off areas for directing lines of people leading up to counters with viewscreens above them; more viewscreens mounted on walls and stands, visible all over the room; benches and small tables with chairs; and at the center of the room, six transporter pads similar to those on the Enterprise, with a control station for each. Clearly this had once been a hub of traffic; it reminded him of the Starfleet shuttle hub in San Francisco.

Above the transporters hung a giant metal ring with letters cut out. Spock circled around, reading. "Porta Ianualis," he murmured. The Janus Gate. Interesting. Turning, he sat at one of the transporter controls, picked up the headset left lying on the surface and put it on. The screens here also failed to respond to his touch.

"Computer, activate transporter controls," he said, his voice too loud in the silence. Nothing happened. "Computer, activate subspace communications," he said. Again, nothing. He pushed away a rise of frustration and closed his eyes for a moment. If there are transporters, he thought, there must be sensor arrays and an engineering bay. I must find it, and reprogram it to allow us to communicate.

"Spock," said Amy from a distance away, sounding apprehensive. Letting out a slow breath, he stood and turned toward her, which was when he saw the shadows moving at the edges of the room, heard the quiet voices, and realized that they were no longer alone.