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Jul. 28th, 2020 09:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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120_minutenTeam: Mega-Team
Challenge: Romantik/Intimität: Instinkt (Päckchen #12)
Fandom: The Old Guard (2020 Film)
Charaktere: Team
Wörter: ca. 1000
A/N: Offenbar habe ich ein neues Fandom, und ihr dürft mir zugucken, wie ich versuche herauszufinden, wie es funktioniert. Eines Tages schreibe ich vielleicht sogar, was ich ursprünglich schreiben wollte. Bis dahin: Nile tries to figure out her new fellow soldiers.
Andy led an army. Which made her the general (or the lead singer in their potentially awful 70’s prog rock cover band, Nile thought, not without a kind of spiteful glee) and them her soldiers.
Nile was okay with that, because soldiers, she knew. She didn’t understand immortality or knew much about the periods they came from, but she knew Andy’s cynical pragmatism and Booker’s quiet hopelessness, Joe’s gallows humour and Nicky’s misplaced idealism. Knew them intimately, knew that they were tools of survival as much as instinct.
“So, you all died in battle?” she asked quietly as Nicky led her to the other room.
“Often.”
“I mean… the first time.”
He stopped in his tracks. “Joe and I did. Andy, too, probably. She says she doesn’t remember.”
Nile heard what he didn’t say and didn’t bother asking. “But you remember?”
“I remember waking up again. I remember looking into the face of the man I’d just run a sword through. Remember him blinking back at me and figuring I’d gone to hell.”
“You believe in God?”
Nicky shook his head. “I started to in that moment. – Just for a while though.” He grabbed a sleeping bag and some blankets from the bed at the wall. “But that was a very different god back then, I guess.”
She didn’t follow him further into the room, just watched as he placed both on the cot, trying to process what he’d just said and how that fit into everything he’d said over dinner. “You went into a Holy War without believing in God?”
Nicky chuckled. “I became a priest without believing in God.” He spread the blanket over the cot, carefully straightening the edges. “Here. There’s toothbrushes under the sink in the bathroom.”
Without even noticing, Nile had started to fiddle with the cross around her neck. Nicky smiled. “Keep your faith as long as you can. It helps to believe in something.”
“So, what do you believe in these days?” she asked with a small smile, waiting for a wonderfully earnest declaration: The right thing. Love.
Nicky shrugged. “Andy.”
Booker talked about his family, about the Russian winter and spring in Paris, and Nile thought that she’d been wrong in her first assessment of him: There was nothing quiet about his desperation. And he was as far away from hopeless as all the bright-eyed recruits who’d signed up with her. Booker believed in a better world and a meaning in all of this and he desperately, desperately hoped.
It was heart breaking, really. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure.”
“How did you die?”
His laugh was entirely devoid of humour. “Pathetically and freezing to the bone. – I’d deserted, they caught me. Andy and the others found me frozen, dangling from a rope.”
“You didn’t become a soldier by choice?”
His smile was soft. “On the contrary, I did. When they presented me with the choice between the dying a prisoner and war for the first time, I chose war. I just changed my mind.”
Nile watched him typing away on his laptop. “You should sleep, kid” he said softly. She watched him and could just imagine him, a man with a wife and kids, signing his life over to a war that he didn’t care about just because it offered the chance of something more, something better than death. Just to have to make that exact same choice again: Running to probable death to escape its certainty.
And then to learn that he wouldn’t die, not for a long time.
Joe laughed, freely and easily and warmly. As if life and death were inherently funny if you just looked closely enough.
Nile pushed herself off from the fencepost, wincing at the feeling of the metal pole sliding through her organs. She collapsed on the sidewalk and came back to life to the sound of Joe’s laughter.
“You do enjoy your short cuts, don’t you?”
“You think you’re funny?”
“Absolutely.”
She flipped him off but let him drag her onto her feet. Impaling herself on a metal pole after jumping out of a seventh floor window would not make it on her list of favourite ways to die, even if it was decidedly better than splattering all over the pavement.
“When’s the last time you fell to your death? It sucks!”
He shrugged. “There’s worse ways to go.”
“Sure.” She rolled her shoulders, took the gun Joe offered and jogged towards the building she’d just been thrown out of. The others were still back up there. “I’ll bite. What’s been the worst?”
“Dehydration.”
“Yeah, that doesn’t sound fun.” She remembered the desert heat, the chapped lips and the sore throat. “Although I was sure you’d have a quip about bleeding to death after being castrated or something.”
He laughed. “Yeah, Nicky did that to me once. Not quite sure what we fought about… I probably deserved it. -- But the thing about dehydration is, it takes forever. You can make it take forever and you will get light-headed and delirious and, yet, you will see and hear everything around you. Hear every ragged breath, see his eyes glaze over, see him die and come back and die again.” With a few finger signs, he let her know to cover him before he burst through the door.
Joe killed like he laughed; quickly, liberally and as if there was no other choice. There really wasn’t anything particularly funny about any of it.
“What are you thinking about?” Andy offered a glass of vodka and Nile accepted gratefully, relishing in the burning sensation and the fact that she still hadn’t gotten used to the taste.
She’d been getting used to a lot in the last years.
“I thought I had you guys all figured out, that first evening in not-quite-Paris” she admitted. “It made sense, I’d met my share of soldiers and they only come in so many flavours. Was weirdly disappointing as well, that that kind of life experience doesn’t change things much.”
Andy filled her glass up again. “And now?”
“Now I know that you’re a lot, but not a cynic.”
A soft laugh. “That’s harsh.”
Nile shrugged. “You’re a good person, Andy” she said quietly, because Andy’s pragmatism was learned just as Booker’s fatalism, Joe’s levity or Nicky’s idealism. “And your first instinct will always be to run into that burning building, no matter how much you try to convince yourself otherwise.”
“Again: Harsh.”
“True.”
“Same difference.”
Challenge: Romantik/Intimität: Instinkt (Päckchen #12)
Fandom: The Old Guard (2020 Film)
Charaktere: Team
Wörter: ca. 1000
A/N: Offenbar habe ich ein neues Fandom, und ihr dürft mir zugucken, wie ich versuche herauszufinden, wie es funktioniert. Eines Tages schreibe ich vielleicht sogar, was ich ursprünglich schreiben wollte. Bis dahin: Nile tries to figure out her new fellow soldiers.
Andy led an army. Which made her the general (or the lead singer in their potentially awful 70’s prog rock cover band, Nile thought, not without a kind of spiteful glee) and them her soldiers.
Nile was okay with that, because soldiers, she knew. She didn’t understand immortality or knew much about the periods they came from, but she knew Andy’s cynical pragmatism and Booker’s quiet hopelessness, Joe’s gallows humour and Nicky’s misplaced idealism. Knew them intimately, knew that they were tools of survival as much as instinct.
“So, you all died in battle?” she asked quietly as Nicky led her to the other room.
“Often.”
“I mean… the first time.”
He stopped in his tracks. “Joe and I did. Andy, too, probably. She says she doesn’t remember.”
Nile heard what he didn’t say and didn’t bother asking. “But you remember?”
“I remember waking up again. I remember looking into the face of the man I’d just run a sword through. Remember him blinking back at me and figuring I’d gone to hell.”
“You believe in God?”
Nicky shook his head. “I started to in that moment. – Just for a while though.” He grabbed a sleeping bag and some blankets from the bed at the wall. “But that was a very different god back then, I guess.”
She didn’t follow him further into the room, just watched as he placed both on the cot, trying to process what he’d just said and how that fit into everything he’d said over dinner. “You went into a Holy War without believing in God?”
Nicky chuckled. “I became a priest without believing in God.” He spread the blanket over the cot, carefully straightening the edges. “Here. There’s toothbrushes under the sink in the bathroom.”
Without even noticing, Nile had started to fiddle with the cross around her neck. Nicky smiled. “Keep your faith as long as you can. It helps to believe in something.”
“So, what do you believe in these days?” she asked with a small smile, waiting for a wonderfully earnest declaration: The right thing. Love.
Nicky shrugged. “Andy.”
Booker talked about his family, about the Russian winter and spring in Paris, and Nile thought that she’d been wrong in her first assessment of him: There was nothing quiet about his desperation. And he was as far away from hopeless as all the bright-eyed recruits who’d signed up with her. Booker believed in a better world and a meaning in all of this and he desperately, desperately hoped.
It was heart breaking, really. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure.”
“How did you die?”
His laugh was entirely devoid of humour. “Pathetically and freezing to the bone. – I’d deserted, they caught me. Andy and the others found me frozen, dangling from a rope.”
“You didn’t become a soldier by choice?”
His smile was soft. “On the contrary, I did. When they presented me with the choice between the dying a prisoner and war for the first time, I chose war. I just changed my mind.”
Nile watched him typing away on his laptop. “You should sleep, kid” he said softly. She watched him and could just imagine him, a man with a wife and kids, signing his life over to a war that he didn’t care about just because it offered the chance of something more, something better than death. Just to have to make that exact same choice again: Running to probable death to escape its certainty.
And then to learn that he wouldn’t die, not for a long time.
Joe laughed, freely and easily and warmly. As if life and death were inherently funny if you just looked closely enough.
Nile pushed herself off from the fencepost, wincing at the feeling of the metal pole sliding through her organs. She collapsed on the sidewalk and came back to life to the sound of Joe’s laughter.
“You do enjoy your short cuts, don’t you?”
“You think you’re funny?”
“Absolutely.”
She flipped him off but let him drag her onto her feet. Impaling herself on a metal pole after jumping out of a seventh floor window would not make it on her list of favourite ways to die, even if it was decidedly better than splattering all over the pavement.
“When’s the last time you fell to your death? It sucks!”
He shrugged. “There’s worse ways to go.”
“Sure.” She rolled her shoulders, took the gun Joe offered and jogged towards the building she’d just been thrown out of. The others were still back up there. “I’ll bite. What’s been the worst?”
“Dehydration.”
“Yeah, that doesn’t sound fun.” She remembered the desert heat, the chapped lips and the sore throat. “Although I was sure you’d have a quip about bleeding to death after being castrated or something.”
He laughed. “Yeah, Nicky did that to me once. Not quite sure what we fought about… I probably deserved it. -- But the thing about dehydration is, it takes forever. You can make it take forever and you will get light-headed and delirious and, yet, you will see and hear everything around you. Hear every ragged breath, see his eyes glaze over, see him die and come back and die again.” With a few finger signs, he let her know to cover him before he burst through the door.
Joe killed like he laughed; quickly, liberally and as if there was no other choice. There really wasn’t anything particularly funny about any of it.
“What are you thinking about?” Andy offered a glass of vodka and Nile accepted gratefully, relishing in the burning sensation and the fact that she still hadn’t gotten used to the taste.
She’d been getting used to a lot in the last years.
“I thought I had you guys all figured out, that first evening in not-quite-Paris” she admitted. “It made sense, I’d met my share of soldiers and they only come in so many flavours. Was weirdly disappointing as well, that that kind of life experience doesn’t change things much.”
Andy filled her glass up again. “And now?”
“Now I know that you’re a lot, but not a cynic.”
A soft laugh. “That’s harsh.”
Nile shrugged. “You’re a good person, Andy” she said quietly, because Andy’s pragmatism was learned just as Booker’s fatalism, Joe’s levity or Nicky’s idealism. “And your first instinct will always be to run into that burning building, no matter how much you try to convince yourself otherwise.”
“Again: Harsh.”
“True.”
“Same difference.”
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Date: 2020-07-28 07:51 pm (UTC)(Mein persönliches Highlight: “You went into a _Holy_ War without believing in God?” :D)