Author Topic: The SSSS Scriptorium  (Read 768103 times)

LooNEY_DAC

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3180 on: May 27, 2017, 03:39:03 PM »
Alphabet Soup
A “Stand Still. Stay Silent” fanfic collection
Series 2, Part 10
Complete Links to Complete Links post
Spoiler: Just Another Little Jaunt • show
The islet was both small and remarkably barren, but it had saved their lives—or at least, most of their lives. Sigrun had fallen from the netting just seconds before the others had  tumbled onto the islet’s sands, but even though that had been two days prior, the others were confident that Sigrun was still alive.

There was a superabundance of nothing on the islet, but the first dawn had brought them the sight of land a few hundred yards away, so they had swum to this larger place, and now they needed to figure out how exactly they would proceed.

The five were of one mind in the need to find Sigrun as soon as they could; they disagreed quite vociferously on just how this should be accomplished. Mikkel wanted to set up a base camp and ready it for long-term habitation first; Emil wanted to light a series of signal fires, hoping Sigrun would see them and find them herself, or, failing that, that someone on a passing ship would spot them and take them home; Reynir wanted them to wait until he could make them staves that would aid the search and double as weapons at need; Tuuri wanted to set off immediately, without thought for anything else; and Lalli wanted to go out at night by himself, since he worked best that way.

In the end, they tried doing all of these, excepting Tuuri’s brash inclinations. Or rather they tried starting each of these, only to discover that they had none of the tools that would allow them to complete the job, having thrown all their equipment out of the balloon in those last desperate hours before the islet had appeared. In fact, they had jettisoned most of their clothing as well, so great was their need to stay aloft until they could reach land.

They were fortunate enough to find drinkable water fairly swiftly, in the form of a river a klick or so down the beach from where they had crossed. This was indeed a mercy, as none of them had had anything to drink for more than three days; thus, the called the river “the Mercy”.

Fortified by the water, the five of them kept walking along the beach until Mikkel found a ragged assortment of rocks that he claimed could be made into a suitable base camp for them. After some investigation, the others agreed: there was a rough semi-shelter where various boulders had fallen atop each other which could be improved into a basic habitation. So while the Finns went off to try to find edible vegetable matter, the others set to shifting various rocks into the various cracks and fissures to block out any breezes from rushing through them.

It was then that Emil found that none of them had any means of making fire.

Tuuri and Lalli burst into the camp, ready to fight whatever had let out such a hideous wail, only to find that it was Emil. It took quite some time to calm him down, so that they almost missed the much more subtle sound at the rock-shelter’s entrance.

“Meow?”

The cat had been their mascot since they’d found her in the stable complex by the volcano; they hadn’t seen her since Sigrun had fallen. Now, Emil’s howls had brought her here, but did that mean Sigrun was nearby as well?

Without a word, Lalli sped out to follow Kitty’s trail…


Spoiler: Authorial Notes • show
Just in case it wasn’t obvious, I looooooooooooove “The Mysterious Island”.

Buteo

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3181 on: May 27, 2017, 07:09:11 PM »
I knew you had excellent taste and judgement, LooNEY!

LooNEY_DAC

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3182 on: May 27, 2017, 08:21:19 PM »
Oh, good; this won't be a double post.

Immune: A Tale of Year Zero
A “Stand Still. Stay Silent” fanfic
Part 3
Complete Links to Complete Links post
Prior part
Spoiler: Deeper Into the Storm • show
“Our world is built upon a mountain of anguish. Once you stir it up, who can tell what you will find?”

Days at sea: 17

The Medical Center on Deck 10 had quickly expanded to cover the entire deck as more and more passengers and crew fell ill. On the whole, it had been done smartly and well, given that they had never expected an epidemic of this magnitude, but it was straining at the seams.

Another problematic thing was that all the elevators had been programed to go directly to Deck 10 and stop there, and would not leave without an operator’s authorization, and the only stairwell that weren’t blocked were the emergency ones, and so would set off alarms if used. Thus, every time the boy went out for food, he had to run the gauntlet of the Triage Points set up by the banks of elevators before proceeding below.

The boy wasn’t sure how many “healthy” people were left on the ship; the number was certainly in the hundreds, but on a ship meant to carry thousands, they would have been hard to spot even if most weren’t trying to avoid anyone who might infect them. He wasn’t sure why he was still healthy, mask or no mask, given how often he’d been passed through the Triage Points.

He wasn’t sure he wanted to know how many people on the ship had already died.

At any rate, despite everything, the storm was only getting worse; it was even beginning to affect the ship, each slow lurch or sudden jolt reminding the boy of old WWII footage of carriers with their decks awash in North Atlantic storms. He was very fortunate not to suffer from sea-sickness even through the worst of it.

*

“Wait… How did he find out they were off course? And why isn’t he mentioning it?” The youngster’s face was puzzled.

For a moment, the elder wanted to grin at the youngster’s expression, but it was a serious question which deserved a serious answer, so he was serious when he replied, “Probably for the same reason he didn’t want to believe that the Illness would be so severe as it turned out to be: people usually don’t want to consider the possibility of disaster when they have a problem. They say Oh, that’ll work itself out or Don’t go borrowing trouble when they’re made to face such things, even now, so it’s no surprise that this was how the people of Year Zero dealt with the catastrophe as it unfolded, until they could ignore it no more.” The elder wiggled the book suggestively. “Shall I continue?”

The youngster was about to reply when his stomach rumbled quite loudly. The elder laughed openly and said, “Well, there’s at least one vote in favor of adjourning for supper. Shall we see whether the stew has simmered long enough?”

*

Little Ulf didn’t want to look at anyone for the rest of the day. Finally, Ulf Mikkel forced the matter by grabbing his son’s chin and gently but firmly tugging his head up until Little Ulf was forced to meet his eyes.

Before Ulf Mikkel could say anything, Little Ulf blurted out, “I’m sorry, alright?” and jerked his head away.

“You think this is the first time this has happened in my career?” Little Ulf’s head rose at the question. “You think I haven’t, er, disrupted a take or two of my own? Usually, the disruptive noise is not nearly so polite as yours; in fact, yours was on the order of a ‘happy accident’, rather than anything disastrous.”

Little Ulf stammered and stuttered incoherently for a bit at this unexpected leniency, until Ulf Mikkel frowned.

“Of course, if I catch you eating cabbage before a big scene, you’ll regret it!”

Little Ulf laughed, and the Glurgle Incident was behind them…


Spoiler: Authorial Notes • show
Oh, look. I updated this again.

Weird, huh?

wavewright62

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3183 on: May 27, 2017, 10:27:06 PM »
Chapter 30.  Uff.  So, the AU crew is getting rescued somewhere in inland Denmark by a boat filled with superpowered individuals.  Because AU.  Still no sign of what happened to Reynir, or his clogs.  "Let's Get this Rescue Started, Shall We?"
http://archiveofourown.org/works/6610714/chapters/24556653
Always a newbie at something
Native speaker: :us:
Acquired: :nz:
Grew up speaking but now very rusty: :ee:


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LooNEY_DAC

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3184 on: May 28, 2017, 02:38:05 AM »
And now for something much...

...darker.

The Expedition
A “Stand Still. Stay Silent”/Cyberpunk AU fanfic
Part 3
Complete Links to Complete Links post
Prior part
Spoiler: At the End of the Known World • show
This was the first time in Emil’s life that he had been somewhere that his Uncle and Aunt couldn’t have whoever they wished immediately boiled alive, and Emil wasn’t sure how he felt about it. On the other hand, he’d much rather think about that than about what had happened on the Dalahästen. He was such a coward as to fall prey to delusions in the wake of the attack—he’d actually imagined hearing Lalli speak to him!

Lalli and Tuuri seemed not to be treating him any differently now than they had before, though, so perhaps he hadn’t utterly disgraced himself—yet.

Emil glanced out of the corner of his eye at the stern, proud figure of his new captain and knew that there was no way he would get out of this without disgracing himself utterly. She had made that clear with her introductory remarks to the three of them after Trond had presented them at attention; actually, simply by calling them to Parade Rest rather than At Ease had made the point clear. No, there would be no pleasing Sigrun Eide aside from sheer perfection—and Emil knew, to his shame, just how imperfect he was.

This imperfection was demonstrated when the XO introduced himself as “Mumble Mumsen”, with further mumbles that Emil assumed were some form of the standard pleasantries. Emil’s parents had been informed early on of his tin ear for languages; this extended to spoken (though not written) Danish, which obviously continued to elude him.

A few moments later, Emil had found a Dane he could understand—if only because the Dane only ever spoke at a shout that brought echoes from anything nearby. While this Admiral Olsen seemed to respect Trond, he treated Torbjörn & Siv with a disdainful and distant semi-courtesy such as they had hardly ever been on the receiving end of. Again, Emil was torn; they were family, but they were… well…

The little group reached their assigned vehicle and immediately began the check-out and loading protocols, leaving Emil with no time for further reflection.

*

How on earth do they expect us to find something the whole world’s been seeking out for the last century? Lalli’s unspoken inquiry was as blunt as ever. Maybe they mean for us to fail, he continued before Tuuri could reply. I’d bet Onni would agree.

Why don’t you try asking him? Tuuri shot back.

Lalli looked doubtful. It’s really, really far away.

Try anyway, Tuuri said. I want to know how they’re treating him.

Can’t be too bad if they want him to work for them after, Lalli pointed out. Anyway, I’ll try, but I can’t promise anything.

OK. What do you think of the Captain? She scares me.

Everything scares you, Lalli replied. I’ve worked with her kind before; you’ll do alright, unless you get on her bad side by whining and cringing all the time.

*

“Green lot, aren’t they, Captain?” Mikkel kept his tone casual as he came back to Sigrun Eide’s side.

“A bit pathetic,” she agreed without rancor, “but only for now. A few weeks under my tutelage and they’ll be up to par—or dead trying.”

They might not be the only ones, Mikkel thought, remembering his orders…


Spoiler: Authorial Notes • show
Oh, yeah; I had this dark-fic thing going, too.

So here’s another revival for you.

Ilral

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3185 on: May 28, 2017, 03:37:30 AM »
I realized that not posting in the scriptorium was denying my fics exposure some time ago, but I didn't act on this until I had something new to post because to do otherwise seemed a bit scummy.

That said, here's 1000-odd words of Onni/Reynir shipfic, entitled Sweet Tooth:
http://archiveofourown.org/works/11021712

If you're interested in anything else I've written, my AO3 profile has a couple other things on it.

:chap14:
:chap15:
:chap16:

Lazy8

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3186 on: May 28, 2017, 10:18:12 AM »
Whoops, almost forgot to post this:

A Journey in the Dark


Now bed.
:usa: native
:spain: comes back in an emergency
:vaticancity: rusty
:china: can usually manage to order food
:norway: can hold a basic conversation

:chap5: | :book2: | :book3: | :chap17: :chap18:

Grade E cat

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3187 on: May 28, 2017, 11:14:22 AM »
Okay, my brain has apparently decided this week would be "get your short one-shot stories out of your system" week. I've had the idea ever since someone commented that the tank may need to be abandonned back in Chapter 13. Now that it's happening, better put this out there before the canon consideration for such an occurence actually gets shown.

To future explorers
Even abandonned, the tank still serves a noble purpose.

I know there is the potential for a much longer fic in there, but it lies in an aspect of the story's universe to which I have never given much thought personally, and that I consider best handled by people who have.
Native: :fr:
So much part of my life it might as well be native: :us:
Few and far between practice opportunities: :es:
A little learned during hardcore anime fan phase: :jp:
Only alternative to English in early junior high school: :de:

Do what cat. Lalli's way of life since age three.

LooNEY_DAC

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3188 on: May 28, 2017, 01:14:03 PM »
Alphabet Soup
A “Stand Still. Stay Silent” fanfic collection
Series 3, Part 10
Complete Links to Complete Links post
Spoiler: The Jitters • show
It was their first night in the Silent World, and Emil was frankly terrified, which was as it should be: their little band was trying to scramble back to Mora in the wake of the Dalahästen’s derailment with no shelter, no supplies, no vehicle, no radio, and no one who knew that they were still alive to expect them. Terror was to be expected; not simply from Emil, but from Reynir and Tuuri as well.

They had made their first camp in a house that would have served well for a grossling’s nest, if only the inhabitants hadn’t died from the Illness instead of trollifying. The three cats with them, Ola, John and Nils, had prowled around and into every crack and crevice they could find before returning to declare the house cleared. Lalli backed them up, which was good enough for Emil, since the thin Finn had somehow sensed the derailment even before the cats.

Lalli had vanished into the night long since, leaving Emil and the cats on their lonely watch. Ola was resting in Emil’s lap, trying to calm him with sustained purring; Nils was patrolling; and John was watching over the two non-immunes, to whom Sigrun still referred as “helpless babies”.

A single candle lit the little hall in which the party slept; even though there were no vulnerable windows to betray their presence through light or heat, Sigrun still demanded that precaution, and the others readily agreed. Still, the feeble, flickering light only made Emil’s watch that much more anxious.

Emil was to wake Sigrun as soon as he swapped out the candles; hopefully, Lalli would be back before that, easing Emil’s mind about one thing, at least.

As Ola purred on, Emil’s mind turned to the journey ahead. During the forced march, he’d been too busy trying to live up to Sigrun’s expectations of him to mull over anything else; now, he had nothing to do but mull things over—or at least, he hoped so.

Despite the foreshortened span of daylight (which would only grow worse as Winter approached, of course), their little band had covered quite a distance, which was good. Remarks from Tuuri and Reynir indicating how grueling they’d found the march were less good, as those two were the weakest link of their group, even if Emil thought “helpless babies” was going a bit far.

The rain and snow had sporadically returned, both adding to the march’s difficulty and yet easing it by ensuring their water supplies were still topped up, and Lalli had managed to bag a few small woodland creatures unlucky and unwary enough to cross his path. Sigrun had seen a deer in the distance, but it had seen her as well, so nothing came of that.

A series of loud rattles on the ceiling above him brought Emil back to the present. As Nils and Ola were still unconcerned, he knew it was simply that the rain had turned to hail, but would the structure that had seen a century or more of such weather choose to yield to it now, or would it hold out until the party sheltering in it left with the dawn?

SCRITCH SCRITCH SCRATCH

The sound was louder than Emil had expected; he jumped to his feet, unceremoniously ejecting Ola from her comfortable perch, and went to the door. Softly, tentatively, he scratched across the door in the countersign Lalli had shown him before leaving, and then Emil waited. The cats waited too, all three of them staring at the door in that intense, unblinking way cats had.

The silence seemed to thicken and stretch on interminably as Emil waited for Lalli to respond…


Spoiler: Authorial Notes • show
No, this isn’t a redux of SectoBossFear and Loathing in Kastrup.

…It is, however, a sequel to my Into the Silent World.
« Last Edit: May 28, 2017, 08:28:20 PM by LooNEY_DAC »

Buteo

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3189 on: May 28, 2017, 03:43:15 PM »
Nice cliffhanger, LooNEY!
Is there a source for the names of the cats?

LooNEY_DAC

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3190 on: May 28, 2017, 04:10:17 PM »
Nice cliffhanger, LooNEY!
Is there a source for the names of the cats?
When I wrote "Next Cycle", I named all the cats after Sundbergs with English-language Wikipedia pages. For this, I re-used some of them.

Lazy8

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3191 on: May 29, 2017, 09:53:17 AM »
Another one, yay.

A Knife in the Ocean

:usa: native
:spain: comes back in an emergency
:vaticancity: rusty
:china: can usually manage to order food
:norway: can hold a basic conversation

:chap5: | :book2: | :book3: | :chap17: :chap18:

LooNEY_DAC

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3192 on: May 29, 2017, 12:56:33 PM »
Alphabet Soup
A “Stand Still. Stay Silent” fanfic collection
Series 1, Part 11
Complete Links to Complete Links post
Spoiler: A Kind of Kind Kenning • show
The night was slowly giving way to morning as the scout quietly slipped back to the campsite. A big, fat, puffy cloud hung right above them in the sky, and as the sun rose, its light played over the cloud’s textures, sequentially bringing ever-shifting colors to the wisps and filaments in a dazzling display.

For a moment, the scout paused outside the vehicle, his face raised to drink in the magnificent light show as it shifted and glowed above him. A rather disgruntled and somehow very Danish throat-clearing from the vehicle cut short the scout’s moment of aestheticism, but a glance at Emil showed that the other youth had been sharing in Lalli’s appreciation of the celestial display.

Lalli mechanically removed his soiled uniform, his eyes still fixed on the sky as he handed each piece over to Mikkel, but his mind on Emil. That tended to happen more often than Lalli quite liked, because Emil was so different from the others, who all tended to stay in the nice little boxes Lalli had mentally assigned them, while Emil did not.

For a stupid and weird foreigner, Emil had many, many more moments of accord with Lalli than Lalli had ever expected or considered possible; in fact, sometimes Emil was downright Finnish, until he opened his mouth.

Of course, now that Lalli was learning more of Emil’s stupid, weird foreign language, it wasn’t so bad as it had been in the beginning. Additionally, Emil seemed to be making an effort to keep his former loquacity under control: not that he said less, but that his sentences were more basic, if more numerous.

And then there were the times when Emil tried to speak Finnish, revealing his weird foreign stupidity in all its glory.

But now, as in so many other shared moments before, Emil and Lalli were in perfect accord about the majesty of a Danish dawn playing across the clouds above them, even if Mikkel was firmly not in accord with them.

Lalli shut his eyes just in time to avoid the frigid spray blasting the rest of him, which necessarily ended his appreciation of Ukko’s gift above. Gritting his teeth, he endured the rough hose-down until it finally, mercifully ended. He had had to pass through a thick patch of some weird foreign plant on his way back, and the hose-down was spreading the mild discomfort from the encounter across his back and his chest.

The warm water felt both good and bad on his skin, unusually tender this morning, as Lalli climbed into the washtub. Though Lalli was braced in readiness for the usual rough scrubbing needed to eliminate all traces of the Silent World that may have clung to him through the hose-down, it didn’t come. Instead, Emil was much more gentle than usual; gentle enough that Lalli almost expected Mikkel to reprimand Emil. But apparently whatever was bothering Lalli’s skin was visible to their Danish healer, who took one of Lalli’s arms, clucked a little, rumbled something at Emil and handed Lalli two small pills to swallow.

When Lalli woke up, it was full daylight. He vaguely remembered Emil making sure he didn’t drown before the bath was done, helping him into his clothes and half-carrying him to his bunk. Lalli made a mental note to avoid stupid, weird foreign plants that left him needing stupid, weird foreign medicine…


Spoiler: Authorial Notes • show
No, there will never be a point when Lalli thinks about foreigners without a stupid and weird attached, even (or especially?) Emil.

Lalli stumbled into a patch of something to which he’s mildly allergic and got contact dermatitis; Mikkel gave him an antihistamine.

Róisín

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3193 on: May 29, 2017, 07:47:33 PM »
That medication does that to me too. And I bet what he found was Giant Hogweed? Forms dense patches, irritates and photosensitises the skin, and is probably common in Denmark after 90 years with no eradication program. Poor Lalli!
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Lazy8

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Re: The SSSS Scriptorium
« Reply #3194 on: May 29, 2017, 09:27:35 PM »
Heh, my first thought was poison ivy, but I'm pretty sure that's a uniquely American thing (lucky us).
:usa: native
:spain: comes back in an emergency
:vaticancity: rusty
:china: can usually manage to order food
:norway: can hold a basic conversation

:chap5: | :book2: | :book3: | :chap17: :chap18: