The SSSS Scriptorium

[Róisín]

Frostykitty: first spoiler won't open for me either.

[frostykitty]

It should work now, sorry I'm not used to this kind of code... Sorry about that!

[Kiraly]

It should work now, sorry I'm not used to this kind of code... Sorry about that!

No worries, it took me a while to figure out would cause that too! Still very much learning the quirks of forum code.

And oh my gosh the suspense! That was very action-packed, I'm anxious to know what comes next!

[Lazy8]

Yes, I like these stories. And 'punishable by Sigrun's wrath' is probably the most gruesome punishment I've ever heard of.
I have narrowed the title down to TWO choices, I'm very proud of myself, it's an amazing accomplishment for me... This chapter is shorter than the one and three (and three isn't even near done yet, jeeze) and there's another wonderful, not-ominous-at-all, optimistic ending. Actually, you all know that was sarcasm, there's some gore but I don't think it's worse than anything cannon, just a fair warning. No main character death.

...is it a bad thing that when Emil (gah, almost typed "Emily," that's the second time today I've almost misgendered a male character from this comic specifically) gets attacked by something and starts screaming, my default reaction is to laugh?

I am hoping he didn't get hurt, though. That's a good thing... right? Right?

[frostykitty]

I was going for suspend end action, so that's good!
And laughing at Emil squeaking in terror is quite a normal reaction. No, no major injuries. Just metal scars and a few bruises. Okay, well he probably got a few scratches on his arms from the attack, but nothing too bad. That will come to a different character, possibly mystery cleanser girl, possibly Sigrun, possibly Lalli...
The next chapter will probably be (my) tomorrow. I'd say in about...15 hours maybe, for those of you on different continents. depending on what time I wake up that is...

[LooNEY_DAC]

The Good, the Bad, and the Bestial
A “Stand Still. Stay Silent”/Western crossover fanfic
Part 18
Caper the Third: The Cave of Time
Part 7
Prior part

Spoiler: show

Sacrifice of Emil’s

The Man in the Black Hat’s flunkies had all fallen save one by the time their master reached the shelter of the Cave’s mouth. With a curse, he began firing back at his opponents, a wild fusillade that forced the Westerners back into cover just long enough for his final minion to carry out his orders.

Emil watched the flunky fumble with the latch from his vantage point behind a rock, knowing that if he moved to stop the flunky, the Man in the Black Hat would gun him down like a dog, but knowing also the horrific consequences if the flunky succeeded. Emil’s internal debate paralyzed him just long enough for the flunky to fling the cage open with a dying spasm.

There was no choice now. Emil stood, silhouetted perfectly against the night, and threw his Incendiary Delight. For a few endless seconds, the bottle hurtled through the air, flying true to Emil’s aim, and finally smashed upon the newly freed Beast.

Something hit Emil’s shoulder; it was the last thing he felt for some time. He certainly never felt the bullet that grazed his neck, nor the one that pierced his ear. But Emil was beyond caring: his success was all that mattered.

Bright fire smothered the abomination, and it screamed in fury and in pain, but, try as it might, it could no more escape those cleansing flames than it could fly. The horrid scent of burning Beast flooded the air already rent with the Beast’s hideous shrieks, until it burned away.

Lalli watched the Beast burn, hearing also how the Man in the Black Hat cursed them from his hidey-hole. A few shots from Sigrun finally convinced that fiend to flee, though, and the others could break cover at last. Lalli took the opportunity to run over to  where he’d seen Emil fall.

Emil was unconscious, and no wonder. A bright red blotch was spreading over Emil’s waistcoat and shirt from his shoulder wound.

*

Between the gunshot wounds and a worrisome (yet thankfully brief) fever, it took Emil three days before he could get out of bed, and the evening he did, Sigrun held a council of war.

“We can’t wait, or the Man in the Black Hat will get clean away.” Sigrun made the statement with a quiet firmness that almost had the others pitying the Man in the Black Hat, for they knew what it signified. “Now that the crisis is past, we can let Emil heal up here while we take care of that filth.”

“I’ll be OK,” Emil said gamely. “Besides, I can use the time to mix up some more munitions for us and our counterparts.”

Tuuri nodded, as did Mikkel; Lalli began to bristle and glare at Sigrun for daring to suggest they leave Emil behind; and Reynir...

“We need Emil more than speed,” Reynir said definitively, “or even vengeance.” He threw Sigrun a significant look. “Our next stop’s where everything changes.”

Something in his voice convinced even Sigrun. They would wait for Emil to heal enough that he could accompany them.

*
Malmö, Sweden
Year 3, Day 26
2257L

“Again with the sewers?” Sigrun complained.

“Home sweet home,” Emil retorted. “At least the aroma isn’t so bad this time.”

“You’re more right than you know,” Mikkel rumbled. “Look.” On one of the walls was a faded mark, two M’s in a circle. “I put that mark there the last time we were here, before we played at the jazz club.”

“So we’re in Sweden again,” Sigrun mused. “This Cave sure likes Europe, don’t it?”

“Something’s wrong,” Lalli said. “You’re right, Emil: it doesn’t smell so bad as it should, and that’s not good.”

Tuuri frowned. “Yeah, this is how sewers smell when they haven’t been used for a while.”

“So the city up there’s been abandoned?” Emil asked. “Why on earth--?”

The realization hit all six of them at once: they were in a plague town, and what other plague had hounded them so far?

Suddenly, the Westerners found themselves preternaturally aware of every little noise around them. “I think we should go up,” Emil said, and they did...

Spoiler: Authorial Notes • show

Hmmmm. They’re in Malmö again. What a coincidence.

[OwlsG0]

Well, I did it. I was thinking about AU's and I went and did it.

Lalli's going to school, everyone. People school.

http://archiveofourown.org/works/5853457/chapters/13491637

*drops link*
*and again melts into dark oblivion to think on sins*

[Róisín]

OwlsGo: this will be interesting.

LooNEY: Poor Emil! But I'm looking forward to further developments.

[frostykitty]

The school AU was wonderful "There's a cat in the pantry! Huh? Oh, no never mind. Any one looking for Lalli?"
So chapter three was getting too long to be posted here (I imagine,) and I cut it at a time skip. It's short now, but you get to figure out what happens to Sigrun and the giant, anyway! I'll post chapter four a little later. Some gore, you have been warned.

Spoiler: show

{chapter 3}

It seemed to shoot a mocking grin at her before lunging to attack. Sigrun lashed out with her blood-stained blade, making a gash down the mutated skull of the second head, but it wasn't dead yet. The second head let out a scratchy yelp before the massive troll charged again, broken spikes of bone raising along the makeshift spine. It rammed in to the captain at full force, but she only stumbled. Despite the minor injuries and possible broken bones, Sigrun cackled and glared up at the creature with wide eyes. She quickly retaliated and, this time, claimed the second head by decapitation.

The last distorted head kept screaming. The rib cage-jaws opened up before it attempted to pin her down with its clawed appendages. All of her kicking was no use, the thing wouldn't budge, but that did nothing to diminish her determination. Sigrun growled as the claws ripped her coat and the piercing screams grew ever louder. Her knife finally made contact after what seemed like both an eternity and the blink of an eye, slicing off one of the arms that held her down, the creature writhed, giving her a small chance to escape, before a gunshot rang out.

Lalli hissed and put his rifle back over his shoulder and tugged on Emil's wrist. Sigrun shoved the corpse of the Rash mutant off of her and ran towards the boys.

"We need to run! Now! Just hope these people will do the same of they have any sense, but we have to get out of here now!" She demanded in a rushed manner. Emil nodded quickly and ran off after Lalli. Sigrun turned back to the young woman they had met earlier, who was struggling to drag one of her teammates away from the fast-growing fire. With an exasperated sigh she jogged over to help.

"If you can get this one, I'll grab them!" The cleanser said, pointing to a man attempting to stand with a mangled leg. Sigrun shook her head and slung the unconscious cleanser over her shoulder before rushing over the help the other.

"There's no time for this! Follow the other two, we have a medic!" She snapped, shooing away the girl while helping the injured walk. The girl nodded and was gone in only a moment, nearly challenging Lalli's speed.

Spoiler: notes • show

Yep, only three cleansers on the team are still alive-enough to be saved after that massacre. There weren't too many on the team to begin with, and as the girl said, most of them were not immune so we're probably going to become sick anyway. The whole thing will be better explained in chapter four. And the two other cleansers (hurt leg guy and ...sleeping... guy) are immune, no masks needed.
Gentle criticism welcome.

[Lazy8]

The school AU was wonderful "There's a cat in the pantry! Huh? Oh, no never mind. Any one looking for Lalli?"
So chapter three was getting too long to be posted here (I imagine,) and I cut it at a time skip. It's short now, but you get to figure out what happens to Sigrun and the giant, anyway! I'll post chapter four a little later. Some gore, you have been warned.

Spoiler: show

{chapter 3}

It seemed to shoot a mocking grin at her before lunging to attack. Sigrun lashed out with her blood-stained blade, making a gash down the mutated skull of the second head, but it wasn't dead yet. The second head let out a scratchy yelp before the massive troll charged again, broken spikes of bone raising along the makeshift spine. It rammed in to the captain at full force, but she only stumbled. Despite the minor injuries and possible broken bones, Sigrun cackled and glared up at the creature with wide eyes. She quickly retaliated and, this time, claimed the second head by decapitation.

The last distorted head kept screaming. The rib cage-jaws opened up before it attempted to pin her down with its clawed appendages. All of her kicking was no use, the thing wouldn't budge, but that did nothing to diminish her determination. Sigrun growled as the claws ripped her coat and the piercing screams grew ever louder. Her knife finally made contact after what seemed like both an eternity and the blink of an eye, slicing off one of the arms that held her down, the creature writhed, giving her a small chance to escape, before a gunshot rang out.

Lalli hissed and put his rifle back over his shoulder and tugged on Emil's wrist. Sigrun shoved the corpse of the Rash mutant off of her and ran towards the boys.

"We need to run! Now! Just hope these people will do the same of they have any sense, but we have to get out of here now!" She demanded in a rushed manor. Emil nodded quickly and ran off after Lalli. Sigrun turned back to the young woman they had met earlier, who was struggling to drag one of her teammates away from the fast-growing fire. With an exasperated sigh she jogged over to help.

"If you can get this one, I'll grab them!" The cleanser said, pointing to a man attempting to stand with a mangled leg. Sigrun shook her head and slung the unconscious cleanser over her shoulder before rushing over the help the other.

"There's no time for this! Follow the other two, we have a medic!" She snapped, shooing away the girl while helping the injured walk. The girl nodded and was gone in only a moment, nearly challenging Lalli's speed.

Spoiler: notes • show

Yep, only three cleansers on the team are still alive-enough to be saved after that massacre. There weren't too many on the team to begin with, and as the girl said, most of them were not immune so we're probably going to become sick anyway. The whole thing will be better explained in chapter four. And the two other cleansers (hurt leg guy and ...sleeping... guy) are immune, no masks needed.
Gentle criticism welcome.

Well, at least Sigrun doesn't seem too hurt.

Also, I think you mean "manner" rather than "manor". Manor as in manor house; manner as in a way of doing something.

[frostykitty]

Haha, yeah... I shouldn't try and write when I'm only half awake, I guess. Could be a good idea *hides in shame*

To be honest I'm surprised anyone is reading it. OH, OH IT HAS A NAME! I threw the two name choices out the window and made up "Return to Silence" instead. "Return to Silence" will probably be broken in to parts. Whenever I get a good idea, I thought I would just add it to this so it would be a part of this second mission. This may or may not be because I don't want to mess with anything in the cannon timeframe and leave that to Minna, but who cares about my pet peeves... So we can count this story and a part one I guess, and they'll each have chapters.

It'll work like that! And now for chapter four (IT ACTUALLY HAS LENGTH TO IT AT ALL! Woahhh!) now let's learn the names of these weird cleanser people...

Spoiler: return to silence part one chapter four • show

{chapter 4}

"Sigrun's here! Mikkel, come on!" Emil yelped, running out the door. He swiftly took the comatose cleanser from his captain and put them on the ground. Mikkel soon joined them. His eyes widened as he looked around.

"Is this all that was left...?" He asked Sigrun in a hushed tone, grabbing his bag and crouching down to look at the other man's wounded leg. She sighed and shrugged.

"All I could see... Emil, can you grab maybe a chair or two?" The captain groaned, rubbing her head. Mikkel nodded solemnly as he tried to stitch one of the wounds.

Meanwhile, in the tank, the female cleanser - Erika, she had told them - was explaining how the whole thing had happened in Icelandic. Reynir seemed quite bewildered, while Tuuri was wonderstruck as she listened to the tale. It was true, unlike a few of Emil's stories, you could tell by the fear in her eyes as she recalled each horrific moment in detail. Emil had crashed through the door, rudely interrupting the part where, well, he crashed in to the story with Lalli and Sigrun. His shoulders were up around his jaw as he awkwardly grabbed two chairs and sidestepped back out the door, receiving a small laugh from Erika and Tuuri.

Sigrun sat down and rested her head on her hand, staring off in to space. "Where's that little scout? Wanted to thank him." She muttered and turned her head to Emil. He just gestured to the tank silently. The captain gave a small nod, knowing Lalli was probably sleeping, she should've known. The male cleanser, who's leg had gotten nearly eaten by a team of trolls, had introduced himself as Viktor. He explained that the nest had been hidden, they hadn't found it at first until it was too late. They had just split up, half of the team heading back while a few stayed to keep the fire under control (or more likely, keep the fire out of control). The explosives had woken up many of the diseased before the fire had claimed much of the building. Furious, the mutants attacked the team of cleansers. Most of the non-immune hadn't gotten their masks on.

"And any that didn't were already being attacked. They were fast, all pushing each other out the door to be the first to get at us..." Viktor growled, crossing his arms and leaning back. The rest of the group had gathered outside to hear the story from a different view. Reynir was humming softly and practicing runes while the tale was told in Swedish gibberish. Lalli couldn't understand much of it, either, so he simply leaned on Emil and fell asleep again. "So, we fought, of course... I don't really care to talk about the details. I'm sure you can all guess, aren't you the same team as last time?" He asked, tone getting a little lighter.

"Yep!" Sigrun grinned, "We're all back together on another mission!"

"It might not be our last mission, either." Emil sighed, a slight smile tugging at his lips. "If they believed in us once, that's amazing, but twice! We're probably going to end up coming back." The captain laughed and clapped a hand on his shoulder, careful not to hit the sleeping scout between them.

"That's the spirit, little viking!" She said, not unlike a proud parent. Erika raised an eybrow and smothered a giggle.

"So you weren't lying about the nicknames?" The girl managed to say, brushing blonde curls out of her face. "That was one of the only things we found hard to believe..." She laughed as Emil huffed and crossed his arms.

"Wait," Tuuri tilted her head and looked across to Erika, "You guys know him?"

"Well, I know him. Viktor knows him a little..." Erika shrugged. "Me and Emil were stuck in training together, and we were in the same team every once and awhile." She nudged his side with her elbow as she added jokingly, "We show our friendship by trying to set each other on fire."

Sigrun put her finger tips together and a small, maniacal, laugh escaped her. "Emil, you never told us you had a girlfriend! Why didn't you tell us?" She only laughed more as his face quickly became red.

"No! You're not even going to start that!" He said, wide eyes glaring at her. Erika broke out in to laughter as well and she hit her knee. Tuuri just shook her head in amusement when Emil continued to argue, his words becoming sharp with embarrassment "That is not true! Not even close to the truth!"

"Okay, okay... So it's about as true as your giant slaying story." Sigrun reasoned with a sneer.

"Uh, no, because that was true! In fact, guess who else was there!" Emil blurted out angrily, gesturing madly to Erika. The girl just rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, it happened. He was just as surprised as the rest of us." She snorted, remembering the key fact of the event. "We asked him what he did, how he did it... Never seen a giant taken down that quick other than today... And he only replied, 'Sigrun taught me'." The captain's face grew softer with real happiness, not just amusement.

"He was only recognizing the most best troll hunter he ever met, of course!" She boasted, putting a hand to her chest and straightening up in her seat.

"Uh, where are we?" Emil and Tuuri flinched at the new voice from behind them. Lalli grumbled in protest, burying he face in his collar and falling asleep on Emil's arm again. The third cleanser had just woken up, quite confused.

"Oh, hey Ivar." Viktor mumbled. "These folks are letting us recover here for a little while... They're the ones who went on that expedition. You remember hearing about that, right?"

"Uh," Ivar shakily stood up, rubbing his head. "Maybe, I might..." Erika frowned and let her teammate take her seat. She sat on the ground on Tuuri's other side.

"Do you remember your date of birth? Your name?" Viktor inquired, raising an eyebrow. Ivar slowly nodded and mumbled something about year sixty-three, but it wasn't too convincing. "Do you remember what happened? At all?" That seemed to be it. The mask of confusion shattered and pure horror covered his face.

"Where are they? How long have I been out? Days? Weeks?! Please tell me they're okay!"

Sigrun bit her lip, brows furrowed. Erika and Viktor looked at the ground and after a pause Viktor shook his head.

"They're all gone. You've only been out for an hour or two..." Ivar made a choking sound and his head fell. Viktor just sighed and continued, "The second group is probably already at our camp, someone ran to get them as soon as we were ambushed, you know that. They probably already called for help."

"That reminds me," Mikkel remarked, trying to change the subject before someone asked what was wrong with Ivar. "How are you going to get back? We certainly cannot escort you three back to your camp, it will take too much time. We still need to get to our camp, assuming it's not burnt down." Erika glanced up at the healer, one hand holding Ivar's to calm him down.

"Well, it all depends on where you planned to set up camp."

Spoiler: notessss • show

Erika, Viktor, and Ivar are okay names, right? Nothing too bad? I'm sorry I tried.

Who is the 'They' Ivar spoke of? Probably his wife and brother, they were fighting, too. And I said this would be the happy chapter, didn't I? Whoops. Uh, well, didn't mean to do that...

[shoop]

I've been back reading super slowly but frosty kitty I really like where you're going with your story haha. So suspenseful!!

I just realized I never posted a link to my shippy emilalli Drabble so here we go

[LooNEY_DAC]

Madsen’s Malmö Mayhem
A “Stand Still. Stay Silent” fanfic
Part 1

Spoiler: show

The Great Dane Grates

My name is Mikkel Madsen. I used to be a spy, until I decided to resign...

Mikkel looked on askance as the red-haired Norwegian fury took out another contingent of guards. Whoever was paying Sigrun to break him out of this “upscale gated community” was getting their money’s worth. Of course, that was why Sigrun was the go-to girl when it came to ops like this.

Eventually, however, there was no one left for Sigrun to fight, so she could turn her full attention to Mikkel. He put up his hands in a placatory gesture, but Sigrun proved implacable as ever, ignoring his attempts to assure her that he would not be fool enough to resist in favor of stun-gunning him into oblivion.

*

For the second time in under a week, Mikkel came to with a bad taste in his mouth. This time, however, his hands and feet were bound, his eyes covered and his mouth gagged. “Sorry, big fellow,” Sigrun’s cheerful voice told him from somewhere to his left, “but I couldn’t chance you changing your mind about coming along peacefully at the last minute. I’ll have you out of those soon enough.”

Mikkel wasn’t so sure he wanted the blindfold off any time soon, as it was obvious that wherever they were headed, they were getting there in a car, and that meant that Sigrun was almost certainly driving; he’d been in a car while Sigrun was driving before, quickly discovering that keeping your eyes closed was the only to keep your blood pressure stable.

Eventually, the vehicle pulled to a stop. After what seemed a very long wait indeed, Mikkel’s gag and blindfold were removed, in that order, and Sigrun chirped, “Mess time!” as Mikkel blinked and worked the kinks out of his jaw.

In front of him was a tray with a steaming bowl of porridge-y stuff on it. A spoon clattered next to the bowl. “As you can see, I managed to get your favorite,” Sigrun told him smugly.

“Thank you,” Mikkel replied even more dryly than was his wont.

“Now, we can do this the easy way or the hard way,” Sigrun said. “The easy way is where I free your left hand and you feed yourself. The hard way is where I have to stun you again and then feed you myself. So, which’ll it be?”

*

Sigrun turned on the radio for him once they were back on the road. The program was in Swedish, to his surprise, but the hosts were amusing and the music pleasing. Had he not been restrained, Mikkel would have enjoyed himself quite a bit.

“Wait, what?” Sigrun sputtered. As though they’d heard her confused outburst, the announcers repeated the breaking news: in an effort to hinder the spread of the so-called “Rash Disease”, Denmark was closing its borders as of 1600 local time, making it the first non-island nation to take such a step.

“Great,” Sigrun groaned. “We’ll never make the Oresund bridge before it closes! Hmmmmmm...” After a considerable bit of thought, Sigrun snapped her fingers. “OK, I’ve got it! We’ll just hunker down in Malmö until this thing blows over. I’ve got a buddy there doing a job who can put us up in a pinch.”

*

Sigrun’s “buddy” was a young, golden-haired pretty boy named Emil, which surprised Mikkel, until he snuck a look at Emil’s quite comprehensive explosives lab. Trust Sigrun to take to a budding firebug. Emil was obviously somewhat in awe of her, which was normal enough.

The confab was broken up by the far door opening and a cheery female voice calling out, “We’re back, Emil!” Seconds later, two ash-blonde Finns and a tall, gangly redhead with a truly remarkable braid walked in.

Emil made the introductions somewhat awkwardly. The two Finns were Lalli, cat burglar and computer wizard, and his cousin Tuuri, grifter and mechanic extraordinaire. The redhead, who proved to be an Icelander, was their intern, Reynir, who was under the impression that they were a legitimate outfit doing security testing work, instead of a ring of thieves and swindlers. Reynir was so like a human puppy, though, that none of them wanted to disillusion him.

Fortunately, Sigrun was glib-tongued enough to claim to be a simple bounty hunter bringing Mikkel back to face justice in Denmark, so the ruddy naif’s illusions were kept intact for the present.

Mikkel had already decided to metaphorically sit back and await further developments, and this pit stop only reinforced that notion. Things looked to become quite interesting very shortly...

Spoiler: Authorial Notes • show

Again, this is “in the style of” rather than a direct crossover with the “Burn Notice”, “the Prisoner” and “Leverage” franchises.

A variant of this sans the Rash is in the works.

[Róisín]

Another excellent tale!

[Kiraly]

shoop, you failed to mention that your "shippy emilalli drabble" is written in the most beautiful way. (Seriously, there's so many poetic turns of phrase in there!) Anyway, I already said so on AO3 but I loved it.

LooNEY_DAC Wow, another fascinating AU! I approve of all their roles in this secret agent thing, hehe. (Also, Sigrun's "Mutiny!" comment in the most recent comic page reminded me of your pirate AU.)

frostykitty your story is shaping up to be very interesting. Can't wait to see what happens next!