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November's Productions, Part I
This was the first year that I didn't attempt a NaNoWriMo project since first hearing about it back in, say, 2001. That doesn't mean I couldn't find anything to write about, however, so I went for fanfiction in my preferred format... drabbles. Or short ficlets. Very little of what I wrote went over 1k words. I guess that's how it's always going to be, no matter the fandom. -_-

So, here's my offerings.


Kingdom Hearts

I. Grains of Sand - Drabble collection. Most of these are old and some were entered at kh_drabble, but I decided to put them all up in one place. First 5 uploaded, another 15 remain.




FF7: Advent Children

-3 drabbles:
I. slight Cloud/Sephiroth - Written for Anya, just last night, because I can't say no to her. XP
II. Cloud and Kadaj's last encounter - Implied Cloud/Seph?
III. Cloud/Tifa - After Cloud, she's my favourite, so let's ship!




§·§·§

It hurts, the blade impaled on his right shoulder, but it's not blinding pain; he can still see him through his own eyelashes and he grits his teeth, forcing himself not to see. The adrenaline pumping through his body deceives his senses, makes him believe that the blade slicing through his flesh and muscle isn't actually so bad, -or is that his mind, misleading him again?- he can overcome the pain, reach for the steel, pull it out and go on.

…go on, go on, go on, kill him, end it, forget…

The green eyes are taunting, the smirk is cruel as it ever was, the silvery strands of his hair are like snakes-

They used to be silk on his hands and he loved to see how hair could actually capture light, not so much as reflect it.

--poisonous serpents, vicious, venom-spitting vipers. They poisoned him, but now he's healed. She healed him and he's grateful, but also aware of his duty. He needs revenge, no matter what.

…let go, let go, forget it, end it, let go…

"Cloud." The voice is also as it used to be, before the madness, and it speaks his given name with all the care it's capable. "Have you forgotten, perhaps…?"

He looks up and he's just a boy again, wanting to show off for his superior officer; as painfully aware of his own shortcomings as he's now aware of the wound on his shoulder.

"I couldn't forget, but I will now," he says, in defiance to those condescending green eyes, but Sephiroth's mouth curves upward and he laughs, dancing back a few steps.

"Will you forget me, Cloud?"

The smile was kinder, then, and it seemed to appear only for him. The green gaze would soften and long fingers would bury into his spiky hair, brushing it, smoothing it…

He responds by getting up and charging again, this is, after all, his only chance. There will be no more, and he will forget, because she asked him to and because life should have a purpose other than remembering what was.

All his anger-

…revenge, desire, memory, death, loss. Let go, let go, let go…

--his frustration, his sorrow, all the pent-up emotion he can gather goes into one last rush of motion. The sword feels extra heavy on his hands, but it won't be for long. At last, he knows, he sees the way of achieving his goal and his mind clears up along with his vision.

Afterwards, he will barely remember what he did and how he did it. The end comes surprisingly fast: a golden blur, stunned green eyes and his own pain -does it come from his shoulder? is it physical exertion or…?-- as the impulse of his own energy holds him aloft for as long as he needs to be.

"Cloud."

Swords crossed, laughter ringing in his ears, hair like silk, strong arms, warmth and cold. And then fire, terror and madness.

"I won't be just a memory."

…let go, let go, forget, let go, it's time, just let go…

And he does, because he has finally learned how to do it. And it's simple, really, like when he let go of her at the lake, now he can let go of him. His eyes follow the last falling feather, until it dissolves into dark nothingness, and in a whisper he says his name for the last time, the last goodbye.

"Sephiroth."


§·§·§







§·§·§


"It is true, then," the man in his arms gasps, between shuddering breaths, and he has to lean even closer to hear the words.

"What's true?" Cloud asks, wondering if he understood the words correctly; the man -he looks so young up close, almost a boy-- is dying, fading, it's hard to make out what he's saying with the wind carrying away the weak words.

The same treacherous wind pushes silver strands of hair into the dying man's mouth, making it stick to parched lips. Cloud's gloved hand lifts, almost involuntarily, to brush it away. To his surprise, he finds he can't hate or feel nothing more than pity for the boy in his arms. His and his companion's brief existence must have been a sad one. Cloud has fought them in the same way he has fought almost everything else in his life, with determination and detachment; they have inspired nothing else in him. So he now makes one last effort to care, for he owes them somehow, if nothing more than this.

"Kadaj," he says, but nothing more comes out and he waits.

"He couldn't-couldn't kill you," Kadaj rasps, panting now. "He could have, I saw…" he trails off, his eyes losing focus, limbs tensing momentarily. "Weak, hesitated, pitied you."

Cloud leans even closer; the dying man's eyes are slitted and green, so very familiar, but he's not Sephiroth.

"He never pitied me," Cloud says almost to himself and Kadaj tries half a smirk at that, relaxing again, his breathing erratic.

"Then why…?" he doesn't finish, but Cloud understands, something cold settling slowly in his gut. Something like doubt and regret, so he hurries to dash the half-formed thoughts away.

"He just didn't."

Kadaj's eyes close, lids coming down slowly. It's not long after that, that he reaches out for some unseen presence and fades from the world, leaving Cloud strangely empty handed.


§·§·§









§·§·§


It's not something he'll forget easily, that sight. Her dark form, lying sprawled among the flowers, so pale and so-

He doesn't want to think about it. All he knows is that, for a minute, he fully understands Barret's constant concern over Marlene's welfare; the older man wanting and doing nothing more than making sure the one thing he loves is always, always safe. Safe and well and happy.

It'll take him longer than a minute to understand why he suddenly feels this way.

When he kneels next to her, her name on his lips, he prays. He prays to that presence that is with him at all times, the presence that feels closer when he's in this very church, among these very flowers.

Please, don't let her be dead. Please, don't let them take her too. Please, I'll do anything.

He doesn't remember receiving any response, but when he wakes up again, he knows he's been heard.

Her slow, steady breathing fills the room and it's the best thing he's ever heard, save for her voice in itself. She's not so pale anymore; she's just asleep and he just wants to watch the rise and fall of her chest for a long, long time.

Of course, though, when she finally wakes up and her eyes look for his, he looks away feeling strangely self-conscious.

"Cloud," she whispers and it echoes in the darkened room, giving their situation all the gravity it demands, but he doesn't mind. Her gaze is a welcome weight in the back of his head and her reproachful tone is sweet to his ears, even if he prefers to remain detached, aloof even.

Maybe, when all of this is over, he can pause and look at her. Stop and listen to her voice. Close his eyes and smell her scent, feel her laugh vibrate against his own body and make sure she really understands why he gave her the ring that bears his chosen symbol.


§·§·§








Fullmetal Alchemist

I. Beginnings - Pre-series, gen, Ed and Al ready to go.



§·§·§

“Your hair’s gotten long, Ed,” Winry said one afternoon, as she worked on the wiring of his right wrist, tugging brightly colored cables and adjusting screws.

“Yeah, guess it has,” the boy replied, reaching with his left hand for the tips of his hair, currently pulled into a hazardous ponytail.

“I could cut it for you, if you like,” she offered graciously, glancing up at Ed’s face.

Edward replied with a one-shouldered shrug. “Nah, that’s okay.”

Winry’s eyes narrowed to slits. “Well, if you don’t thrust me with you precious hair,” she started in a haughty, reproachful tone, “I’m sure Granny can do it.”

Sitting on her rocking chair by the window, Pinako let out a soft snort and continued with her needle work. Alphonse, hunched on the floor nearby, made a curious clanking noise; ever since their friend had become his brother’s mechanic, Ed and Winry’s interactions were twice as interesting as before… and most times, had rather funny results. Alphonse had had no idea that a girl with a wrench could be so dangerous.

Ed squirmed in his seat, but held his ground, meeting Winry’s eyes with his own. “It’s not a matter of who does it, Winry. I’m just not cutting anything else off my body, save my toenails, okay?”

Ed’s words had an echoing finality to them and Winry backed off, turning back to her work. Pinako glanced at Edward with a shrewd look in her old eyes, but remained silent, holding up the piece of fabric she had been patiently embroidering for a few days now. Alphonse looked up to admire her work: the winged crown was only just outlined, but the snake and the cross seemed to be finished. Al quite liked the contrasted between the red and the black; it suited his brother. Or at least, who his brother had been for the past year.

Edward was also inspecting Pinako’s work from his chair by the table. “Looks great, Granny,” he said, absently fingering the edge of his shorts. Then he glanced once at Al and promptly looked away again.

Al sighed, or gave a try at what a normal person with lungs would have called a sigh, an odd rolling of the armor’s torso, its leathery bellows inflating momentarily. His brother’s attitude lately had been pretty much like that: he would look at Alphonse for hours on end, while Winry or Pinako worked on his automail, and the saddest expression would cross his eyes, followed by a painful-looking clench of his jaw. Al knew what was coming. The phone call to Central two days ago heralded it, along with the resolution etched in Ed’s eyes; they would have to leave Risenbool soon.

By the worktable Winry finished screwing up a green wire to its place and Ed flinched, gritting his teeth.

“I’m done for today,” the girl said, getting up and stretching ostentatiously, then she bent over again and started gathering her tools into a wooden box.

Ed got to his feet, as well. “Good, because I’m hungry,” he said, and his stomach agreed rather noisily as he reached for his pants.

Pinako folded the red coat on her lap, placing the needle and the reel of black thread on top of it. “Come back tomorrow and we’ll finish the balancing of the leg, kid,” she said around her pipe, “then you’ll be almost ready. Perhaps with another day’s work on the arm.”

Ed nodded, shrugging a t-shirt on and looking around for his shoes. Winry, however, looked alarmed.

“Are you sure he’s ready, Granny? The nerves of the arm—”

“Are responding very well and he’s worked very hard to have come this far in a year.” The old woman got up –not a very startling difference between that and her sitting position- and walked up to Ed, who looked down at her and smiled, certainly pleased with her decision.

“You’re still thinking about taking that exam, aren’t you, kid?”

Ed’s expression sobered instantly. “Yeah, I have to, Granny. It’s the only way, you know that.”

Pinako nodded, glancing also at Al who had gotten to his feet. “Very well, but don’t forget that we’re here when you need us.” Behind Ed, Winry seemed on the verge of tears, fact which she hid by disappearing into the adjacent room.
“We know that, Granny, don’t we Al?” Ed patted Alphonse’s metallic forearm with his automail, causing a great deal of noise.

Al nodded as he could, panache bobbing at the crown of his helmet. “This is home to us, Granny,” he said and meant it, but wondered at the doubtful look in Ed’s face.

When some time later they reached their house up the hill, Alphonse turned to glance at the far away light coming from the Rockbell state.

“You don’t plan to come back, do you, Brother?”

Edward, caught mid-motion as he climbed the steps of the porch, stopped and fidgeted with his automail fingers.

“Al…”

“It’s okay, Brother. You don’t need to explain.”

“But—”

“If we get too attached to one place, it might slow us down, so we have to let go of everything that might do that…”

“Al.”

“…move forward and then—”

“Alphonse!”

“Yes, Brother?”

“I’m sorry.” Ed was now fingering the small tear on the left knee of his pants and, very resolutely, not looking at Al.

“I’m sorry too, Brother. And stop that, you’ve already made holes in two pairs of pants. Granny gets tired of sewing them again.”

Edward looked up, frowning. “Well, it’s not my fault, is it? The automail’s screws and joints snag at the fabric.”

Al started to move past him and into the house. “You’ll have to find something harder to wear, or make patches to sew on them. Oh, and learn to sew!”

Ed snorted and followed Alphonse inside. “I don’t think so, Al. I’ll just find something else to wear. Leather, maybe.” He closed the door behind them.

“Leather pants? That’s bound to be uncomfortable, Brother.” Al went around the room, lighting the lamps around the room.

“Probably, but they’ll be resistant,” Ed buried his hands into his pockets and looked around the room, eyes stopping as always at all the spots where their mother used to sit when she waited for them and, as always, finding them empty. Alphonse had already moved over to the small kitchen, Ed called after him.

“I’m thinking about leaving by October, what do you think Al?”

“Sounds fine, Brother. Did you tell Lt. Colonel Mustang about it?”

“Yeah, he said it’d be okay, but to call right before we left for Central. No idea why.”

“Probably to know which train are we taking,” Alphonse started to set the table, glancing occasionally at Ed, who was pacing up and down the living area, piling up scattered books. “He seems okay, I like him.”

“Huh? Who?”

“The Lieutenant Colonel, Brother. He seems to care.”

Ed only offered a noncommittal snort at that and they remained in silence after that and all through dinner; Ed seemed to be in one of his brooding spells and Al knew better than to try and snap him out of it.

As he expected, however, his elder brother’s mood went back to his regular petulance after dinner, when his stomach had settled. They went outside to the porch to stargaze before bed, an habit they had picked up during their year of training with their Master, first by themselves at a desolated island and then with Izumi and her husband, at Dublith. Learning the position of constellations and their names had become child’s play after the hard work that came with learning alchemy, and they had pleased Izumi by challenging each other to find the major stars and to point out the rest.

“There’s Rigel,” Al pointed.

“And there’s Aldebaran.” Ed yawned. “Bet you don’t remember their other names, though,” he added with a wicked grin.

“We never really learned them, so neither would you.”

“Hmm.”

A long moment passed and neither brother spoke, silently gazing up at the sky.

“You should visit Mum before we go, Brother,” Al said abruptly and next to him Ed jerked involuntarily.

“I don’t know. I don’t want to get second thoughts about leaving.”

“Then we should make sure we don’t have any doubts about leaving, or about coming back.”

Ed shrugged. “That’s impossible, this place is always going to be here, we’re always going to be tempted to come back, to give up.” He looked over his shoulder at the old house, a resigned look on his face.

“Not if it’s gone, though,” Al insisted and stared back at his brother when he turned to look up at him. Edward nodded, at long last, as if he had made up his mind, but said nothing.

“I’m going to bed. Coming?”

“Yes, Brother.”

As he climbed the stairs to the second floor and their room, Alphonse thought that perhaps now they were ready, after all. Ready to move forward, atone for their sin and recover what they had lost. The fact that Ed’s automail was almost set and Granny was preparing him traveling clothes had very little to do with it, in Al’s mind.

What mattered the most was that, in their hearts, they were ready to leave home behind on steady legs and minds; they just had to pack up and go.

Alphonse knew that the day wasn’t far off now.


§·§·§






II. Promises - Post series, gen, Al and Winry by the river.




§·§·§

Al was beautiful in a way Ed never would be, she reflected, fingernails scratching slightly at the boy’s scalp. That serene expression said, quite blatantly, that the boy was happy and that all was well in his world. The shape of his eyes and the way he blinked, slowly and in time to his smiles. The sound of his laugh when he rolled around with Den and his simple delight when he touched the grass or smelled her hair.

Of course, she thought now, arranging blond bangs over a smooth forehead; of course, not everything was right in the boy’s world and you only had to say a name –even half the name would do- to see it. The smile turned frown, the rich laugh turned longing silence and then the questions would come. Nothing put a stop to the questions, and each and every one of the answers she came up with were rendered futile and childish before Alphonse’s severe scrutiny. And nothing made Alphonse as relentless and determined as the mention of his brother.

For an ten year old boy, Alphonse could be downright frightening, she thought. Not even Edward, when they had all been children and he came up with the stupidest and most dangerous ideas, not even then had she been afraid to look into an Elric’s face and say her piece. Yet now… all Al had to do was focus his large grey eyes on her and she would squirm, because she had no satisfying answers for him.

“Winry?” The boy’s head on her lap moved suddenly, and said eyes blinked up at her, still heavy lidded from the impromptu nap by the river bank.

“Yes, Al.” No matter how bad he made her fidget with his questioning and his logic, she could never stop looking into the boy’s eyes. She had to catch up on the five years she had missed them, she had to admire and love him, if for nothing more than to honor Edward’s sacrifices.

“Sensei is leaving tomorrow, isn’t she?” Alphonse had captured a strand of her blonde hair and was absentmindedly twirling it between dexterous fingers.

“Yeah, Rose and Granny are cooking a bunch of stuff and we’ll have a goodbye dinner for her and Sieg.” Winry smiled down to her boy, but for once, he didn’t smile back.

“I want to go with Sensei.”

Ah, there it was. Her fingers curled involuntarily, still buried in Al’s short hair. Yet again, she would have to watch him go, only this time it would be doubly painful. She had been so young when they had left before, the ache of their absence had blurred edges and had eased with time, even if the permanent worry had made itself sharp and clear in contrast.

“Are you sure, Al? Won’t you miss Risenbool? Won’t—won’t you miss Granny and me?” She could be a little selfish now, because she hadn't allowed herself to be back when Ed had announced their departure. She had earned it, hadn’t she?

“I’m sure, even if I miss everything.” Deft fingers were now making a little braid with her lose strands of hair. “I want to study alchemy more thoroughly and Sensei can teach me what I need to know, and then I’ll find Brother.” Al’s face closed off in a look of defiance and determination Winry had only seen in the older Elric’s face up until now.

“I see. Well, you should tell her tonight, then.” The older girl nodded, eyeing Alphonse’s handiwork and running her own fingers over the smoothly braided hair; it was clear who was in both of their minds as they looked at the slim plait.

The boy sat up, abruptly reliving her legs from his weight, and turned around to trap her between still chubby arms in a fierce hug. She returned it, knowing very well that it could be one of the last she received before a long, long time. Well, at least Al was more prone to physical displays of affection than Ed had even been to displays of any kind.

They held each other for a long time, the afternoon sun prickling at the back of their heads, the sound of ever running water as backdrop.

“Winry?” Came muffled from the left side of her neck.

“Hmm?” Please Al, no dreadful questions…

“I will come back, I promise.”

If she hugged him even tighter then, Alphonse did not complain. No Elric had ever made a promise to her, but she knew very well how they were about keeping what they promised. And next morning, as she waved him off the train platform with yet another of her boy’s promises ringing sweetly on her ears, Winry could only feel relieved and just a little excited about the future.


§·§·§





And that's it for today. I guess I'll do crossposting sometime, probably after I post Part II and III of the ficcage.
For now, I'm readying the icon post for tomorrow and trying to ingnore the SPLITTING HEADACHE that's threatening to blind me or something. Argh.