The Peninsula

The Fiction and Poetry Archive of Liana Mir and scribblemyname

Minimal

May
06
This entry is part 4 of 9 in the series Counting Coup

Skylight has made blood of the regions they serve in. The Ogunn block of nations is bloody enough without their team dipping in their hand, but when it comes to mission parameters, it’s Wolf that decides acceptable cost, and Skylight that tells her the options available.

“Minimize the blood,” Wolf says, slowly, thoughtfully, knowing there will be some other cost for even that.

And Skylight minimizes the blood, taking it down from thousands to hundreds to dozens before she digs in both her metaphorical feet and tells her leader, “That is the minimum.”

Fifty-six people dead to achieve their goals.

Chapter, Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble Series, Kingdoms and Thorn, Original Fiction , , , 0 Comment

Blood

May
06
This entry is part 3 of 9 in the series Counting Coup

They’re older, practically grown, when Skylight broods for a moment, considering the dance they’re practicing. She isn’t given to brooding, though he’s heard she knits her brows in concentration or thought quite frequently. But she doesn’t hesitate, until she asks for a goal and the instructor says, “Just dance.”

It’s an outside instructor. He doesn’t realize there’s always a goal—whether seduction, intelligence gathering, or even assassination.

“Sex, blood, and violence,” Math murmurs. The mortar with which empires are made. “Arc is the sex, Ice Queen is the violence, and you’re the blood. And that’s okay.”

They dance for blood.

Chapter, Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble Series, Kingdoms and Thorn, Original Fiction , , , , 0 Comment

Comfort

May
06
This entry is part 2 of 9 in the series Counting Coup

It’s not Wolf’s job to comfort her team. It’s her job to take care of them and protect them, which means making sure they continue to do the things they do, no matter how terrible.

But when Ice Queen sits down quiet and somber against the wall of the training area, Wolf goes and sits beside her. Sometimes they say nothing, and she ends up feeling frustrated at her inability to break that emotional wall.

Sometimes, Ice Queen tilts her head and stares with coldly glittering eyes. “Three hundred eighteen.”

Unverified kills. Counting coup.

Wolf counters, “Five hundred ten saved.”

Chapter, Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble Series, Kingdoms and Thorn, Original Fiction , , , 0 Comment

Cold

May
06
This entry is part 1 of 9 in the series Counting Coup

She feels all cold inside. They call her Ice Queen, and there are times when the name truly fits, when they bring down their rules and their punishments and she stares back at them with icy uncaring defiance of a kind they can’t do much with.

But most of the time, she feels aflame with all she wants and all the viciousness she can bring to bear on a mission.

Right now, she’s just razed an encampment to the ground in service of the mission. Right now, she feels cold, like a wind blows through her.

She reports. “It’s done.”

Chapter, Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble Series, Kingdoms and Thorn, Original Fiction , , 0 Comment

Welcome to the Mafia

May
02

“Mori’s asked me to look after you.” The woman folded her hands into her sleeves as she looked Chuuya over, assessing. “I’m Ozaki Kouyou,” she introduced herself.

Chuuya remembered Mori’s comments that someone was responsible for teaching and caring for new Port Mafia recruits, and it was only a relief he clearly didn’t consider that devil Dazai his recruiter. He stood up a little straighter for Kouyou. “Thank you, Ane-san.”

She paused, a hint of surprise on her face, but waved it aside for the moment and handed him a small box. “For you.”

He opened it curiously, then slowly slipped off the band marking him a member of the Sheep. He reached up and fastened the choker around his neck.

Kouyou smiled. “It suits you.”

Bungou Stray Dogs, Daily Ficlet 2019, Fanfic, Ficlet , , 0 Comment

Chocolate and Kisses

Apr
30

Typically, it was the boy walking the girl home from school, but Kukuri was the most familiar with Ashinaka and had once served as a guide to Kuroh. It was natural for her to keep walking him back to the dorm at times, especially on days when Shiro promised to keep Neko out, generally with a promise of “Shopping!” or “Food!” explained by Neko as she hung off him excitedly and he blushed a little and waved in his sheepish innocent manner.

(more…)

Daily Ficlet 2019, Fanfic, Ficlet, K , , , , , , , 0 Comment

She Dances

Apr
28

Grace dances because she’s good at it. It’s the only thing she’s good at.

She doesn’t know how to be a good person or how to love. She doesn’t know how to be a good friend.

(She does know. Only it doesn’t last after the jealousy rises up inside her to fight against being abandoned again—and again, and again, and again.)

Her mother fractured under the weight of her own genius, and they’re waiting for Grace to do the same. (Is she manic to suit them? To perform?)

She dances because there, at least, she knows exactly what to do.

Daily Ficlet 2019, Dance Academy, Drabble, Fanfic , , 0 Comment

Smile Recklessly

Apr
24

“Smile recklessly,” Kusanagi asked, desperate for a bit of hope and normalcy in their crisis.

Totsuka thought of his childhood wish to be the joker in the King’s court, to make the King laugh. He smiled recklessly. “Hey, hey, don’t sweat it. It’ll all work out.”

Yata was holding him, and there was Kusanagi standing over him stricken shock instead of the emotional composure that carried him through all major and minor catastrophes.

Smile recklessly.

Totsuka struggled to breathe. “Hey, hey, don’t sweat it,” he managed to get out. Normalcy in their crisis. “It’ll all work out.”

Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble, Fanfic, K , , , 0 Comment

The Sound of Contentment

Apr
18

Kuroh’s heartbeat was warm under her head. Kukuri hummed softly under her breath in time with the feeling. It was the first time they’d gone beyond kissing, and the first time she’d ever woken in the warmth of another’s arms. She felt it when he woke, slight tension, but not immediately speaking.

“What are you humming?” he finally asked.

“Nothing.” It was nothing, no particular melody or tune. She sat up just enough to slide up and kiss him properly awake, enjoying the freedom and feeling of doing it.

It was nothing, really, but the quiet sound of her contentment.

Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble, Fanfic, K , , , , , 0 Comment

Where Is

Apr
18

She comes in out of the cold, night shadows like wings trailing in her wake, and drops to a crouch beside the fire.

They make room for her, these Baganechi raiders, recognizing the leather bands around her arms, the tattoo encircling her wrist, the icy blonde hair and blue eyes of one of their most infamous members.

“Cherinagos,” one says and hands her the cup.

She drinks with a nod of gratitude. To share in the spoils one has not taken is an honor.

“You are home,” says another.

But she laughs at this, this wandering raider. “Where is home?”

Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble, Kingdoms and Thorn, Original Fiction , , , 0 Comment

The Point

Apr
12

“What is the point of living?” Dazai demanded with a sigh.

“How should I know?” Chuuya demanded right back.

They were both fifteen years old and neither of them had a very good grasp on being human. Chuuya though, Chuuya was intent on figuring it out by doing everything that made him feel alive. Dazai seemed to flirt so strenuously with death in an effort to figure out what being not alive felt like, the better to see a contrast he could make sense of.

Dazai studied Chuuya out of one eye.

Chuuya shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. We just live.”

Bungou Stray Dogs, Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble, Fanfic , , , , 0 Comment

The Warmth of His Voice

Apr
08

Kukuri woke in Kuroh’s arms, groggy and lightheaded and wondering what had happened to her, if everyone else was okay. Except she couldn’t remember and for a moment, she tried to panic. Had she hit her head, gotten amnesia, but there was Kuroh’s warm smile as he reassured her, “Just rest.”

She listened to the warmth of his voice, the sound of his heartbeat as he carried her away. She looked back, something in her heart disquieted enough to realize something was still wrong.

But Kuroh would make it better, she thought. She would believe the sound of his voice.

Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble, Fanfic, K , , , , 0 Comment

No One There

Apr
08

Why did you leave me? Yata’s heart demanded. Weren’t you there when my friends turned against me? Weren’t you there when my family no longer needed me?

Wind whipped through his hair.

He couldn’t quite believe the feeling, flames burning on Saruhiko’s chest. He didn’t need Yata anymore and could not have made it more clear.

Yata slipped and lost his grip on the skateboard, flying into a wall. It hurt, it hurt, but that was good. He could focus on the pain in his knee, his arm, and pull himself upright.

It hurt so much less than his heart.

Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble, Fanfic, K , , , , 0 Comment

Talk About the Magic

Apr
06

Everything sounded so possible around Sarah. Little serving girls could walk in dainty shoes that didn’t hurt their feet. Monsters could be slain by magic. Becky would imagine each of the dusty, dirty clods she cleaned from behind stove or furniture as another monster to be vanquished.

In a world where magic was real and little girls were princesses, Becky herself could feel a lost princess with an inheritance of magic slippers locked in her trunk so no one could find it.

One day, the prince would come, find her in the attic tower, rescue her at last.

A Little Princess (1995), Canon Consumed 2019, Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble, Fanfic , , 0 Comment

A Vision of Glamour

Apr
06

Melody was pleased to discover a world once denied her. She cherished it to herself, telling almost no one of the folds of ether now visible to her, the glamour she could gather in hand and take so much less than before without it disappearing into a fuzzy mass of shimmering color.

She’d never been able to see the fine details, the splendid possibilities, but now she wove over and under her fingers, tied and, breathless, laughed.

“I’ll never weave glamour like Jane,” she said, recovering, faintly wistful.

Alastar caught her hands. “She will never be like you.”

Canon Consumed 2019, Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble, Fanfic , , , , 0 Comment

Dance of the Dragonfly

Apr
06

They call her the dragonfly. She floats across the stage, soaring into a perfect spiral, extension, the leap like magic, her trailing red and gold dress fluttering about dainty brown limbs. Emotion writ through every limb, across her face—she shines like she was made to dance and only dance.

For a moment, we are captured with her, dancing in the brightness of her motion, feeling the swell of music within our hearts. We leap, we cry as she comes to a stop and beckons; a smile invites into her stage, the flight of her spirit. We follow where she leads.

Canon Consumed 2019, Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble, Fanfic, World of Dance (TV) , 0 Comment

Hates to Kill

Mar
12

Skylight whispers warm, sweet nothings against his ear. Math can barely even make out the sounds into proper language, but it doesn’t really matter. That’s not what he’s listening to.

It’s her heart he hears, her love, the way she doesn’t judge him for taking deep, ragged breaths while he tries to deal with everything he’s just seen and done. Math hates to kill, only does it when he must.

They were told it was a military target, not a civilian one, and for once they hadn’t had time to gather their own intel first.

But they were lied to.

Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble, Kingdoms and Thorn, Original Fiction , , , , 0 Comment

Consolations

Mar
01

“Sometimes you’re a real piece of work,” Kusanagi commented dryly, (more…)

Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble, Fanfic, K , , , , , 0 Comment

Small

Feb
20

He felt small and very alone in the quiet woods around him. He wasn’t very big yet anyway, newly born from his power only a few years before, and while he grew, it was at the rate of all the gods—whatever that power sustained.

So even when he’d been walking alongside his older sister, her mouth curling in a bright smile, warm fingers curled around his hand, he’d been a child at her waist and unnamed yet. But there it hadn’t mattered that he was small and she was not because he knew that she wouldn’t let anything happen to him.

The woods rustled gently, creaking branches, wind-blown leaves and underbrush. His sister was the god of finding. If he just waited, she would find him.

He crawled under the brush around one of the trees with low-hanging branches and let it cover him while he waited.

Daily Ficlet 2019, Ficlet, Original Fiction, Other Original , , , 0 Comment

The Approach to Dance

Feb
14

There was a big difference between how Skylight practiced her dance and how Skytouch did.

Skylight was skilled and her control over her body practically perfect. She went through each stretch and leap and twirl and footwork and stance until it was perfect. Then carefully retrained her reflexes to maintain safe combativeness.

Skytouch let herself go completely. She threw herself into the dance, technical perfection offset by genuine emotion and less control than Skylight. She didn’t bother to fix her reflexes after.

“You’ll break an ankle one day like that,” Skylight pointed out.

Skytouch shrugged. “One day, I won’t fight.”

Daily Ficlet 2019, Drabble, Kingdoms and Thorn, Original Fiction , , 0 Comment