drabbles: White Collar and Inception

[tigriswolf]

Title: As kingfishers catch fire, as dragonflies draw flames
Fandom: White Collar/mythology
Disclaimer: not my characters; title from Hopkins
Warnings: future!fic; depressing
Pairings: gennish
Rating: PG
Wordcount: 400
Point of view: third

 

He has been called Coyote's cousin and Anansi's nephew, the adopted son of Loki. He is not truly a god; merely a lesser trickster spirit, a shadow of what a Trickster God can do.

o0o

In June of 2011, for no reason she can discern, Elizabeth Burke buys a lottery ticket and wins three hundred million dollars. Her business flourishes and she has to start turning people away.

In July, Peter Burke retires from the FBI and becomes a private investigator. He never works on the weekend, instead searching for Neal. He knows the faces of the men who took him. Soon, he learns their names. Their location comes days after that.

o0o

He made a bet with his brother that he couldn't go powerless for long at all. He lasted four hundred years by human reckoning, and he finally asked to be released to save Peter's life. He ensured that Peter would heal, that the rest of his human family would be rescued, and then he surrendered himself to the criminals who wanted to destroy Neal Caffrey.

o0o

In August, Neal's kidnappers give up the location of a mass-grave. Two dozen cold cases are solved, but none of the bodies are Neal.

In September, the kidnappers finally say why they took him. The next day, all seven are found dead in their cells.

o0o

He lived as a coyote and a spider and a raven. He hunted as predator and fled as prey. He was a flower and a weed, a drop of rain and a drop in the ocean. He was born and he died. He always knew who he was, what he had been, what was just beyond his reach. He had only to say the word.

Brother, I need you. Please. Remove your collar from my neck.

o0o

His old agents at the Bureau tell him the search is on-going, but Peter knows they think Neal is dead. Elizabeth insists they talk about him every night, if only for a few minutes. June and Mozzie come over every Sunday, just to share gripes about the antics Neal used to get into.

Peter still spends a large portion of each weekend trying to find Neal. A part of him is terrified he'll only ever find a body.

o0o

Neal Caffrey is dead. Neal Caffrey never existed.

Peter doesn't notice the small dark bird that follows him till the day he dies.

Title: the past and the future are a door like fire
Fandom: Inception
Disclaimer: not my characters; title from Donald Platt
Warnings: limbo!fic
Pairings: gennish with Eames/Arthur leanings
Rating: PG
Wordcount: 295
Point of view: third
Notes: partially inspired by this

 

i

Darling…
Go to sleep, Mr. Eames

He had a name once, back when the sky was blue and blood was red, he had a name and he thinks it was his own (forever and ever days and weeks and months ago years and years forever), he had a name.

The flowers talk sometimes, when no one else is around, and no one else is ever around because he's alone (alone always alone alone alone forever no way home).

There is a desert to the northsoutheastwest, everywhere and nowhere, all around and through and above and below him. Sometimes it's so cold he sees his breath, except when it's so hot he melts.

Sometimes he remembers a name that he's sure is not his own, and he'll scream and scream and scream, but no one ever answers because no one else is here at all.

(he's dreaming)
(is he dreaming?)
(what's a dream?)

Darling…
Go to sleep, Mr. Eames

(wake up)
(wake up?)
(wake up!)

He turns north (to the mountains) south (to the oceans) east (to the sun) west (to the moon) and there is someone calling a name.

(His name?)

He listens to the new sound, to the difference after hoursdaysyearseons of monotony. He listens in wonder, in joy—the voice is familiar. He yells back nonsense, just to hear his own voice echo off the sky.

Silence, and then the name comes again, filling the air and the caverns, soaring over the clouds and under the ocean, and he screams, launching himself upwards, searching and seeking and certain that finally, there might be a way home.

(His name!)

Past the oceans, past the mountains, into the sun and out of the moon, there is a man.

Darling…
Wake up, Mr. Eames

i

 

Comments

[romyra]

Both of these blew me away but the White Collar drabble definitely gave me goosebumps.

[tigriswolf]

Thank you so much!

[loobeeinthesky.livejournal.com]

I don't know what to write, as really the fic to my art really knocked my socks off. It was beautiful and has such an ethereal dreamlike quality ♥ Thank you so much for writing this ♥

[tigriswolf]

I'm so very glad you like it! I'd been stuck with just a few paragraphs and then I saw your art, and it all just poured out.