francisco javier es una (pesadilla) wrote in doorslogs, @ 2013-02-28 23:13:00 |
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Entry tags: | hoban washburne, jayne cobb, plot: switch |
Who: Winnie O'Hara & Lin Alesi
What: Combat boots, nail polish, & kewt bois: a slumber party Linnie-style
Where: All aboard the good ship Serenity
When: Day Zero of Plot
Warnings/Rating: Here be cutes and swears.
Maybe it ought to have disturbed Lin more to find himself with a sudden knowledge of colloquial Chinese on a spaceship that he magically knew how to fly with a bunch of strangers he’d met over a journal sent to him by a seemingly sentient hotel and no explanation. But, ...he was surprisingly at ease. He’d watched both Firely and Serenity enough times to feel somewhat comfortable on the ship - with its layout, anyway, even if it still felt like a set to him. He couldn’t quite shake the feeling that he was in some sort of eerily realistic, but still science fiction-y dream. But Winnie was here with him. That was a relief in and of itself. He didn’t know anyone else and Olivia, the woman who looked exactly like Zoe minus the leather, but was twice as cold and infinitely more serious, terrified him more than he cared to admit, but, yes, Winnie was here and she had guns, guns, guns, and that, like being on the ship, was a strange sort of comfort. The boy sat at the long wooden slab of a table, alone, in one of the mismatched wicker chairs with the tall, tapered back, and stared at the wall across the room sleepily. His eyes followed the way the metal curved and sloped in a graceful way that he hadn’t realized before was as functional as it was beautiful. It was late now - or so the lead weight of Lin’s eyelids told him. He didn’t know for certain as there was no sun or moon to denote the hour, but most everyone else had disappeared to their bunks by now, leaving him alone in the common area as the ship just sort of saw itself through space. (It would help if they had a destination. Otherwise, the new part of his brain helped him understand, they were just going to fly around until they ran out of fuel, and then what?) He, however, didn’t have a room. Olivia had made it clear enough that they weren’t to be sharing Zoe and Wash's when he had tried to follow her. Might as well sleep here, he figured. At least it was warm. Folding his arms on top of each other, the boy laid his head there and closed his eyes. The best thing about changing places with Jayne Cobb was that they basically had the same taste in clothing. Cargo pants, some ratty old t-shirt and guns. Honestly, what else could a girl ask for? She felt stronger than she had before and that was saying something for a woman who ran the obstacle course every time she got the chance and trained like any rookie trying to keep up with the rest of the boys. She felt like she really understood how to kick more ass even though she had yet to shoot off any guns inside of the ship (thank god she resisted that urge) and the things she suddenly knew were overwhelming. Even though Jayne was by far the dumbest member of the Serenity crew, he still knew his way around Chinese. She stomped into the room, boots heavy and dramatic and smiled brightly at the little sleepy Lin sprawled on the table. "Hey." Winnie said, more alert than Lin seemed to be and still riding the buzz of being in space. "You know, I kind of would rather be some kind of hot female turian, but I guess this’ll have to do." She walked over to him, taking a seat in one of the wicker chairs and propping her worn boots up on the table. "Also, I found this knife." She said proudly, pulling out a large, sharp looking thing that could probably kill an alligator. The sound of heavy boots on metal startled Lin into at least opening his eyes. His head lifted about an inch off the table until he espied Winnie tromping into the room with an obscene amount of energy. Then he was once again down for the count, chin cradled in his arms. He wasn't so tired as to be drifting off to sleep, but nor was he in the same spirits as his friend apparently was, all gung-ho and riding high from - what? - the sheer amount of guns and ammunition lying around. The boy watched Winnie through half-lidded eyes as she leaned back in her chair and set her head-stomping boots on the table. "You'd rather or Garrus would rather?" Lin picked himself up off the table and smiled sweetly. He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his palms. Then the knife came out. His expression dropped to something a little more cautious, a little more ready to run if it so much as inched toward him. Winnie wouldn't hurt him, he knew. But Jayne? That was questionable. The boy eyed the knife's sharp, very wicked looking blade in silence. He flicked his gaze back to his friend, in her cargo pants and old t-shirt, and in his best deadpan voice said, "Wow, lucky you. Forget exploring space. Think of all the peanut butter sandwiches we can make with that." Winnie frowned, the wound of missing Garrus still a little fresh. Without the blue gruffy alien in her head giving her worldly advice and always being in her corner even when she fucked up, her safety net was gone. And, while she was grateful Jayne wasn’t actually all that evil and she was still sharing a door with Lin, Winnie still knew he was going to be trouble. She turned the knife around in her hand like it was a toy more than something that could chop down a tree and then snapped a fake dangerous look up at Lin. "I’m making a sandwich and I’m allll out of jelly." The rookie cop thought that this gun fever thing was more funny than actually alarming, but once she caught the look Lin gave her she sighed and put the knife away. "Stop it. I’ve been really good." She warned him, even wagging her finger at him before curling up in the chair with her arms around her knees as she kept her eyes on him. "You look exhausted." Winnie said after a couple seconds, tilting her head on the top of her knees with a soft lift of her voice that sounded more like her than the dangerous mercenary that had infected her mind. Dahng ran. The words, in their laconic tone, sped through Lin’s head before he could stop them and his understanding of what they even meant tagged along a few seconds behind. ‘Of course.’ Okay...’Of course’ what? ‘Of course you’re out of jelly. Such is my soon-to-be-ended life’? Not his best, Chinese or English. Honestly, he didn’t know what joke he’d been going for. It didn’t matter. Lin just stuck his tongue out by way of witty response and let that speak for him. It would be a lie to say he wasn't somewhat relieved to see the knife go. Rationally, he knew Winnie would be more apt to use it per his suggestion than per her own, but it was better safe than sorry in this particular instance. Lin moved to prop his chin in his open palm after settling both elbows most rudely on the either side of the placemat before him. "Yes, so you're doing fantastically well on the whole not-killing-people-in-space thing so far. I, for one, was unable to control myself and ruthlessly murdered someone the moment I found myself here. So bravo, I say! Bravo!" One unenthusiastic hand shot into the air, then dropped back down, all without the expression on Lin's face changing an iota. His eyes were still only half-open and on his friend as she shifted in her own chair and looped her arms around her knees. "I am tired. That woman, Olivia, won't let me sleep with her. Not even platonically." Lin sounded exasperated and very much looked the part of a lost little kid. It wasn't as if he would do anything. He was fairly certain not-Zoe could snap him in half if she really wanted to, - and even without the threat of bodily injury, he was as harmless as they came. Winnie’s expression turned to an even deeper frown and she sighed, closing her eyes momentarily. Usually hanging out with Lin didn’t make her feel small, but when he used that tone and did that smart guy dry humor thing, she felt like a child. Reality was starting to set in. She was going to miss work tomorrow. And, the day after that. And, so on and so on until who even knew. Winnie had been doing a pretty good job at not panicking at the thought of never seeing her parents or her sister again, but without the cool knife and guns it was getting kind of hard to ignore. "Gotcha." She said with that girlish, passive tone to tell Lin he was being a dick before turning her head away from him, her short blonde hair messily limp over her arms and knees. "I like Olivia." She murmured into the crook of her arm. Winnie didn’t know much about her besides what she saw on the forums, but she was instantly drawn to strong women. She responded well to anyone who carried themselves with a little bit of authority, but perhaps that was due to being raised in a family of police officers. Well, fuck. Now he was being an asshole in a way that was far from delightful and/or endearing, and mostly just being an asshole. Lin facepalmed, and just sat that way for a good minute as Winnie turned her head away and said something about liking Olivia. Then he pushed his chair back and pulled himself up and out of it. He needed to wake up. It would be doing no one a favor to alienate the only person on the crew who actually, legitimately liked him, especially not himself. Next he would find himself tied up and stowed away in some secret cargo nook. Honestly, he hadn't meant anything by what he'd said, but intention had little to do with anything of substance, Lin had learned long ago. "I'm sorry," he apologized, genuinely, as he circled the table to join his friend on the other side. Pushing aside a placemat, he perched himself on the table's edge and looked down at Winnie, only a ghost of a smile on his face. "I'm an asshole and I'm sorry. I'm tired and annoyed and taking it out on you is wrong. You can cut a piece of me off, if you want. Lord knows I deserve it. You can add it to your man-skin collection." Lin offered his bare arm to Winnie as solemnly as he could. Winnie looked up at him, mouth still buried in her arm and expression a little grumpy if not just a tiny bit hurt. She tilted her head forward, letting her hair fall in front of most of her face before she blew a raspberry against the inside of her elbow. "It’s okay." She said finally, perking up and unraveling herself from the chair. Lin was fun and easily one of her favorite people, but he wasn’t anything like the kind of friends she hung out with. Winnie didn’t know how to deal with some sarcastic genius who could juggle silly and dickishness so effortlessly. "You’re probably a crier, anyway. I wouldn’t even put you in a headlock." She regained some of her badass attitude with a brighter smile that was wide and almost cartoonish on her round face. Being mad at Lin was kind of impossible. She hated that. Slapping the back of her hand against his leg affectionately, she pushed away from the table and stood up. "Stay in my bunk. We’ve fallen asleep on my couch before, it’ll be like that, but with blankets. Oooh." Winnie had casually invited plenty of guys into her bed, but it was rarely for platonic reasons. Lin, again, was an exception to the rule. It wasn't until Winnie finally spoke that Lin actually smiled. As much as he liked to tease and rankle and watch others try to keep up with him, he really didn't get as much joy as was often assumed out of hurting people's feelings - especially when those people were his friends. And while they maybe made an unlikely pair, Winnie was most definitely a friend to the boy. A good friend. Making her feel bad was like kicking an especially BAMF, but ultimately adorable, puppy, and Lin didn't like doing it. "They would be tears of joy that you actually touched me," he joked as she slapped his shin, reaching forward as if to try to catch her hand and take it in his own. "You know how I pine for you, Winifred." She never had told him her full name. It could have honestly been Winnie. But Winifred had more comedic value. Lin flashed another innocent smile, sliding off the table top as his friend stood. "The blankets make it more intimate," said the boy pilot as seriously as he could before another grin cracked across his face. (Really, he was extremely grateful for the offer, though he perhaps did a poor job of showing it.) He led the way out of the common area and toward the quarters corridor. It was long and dark and the floor was punctuated by strange little doors that swung down and revealed ladders that dropped down to the crew members' bunks. Idly, he slipped a hand into his pocket as they neared Jayne's hatch. A look of excitement lit up Lin's face, making him appear more himself than he had all night. "Oh my God, Winnie. Best idea." The boy withdrew a small glass bottle from his pocket, his fingers pinching its long, cylindrical lid. He wagged the nail polish in front of Winnie's face. It was black and full of glitter that looked appropriately like stars. China Glaze Cosmic Black. After all, what was more badass than a woman wielding a Crocodile Hunter knife as thick as her wrist while sparkly nail polish flashed on her fingertips? Winnie blew air through her lips to make a pppbbbtttlllh sound at being called Winifred and playfully yanked her hands away from him. Once she had a boyfriend who insisted on calling her Fred while they were dating. It took a whole week before she threatened to kick his ass into next week if he kept it up. That said, no one was more used to immature nicknames than her. Blonde and named Winnie set her up for so many honey bear references it could make Lin’s head spin. Her parents clearly anticipated her to become a cop, since giving a girl a name like that set her up to either be a wallflower or a badass. It also made her kind of a weirdo. Standing out from the crowd could do that to a person. She squinted at the nail polish and shook her head. "No way. I can’t patrol with that-" Winnie stopped herself short and then shined a goofy little smile up to him with a shrug. "Fuck it. I don’t know how long we’re going to be here, right?" And, she was sad about that, but Lin and the nailpolish made it better. Lin understood the truth behind the universal equation that said the more degrees away from the norm, in looks, intelligence, name, anything, really, one stood, the greater their inherent weirdness would be. His name was Lin, wasn't it? Though he was privileged to not have to had to endure the Winnie the Pooh jokes (thank Christ), he was still a small, relatively genderfluid, not-white, loudmouthed boy named Lin. That kind of set him up on the same path as the perky, little honey bear police officer. He much preferred being different to not, in any case, and he much preferred his friends that way too. The boy kicked open the door that led to Jayne's room, pocketed the nail polish, and descended into that dark, well-armed abyss, rung by rung. Once his feet hit the metal floor, Lin flopped on the surprisingly soft (and narrow) mattress of the man's bed. He watched Winnie as she herself climbed on down. "Yesss. I knew I could use my feminine wiles to convince you," he said with a laugh of victory, fishing the bottle out once again and situated himself, cross-legged on the bed. These pants were too big. And baggy. Ugh. He was trying not to dwell on the fact that they might be stuck on the ship indefinitely or return to Vegas unemployed and/or homeless, and to, instead, ...focus on matters at hand. Like painting nails. (Literally.) "Girl, you gonna look so fine. I bet Pete will ask you out. You like the stand-in captain, don't you?" The boy glanced up with an innocent half-smile as he unscrewed the cap to the nail polish. Winnie followed after him, wondering when was the last time she had a sleepover with gossip and nail polish and decided that it had been never. Even with Maggie, Winnie would shy away from that kind of thing in favor of getting nice and drunk and talking shit about practically everyone they knew. In high school, no one from her soccer team ever invited her to sleepovers that didn’t begin with some kind of party because she was just bad at it. They’d spend hours fawning over magazines and Winnie would just sit there wondering who she could talk into some late night soccer out in the backyard. Lin, though. Lin looked like he could have taken her place at those sleepovers and charmed the daylights of all the girls there. "He’s cute I guess." She gave him a stern look and then climbed across from him, legs crossed and fingertips spread out for him to take and paint. "I really don’t want to earn the title of space slut just yet. Though I have to admit being some kind of glorified body guard for all of you is already killing my credibility." Small town, backwater Oregon hadn’t found Lin quite so charming, in all honesty. Harmless though he seemed, small and scrawny with a particular fondness for glitter and gifs, he’d actually had something of a reputation growing up and frightened most of the kids in his hometown away. It all went back to that bit mentioned before - being different. Whether it was because you were a girl who wanted to play soccer rather than fawn over the week’s current heartthrobs or because you were a boy who wanted to fawn over the week’s current heartthrobs rather than play soccer - or whatever it was, it came across to the ignorant as scary or just too weird to want to deal with. Which was some bullshit. Lin had been lucky in that his parents indulged him more often than not. Maybe he’d had no friends to play with him, but his dad and his mom would get on the ground with him and endure infinite rounds of Pretty Pretty Princess. They let him go bury his Barbies out back to exhume later in an archaeological mystery adventure that involved an unnecessary amount of sequins. - But that was then. Perhaps if he had grown up somewhere more metropolitan, he would’ve been as Winnie imagined, feet dangling over a bed at a sleepover with his faves Leo poster. He did have a certain kind of endearing persuasion, and he liked to think that it had been with him as a child and would’ve been strong enough to charm a group of pre-teen girls. Not that he thought about that often. "You guess?" Lin’s eyebrows rose incredulously as Winnie clambered onto the bed, dragging her heavy boots up onto the mattress with her. His eyes lingered on them for a moment, like a disapproving mother’s might, but then he was grinning. Firmly, and with much experience, he held Winnie’s fanned right hand in his own. The little brush came out of the bottle in his left hand and painted on the first shining, pretty coat of black, very fitting, cosmic polish expertly. His tongue poked out of the corner of his mouth as he concentrated on the girl’s thumb. He peeked up through his lashes at her. "As if you had any credibility to begin with." The boy admired his handiwork before moving along to Winnie’s likely well-exercised middle finger. He decided now was not the time to lecture his friend on his own view of the word ‘slut,’ that is, that it was a constructed concept. Maybe later. "I don’t see why you’re waiting. What if someone else makes a move on him first, hm? He has that sort of all-American, nice guy, dimply thing goin’ for him - that’s especially appealing in the void of space, where one never knows when one’s last moment will be, thin metal walls being our only salvation, the only thing keeping us from nothingness." So it was dramatic. Lin blew on the polish. Winnie rolled her eyes at Lin’s pointed look at her boots. Maybe she fell asleep in her own boots more times than she could count, okay? She grinned back at him, free hand reaching to tug the massive things that were covered in god knows what kind of space diseases before yanking them off and throwing them with a thud to the floor. "I was sparing you the smell." She said in full tomboy mode, wiggling her socked toes as they faintly smelled of dirt and a men's locker room. Knives and gun fever weren’t the only thing Winnie and Jayne had in common. Even if the gun fever was kind of a new thing once she got on the ship. Since she couldn’t crack a window in space, Winnie moved around so she could pull part of the bunk’s blanket over her feet and shins as a sort of shield from the smell. Killing Lin with foot stank wasn’t something she actually wanted. "Excuse you." Winnie only started using that phrase since she started hanging out with Lin, by the way. "I’ve been very good back in Vegas. My ex-shrink boyfriend? He doesn’t want casual stuff. And, I totally could have taken advantage of him, but I didn’t." She told him proudly, like she had won some kind of anti-slut achievement. "Who else on this ship is going to make a move on him? Olivi- well. Maybe. I can’t really tell what her type is. She doesn’t like you, that means she’s not into bottoms." Winnie grinned challengingly at Lin with a wink and then tugged her hand back to look at the nail polish before he could keep going. "Oh my god." Winnie broke out in a loud laugh that sounded more like it belonged to a marsh bird instead of a 20-something girl. "Tell me this will look good before I puss out." All the jostling was going to mean more polish on Winnie’s cuticles than her nails, so Lin, thoughtful as ever, because he didn’t have infinite nail polish, okay? - and he wasn’t about to waste the precious little he did have, paused as his friend peeled off her 300 pound boots and kicked them - loudly - to the floor. He gave her socked feet, and their accompanying stench, a small shake of the head, one that, despite its restricted movement, spoke volumes. It painted the picture of a beleaguered, yet resigned housewife, who had asked time and again for a little more respect of the places she spent hours day in and day out scrubbing down on her hands and knees, only to have her husband and two-and-a-half children come in, trailing mud and the like. It was a gesture Lin had spent much time perfecting, obviously. He heaved an over-dramatic sigh, truthfully not bothered in the least because hey, body odors, whatever. They had nail polish to combat it for strongest scent in the room, anyway. He lifted himself enough for Winnie to get enough blanket to shield her feet away. (He continued to sit cross-legged, his own shoes still very much on the bed.) The ‘excuse you’ earned the girl a very self-satisfied smile, but Lin let her talk as he got back to business. Ring finger down. He listened with his chin tucked against his chest and with the little brush clinking rhythmically against the glass bottle. The mention of the ex-shrink boyfriend received a cocked eyebrow. "Good on you, but we’re not in Vegas, baby. What happens on Serenity, stays on Serenity, I think is the motto ‘round here. Especially if we die. Space, no oxygen, thin walls, oblivion, - you remember." Lin paused to wave a hand to illustrate the ever-expanding, unforgiving monster of a universe that lurked just through the few inches of steel by their heads, etc. He returned to his ministrations. Until the joke and accompanying wink. The small boy sat up a little straighter and feigned a bit of righteous indignation. "It’s not my fault she’s jelly that I’m prettier than she is, is it? I didn’t ask to be blessed this way," he sniffed, before making an annoyed sound when his canvas was ripped away mid-stroke. Lin reached back out in a huff to force Winnie’s hand into submission before she could ruin the still-wet coats there. He chided her playfully. "Keep your god to yourself. You’re going to smudge it, heathen. - And you can just go ahead and excuse yourself, because, of course, it’s going to look good. I’m doing it, aren’t I? And I am good at everything. Also, I will seduce Pete." Lin applied a little bit of a flourish to Winnie’s pinky to match his singsong tone and smiled. Winnie rolled her eyes, flattening her fingers out in a fan without so much as another movement. She was good at following orders when she needed to, even if during this casual friendship time it didn’t seem possible. "I’d love to see you try." She challenged him with a grin. Lin was cute, but if this guy was only a little bit gay, he’d have to work a lot harder than Winnie would. And she had never really seen his flirting in action. "Okay, I think I love this color." She said finally, blue eyes bright with a small grin on her face. |