Fandom: Blake's 7
Title: Splashdance Silver Double Drabbles
Rating: Australian PG, like the series.
Disclaimer: The characters of Blake's 7 belong to the estate of Terry Nation, and are being used here without permission. No money is being made from or solicited for this work of fan fiction.
Author's Notes: This was born out of the same challenge as the B7 Friday Drabble Set - but this time I stuck with one book ("Splashdance Silver" by Tansy Rainer Roberts) and chose different sentences from throughout the book to use as my initial sentence.
Vila
"Thinking's a dangerous habit." Vila paused to take a pull of his drink. "Take my advice; don't get involved with it."
Dayna laughed. "What's wrong with thinking?" she asked.
"Just look at Tarrant, if you don't believe me. While he's doing things, he's just fine - nothing bothers him a bit. But when he stops to think about them, he gets all tangled up. That's why he keeps haring off on these wild goose chases, y'see. Gotta stop himself thinking."
"But what about Avon? He does a lot of thinking. So does Cally."
"Yeah, and they're not much better. Avon tries to reason things to death, and trips over his feelings in the meanwhile. Cally over-analyses, and gets snagged by horrible aliens when she's off-guard. Better off just staying out of the whole mess."
"Like you?" There was a sarcastic inflection to the laughter this time.
"Nah, not like me either. If I didn't think, I wouldn't have anything to worry about. But I do, so when can I stop worrying with the rest of them around? Why d'you think I drink so much?"
It was Vila's occasional flashes of wisdom, Dayna decided, which gave creedence to the statement.
(Sentence 5, page 32)
Avon
"This makes sense to you, does it?" Avon sounded sceptical about the possibility of the message received from Avalon making sense to anyone. Ciphers he could handle - if nothing else, the challenge of breaking them was fascinating. But using codes tended to make for more confusion than it was worth.
Blake looked up from the old paper books before him. "It should, once I've decoded it. The trick is - "
"The trick is to go to the correct sentence in the correct page of the correct book, and count the correct number of words on," Avon interrupted. "Yes, I know. But the trick depends on a number of factors, none of which you appear to have factored into your calculations."
"Such as?" Blake sounded amused.
"Such as both people having copies of the same edition of the same book. Which in this case, you don't."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean the version of the complete works of Shakespeare you have has the plays in a slightly different order to the one Avalon is using. She referred to 'The Tempest', you were referring to 'Coriolanus'."
"So they didn't?..." Blake looked somewhat shamefaced.
"They don't want a shipment of women's undergarments, no."
(Sentence 5, page 23)
Cally
'What happened?' seemed a more urgent question than 'Where am I?'. Particularly since the answer to the second would presumably be contained in the first. Before she opened her eyes, she took stock. Her hands were bound behind her, and there was a collar around her neck. She lowered the barriers around her mind to gain a sense of how many beings were nearby. Nothing telepathic in the Auron sense. But she could hear breathing, and the scufflings of feet on the floor.
The floor was cold beneath her; smooth too. Wherever she was sounded hard, solid. There was a soft hum, in the background - familiar. She suspected she was on a ship of some kind. Cautiously she opened her eyes. It looked as though she were still on Liberator - the architecture was nothing like anything she'd seen in any Terran ships, but then, the people who had attacked her were nothing like any other humans she'd met. Avon, Gan and Blake were all visible, although Blake appeared to still be affected by the gas their attackers had used. Where was Vila?
There was a quiet 'click' behind her, and her wrists were freed. Ah, that was where he was.
(Sentence 1, page 223)
Jenna
Daggar hurried after her. "Why don't you want to take his cargo?" he demanded.
"Largo's been getting more dangerous to work for," Jenna said, continuing her rapid stride across the spaceport plaza, "and I don't want to chance this time being the most dangerous yet."
"But he's offering a fortune," Daggar said, "and the cargo's small. Where's the risk?"
Jenna turned to look at her supercargo. She couldn't believe the man was so obtuse. "Daggar, anything small enough to be worth as much as Largo is offering us to transport it is either illegal or explosive. Knowing Largo, he's trying to get himself bounced up the rungs of whichever organisation he works for now, and that means being willing to take risks - or able to persuade other people to take them for you. I'm not willing to have my ship or my livelihood treated as an acceptable risk for Largo to be taking."
"So?" Daggar looked honestly puzzled.
"So we aren't taking his cargo. Not even if he trebles the price."
Daggar watched her retreating back. Maybe Jenna wasn't taking the risk, but if the cargo was small as Largo said, she'd never know. He turned back to the bar.
(Sentence 1, page 32)
Blake
"Hot!" exclaimed Ferdee. Roj moved quickly to catch the dropped cake before it hit the ground, and was able to confirm his brother's comment as he tossed the morsel from palm to palm, trying to avoid being burned. Mother would never forgive them for filching from the kitchens on the afternoon before one of her parties.
"We'd better move," he said, "or Della will spot us, and we'll be in trouble."
Ferdee grinned, snatching another cake for himself, then the two boys scrambled for the rear door of the kitchens. They escaped into the corridors outside the Blake residence, making their way to the nearest exit. "Where to now?" Ferdee asked, once they'd reached the junction.
"Dunno," replied Roj. "Any preference?"
"We could go to the museum," Ferdee said unenthusiastically. It was the only public leisure facility in this part of the dome. But today, Roj didn't want to go through the museum again and have a look at the same dull exhibits.
"I've got an idea," he said. "How about we go down to the Delta section?"
Ferdee looked dubious. "We'll get in trouble," he said.
"We'll get in trouble anyway," Roj countered. “Might as well be something worthwhile.”
(Sentence 1, page 132)
Gan
The tiny balls of jingling gold rippled down her back, circled around her waist, and slid down across her feet. The music from the sound system was met by the music of the bells and of her finger-cymbals, chiming in an expressive counterpoint to the throbbing of the tabla, and the whine of the mizmar. Each movement of her hips, her waist, her shoulders and her legs made the bells chime, or made the coins sewn to the scarf around her hips jingle. When Cat danced, she was the most beautiful woman in the world, or so it seemed. His woman, his own desirable, beautiful, wonderful woman...
Then the rhythm broke, and the pain shattered through the vision. Olag Gan awoke, alone once more in his quarters on the Liberator, with the slight beginnings of an erection, and the knowledge that even a small amount of physical arousal caused his limiter to give him a massive headache. He swallowed a painkiller, noting the time. He'd need to take another in four hours, because no matter how much he relaxed, cleared his mind, and practiced the exercises Cally had showed him, the headache caused by the limiter wouldn't be gone.
(Sentence 1, page 123)