☆ Round Two!

[jsmn_kink]

Welcome to the second round of the Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell Kink Meme at jsmn_kinkmeme!

Below are some basic guidelines, but please make sure you also check out our complete Rules & Guidelines.

Guidelines:
■ Anonymously comment with your request – a character/pairing/nthsome, and a kink or prompt.
■ Only one prompt per post.
■ Fillers please link your fills in the Fills Post!
■ Have fun! :)

Keep in mind:
■ Any kinks welcomed!
■ The fill/request does not need to be sexual or porny.
■ Multiple fills are allowed.
■ Fills can be any sort of creative work: fic, art, song, photomanip, etc.
■ Beware of spoilers! Prompters and requesters are encouraged to warn for spoilers, but this rule is not enforced.
■ Warning for non-con, dub-con, abuse, slurs/language, and other potentially disturbing subjects is encouraged but be aware we do not enforce this.
■ Would fillers please make sure when posting a fill in multiple parts that they thread their comments by replying to previous parts.

Links:
☆ Mod Post
☆ Fills Post
☆ Discussion Post
☆ Misfire deletion requests
☆ Previous Rounds: Round One

Comments

Fill: Going home (1/1)

[(Anonymous)]

Another fill! (I'm not the potential A!A from above either, so fingers crossed this prompt will get a THIRD fill too!)





18 June 1815

Just a date. A Sunday.

30,000 men dead

A statistic.

Numbers and dates are nothing compared to being there.

Being there, standing at the precipice of Hell, is much too much for one man to comprehend. Bodies scatter battered, smoking soil all the way to the horizon. The uniforms decorating the corpses, their colours and ranks, mean nothing, for they were all men. All alive. Gone now.

“The war is over,” Wellington says. His hat bears the cockade colours of Britain, Spain, Portugal and Prussia. For these are all his men.

Everything within Grant tells him it isn’t over. If it was over, why would his heart still race, and his lips still tremble? He clenches his jaw to stop it. His broken arm is held in a sling made of a strip of shirt. He can’t feel it. He feels nothing. Your body becomes no more than a host at times like these. It walks, talks and breathes, but your mind is elsewhere, trying desperately to understand.

Strange doesn’t think he remembers how to undress, let alone wash. Mud is caked into his skin, hair and clothes. There’s blood on his hands. How dare he go about changing his clothes, washing and eating, when men are lying dead? Amongst the multitude of carcasses, some men remain alive. The thought haunts him. Strange could return home now, the ghosts of the battle following him at every turn. Had Grant not been injured he would be needed for the advance toward Paris, but he’s in no fit state to fight. Strange realises very quickly that Major Grant is in no fit state to do anything.

The Major is silent as they board the ship that will return them to England. There he will stand beside men, women and children who know nothing of Waterloo and its carnage. They will never see the piles of groaning bodies first-hand, know the stench of death and gunpowder, or hear the deafening, heart-stopping sound of a cannon. Perhaps they might shake his hand, thank him for his bravery. Perhaps he might be promoted, now the position is vacant. Grant wants none of this.

Merlin’s hand is on his thigh and he has no idea how long it’s been there. The swaying of the ship has become a comfort. Grant has been watching the waves split behind it, spreading out to leave a frothy trail in its wake. Strange is worried about him. Grant is never like this. He’s always cheerful, always in control of himself. Right now, he looks like he wants nothing more than to throw himself overboard. He’d like to say something to him, offer some words of reassurance – we’re going home, we made it – but he doesn’t have the energy to pretend he feels a thimble-full of happiness for either of those things. Instead he kneads his fingers against the Major’s thigh, just enough to show him he’s here.

As they watch the waves together, the coast of France slowly fading into the distance, Grant rests his head on Merlin’s shoulder. His arm is starting to hurt, the whipping cold of the salt-wind on his face beginning to sting. The shock of Waterloo is subsiding and here, in the safety of the ship beside the warmth of his friend, it’s finally starting to sink in.

The losses.
The bloodbath.
It happened. It was real.

When Grant lets out a single sob Strange turns immediately to wrap his arm around his shoulder. The Major’s face presses into his neck, his eyes screwed shut. He would like to scream until his throat is sore and smash his fists into the deck until the bones crumble. He wants to ask why. Why, why… why? And he’s shaking, with anger and horror and every emotion he’s ever felt all at once. Merlin is gripping him tightly, both arms around him, holding back the shaking and the shouting and the breaking down – holding him together.

Grant’s good hand grips at Strange’s coat-tails, fingernails digging into cloth as the screams he’s keeping at bay release as mere whimpers from a body wracked with guilt. Clinging, like a small blind animal clings to its mother, he stays in Merlin’s embrace. He would like to stay here until their return to England, until the end of time, because leaving it means facing it: everything.

Grant realises Merlin is shivering too, and not from the cold. The two men, sitting on the ship’s quarterdeck and surrounded by soldiers, are both weeping quietly into each other. Once they return to England, this kind of behaviour will be unacceptable. Heroes don’t cry like children. They stand tall and accept their praises with poise and solemnity. They remember their fallen comrades and share stories of war.

Until then though, the soldier and the magician will cry all they want.

Re: Fill: Going home (1/1)

[(Anonymous)]

*slow exhale* *hard swallow*

I'm not the OP, but thank you, A!A, thank you for writing this beautiful piece. Strange's hand gripping Grant's thigh with no overtones of sexual desire is incredibly moving. Thank you for not letting Grant lose it in an uncharacteristic fit of passion, because Grant wouldn't, he would hold back as much as possible, which just makes his whimpering and his clinging even more heartbreaking. Key word: guilt. Key detail: Wellington's cockade. Key sentence: "The Major is silent as they board the ship that will return them to England." Grant without banter, without his words of comfort or explanation, is truly horrible. I send you many sad hugs through the ether.

Re: Fill: Going home (1/1)

[(Anonymous)]

Beautiful and heartbreaking...
Not much of a comfort here - for both of them (still, I believe they both would cope).
Thank you, A!A, it's so sad and yet so delightful.

Re: Fill: Going home (1/1)

[(Anonymous)]

This is stunning. Absolutely beautifully written and perfectly executed...and in so few words! I take my hat off to you a!a, you have some serious skill!

This made my heart ache which I should've expected after reading that prompt but you did it so elegantly I can't even be angry at you for causing me such pain!

This line in particular really got me and I'm not sure why. When Grant lets out a single sob Strange turns immediately to wrap his arm around his shoulder.

I think I could just envisage it so well? And the whole atmosphere on the ship was just so well captured I was completely enthralled. What lovely writing. I'm now going to curl up into a ball and think about how I want to hold that lovely Colonel and stroke his hair until the end of time.

Goodbye world.

Re: Fill: Going home (1/1)

[(Anonymous)]

Absolutely beautiful. A wonderful, heart-breaking piece of superb writing. You captured the essence of Grant's and Merlin's pain and trauma perfectly. Thank you for this!