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come out of the cupboard, you boys and girls
Back! Absolutely nothing of note happened, so, how was your holiday?
(Ooh, I lie. I picked up a book of Seneca's plays, a copy of the Iliad, a book by Raymond E Feist and Mignight in the Garden of Good and Evil for the grand total of $20. Excellent.)
Two more Xmas requests completed:
For![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
shineko - The Shortest Day
Foryakalskovich - Blood Casino, an extract
I'd be producing them faster, but I have this weird honour thing where they have to be over 2000 words or I feel like I'm cheating someone out of their fic. Don't ask. And yes, I write sloooooow.
Forschiarire and dredpiratejenny: I finished A Place of Greater Safety, didn't cry, got pissy at Danton, wanted to hug Robespierre, am frighteningly fond of Lucile, and adore Camille beyond all bounds of sanity, time and, um, fictionalisation.
So, Art - arm-wrestle you for him?
I had to scribble something to make myself less depressed. This started at a weird place and wrote itself in my head. And then it refused to go further, and I was sad.
“Danton said… he was being crude, laughing, he said, you… like large, ugly men, who…” He runs out of breath – too many of those damn pauses – and takes another, awkwardly.
“Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he?” They share a smile, a small one. “If you were to ask Saint-Just, he would probably say that my type is pretty young revolutionaries. Dangerous, precocious brats. But then, he’s been accusing me of narcissism for years.”
Robespierre’s mouth drops open. “You…Saint-Just?”
“Oh, of course not.” Camille gives a startled laugh. “God, no. I was making a point. No matter how distasteful people find my habits, they all like to imagine that I’m harbouring a raging secret desire for them.”
“You are incredibly vain.”
“Oh yes.” His voice is comfortable. “It’s what makes everyone love me.”
“I am quite certain that there are members of the Convention who have never wished for your attentions, Camille.” He smiles.
“Are you certain?” Camille flashes a smile in return. His teeth are very white beneath his black eyes. “It only helps their moral case, you know. It makes them more self-righteous. Not only am I lusting after the inappropriate, I am lusting after them! Shocking, wouldn’t you say?” He laughs, and looks about fifteen years old again.
“I am certain. Can you imagine Legendre, in such a situation? Or your nervous little cousin? Though you have a reputation for incestuous behaviour…”
Camille’s face twists comically, and Robespierre laughs. It comes out as a dry chuckle in the back of his throat; how long has it been, since he last laughed?
“And what about you, Max? Where do you place yourself?”
The laugh dies.
“I have never once thought that you looked upon me as anything but an old friend, Camille,” he says. He is not lying.
Camille leans forward, planting his hands on the edge of the desk. “What would you have done, my old friend, if I had come to you with such an intent? What would you have said?”
Ropespierre stares at him, his hands moving nervously across his books. “I… I have no idea, Camille. I have absolutely no idea.” Again, he is not lying.
“Oh.” Camille is nonplussed. He likes to think that his Max has a plan for everything; not in the same way as Danton, of course, nothing and no-one could match those vast reserves of energy and invention. But it is a stalwart of his life, that Max is equipped for every moral situation.
Ropespierre sighs, and reaches across the desk to take his hand. “You know I love you, Camille.”
“Yes. I have depended on it.”
~
See? It stops! Annoying!
Um... Ji! Tag!
(Ooh, I lie. I picked up a book of Seneca's plays, a copy of the Iliad, a book by Raymond E Feist and Mignight in the Garden of Good and Evil for the grand total of $20. Excellent.)
Two more Xmas requests completed:
For
shineko - The Shortest DayFor
yakalskovich - Blood Casino, an extractI'd be producing them faster, but I have this weird honour thing where they have to be over 2000 words or I feel like I'm cheating someone out of their fic. Don't ask. And yes, I write sloooooow.
For
schiarire and dredpiratejenny: I finished A Place of Greater Safety, didn't cry, got pissy at Danton, wanted to hug Robespierre, am frighteningly fond of Lucile, and adore Camille beyond all bounds of sanity, time and, um, fictionalisation. So, Art - arm-wrestle you for him?
I had to scribble something to make myself less depressed. This started at a weird place and wrote itself in my head. And then it refused to go further, and I was sad.
“Danton said… he was being crude, laughing, he said, you… like large, ugly men, who…” He runs out of breath – too many of those damn pauses – and takes another, awkwardly.
“Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he?” They share a smile, a small one. “If you were to ask Saint-Just, he would probably say that my type is pretty young revolutionaries. Dangerous, precocious brats. But then, he’s been accusing me of narcissism for years.”
Robespierre’s mouth drops open. “You…Saint-Just?”
“Oh, of course not.” Camille gives a startled laugh. “God, no. I was making a point. No matter how distasteful people find my habits, they all like to imagine that I’m harbouring a raging secret desire for them.”
“You are incredibly vain.”
“Oh yes.” His voice is comfortable. “It’s what makes everyone love me.”
“I am quite certain that there are members of the Convention who have never wished for your attentions, Camille.” He smiles.
“Are you certain?” Camille flashes a smile in return. His teeth are very white beneath his black eyes. “It only helps their moral case, you know. It makes them more self-righteous. Not only am I lusting after the inappropriate, I am lusting after them! Shocking, wouldn’t you say?” He laughs, and looks about fifteen years old again.
“I am certain. Can you imagine Legendre, in such a situation? Or your nervous little cousin? Though you have a reputation for incestuous behaviour…”
Camille’s face twists comically, and Robespierre laughs. It comes out as a dry chuckle in the back of his throat; how long has it been, since he last laughed?
“And what about you, Max? Where do you place yourself?”
The laugh dies.
“I have never once thought that you looked upon me as anything but an old friend, Camille,” he says. He is not lying.
Camille leans forward, planting his hands on the edge of the desk. “What would you have done, my old friend, if I had come to you with such an intent? What would you have said?”
Ropespierre stares at him, his hands moving nervously across his books. “I… I have no idea, Camille. I have absolutely no idea.” Again, he is not lying.
“Oh.” Camille is nonplussed. He likes to think that his Max has a plan for everything; not in the same way as Danton, of course, nothing and no-one could match those vast reserves of energy and invention. But it is a stalwart of his life, that Max is equipped for every moral situation.
Ropespierre sighs, and reaches across the desk to take his hand. “You know I love you, Camille.”
“Yes. I have depended on it.”
~
See? It stops! Annoying!
Um... Ji! Tag!
no subject
-
"Upon me," says Robespierre with his usual quiet certainty. "You know you can always depend upon me."
Camille nods; flicks his hair out of his face; where is this going? "Yes, Max."
Robespierre sighs again, releases his hand and straightens up. "Thank you, Camille," he says. "Good day."
Camille stares at him, confusion wild in his odd dark eyes. "That's all?"
"Isn't it?" It's not a question.
"No, how can that be all?" Camille is petulant. "You still haven't answered my question. Not really."
*metaposting like whoa*
*mumblemumblecan'twritemaxmumble*
~
"Which question was that, Camille?" He turns his attention to a piece of paper in front of him.
"That paper," Camille tells him, "is upside-down."
"Thank you." He stares at it some more, idly making out the words.
"What would you do?" Camille decides that desperate measures are called for. He turns around, lies back on the desk, putting his face neatly underneath Robespierre's field of vision.
"I told you." Max can read Camille right-way-up, on a good day. He has no chance from any other angle. "I don't know. And since it never happened, I would say the point is moot."
"It isn't at all." Camille's eyes are very wide. It looks like he is frowning. Robespierre tries to translate.
no subject
More importantly, Rousseau never taught him to understand it.
Camille smiles lazily up at Robespierre. "Divine it, mon vieux."
no subject
"Come now. It is an easy enough scenario to envisage." Camille tries to flick his hair again; it only moves a little, and his neck hurts.
Robespierre laughs shakily. "For you, perhaps."
"Do you have no imagination, Max?" One slim hand reaches up and lies next to Robespierre's cheek.
He sighs and takes Camille by the wrist. "Don't do that."
"Why not?"
no subject
"It -- it's not proper," Robespierre says. "It's unthinkable, in fact; implausible, impossible . . . it has not been and will not be."
"Notes for your next speech?"
"Don't," says Robespierre, and he looks so sad that Camille doesn't.
no subject
"You will destroy your eyes." Robespierre picks the paper up. "Camille. Camille?" He waves it, trying to make the dark eyes focus.
"You sound like Lucile."
"Heaven forfend." He smiles.
no subject
Robespierre falters. "I . . . it's just an expression."
"Nothing is just an expression." Camille is perfectly solemn; Robespierre is flustered.
no subject
"Because it's so easy to do, of course..." Robespierre looks at him; smiles, painfully.
"Not at all. Where were we? I quite forget."
"Lucile?"
"Ah. My question. I'll admit to implausible, but impossible is stretching it too far. It is part of our very existence, Max, to allow for the fact that anything is possible."
no subject
"But is right the same as just?"
no subject
"So you admit that it is possible?"
"Is there any use in arguing with you?"
"Not really, no," Camille says cheerfully. He lifts his hands and begins to count things on his fingers. "Item: the occurence is possible. Result: it should thus be possible to prepare a theoretical response to it. Which would be...?"
"Don't bring your acrobatic logic into this, Camille." But he smiles anyway.
"No, really, I'm curious."
no subject
AS A SIDE NOTE
THAT I LOVE YOU TWO IMPOSSIBLY MUCH; YOU ARE MY REVOLUTIONARY HOS; WHEN I GET BACK FROM THE HILL COUNTRY WHERE I HAVE CLIMBED MOUNTAINS AND ATTEMPTED TO CATCH FISH WITH MY BARE HANDS, IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT CHRIS ROCK SAYS BECAUSE THERE WILL BE SEX IN THE CHAMPAGNE ROOM. THE CHAMPAGNE ROOM OF THE MIND.
THAT WAS A METAPHOR.
AND JI, I CONCEDE THE POINT ABOUT THE CAPITALS. BUT I AM JUST SO ENTHUSED YOU SEE.
<3<3<3
no subject
Also: <3
We wouldn't have
sold our souls toread the book if it weren't for you!Sensual pleasures are like soap bubbles, sparkling, effervescent. The pleasures of intellect are calm, beautiful, sublime, ever enduring and climbing upward to the borders of the unseen world.
- John H. Aughey
Sparkling bubbles, sensual pleasures and the wonder of intellect!
Ergo, sex in the champagne room of the mind.
Look, it made sense at the time, all right?
*is quote h0r. is going to be quiet now*