Torchwood drabble: Mercurial

[littledoglaughed]

Title: Mercurial
Author: rustydog
Characters: the Rift
Rating/spoilers: rated G, no spoilers
Beta: mad_jaks
Notes: Written for tw100's challenge #102, "endangered words"


It appears on soft paws: its dexterous tentacles choose one knife from a drawer of dozens; this child but not her sister; the husband from bed, leaving the wife among the sheets, the tinny taste of ozone ringing her throat.

Or it is a lightning cloud: mercurial as a tornado, it skips this farmhouse and devastates the next, no pattern to its swirling atomic trail of debris. It deposits the flock on a grassy hill a century hence and drops the lamb light years away on the shore of a poison sea.

Without conscience, the Rift gives and takes away.

Comments

[love-jackianto.livejournal.com]

Oh I liked that last line. Very poetic :D

[rustydog.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much!

[itsarift-thing.livejournal.com]

OH that's got a lot of depth to it.

one knife from a drawer of dozens; this child but not her sister; the husband from bed leaving the wife among the sheets

Is absolutely gorgeous.

(and I have PM'd you - is compulsive beta *aplogises*)

[rustydog.livejournal.com]

Thank you for everything!

[mad-jaks.livejournal.com]

You're welcome *loves you*

[donutsweeper.livejournal.com]

oooh, the rift as an entity itself, picking and choosing. Love it

[rustydog.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I think I must have been influenced by a New Testament passage that always stuck with me as especially sad: "I tell you, in that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left. Two women shall be grinding together; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Two men shall be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left." When I started thinking about "mercurial," the Rift came to mind and the way it was portrayed in "Adrift."

[donutsweeper.livejournal.com]

I don't recall that passage, but it does really emphasize the way we see the rift, especiallu in Adrift!

[rustydog.livejournal.com]

Even if you've studied the New Testament, that might be one that's not too memorable - I suspect it's not really quoted a lot except in evangelical circles when people are talking about the concept of the Rapture. In fact, I forgot it was in Luke, I looked for it first in Revelation.

Yeah, "Adrift" was *about* the Rift itself more than any episode before, though I think it raised more questions than it answered!

[donutsweeper.livejournal.com]

I like how the Rift is sort of another member of Torchwood, an unpredictable and kind of mean one, but a member none the less

[mad-jaks.livejournal.com]

That's *pokes it* the thing about how the kingdom of god will come...? Isn't there something about Sodom and Gomorrah in there somewhere??

[rustydog.livejournal.com]

You're right, it's how the son of god will come, and he does talk about Lot's wife when he's exhorting people not to... stop to grab your coat, basically, don't turn around. People will be eating and drinking and partying and then BAM fire and brimstone and people disappearing. Pretty grim! No wonder it reminded me of Torchwood... *g* (Luke 17)

[hab318princess.livejournal.com]

lovely, scary but true

[rustydog.livejournal.com]

Thank you. The rift is so creepy but so interesting!

[adafrog.livejournal.com]

Lovely.

[rustydog.livejournal.com]

Thank you. :)

[topgeargirl2.livejournal.com]

very good

[rustydog.livejournal.com]

Thanks.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Beautiful. This really brings home how dangerous the Rift is, how it can affect anyone randomly at any time.

[rustydog.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much. The folks in London are lucky by comparison; at least they have a general idea that they should flee on Christmas! With the Rift, life is even more fickle than... well, normal life. Which is randomly dangerous enough, if you look at it a certain way.

[rabecka.livejournal.com]

That's gorgeous. And eerie. I love the image of something alive sending out tendrils.

It appears on soft paws
This really, really reminds me of something, but I can't think what. Arg!...

[rustydog.livejournal.com]

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, possibly?

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening.
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains.
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys.
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

I wasn't thinking of that specifically when I wrote the drabble, but any sort of cat metaphor for a nonsentient entity would have to have been influenced by that passage, I imagine. :)

And thank you very much! I'm so glad it worked.

[rabecka.livejournal.com]

Talk about late comments... But, I just tripped over the poem I was trying to think of.

THE fog comes
on little cat feet.
It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on
- Carl Sandburg