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lirillithTitle: A Beautiful Friendship
Fandom: Final Fantasy VI/Chrono Trigger
Characters: Edgar/Lucca
Length: 720 words
Rating: PG at most
Summary: Edgar meets a fascinating new mechanic in the Figaro Castle engine room.
Notes: The prompt was "His Girl Friday," courtesy ofsuzume. I never got to the point where Lucca actually becomes his girl Friday, but maybe later.
****
Edgar never mentioned it to visitors - he preferred to give the impression that the conveniences of Figaro were effortless, almost magical - but the engine room required constant maintenance. Sand seeped in as if through the castle's pores. It was tracked in on the shoes and clothes of staff, it probably did leak in through the walls, and while the machinery was designed to survive a certain amount of friction, no one in Figaro wanted a second experience of being stuck belowground once the gears ground to a halt. To set the residents' minds at ease, he frequently oversaw the cleaning and repair processes himself.
It was on one of his maintenance tours that he walked through the door to the main staging area and swiftly got sprayed in the face with a blast of lukewarm water. "Oh my goodness!" a voice yelped. He heard a metallic squeaking noise, and the water stopped.
"We really can't afford to waste water like this, you realize," he commented, pushing his sodden hair out of his face. The figure in front of him was anonymous, in voluminous overalls.
"It's actually all gray water," the voice said. The feminine voice.
"That's not really much comfort," he said. "I think my mouth was closed..." The woman standing before him had goggles, which she'd pushed up onto her head, and large glasses she must have been wearing underneath. Her hair, chin-length, was mostly brown save for a few purple streaks; creative dyeing, he assumed. "I don't believe we've been introduced," he said.
"No, probably not," she said absently. "The water was an experiment. I thought if we sprayed down the sand that gets tracked in, we might keep quite so much of it from drifting into the machinery."
"Interesting," he said. "I can see the reasoning, but I don't know if it would make enough of a difference. And the results of spraying gray water everywhere--"
"Ugh, I know. I was hoping to manage a fine mist, but obviously I need to rework the sprayer a bit."
"That could work, yes." He shook his head slightly, spraying water around. He'd gotten sidetracked. "Let some of the apprentices do that, my dear," he said, bowing to her. "A lady of your beauty and intelligence has other interests. I am King Edgar, but you, I must confess, are the queen of my heart."
"Oh, please!" she exclaimed cheerfully. "You already tried this once before. I didn't have my glasses on then, and I was too awestruck to say anything so you didn't think I was that intelligent. But otherwise, yeah. The whole spiel."
"Then why did you say we hadn't been introduced?" He sighed inwardly. If he could just pull off the charming-king act in full once, he was sure some young lady would be swept off her feet by it.
"Because we weren't. It was part of my tour of the engine room." She extended her hand as if for a handshake. "I'm Lucca Ashtear."
"Lucca," he said. "A lovely name." He took her hand, turned it over, and laid a kiss on the back of it. She had engine grease under her nails, he noted, charmed.
"It's really not," she said. "I mean, I don't think so."
"But I do," he said.
"Listen, your Majesty," she said. "I hate to take advantage of your... I'm not sure if it's poor judgment, or just compulsive skirt-chasing. But I have some schematics and project proposals I've been working on, and you seem like you might appreciate them."
"By all means," he said. "I'm sure I'd appreciate anything designed by so lovely a lady." She just laughed as she headed for the personnel locker room. Edgar waited, wringing his hair out onto the stone floor. Really, laughing it off was far from the most discouraging reaction a woman had ever had to his flirtation, and he was curious about these schematics.
Late that night, he laid the last of the designs down on top of a stack of reports on his desk that he'd been neglecting for hours. Lucca Ashtear had some ideas that struck him as over-ambitious, but many more that intrigued him. It would be a crying shame to let that kind of creative mind go to waste on regular oil changes for the castle.
****
Fandom: Final Fantasy VI/Chrono Trigger
Characters: Edgar/Lucca
Length: 720 words
Rating: PG at most
Summary: Edgar meets a fascinating new mechanic in the Figaro Castle engine room.
Notes: The prompt was "His Girl Friday," courtesy of
suzume. I never got to the point where Lucca actually becomes his girl Friday, but maybe later.****
Edgar never mentioned it to visitors - he preferred to give the impression that the conveniences of Figaro were effortless, almost magical - but the engine room required constant maintenance. Sand seeped in as if through the castle's pores. It was tracked in on the shoes and clothes of staff, it probably did leak in through the walls, and while the machinery was designed to survive a certain amount of friction, no one in Figaro wanted a second experience of being stuck belowground once the gears ground to a halt. To set the residents' minds at ease, he frequently oversaw the cleaning and repair processes himself.
It was on one of his maintenance tours that he walked through the door to the main staging area and swiftly got sprayed in the face with a blast of lukewarm water. "Oh my goodness!" a voice yelped. He heard a metallic squeaking noise, and the water stopped.
"We really can't afford to waste water like this, you realize," he commented, pushing his sodden hair out of his face. The figure in front of him was anonymous, in voluminous overalls.
"It's actually all gray water," the voice said. The feminine voice.
"That's not really much comfort," he said. "I think my mouth was closed..." The woman standing before him had goggles, which she'd pushed up onto her head, and large glasses she must have been wearing underneath. Her hair, chin-length, was mostly brown save for a few purple streaks; creative dyeing, he assumed. "I don't believe we've been introduced," he said.
"No, probably not," she said absently. "The water was an experiment. I thought if we sprayed down the sand that gets tracked in, we might keep quite so much of it from drifting into the machinery."
"Interesting," he said. "I can see the reasoning, but I don't know if it would make enough of a difference. And the results of spraying gray water everywhere--"
"Ugh, I know. I was hoping to manage a fine mist, but obviously I need to rework the sprayer a bit."
"That could work, yes." He shook his head slightly, spraying water around. He'd gotten sidetracked. "Let some of the apprentices do that, my dear," he said, bowing to her. "A lady of your beauty and intelligence has other interests. I am King Edgar, but you, I must confess, are the queen of my heart."
"Oh, please!" she exclaimed cheerfully. "You already tried this once before. I didn't have my glasses on then, and I was too awestruck to say anything so you didn't think I was that intelligent. But otherwise, yeah. The whole spiel."
"Then why did you say we hadn't been introduced?" He sighed inwardly. If he could just pull off the charming-king act in full once, he was sure some young lady would be swept off her feet by it.
"Because we weren't. It was part of my tour of the engine room." She extended her hand as if for a handshake. "I'm Lucca Ashtear."
"Lucca," he said. "A lovely name." He took her hand, turned it over, and laid a kiss on the back of it. She had engine grease under her nails, he noted, charmed.
"It's really not," she said. "I mean, I don't think so."
"But I do," he said.
"Listen, your Majesty," she said. "I hate to take advantage of your... I'm not sure if it's poor judgment, or just compulsive skirt-chasing. But I have some schematics and project proposals I've been working on, and you seem like you might appreciate them."
"By all means," he said. "I'm sure I'd appreciate anything designed by so lovely a lady." She just laughed as she headed for the personnel locker room. Edgar waited, wringing his hair out onto the stone floor. Really, laughing it off was far from the most discouraging reaction a woman had ever had to his flirtation, and he was curious about these schematics.
Late that night, he laid the last of the designs down on top of a stack of reports on his desk that he'd been neglecting for hours. Lucca Ashtear had some ideas that struck him as over-ambitious, but many more that intrigued him. It would be a crying shame to let that kind of creative mind go to waste on regular oil changes for the castle.
****
no subject
Date: 2011-11-13 03:42 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-13 07:30 am (UTC)