Three 100 word drabbles on the themes Cold, Postcard and Whimsical for a stargateland challenge.
Cold
It's the cold that wakes him. Every time it happens, at least once in every week, sometimes for what seems nights on end, the cold.
He rolls over, throws out an arm and hits cold bed. The sensation wakes him instantly from dreams of clear light, from sleep to alert, shocked and searching, confused and disoriented.
Six months, a year, three years, it never goes. In his bed, in a hotel, on a base, on another planet, a myriad of galaxies away from home, one thing is constant.
In his sleep Rush reaches out for her and she is gone.
Postcard
Dale sees the postcard every time he goes into the room. It's a postcard from Afghanistan and it's not very good, the printing is cheap and the cardstock thin, but then you don't get much tourism in Afghanistan.
"It's where I am." Greer had told him. "A friend brought me a bunch back when I was posted to Icarus. My mom thinks I'm in Afghanistan."
The last postcard Greer had not been able to send to his mom.
It still rankles Dale that after over a year out in the universe Greer's mom has not been read into the program.
Whimsical
It is not the way that anyone thinks of him. It is not the way that he thinks of himself. Some days he feels like the weight of the world is on his shoulders.
Young didn't ask for this command, turned it down in fact. They depend on him, all of them, over seventy remaining souls, all look to him to lead. So he leads.
It's an order at the right time, a hard decision made, a dispute resolved, a quiet word in the right ear.
It's a white board full of Garfield cartoons when the mess hall is deserted.