Yes, I've taken another Nickelodeon children's show and have made it much darker than it's supposed to be.
Prologue
In the Realm of Shadows and Silence
“Laugh and the world laughs with you.
Weep, and you weep alone
For the sad old earth must bury it’s mirth
But has trouble enough of it’s own.”
-Ella Wheeler Wilcox, “Solitude”
The church was silent as Beatrix Tang walked in, the young Asian’s woman’s footfalls echoing through the empty building as she walked alone down the red carpet that ran between the blocks of simple wooden chairs. As she walked, alone she felt a shiver, and a foreboding presence run down her spine, as if ghosts had followed her down this empty path, lit only by candlelight in the darkness of the Belgian night.
I’m not surprised, the sixteen year old, clad in a dark blue double-breasted dress uniform with gold and white trim running along it and down along the outsides of both legs of the black pants she wore thought to herself, shaking her head. Thousands of restless dead must haunt this site, this city, where so many died for no purpose.
She sighed, she was used to the idea that the dead haunted this place, made sacred by their blood, toil, sweat, and tears in an unassuming town called Ypres, in the country of Belgium. She walked up to the lectern at the front of the church and stared around her. This was no ordinary church. This was a church dedicated to a specific time in human history. She stared around at the flags that hung from the walls, and stood on poles on the floor. She looked at the flags of regiments, so many of them bearing some representation of the crown of Britain and Commonwealth Realms. She looked around again, compelled by some deep urge to see that everything was just as it was a year ago, when she’d last made this pilgrimage. After a moment, she concluded as usual, that it was still as it should be. Not one regiment’s flag missing, not one Union Jack or Maple Leaf or other flag out of place, not one blue cushion bearing the embroidered symbol of a regiment missing from the rows and rows of chairs here.
Just as it was the year before that, and the year before that, and the year before that, she thought. No one in their right mind would want to steal from this place.
“I thought I might find you here,” a familiar voice said, snapping her from her pained remembrance and into a hasty salute. She looked up to see a fair-skinned young man with blue eyes and brown hair standing in the middle of the church doorway. The young man, taller than her and somewhat broad shouldered wore the exact same uniform as she did, with additional insignia that indicated a slightly higher rank than her. He was leaning against the side of one of the doors, his arms folded as he regarded her coolly.
“I’ve come here every year since I was thirteen,” she said, slightly annoyed at his reaction after he’d returned her salute. “Of course you’d find me here, Timmy.”
Timmy smirked, folding his arms, and said, in a half-serious tone. “Is that anyway to talk to your Commanding Officer, Lieutenant Commander Tang?”
“Of course not, skipper,” she said, smiling slightly and feeling something approaching happiness for the first time that day. “Can we drop the ranks, please?”
“Of course the ranks are dropped, Trix,” he said, an exasperated tone in his voice as he regarded her with annoyance. “I was trying to joke with you, you always get so serious this time of year.” At Trix’s incensed glare, he hastily amended that sentence with a, “not that I don’t understand of course. I was there to the end, after all.”
“And I love you as I love breath for it,” she said, smiling. “But that’s neither here nor there. Why are you here, Timmy?”
“Because I thought I’d share this moment with you,” he said, stepping forward slightly, “if you don’t mind, of course.”
She sighed, coming here alone had always torn at her, but she thought she owed it to the memory of what happened to these people commemorated here, the people she’d nearly died beside so far from home and nearly a century into the past, to let this always be a solemn, solitary moment. It always seemed disrespectful to be here with more than myself, which is odd considering that this is a church built to house large numbers of people for worship and to honor the people who died in the meat-grinder that was this very spot nearly a century ago.
But this time, something felt different, like maybe this time had to be shared with him who’d been there the entire time, the man who’d saved her life, and whom she’d saved in return, so many times over, a debt to each other that neither could or should fully repay.
Like maybe I should’ve done from the beginning, she thought to herself. She nodded slightly to him, and Timmy walked forward and took his place next to her on the right. After a few moments of silence, he said, his voice soft.
“For all our responsibility,” he said, “for all we’ve been through, it’s hard to believe that only a few years ago we had just become teenagers and were for the most part still stupid and carefree, our only constant companions being our fairies, at the different times we got them.”
“And before that I was a shallow, fairyless twit who hated you,” she said, lightly touching his arm. “Don’t forget that, sir.”
“I know,” Timmy said.
He sighed, a deep and painful sigh. “Do you want to finally talk about what we went through?”
“Why,” she said anger, and puzzlement coursing through her. “What’s the point? You were there along with me; you already know everything that happened firsthand. Beside you haven’t wanted to talk about it for three years. Why on earth would you want to do it now?”
“It’s unhealthy to never talk about things like this,” he said, stroking her hair. “But if you don’t want to…” He trailed off, signaling that the next move was up to her. If she wanted to talk, she wanted to talk, but if she didn’t, he wouldn’t bring it up tonight.
“No, it’s all right,” she said decisively, and sitting down on the steps that led up to the lectern. “Where do you want to start?”
“The beginning,” he said softly, dropping down to join her. “The very beginning.”
She sighed running her hand through her hair, her father’s death, painful as it was, was logically the place to start. “All right,” he said. “The day my father died,” she began softly. She stopped briefly, closing her eyes. The memory was as painful a wound today as it was three years ago. “Was just any ordinary day at first...”
A/N: The church that they’re sitting in is Saint George’s Memorial Church in Ypres, Belgium
Prologue
In the Realm of Shadows and Silence
“Laugh and the world laughs with you.
Weep, and you weep alone
For the sad old earth must bury it’s mirth
But has trouble enough of it’s own.”
-Ella Wheeler Wilcox, “Solitude”
The church was silent as Beatrix Tang walked in, the young Asian’s woman’s footfalls echoing through the empty building as she walked alone down the red carpet that ran between the blocks of simple wooden chairs. As she walked, alone she felt a shiver, and a foreboding presence run down her spine, as if ghosts had followed her down this empty path, lit only by candlelight in the darkness of the Belgian night.
I’m not surprised, the sixteen year old, clad in a dark blue double-breasted dress uniform with gold and white trim running along it and down along the outsides of both legs of the black pants she wore thought to herself, shaking her head. Thousands of restless dead must haunt this site, this city, where so many died for no purpose.
She sighed, she was used to the idea that the dead haunted this place, made sacred by their blood, toil, sweat, and tears in an unassuming town called Ypres, in the country of Belgium. She walked up to the lectern at the front of the church and stared around her. This was no ordinary church. This was a church dedicated to a specific time in human history. She stared around at the flags that hung from the walls, and stood on poles on the floor. She looked at the flags of regiments, so many of them bearing some representation of the crown of Britain and Commonwealth Realms. She looked around again, compelled by some deep urge to see that everything was just as it was a year ago, when she’d last made this pilgrimage. After a moment, she concluded as usual, that it was still as it should be. Not one regiment’s flag missing, not one Union Jack or Maple Leaf or other flag out of place, not one blue cushion bearing the embroidered symbol of a regiment missing from the rows and rows of chairs here.
Just as it was the year before that, and the year before that, and the year before that, she thought. No one in their right mind would want to steal from this place.
“I thought I might find you here,” a familiar voice said, snapping her from her pained remembrance and into a hasty salute. She looked up to see a fair-skinned young man with blue eyes and brown hair standing in the middle of the church doorway. The young man, taller than her and somewhat broad shouldered wore the exact same uniform as she did, with additional insignia that indicated a slightly higher rank than her. He was leaning against the side of one of the doors, his arms folded as he regarded her coolly.
“I’ve come here every year since I was thirteen,” she said, slightly annoyed at his reaction after he’d returned her salute. “Of course you’d find me here, Timmy.”
Timmy smirked, folding his arms, and said, in a half-serious tone. “Is that anyway to talk to your Commanding Officer, Lieutenant Commander Tang?”
“Of course not, skipper,” she said, smiling slightly and feeling something approaching happiness for the first time that day. “Can we drop the ranks, please?”
“Of course the ranks are dropped, Trix,” he said, an exasperated tone in his voice as he regarded her with annoyance. “I was trying to joke with you, you always get so serious this time of year.” At Trix’s incensed glare, he hastily amended that sentence with a, “not that I don’t understand of course. I was there to the end, after all.”
“And I love you as I love breath for it,” she said, smiling. “But that’s neither here nor there. Why are you here, Timmy?”
“Because I thought I’d share this moment with you,” he said, stepping forward slightly, “if you don’t mind, of course.”
She sighed, coming here alone had always torn at her, but she thought she owed it to the memory of what happened to these people commemorated here, the people she’d nearly died beside so far from home and nearly a century into the past, to let this always be a solemn, solitary moment. It always seemed disrespectful to be here with more than myself, which is odd considering that this is a church built to house large numbers of people for worship and to honor the people who died in the meat-grinder that was this very spot nearly a century ago.
But this time, something felt different, like maybe this time had to be shared with him who’d been there the entire time, the man who’d saved her life, and whom she’d saved in return, so many times over, a debt to each other that neither could or should fully repay.
Like maybe I should’ve done from the beginning, she thought to herself. She nodded slightly to him, and Timmy walked forward and took his place next to her on the right. After a few moments of silence, he said, his voice soft.
“For all our responsibility,” he said, “for all we’ve been through, it’s hard to believe that only a few years ago we had just become teenagers and were for the most part still stupid and carefree, our only constant companions being our fairies, at the different times we got them.”
“And before that I was a shallow, fairyless twit who hated you,” she said, lightly touching his arm. “Don’t forget that, sir.”
“I know,” Timmy said.
He sighed, a deep and painful sigh. “Do you want to finally talk about what we went through?”
“Why,” she said anger, and puzzlement coursing through her. “What’s the point? You were there along with me; you already know everything that happened firsthand. Beside you haven’t wanted to talk about it for three years. Why on earth would you want to do it now?”
“It’s unhealthy to never talk about things like this,” he said, stroking her hair. “But if you don’t want to…” He trailed off, signaling that the next move was up to her. If she wanted to talk, she wanted to talk, but if she didn’t, he wouldn’t bring it up tonight.
“No, it’s all right,” she said decisively, and sitting down on the steps that led up to the lectern. “Where do you want to start?”
“The beginning,” he said softly, dropping down to join her. “The very beginning.”
She sighed running her hand through her hair, her father’s death, painful as it was, was logically the place to start. “All right,” he said. “The day my father died,” she began softly. She stopped briefly, closing her eyes. The memory was as painful a wound today as it was three years ago. “Was just any ordinary day at first...”
A/N: The church that they’re sitting in is Saint George’s Memorial Church in Ypres, Belgium
