comment_fic | Tuesday: Careers

Hello, everyone. I’m still

ami_ven and today's theme is careers. Prompts should be about or involving long-term work choices.

Just a few rules:
No more than five prompts in a row.
No more than three prompts in the same fandom.
Use the character's full names and fandom's full name for ease adding to the Lonely Prompts spreadsheet.
No spoilers in prompts for a month after airing, or use the spoiler cut option found here.
If your fill contains spoilers, warn and leave plenty of space, or use the above mentioned spoiler cut.

Prompts should be formatted as follows: [Use the character's full names and fandom's full name]
Fandom, Character +/ Character, Prompt

Some examples to get the ball rolling...
+ Star Trek (any), any, “This is why we joined Starfleet.”
+ The Princess Diaries, Mia Thermopolis, running a country is a full-time job
+ Any, any, it’s a living

We are now using AO3 to bookmark filled prompts. If you fill a prompt and post it to AO3 please add it to the Bite Sized Bits of Fic from 2021 collection. See further notes on this new option here.

Not feeling any of today’s prompts? Check out the just created Lonely Prompts Spreadsheet. For more recent prompts to write, you can also use LJ’s advanced search options to limit keyword results to only comments in this community.

While the Lonely Prompts Spreadsheet and LJ's advanced search options are available, bookmarking the links of prompts you like might work better for searching for in the future.

tag=careers

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

ami-ven.livejournal.com

Star Trek (any), any, “This is why we joined Starfleet.”

From:

ami-ven.livejournal.com

The Princess Diaries, Mia Thermopolis, running a country is a full-time job

From:

ami-ven.livejournal.com

Any, any, it’s a living

From:

canonisrelative.livejournal.com

The X-Files, Dana Scully +/ Fox Mulder, Telling each other stories of their childhood, they end up laughing over what they thought they were going to be when they grew up.

From:

canonisrelative.livejournal.com

Leverage, Sophie Devereaux, Sophie has said that her first con involved taking a job as a pastry chef in Paris: show us a day in the life of young Miss Devereaux, newly unleashed on the world.

Edited Date: 2021-11-23 07:29 am (UTC)

From:

canonisrelative.livejournal.com

Star Trek Voyager, Kathryn Janeway +/ Seven of Nine, Janeway reminiscing and telling Seven about her early days in Starfleet.

From:

brumeier.livejournal.com

Stargate Atlantis, John Sheppard +/ Any, he joins the expedition as the math whiz instead of the pilot

From:

cornerofmadness.livejournal.com

Prodigal Son, Malcolm Bright + Gil Arroyo (and Martin Whitly if you want), Both Gil and Martin do not want Malcolm to join the FBI

From:

cornerofmadness.livejournal.com

Angel the series, Angel, Connor, Angel wants him to go to college and have a career

Edited Date: 2021-11-23 03:34 pm (UTC)

From:

cornerofmadness.livejournal.com

Prodigal Son, Edrisa Tanaka, realizing she wasn't cut out to deal with live patients and what was she going to do now

From:

cornerofmadness.livejournal.com

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Buffy Summers + any, sometimes she thinks about what Willow and the rest of her friends could have been had they not met her

From:

apachefirecat.livejournal.com

Sometimes she thinks about what this town would be like if she had never come here. She's lost so many friends already, and she knows that it isn't ending any time soon. Every night is a battle just to survive, forget the normal headaches and heartaches of school.

She knows Willow just recently turned down a more advanced school that could have easily paved the way for the kind of education her best friend truly deserves. She wasn't supposed to see the envelope, but her books got knocked out of her arms when they were attacked while walking home. Buffy had made short work of the single Vampire, but she had noticed the envelope when she'd helped Willow regather her things. She had noticed it, and Willow had quickly swiped it out of her hands but not without a murmured admission that it had been her mother's idea and a deep blush brighter than her short hair. Buffy's heart had ached for her, and it had been aching ever since.

Normally she can reason her position in this place. She can justify her presence in the other's lives, because she's saved their lives so many times. But that doesn't make it right. It's bad enough that she has to deal with Vampires, Demons, and all the other things that go bump in the night. But she's the Slayer. Her friends have no such destiny. Theirs are being stolen from them every night that they're having to focus on staying alive and helping her keep others alive rather than on what they want.

Willow could have had such a bright future; she still could, if she'd leave Buffy and the rest alone. There is nothing that girl's mind could not do. She could easily be the first female President, or beyond. What was more powerful a position than the Preisdency? Buffy wondered, chewing her bottom lip. The Queen of the world? Willow could do that even, she knew; she could bring everybody together in peace and become the royal matriarch over them all.

But instead, she's stuck here helping her keep everybody else safe. She's stuck here, fighting to live in a world full of things that were not even supposed to exist. Buffy's future could have been bright, too: a husband, a loving home, maybe working as a salesgirl or even a fashion designer with one of the up and coming companies that populated sunny Cali. It was bad enough her future had to be ruined, but she couldn't have done half the things of which Willow was capable.

Then there was poor Xander, she thought, watching him walk down the sidewalk with Wills from where she stood on the edge of one of the higher buildings in the town, watching over everybody. Poor, loveable Xander. His grades weren't good, his mind wasn't much better, but his heart... She had never known anyone with a bigger, kinder heart. What could he have done? She doesn't know, but she's certain his love could have led him to helping people in another way, a much better, calmer, safer way than patrolling with her every night.

"Dead." The single, softly spoken word startled Buffy. Her hand closed around the hilt of her stake, but she hesitated to pull it. She turned from her overlooking position to face the oncoming Vampire.

"Angel." His mere presence did strange things to her, things she didn't want to think about tonight.

"They'd be dead," he clarified for her, saying the words with the same calm manners as a normal human being announcing the calm weather. "Just like... What was his name? Xander's best friend?"

"Their best friend," she clarified instantly. "Jesse. The three of them grew up together."

From:

apachefirecat.livejournal.com

"And if it wasn't for you," he insisted, "they would all be dead." I would be dead. I still feel dead when you're not around. But he would not, could not, tell her that. She had far too many burdens on her already for the tender age of seventeen; he wasn't about to add to them. He would help her as far and for as long as he could, but he swore yet again, watching her beauty shine in the moonlight, that he would never hurt her.

"You really think so?" she whispered, looking back down at her friends. She noted the way they were both looking around as they spoke and realized it was not with apprehension. They were not afraid they were about to be attacked; rather, they appeared to be looking for her.

"Yes," he spoke fervently. "Buffy, you're what keeps this town from being overran. You save lives every night. Stop beating yourself up. You're just a girl doing the best you can --"

"I'm not just a girl," she snapped. She had saved countless lives, and she was so sick and tired of hearing everybody, even those who knew what she did on a nightly basis, all she risked to help and save others, tell her that she was too young. Too young to do this, too young to do that! She had not been too young to be called; therefore, she must not be too young to save the world! But she couldn't save them, she thought again, looking back down at her friends.

"You save them every night," he whispered, watching her with compassion shining in his large, dark eyes, "and not just from Vampires. Those two were so very lonely when you came into their lives."

"How do you know?" she questioned, not looking back at him. "Did you watch them?"

"No," he answered, "but I didn't have to. Watch them now. Listen to them. They were so very alone before, even with Jesse. And just like Jesse, they would not have made it through so many of the Vampires and other creatures who have attacked them if it was not for you. They value you. They need you, and not just for your heroics."

"Buffy?" This time, she clearly heard Willow's voice calling out for her.

She glanced at Angel, then shrugged, ran over to the ladder, and started climbing down. Seconds later, she popped up beside them. "Hey, guys." She swung her arms over their shoulders, as though she had not been hiding and only just caught up to them, as though she was merely their friend and didn't think, perhaps even know deep down, that they would be so much better off without her.

"They need you for your love," he whispered, watching Xander recover from his initial jump at Buffy's sudden appearance and listening to Willow babble about their plans for the night. Maybe tonight, they could actually be just kids. All three had much bigger destinies ahead of them, but they were just children. Maybe tonight they could get away with being only what they were meant to be at this stage in their lives. The Vampires were low, and he could keep them away from them -- for a night. Maybe he could give her one night of normalcy, he thought, his heart aching, and swept silently alone behind them.

The End