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Polar Explorer RPF - Prompt Post 1
This is for prompts for all things general Polar Explorer RPF.
If you've filled (or started filling) a prompt, please make sure to link it in the comments of the Fills Post. And if you would like to cross-post your fills on AO3, here is the collection!
Under this umbrella you can prompt:
Prompts in line with adaptations of Heroic Age stories can also fit here, for example if you want to specifically prompt Hugh Grant!Cherry from The Last Place On Earth getting wrecked (which someone really should).
No blorbo too obscure for this post! EXCEPT: NO PEARY ALLOWED. God I hate that guy.
Rules:
Regular view: https://coldboys.dreamwidth.org/925.html
Regular view, last page: https://coldboys.dreamwidth.org/925.html?page=999#comments
If you've filled (or started filling) a prompt, please make sure to link it in the comments of the Fills Post. And if you would like to cross-post your fills on AO3, here is the collection!
Under this umbrella you can prompt:
- Historical versions of Franklin Expedition(-adjacent) guys (Rossier, Gore/McClure, etc)
- Madhouse at the End of the Earth/Belgica Expedition
- Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration - Shackleton, Scott, Amundsen, Mawson
- Andrée Expedition
- Karluk Expedition
- etc
Prompts in line with adaptations of Heroic Age stories can also fit here, for example if you want to specifically prompt Hugh Grant!Cherry from The Last Place On Earth getting wrecked (which someone really should).
No blorbo too obscure for this post! EXCEPT: NO PEARY ALLOWED. God I hate that guy.
Rules:
1. Be fucking nice. YKINMATO/KINKTOMATO at all times.
2. This meme is CNTW (Choose Not To Warn) but warnings are highly encouraged.
3. Prompts should use this format in the subject line: [SHIP], [DESCRIPTION]
e.g.
Mertz/Ninnis, sex crying
Solo gen can be prompted as well alongside (a) character name and description
e.g.
Gen, Emil Racovitza, discovering a crazy new fish
4. Fills should use this format in the subject line: FILL: [TITLE], [PAIRING], [RATING], [ANY WARNINGS]
e.g.
Fill: The Very Next Day, Cherry/Birdie, E, cw self-harm
5. One prompt per comment please.
6. Multiple fills for each prompt are welcome!
7. You don't have to be anon for your prompts or your fills but we do encourage it because of the vibe. You're also welcome to deanon your stuff by posting on AO3/Tumblr as you please!
8. Feedback on prompts and fills is AWESOME; please take longer conversations to the discussion post.
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Racovitza, anyone, butchery
(Anonymous) 2022-10-02 03:36 am (UTC)(link)FILL: Expertise, Racovitza/Lecointe, T, cw animal death & talk of cannibalism
(Anonymous) 2022-11-29 02:49 am (UTC)(link)**
There is a unique tang in the scent of penguin blubber not unlike the pungent odors wafting through a portside fish market, but different in how it beckons one closer for how curiously mixed it is: the ever present salt, a hint of leather, something acrid and aged like guano, and then the slap across the face of spine-tingling copper when the penguin's blood oozes past muscle and skin. Nausea sweeps over Lecointe at the other end of the table, but the foul cloud passes as abruptly as it took him. The scent drifts from the wardroom down the passageway into the rest of the ship, mingling with the many other odors of their cramped living quarters.
Racovitza is precise with every incision. He pinches the short feathers and pulls the skin taut as he hovers the knife above the bird and practices his cut before slicing to the bone with ease. It is grim work made all the more macabre by Racovitza's cheery demeanor.
Beside him, Cook is recalling a colorful tale. His words are a garbled mess of English, German, and Dutch, and he conveys the most impact with his broad gestures and exaggerated expressions. Lecointe assumes he is talking of his close encounter on the ice; how Lecointe had almost mistaken him for a seal and shot him.
Once he understands—or understands as much of Cook’s story as he can—Racovitza roars with laughter, his whole body shaking. His knife slices upward, nearly nicking his chin, but the close call only causes another round of merriment between him and Cook.
Lecointe's face burns, and he returns his full attention to his own task. The tonite from today's crate is in poor shape, and he is salvaging what he can. He isn't optimistic about the soggy sticks before him, but there is more in the hold to scavenge. He refuses to give up hope yet.
"Kapitein!"
Lecointe raises his eyebrows; the use of his title implies that Racovitza is in a mischievous mood, one that Lecointe is in no mood to currently entertain. True enough, Racovitza is grinning at him from above the butchered corpse of the penguin. His hair is a mess from where he had combed his fingers through, brushing off snow, and there is a smear of blood across his cheekbone where he must have carelessly wiped his hand. His disheveled appearance doesn't deter him (in fact, it would likely only spur him on), and he waves his gleaming knife at Lecointe as he speaks.
"Our American friend says that you are the terror of our neighbors. You see anything moving off ship and—" He clicks his teeth and mimes holding a gun, the knife creating a silly if somewhat sinister pantomime bayonet. "—boom! Dead. More meat for me and for the chef."
Cook is laughing alongside him. Likely more from the display than fully understanding the joke. Regardless, Lecointe does not appreciate being the subject of such attention.
"We don't eat the seals," he reminds Racovitza. He sounds peevish even to himself, so he quickly amends, "Until Dr. Cook finds any benefits from their meat, of course."
Racovitza's eyes crinkle, his smile turning devilish. "We also don't eat people, so all the better that you didn't kill our companion."
Lecointe glowers. The joke is fast losing its momentum. If Cook senses the sudden tension, he doesn’t react to it. His head remains bent over his journal, sketching the penguin in mid-dissection. He seems content with his rendition and soon closes the book. His rising from the table incites the others to return to their work, Racovitza continuing to remove strips of meat from the penguin and Lecointe continuing to reorder the tonite.
Cook bids them goodbye, though all that Lecointe clearly understands is something about an evening walk with Amundsen. He nods as Cook leaves, offering a helpful if unnecessary reminder to watch for patches of thin ice to Cook's retreating back.
He sinks back into his seat. The smell of blubber and blood is nauseating to him again. The repetitive nature of his task—combined with the overpowering smell and the churning embarrassment in his chest—feels impossible. Not to mention futile.
Racovitza has already moved on from the awkward exchange. He is humming to himself as he rids the penguins of its flippers and deftly peels the skin from its back. The sight should disgust Lecointe as the closest he has ever come to such butchery is when he witnessed a cook plucking a chicken.
"You make it look easy," he says.
"Hm? Oh this?" Racovitza shrugs. "Years of practice."
And of course, Lecointe has seen him butcher a seal with such alacrity that his current dissection would appear sluggish. There is no squeamishness on the ice, no guilt weighing one down over the needless killing. There is only the piercing cold air, the crunch of ice underfoot, the burning in one's lungs, and the bounding of blood between one’s ears as they catch their prey. Racovitza has the efficiency of a military surgeon when he field dresses a kill, be it penguin or seal. He retrieves his knife from its sheath and removes the creature's skin with no more than five long gashes. The blood spilling onto the snow always steams into Lecointe's face, his cheeks flushing with satisfaction. When Racovitza hands him the pelt, Lecointe imagines he can feel the heat of its cooling skin seeping into his hands and warming him all the way to his toes. For the briefest of moments, all but his primal nature is stripped away, and his whole body quakes with the strange liberty the feeling affords him. Such a sensation should terrify Lecointe, but instead, he finds himself eagerly drawn to it.
The knife clinks against other tools, the noise loud in the small room. Lecointe's fingers slip on the twine he is knotting around the tonite. The skinned penguin lies open before Racovitza.
He resumes his earlier train of thought: "It is no different than you and your guns. Bombs, whatever." He waves his bloody fingers toward the skylight in a dismissive manner. "You learn about the small things in the larger things until it becomes a structure that makes sense to you. Simple really."
Lecointe snorts. "Yes, that sounds incredibly simple."
Racovitza pauses after removing an organ from the penguin. He brushes some hair from his face with his wrist, but still more flecks of blood cling to his forehead.
"What I said before. It was a joke," he says, after a moment. "A bad one, maybe."
It was a halfhearted apology but an apology nonetheless , and one to which Lecointe doesn't know how to respond.
"It was," agrees Lecointe. "A joke, I mean. Not necessarily bad. Only…unexpected."
Racovitza smiles at his stumbling of words. "But you knew it was just a joke. Good."
He resumes his work, selecting a scalpel—tiny compared to the rather intimidating hunting knife—to cut into the penguin's stomach.
“But I would suggest,” Racovitza continues, his face lighting up when he sees something he deems interesting inside the penguin, “we have more people learning anatomy."
Lecointe frowns. "Why is that?"
"If you shoot our only surgeon, we won't have anyone who knows how to properly butcher him."
Lecointe gapes in stunned silence. Racovitza doesn't look up from the penguin except to drop a specimen of half-digested viscera into a jar. The first puff of air from Lecointe is more a sigh than a laugh, squeezed out of him from pure surprise. Then he is doubled over, laughing so hard that it is nearly painful. By the time he can do little more than wheeze, he slouches back in his chair and wipes the tears from his eyes.
"You are a madman," he says.
Racovitza shrugs, allowing himself to smile.
"Besides," Lecointe adds, feeling rather devious himself now, "wouldn't you be the best one to do it? You already know how to cut up the penguins."
"What praise. Thank you.” He thinks a moment, staring skyward. "I could learn. It might be important to know in a disaster."
"God-willing we don't have a disaster like that," mutters Lecointe.
Racovitza continues undeterred, "Of course, you need to get rid of unwanted body parts. One long cut from chin to groin should do." He mimes the slash, ending with the knife at his hip. The metal glints in the lamplight, drawing Lecointe’s eye. Racovitza trails it suggestively from the front of his trousers to his backside. "Now, the best meat from a human would come from the arse—"
Lecointe barks another laugh. "All right, you've made your point."
"—but that depends on the man, I suppose. I wouldn't suggest Arctowski. No, you need someone large with muscle. I would say myself, but all flattery aside, we can't keep killing our only butchers."
“Deciding by lottery might be best. Or have volunteers.”
“Martyrs, yes! Are you saying you would volunteer yourself?”
Lecointe’s mouth drops open, once again stripped of speech. Unbidden, he imagines what such a scenario would look like, what it might feel like (foolish! he’d be dead), whether or not the metal of the knife would be cold against his skin or warmed from Racovitza’s capable hands. First cut, chin to groin. Those hands on naked skin and underneath his skin, touching in him in impossible, unknowable ways…
As Lecointe’s silence grows, so does the width of Racovitza’s smile. Lecointe knows he has to say something fast to make this conversation less damning to himself.
“Let us hope it does not come to that,” he finally says, the conviction weak in his voice.
There is a second where Racovitza’s eyes gleam, and Lecointe fears he won’t let this go. But he just nods and continues cleaning up the tools from where they’re strewn on the table.
“Yes, let us hope,” he says.
Lecointe hurriedly bundles the rest of the tonite, returning the sticks to their crate. He stands fast enough that his legs collide with the table and his chair squeaks against the deck. He holds the crate fast before himself—carefully positioned at his waist. Racovitza stares at him, eyebrows up and expectant. His hands are suspended in the air, interrupted from cleaning the scalpel.
“Everything fine?” he asks, pointedly glancing at the crate in Lecointe’s hands.
“Yes,” answers Lecointe, too quickly. “I’m needed for next watch—” A lie. A clumsy one, at that. “—I must be going. Enjoy your…penguin.”
Racovitza’s mouth has grown thin and white, his eyes wildly alight with whatever sarcastic remark he’s forcing himself to swallow. “I will.”
“Good.” Lecointe manages to leave the wardroom with some of his dignity intact (he hopes), but Racovitza’s parting words pierce him as he leaves.
“Enjoy your watch, Kapitein! Try to not shoot the surgeon.”
The teasing lilt in Racovitza’s voice makes the comment all the worse. Lecointe hurries into his cabin to compose himself before passing through the forecastle to the hold; he is in no state to be seen by any of the crew.
And what a state. He sits on the edge of his bed, willing a more stubborn part of his anatomy to behave itself. Instead, he thinks of blood-spotted knuckles and a grinning face and a gleaming knife the length of his forearm, and the twinge between his legs only grows more uncomfortable.
He buries his head in his hands with a sigh. “You idiot,” he groans softly to himself. How will he possibly live this down?
Re: FILL: Expertise, Racovitza/Lecointe, T, cw animal death & talk of cannibalism
(Anonymous) 2022-11-30 05:20 am (UTC)(link)Those hands on naked skin and underneath his skin, touching in him in impossible, unknowable ways…
INCREDIBLE.