In-County Vietnam by Auburn (FRAO)

[farad.livejournal.com]

Fandom: THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN
Pairing: Ezra/Vin, mainly
Length: novella - approx 37,000 words.
Author on LJ:  auburnnothenna
Author website: http://www.eternalvox.net/~auburn/index.html

This won a runner-up award for the Best Adult Non-ATF AU, which means it was darn close in points to sara_merry99's "Sepulcher Mountain" which won (see my last entry).  And I have to say, it would be a close vote for me as well.  This is a wonderfully dark story, set during the 1970's in Vietnam - during the war, and up through the American evacuation/pull-out.  Auburn does a stellar job with the characters, keeping them where we see the canon in them, but also adapting them so well to her universe that one can actually see them there.  It's a dark story, though, as I said, very much like "real life" in many ways.  And real war.  It's those qualities to it that appeal most strongly to me, but I do warn you.

 

JD looked bleak, fiddling with the black leather strap to his Leica, talking about what he'd heard among the other reporters at the Continental. "There's talk of a coup. Ky's been talking to some of the senior generals." His dark hair flopped in his eyes.

JD had become paradoxically hardened yet remained innocent. All the horror and ugliness he recorded with his camera, even picking up a gun and using it to kill, hadn't touched something basic in him; he still believed in people. He still hurt for them, but it was covered by a slick ice of cynicism now. It made him a strange mixture of boy and man.

A prototypical American, Ezra had declared fondly, sweet and merciless the way only the young can be.

"They won't do it. They're more concerned with getting out and they've been warned that the US won't welcome them if they side with Ky," Larabee said. He looked tired too. His amorphous position with the embassy and the Judge Advocate's Office meant he saw and heard a lot, but had little power to do anything about it. The frustration had been growing in him for weeks.

Ezra sipped his café sua and stared down the street. It was abominably early by his standards. The sun hadn't started heating the air yet and the streets still smelled pleasantly of flowers and damp. He was freshly shaved but hadn't bothered knotting the thin tie looped around his open collar. The fingers of his free hand drummed restlessly against the tabletop. His eyes felt bruised and burned. "The French want Big Minh."

"Fuck me," Buck said while he rubbed at his bloodshot eyes. He'd been flying non-stop every day since Da Nang fell and it was catching up with him. Even his mustache looked wilted.

Ezra snorted. "You're not my type." It was a weak jape, but Buck jumped on it.

"Yeah, I know, you like 'em skinnier. It's breaking my heart, Slick." He patted his chest, leaving his hand over the pink hibiscus on the gaudy Hawaiian shirt he wore over his gray Air America uniform. A heavy gold bracelet like most Air America pilots sported glinted in the morning light on his dark haired arm.

Ezra watched Vin swallow hard and wondered. Vin had to know it was no more than Buck and Ezra trying to lighten things up. He couldn't be jealous. He hadn't touched Ezra in months... but Ezra still wanted him. He hated himself for that. He thought Vin would hate feeling that way too, if he did - which his liaison with Charlotte Richmond indicated he didn't.

JD leaned forward and looked at Ezra earnestly. "He's really crazy about you, Ezra. All those women...? Just trying to forget how you broke his heart."

Buck cuffed JD's shoulder.

Ezra looked coyly at Buck and fluttered his eyelashes outrageously. All of them ignored Vin looking away, gritting his teeth and growling. He'd been as touchy as Larabee for months; they'd grown used to it.

"Why, Mr. Wilmington," Ezra drawled in an thick Southern accent, "I wasn't aware you cared. I swan, I am just overwhelmed."

JD and Nathan both began snickering. Josiah shook his head fondly. Even Larabee managed a tired smile at their antics.

Larabee waited until they were in control again. "Minh?"

Ezra nodded.

Buck whistled. "Yeah?"

"Yes."

"He's nothing. Nothing. Duong Van Minh." Nathan shook his head. "They make him president and the North is going to roll into Saigon the next fucking day."

"Ezra? What the hell are the French thinking?" Larabee asked.

Ezra shrugged jerkily. "Do not ask me. I don't make policy. If the French had a good grasp of what works in Vietnam, they'd still be in power."

Buck chuckled. "Got a point there, Slick." He spread butter on his croissant and ate in three bites. "So, what do you think?"

Ezra scratched at his arms in an uncommon display of nerves. He stopped when he noticed Nathan watching. He felt like his skin wanted to crawl off him and knew what it meant.

"It's time to get out."

Auburn does an excellent job of mixing all the elements that the reader needs to understand what's going on and why, keeping it historically accurate and realistic, but not too much so.  The atmosphere is as heavy and pungent as the country it's set in, and easy to get as lost in the story as the jungles.  Another very  worthy award-winner.

In-Country Vietnam

Comments

[st-crispins.livejournal.com]

Hey:

send me your email address. My computer crashed and I lost my address book.

[auburnnothenna.livejournal.com]

It took runner-up? I've got to check my old email more often. Sweet.

Oh, and thank you for the really generous description of this story.

In case you want to update the post, it's auburnnothenna on LJ and IJ and gmail and the website is Allusions at http://www.eternalvox.net/~auburn/index.html

[farad.livejournal.com]

COOLNESS!!! Thanks for the updates - and congrats! MOMA winners are here: http://malarkeyseven.0catch.com/2008/08AwardWINNERS.html - feel free to check it out.

Thanks for the website link as well - I can't wait to check it out!!! More M7, I can only hope????

[auburnnothenna.livejournal.com]

Just the two M7 stories, despite my love of westerns. I fell headfirst into SGA shortly after finishing In-Country and never surfaced again. Now I have to go drape my TV in black crepe, though M7's a good example of a fandom surviving just fine without new canon.

[farad.livejournal.com]

And you know - M7 and SGA cross-over beautifully. I know, I've done it. Think about it. Rodney and Ezra together in conversation are a delight.

Yeah, I've got my cape out as well. I'm really gonna miss this show. I came into it late, but it's been a lot of fun.

[auburnnothenna.livejournal.com]

Don't feed the plot bunnies! I can't write a short story if you put a gun to my head and I'm trying to thin the herd not add to it.

[farad.livejournal.com]

Chris and John, Woolsey and Josiah, Radek and Nathan, Keller and Buck, ronon and Vin and Teyla . . . Wraiths who I adore (they actually sold me on the universe, truth be told). I can just see Buck flirting with a Wraith queen. Up to the point where someone shoot her.

[auburnnothenna.livejournal.com]

Damn you. They would make a good SG team.

But I'd very likely snake Eza and make Josiah a Jaffa or an ex-Ori Prior - which would place them in SG-1's galaxy rather than Pegasus. I'd pay good money to see Buck and Vala in the same scene though.

Oh, I'm not doing this. I'm not. I have a zine story due and other things to finish and I keep putting off my nervous breakdown. This must go into that file of things like the misbegotten and never finished Alias/M7 crossover.