#rae dang

I went with Viscaria -- Dance with me

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“Do you wanna dance?” Hannah calls over the blare of the bandthat’s playing.

“I’m not much for dancing,” Rae shouts back.

Her ears are already aching, and they’ve barely been herefor half an hour. It’s a whole group thing, Hannah and the rest of Jami’sfriends showed up for the weekend again, and it’s almost the end of the schoolyear so they went to a different bar than usual. Rae hadn’t realized that meantlive music. The rest of them have hit the dance floor already.

Hannah’s face falls a bit, but she says, “Oh, okay. We canjust hang out, then.” Only she has to shout it, practically, because thebackground music is so loud.

“You can go without me,” Rae calls.

“No, it’s fine, I’d rather be with you.”

Rae’s throat feels unexpectedly tight. She and Hannah havebeen a Thing for six weeks. Not a Thing, a couple, an actual honest-to-Goddating couple. They’ve texted practically every day, and chatted a lot, butthey haven’t actually spent time in the same place. Much less being a couplewith other people around. She’s keenly aware of Hannah’s presence in the seatnext to her, the faint smell of the soap she uses, but neither of them seemsquite sure what to do.

Two booths over a guy and a girl are making outenthusiastically. Rae eyes them with discomfort and a bit of jealousy. There’sno way she’s going to be all over another person in public like that. Even Hannah.Who’s her girlfriend.

She reaches for Hannah’s hand, half reassuring herself thatthe last six weeks haven’t been an elaborate fantasy. Hannah takes her hand andsqueezes it, hard.

Fuck it. It’s too loud to hear each other talk, anyway. “Actually,”Rae says, “yeah. Let’s dance.”

Hannah lights up with a smile. “Really?”

“Yeah!”

Rae doesn’t exactly know dance moves. But the music is loud,and the beat isn’t hard to find, and no one is looking at her anyway, andHannah’s a joy to watch, bouncing and sweaty and lost in the music.

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@ferociousqueak tagged me for this, and this frankly seems like the perfect time for diversion via memes.

I’m going to do this for Hannah Shepard and Rae Dang, Julian Shepard’s parents. :D

Rule for the Thing: Bold the ones that are true for one (or both) of them, and italicize the ones that are sometimes/situationaly/kinda/partially true

height difference | mutual pining | first kiss | first love | wedding | in-jokes | lgbt+ | family disapproves | friend disapproves | would die for each other | fake relationship | arranged wedding | cuddlers | pda friendly | and they were roommates (not a whole lot before being married, actually) | holding hands | secret relationship | opposing worldviews | opposing personalities | opposing goals | getting a pet | have kids | want kids | grow old together | relationship failures | rests head on shoulder | share a bed | token dummies | relationship doubts | they have a song (they have different songs that make them think of each other) | first date | share a jacket | sharing a blanket | mutual interests | study buddies | bathing together | crash into hello | accidental nudity | laundry | same hobbies | cooking for each other | big fancy gala | sibling rivalry | hair stroking | dancing | laying in the grass | watching stars together | watching the other sleep | shared values | friends to lovers | enemies to lovers | lovers to enemies | childhood friends | slow burn | love triangle | toxic relationship | sitting on each other’s laps | can’t be together | hugs | forehead touches | neck kisses | car/motorbike rides | compliments | nicknames | falling asleep together | late night talks | gifts

I picked “a night kiss” out of these! Thank you for some lovely choices! :D

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Half-asleep, Rae reached idly across the bed and found theother side empty. That was enough to rouse her, and she squinted blearily atthe clock. Three am. Too early even for Hannah to be up.

She sat up and frowned into the dark room. She couldn’t tellwhat had waked her. It might even have been the lack of Hannah’s weight by herside, but she wasn’t sure how long Hannah had been gone. A little light bledthrough under the door, so Rae swung out of bed and shuffled out in her bedroomslippers.

The Alliance’s housing allotment for married personnel witha child was still pretty damn small, so Rae only had to take three steps out ofthe room before she got to their living room. There she found Hannah sprawledon the couch with her eyes closed and her mouth open, and theirnot-quite-two-year-old son playing placidly with a cloth book on the floor.

“You’re supposed to be in bed, kiddo,” Rae told him quietly.Julian patted the fuzzy animal on the page without paying her any attention.With a shrug, Rae sat down on the couch and kissed Hannah on the cheek. “Hey.”

Hannah blinked herself awake. “Huh?”

Rae grinned at her. “The kid’s supposed to be in bed at thishour and so are you.”

“Gah.” Hannah rubbed her eyes. “I heard him fussing, and Iwas just going to get up long enough to get him settled...”

“Well, he seems happy enough now.” They both surveyed thetoddler tugging at the pages of his book.

“Happy, but not sleepy,” Hannah said with a sigh.

“Maybe he’s just a night owl.” Rae snugged an arm around Hannah’sshoulders. “It’s not like he has anywhere to be tomorrow.”

“Mm.” Hannah twisted her head to give Rae a long kiss.

Literally everyone wanted this one, hi @dearophelia​, @theherocomplex​, @thievinghippo​, and @bigassmagnet​!

Anderson delivers the news about Julian Shepard’s death to his moms:

“So are you looking?” Rachel demanded.

Anderson took a deep breath. “No.”

“So let me get this straight, you don’t actually have a body or any idea where it is, but you’re still fucking going with presumed dead?”

“Rae,” Hannah said softly.

“One surviving crew member believed the commander’s oxygen line was damaged at the time of ejection.” It was easier to say if he put it clinically. “Even if that wasn’t true, hardsuit oxygen supplies would never have lasted more than a few hours. It took hours for the escape pods to be picked up. It’s been days since.”

“And the Alliance isn’t willing to rile up the Terminus pirates by searching the Omega system,” Hannah finished.

Anderson nodded. “That’s right. I’m sorry.”

It almost would have been easier if they’d cried. As it was, both of them simply stared at him, dry-eyed, and then Rachel muttered, “This is bullshit,” and walked out.

Hannah glanced over her shoulder and then returned her attention to Anderson. “Thank you for your time,” she said.

There’s not a whole lot more to it than that, honestly.

4. Coldest VS Most emotional: For coldest I’m going with Maeve Surana, who certainly can be warm and caring, but is also capable of detaching into a very cool-headed logical pragmatism. Most emotional... hm. Maybe it’s just that I’m playing her right now, but I think Nim Amell feels all the feelings, even if she sometimes masks them.

11. Most ticklish VS Cruellest tickler: Hannah Shepard is actually super ticklish and this is a deep dark secret that she and Rae guard together. (I’m counting Hannah as an OC since there’s so little of her in canon.) Cruellest tickler:  Alex Shepard, because when you are the shorter than all three of your siblings you have to be merciless sometimes.

19. Cast iron stomach VS Most squeamish: Val Shepard will eat just about anything and, being a biotic, metabolizes it before a stomachache occurs. For most squeamish, I’m thinking Rae, who is fairly picky and sensitive to food textures.

Hannah Shepard, highly organized and super-efficient morning person, won that draw.

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Hannah woke languorously, dreams dissipating into barely remembered fog even before her eyes were open. She sighed and stretched, the sheets sliding against her skin. She could just feel Rae’s warmth behind her, on the other side of the bed, and could dimly hear the cheerful noises of some kind of children’s program coming from the next room.

Her eyes snapped open. What happened to her alarm?

Rae gripped her shoulder before Hannah could spring out of bed. “Relax. It’s Saturday.”

Hannah fumbled for her omni-tool on the bedside table, squinting to bring up the clock. “What time is it?”

“I dunno, around nine or something?”

“Nine?” Hannah never slept in so late. On weekday mornings she was up by 0600, like clockwork, and on days off she let herself sleep an extra hour. Sleeping until 0900 sounded so decadent she felt ashamed of herself. “I have to --”

“You have to do fuck-all,” Rae said firmly, squeezing Hannah’s shoulder.

Hannah rolled over to regard her wife pathetically. Rae looked like she’d gotten up, and even changed into a less faded tee shirt than the one she slept in. She’d evidently climbed back into bed, though, which made Hannah feel helplessly fond of her and vaguely annoyed all at once. “Why did you let me sleep so late?”

“You looked really peaceful.” Rae leaned over and kissed Hannah’s cheek. “You’ve put in a lot of extra hours this week. I figured you probably needed the rest.”

Hannah sighed, because Rae was undoubtedly right. The fact that she hadn’t woken up on her own until now was proof enough of that. “But I had plans,” she said, her voice coming out small.

“Yeah? Like what?” Rae draped an arm over her and snuggled closer.

“I was going to make a batch of cookies, and work out for an hour, and take Julian down to the park for a while… uh, Rae?”

“Yeah?”

“Where is Julian?” Their four-year-old was usually awake long before now, too.

“Watching some kids’ program about all the new aliens. Don’t worry, he had breakfast already. I can keep our kid alive for a few hours at a time, remember?”

“I know that.” Hannah groaned, rubbing her eyes. “Gah. As much as I’ve been working this week, I was planning on getting in a lot of Mom Time today.”

“Come on, it’ll be fine. We can still do most of that stuff. Everything doesn’t have to be planned down to the minute. Spontaneous can be good.”

Hannah wrinkled her nose. “This from you? You hate last-minute stuff.”

“I hate last-minute invitations to parties and shit. Hanging out with you and the kiddo for the day doesn’t qualify,” Rae countered.

Hannah let out a breath and tried to shed the nagging sense that she ought to have been up and making plans with her family hours ago. “Okay. You’re right. You’re right. I’ll try to relax and have a nice day.”

“Good. So now I got a question for you.”

“What’s that?” Hannah could guess, from the smirk that took over Rae’s face, but she wanted to hear it.

“Do you want breakfast? Cause I could make pancakes, if you want. Or… do you need help relaxing? Cause I could probably do something about that, too.”

Hannah bit her lip. “Do you think we won’t be interrupted?”

“I checked the time on that vid. I think we’ve got forty-five minutes or so left, in case you wanted some Wife Time to go with the Mom Time.”

“I definitely do,” Hannah breathed. Rae looked delightfully mussed and pleased with herself already. “And pancakes afterward?”

They met when they were both eighteen. Rae’s college roommate, Jami, had been Hannah’s high school friend, and Hannah was off at the Alliance Academy, but came to visit her friend on a weekend’s leave. They crushed on each other pretty much immediately, although it took them a while to work their away around to realizing it.

8. What (if anything) do you relate to within their character/story? 

Sometimes I too am very cranky and don’t like dealing with people. Also I, too, wouldn’t know what to do with a baby if handed one unexpectedly. Rae’s introversion is more extreme than mine, but relatable to me.

12. What have you found to be most difficult about creating art for your OC (any form of art: writing, drawing, edits, etc.)? 

I consider Rae to be not neurotypical, but it’s tricky to figure out how hard to lean into that; I don’t want to be heavy-handed or overly stereotypical in writing her.

14. If you had to narrow it down to 2 things that you MUST keep in mind while working with your OC, what would those things be? 

a) prefers puzzles to people

b) when it doubt, throw in some profanity

To be honest, I haven’t written her all that much yet, so it’s possible that will change over time, but that’s where I’m at right now!