bookblather: Natalie Dormer looking smugly off-camera. (Miranda Hennessy: Natalie Dormer)
bookblather ([personal profile] bookblather) wrote in [community profile] rainbowfic2015-04-05 05:45 pm

Spring Green 6: Killer Queen

Author: Kat
Title: Killer Queen
Story: Shine Like It Does
Colors: Spring green 6 (you're not innocent, I'm not innocent)
Supplies and Materials: Mixed media, miniature collection, canvas, frame, illustration, acrylic (How do you feel?), oils (a perfect storybook ending), stain (That all men are equal is a proposition which, at ordinary times, no sane individual has ever given his assent. - Aldous Huxley), beading wire (this eagle), novelty beads (“I am good, but not an angel. I do sin, but I am not the devil. I am just a small girl in a big world trying to find someone to love.” ― Marilyn Monroe)
Word Count: 2000
Rating: PG-13
Summary: A fanmix for Miranda Hennessy.
Warnings: Description of a knife attack, mention of a nonfatal poisoning.
Notes: HUGE images behind the cut.


Natalie Dormer in white, staring at the camera: text reads "Killer Queen, a Miranda Hennessy Fanmix"

download here

Natalie Dormer in black ducking her head and smiling at the camera; track list is to the right.

1. Killer Queen, Queen

She's a killer queen
Gunpowder, gelatine
Dynamite with a laser beam
Guaranteed to blow your mind
Anytime


"It's like he knows you, Andy," Jack said, sounding awed. Miranda considered kicking him.

It was true, of course. Killer queen, queen and killer; she couldn't think of a better description for what she would like to be. Not that she planned to involve dynamite in her life at any point, but still... the idea was attractive.

She chased Jack out of her room anyway, because it was her room and he was being a pest, then sat listening to the song, over and over. Killer queen. Attractive, impossible, deadly, perfect. Killer queen. Yes.

She liked the idea very much.


2. Ballad of a Politician, Regina Spektor

Work it, work it baby
Work your way 'round that room
You're gonna make it big some day
You're gonna make a boom


She always knew she was going to be exceptional.

How could she not be? Her father was famous, an actor and a producer. Her mother was a lawyer, deadly and unpredictable. She was beautiful, intelligent and quick. How could she be anything else?

It wasn't until she grew older that she realized the downsides of being exceptional. Of fame-- the constant attention, people watching and judging. Of deadliness-- people feared you whether you wanted them to or not. Of beauty, and femininty-- being ignored, being disliked.

She was still going to be exceptional. She would just have to take it.


3. Bubblegum Bitch, Marina and the Diamonds

I'll chew you up and I'll spit you out
'Cause that's what young love is all about.
So pull me closer, and kiss me hard
I'm gonna pop your bubblegum heart


Miranda began the work of making herself impressive immediately.

She began with the outside, with dress and hair and makeup, and moved to the inside, with poise and capability and cool quick repartee. Shoes that clicked on the floors she walked on, language that snapped with intelligence and skill. She aspired to brilliance, and hoped that she achieved it.

And, of course, she learned to use people.

It wasn't as bad as it sounded. Most of them wanted to use her in return; she simply did what they would have. And if she hurt people...

Well. That was just life.


4. Poker Face, Lady Gaga

Just like a chick in the casino
Take your bank before I pay you out
I promise this, promise this
Check this hand cause I'm marvelous


It all went back to confidence, and the knowledge that she was better than any of them.

College, law school, the bar exam, work. Everything she did, she did well, or she did it again, and better. She would be good-- she would be better than good. She would be perfect. She would accept nothing less from herself.

And if others did not believe that, well, that was hardly her problem. She would simply show them, again and again, how very good she was, until either they accepted her strength or she crushed them entirely.

She almost preferred the latter.


5. Cheap and Evil Girl, Bree Sharp

A cheap and evil girl sets out on the city
She's moistened every curl, she's poisonously pretty
And the unsuspecting fool falls prey
As the dim detective's lead astray
And the genuflecting boys all say
The cheap and evil girl will get her way


If people would just stop... underestimating her, if they would stop hurting people she loved, then she wouldn't have to do things like this.

Miranda did know that was a self-serving way to think about things, but it was true. She really wouldn't do these sorts of things if people just respected her. Poisoning that woman was necessary, or Charlotte would be hurt. Andrew Dalton had hurt her siblings; he deserved to be in jail. Men who underestimated her deserved to be fleeced. Traitors deserved what they got.

She deserved to get her way. It was just how things were.


6. Red Lipstick, Ke$ha

Red's the color of passion, of love
Got the color of evil and blood
Painted on me with such intention
Gettin' your full attention


Miranda gave up on men about the time she turned twenty-five.

Not on sex. It was easy enough to get that. A slinky dress, high heels, blood-red lipstick and a glance over her shoulder, and men would fight to buy her drinks, to kiss her, to take her out in the alley and fuck her against a wall.

If Miranda was honest with herself, she preferred things this way. No need to negotiate a man's tantrums or assumptions about her, no need to fold herself smaller to make him feel more comfortable.

It could be lonely, but it was better.


7. Must Be Dreaming, Frou Frou

I must be dreaming
Or we're onto something
I must be dreaming
For I don't fall in love lawlessly


It wasn't supposed to be like this.

She'd given up on men. She'd given up on romantic love, on love of any kind that wasn't from someone related to her. She'd given up and here he was, brushing kisses along the curve of her eyebrow. It wasn't supposed to feel like this. It wasn't fair.

Miranda closed her eyes. None of this made sense. She'd given up for a reason-- she wasn't the sort of woman who got the happily ever after. There had to be some kind of catch.

She just wasn't sure she could bear to find it.


8. Have You Got It In You? Imogen Heap

All at once, not a whisper, nor word
Then all at once
Let me have it all, let me have a battle on,
Easy target,
Look can we just
just get it over with.


She left Peter on a Saturday, and got stabbed on a Monday, and the two feelings were not all that dissimilar when she thought about it. The same shock, the same ripping pain, the same plunge into freefall that she thought she'd never escape. And, to be honest, she'd probably done both to herself.

Not that knowing that made either one hurt any less.

But God was merciful and she wouldn't have much time to endure either. It seemed there really was such a thing as too much pain.

It would be over soon. She just had to remember that.


9. Dark Side, Kelly Clarkson

Everybody's got a dark side
Do you love me?
Can you love mine?


Her mother clutched her hand and muttered in rapid Spanish, words of fear and anger and love. Her father kissed her hair, and dampened her skin with tears. Charlotte climbed into bed with her and cuddled up as she'd not done since they were children. Jack buried his face against her shoulder and howled. Peter knelt by her bed and pressed her hand to his forehead, breath shuddering. Emily and Seb brought armfuls of flowers.

They all knew, what and why. They knew, and they still loved her, every one of them.

Miranda didn't even try to keep from crying.


10. This is the Future, Owl City

Release your high hopes and they'll survive
'Cause this is the future and you are alive
Dive in and swim away
From your lonely nights and miserable days


She found, quite unexpectedly, that she was happy.

Miranda had never thought she would be happy. Contented, certainly. Pleased with herself and her life, absolutely. Happy seemed superfluous at best, and impossible at worst. And still.

Still, there were her brother and sister, her parents and friends, her extended family. There was the work that she loved, both sides of it. There were her pretty house, the voice lessons she was taking up again, Peter's dogs, Glory's homework. There was good wine, and dancing with her husband, and playing with her daughter.

She was happy.

She could live with that.


11. Winter, Tori Amos

When you gonna make up your mind
When you gonna love you as much as I do
When you gonna make up your mind
Cause things are gonna change so fast


She knew her parents worried about her. She wasn't sure why-- she was a straight A student and never got into trouble at school, at least not that anyone reported. Still, they worried about her, while she took care of her siblings, did her homework, went to voice lessons and field hockey practice.

It bothered her. Sometimes she thought how she could reassure them, ease their fears so they would look at her with nothing but pride. Useless, though; she couldn't solve a problem she didn't know.

She knew they were proud of her. She only wished they wouldn't worry.


12. Beautiful, Glee Cast

You are beautiful no matter what they say
Words can't bring you down....oh no
You are beautiful in every single way
Yes, words can't bring you down, oh, no


To Miranda, Charlotte was perfect.

She knew intellectually that this was silly. No human on earth was ever perfect, and there were flaws in Charlotte's character; a frailty, a kind of timidity that Miranda despised in other people. In her sister, though, it only made her more lovely, more perfect, as she bent over her homework or the piano's keys.

Miranda loved her sister fiercely, had since she first saw her. Charlotte could be hurt so easily, so badly; well, Miranda would never let that happen.

Her sister was perfect, and anyone who said otherwise would have to face her.


13. Landscape, Florence and the Machine

Cause she's just like the weather, can't hold her together
Born from dark water, daughter of the rain and snow
Cause it's burning through the bloodline
It's cutting down the family tree
Growing in the landscape, darling, in between you and me


She and Jack were more alike than she was comfortable with.

For his sake, not hers. Miranda knew who she was, and she knew her flaws; she had accepted all of them long ago. But Jack...

Well.

He was far more open-hearted than she was, far easier to like. But like her he was difficult to love, to understand. She thought perhaps he would be more so if he were not bipolar; it gave people a hook, a place to start.

She loved him, defended him, just as fiercely as their sister. But oh, how she wished they were different.


14. White Knuckles, ok go

So come and let it all out, let it bleed
Did you get what you want? Did you get what you need?
Behind the lines, behind the walls
Tell me what's the bet you made, was it that bad after all?


Seb was closer to both of her siblings than he was to her, for all he was her friend first. Miranda didn't mind. She knew it was difficult to get close to her; knew that she made it difficult, if not always on purpose.

Still, he was dear to her, if only because they'd known each other since they were twelve. There was a time when she told him anything, and vice versa. There was a time he helped her understand herself; she thought maybe she'd managed the same for him.

They supported each other. It was all she asked.


15. Walk Like Models, The Vettes

We walk like models, we walk like models
In the lipstick jungle, the lipstick jungle
We walk like models, we walk like models,
Boy, you'll never really know what a girl is about


Emily was her roommate starting freshman year, and it seemed more or less a given that they would be friends forever. Two women-- girls, then-- of color in a white man's world, with red hoods and high heels and axes held behind their backs. Meeting Emily had been like meeting another self.

And they were still friends, still close, still sharp-toothed women in stiletto heels. There were wolves in the world but they were sharks, and they could always, always get their way.

Sometimes Emily did destroy her in Mario Kart, bitch that she was. Every friendship had its bumps.


16. A Bird Flies Out, The Weepies

Maybe I'm too jaded to love somebody like you.
Maybe I want to love my dream that'll never come true and
Someone who is real, oh, gets in the way
And moves inside my heart, not just my head


She didn't expect to love him. Not really. She expected to go dancing and have a few meals and then leave him like all the rest. Maybe kindly, because he was a kinder man than most, but she would leave him nonetheless.

Except somehow that day never came. They went dancing and had meals and eventually she slept some nights with him, stayed until morning and woke up on worn cotton sheets with his arm curled around her waist.

She'd never had a relationship like this before. He got in the way, and she had no idea what to do.


17. A Hopeless Attempt, Charlotte Martin

I didn't mean to do it
I didn't mean to love you
I didn't mean to chant it so
All the ways I cannot want you


She knew what she was, what he was. She knew what she would do to him. She had to keep repeating that, or she couldn't do what had to be done.

Peter was just too damn good for her. She did not think that out of any lack of self-esteem; it was nothing more than a clear-eyed assessment of them both. She was a bad person so her family could be safe, and he had never had to make that choice.

Would never have to make that choice. She would not allow it.

No matter what it did to her.


18. Home, Vanessa Carlton

Even now when I'm alone
I've always known with you
I am home


He made her feel so safe.

It wasn't that Miranda had never felt safe before. It was more that she made other people feel safe. She was her family's protector, the guardian of her friends and loved ones. No one had protected her since she'd turned sixteen and made it clear to her parents that she could handle herself.

And she could. Peter never made her feel like she couldn't do things; only that she didn't always have to, that now there was someone to help her.

She didn't have words to describe how that felt, except maybe "like home."


19. Rocks and Water, Deb Talan

I will be rocks, I will be water.
I will leave this to my daughter:
lift your head up in the wind


Miranda loved her daughter almost viciously.

It wasn't unusual-- she loved everyone that way, her siblings, her parents, her Peter. But Glory was something else again. Glory was her daughter, her child, part of her in a way no one else was. Glory was...

She wasn't the most approachable mother, or the most outwardly loving. Glory went to Peter with her little problems and triumphs. What she was... she was her daughter's protecter, enforcer, example. Glory would be safe, and well, and cared for. Glory would understad her value.

Glory would be loved, if someone had to die for it.


20. Choosing Life, Philip Glass

[instrumental]


She was not a nice person, at her core.

She was an exceptional person. She was clever and quick and brutal when she had to be, ruthless and selfish and gentle when she could be. She was extraordinary, she knew that. But she was not nice.

But then, nice was not the same as good, and she could not doubt the good. Not when her parents loved her so, when Charlotte adored her and Jack treasured her and Glory admired her and Peter... and Peter.

She was not nice. But maybe she was good.

And maybe that was good enough.

[personal profile] greenling 2015-04-06 03:43 am (UTC)(link)
I love your format here. The character is fun too, I have a lot of love for ambiguously-villainous characters.

Mario Kart: testing friendships since 1992.
finch: (Default)

[personal profile] finch 2015-04-06 08:46 am (UTC)(link)
You are fabulous and she is fabulous and your taste in music is fabulous.

And I may have to steal this format.
novel_machinist: (Default)

[personal profile] novel_machinist 2015-04-06 07:03 pm (UTC)(link)
The format for this was really fun. I loved the spacing and the pace of the whole thing. The end was extremely nice.
kay_brooke: Two purple flowers against a green background (spring)

[personal profile] kay_brooke 2015-04-08 02:13 am (UTC)(link)
Yay, another fanmix! I remember when you did a bunch of these for In the Heart, and I just really love the format and the little bits of characterization that get examined. And Miranda is a great character for this, because she just has so many layers.
shipwreck_light: (Default)

[personal profile] shipwreck_light 2015-04-12 02:53 am (UTC)(link)
It wasn't as bad as it sounded. Most of them wanted to use her in return; she simply did what they would have. *ROLLS ON GLORIOUS LINE*

Mmm, Miranda crushing foes. I prefer that as well.

no need to fold herself smaller to make him feel more comfortable. Ppffff yes

HENNESSY CUDDLING

Glory would be loved, if someone had to die for it.

AND MORE EEE

I LOVE THIS

THANK YOU
with red hoods and high heels and axes held behind their backs.

ALSO YES (ALWAYS WITH THE MARIO KART I SHALL NEVER TIRE OF THAT)