Type: Prose

Length: 300-500 words

Description: Write an impactful scene between two or more characters where words are not spoken. Optionally, also no described thoughts - i.e using only body language and cues.

SUPPORT

They sat in the elevator carriage with seventy-eight other passengers, awaiting the final go-ahead from Ground Control. Fern clenched her eyes shut, folding her ears back flat against her head. The perfume in the air did a poor job of masking the various canid smells. She wrinkled her nose. There was a ScentGuard in her backpack underneath her seat, and she bent forward to grab it, but almost immediately leaned back, putting a paw to her mouth and trying not to retch.

A comforting touch on her shoulder -- Blade was looking at her concernedly, eyebrows furrowed in that earnest expression that was so characteristic of him. She gulped and nodded, then lowered her paw to the armrest, gripping and releasing it in a loose rhythm. The murmuring in the room was just on the edge of perception, a drone that blended in with the rumbling of the great engines warming up outside the carriage.

Now the go-ahead from Ground Control, and the final countdown. Fern’s lips moved without sound, mouthing a silent prayer, and she dug her heels into the floor, hooking her right foot around the leg of her seat. The floor trembled, and she gripped the armrests tighter. On an impulse, she forced her eyes open. The carriage had dimmed its lights in preparation for ascent, but she could still see the tired old wolf sitting across the aisle, staring at her without expression, as if she were a piece of cheese at the grocer’s.

A warmth enveloped her paw, and she looked down. Blade’s slender coyote digits atop hers, thumb stroking her fingers gently, willing them to loosen up, let the blood flow through the whitened knuckles. She turned to look at him, and he smiled at her, his slightly lopsided grin just visible through the darkened lighting. She would have held his paw with her free one, but the force of the ascent was enough to keep it pinned to the armrest. So she just focused on his smile, his golden eyes, the piercings in his ears. Focused on his thumb on her paw, stroking her worries away. And, despite the circumstances, despite herself, she found it in herself to smile back.

Final word count: 366