Disclaimers: The characters of Xena: Warrior Princess and all other associated with the television series of the same name are owned by MCA/ Universal Pictures. This is a work of fan fiction and no copyright infringement is intended.
Subtext: I guess with my writing so far we'll just quit calling it subtext and call it maintext. Yes they are in love with each other.
Sex: Implied.
Violence: None
Language: Mild
Spoilers: May contain spoilers for 4th and 5th season XWP
Other: These things sneak up on me in the middle of the night. Sometimes I wish I could sleep instead, but let’s see how this goes, shall we? It’s 2:30 am here in the States and I actually got out of bed to write this because I couldn’t get back to sleep once the idea hit me. Sad but true.
The Cutting Room Floor
By T.Novan
TNOVAN@aol.com
Gabrielle cuddled the baby.
Eve snuggled down into the embrace of the other woman who held her, loved her and told her stories. The baby decided that if she could get a warm meal here too all would be right in her world, but her other Mommy was the one who handled that detail so all in all life was pretty good for the little one.
She dozed as they continued their walk down the street and she was sound asleep by the time Gabrielle entered the inn and found her partner sitting at a back table, head leaning against her fist, picking through a dish of stew with a spoon.
The Bard moved to the Warrior, snuggling Eve closer to her, she gave her partner a playful shove with her hip to get her move over on the bench. "Why so glum chum?"
Xena sighed, sliding down a bit to give the Bard and Eve the room they required. "People think I’m mean to you."
"That’s not true Xena."
"It is too. Everyone’s talking about it."
"Define everyone."
"You know. ‘Everyone’." Xena growled.
"Oh ‘them’." The Bard grinned, looking down at the sleeping baby. "Well, they don’t know everything now do they?"
"Guess not." Xena mumbled. "Just frustrates me to no end."
"Well, don’t worry about them. It’s not their fault. It’s ‘their’ fault."
"Yeah, well, if the Gods would butt out…"
"I’m not talking about the Gods Xena. I mean come on, they’re not bright enough to tell the real Eve from a doll. I’m talking about ‘them’."
"Michael and his group of buttinski angels?" A dark brow rose with the question.
"Hey easy on Michael. If it weren’t for him, we wouldn’t have Eve. No, I’m talking about ‘them’." Gabrielle growled, lifting her eyes up long and hard. "You know."
"Oh yeah TPTB."
"Yup those be the ones." Gabrielle smiled when Eve grasped her finger and drew it to her little mouth to suck on.
"Yeah they’ve been a royal pain in my backside this year too. But it’s because of them that everyone thinks I’m being mean to you all of the sudden. I don’t touch you enough, I don’t spend enough time with you, I don’t even say your name right anymore apparently."
"You say my name juuuussst fine." Gabrielle smirked a bit. "As for the rest, that’s not our fault. Besides you’re not the only one getting picked on, you know. They think I’m frigid and going to run off with the first nice looking guy that comes along."
Xena straightened and turned to Gabrielle. "You’re not, are you?"
The Bard groaned and rolled her eyes. "Great God no Xena! If I were gonna do that why in the world would I still be here?"
"True. Sorry."
"It’s okay. I know you didn’t mean it. Just another example of mediocre writing."
< TN cleared throat. "Un… excuse me?">
The Bard looked up, laughing slightly and gave a small wave. "Sorry, forget I said anything." She turned to Xena, whispering. "Cripes I gotta watch that. I forget they’re just every friggen where."
"And that’s where the problem is. Everyone sees everything we do."
"Sorry Warrior," Gabrielle shook her head. Then gave Eve a little kiss on the top of her head. "I have to say the problem is, everyone ‘doesn’t’ see everything we do and that’s where the problem is."
"Yeah they didn’t see the massage I gave you the other night did they?"
"Nope."
"Or the way you fell asleep with your head in my lap during lunch the other day while I fed Eve."
"Nope. And they didn’t see it the other night when I had to fight you for the blankets because as per your usual warrior self, you stole most of the covers in the middle of the night."
"I was cold." The warrior whined a bit.
"Then wear clothes to bed." Gabrielle mimicked the whine.
"I started off wearing clothes to bed. You’re the one who demanded I take them off."
Gabrielle blushed and gave her throat a little scratch as she cleared it slightly. "Whew, I’m glad they didn’t see that."
Xena stabbed at the stew with the spoon again. "I wish they had."
"You want people to watch us make love?" Gabrielle leered a bit. "Xena you pervert. I didn’t know you had it in you."
"Don’t read much do you?"
"Huh?"
"Well, from what I’ve read, I’ve have you everywhere from a meadow to on Argo, while we were riding down the road I might add. And in every way humanly possible and in some ways that just aren’t possible without one of us having spare body parts. An arm here, a spare leg there." Xena gestured into the air. "Would have been easy while we were in India and I was possessed by Krishna, but unfortunately I wasn’t in the mood then."
"True. If it didn’t involve hacking and slashing, it wasn’t happening."
"Another missed opportunity."
"You do know that it’s not always our fault."
"Meaning?"
"Meaning, sometimes we do it and TPTB take it out."
"Really?"
"Un-huh…what about that duet you and I did together when we did the show with Jace and Draco?"
"OH YEAH! Damn I forgot about that!"
"Snip. Hit the cutting room floor."
Xena sighed. "You know the sad part of all this?"
"What?"
"They’ll never see this either because it’ll hit cutting room floor too."
<TN intervened again. "Nah, no worries there, my friends. I’ll ship it over to MaryD and everyone who counts will see it.">
"Finally!" Xena threw her hands up. "Someone with a brain!"
"Eh, it may not be the screen time we need," Gabrielle agreed. "But it’s a start. Now stop pouting and kiss me."
Xena smiled, leaning over to her partner. She looked down briefly, rubbing her thumb over Eve’s head, before returning her attention to the Bard. "I can do that."
<Fade Out>
Note from TN : Now we really didn’t need to see it, to know it happened, did we?