Her eyes were like a tractor beam...

Mmkay, so I wish the ending of this were stronger. Also, why do I have to integrate "America's Next Top Model" references into every crackfic I write? Geeze. (Srsly, where has my originality gone? There's an astronomy reference in this one, just like there was in my last KotOR 2 oneshot... clearly, I need to stop writing these while doing homework. Although I did kind of like the way the Kavar fic turned out. And I liked the reference in this one.)

It's LOST, it's for lady_boromir, and the prompt she gave me was "whipped cream".

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you... crap, I don't have a name for this yet. I'm now offering YOU the chance to name this fine piece of crazy! WOO!

Srsly, any ideas, people?

I'm not exactly positive how to introduce this, so I'm going to do that thingy that lady_boromir does, even though I think that's generally for challenges.

Title: ???
Fandom: LOST
Characters/Pairing: Daniel/Charlotte, Ben/Hurley/John (not like that, sickos), Claire, Christian... Nikki/Paulo/worms... and a Desmond cameo!
Rating: G... for Good grief, someone WANTED you to write this??
Warnings: Season 4
Summary: Charlotte takes a seduction tip from the first season of her favorite ABC show, John Locke starts to wonder if Jacob is just playing games with him.
Table/Prompt: See, this is when I realized that this format basically exists for comm challenges or something.
A/N: Takes place directly after 4x11, so just... pretend that 4x12 hasn't happened yet.





Daniel Faraday sat on the beach, desperately trying to remember.

Breathe, he thought. Inhale. Exhale. Why can’t I focus?

“Well?” Charlotte’s voice cut through Daniel’s concentration.

“I, ah… Elyse Sewell?”

Charlotte sighed. “No, Dan. She was the second runner-up. Adrianne Curry won Cycle 1 of America’s Next Top Model.”

Daniel clutched the sides of his head. “So frustrating.”

Charlotte frowned, worry showing through her unyielding exterior. “Daniel…”

“I just… I should have known that. I mean, Adrianne… she was on The Surreal Life and she married that Brady guy…”

“I know. Look, it’s an easy enough mistake to make.”

Charlotte put her hand on his shoulder. Surprised, he looked up, and as their eyes met, he found himself unable to look away.

Charlotte continued. “After all, Elyse was the clear front runner throughout the competition.”

Light returned to Daniel's eyes.

“Yeah… she was.”

Oh, Charlotte, he thought, your eyes are like a tractor beam, and you the Death Star of which I am so in awe. Of, if I were ever to find an old man with a silly, hyphenated name inside your mind, trying to shut you down, I would be your Vader… I would strike him down to preserve your beautiful soul! Oh, but wait… then he would become more powerful than I could possibly imagine… that’s no good…

“Dan?”

Ah, I’ve got it… Charlotte, your eyes are like a black hole, compelling everything around you to enter them with their gravity! You warp my space-time, you draw me in… oh, Charlotte, if only you’d let me in… let me reach your singularity, where everything is infinitely small and yet infinitely massive… that sounds kind of wrong, never mind.

“Dan.”

“What?”

She furrowed her brow. “You all right? You kind of… went blank there.”

“Yeah… I’m… hungry.”

Charlotte’s gaze fell. “Hungry. For what?”

“Yeah, the… the radiation and the magnetic field… they really make you hungry for… for whipped cream.”

“Whipped cream?”

“Yeah, it’s weird.”

Charlotte smiled. “I’ll see what I can do.”

She got up and ran off.

--

“Why are you back, John?”

John Locke sighed.

“They didn’t buy it.”

Christian Shephard raised an eyebrow. Uncomfortable, John shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

After a moment, John seemed to hear a “whoosh,” and he vividly recalled the events of a few minutes earlier.

--

“Move the Island,” Ben had said, almost amused.

“Dude, the whole ‘everyone-has-a-twin’ theory makes more sense than you saying that some dude in a suit in that cabin told you to move the Island.”

Ben and Hurley had looked at each other then, and both had begun to laugh hysterically.

“It’s not funny,” John had insisted.

“Yes, John,” Ben had said between spasms of laughter, “it is.”

“It’s hilarious, dude,” Hurley had said in agreement.

--

Their laughter still echoing in his mind, John heard another “whoosh” sound, and turned back to Christian, who had fallen asleep.

John cleared his throat. Christian awoke.

“Oh, sorry. You talking again?”

“While you were flashing back,” Claire said from behind John, “I stole your wallet.”

John turned to her. “I don’t have my wallet, Claire.”

Claire laughed loudly. John shook his head and turned back to Christian.

“They don’t think it’s possible to move the Island.”

“So?”

“So they’re not going to help.”

John paused. “How are we going to move the Island, anyway?” he asked.

“Jacob isn’t sure you’re ready to know.”

John sighed. “What do I need to do?”

Christian smiled. “Jacob wants you to prove your loyalty.”

John nodded. “I’m ready.”

Christian’s smile grew.

“Jacob says… stand on one foot.”

“Which foot?”

Christian scowled. “I don’t care.”

“What does Jacob say?”

Christian rolled his eyes. “Jacob says… left foot, I guess.”

John calmly moved onto his left foot.

Christian’s smile returned. “Jacob says… make a flamingo noise.”

John tried.

“Hmph. Sounds like a wild turkey, but I’ll give it to you anyway. Now, hop once.”

John hopped.

Christian laughed so deeply that it was nearly a growl.

“Jacob didn’t say.”

--

Desmond sat on the freighter.

He unbuttoned another button on his blue shirt.

All around the world, women sighed.

Desmond leaned back. It felt good to be pretty.

--

Ben and Hurley threw open the cabin door.

“What’s taking—“

Ben was stopped short by the scene before him.

John and Christian were sprawled out, limbs crossed, over a Twister mat.

“Left hand on green!” yelled Claire.

“So that’s where my Twister mat went,” Ben said.

“What’s going on in here?” Hurley asked, exasperated.

“John’s proving his worth,” Christian said, one arm reaching towards green.

Claire dropped the spinner.

“I sense a disturbance,” she said, running out of the cabin.

Silence ensued.

Christian fell over.

“Yessss!” shouted John.

--

Charlotte smiled. “Found some,” she said, sitting down again next to Daniel.

Daniel looked at her, brow furrowed. “Found what?”

“Whipped cream.”

Daniel’s face lit up. “How did you know I wanted whipped cream?”

Charlotte sighed. “You told me.”

“Oh.” Daniel thought about this for a while.

“Never mind,” Charlotte said, pulling out an aerosol can from behind her back.

“Looks kind of light,” Daniel said, his smile shy.

“Give me your hand,” Charlotte said. With a slight twitch, Daniel did.

Taking Daniel’s hand, Charlotte shook up the aerosol can and pressed down on the trigger. Nothing came out.

Daniel looked up at her, confused.

“HEY!”

Charlotte and Daniel looked up to see Claire running towards them, enraged. With a fearsome leap and a wordless battle cry, she snatched the aerosol can out of Charlotte’s hand and somersaulted to her feet. She whipped around. Daniel let out a squeak and buried his head into Charlotte, who, while terrified by the behemoth that was Claire, felt and subsequently suppressed an urge to yell the word “score”.

“NO ONE PLAYS THE IMAGINARY FOOD GAME EXCEPT FOR ME AND MY DEAD HOBBIT!”

Claire turned and through the aerosol can into the ocean. As she turned back to Charlotte and Daniel, the terrifying look on her face fell and was replaced by a look of confusion.

“Where… where am I?”

Daniel began to straighten up, but Charlotte held his head down tightly, and Daniel felt that perhaps movement was not going to be the most successful strategy.

“How did I get here?” Claire asked.

Daniel scratched his head. “I can’t remember.”

Charlotte sighed. Daniel went on.

“I could really go for some whipped cream right now.”

“Oo,” said Claire, “I could go for some peanut butter.”

Charlotte pushed Daniel away. “I could go for some people with functioning brains.”

Daniel considered this, then jumped up and ran after her. “Wait! Charlotte! I just remembered something about your eyes!”

--

Elsewhere on the Island, Nikki and Paulo were still dead.

This was a relief to some of the more desperate worms on the beach, as a beach was really no place for worms anyway, given the instability of tunneling through sand and the infrequency of dead bodies to scavenge now that so many of the redshirts had gone off to the Others’ town with John Locke instead of staying on the beach.

--

“…also, they’re like the tractor beam… but before Obi-Wan Kenobi shut it down!”

“Right.”

“But you’re… you’re not like the Death Star or anything. You’re much less… much less… something. Lots of things. But also, so much more. Charlotte, does that… does—“

Charlotte turned to him and kissed him.

Sun, witnessing this, grinned. Jin entirely owed her five dollars now.

Pulling out of the kiss, Daniel looked slightly confused. “So… was it the Death Star that convinced you, or the space/time distortion?”

Charlotte sighed, and, tossing up her arms, walked away from him even faster than before.