Fic: Mercy (Mirror!Philippa/Michael)

[rivendellrose]

Mercy (1653 words) by rivendellrose
Fandom: Star Trek: Discovery
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Michael Burnham/Mirror Philippa Georgiou
Characters: Michael Burnham, Mirror Philippa Georgiou
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Jealousy, Possessive Behavior
Summary:

The universe is hard, my love, and you, with your mercy and your pity and your qualms, you are soft. But don't worry. I am here now, and I will keep you safe.

The Michael Burnham of this universe isn't the one that Philippa Georgiou lost. But she's still Michael Burnham, and that means she's hers.

Notes: This diverges slightly from canon in that it posits that instead of having been Emperor Georgiou's adopted daughter, the Michael Burnham of the Mirror Universe was her consort. A similar shift in the Prime universe version of their relationship is also assumed.

Thanks as always to gaslightgallows for beta-reading and encouragement.

Comments

[indiegal]

I am now headcanoning this story taking place in Philippa's cabaret, just fyi =D

[rivendellrose]

...Oh my god, I am totally going to have to write something where Michael comes to visit Philippa's cabaret. This totally could have happened there, too, though!

[indiegal]

I'm still just trying to get over the concept of the Emperor, possibly the most evil woman in the universe of evil people, running a cabaret! It's like some kind of weird AU - if I'd read it in fanfic, I'd be going 'well this isn't very plausible!' XD

[rivendellrose]

I'm torn on this. On the one hand, like you said, it feels very much like an AU or at least fanfic. On the other hand... I kind of love that? It's not at all what I expected this version of Philippa to start out doing with her life in our universe, but a the same time it's clearly just a starting place, and I kind of love the idea of her walking away from near-genocide and Michael telling her to "be good," wandering back to the Orion district because it's the one place she knows on the planet, and then seeing the cabaret and being like "...Well, shit, I don't know what else to do, so why don't I buy that place?"

Or scare the shit out of the owner, or kill them... y'know, whatever happened that left her in charge. Probably some combination of scaring them and buying them off, possibly pure threatening or killing.

Anyway. The former most powerful woman in the universe, brought low, is just like, "Fuck it, this place is shit but I guess I'll stay here for a bit while I figure out what to do next."

And that poor dancing boy throws a goddamned party, because he hasn't realized yet that she will break his heart into a million pieces.

It's weird, but I kind of love it.

[indiegal]

I do love that the Disco writers seem to be throwing all the rules out the window and just writing what they want to write, and then explaining it later and we all go ‘Ohhh I see, that’s what was happening there!’ So maybe that’s what this is all about too?

I think she’s probably there partly because it’s a good place to hide, yet keep informed about what everyone else is up to, and partly because she’s probably going ‘I’m just gonna have fun for a bit!’

The poor dancing boy XD