Cold Hill's Side

Fanfiction
Title:	Cold Hill's Side
Author(s):	Dee
Date(s):
Length:	4800 words
Genre(s):	slash
Fandom(s):	The Professionals
Relationship(s):	Bodie/Doyle
External Links:	Cold Hill's Side, Archived version
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Cold Hill's Side is a Bodie/Doyle story by Dee.

It was published in Slagensh and is online.

Reactions and Reviews

This story took me by surprise when I read it for the first time after it came online in March 2005. I hadn't seen the zine it was published in and I'd also never heard the story talked about, so I had no idea what it was about. I enjoyed it, and I've now reread it a couple of times and still like it. Why is that so surprising? It's an elf story! It's one of the few elf stories I actually like--primarily because Dee gives us elves as they are in ancient lore: Dark beings with an illusive beauty who bear no goodwill towards humankind.

It also helps that Doyle isn't an elf, avoiding the cliche. The story is set in an alternate universe in which Doyle works for CI5, but Bodie doesn't. On surveillance one night near some standing stones, Doyle follows a horseman inside the stone circle and finds himself in the midst of a group of glittering, exotic dancers. Doyle is immediately aware of his otherness, but his focus centres on running to ground the man he followed:

Doyle was vaguely convinced, as he dodged this way and that, that the amusement created the music they danced to, but he was beyond caring about it. Frustration built in him as his futile chase went on and on, his breath coming short, his face flushed, sweat prickling all over his body, until finally he stopped short, looking wildly about himself, on the verge of breaking out into a howl of inarticulate rage and defeat--and there the other was, right in front of him, within reach.

Doyle reached. He caught the other by his wrist, closing his fingers about spun-steel strength, suspecting even as he did so that he was being allowed to. The sounds of amusement from the crowd peaked, then ebbed, and the form of the dance changed as the music became lighter, more airy.

This story's my favourite of Dee's; I enjoy her take on elves, the characterisation, writing, and the way the fic becomes an origin story.