<1k words, rated T, angst, Milippa Prime, POV Michael Burnham, no archive warnings apply
Summary: In a world where Philippa Prime was saved instead of her Mirror self, all good things still must come to an end.
On Ao3 • more Milippa fics • prompt me!
Prompts (meaning spoilers) below the cut!
The 'last kiss' prompt immediately made me think of something like this right here, but that has already been done a lot, so to change it up a bit I decided to go with a Terra Firma one-shot from a bit of an unspecified AU where we have Philippa Prime in place of Mirrorgiou during the events of season 1-3. Maybe her life was saved via time or dimension travel, and that's why she now has to leave via portal?
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For @thepromptfoundry's November event Trope Fl!p Fest, @onaperduamedee prompted 'Last kiss for Milippa prime or mirror (I miss them)?' - I miss them too, so that was a very welcome prompt!
While going through my inbox looking for past prompts I hadn't fulfilled yet, I found two other Milippa prompts I decided to combine with this one, an anon prompted ‘kissing so desperately that their whole body curves into the other person’s’, and @my-gaydar-is-on-point prompted ‘'sounds of crying' for Philippa Prime or Milippa Prime?’
"Care to spar, Number One?" Philippa called across, her eyes glinting with what Michael recognised all too well as anticipation.
"Always, Captain," Michael replied, forcing down the hot, tightly-wound prickling feeling that had sparked into existence inside her belly in answer to that challenging gleam in Philippa's eyes.
In which Michael's human heart is playing decidedly non-logical tricks on her, the gym is free, and Philippa Georgiou is gorgeous.
For my one and only sauce jar and fandom wife, @aleksandrachaev. 😘
For this year's @startrekfemslashweek, I had the silly idea to squish as many prompts as possible into one work! I didn't quite manage to get every single one, but at least I've got one or both from each day :) It turned a bit silly because they don't really all go together, but I think the result is pretty fun! Posting today for the main prompt I used, which is if course Tribbles :D
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'At least it's not the Borg this time,' Michael thought as she struggled with several specimen of a species that was arguably an even bigger threat to Starfleet than any Borg cube.
She had just cleared out the tribbles from the replicator while floating in zero gravity because the artificial gravity had failed hours ago, when more furry beasties spilled in through the vents, the environmental controls started to fail with a noticable drop in temperature, and Captain Georgiou was forced to call for a complete evacuation.
Oh well. The Shenzhou had been getting on in years after all, maybe it was time for another ship to take them through space and time!
In the days before their new ride could be made ready for takeoff, Michael and Philippa spent some quality time together, including a picnic under the stars - well, it had been supposed to be a nighttime picnic, but as they were surprised by a downpour, it turned into a mad dash towards the safety of a roof over their heads. Long before they made it however, they were already completely soaked - and as it now didn't matter anymore as they really couldn't get any wetter, Philippa pulled Michael into her arms for a steamy kiss!
~
You can also find this and more Star Trek fic on my Ao3 • more Milippa and Star Trek on tumblr • prompt me!
For today's @duckprintspress May Trope Mayhem prompt: a Milippa meet-cute AU ficlet.
Direct follow up to Part 1, read that first!
total 1k words, rated G, no warnings apply :)
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Tilly hurries out of the room, and Michael leans back against the sink with a sigh. She feels kind of silly waiting in the bathroom when her dress has already been fixed, but on the other hand, she doesn't want to walk around with an obvious safety pin disaster if she doesn't have to...
Turning her neck to look at the mirror behind her, Michael manages to catch a glimpse of the pins and winces. Tilly was right, it does look pretty obviously macgyvered.
Before Michael can really start to worry about it, Tilly comes back and hands her a beautiful green silk wrap.
"Here! Yes, that colour works even better than I thought it would!" Tilly excitedly holds up the fabric against Michael's dress.
"That looks expensive," Michael murmurs, pinching a bit of fabric between her fingers. It feels as expensive as it looks. "What if it gets damaged? Especially with those pins..."
"Oh, don't worry about it, it'll be fine I promise! I'll take responsibility if it tears or anything, and Philippa can't ever be mad at me."
Michael has to chuckle. That, she believes - even after their short interaction, she already can't imagine anyone really getting mad at Tilly.
Wrap secured around Michael's shoulders, covering the back of her dress, the two women leave the bathroom and make their way through the crowd back to the ballroom. When Michael admits that she has no-one to have dinner with, Tilly insists that Michael accompany her back to her table.
There, they find Philippa, whom Michael realizes with a swooping sensation in her stomach is someone she is already acquaintaned with...
"You didn't tell me your friend is the/ Professor Philippa Georgiou!" She hisses at Tilly who keeps dragging her along despite Michael attempting to duck behind some people to stay out of sight.
"You know each other?" Tilly asks excitedly.
They're close enough now for Philippa to hear, and she looks up with a smile, eyes widening when she sees Michael.
"Professor..."
"Miss Burnham?"
Tilly looks from one to the other and back. "I had no idea you two knew each other! Why didn't you say? Did you do research together?"
"Not really -" "Yes, back when -" they talk over each other, and Philippa chuckles and waves for Michael to- "please, go on."
"No, I mean, yes, I guess we did, but I mean, I was just a student at the time, so it's more that Professor Georgiou did the research and I was assisting..."
"Oh, don't sell yourself short! Your insights were always invaluable. And please, call me Philippa. We're both equals as guests here, and as researchers in the field now, after all."
Blushing at the praise and the invitation to call her erstwhile Professor whom she had always admired by her first name, Michael quickly nods and lets Tilly usher her into a seat.
As she sits down and has to adjust the shawl, Michael remembers with a jolt that the fabric that is now lying across her own shoulders is Philippa's/ - that it must have been draped across the other woman's shoulders just minutes earlier -
Avoiding her gaze and hoping that no-one can tell how quickly her heart is beating, Michael tries to focus on literally anything else. She can't help it, though - she wishes it wasn't just Philippa's shawl touching her skin, but Philippa herself.
@thelastuncharteddawn thank you so much for this ask, omg that's a whole list of ideas! I'm going with the tattoos appearing prompt for Mirror Milippa this time but I thought I'd leave the ask in my inbox for future reference, so maybe you'll get another prompt fill later :D & I haven't written the full fic for this one yet but I've got the outline down, for now here's the already finished intro, and I'll let you know when I post the rest of the fic on Ao3!
Philippa had known about soulmates since she was young, of course. About couples and triads bound so tightly in trust and affection, nothing of the hard reality of their world could ever pull them apart. How they grew stronger through their bonds to each other, all their strengths combined in a single unit working together seamlessly.
Fairy-tales.
Of course, there was truth to it - no denying that most people had faint grey tattoos from birth on that darkened into definite black shapes over time, until they met their match.
But that wasn't all there was to it.
Soulmates could mean strength, sure - but they could also mean weakness, as a threat to a mate would leave the other with a singleminded focus on saving them, leaving no thought for the bigger picture.
Philippa, with her blank skin (well, not unmarred of scars and birthmarks, but untouched by any sort of grey or black soulmate tattoo), had decided early on that it was a good thing that there was no match for her in this world, that she was destined to rule it, with no distractions holding her back.
And ruthlessly rule it, she did, until one day she was pulled without mercy from her universe into another, leaving her life's work and legacy behind, going snapping and snarling and trying to ignore the fact that if she had stayed, she would be facing certain death by the hands of her erstwhile mentee and that pesky soulmate of hers.
It was easier to ignore all that and to be angry at the people she could actually face instead...
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Lmk if anyone else wants to get tagged when I write more to this AU!
Philippa's body has healed from the wounds inflicted during the battle of the binary stars, but the mental pain lingers, and sometimes comes to the surface in the worst possible moments...
Thankfully, Philippa has Michael by her side to help her through it all.
1k words, T, Michael Prime/Philippa Prime
Read on Ao3
I wrote this in one go completely ignoring all my wips and the rest of my responsibilities. Happy Halloween!
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"Hey!" Michael slips onto the bench next to Philippa, pressing a kiss to her cheek before turning towards her meal. "What's up? You look so glum."
Philippa sighs, sips her soup, eyes darting left and right to check which of their subordinates might be listening in. "It's nothing."
Michael just nods. She'll ask Philippa again later in their quarters or if they find a moment alone while on duty. She understands Philippa not wanting to talk about what looks like it will be a personal topic out in the open. While she is more laid back than many others in her position, she still needs to keep a certain image as Captain, and the mess hall isn't the most private place on the ship after all.
"Everything alright on deck three?" Philippa changes the topic, and Michael nods.
"Engineering just needed to replace two parts, it's all good now. I've actually spent the last two hours in the lab after we were done there..."
"Yes? Any new discoveries?"
There haven't been, as of yet, but Michael's eyes still light up with joy when she gets to talk about her favourite work with her girlfriend.
Later that day, Michael is just getting out of her uniform when Philippa walks into the room out of their shared bathroom, wrapped only in a towel and her hair still wet from the shower.
"Hey, can you pass me my nightgown?" Michael pulls off her boots and waits as Philippa picks up the nightie as she walks past it, but instead of throwing or handing it to her, she places it on the bed and crawls into Michael's lap while the other is still just in her underwear.
"Oh, hey there." Michael ignores the gown in favour of stroking Philippa's back while two arms snake around her waste and squeeze tightly, Philippa's face hiding in the crook of her neck. "That bad? Anything else I can do to make it better?"
Philippa just shakes her head and mumbles something unintelligibly, and Michael gives her a comforting squeeze.
Her girlfriend gets this way sometimes, ever since she almost died during battle. Her physical injuries have long since healed, and the mentally bad days have also gotten less, she's been cleared for duty and back in her old position (a new, shinier Shenzhou II named in honour of the old ship, and sometimes Michael isn't sure whether the reminder is a blessing or a curse)... But she still does have bad days from time to time, and while she can keep it together and do her job without taking sick days for them more often than not, she tends to fall apart after her shifts, hiding in Michael's arms.
Michael rests her cheek on top of Philippa's damp hair and hums a lullaby, waiting comfortably for her to either fall asleep or pull away.
A few minutes later, Philippa sniffles and presses a kiss to Michael's collarbone before sitting up. "Thanks."
"Any time." She means that, hopes Philippa believes it by now. "Want to talk about it?"
Philippa frowns. "It's silly, really."
Michael doesn't correct her this time, Philippa already knows her opinion (which happens to match the opinion of Philippa's counselor), that anything that can reduce Philippa to tears, a state of panic, or complete mental exhaustion or apathy, is clearly not nothing. From the look Philippa gives her, she knows it too, even without the reminder.
"The ensigns Tilly and Tal have asked to have a pumpkin carving competition for Halloween next week," Philippa says, pulling her towel closer around herself.
Michael tugs the covers lose from the bed and pulls her underneath them instead. "Yes?"
"They've roped Jett into it already, so naturally I had to say yes."
"Alright?"
"It's just -" Philippa squeezes her eyes shut, her hand shivering as she holds onto Michael's forearm. "Carving... Knives..."
"Oh, love." Michael instantly hugs her close again. "I should have realized!"
Since being stabbed by the mek'leth and almost bleeding to death from the wounds, Philippa has an aversion to any kinds of blades. She hasn't told anyone apart from Michael, and even she has had to figure it out herself from the clues, Philippa had been afraid to have her Captaincy taken away again so shortly after being declared safe to go back to work. And she can handle herself, she didn't back down when in diplomatic talks with a people whose officials were holding longswords, didn't flinch when engineers were using knives to manually cut apart a part of a door that had fused together with the wall in a freak accident...
But she never eats meals that require knives in the mess hall anymore, in the privacy of her own rooms she programs the replicator to only give out pre-cut pieces she can eat with a fork, and she switched to laser hair removal when until then she had always used an old metal razor.
"It's silly," she had said when Michael carefully approached her about it, "it's not like I stabbed myself on my own blade, but it's worse when I'm holding the knife somehow, it's like I'm constantly afraid of cutting myself or falling into it!"
That had been one of their first discussions about what does and doesn't fall under the term 'silly', and Michael had promised her not to tell anyone about her trigger, though she should really see the counsellor about it. She did, after some time, and it has gotten better, but still...
"I used to love pumpkin carving as a child," Philippa whispers. "A few years ago, I would have been delighted at Tilly's idea, the nostalgic childhood memories and the fun competition. But now..."
Michael cards her fingers through Philippa's hair, carefully detangling a strand before placing it back down. "You know I can find you an excuse not to attend, if that's what you want, she says quietly. But... You do realize no-one will actually expect everyone from participating? I've heard Tilly and Adira talk about it earlier, the way I understand it, there will just be a few from every department chosen to do the carving, the rest of us will be spectators or judges... You could easily say that as Captain, you'd rather someone else from the command team does the actual carving, both because you don't want to take away that chance from someone else and because you might get called away at any moment."
Philippa nods quietly, thinking about it.
"You still don't have to go," Michael reassures her. "Not if you don't want to. You said Jett wants to be there, I'm sure we'll find a time where she's free and you're busy, and say it's just happenstance. But... You said it's mostly just you holding knives that gets to you now, maybe seeing others use them for something fun wouldn't be so bad?"
Philippa nods. "I'll think about it." Then, she buries her face in a pillow, clearly hiding from the world.
Michael doesn't begrudge her that, she knows Philippa is emotionally exhausted. She carefully extracts her arm from Philippa's grip, though. "Just give me a moment to take off my bra, yes? Then we can go to sleep."
Philippa giggles, sniffs again, then actually sits up and rubs her hair dry a bit on the towel before throwing it in the direction of the hamper, narrowly missing it. Michael's eye twitches - before living with her, she never would have thought the Captain of a starship could be such a slob. But she doesn't say anything. It's Philippa's room too, they've got to compromise. At least she tried... And Michael just picks up the towel herself when she goes to place her clothes in the hamper.
Philippa is watching her when she walks back to the bed, and Michael puts some extra sway into her hips, though she doesn't expect Philippa to have the energy for sex tonight. "Enjoying the show?"
"You know it." Philippa smiles. The covers have slid down her body exposing her own chest to Michael, who looks her fill in turn before turning out the lights and climbing into bed.
"Night, love."
Philippa wraps her arms around her, feeling the comfort of her girlfriend's warm skin.
"Goodnight, my Michael."
Fini
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Image sources: Philippa Pumpkin
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An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
10k words, rated T
Shenzhou-Era Milippa Prime, mutual pining and getting together
Michael has just been promoted to First Officer when Philippa gets an invitation to a ball on Space Station Four, and she asks Michael along to attend the event with her. Not that this is a date, of course - or is it?
