[Meme] Fic snippets

Apparently this meme began life as a WIP meme, but duck_or_rabbit and paulamcg have created a variation with excerpts from completed fics. Well, today I was (finally) finishing a year-in-review fic index for 2009 that I started in, um, January, so it was kind of fun to look over some of those stories and grab snippets while I was at it. I'm following the no-explanations rule, but at least I can say that all the excerpts are from fics that were posted last year. ;)

Post a paragraph or a scene from as many of your fics or WIPs as you want, with no explanation attached.

1. The teachers all knew the password to the stairs that led to the Headmaster’s office, as a matter of policy, but he had tried to make it clear at staff meetings how little he liked to be disturbed when he was up here. Merely, of course, because it was easier to do his jobs—both overt and clandestine—when he was alone. His preference for solitude had nothing to do with the looks of loathing and wounded betrayal in the eyes of teachers who had once been reasonable colleagues.
   
   That was irrelevant.
   
   ( eight more snippets )
   
   .