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elwingflight · 5 years

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Coronavirus: Information & Guidelines

What you can do now, and what to prepare for

There seems to be a lack of what-to-do suggestions on tumblr beyond handwashing, so I thought I’d put something together. I’ve never actually encouraged people to reblog something of mine before, but this might be the time. To be clear: I am not personally a public health expert of any kind. Both my parents are (epidemiology/global health degrees, worked for CDC) and I’ve run this by them. My information is coming from disease researchers on twitter and official public health guidelines online. Sources at the end of the post. This is mostly directed at people in countries where COVID-19 has been reported (I’m in the U.S.), but is not *yet* widespread in the community. Written Mar. 1st 2020, last updated 3/9 (shorter, helpful twitter thread here, helpful NPR article here)

General Info

Firstly, a lot of politicians are *still* trying to sugarcoat things, but it should be clear by now that the new coronavirus is spreading widely and will continue to do so. Because of the incubation period, and in the U.S. at least the delay in testing, the number of cases is almost certainly going to increase rapidly in the near future no matter what we do now. Official government sources are helpful, but its also good to look at what experts on viral epidemics who aren’t directly government-affiliated are saying. Their agenda is purely informing the public in the most constructive way possible, without politics getting in the way.

Two key points- COVID-19 can have a long incubation period (the time from when you catch the virus to when you start showing symptoms) and most people don’t get severe symptoms. Some are entirely asymptomatic, but most people get typical flu-like symptoms. Specifically, the early symptoms to watch out for are a fever and dry cough (meaning, a stuffy nose is probably just a regular cold). Its possible but unlikely to transmit the virus while asymptomatic, most transmission happens when you have heavier symptoms.

The most vulnerable people are the elderly (~ over 60) and those with preexisting health conditions (i.e. cardiovascular disease, respiratory condition, diabetes), or a simultaneous infection with something else (NOT kids in particular!) So far the mortality rate has been about 1-2% (compared to 0.1% for the general winter flu - yes, this really is worse). However, that might be an overestimate, both because people with mild cases aren’t getting tested (the denominator should be bigger), and because the early situation in Wuhan, where a lot of our numbers come from, was especially bad in regards to availability of healthcare.

This is an emotional, difficult situation. Don’t panic. The world didn’t end in 1918, and its not going to end now. But it is very serious, and we need to be thinking about it rationally, not pretending everything is just going to be okay, or uselessly pointing blame. Take care of your mental health, and check in with each other. Epidemics test our generosity and selflessness. Those qualities are needed right now, but don’t neglect yourself either.

What You Can Do Now

There is stuff everyone can do both to prevent yourself from getting infected, and to prepare if you do. ***The big picture to keep in mind is that the biggest risk of epidemics is that they overwhelm our system, especially our healthcare system. What I mean by this is that our society is built to deal with a certain volume of things happening at once- people buying groceries, getting sick, etc. If we suddenly all rush to do something, we overburden these systems and they won’t be there for the people who need them most. Therefore our goal is to slow down the spread of disease, buying time and lowering the overall burden on these systems. This is called “flattening the curve”. It looks like this, and I cannot stress how important this is.***

A very helpful thread on preparedness

Staying Healthy

Like similar viruses (think colds and flu), COVID-19 is mostly transmitted from person to person, usually by close contact but sometimes from an infected surface. More here.

Wash your hands. Everyone has heard this one- 20 seconds, soap all over your hands, wash the soap off. If you can’t wash your hands use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer (at least 60% alcohol). But handwashing is absolutely better. Also- cough into your elbow/shoulder, not your hand, and avoid shaking hands- try elbow bumps or maybe a polite nod instead! If you’re handwashing so much that you’re hands are threatening to crack and bleed though, consider washing more strategically or using hand sanitizer instead.

In combination with hand-washing- stop touching your face, especially while out! This takes practice, everyone does it all the time without thinking. A good practice is to avoid touching your face while out, then wash your hands thoroughly as soon as you get home.

Similarly, avoid touching surfaces as much as possible! Particularly bad are door handles, elevator buttons, that kind of thing. The virus can probably (based on studies of related viruses) last a while on these. Regular gloves can help a bit. Use a tissue then throw it away, use your elbow, etc.

Do Not buy face masks! There’s mixed evidence on whether they’re at all helpful when used by the general public to prevent catching a virus, but actual medical professionals who need them are facing shortages (that’s probably part of why so many healthcare workers got sick in Wuhan), so our buying them up is really bad. The only times you should be wearing them is if you yourself are sick (they do help then!) or if you’re looking after a sick person. Seek instruction in that case in how to use them properly. (Thread on why buying those fancy masks is not good).

If COVID-19 is in your community, try to stay 6 feet from people, which basically means going places as little as possible. See below.

Planning Ahead

Its also a good idea to prepare in case you need to self-quarantine. Self-quarantine is necessary if you’ve potentially been exposed to COVID-19, or if you’re sick but not enough to need to go to the hospital. Follow local guidelines- if there’s lots of transmission in your area, nonessential workers will probably be advised to stay home as much as possible.

If you’re able, get medication now. Don’t go crazy and buy out the drug store, just a reasonable amount. Try to get at least a month’s worth of any prescription medications. This can be hard at least in the U.S. - your doctor may well be able to prescribe more, but insurance companies and drug stores can be terrible. I’ve found trying a different drugstore can sometimes help. Try your best. They may also be reluctant to prescribe more to avoid causing shortages. Idk what the right answer is here.

Don’t go crazy and buy out the store, but start getting a little extra shelf-stable or frozen food. Even some root vegetables that will last a few weeks. You want enough for 2 weeks in case of self-quarantine, but you do NOT want to empty out stores. Panic buying is definitely a stress on the system. Just add a few extra things each time you shop. Don’t forget about pets. You can always eat the food and replenish it over time.

Make a plan with your family/community. If someone gets sick or needs to self-quarantine, is there a corner of the house they can stay in? Who can take care of them? etc. I haven’t focused on plans for schools/religious communities/workplaces etc but those are very important too! This is one place where keeping an eye on local and national news is important. In the U.S., for example, school systems are planning ways to make food available to kids if they’re not going to school.

If COVID-19 is starting to spread in your community, think about how else you can be a good community member. Cancelling nonessential doctor’s appointments, surgeries etc may be very important, for example. If schools are closed, can you help out neighbors with childcare? Do you have a cleaner who may need to be payed in advance if there’s a quarantine?

If You Might Be Sick/Need to Quarantine

See likely symptoms above. Remember, normal colds still exist, and if you go to the doctor for every one of those you will overwhelm the system.

Don’t just go to a hospital! Call ahead to your doctor/clinic/hospital and get instructions on what to do. Getting healthcare workers sick is something we really want to avoid. That said, DO get tested as soon as possible, and act as if you are contagious. The health coverage situation is the U.S. is not yet clear (and ofc its not something the current admin is eager to clarify). Hopefully testing will be covered financially by the government, but I can’t promise that at this time.

In the meantime, stay home and quarantined if you show any symptoms of illness if you possibly, possibly can. This is especially difficult in the U.S. if you don’t have sick leave/childcare, but please. Do your utmost.

Look after yourself. Skype/google hangouts/etc is great for keeping connected. Have some chocolate/chicken broth/other sick foods ready.

The Big Picture

Coronavirus/COVID-19 has not been declared a pandemic yet, but it probably will be before long. This is almost certainly going to get worse before it gets better. We don’t yet know if warmer weather will slow its spread, and a vaccine will probably take about 1-1.5 years to be developed and tested. As I mentioned before, the best thing we can do to keep the world working, minimize mortality, etc is to slow the spread as much as we can, and minimize the strain on the system. Hospitals are going to be overwhelmed. There aren’t infinite unoccupied beds or ventilators, or people to operate them, and supply chains could get disrupted. Thinking about these things is scary, and it will take time to adjust to what’s happening. Start that process now, and help everyone you know reach the point where they’re able to act, not panic. Another reassuring thing- if we slow the spread of COVID-19, in addition to fewer total people getting sick, you will soon have people who are recovered and almost certainly immune. These people will be invaluable as helpers in their communities.

Now that the practical stuff is out of the way, I want to say from a U.S. perspective that yes, our lack of social welfare other countries take for granted is going to hurt us. Lack of access to childcare, no guaranteed paid sick leave, and of course expensive healthcare are massive problems that will make it much harder to limit disease transmission. Help each other in any way you can, and vote for candidates that support implementing these policies! And of course, watch out for propaganda of all kinds, whether its using the virus as an excuse for racism, calls to delay elections, etc. So far my biggest concern is a lack of willingness to admit how serious this is, but we can do this. Lets put extra pressure on politicians to be honest and change policies to actually help people. But, yes, lets also stay united. We need each other now (just, you know, 6 feet apart).

A few sources

In general, the Guardian is a great, free, reliable source of news. In the U.S., NPR (website as well as radio) is another great source. The Washington Post and Seattle Times have made their coronavirus-related coverage open access, not sure about other national newspapers.

twitter thread from World Health Organization (WHO)

U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) COVID-19 homepage (not being updated in some ways it should be, like total # of tests)

A reality check from some non-Governmental experts (basically, what governments don’t want to say yet, which is that this virus is going to spread, and the goal now is to infect as few people as possible, as slowly as possible. Read this.)

Why you should act now, not when things get bad in your area (we’re always operating on outdated information)

If you want the latest technical info, The Lancet (major medical journal group) has all of their content compiled here, open access.

I can do my best to answer questions (i.e. ask my dad) but those or other reliable, readily find-able sources should have you pretty well covered. Do let me know if anything on here is wrong or needs to be updated! Stay safe, stay positive, we can do this.

#coronavirus #covid19 #covid-19 #healthcare #actually important shit

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leverage-commentary · 4 years

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Leverage Season 2, Episode 6, The Top Hat Job, Audio Commentary Transcript

Dean: Hello I’m Dean Devlin, Executive Producer.

Christine: I’m Christine Boylan, one of the writers.

Peter: Peter O’Fallon, Director.

John: John Rogers, Executive Producer.

Scott: Scott Veach, the other writer.

Chris: Chris Downey, Executive Producer. And this is the Top Hat Job.

John: See, I was hoping we’d pretend that there were like twelve more people [All Laugh] in this, like, baffling list. Uh, the Top Hat Job was born actually of two things. One, Scott Veach, who’s a name you haven’t heard before on the show, came in as a freelancer to pitch a magician show. And at the same time, Tim Hutton had said that he would like to play a magician.

[Chris and Christine Laugh]

John: And Tim makes very few requests of us, so it seemed like not a bad idea. The question is, of course, well, how would you go about doing this? Um either Christine or Scott, can you tell me where we got the villain from?

Christine: Uh... where did- where did we get the villain from?

John: I think it was-

Christine: Uh, was a-

Scott: Oh, yeah.

Christine: -magazine article. Again, I believe Albert Kim brought that into the room-

John: Yes.

Christine: -a lot of these, this season we all had a hand in everything and I love that. Albert brought in this article about a foods company that was knowingly putting out salmonella-laced meals, frozen meals on the market and we were just really upset.

John: As a matter of fact, the really ridiculous villainous thing we have this guy say, which is, ‘You’re supposed to cook it to this temperature. It’s on the package; that’s why we’re not liable’ is something that company actually said-

Christine: Completely true.

John: Without mentioning the fact that even in their laboratories, they could never get it that hot.

[All Chuckle]

John: So these guys, the real life villains, are far worse than the enormously cartoonish evil guys we have in this show.

Christine: Absolutely.

John: And now, who’s this actress?

Chris: This is, uh, Jennifer, uh… Skyler.

John: Chris always has the cast list, thats-

Chris: Yes, I got my cast list right here. This is Jennifer Skyler, she’s a local Portland actress, and tried out and was fantastic.

Peter: She did a great job.

John: Now Peter, this, y’know, I think this is another one we really cast almost entirely out of Portland, right?

Peter: All but the bad guy. I think the bad guy-

Chris: I think so, yeah. I think-

Dean: Yeah, yeah.

John: What was it like working with, like, the Portland humans, Peter?

Peter: Overall it was pretty good. We had a little bit of uh, well, you know, and it turned out very well, thank you.

[All Laugh]

John: We got a state grant on the line here, Peter, so don’t screw this up for us, man.

Peter: No, she was- she was great, she was uh, she did a really good job. The concept was to try to add as much pressure to her so that you’d have compassion for her, and as you can see right where we are right now, she does a very good job of it.

John: And during the uh, during the... um, horrible credit sequence we all hate.

[Christine Laughs]

John: And I can say that, ‘cause it’s the DVD, they’ve already bought it.

Peter: Saga sell.

[All Laugh]

John: Yeah, it’s the saga sell. That’s actually, you know Pete, it’s the first time somebody’s brought up the phrase ‘saga sell’. Uh, who wants to define the ‘saga sell’ for the nice folks?

Peter: That was uh, I did the show The Riches and that was the bane of our existence, was trying to sell what the show is about, that’s what the saga sell-

John: In thirty seconds you have to remind new viewers what the show is about, and annoy old viewers.

Christine: Wow.

John: And now, why is this scientist drinking? Someone tell me that.

Christine: Because her last name is Jameson.

[All Laugh]

Christine: You’re welcome.

Chris: I believe that was your addition to the- to the character, wasn’t it? I mean-

Christine: I do like naming characters, yes.

Chris: She was initially known as ‘plucky research girl’, I believe?

John: Science girl. Plucky science girl.

Christine: Many variations on that.

Chris: And then a lot of the- there was a big cry out in the development of the story: “more plucky science girl!” And I think Christine, you added the little wrinkle that she likes to— likes to drink a few.

Christine: She does like to drink a few. I’m a big fan of uh—

Peter: Drink a lot.

Christine: Yeah, she does like to drink a lot. Um, I’m a big fan of victims who like to get involved and crusade a little bit and we hadn’t had one in a while, so getting her involved was a lot of fun.

John: It’s always tricky, because the victim, in theory, you don’t want to endanger these innocent people who’ve always been in some sort of danger, but if you don’t check in with them or don’t make them present in the story, they disappear.

Christine: But she’s plucky, has no discernible friends or family, and is a drunk, [All Laugh] so I think it’s okay that we go ahead and, you know, put her in danger.

Peter: And we decided on the set to have her play that— she’s playing really, uh, she really enjoys Tim’s company; would like to be with Tim a lot more than she’s letting on.

John: Well, you know, Tim’s a dreamy guy, right?

Christine: He is.

John: You know, when I use his photo and pretend to be him on the internet, I do very well.

[All Laugh]

Scott: I do that same thing!

John: Yeah, exactly, there’s a lot of guys pretending to be Tim Hutton on the internet, so if you ever get something dirty from Tim Hutton on the internet, it might not be him.

[All Laugh]

Christine: The actual Tim Hutton [unintelligible].

Chris: Interesting thing in his little reaction here. When I was watching this, it really, it took me back to Ordinary People because, remember him playing flustered, in Ordinary People, around the girl?

John: Yeah.

Chris: It’s very much, you see it on his face right here.

Peter: Little nervous.

Chris: It’s kinda right there-

Christine: Yeah, there’s an ‘aw shucks’ quality to it. I love it.

John: And it was interesting because, trying to get the Sophie character, trying to reconcile like what was going on here, was the understanding that they had screwed up whatever they’d kind of had first season. And so this is the phase where, you know, even if Sophie doesn’t necessarily want to see Nate off with somebody else, she knows he has to at least have some sort of human relationship—

Christine: Mhm.

John: — that this isolation that he’s engaged himself in will eventually, you know, isn’t healthy, and it is, as a matter of fact, what eventually destroys him over the course of the second season.

Christine: Mhm. Spoiler. [Laughs]

Peter: And she’s also trying to uh—

John: I think people know it’s not ending well. [Christine Laughs]

Peter: And she’s trying to break his balls a little by leaving him there alone.

John: Yeah, yeah, exactly. And that’s great, that’s— this take goes forever.

Timestamp: [5:00]

Christine: Yeah, he has this nice uncomfortable beat.

John: And still—

[All Laugh]

Scott: Ooooooh…

Peter: Well… so… uh.

Christine: Been on that date.

[All Laugh]

Peter: What about them Yankees? How ‘bout those Yankees? [More Laughter] So, you gonna make a move there, son? [laughter continues]

John: So—

Peter: No, I’m not.

John: No, no. Aaand thank you, sir.

Christine:And, leave the bottle.

John: Another drink.

Chris: One more drink.

[All Laugh]

John: Yeah she’s gonna be very lonely, looking like that, drunk, in a bar in Boston. She’s not gonna do well. Uh, this is actually interesting. Now, Scott, you wrote a big chunk of this sequence, if I remember correctly. This is interesting, this is not something we usually see on the show; uh, why don’t you tell us about it?

Scott: You mean where, where they’re failing?

John: Yes. But Scott—

Scott: They never fail!

John: Scott came in and made the characters you love suck. Now Scott, explain why you did that.

Scott: [Laughs] Uh, yeah. No, but it was, you know, I think it was a, it was a group idea. But it was- the idea was it’d be really fun to see them get overconfident, and to see what happens when, you know; it’s usually, they’re so good at everything that they do, what happens when that sort of falls apart and how do they react? And so we thought it’d be really fun to see what that looks like.

John: How did you— how many takes to get him to balance the damn ball on his forehead?

Peter: We stuck it to his head. [John laughs]

Christine: Aww, that’s adorable.

Scott: There’s some, there’s some tape under there.

Peter: The other one too, is a- the- the bandana on his head is covering a scar—

Christine: Oh, yes, he is.

John: Oh, this was this episode.

Peter: — that was left because, in one of the fights he got caught and got stitches.

Chris: We’ll get to that; that’s a good story there.

Christine: This is the one, yeah.

Peter: So we added the scarf to cover the stitches.

John: Yeah, and it’s also, it’s interesting because it is- it is something they’re doing, and you know, when he says after Tim walks in, you know, there’s no blueprint fairy. The idea is, this scene, all this act here, is what happens in act zero of every other show. Like in every other show, they’re doing this, they’re showing up as pizza guys, they’re getting sketches of buildings and stuff, we just never bother to see it because this time they, they—

Dean: Actually this particular scene here was not actually, was not in the episode—

Scott: Oh, that’s right.

Dean: — when we came in, when we came in short, [All Laugh] we added this scene, and one of the things I’m so proud about is that it seamlessly goes into this scene, which was part of the show—

Chris: That I could not believe.

Dean: And it actually ended up adding a very nice-

John: The other side of the door, that first side of the door was shot how many months after the- this side of the door?

Dean: About a month.

Scott: Probably a month, it was probably about a month. And see if you can track, uh, Gina’s pregnancy there.

[All Laugh]

Scott: It’s an interesting thing.

John: Yeah, it’s really— you’re kind of in a medium-close there. There she’s okay.

Christine: She’s glowing, she’s gorgeous.

John: She is glowing.

Peter: We decided to give Tim a lot of movement here because the concept is, he knows it’s all gonna go bad—

John: Yeah.

Peter: — they don’t.

Scott: He’s convinced it’s gonna go bad; he’s gonna sit down and wait.

John: Well, in the research, it was a little stunning. When we started investigating these food companies, because, you know, in the show it’s always, how do you have a threat? And uh, the scale— the amount of money that these guys throw around, is truly boggling, and the depths to which they will go to cover up their maleficence is uh, it’s… they’re not putting people in shallow graves, but they’re ruining people’s lives.

Peter: Did you notice his name?

John: What’s that?

Peter & Christine: Oleg.

John: Oleg, why?

Peter: I dunno.

[All Laugh]

Christine: Damn sexy name.

Scott: Yeah, I don’t think that was in the script.

John: I like that it’s “Super Hot Pizza”, because you wouldn’t want to buy another kind.

Dean: But I also notice that this- this entire sequence, the camera never stops moving, and it— just love the way you use the camera in this sequence.

Peter: Try to keep the heat going on, the pressure.

John: Now when you’re planning on shooting something that cross cuts between two to three situations, I mean, you know, are you trying to match actual camera left-to-right movement? Or do you just keep it in motion and assume that when you’re cutting it that’s gonna play?

Peter: I try to match it, right-to-left. You know, the idea was that Tim’s static, and he’s just sitting there doing, uh, you know, he’s confident about what’s going on while the rest of them are panicking.

John: He’s Reed Richards back there, he knows.

Scott: It’s like his version of TV, to watch this.

Peter: Exactly.

John: Nice fight, by the way.

Scott: By the way, this was literally maybe twelve hours after he’d gotten stitched up, he did this fight.

Peter: If that, yeah.

Christine: He is a superhero, seriously.

Peter: He takes it very seriously.

John: I always say, shit kicker is genetic.

Dean: And I think that’s our first ‘in the nuts’ shot of the series.

John: I think it is.

Peter: I like to do those nut shots.

Christine: Nice.

John: That was in your contract.

Dean: And I love the whole Parker thing here, this whole Parker exchange here was just inspired.

John: Yes, her idea of witty banter just doesn’t quite cut it.

[All Laugh]

John: But yeah, neither one really gets it.

Christine: Who put Parker in the glasses? A+. She looks great.

John: Thanks for bringing the lesbian vibe tonight, Christine.

Christine: You know, I’m here, you know, I’m representing all kinds of people.

Chris: Here’s another shot.

John: Nice green screen. Have you not seen that nice green screen? Nice green screen shot. Um yeah, there’s a lot of green screen in this one actually, just because there’s a lot of Parker hanging places.

Dean: I love this Aldis ending here, trying to, like, put a good spin on it.

[All Laugh]

Peter: And Aldis was quite at adding little quips here and there, and the fun stuff.

John: Yeah, a lot of— by this point, these actors know these characters well enough that, you know, a lot of times you’re just trying to get out of their way when they’re on pace.

Peter: This was a note that Chris gave me, which I loved, which is that they’re, like, children.

Timestamp: [10:00]

Chris: They’re siblings.

Peter: And Tim’s the father.

Chris: And Dean, you were here for this, I believe—

Dean: I was here for the poking.

Chris: And I think that I gotta give you credit for kinda, getting the whole poking thing. You know, ‘Stop it. Stop it. Stop it.’

Dean: Yeah, we just wanted to get that vibe of ‘Daaad.’

[All Laugh]

Peter: ‘He’s bugging me, stop it!’

John: The ice thing we actually established early in the season; the idea that they’re constantly raiding Nate’s apartment for the tools- his life has turned upside down, at some point, three AM, he will wake up and they will be in his apartment, like, bandaging themselves up with his stuff.

Christine: Eating cereal.

John: Yes, eating cereal. He has not had ice for a drink in, like, four months; it’s all for Eliot’s bruises.

Scott: ‘She’s poking me!’

[All Laugh]

Peter: ‘Leave me alone, dad.’

Dean: Love it.

John: Now, this whole section where they introduce how we get the information because these guys couldn’t get in, uh, Erik with a ‘k’.

Christine: Always evil.

Peter: I love the reaction with the ‘k’, too, here, that she’s uh, ‘I didn’t know that.’

[All Laugh]

Dean: And she goes, ‘Everyone knows that.’ [All Laugh] And he’s like, ‘What the fuck?‘

Christine: I got a lot of weird Facebook messages after this aired, by the way, from Eriks with ‘k’s.

John: You actually get all three character’s attitudes flawlessly there, which is: Parker just lives in a slightly different world, it’s about ten degrees off of everyone else; and Sophie treats her like its just, oh, I didn’t know it was that way in your world; while Nate, Nate is the only sane man in an insane world.

Chris: Here, look at this, we gotta give credit to Apollo Robbins, here. Apollo gave us [unintelligible].

Dean: I love this camera work, I love this idea of attaching the camera to the packet.

John: What is it? Is it just a button cam, or…?

Peter: Eh, we just attached the camera with a c-stand onto the box itself.

John: Oh cool. Um, that whole trojan horse thing comes from Apollo Robbins.

Chris: Apollo Robbins, our consultant, gives us all kinds of, you know-

Peter: And you will see a short little cameo of him in the back in one of the scenes.

John: Oh cool!

Peter: We’ll point him out.

Chris: We’ll talk more about him later.

[All Laugh]

Peter: Oh that was a great idea. Speedos are always good.

John: But there’s a hacker conference in vegas called DefCon every year, and that year, the trojan bluetooth cellphone happened to be the big thing of that year, so we ganked that. Um, you know, we really should, like McGuyver, leave out one crucial element, because we have taught people to do fairly horrible things on this show, and only later do we realize, oh we…we taught them exactly how to do that.

[All Laugh]

John: We should have rethought that.

Dean: Oops.

John: And then they’re talking about the horrible corporate meeting.

Chris: I think that was- Albert Kim, who worked at Time Warner and their magazines for many years, introduced us to the state of the company meeting, where they often have magicians. That was, kind of, what brought the whole episode together.

John: And remember, I had done a bunch of those, and that’s why as soon as Albert said that, I was like oh god, I actually did one of these shows when they announced layoffs right before I went on.

Christine: That was a great day in their world.

Peter: Well that’s a tough room.

Chris: Because folks, surprisingly, to do a show - a heist/con show involving a magician, is not the easiest thing in the world.

[All Laugh]

John: No, really, oddly enough.

Chris: When that’s your mandate…

John: Yeah, we don’t usually start backwards like that, but you know what, this actually turned out pretty coherent, considering.

Dean: I love this whole magic bit here, I think this was inspired.

Christine: This kid’s great.

John: This guy is so- now why are they dressed like fif- by the way, Parker and Hardison here are either, a) dressed like a fifties’ couple or b) like the couple from Thriller, from the horror movie Thriller.

Christine: I thought b), I thought we were going for that-

Dean: They are college kids.

John: They’re college kids, is that how the flappers are dressing now?

Chris: This is Tim Gouran as Chronos.

John: [wheezing] Chronos… Oh the nipple rings are horrifying.

Christine: They’re fantastic.

Peter: The guy does- the guy’s channelling...what’s his name?

All: Chris Angel.

Peter: The way he does the movement, and all of that, we asked him to just study him and go wild with it.

Christine: I remember his audition tape; made me laugh.

Peter: I love that she’s reluctant to go up to the- first she goes, ‘Oh no no no, I don’t wanna go-’

Christine: ‘No, I don’t like magic-’

John: God, he’s so cheesy- oh man, and then him showing her exact- and that’s the- it’s interesting that the entire show’s, kind of, about trade secrets. Because you know, the whole idea is the advantage these characters have is, they know how these tricks work, which is a trade secret. Wow, that’s a really creepy look.

[All Laugh]

John: “Silence!”

Scott: Oh, he was great.

John: I almost enjoy this sequence more without words. Seriously, I’m like half a Guinness in and I’m loving this.

Chris: And kudos to the assistant, giving the bored reactions.

Peter: She’s just bored out of her mind.

John: I believe that’s actually in the script, right? ‘Even his assistant doesn’t like him.’

Peter: ‘That’s my girlfriend; that’s her up there, quit looking.’

Chris: A lot of great ad libs here from them.

John: Again, this is one of those places where when it’s, you know, Aldis and Beth, you just kinda get out of their way, and you assume it’s gonna work out.

Timestamp: [15:00]

[All Laugh]

Dean: This guy is so great.

Christine: We’re all just watching him.

John: I almost want to bring him back now; now that I’m watching this again?

Dean: He’s so over the top; it’s awesome.

Christine: Can we please bring him back? He’s adorable.

Peter: And once again, kudos to our magic… what’s his name again?

Christine: Apollo.

Peter: He helped him out with all these, how they do it.

Chris: He designed the box. I mean he did so much; he added so much to this episode.

Peter: That was a mistake, and it was hilarious, you know, with the sword; she grabbed it and pulled it in, and I thought it was hilarious.

John: No, I’m actually- I’m friends with David Ackroyd who designs tricks for Penn & Teller, and the whole, sort of, the loathing for stage magicians that these guys have is hilarious. Oh, the eskimo kisses. And the rings. Yup, I think we went through a whole day of, like, looking at tricks and seeing what could malfunction in the most annoying way.

Christine: That was an odd day of YouTube clips, I’ll tell you. We went down the rabbit hole there.

John: No odder than usual, really.

Christine: No odder than usual, it’s true.

Chris: I love the way this actor dropped the character at one point, like “stop it!”

John: That’s really, that’s dark, ‘cause now I can actually- now as he runs off-

Peter: ’Is there a surgeon? Is there a surgeon?’

John: Like, with Parker actually trapped in the box still, nice. And, another innocent human destroyed in our quest for justice.

Christine: Not so innocent. Not so innocent.

John: Yeah, that’s true.

Christine: He was sexually harassing his assistant, I believe it says in the text.

Chris: Here’s George Castillo, who’s playing Dan Markland, head of security, who is our bad guy’s henchman.

John: He’s the Busey. We can say Busey, Busey is the word we use all the time-

Peter: And here’s Tim, having fun.

Christine: Oh no.

John: If you haven’t heard the first season DVDs, the Busey is based on Gary Busey’s character in Lethal Weapon.

Dean: Are those Apollo’s hands?

Chris: Those are Apollo’s hands.

John: Uh, who is the thug who brings physical violence so that the main bad guy doesn’t have to. Yes, that’s Apollo doing the close up stuff. Although Tim did a little bit of it; Tim really got into it.

Dean: Oh, he was into it.

Peter: And again, Tim handled this so well, the idea that the- they just start pushing away and go through it all- they just start pushing their way in.

John: Yeah, exactly. Well, that’s the, you know, all of heist and confidence shows are just, just keep it moving so people can’t ask questions.

Dean: And carefully placing Gina behind the box.

[All Laugh]

Peter: She’s always carefully placed, you’ll notice.

Christine: We couldn’t have laundry in this one, so we, you know.

John: What is Beth- what is Beth wearing?

Dean: This got more and more obvious as the season went on.

Peter: I’ll bet.

John: Beth is like Neil Gaiman’s Death back there.

Christine: I know, I love it. Again, A+ Parker look right here. Just, all these Parker outfits are terrific.

John: And it’s interesting, it’s really interesting because you got, everyone’s got a very distinct look; in particular I love Aldis in the suit, as the engineer, as the kind of like.. you know, you can totally see how that character lives his life. He dresses up, he goes to these shows, he’s actually based- that character’s based on a British fictional character called Jonathan Creek, which is a British mystery show about a guy who designs magic tricks. He’s not the magician, he’s the guy who designs the impossible and he solves impossible crimes, and you know, when you have five humans, coming up with a role for everyone to play, never easy. That’s why Chris is actually in the box.

Peter: Oh, this is the rabbit gag.

Christine: Oh, the rabbit. I love the camera work here.

Chris: And this is all one shot, watch, watch this.

Dean: This is a beautiful steadicam shot.

Peter: Our steadicam operator was, uh, a bit nervous when we started, but- except for this.

Dean: Oh, this is awesome; one of my favorite flashbacks.

John: Now this- And we have not done a lot of the flashes this year-

Christine: Look at their face. [All Laugh] That’s great.

Scott: That was my mom’s favorite moment.

Christine: “It’s not the same thing.“

Chris: And the rabbit’s gone.

John: That was actually written as just an anecdote, and then we hadn’t done a flash in so long, it’s like, you know what, what the hell, let’s bury a kid.

Dean: And what’s the story with the girl who played Parker? Wasn’t there a story behind that? That she didn’t get to do that part in a different episode?

Chris: I think that’s right, she got cut out earlier.

John: Yeah, she got cut from the MMA one, the flashback of Parker’s first concert. And then, so instead, we gave this one where we buried her alive, in a backyard in Vancouver, Washington.

Christine: That girl’s adorable.

Chris: Backyard? That was a public park.

[All Laugh]

Christine: Buried a girl alive in a public park.

Peter: Marc Roskin shot that, by the way.

Chris: Yes, Marc Roskin did a fantastic job shooting that.

Christine: Only on Leverage.

Chris: That’s how accommodating they are in Portland.

John: ‘Hi, uh, listen, we’re the film department. We’d like to bury a twelve year old girl alive in a public park, if you can-’

Christine: ‘Great, great, we’ll get you a brunette, we’ll get you a redhead-’

Peter: I actually had a bet with the location department, because I’ve been all over the world shooting, where you could never dig a park up. In Portland you can.

John: No, they’re very happy to have us there.

Chris: We have eminent domain powers in Portland.

[All Laugh]

John: ‘We’re here seize your home.’ ‘What?’

Scott: We’re like diplomats.

John: To be fair, we couldn’t have made this year without Portland. I mean, seriously, the locations we got?

Peter: No.

John: Oh yeah. ‘Where’s the rabbit?’ Nice running gag, by the way, I don’t believe that was in the script?

Peter: No, that was just [unintelligible].

Chris: Nah, that came up on set.

Timestamp: [20:00]

John: Nice. You didn’t actually lose the rabbit, did you?

Peter: No. No white rabbits were harmed filming this show.

John: Now, have you shot a con or heist show before?

Peter: Uh, I did The Riches.

John: The Riches, yeah. So— but that’s almost more of a character piece, than a— ‘cause they, they’re, he’s running a long con, but not—

Peter: Yeah, big tycoon, he’s lying to everyone all the time.

John: Yeah, exactly. Was there any—

Peter: Not quite this… this…

John: Yeah this is more heisty, y’know, was there any prep you did coming into this, just like looking at stuff, or, uh-? I’m always curious, because we have different directors come in, it’s a very different kind of show. It’s not like, say, ER, where it’s the hospital, there are doctors—

Peter: Everybody runs a steadicam shot all the way through.

John: Yeah, exactly.

Peter: No, actually, I just uh— I watched the, like, five shows that Dean had sent me, and in the big picture I got the idea, I mean the concept. Also, I love that Tim wanted to do the magic so badly that we ended up writing, what, four or five more pages that we shot for days on end. But it was great; it was really fun. And for me it was all movement; the whole show is about movement.

John: Yeah.

Peter: And we added a whole bunch of guards everywhere so, I wanted to have an extra pressure all the time, so every time they step around the corner there’s more security people walking around, so it appears as though—

Dean: I love this guy, who played the uh, the CFO.

Christine: Oh, yeah.

Chris: This is, uh, Jack Armstrong, another local Portland actor.

Dean: This bit was great, what was the story behind this bit?

John: I actually dropped this one in the script based on a guy who had been driving around, um, San Francisco with a RFID receiver, ganking people’s passport numbers out of their pockets. He was, like, driving around in a car, and the RFID chips were giving off enough of a signal that he could read their data as he drove by.

Peter: God.

John: So getting your car to do it was a piece of cake. I mean, getting your phone to do it at that range, eminently believable. That is one of the things about this show, is you spend an awful lot of time telling America they’re nowhere near as safe as they think they are.

[All Laugh]

Peter: This uh, this gag in the elevator, uh, the giant bar broke, and damn near took off… uh, who’s head?

John: Aldis?

Peter: Aldis, and Chris, actually. Both of them.

John: No, don’t hurt Aldis. I mean Chris, has the shit-kicker genes; he heals in like a day. Seriously he’s got some weird Wolverine stuff going on, but now, don’t bang Aldis up, man. You know, that’s weird, that happened on a pilot I shot in San Diego. They had a wire rig for two thousand pounds, had two hundred and twenty pounds of people on it, snapped, put them through like fifteen feet; dropped them right through the ceiling of a hut they were supposed to fall through. Now luckily, they were supposed to fall through the hut, so we got the shot.

Peter: Right.

John: And they were fine. [Laughs] But the point is—

Peter: Well, we had one take, we had one take of this, that’s it.

Scott: Yeah, this is it.

Peter: Luckily it worked really well.

Dean: Oh this is great, uh, falling through the, uh…

Chris: The elevator shaft.

Dean: The elevator shaft. Now part of the- this gag actually came because of TNT, right? What was the story behind that?

Chris: TNT said, ‘How come the in the script it just has him falling up? And we suggest her falling through the elevator shaft.’ And we said, ‘Well, if you’d like to pay for a shot of them falling through the elevator shaft, [All Laugh] we’d be happy to shoot it.’ And credit to TNT, they did.

Dean: That’s so great.

Peter: And I love– again, they’re arguing like — they’re back at arguing like kids, about who goes out and what they do and how they handle it.

Dean: Yeah, I love Eliot’s one, it’s like, ‘Who wants to be me? I punch people.’

Chris: ‘I get punched and kicked.’

John: That’s it. That is his lot in life, man, and he knows it.

Peter: And this was actually a auditorium from a large corporation.

John: Yeah. This is how they do those shows, man; those shows are death. They’re a lot of money, but they are death.

Chris: Hook it to something. There we go.

John: Now you shoot— Now, when you’re shooting up, this is green-, this is all computer generated right?

Chris: There we go.

John: But when you’re shooting up through the top of the elevator, was that green too, or—

Peter: Yes. I love his reaction here.

John: Yeah. And down.

Dean: I like the little pause, though. Like, everything’s okay, and then, Bugs Bunny.

John: It is Bugs Bunny, isn’t it?

All: Woah!

Dean: And that is digital debris, my friends.

Christine: Wow.

John: That is digital debris. So let me get this straight - we dropped digital pieces of cardboard, but we used a giant bar to lift our actor and slam him against the top of an elevator.

Peter: And slam him hard, too.

John: Okay. Good, that’s good, I’m glad we got our priorities straight.

Chris: There was a little smile from Aldis there because it was just so fun. I mean it was like, we couldn’t— and we only had one shot at it. I mean, you really wanted him to be scared, but it was just too impossible when he got pulled to the ceiling.

Peter: And we decided to add this part at the end where they drop.

[All Laugh]

Dean: “You didn’t see that coming, seriously?”

John: We actually, uh, it was a big debate this year, and most people watching the DVD might now know Jeri Ryan, until she shows up, when she would get her ‘seriously?’, because being allowed to say ‘seriously’ is part of the whole ‘you’re part of the team'.

Timestamp: [25:00]

Christine: On the writing staff, too.

John: Yeah, exactly, exactly.

Peter: Where did Erik Casten come from, the name?

John: Uh, clearances. [Laughter] Seriously man, we accuse people of such horrible, actionable crimes, we absolutely will.

Christine: Well what do we say, K's are evil?

John: K's are evil.

Christine: S's, P's, you know, things like that. And so I, you know—

John: An F or a Ph, that's usually evil.

Christine: I like to work with sounds, when we're naming.

Scott: Oh here he's covering his scar there, too.

John: Yeah.

Scott: If you guys are paying attention, he puts his hat back on.

John: And again, it's, it's—'cause we just did the commentary for The Order 23 Job, and this is another one where it's just, you just take Aldis and Chris, you let them be annoyed with each other, and you set them off on a separate plotline. And that will bring you amusement.

Peter: Yes. Mark Roskin shot this scene also, because my wife was having surgery.

John: Oh I'm sorry, is she okay?

Peter: Yeah, she's fine. God bless you guys though, it's the only time I've actually been able to leave. [All Laugh] 'My wife's having surgery.' 'Sorry, you can't-- have to stay.'

John: Well, Marc Roskin directed, uh, MMA, the MMA job which is on the set of discs and everything; he's actually our Producer/Director up there, who stayed up in Portland. So he picked up a lot of-- he shot a lot of stuff. We're... we shoot in seven days when we should really shoot in, oh, ten. Right?

Christine: Everybody gets to work with Rosky, that's uh, that's the way it goes.

John: That's the tradition. Uh, which hack is he doing right now?

Chris: I think this is when he hacks into the camera.

John: Oh, as he hacks into the remote camera.

Chris: He hacks into the remote camera.

John: That's another thing we—

Dean: Yeah this is when we decided to have that— the camera on his belt buckle allowed them to see what he was doing on the computer.

John: The phone camera.

Dean: The phone camera.

Christine: Right.

John: Also eminently doable. It's a bit cludgy, but you can- you can do it.

Peter: Tim's bombing here, which— we decided to give an arc here-

John: See, this is my question, because Tim's bombing, alright, and that's what I found delightful, is the fact that Nate Ford is finally not good at something.

All: Right.

John: What was the audience thinking? These are Portland extras, they've been told they're seeing Tim Hutton, did he just go up and suck, or did you tell them he was going to suck?

Scott: No, they were—

Peter: We told them that—Uh, we stood up and we showed all the uh, audience reactions, and Tim was up there with me and I was yelling out 'Okay now he really sucks; no, he really, really sucks' [All Laugh] 'No, he's boring', and they would all get really bored.

Chris: Now here were these real tricks that Apollo Robbins taught them to do, we did— we kinda had a little magic bootcamp while this filming was going on. And uh, you know these are all things Apollo brought up there, and we choreographed; they just had a ball.

Peter: It was astounding the show still turned out short with the four pages we added there. [All Laugh] Nothing but magicians.

Chris: But, but it's a testament to the pace of this show, I mean you really- it just flies.

John: It's, uh— and she's having another drink.

Peter: More drink.

Christine: Still in the bar.

John: Seriously, we're so—

Peter: Three days later.

John: We're so bringing drunk science girl back.

Christine: Oh, that's right.

John: I love science— I love a good science girl anyways, so.

Scott: Who doesn't?

John: Who doesn't?

Christine: Drunk science girl is just a bonus.

John: Yup.

Peter: Covered his scar again.

John: Yeah. But it's a tricky bit, because you know, your average television script is between forty five and fifty five pages, and because we're an action driven show we just never know where we're gonna land.

Christine: Yeah.

John: Um, that's cosy. [All Laugh]

Chris: That's a great shot right there.

Christine: No comment.

John: Yeah that's, that's a great shot.

Peter: Once again the bad guys walk by.

John: You know what, if they were- if they were really good at their jobs, they wouldn't be working at a food company.

Chris: Eh, now they're starting to get the hang of their magic act, you see things starting to turn around.

John: Uh, and then, oh yeah, we came up with the whole idea— this was the other thing, is, what were the constraints, what you need for security systems?

Peter: This the most— with the check, the chances of us timing this correctly were so slim, and this was the first take. Wow.

Scott: That was perfect.

Peter: Racked to it. And everybody got up at the right time.

John: Nice. You either get that— you know what, that always is a first take, isn't it? It's like, either you get it or you don't, yeah? Um, yeah that was a big part of designing this episode, is, we had to figure out what were the security systems in place, and how they could possibly interact with magic, none of us being magicians.

Chris: Right.

John: Yeah, it was a lot of, uh, a lot of big lists on the board that day. I like how the thing even has a top to hide her, uh, her pregnancy there. The sword thing is even at the right height.

Peter: The background absolutely loved Tim. They thoroughly enjoyed the—they sat there for, I dunno, eight or nine hours?

Christine: Wow.

Dean: I love that. 'No questions!' [All Laugh]

Chris: Yeah, first thing was- was a fingerprint. Okay—

Dean: 'Belieeeve in the magic.'

Chris: —well lets, how would they get a fingerprint if you're a magician on stage? Well okay, this is how. How would we relay it? And it was all... There's a lot of great gadgets here, we have the [Chuckles], you know the handy, uh, Brother P-Touch... [Laughs]

John: Yeah! The Brother P-Touch fingerprint printer.

Christ: The Brother P-Touch fingerprinter which, uh, available at [sounds like: hamburger shlemer] folks.

John: You know what? Again, this is why people underestimate Hardison. He has to have this stuff in his bag all the time. That's why he has the van. The van is there for a reason, people.

Christine: Respect the van.

Dean: Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think this was the first episode that we introduced the gummy frogs—

Chris: Yes.

Dean:—which now became a partner with the orange soda as a necessary thing for Hardison at all times.

John: It is required, it is absolutely required for Hardison to have gummy frogs while hacking.

Dean: And orange soda.

John: And orange soda.

Chris: Alright, now they got the fingerprint, now it's smooth sailing, we get to get in. Uh, not so fast.

John: Uh, well they need to get—it's not so fast because now they need the gel.

Peter: I'll never forget when the prop guy said— we started with gummy bears, gummy this, gummy that, and when you said, I think, gummy frogs, and he's like, "You're fucking killing me".

[All Laugh]

Chris: Nope, gotta be gummy frogs.

Christine: They're exactly the right size! They're perfect.

Timestamp: [30:00]

John: It's gotta be frogs. And again, by the way, I've actually seen the video where Bruce Schneier used this exact technique to fool a $150,000 fingerprint scanner.

Chris: Yeah.

John: The type that the TSA uses to secure airports.

Christine: So please try this at home.

Chris: This is a great reaction right here.

John: And that's a great reaction. Just the laser, just the mocking him with the lasers.

Chris: And literally, ‘I'm spinning plates here, I'm spinning plates here while you're asking me for retinas.’ He's spinning plates!

Christine: Doing a great job! Spinning plates. And juggling.

Chris: And the retinas part is, to me, what the show is all about, what Leverage is all about, is that we have to put a CEO in a magic box, to bring him to scan his retinas. That is a whole, whole thing.

Dean: That's my favorite part of this whole episode, that for me... when I read that in the draft, I literally fell out of my chair laughing. I thought that was the funniest bit.

Christine: I think that was our favorite bit to do in the room.

John: Yeah, I must have driven the staff crazy, because I must have said 'They put me in a box' a thousand times.

Christine: It was hilarious. And the fake music cues we would make up, wheeling along...

John: Yeah. Oh, remember the uh, the thing I had was the sound of the box [mimics squeaking] and then we cut to the box. [mimics squeaking] 'Hey, is anybody out there?''

Chris: And this was great, this is Apollo—Apollo figured out how we would do the uh, box switch.

John: Cause the box actually works slightly differently, that's not how you'd usually do it, but he—Apollo invented a version of the trick on the fly.

Christine: For us.

John: [mimics squeaking] Hello?

[All Laugh]

Chris: And this stuff, when we shot this, I literally was crying, I was laughing so hard. We were shooting the stuff of him in the box, the CEO-

John: How did you shoot that?

Peter: We attached a camera again, kind of like the box shot earlier, attached the camera to the box and spun it. But I was surprised, it didn't look like I thought it would. It looks great, but it didn't turn out like I thought it would. But he was great, we spun him around and around, at one point he said, 'I'm getting sick'...

[All Laugh]

John: And all the jokes about bosses here, this is what you do in a corporate show, is when you go, you find out like all the stuff, the name of the boss, and the one who's bad at golf, and you work it into the routine, and oh, man. It's filthy, filthy lucre.

Chris: Here's a beautiful shot I love here, too; there's a shot from behind of the box spinning I just love.

John: And, away.

Christine: The color palette’s great, for the entire show. Looks terrific. Really pops.

Peter: [Unintelligible] to our DP by the way, that was four cameras at once; we shot the whole thing in one day.

Christine: Wow. Dave Connell, superstar.

Dean: I love all these shots, I just love them. And he was great in these scenes. I mean, I totally buy him.

John: We just put him in the elevator. ‘Have a good time.’ Yeah like it's all sort of blue and orange down here, it's all sort of grey and pastels upstairs—

Peter: The crowd loved this gag.

John: Oh yeah.

Chris: And here we go.

John: [Mimics squeaking] It's just funny, I'm sorry, man. You put a CEO in a box... And the uh, did you use a real dove, or no, that was a fake dove all along?

Peter: It was fake. It was a little squeezy dove, that's really kinda cool.

John: There's actually a famous, uh, Penn and Teller famous story, they do magic exhibitions, where people demonstrate their tricks. And there's a youth category, where kids show that they have mastery of these classic tricks, there's one where you, like, show the dove in a cooking pan, and then close the pan and then light the fire and whip it away and there's like a cooked dove in its place? And as the kid did it, he screwed it up, so as soon as he lit the fire, like, a hundred magicians stood up at once and went 'THE DOVE!!' 'cause they all know how it works.

Dean: Oh noo.

John: And he's like the thing's on fire and he's beating it out with his tiny like, his twelve year old magician's coat... 'cause doves are expensive. I mean nevermind the cruelty, but yeah.

Christine: Aw... [Pause] These two need to have their own vaudeville act. I would watch a variety show that they hosted.

John: I like, again, just the constant choices that Beth is making at all times, just like- and she's kind of amused, and now she's bored with this. Ah, she's done, she wants to be breaking into things. Uh, excellent cheesy server room, nicely done.

Peter: It was the smallest room in the known world.

John: Ye—what's that?

Peter: It was the smallest room in the known world.

John: We like to build our sets really tiny.

Peter: It was basically a closet.

John: Yeah, and then this was again always our drive to the [unintelligible] complication.

Peter: Good bad guy, by the way.

Dean: Yeah, he really delivered.

Chris: This bad guy, he was really terrific, Kevin E. West is his name.

Dean: We actually met him through uh, Patrick Jakoni, who's our mixer, who mixes all the episodes of Leverage.

John: Did he have a—did he just bring the headshot in, or....

Dean: He was a friend and he just said "I really want you to meet this guy, he's a friend of mine, I really think he's a terrific actor." And I met him, and I thought he was great. You guys have met him, and—

Chris: Great kind of middle management evil.

John: The banality of evil. He gets a great evil speech of evil.

Chris: He does. Which is a late edition.

Dean: A little shout-out to Derek, who does all of our graphics on all the computers.

Peter: Unbelievable.

Dean: I mean, he does so much for us—

Peter: This is where he hit his head.

John: Yeah, see, no scar there, and then, uh, nothing but scarves afterwards.

Dean: I love this fight too.

John: This, I will—

Timestamp: 35:00

Dean: I love the closed quarter fights.

Christine: Absolutely.

John: I will fully admit, this is, um. I'm trying to remember....

Chris: Look at this. [All Laugh] There's the scene.

John: I'm trying to remember, there's a, it's not a Jackie Chan fight, it's a Jackie Chan produced movie, it's with three actresses, I think it's called So Beautiful, which has an elevator fight, that actually was the origin of this.

Peter: What I like is the 90 degree shutter in all these fights. It makes it feel, like...

John: It's very crisp.

Peter: Yeah. It makes it feel like, like you're missing a frame or something.

John: So what happened? Chris turned around, right, turned around and just smacked his head against the side of the cabin?

Chris: Well, I mean, we passed it, but there's a moment when he throws a punch, and it sort of—you can kinda see the edge, in the frame, and his head just continued into the edge of the box.

Peter: No, we had the— we didn't have the padded one in there. And he went against the hard one. Split it open huge too.

Chris: Seventeen stitches.

Scott: Wow.

John: Seventeen stitches, and then like a week later, pulled them out himself because he was sick of them.

Peter: I think it was actually right here.

Scott: Really?

Peter: I think it was this one. I think it was the last punch, if I remember correctly.

John: Never do the last punch.

Chris: Oh, might have been there, yeah.

John: Yeah, lotta elbows, lotta—I always loved a good fight—what, what is this? This is madness!

[All Laugh]

Christine: It's vaudeville!

John: What the hell was that?

Dean: Something like a Marx brothers movie.

John: I know!

Christine: It's delightful.

John: I'm really waiting for Zeppo to show up to that. I think Gina's Zeppo in this episode. And he's still in the box.

Peter: 'Hello? Hello?'

John: And then this, the getaway with the curtain trick.

Chris: Curtain trick, and this again was, you know, Apollo designed, because, you know, we had in the script, they disappeared in a cone curtain, and he, you know...

John: Well it's actually, it was uh, when I was seven, or something of that age, I saw Bill Bixby do that in The Magician, and it always stuck with me.

Christine: The greatest theme song in the world.

Chris: We watched a little bit of The Magician.

John: We watched a little bit of The Magician, and it has the greatest theme song of all time. If you can go YouTube the theme for The Magician, it's fantastic.

Christine: Our writers’ assistant had it queued up. Becky had it queued up and ready whenever we needed to play.

John: Ohhhh.

Chris: Ohh, gut punched into a chair, that's another kind of recurring theme of season two.

John: Well, it was our Rockford homage.

Christine: Ah yes, the gut punch.

John: Yeah, James Garner spent five years getting gut punched.

Chris: I think this is an iconic shot of this show, I do, it's a beautiful shot.

Peter: And this is Apollo's idea, I think, to put the rabbit back in, too.

Chris: Yes, it was, it was.

Christine: Fantastic visual.

Dean: And I love the way that Aldis plays this scene here, because I- the danger felt real. It didn't feel like, oh comedy villains' fake punch, he's really okay. You know when I watched it, I really felt like wow, we're in trouble.

John: Well Aldis is a very good actor. Yeah. This really also became the year where we kind of established the straight run fourth and fifth act.

Chris: Well this is very much a real time episode. I think three of the five acts were pretty much in real time.

Peter: I like that he talks about the uh, magician's union. You're gonna get a letter from them, I'm telling you.

Chris: And here is the evil speech of evil.

John: Just explaining that if people are stupid enough to eat frozen pot pies without heating them enough, they deserve salmonella.

Dean: That's not a rationale!

John: No!

Chris: That's what happens to people who don't follow instructions. Now I'm giving you instructions.

John: No, he's really selling this, he thinks he's gonna die here, or at least get seriously messed up. And the bad guy, uh, who played the Busey?

Chris: The bad guy was George Castillo.

John: Yeah he was good. He had a good physical menace. And the nice pass, there we go, if you're paying attention. And what I like is that Aldis made a choice there, like, as soon as he saw that—

Peter: Two different locations, by the way.

John: Oh yeah, you're not— that reverse isn’t anywhere near there?

Christine: Oh, nicely done.

Peter: It's like, thirty miles away.

Dean: Nice. Never knew that.

Chris: We coming up to— when we do this flash, about how we got the phone, is a, this right here is an absolutely beautiful shot coming up.

John: I like that he calls him magician too, as if— it's very, like [very dramatically] 'Magiciaan!'

Christine: I'm actually most proud of that line, by the way.

John: Yeah, exactly. It is. It's very Lord of the Rings.

Dean: And a terrific use of the ninja zoom.

John: Yeah, to reestablish that geography we talk about all the time. Um, yeah, and the poker chip, and the turn to the reveal, she’s gonna bump into him, but the thing I was going to say is, Aldis does a moment there where he sees the lift, he knows it’s going to be okay, and his expression changes.

Christine: His whole face relaxes.

Peter: She looks so hot there, too.

John: She does, she looks very good.

Christine: She's rocking the power pony. There's a lot of Parker's power ponytails this year.

John: Parker ponytails?

Christine: The power pony.

John: The power pony, is that what you're calling it?

Christine: That's what it's called.

John: By the way, if you google power pony that's not what you're gonna get.

Christine: Do not Google power pony.

John: [Laughing] Do not Google power pony.

Peter: Here's a flashback, this is a great shot.

Chris: Here it is, here's the shot.

Peter: This was— our operator nailed this.

John: It's coming.

Chris: It's a long explanation.

John: It is a long explanation.

Chris: Here it is, here it is. Oh, look at that. Perfect shot

Peter: Her look back is fabulous.

Timestamp: [40:00]

Chris: Perfect turn.

Christine: That is poetry. That's beautiful.

John: It also helps that Beth has good hands. You know, Apollo said that —

Chris: Well, he worked with her on this.

John: Yeah, he taught her how to lift.

Christine: She could be a thief if she wanted to.

John: And we'll see how season three goes, who knows where we'll wind up. Aww, thief of hearts, that's nice.

Christine: Isn't she?

John: And the whole idea of dumping, um, it was actually, the whole idea that phones now, you can just dump massive amounts of information on, was, I think Bruce Sterling had just done a thing about, um, the ubiquity... instead of cloud computing, but using the sort of—why go to cloud computing if your devices have more memory than the NASA moon landing?

Chris: And here, here's where we're—

John: And, ah, she's back!

Peter: 'I was in the box.'

[All Laugh]

Christine: 'I was in the bar!'

Peter: 'They put me in a box.'

Christine: He was in the box, she was in the bar, and now they're together again.

John: Seriously man, I had a fistful of scotch, and I must have been saying that for a week. 'They put me in a box'. I may drink during the day. And this, by the way, is an iconic shot for the show. That's a big one.

Christine: Aw, look at that. Look at those two.

John: It's tricky, when you find— our wardrobe has to be high style without ever going over the top, and that's what really— it's nice because that's what makes it visually interesting.

Christine: Look at these two together. Oh my god.

John: I know. They're great.

Dean: And this, again, was a real nice setup for where we ultimately go with the uh, the entire season.

John: That's right, because if you're listening to these commentaries in the—and we've split the season, it's— 209 is the last one. So you don't know what happens in the back end. Um. Dinosaurs.

Christine: They fight dinosaurs.

Dean: But this concept that he has replaced alcohol with control...

John: Right, this season is about addiction. Um, and people who cope with alcohol. Ahem.

Christine: Oh, this season is about addiction? [All Laugh] What? What show was I writing on last year?

Chris: Beautiful shot of her here, too, just really nice.

Peter: Hiding her pregnancy.

John: You know, she does a lot of work here when she's talking to—'cause it's interesting, this is a pairing we don't do a lot, and we wound up doing more this year. Um, is the idea that he is a little outside the team, and very hyper competent at what he does. And you can sort of see their relationship over the course of the first couple episodes arc where she feels comfortable confiding in him, in a way that was not there for season one.

Chris: And she's a little estranged from Nate, too.

Christine: I think because of that betrayal, first season, Sophie and Eliot have a special relationship in season two.

John: Yeah.

Dean: Well, Peter, thank you for being part of this episode, and being part of our show.

Peter: Loved it, enjoyed it immensely. I wanna live in Portland.

[All Laugh]

Christine: We do too.

John: And uh, Christina, Scott, nicely done.

Christine: Good job guys, everybody did a great job.

Dean: Stay tuned for the next episode of Leverage.

Peter: Single person clapping, single person clapping.

John: We're all clapping.

#Leverage #Leverage TNT #Leverage Audio Commentary Transcripts #Audio Commentary #Transcripts #Parker #Alec Hardison #Eliot Spencer #Nate Ford #Sophie Deveraux #Season 2 #Episode 6 #season 2 episode 6 #The Top Hat Job

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spookysanta · 5 years

Text

daddy’s girl. (e.d.)

Summary: he's been watching her and she knows it. He's yearning for her, and he’ll have her, but she has to finish high school first.

Pairing: Ethan Dolan xReader

WARNINGS: age gap (38 vs 18), creep shit

SAY NOTHING IM WRITING A NEW SERIES JUST READ IT AND TELL ME IF IT SUCKS

DISCLAIMER! PLEASE READ: in this, the girl (cairo) is of LEGAL age. he (ethan) refers to her as a child bc yanno.... he's almost 40 here. this isn't on any pedophile stuff, okay? just for clarification. AND as i was writing this i got jake gyllenhaal vibes from this, but then i figured ethan could be the “sexy dad” in the future (so to speak)—which is what i was kinda going for; like a man that’s older but is so irresistibly gorgeous, even young girls swoon over him.

UNEDITED

****

******

She'd caught his eye.

And he doesn't know how it came to be this way; he thought he was done messing around like this ages ago. But here he was, a thirty-eight-year-old man, watching an eighteen-year-old girl cheer at his neice's high school's football game.

She sees him though; as if he's staring into her soul. As she finishes her tumbling routine in the halftime show, her eyes dart in his direction and his never leave her. She shivers slightly--

Who is that man? she wondered, walking away from the field to distract herself.

She stands at the cash register, swiping his items across the scanner. "Did you find everything okay?" she asked in a monotone voice, looking at the clock on the register's screen.

"Yes, I did. Thank you." the man responded, fishing in his wallet for cash as he already knew how much two bottles of red wine cost. "Do you need to see ID?"

"Yes, I--" she paused, looking at the man for the first time during their interaction. This was the man from the football game! She couldn't have forgotten those pearly eyes that bore into hers, and definitely didn't forget the way he ironically made her feel when their eyes locked. "I-I do."

"You okay?" he asked with a chuckle as he handed her his driver's license. He knew exactly who she was, and after a bit of research, he knows that she's what he wants. And, likewise, he knew that she remembered him. That in itself was exciting because now he knew where she was from 9-2 every Saturday--which meant he'd be seeing her a lot more. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

She glanced at the line forming behind him and shook her head at the idea of her confrontation. She took the card and read the birthdate carefully. "1980." she muttered, handing it back to him. "Your total's $18.20."

He handed her a $20, grabbing the bottles of wine by their necks and smirking. "Keep the change."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome, Cairo. See you around."

She lay in her bed, wondering why this man clouded her thoughts. What was it about him that made him so intriguing? Yes, he was attractive, but he was more than twice her age--shouldn't that mean that he was repulsive to her? Should she shy away from this man and his beauty?

Ethan.

If there's anything she knew about men, it's that older men (well, boys, in her case) don't usually have the girl's best interest in mind. But no matter how many cons appear on this list, the only pro she seems to think of is the fact that he looked at her like he knew her already. His hazel eyes were almost magnetizing her brown ones to his gaze, and the energy was too strong to pull it away.

He's come to the realization that he's hooked on her.

He wants her, no--needs her.

And he knows how crazy that sounds with all of the odds stacked against him (namely, her being a child by his comparison) but he'll admit they'd look absolutely perfect together.

And there's nothing he won't do until they're in love.

day one.

She walked home from school every day. Three-fifteen on the dot, Monday through Friday. Sometimes, she takes the after-school bus after her cheer practices, and that drops her off on the same corner but at five-thirty. He sees her walk down Linden Avenue, then make a left on Conch Street, and then go into the tiny brick house at the end of the lively culdesac. Sometimes he sees her through her window at night, laying in her bed soundly. It takes everything in him each night to not climb up the big pine tree to the second floor, open the already unlocked window—she doesn't lock it anymore because the lock can get finicky at times and it can get quite hot in San Bernadino in May—and breathe in the same air as her.

Just once.

Just once, he wants to be there for her—hold her, kiss her, smell her, taste her.

Is that too much to ask?

Just one more month, he reminds himself as he perches himself on his porch chair, watching her walk into her home with her friend, Janelle.

He does not like Janelle.

Janelle has a tendency to be a bit manipulative when it comes to Cairo; she wants the best for her, of course. But she's always making Cairo go to parties that she doesn't want to go to, or do things that Cairo doesn't typically do.

Cairo's a good girl who doesn't need to be bombarded with social...ick.

"She's a good girl," he mumbled, palms set on his knees with white fingertips. "My good girl."

***

She continued her walk to the store like she usually does on Sunday mornings in the spring. Yes, she does work at the store, but why not stop by and visit her favorite co-workers while she picked up her favorite ice cream?

"Good morning, Edith!" she greeted to the elderly woman stood behind the customer service desk. She resembled Jane Goodall in a way; caring, generous, kind. "How are you today?"

"Hey, sweetie! I'm alright, hope you're doing well. Say 'hi' to Katherine for me!" she replied with a wave, going into the employee's lounge.

"Will do!" she wandered to the frozen food section, her coffee brown eyes set on the cookie dough ice cream in the freezer. With happy alarms blaring in her head, she grabbed a pint from the shelf, going immediately to the checkout line to pay for her dessert. "Hey Ricky." she said to the cashier.

"Hey, Cai." he responded, ringing up her ice cream and setting it on the counter. "$4.68. Got your employee ID on you?"

She fished through her wallet and came up emptyhanded. "Shoot. I must've left it at home." she sighed. "It's cool, I'll pay full price."

"Nah, I got you." he took a card out of his front pocket, swiped it, and put in his pin. "There ya go. $2.27."

"Thanks, Ky. I owe you one." She handed him a five dollar bill, keeping the cash fold of her wallet open so she could put her change in it.

"You know what you could do for me so we're even?" he opened the cash drawer, taking out her change and handing it to her.

"What?"

"Go to dinner with me." he wrote on her freshly printed receipt. "It doesn't have to be fancy, but if you're interested, you should hit me up sometime."

"Sure. I'd love to." she smiled, putting the receipt with her change and grabbing her ice cream off the counter. "We'll talk tonight?"

"Totally. See you around."

"See you!"

She entered the house again and put her ice cream in the fridge. "Ma!" she yelled into her mother's office as she passed it. "Ms. Edith at Ben's said 'hi'!"

"Aw, how sweet of her to think of me!" she said with a smile. "I'll have to send you by her house with a plate of cookies this week."

She groaned inwardly. Edith's a nice woman, but Cairo's mother, Katherine, does not conjure up her life-changing cookies on any given day. Which means that she would make a small batch—just enough for Edith and her husband, Clarke—and then, poof! No-one's going to see those cookies until Christmastime. Bounding up the staircase and into her bedroom, practically leaping onto her bed with a sigh.

Meanwhile, he was watching her still. He didn't even think to consider the idea of someone catching him stare at this girl, sat in the rocking chair on his front porch, watching her intently through a pair of zooming binoculars while she boredly scrolled through her phone. Quite frankly, he wouldn't care at all. If someone were to walk by and ask him what he was doing, he'd merely say: "Protecting my girl."

He doesn't give a damn if she took a glance out her window and saw a man—that man—staring back at her. Knowing her, which obviously he does, she'd probably scream for her mom and tell her mom to come and look because "there's a strange man" looking at her through her window. And then her mom would come and look but by then he'd be back in his home across the way from hers, in his bedroom, watching her panic through the telescope he'd set up.

That'd be a gift to himself, really. Because he knows deep within that she thinks about him. Even though maybe the thoughts are of worry or panic and not ones of admiration, all he cares about is the fact that he's invaded her thoughts just like she's invaded his.

#dolan twins #dolan fandom #dolan tuesday #dolan imagines #ethan dolan #planet dolan #grayson and ethan #ethan dolan smut #ethan dolan imagine #ethan imagine #ethan dolan fic #ethan dolan series #ethan dolan x reader #ethan dolan x poc #ethan dolan x black girl #stalker!ethan

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purplesurveys · 4 years

Text

698

3 words that describe...

Your personality: (A bit) aloof, sensitive, and shy.

Your friends: Loud, laidback, cheeky.

Your family: Emotionally distant, (mostly) religious. I’m cheating so much on this looooool.

Your life: Right now? Put on hold. Thanks, coronavirus.

Your current mood: Hungry, and irritated eyes.

Your dreams/goals in life: Ok three words will be too short for this so I’ll just enumerate three whole phrases: I’d like to have a job that pays well, get a house that doesn’t have to be huge, but it has to come with features I’ve always wanted like cove lights and a yard for the kids and dog to play in, and get settled.

Your partner/boyfriend/girlfriend (if you have one): Funny, intelligent, courageous.

The person you last talked to: Brave, considerate, responsible.

The room that you are currently in: Comfortable, well-lit, homey.

The world in your perspective: Many stupid humans.

Yes/No questions...

Are you creative? Absolutely not. I like doing the logical/rational side of things... I let others take care of creative aspects, if they have to be present.

Do you like spending a sunny day outdoors? NO, unless I’m at the beach then sunny is the only way to go. Otherwise I’d rather be indoors or somewhere air-conditioned thx.

Do you get upset easily or over the littlest things? I can be. It’s usually when I’m already stressed/antsy enough, or if I’m on my period.

Do you dislike any of the people in charge of you (i.e: teachers, bosses)? I don’t particularly dislike my prof in my Rizal course but he sure teaches like he doesn’t want to be there. I just haven’t been getting the enthusiasm off of him, and that’s really important to me when it comes to being interested in my subjects. Oh but my PE coach this sem is a bitch - one time I forgot to wear the shirt color she demands us to follow and she ignored me for the entire period. Quickest way to make me feel shitty. So yeah. Probably her.

Do you like to read books/magazines/newspapers? I like books only if they’re non-fiction. I...don’t really read magazines anymore, and I kinda have to check into newspapers from time to time because I take up journalism.

Are you family-oriented? Towards my girlfriend’s family, yeah. I don’t really care about being family-oriented for my own.

Have you ever been friends with someone in the past out of sympathy? Yeah, this girl named MJ in Grade 7. She was a new-ish student then and no one was approaching her, so Gab and I tried to befriend her for a time. Didn’t really pan out that well - we just didn’t mesh - so we stopped talking not long after.

Do/did you ever get nervous around people you are/were crushing on? I still do.

Do you believe in global warming? Duh.

Are you happy with the way society/the world in general is? I’m typically pessimistic when it comes to people, so no not really. I just feel like the bad news always overweigh the good these days - and while good news can serve as rays of sunshine sometimes, I’d rather face reality than live in my own bubble and choose to be oblivious to all the shitstorms happening around me.

Do you ever question your own religion/beliefs? I did, as early as when I was 10. The Bible just didn’t make sense to me to my frustration, and I’ve always felt disgusted with my school guilt-tripping us to be good people because a man got crowned with thorns and nailed to a giant cross. I figured I can be good simply because I choose to, so I let go of my Catholic roots quickly after. Having no friends that time surely forced me to think hahahahahahaha jk 1/2

This/That...

Do you prefer today's trends/styles, or ones from the past? Both have awesome stuff, there’s no need to pick. I’m really into the mom jeans of the 90s, but I also like the yellow trend that’s been going on recently.

Being too cold or too hot? I’d rather be shivering but be comforted with a thick blanket, than sweat bullets and have absolutely no way to cool myself down.

Uploading music to your iPod, or buying CDs? Depends. I used to buy the CDs of my favorite artists then just download the other music I’m not as passionate about.

Fruits or vegitables? VEGETABLESSSSSSSSSSSS. I hate fruits.

Chocolate or vanilla? Chocolate, for the most part. Vanilla tastes like nothing to me. Baseball or football? I don’t watch either and I probably won’t enjoy either either lmao, but I have a bias towards football because my girlfriend’s sisters play the sport. The mall with a bunch of little stores, or one single, big store? Malls kinda work differently here... they’re all one big building with a bunch of restaurants, clothing shops, sports shops, novelty stores, etc. Rap music or rock and roll? Not a big fan of either but I’d go with rock and roll I guess. I like some rap but none of them make me feel things, which rock can sometimes do for me. Roller skates or roller blades? I owned a pair of roller blades when I was 10 and had fun memories with it even though I never did learn how to do it properly. Horror movies that give you nightmares, or romance that makes you vomit? Horror for sure. I don’t even like romance-only movies; they have to be laced with a lot of comedy in between for me to enjoy them. Making more friends or making more money? Making more money sorry LMAOOOOOO Living it up and being stupid, or being safe and never pay the price? I’d always rather be safe. I hate getting reprimanded or caught doing something bad or being punished. Doing more of the talking, or more of the listening in a conversation? Listening, please. I don’t like having the attention on me for too long. Giving or receiving? Giving I guess? I always have a pretty good sense of what my loved ones need, and it’s always nice to see how good they feel when I give it to them. Cats or dogs? Dogs. Playing on the swingsets or the slides (as a kid)? Swings. I was traumatized by one slide when I was 6 because it was apparently blistering hot when I slid down from it, and it almost burned my butt off lmao.

Would you rather...

Bolding these because I’m lazy.

Live off of just food for 2 days, or just beverage for 2 days?

Tell a lie and be believable, or tell the truth and still be blamed?

Die at 65 with the love of your life, or live to 85 being single?

Fart and be heard from far away or fart and be smelled from far away?

Be tickled for an hour straight or be woken up by a bucket of cold water?

Have a cabel snap while bunjee jumping or have the bar go up on a coaster?

Have a deadly plague or a nuclear bomb hit your country? (Don't get ideas!) < This is a sick question to ask these days lol. I’m not answering.

Lick a frozen telephone pole or stick your hand in dry ice? Be rejected by your favorite celebrity or by someone you secretly admire? Give up your favorite food for eternity or eat a bowl of dead spiders? Make a lot of money at a job you hate or little money at a job you love? Jump off a bridge or from a moving car? < Another sick question.

Favorites...

Color(s): Pink, sky blue, off-white.

Song(s): I don’t have one at the moment. I haven’t listened to any music in a while, save for lo-fi.

Artist(s): Beyoncé if we’re talking solo, Paramore if you mean bands.

Music genre: I don’t have a favorite one; my taste is pretty scattered.

Movie: Two for the Road or Good Will Hunting

TV show: Breaking Bad, Friends, BoJack Horseman, Queer Eye

Actor and actress: Gregory Peck; Audrey Hepburn or Kristen Stewart

Movie/TV genre: Romantic comedy or drama lmao, I’m a sappy bitch. Suspense and psychological horror are also cool.

Restarant: Yabu, Mendokoro Ramenba, or Silantro

Food: Sushi

Dessert: Macarons

Hobby: Going to museums! Or reading about the history of anything.

Activity to do out of boredom: Scroll my social media feeds orrrrrr do surveys, or watch cooking videos on YouTube heh.

Type of weather: Bleak, rainy, and chilly.

Book: I don’t have a favorite.

Subject in school: History

Item that you own: My car hahahaha

Pastime: Eating out and window shopping. Maybe I’m just saying these because I haven’t been to a mall in a while :/

Site: Palawan

Tourist attraction: I’ve always wanted to go to those towers that lets you go to the top floor and the floor is just literal glass. If I’m gonna be a tourist-y tourist, that’s the first place I’d go to haha.

Random questions in your own words...

If you could have any desired superpower, what would it be?

The history nerd in me would take up time travel in an instant. And I won’t even be using it as a superpower lmao, it’d be like a research pastime for me.

What would be your dream job?

If I wasn’t such an introvert and if I were a lot better in handling crowds, I really would have wanted to be a pro wrestler.

Descibe your dream date:

Museum in the day, cute dinner at night.

What was the best day of your life like?

I don’t know if that has happened yet.

What was the worst day of your life like?

So far my worst day was when I wasn’t accepted into my school paper in high school and I spent like 18 hours crying my eyes out. I liked writing and was accepted for my portfolio, but people thought I was too shy to fit the group’s dynamic and ended up getting booted. There are quiet writers too, assholes.

If you ever have kids one day, what you you name them?

Too early for this lol I’ve only had name picked out - Olivia.

What's one thing that will bring you out of your worst mood no matter what?

My dog. FOR SURE.

Who's the most annoying person you've ever encountered?

Jem, someone from my college who thinks she’s close with me but I really do not like her at all.

If you could grow up to be like anybody, who would it be?

I don’t believe in having role models. I just want to be the best version of myself.

If you could change something about yourself, what would it be?

My mental health could be mental healthier.

What's your favorite inspirational/famous quote? I don’t depend on these either. Describe your dream ice cream sundae (unlimited toppings): Meh, I don’t like sundaes. Just scoops would be fine with me. What comes to mind first when you think of your favorite color? I have no idea why this is what I remember, but it was the day I went shopping for school supplies and got myself a pink clipboard, pink pencil case, pink expander, and pink highlighters. I think it’s because it was that day where I had to acknowledge that pink was in fact, unironically, my favorite color HAHAHA What's something in your life that you once hated but came to like? ^ The color pink. And chicken curry. What's something in your life that you once liked but came to hate? Cooked salmon. There was one phase my mom made it almost everyday and I just got sick of it. I refuse to eat salmon to this day unless it’s sashimi or in sushi. If you could stop any chaos/problem in our world today, what would it be? This fucking pandemic. 2020 CAN’T CONTINUE BECAUSE OF YOU. What would be the best way to die, in your opinion? Peacefully, in sleep, with no pain. What would be the worst way to die? Falling off a cliff (or anywhere high) and landing on a boulder EUGH I cringe at it. Also getting impaled. AND plane crashes. If you could give your room a free makeover, what would you do to it? I’d make it look spacier by moving the bed to the wall so there’s a lot of free space in the middle. I’d also add a desk, work chair, and a lamp so I can study there. If you could have an unlimited amount of anything, what would it be? The number of years my dog would live. What's one thing that you like that would probably surprise your friends? They know I like punk rock in general but I haven’t shared any of the music with them. It would definitely surprise them. Out of everything in the world, what holds the most meaning to you? Stability.

#survey #surveys

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welllpthisishappening · 6 years

Text

Have Your Cake [And Eat It Too] (Part 2)

Killian can’t seem to stop moving. It’s a nervous habit. He’s a little nervous. Because they’ve been waiting forever and he’s been waiting forever and he really just wants them to be a family. Officially.

Emma needs to keep moving. To win. She’s very competitive. And she’s needs a distraction. Because they’ve been waiting forever and trying a bit longer and she really just wants them to be a family. Officially

Or: Another quasi Out of the Frying Pan sequel with the legal system and Kitchen Stadium.

Word Count: 8.4K of Emma Swan and Killian Jones being stupid into each other while cooking. Rating: Teen. But, like, a higher teen than last time. AN: Back at it again with the family feelz and the kissing and I did more food-based research for these few thousand words than I have in my entire life. Also, peanut soup is a real thing that they serve in Colonial Williamsburg and I have begrudgingly had it on more than one family vacation. As always, thanks internet for being awesome and reading the words I spew at you. I really will write that other sequel eventually. In the meantime, if you’ve got thoughts on what I should hoarding fic-wise, let me know.

This is also on Ao3 if that’s how you roll.

“It’s kind of intimidating, isn’t it?” “It’s a stadium, Swan.” “I really need you to stop referring to it as that.” Killian glanced at her, all smiles and bright, blue eyes that were going to be way more distracting than they should have been when there would probably be a considerable amount of very sharp objects nearby soon. But it had been that way for a week and it was closing in on Christmas and there was always something about Christmas in New York and snow and family and everything felt decidedly official and kind of like they’d been living in some kind of snow globe for the last week and a half.

Emma assumed things were consistently picturesque in a snow globe.

Or, at least, their snow globe.

It was a very strange metaphor. She wasn’t sure she’d ever actually seen a snow globe in real life. Maybe, like, at Macy’s.

Macy’s seemed like the kind of place that sold snow globes at Christmas time.

“Swan,” Killian said lightly, wrapping his hand around her shoulder to stop her from walking any further into Kitchen Stadium and now she was doing it too. It was, admittedly, pretty goddamn intimidating and absolutely enormous. “You went all distant there, love,” he continued.

There was a hint of worry in his voice. That did something absurd to Emma’s pulse. That might have been because of his hand. Maybe she’d buy Killian a snow globe for Christmas.

That also felt like a kind of lame gift after everything else, but everything else felt less like a gift and more like just their lives and Emma hoped the secret ingredient was good.

She hoped Archie didn’t bother her too much while she was cooking.

“I think you could fit, like, six of my studios in here,” Emma said, not quite an answer, but Killian hadn’t actually asked her a question and his eyebrows shifted when she spoke.

“That seems like a lot doesn’t it?” “This place is enormous.” “You’ve been here before.” That was true. She’d watched Killian cook on that soundstage or studio or whatever more times than she could count in the last few years, and he won every single time, some kind of kitchen wizard or a compliment that wasn’t nearly as lame as that, but they both kept calling it Kitchen Stadium, so maybe they were on even footing there.

And Emma assumed parents were just sort of supposed to reach a certain plateau of lame at some point – dad jokes for actual dads and official paperwork and she kept wondering if it was possible to smile too much.

She didn’t think so.

The secret ingredient needed to be something good. She would scream if it was festive.

“I know, I know,” Emma mumbled, resting both her hands on the front of his shirt and neither one of them had changed yet. They were, actually, almost early.

“But?” “But it’s...big.” “We’ve covered the size of the studio several times now, love,” Killian grinned. His whole face did something absolutely absurd when Emma made a noise in the back of her throat, a scoff and a groan and something Henry had picked up at some point as well. “You worried about stacking up against the competition?” Emma’s jaw dropped, air rushing out of her and she dimly wondered where their kid was, but that thought only lasted as long as it took to come up with a slightly scathing retort and both Ruby and Regina would be frustrated they weren’t filming this.

They were really, really good at flirting in studios.

“That sounds awfully presumptuous, Lieutenant,” Emma muttered, tugging on the shirt she’d never actually let go of and she had no idea how she was expected to cope with seeing her husband cook in a jacket that said Iron Chef on it. It would be a miracle if she didn’t fall over herself at some point.

“Not presumptuous. Just historic.” “Oh, God, that’s even worse.” “Track records or something.” “And far too much confidence. I’ve beaten you several times in cooking competitions before.” Killian’s eyebrows jumped and twisted, tongue pressed into the corner of his mouth as his hands found her hips and his thumb started tracing idle patterns against the hem of her shirt. Emma’s breath hitched, lips tugged back behind her teeth so she wouldn’t make any more noise or say anything decidedly sentimental.

They’d done enough of that in the last few days – muttered conversations in their bedroom and the kitchen, tucked against each other in the corner of the couch and everything seemed like a chance and an opportunity and Emma was certain they’d both set a record for consistent and constant happiness.

“I can hear you thinking, Swan,” Killian said. His thumb was a menace.

“I’m just considering how nice it’s going to be to take you down a few pegs this afternoon.” He chuckled, letting his forehead rest against hers and it was a miracle no one had found them yet. Emma assumed that had something to do with wherever Henry was. He was getting very good at running interference and being just as happy and excited and several other incredibly positive adjectives.

There was a color-coded countdown in the corner of the kitchen.

“I think your trash talk is out of date, love,” Killian mumbled. His thumb still hadn’t stopped moving. “I’ve got home stadium advantage here.” “I can’t believe you just said that.” “That’s a fact. One loss in several years is impressive.” “Yeah, so says you.” “So says several legions of very impressed fans.”

“Really think very highly of yourself and your fans, don’t you?” Emma asked, leaning back to smile or do something vaguely flirtatious because she knew he had a difficult time forming coherent sentences when she bit her lower lip. She grinned when he practically growled in response, eyes somehow getting sharper and bluer and possibly just evolving into a whole different level of trash talk, and Emma was only a little frustrated her plan had kind of blown up in her face.

Metaphorically.

She’d like to avoid anything blowing up while she was competing in Kitchen Stadium.

God, she hated that name.

“You don’t have a cookbook though,” Emma pointed out. She really could not think when he did that thing with his tongue. This whole thing was going to be a disaster.

It’d probably set viewership records or something.

“True,” Killian admitted. “But I did help come up with some of the recipes in the cookbook, so I’d like to imagine that some of it has to do with me.” “Nah, that’s not how that works at all.” “No?” “No,” Emma echoed. “And, you know, if we’re going to point out things you don’t have, you don’t have a very popular cooking show and your own legion of fans who, and I’m quoting Rubes here, totally lost their shit when you showed up with a different name on screen.” Killian threw his head back when he laughed, body shaking against Emma’s because, at some point, they’d decided to start occupying the same space and she hadn’t felt nauseous in awhile, but her stomach seemed to have different ideas in the moment and if he’d just move his thumb a few inches to the--

“Ah, yeah, right there,” Emma hissed, scowling when Killian grinned triumphantly at her. “God, did you just know that?” “Of course not, Swan.” “Why’d you move then?” “I had an assumption about your back,” Killian answered. “And your hips, honestly, because you’ve been complaining about them for the last few days--” “--I have not!” “No one is actually upset about the complaints, love, I promise.” “No one meaning you,” Emma corrected lightly, but her heart didn’t appear to get the memo about normal and they hadn’t said anything yet because there hadn’t really been time. There were character witnesses and worrying about paperwork and payments and they hadn’t even filmed the holiday special yet.

Emma should ask Killian to be on the holiday special.

That was, like, a thing now.

Killian nodded. “Yes, meaning me exactly. And probably Henry too, but I’d also assume he doesn’t want to talk much about your hips, so…” “Do you want to talk about my hips?” He laughed again, although the sound was a bit more strangled than it had been a few minutes before and Emma silently congratulated herself on that. They were seriously going to set records for Iron Chef. “I would love to talk about your hips at all times,” Killian said, sounding far more serious than those words should have allowed.

Emma was going to sprain her face muscles.

“Just my hips?” “I’m open to other options too, honestly.”

She burrowed her head into shoulder, an arm moving around her waist and her sneakers squeaked when she tried to find a few inches of space they weren’t both occupying. “I’d really like to beat you at your home stadium,” Emma mumbled, but the words lost a bit of their threat when spoken mostly into Killian’s collarbone.

“I’d really love to see you try, Swan.” “I’ve got some plans.” That gave him pause – quite literally. Killian tensed, like he’d been turn to stone or frozen and Emma wondered where the blast chiller was on that set. She should probably look around before they started cooking. Or after they took whatever promotional pictures she was sure both Regina and Ruby had demanded.

She hadn’t really been listening to the plans, had kind of tuned out anything that was her newly official family and she hadn’t been lying. It wouldn’t have mattered if the judge said no. It would still be theirs and them and some kind of collective unit that regularly cooked things on the weekend with color-coded schedules and matching looks of terror on their parental-type faces when Henry got hurt.

But, well, it was nice.

It was more than nice, but Emma’s hips were honestly killing her and it was only a matter of time until someone found them flirting in the studio.

“Are you guys kidding me?” Ruby asked, a lack of any real frustration in her voice. She almost sounded amused. Emma figured she also looked amused, but she wasn’t entirely willing to move away from Killian yet.

He didn’t let go of her either.

“You know we have a schedule,” Ruby continued. “It’s like...official.” Killian scoffed, and Emma still didn’t need to turn around to know that Ruby was glaring at him. “Sounds incredibly official, Ruby,” he said, fingers dancing along the ridge of Emma’s spine. “Where’s Gina?” “Talking to your kid.” “Aw, you did that on purpose,” Emma muttered, twisting despite Killian’s quiet objections and incredibly agile fingers and Ruby lifted her eyebrows in unspoken challenge.

“Did it work?” “I mean obviously. It got me to turn around, right?” “Is it going to get you to stop flirting with your husband and the father of your kids?” “Possibly, if you promise---”

Emma cut herself off, nearly biting her tongue in half in the process and she’d never seen that look on Ruby’s face before. Like she was torn somewhere between joy and euphoria and it was a feeling Emma understood in the pit of her stomach and the ache of her hips and Killian was never going to move again.

They were never going to be able to film.

“How did you know that?” Killian asked softly, and that was probably how it was supposed to sound when a person was trying to be threatening.

Ruby laughed. “I didn’t.” “What?” “I had several assumptions and thoughts based solely on what I know from sitcoms and, you know, high school health classes and kind of Mary Margaret, but--” “--The point, Lucas.”

Ruby’s eyebrows shifted again, some of that joy falling off her face and crashing onto the ground. She crossed her arms, twisting the fabric of her dress under her elbows and her eyes all but disappeared when she glared at Killian. He glared back. The secret ingredient was totally going to be something seasonal.

That’s how Iron Chef worked. “You won’t be able to cook like that,” Emma said. She turned on the spot, running her hands over Killian’s arm and the top of his prosthetic and he blinked, exactly, six times before he met her gaze. “I mean...that’ll make it easier for me to win and I’d like this to be an even fight.” He exhaled, tongue darting between his lips and eventually Emma would learn enough words to describe what color his eyes actually were. She hoped she figured it out before the kid they hadn’t actually told anyone except Henry about actually showed up.

“Definitely an even fight, Swan,” Killian said. “And I’m better at cooking when I’m slightly frustrated anyway. Something about using that emotion to my advantage.” “No one has ever said that.” “Several TV critics have said that and probably Eric.” “Yeah, but Eric is not a good source. He’s just nervous you’re going to put a shit ton of holiday themed items on the menu in Gowanus.” “No, love, that’s you.” “No!” “Eh,” Killian said, clicking his tongue at the same time Ruby made an almost identical noise. Emma gaped at them both, head on a swivel and something that felt like betrayal festering in her gut.

“That is absolutely untrue,” she shouted. Ruby scrunched her nose. “Aw, c’mon, don’t look at me like that! It is!” “How many times have you tried to change the dinner special in the last week?” Ruby asked knowingly.

“It’s a special! It’s supposed to change every week. That’s what the name implies!” “Once a night, Swan,” Killian muttered, dropping his mouth to the side of her neck and that one spot behind her ear that made everything else in several different universes entirely pointless. Ruby’s nose was going to sustain permanent damage. “You change specials on a daily basis. Not on an hour basis.”

“It has not been that bad.” “I hate to repeat Jones here, but eh,” Ruby laughed. “Ariel said Eric is legitimately worried you’re going to move to Gowanus.” “I am not moving to Gowanus.” “Just trying to put the previously discussed shit ton of holiday items on the menu.” Emma huffed, frustration and acceptance in the sound and Ruby grinned triumphantly. “Do you know what the secret ingredient is?” she asked. “Is it holiday themed?” “Why would I tell you that?” “Because you want me to win.” “You can’t cheat like that, Swan,” Killian chastised. His arm had moved again, wrapped around her middle with fingers that kept tracing patterns she was positive only he could see.

“You’re standing right here. If Rubes tells us what the secret ingredient is, then we’d both find out. Unless she wants to tell me in code.” “Do we have a code?” Ruby asked.

“Nah, but we probably should.” “Mary Margaret would really get mad if we came up with a secret code and didn’t include her. That’d almost be as shitty as force feeding the patrons in Gowanus holiday-themed food.” “Oh my God, no one is force feeding anyone anything,” Emma sighed. “Least of all holiday-themed food. That’s so aggressive.” “Fa la la la, la la la la.” “And,” Killian said sharply. “Speaking of Mary Margaret and your apparent knowledge of things that previously included her…” Ruby didn’t quite cackle, but it was pretty close, rocking back on her heels when the smile practically slid across her face. She hadn’t ever uncrossed her arms, but it didn’t look like a battle pose anymore. It kind of looked like she was trying to stop herself from jumping up and down or, possibly, crying.

They really needed to find Henry.

“Man, you are cranky when parenthood is impending, aren’t you?” Ruby asked, ignoring Emma’s muttered curses as she moved to the closest cooking station and promptly sat on top of it. Killian’s eyes widened slightly.

“It has nothing to do with that at all.” “Aw, that’s nice.” “Rubes, you are going to get whiplash from jumping through these emotions,” Emma said, swinging her legs out and she’d done it entirely for Killian’s reaction. Maybe cerulean was the right color? She’d ask Mary Margaret. Mary Margaret saw more Crayola crayon names than Emma did.

“Because no one has actually confirmed anything to me yet,” Ruby pointed out. “Why was it a secret? Is it still a secret?” “Why were you making assumptions?” “Because Will made a drink after your husband officially adopted your kid and you tried very hard to make sure that no one noticed you handing it to Killian.” “Maybe I just wasn’t thirsty.” “Oh, that was really bad, Em,” Ruby said, shaking her head. “Killian, wasn’t that really bad?” He didn’t answer, just pressed his lips together and did something entirely unfair with his eyebrows and Ruby sighed as if this were actually the end of the world and not some kind of best news ever in a way that led Emma to thoughts about snow globes. “Ok, whatever,” Ruby continued. “It was really bad. Also you got sick on set one time.” “What?” Killian asked sharply.

Emma rolled her eyes. “Ok, that didn’t happen.” “She’s lying,” Ruby whispered.

“I’m not! I didn’t actually get sick, I just thought I was going to and that’s like...it’s a thing. That’s how bodies work at that point.” Ruby nodded seriously, lips pursed together and the whole thing felt a little patronizing, but Emma could also see what might have been actual tears in her eyes. “I really don’t think anyone else knows. Does Henry know?” “Yeah.” She was absolutely crying. “God, I hate that.” “What?” Emma croaked, eyebrows pulled low and this could not have been part of the filming schedule. “Were those the words you were looking for?” “They absolutely were not,” Ruby admitted. “But I’m, like, kind of losing my mind and you guys are...I hate your stupid, emotional familial emotions. It’s just super nice and super something else that’s nice and picturesque and only kind of threatens to rot my teeth. And also how obviously flirting you were when I walked in on you.” “You’d think at this point you’d know not to walk onto set without announcing yourself,” Killian muttered. He pulled Emma against his side, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and they’d have to stop trying to touch each other when they started filming.

“I’m doing you guys a favor. It could have been Gina and she would not have been nearly as receptive to totally messing up the schedule as I am.”

“Ah, that’s probably true, actually.” “See, you’re welcome.” “What is the schedule, exactly?” Emma asked.

“Besides the flirting and the ever-growing family?” “You need to go back to school or something. Your sentence structure is all off. There’s Henry and,” Emma waved her hands in front of her, not quite an explanation or confirmation and Ruby clasped both her hands over her mouth so her squeal wouldn’t ricochet off the studio walls.

“Ok, ok, ok,” Ruby stammered. “Can I just ask a question? Jones, are you going to kill me if I ask a question? Also, remember that we are literally on set so you can’t kill me.” “Well, that answered that question, didn’t it?” Killian said.

“Ok, but that doesn’t actually make me feel any better.” “I’m not going to kill you, Lucas. Ask your question.”

“How long have you known?’ Killian tensed again, and Emma took a sharp breath through her nose, trying to keep her footing when she hadn’t actually moved at all. Ruby grimaced. “Remember the no killing promise,” she mumbled.

Emma clicked her tongue, glancing at Killian over her shoulder and it wasn’t like it was a complete secret, but it had been so different the last time she’d done this. And they hadn’t really been trying, weren’t actively not trying, but it was a surprise and in the middle of everything else and a lot and everything, again, and she desperately needed to expand her vocabulary.

So they’d told Henry – partially because he’d found Emma on the bathroom floor and partially because they were a them in a family kind of way that didn’t include secrets regarding the expansion of said family – but they hadn’t said anything to anyone else. They might have been a little selfish about that.

Killian shrugged.

And Emma was glad she’d taken that deep breath before, all the air seemingly rushing out of her lungs in one great, big huff of feeling and pre-show jitters and she was totally going to eat all of Killian’s food after it got judged.

“You can’t yell too loudly,” Emma warned. Ruby’s hands were still over her mouth, moving with her head when she nodded. “Uh, almost three months.” Ruby’s eyes bugged and the noise she made sounded strangled and a little desperate and she got some pretty good height on her jump. “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. Are you kidding me? Are you guys kidding me?” “Why would we joke about that?” Killian asked, and Emma swatted at his thigh. He caught her around the wrist, lacing his fingers through hers, and they didn’t have time for this.

“I have no idea, but seriously, you guys aren’t kidding?” Emma shook her head. “Not kidding. And you’re not really supposed to say anything before three months, so if you could--” “--Of course,” Ruby shouted. “Shit, yeah, I just…” She exhaled like she’d just run a marathon, finally moving her hands away from her mouth so she could wipe away tears that would only draw more questions and the clack of Regina’s heels at the other end of the studio sounded impossibly loud. “You guys going to flirt the entire time you’re on camera, right?” “Probably,” Killian nodded. “If Swan ever decides she’s going to get changed.” She turned, mouth hanging open and it couldn't have been very attractive, but Killian – her husband and father of her kids, plural and officially – didn’t seem to mind all that much. He ducked his head, catching Emma’s lips with his and putting his tongue to totally different use until she was threatening to melt on the floor and that would make it difficult to cook.

Emma figured she needed to be a corporal body to grip things. Or chop them. She wanted to change the dinner special at The Jolly later.

“Are you two honestly not dressed yet?” Regina asked sharply, Henry a few feet behind her with a smile on his face and excitement radiating off him. Emma glanced at Killian again.

“What were you doing, kid?”

He ran his hand through his hair – a move that had been growing more and more frequent recently, but Emma couldn't think about that if she was actually going to try and win this stupid thing. It was distracting. “Nothing,” Henry said quickly.

“Didn’t even try,” Killian murmured.

“That’s not true at all. I tried very hard.” “That’s disappointing, honestly.”

Henry laughed, jumping onto a counter as well and Ruby had taken her phone out at some point, explanations of stuff for the site that Emma was only half listening to while Regina made very attempt to turn them to stone with her mind. “Should be advocating for better lying?” Emma asked. “That seems very unparental.”

Ruby dropped her phone.

“You know what else is unparental?” Regina asked. “Not being on time to a set that is very scheduled and requires its talent to be wearing specific clothing with makeup so their skin isn’t shiny under camera.” “I really don’t think those are part of the rules, Gina,” Killian grinned.

“Put your jacket on. Get your face fixed and then cook something.” “Get my face fixed.” “You heard me the first time, I’m not sure why you need me to repeat it again. Also, your kid is not a very good distraction. So next time try harder when you want to make out on set, ok?” Emma wasn’t sure what sound any of them made – several gasps and one gag that definitely came from Henry and Killian’s fingers tightened around hers like he was trying to make sure his knees didn’t immediately give out.

“I feel like that’s kind of an insult to me,” Henry muttered. “I thought I was a pretty good distraction. And I helped, Gina.”

Her face softened slightly, not a full glare as she reached up to brush Henry’s hair away from his eyes and that should be studied because it always seemed too long no matter what kind of parental thing Emma or Killian did. “You did,” she agreed. “But I think you might have been playing favorites, a little bit.” “No, that’s not true at all,” Henry argued, trying to sit up straighter and jump off the counter and his gaze darted to Emma and Killian like they were going to ground him right there in Kitchen Stadium. That wasn’t really their game.

They desperately needed to change.

“What were you two doing?” Killian asked. Henry squeezed one eye closed.

“Making food decisions.” The door opened again, more crew and techs and Elsa mumbled a handful of questions because everyone’s skin was far too shiny to be camera-ready. They were probably going to be there for days. “Alright,” Regina snapped, tapping her right heel and Killian laughed in Emma’s ear when she jumped to attention. “Faces. Jackets. Cooking ready...ness.” “It’s not your best work, Gina.” “Get changed or I will fire you.” “Ah, no you won’t,” Killian said, saluting anyway and that should not have been as attractive as it was. “We’re going to pull record numbers with this, aren’t we, Swan?” “Definitely. But only because people are going to tune in to see the very impressive Iron Chef Killian Jones get defeated on his home turf.” “Home stadium, love, we’ve been over this.” “And I wasn’t listening,” she smiled, pressing up on her toes to kiss the edge of his mouth. He chased after her. She was winning. “I’ll see you back on set in a couple minutes, Lieutenant.”

She still wasn’t entirely sure what possessed her to agree to any of this – Regina had been trying for years, as soon as Killian moved a few boxes to the apartment three blocks away from The Jolly, but Emma had always waved her hands and shook her head and she didn’t really have a restaurant to represent anyway.

But then she did.

She had a joint partnership and something less clinical than that and Killian agreed to all that paperwork and official titles and other titles and he smiled every single time she tried to change the menu.

So, when Regina had asked, again, Emma was sure something in her brain had just short-circuited and she heard herself saying yes and she knew Henry would be thrilled.

She knew Killian would be thrilled to, but that was neither here nor there.

Because Emma was absolutely, positively counting on that very specific emotion to give her a bit of a leg up on her competition.

The lights were, somehow, even brighter when she stepped back onto set, any threat of shiny face defeated by several pounds of makeup and Ruby laughed softly when she and Emma moved towards her side of the Stadium.

“You’re playing games, Em,” Ruby accused. Emma shrugged, mostly because she couldn’t disagree and she was so goddamn happy she was only a little worried she’d explode with the feeling at some point during filming.

“Isn’t that part of the fun?” “You guys have a twisted way of flirting.”

“You know what the secret ingredient is. And don’t act like the flirting isn’t good for the numbers. I bet Zelena nearly had a coronary when she found out I agreed to this based solely on the potential for flirting that you guaranteed.” “That’s my job.” “Eh.” “Henry asked,” Ruby muttered, like that explained it and it absolutely did. “No one’s been more excited to get parented in their life, you know that?” Emma nodded. “Yeah, I do.”

“You better win.” “No pressure or anything.” “Nah,” Ruby promised. “You’re an incredible chef. And he’s...ah, there it is. The game within the game or something. Maybe that should be our tagline.” Emma’s head snapped up, teeth finding her lower lip on instinct and that couldn’t have been good for Killian’s jaw. He was frozen mid-step, feet not quite even when he came to a stop halfway towards his station and his own Iron Chef jacket was, admittedly, pretty impressive, but Emma had stolen hers from the back corner of The Jolly kitchen and Mary Margaret knew someone who did embroidery in Chelsea because of course she did and Emma Swan-Jones looked pretty damn good underneath the name of their restaurant.

“Oh, that’s not even playing fair, Swan,” Killian mumbled, taking those last few steps and someone yelled about crossing the line when he nearly stepped into Emma’s station.

She smiled. “I think I heard someone talking about mind games on a show like this once before.”

“Must have been the world’s biggest idiot.” “Nah, he’s got a very impressive history degree.” “Oh my God, it’s started,” Elsa called from behind the camera and Emma swore the lights got stronger. Like they knew or something.

“It’s not going to work, love,” Killian said. He leaned forward, ignoring lines and rules and Emma only kind of hoped he did that while they were cooking.

“Isn’t it? You just accused me of cheating, I think it’s working already.” “Nope. Not at all.” “Were you upset about Henry’s bad lying because you knew he got it from you?” Killian blinked, licking his lips and Emma’s mind drifted to several things it shouldn’t have while they were still on set and he was still wearing that jacket, but that jacket did something absolutely unfair to his biceps when he crossed his arms. “He picked the secret ingredient, you know. Gina told me while she was yelling about my face.”

“I kind of figured that out on my own, actually. Context clues.” “Maybe you’re the smart one in this competition. And relationship.” “Flattery will get you everywhere,” Emma whispered. “You going to be able to remember borders once we starting cooking?” “Depends.” “On?” “On what you start cooking.” She laughed before she could stop herself, the noise bubbling from the center of her soul or something equally absurd and each of them had a small platoon of sous chefs who were supposed to help them – they all looked equally and incredibly uncomfortable. “That wasn’t even clever,” Emma said. “I’m not even sure what it meant.” “Ah, but it got you thinking didn’t it, love? Pondering. Questioning. Possibly distracted.” “Was that your goal? To distract me?” “Wasn’t it yours?”

Someone sighed. It sounded like Regina. It honestly might have been Archie. Elsa was shouting about places and marks and those lights must have been industrial-grade. Emma was very warm. She didn’t think it actually had much to do with the lights.

Navy blue. That was another color in a Crayola 64-crayon box. “You should know,” Emma muttered, twisting her well-styled hair over her shoulder. “Something about battle plans and seizing the vessel.” “I honestly can’t take you seriously when you compare yourself to a ship, love.” “Was I doing that?” “Certainly what it sounded like.” “Weird. Something, something, capturing things, pillaging and plundering.” “The Navy generally frowns on that.” Emma hummed, a smile on her face still and always and possibly indefinitely and she jumped back when Archie moved into the middle of the set. “You two realize this whole thing has been filmed, right?” he asked, Emma shrugging and Killian nodding. He laughed. “Well, this is going to be interesting. Your kid picked the secret ingredient, was very adamant about eating all of the food and I need to do the intro now, so if you could…” He waved his hands, directing them back towards their stations and a bit more personal space and Emma let her tongue trail over the front of her teeth before she moved. Killian smirked.

“Mind games,” he muttered, and maybe she’d be able to cook with the butterflies in her stomach.

There were more staging directions and Emma tried not to move – far too aware of the gaze boring into the side of her head and he was probably worried she was standing too much because he was an idiot and read too many things and thought about everything and her cooking crew still looked a little nervous.

“Chairman, if you’d be so kind as to introduce our secret ingredient,” Archie said, already back behind his podium and there were, frankly, a shit ton of screens there. Emma jerked her head towards the table, a man in a suit that was only kind of intimidating to look at staring at both her and Killian and the cover flew into the ceiling when he threw his hands into the air.

“Good production value,” Emma mumbled. She wasn’t sure if she imagined Killian’s answering laugh, or how he’d been able to hear her, but she didn’t care about specifics and he smiled when her eyes darted his direction.

“Today’s secret ingredient,” the chairman yelled. “Is…. peanut buuuuuuuuter.”

Emma’s eyes bugged, mind immediately racing and trying desperately to come up with food ideas that weren’t just seventeen different forms of cookies and it took her half a second to remember she needed to move. The sound of Killian’s shoes moving by her helped.

“You got a plan yet?” Emma asked, skidding to a stop next to him and using his body to stop herself from colliding with the table.

“Swan, you can’t run like that.” “That is not an answer to my question at all. Compete with me.” “I’m more than willing to compete with you, I just would like to avoid injury if at all possible. And also I’m not going to tell you.” “Aw, that’s not fun at all.” “It’s a show, love,” Killian said, but he was still kind of laughing and throwing jars of peanut butter to the closest sous chef.

“Should I also be throwing things? Is that part of your plan? Impress the judges with your hand-eye coordination? Because that’s not fair at all.”

He chuckled, tossing another three containers and shouting about make sure we get some of the honey kind before turning back towards Emma and kissing her quick. “Try not to make too many cookies, Swan,” Killian grinned. “And as long as you’re impressed by my hand-eye coordination, I really don’t care.” “Idiot,” Emma grumbled.

“I love you, too.”

“Well, that’s kiss one,” Archie called from his station. “Who had a kiss within the first five minutes of competition?” He pointed towards Ruby just out of camera when she raised her hand, a wry smile on his face and Emma knew there’d be a graphic for this. She grabbed a container of honey peanut butter.

“Alright,” she said brusquely, addressing a team she hadn’t really been introduced to because she’d been too busy flirting. “We’re going to do a cookie. I know, I know, but this recipe is way better than anything Killian make--” “--That’s rude, Swan!” “Focus on your own food.” She smiled at the group around her, jackets that were far too white and far too crisp and she reached behind her back to turn on one of the half a dozen ovens she got to use. “The cookie’s our centerpiece, but we’ve got to do some other stuff too, obviously. You,” Emma pointed to a guy she thought might be named Rob, “start on a peanut sauce and I want us to start making noodles too. Udon because it’ll hold the sauce better. Then, uh...what about wings? Is that too obvious?” Maybe-Rob shook his head. “No, that sounds good actually.” “Well, thanks for the vote of confidence. Ok, ok, so wings and maybe a slaw? Something to go with the wings. Something with Sriracha!” “You may not want to yell that,” another guy who Emma was, like, ninety-two percent positive was named Devon.

“You’re going to give away secrets, love,” Killian called, and something dinged in the background. “What the hell is that?”

“A nickname counter,” Archie explained. Killian made a noise that was not entirely human. “The Iron Chef does enjoy his endearments doesn’t he?” “This is absolutely ridiculous,” Emma mumbled. “And if you take my Sriracha idea, you can walk home later.” “It’s Manhattan, Swan, I don’t think that threat holds much water.”

“Speaking of water,” Archie said pointedly. “The Iron Chef’s got a good amount of the secret ingredient at his station now. He appears to be boiling something, getting ready to make, maybe...a caramel? And it looks like that’s...what is that Iron Chef?” “If you can’t tell already, then we’ve got problems,” Killian answered, not looking up from the bowl he was mixing.

“Thoughts from our challenger?”

“He’s stress baking,” Emma said. She flashed a smile at the camera when one of the several thousand moved her direction. “And we need to make some Thai dressing for the dumplings we’re going to do. I’m going to start on that dough now.”

“That’s all sounding a little Asian influenced, love,” Killian yelled, cursing loudly when the counter or dinger or whatever it was called did it what it was supposed to do. “Can someone turn that off? It’s distracting.” “Stop flirting with your wife then,” Archie suggested. He’d left his station at some point, moving into Emma’s space when she grabbed ingredients she hoped would make acceptable dumplings. There was already flour under her nails. “Long time, no see, Emma,” he said, resting against the side of the counter. “What are you making?” “Dumplings,” she explained.

“Pork?” “Well, we’re doing chicken wings as well, so I didn’t want to double up too much.” “A worthy idea. You hear that, Iron Chef? Emma’s not going to double up on ingredients.” “That’s incredibly judgmental, Archie,” Killian groused. “And not entirely true. This show, by its very nature, requires us to double and triple and quadruple up on ingredients. You going to put some peanut butter in the dumplings, Swan?” Another ding.

“That sounds disgusting,” Emma said, shuddering for extra effect. “And stop trying to steal my ideas! You are cheating.” “It’s because I’m so annoyed with that sound.” “Archie’s right. Stop flirting then. Where’s the soy sauce in this kitchen?” Killian shook his head, a different bowl propped on his hip and Emma wondered if they’d get in a lot of trouble if she crossed Kitchen Stadium borders, tugged on the lapels of his chef’s jacket and kissed him for several prolonged and uninterrupted minutes.

Probably enough that it’d be as annoying as the dinging thing.

“No insider information,” Killian said.

“Here, Chef,” possibly-Devon said, handing Emma an unopened bottle. She dumped the whole thing in the closest bowl. It was way too big for what she was making. “And we’re heating up the oil for the wings too.” “You guys are the best,” she said. “You hear that, Lieutenant? My staff is so much better.” Another ding.

“Aw, c’mon,” Emma groaned. “That’s not an endearment! It’s a rank!” Archie clicked his tongue. “Ah, but you say it like an endearment, Emma. It counts.” “Wasn’t this just to distract Killian?” “No we’re equal opportunity distraction in Kitchen Stadium. What are you going to do to make your peanut butter cookies not quite so boring?” Emma gaped, and Killian laughed, working with his own deep fryer and she hadn’t been kidding about the Sriracha threat. “Watch and then eat them,” she seethed, pushing lightly on Archie’s shoulder like that would get him to move or get a camera out of her face. “Seriously, though, what are you baking over there? You know you have to make actual food, you can’t just make desserts?” “Yes, I’m aware of how the show works,” Killian nodded, clearly trying to avoid another ding and Emma could smell the chicken wings already. “It’s almost as if I’ve been on it before.” “If that’s supposed to be intimidating, it’s not going to work.” “I’m just looking to get a leg up since this secret ingredient was clearly chosen to favor you.” “That’s not true,” Henry called from the side, and whoever was in charge of post was going to have a hell of a time fixing all of this. “Someone better make me peanut butter chip pancakes.”

“Aw, shit, I didn’t even think of pancakes,” Emma muttered, sticking her tongue out when Archie clicked his again. “Seriously, that is what post is for.” Archie lifted his eyebrows. “They haven’t had to do this much work in years.” “God, you are rude when you’re on this show! Don’t you have to go ask Killian what he’s baking? Or at least guess? Do your hosting job.”

“You seem stressed, Emma.” “Because you won’t get out of my station.” “Those emotions hindering your cooking ability, love?” Killian asked, and he’d tried to get the ding on purpose that time. “And what do you think about banana and peanut butter pancakes, Henry? With cornflakes for crunch?” Henry perked up, Archie’s head falling into his hands because all of them refused to follow any of the rules. He was standing on something when he answered – a crate or something that probably had another camera in it and Emma was only a little worried about that because she’d been very worried about his ankle and Killian had been worse.

“Yeah, make that,” Henry nodded.

Killian beamed. “Deal! And they’re brownies, Swan. With peanut butter icing. You can try ‘em after I win again.” They got to sixteen dings before Emma threw a ladle across Kitchen Stadium.

They’d probably use that in whatever commercial was going to run to promo this whole, stupid thing and time was, suddenly, not her friend.

The key, in her head at least, to the perfect peanut butter cookie was to make the cookie the ends of an ice cream sandwich and because this was the Network and they thrived on stressing out their chefs, there was only one ice cream maker on set.

And it was being used when Emma ran towards it.

“What the hell is this?”

“I’d imagine it’s an ice cream maker making fantastic ice cream,” Killian muttered, coming up behind her and his fingers moved again and that really was the worst kind of mind game. She didn’t try to lean against his chest, but there were magnets or something and more sound effects and Archie’s voice sounded like white noise when she felt Killian’s chin hook over her shoulder.

“You used the same words far too many times in that sentence.”

He laughed against her, a breath of warm air that ruffled her hair and any attempt at styling had been pointless because she was a sweaty mess, covered in flour and something that might have been vinegar and oil if the smell was anything to go by. “Why do you smell like Easter?” Killian asked, Emma still holding a bowl of liquid that she really needed to become ice cream.

“I honestly have no idea,” she admitted. “You make your pancakes?” “Mmmhm.” “What else did you make?” “More insider trading. And several things involving peanut butter.” “You’re a food tease.” “Yes, absolutely,” he said, and Emma didn’t have to turn around to hear the smile in his voice. “You alright though? Not tired or dealing with aching hips or anything?” Emma twisted, eyebrows pulled low and she almost, kind of expected that look – like several suns and moons and she really wanted to eat those pancakes. “Is this a mind game?” “No. The opposite of that.” “That is stupid,” she sighed. “I can’t believe you got to the ice cream machine before I did. Why is there only one? Should we start a petition against that?”

“You know I love it when you get indignant over cooking supplies, Swan.” Ding.

Killian groaned, head falling forward and lips brushing over Emma’s forehead and there were several other dings and sound effects, one of which might have actually been the goddamn ice cream maker. “That shouldn’t count as an endearment either,” he muttered into her hair. “It’s your name.” “Eh,” Emma objected, leaning back to tap on the embroidery that Mary Margaret had actually paid for. “Not what the jacket says. So, you know, if you want to get--”

She didn’t finish. And the sound effects machine was going to self combust, several shouts from the metaphorical peanut gallery and both of their staffs and Emma hoped her dumplings didn’t burn because she was making out in the middle of Kitchen Stadium.

She slung her arms around Killian’s neck, standing on tip toes to reach him and his hands held steady on her hips, like he was trying to keep her there or preserve the moment or distract her from her frustrations regarding kitchen appliances. Emma didn’t actually get her fingers on his jacket, which was kind of disappointing, but she put them to much better use carding them through Killian’s hair and she gasped when his tongue darted across her lower lip.

“We’re going to scandalize an entire audience,” Emma said, but she didn’t pull herself away from his mouth, so she wasn’t really helping her own cause.

“I certainly hope so.” “Maybe the petition will be about us.” “That’d be entertaining at least.” “Are you not entertained?” Killian laughed, another kiss and a squeeze to her hip, thumb brushing over the front of her stomach quick enough that Emma was sure even the most advanced camera wouldn’t have caught it. “I have to get my ice cream out of the machine,” he said. “That’s why I came over here in the first place.” “So it wasn’t to make out?” “That was a benefit.” “High praise.” “I’m willing to share some of that praise before we get judged, love.” “Far too confident for your own food.”

“If you two are done being adorable,” Archie started, back with the screens and the notebook that Emma wasn’t sure he actually used and she’d been so wrapped up in the moment she hadn’t noticed the other person standing there with a camera half an inch away from them.

She hoped he hadn’t seen the thumb swipe.

It probably wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world if he’d seen the thumb swipe.

“Get your ice cream out of my way,” Emma said, doing her best to sound like she was even remotely annoyed by anything in the entire world.

“That’s the least threatening thing I’ve ever head, Swan.” “My cookies are going to be better than yours.” “I didn’t make cookies. Did you make soup?”

She shook her head, eyes falling on Killian’s back and the twist of his shoulders when he cranked the machine, and his ice cream really did look good when it fell into the bowl he’d gotten from somewhere. “Salad. Peanut soup? That sounds awful.” “It’s a colonial delicacy.” “Why do you know that?” “I know everything.” Emma made a contrary noise, sticking her tongue out for good measure, but that just earned her another smirk and twist of eyebrows and she barely finished putting together her ice cream sandwiches before someone called time. She exhaled, wiping the back of her palm across her forehead and looking at her dishes with something that almost felt like pride.

“Looks good,” Killian muttered, still on his side of the Stadium with his own food and--

“You made a hotdog?” “Gourmet.” “God.”

He grinned, all teeth and eyes and periwinkle wasn’t the right word either, but Emma was forgetting the English language quicker than she entirely appreciated. And she had to get judged. Killian had to get judged.

She explained her dishes, watching as plates were brought in and out and several prominent network personalities nodded and hummed and Emma kind of knew it was coming because Killian had only ever lost once and he’d gotten to the ice cream maker first.

“Congratulations on your win,” Emma said, and Killian rolled his eyes like he wasn’t a giant, competitive weirdo who didn’t desperately want to impress Henry every time he cooked.

“Ah, your cookies were the best thing either one of us made, Swan.” “You didn’t try them.” “Yet. And call it a very strong assumption.” “Eat ‘em first and then tell me.”

He mumbled something, words, probably, but the sound got caught in the air when his head tilted and someone hit the ding again. “The show is over,” Killian growled, pulling away long enough to curse a shadow that, upon closer inspection, looked very familiar.

“I know it is,” Henry said, jogging onto set and blinking under the lights. “God, it’s rough under here isn’t it? How do you see? Also, can I eat the food now?” “What do you want?” “Like...all of it.” “We feed you at home, don’t we?” Emma asked, Henry shrugged, making his way to the judging table and taking the seat the chairman had used during filming. He grabbed the pancakes first. Killian’s ears went red.

“It’s almost like you guys are good at cooking or something.” “Almost,” Killian repeated. “C’mon, Swan, I want a cookie before the ice cream melts.”

The three of them put a fairly big dent in the food by the time Ruby came back and demanded their presence for talking heads and a rather pointed reminder that Emma still had to film her holiday special and Henry’s smile could have powered the entire Tri-State area and some of Westchester when she asked both him and Killian to help her cook.

“I’d love to, Swan,” Killian said, arm back around her waist and fingers moving and confirming things and he made the pancakes when the episode aired a little over two weeks later.

And they made things even more official – more announcements and another drink Emma couldn’t actually drink later that night, an entire family that seemed to keep growing packed into the restaurant three blocks away from their apartment with smiles on their faces and tears in their eyes. Killian barely moved out of her space, but Emma’s smile seemed permanent and Henry kept talking about names and ideas and he used the phrase parents more than once, so she figured official wasn’t really all that bad.

It was the best.

#cs ff #captain swan #captain swan ff #captain swan fic #cs fic #WHY DO ALL FOOD NETWORK SHOWS ONLY HAVE ONE ICE CREAM MAKER #also #macy's absolutely sells snow globes at chirstmas

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youcantkillamutant · 6 years

Text

A Map Made in Heaven (Chapter 3)

Prologue...Chapter 1...Chapter 2

Author: youcantkillamutant

Fandom: Marvel (Black Panther)

Pairing: Erik Stevens/Killmonger x Black!OC

Summary: Erik ‘Killmonger’ Stevens is the biggest bootlegger in South Carolina, but he wants to be more than the middle man. After he receives a letter from an ‘old friend’ of his father, he embarks on a quest to find his homeland. Enter Audrey Cade, the finest mapmaker in the County.

Warnings: Mentions of slavery, cursing, violence, blood

Words: 5K+

A/N: Back with that 1920’s bootleggers AU that absolutely no one asked for! Thank you to @k-michaelis as always for the review and love! And thank you everyone else for reading liking and reblogging I love hearing what y’all think of the story :)

I only own my original characters of course. As usual Marvel don’t sue me I’m broke.

Listening to: The Long Way Around by the Dixie Chicks, Pay Dearly by Johnnyswim, and The Good War by Kimbra

CHAPTER III

June 12, 1920: Charleston, SC

“Are you done yet?” Erik sang this question, as he had for the past few days. The pair were in Cade’s Atlas, Erik watching Audrey paint broad border lines and etch forests into existence.

“Didn’t your momma tell you a watched pot never boils Mr. Stevens?”

“My momma’s been in penitentiary since I was six.”

“I—I’m so sorry.” Shock staggered Audrey’s words. Over the past few days, Mr. Stevens watched Audrey work. He was a fairly quiet audience, questioning her technique and methods not to challenge her, but for his own edification. He rarely shared anything personal, unless it had to do with Wakanda.

“Pigs take anyone they can.” Erik shrugged, but Audrey had a feeling it wasn’t as casual as he played it off to be.

“Do you ever go see her?”

“She told me not to.”

Erik could remember the day they took her away. It was the last time he cried. His whole world sat out on the porch, mom pouring lemonade and dad rocking in a chair. Erik was playing with something, though he couldn’t remember what. Sirens whined louder and louder as they approached the house. Erik’s mother turned to him, eyes soft.

“Don’t come looking for me.” Tires screeched on the pavement.

“But Ma!” Car doors slammed.

“You don’t need to see me like that baby. Promise me you won’t come.” Men shouted, boots pounded on the steps, N’Jobu placed his hand on Erik’s shoulders.

“I—I promise momma.” The pigs pulled her away before he could utter another word.

“Just give me another hour. I’ll be done then, I promise.” Audrey’s voice, low and cautious, pulled Erik back to the present. Audrey decided she was done questioning Killmonger for the day, and focused on the map.

When Audrey opened the note from Mrs. Kae, she was disappointed. It was only a few words, more of a riddle than a clue: Wakandan blood runs strong and rings true, but the key we are given glows bold and blue. Gibberish. Audrey didn’t bother showing it to Erik, but she didn’t want to throw it away either. She taped it in the last page of her sketchbook, returning to the page to puzzle over the words after Erik left the shop every day for lunch.

Audrey kept a list of notes on Wakanda’s possible whereabouts next to her as she drew. Mrs. Kae had mentioned the sea and a forest, so Audrey knew she was looking for something on the coast. North or South? Erik had mentioned that before everything “went to shit” he remembered his father taking business trips to Wakanda. He informed Audrey that his father would return with gifts from “home” for him and his mother the next day. That meant that it couldn’t have been more than a few hours drive from Charleston. North or South? Klaue had only mentioned a ferryman and the silent water. Audrey decided to interpret that as a fact that the bridge to Wakanda wasn’t on a rocky bluff. The closest thing to that description was the Francis Marion National Forest to the North.

The fact that Wakanda was unmapped is what made Audrey’s brain hurt the most. Even with all of the information she was able to pull and rationalize, Audrey could still be wrong. She could be miles off. Or the whole place could just not exist. That was the most frustrating part for Audrey. She hated to think that all of this work she was putting in would be worthless if Wakanda isn’t real.

The map had taken longer than usual because she was constantly fighting herself for trusting Erik’s word, a criminal’s word, that Wakanda exists. Audrey did her best to remind herself of Killmonger’s seedy background otherwise she might find herself beginning to like him. She began to make up outrageous stories about him to keep her feelings in check. Erik brought her dinner? He probably picked it up from Roland’s after punching a man and leaving him to drown in his own blood in a city gutter somewhere. Erik brought her a new set of ink pens? He probably found them on the black market or stole them from an art store three towns over. Or he could just be nice… Audrey shook herself from her spiraling mind. Mr. Stevens is a client, nothing more.

“Okay, I’m done.” Erik leaned over Audrey’s shoulder, admiring the map and inhaling her scent. Fresh parchment and brown sugar.

“Well then baby doll, It was nice doing business with you.” Erik reached to grab the map, a sort of listless sadness falling to his gut, but Audrey snatched it out of his reach.

“I’m coming with you.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m coming with you to find Wakanda.”

“Says who?”

“I do. I made the damn map Stevens!”

“Yeah and?” Audrey was too busy flitting around the shop to see Erik’s unimpressed expression. “What about your momma? You just gon leave her with the shop?”

“Yes I am. She can handle the shop, she’s done it before. I’m going.” Audrey was out of the door and hopping up the stairs to her apartment when she finished. She dragged Erik along to make sure he didn’t drive off without her. “Just have to grab a few things…”

Audrey ignored Erik’s grumblings as she pushed her way through the apartment door, bee-lining to her bedroom and dragging out a backpack she had only used a few times. It was bulkier than she was used to, but she had no idea how long this search would take. Erik on the other hand was frozen in the kitchen. Sure, he’d been into women’s bedrooms before, but he wasn’t here for that. Erik was beginning to believe that Audrey would never see him as anything other than a client, but he wasn’t sure he wanted to test her limits either. He’d gotten what he wanted, the map was within his reach, but he didn’t want to shake Audrey either.

Erik surprised himself when he admitted that he wanted a partner on this trip. Someone to share the frustration in the search, the joy in the discovery and the disappointment should things go wrong. Don’t think like that Erik. Don’t think that shit into existence. Instead of staying in his own mind, Erik observed Audrey’s tiny apartment. The kitchen was covered in paintings of the world. France opening to a window over the silver sink and Greece crawling across the cupboard doors. The wood floor creaked as Audrey flitted back and forth, shoving one last shirt into her bag and grabbing her pencil case.

“All done!” Audrey bounded down the stairs, Erik following slowly behind.

“You’re really going to leave your mom?”

“I’ll write her a note.”

“Are you sure that will be en—” Erik stopped short when they arrived back in the shop. Audrey breezed past him, kissing her mother on the cheek and grabbing a few maps on the table behind her.

“Ma! I was just abut to write you a note.” In a moment of brattiness, Audrey turned to Erik to stick her tongue out.

“I’m going on a research trip with Mr. Stevens.” Audrey’s mother nodded to her. She had done this plenty of times, running to the nearest train station and hopping on the express to explore another state. It was all a part of the job.

“Alright honey. You be careful.” She gave Audrey what looked to be a bone crushing hug, releasing her after a few moments and turning to Erik.

“I’d like to speak with you before you go Mr. Stevens.” This time Audrey stopped short, wondering what her mother was up to. “Go on Audrey, he’ll meet you at the car in just a minute.” Audrey pushed down the embarrassment she had from being shooed away by her mother and walked out of Cade’s Atlas, refusing to linger at the door.

“Audrey is my only child, I try to let her do what she wants, but I’m still her momma. Now, I don’t know what the two of you are up to, but if you hurt my girl, there will be a price to pay.” Killmonger admired the strength in Mrs. Cade’s delivery. He even laughed a little at her last statement.

“Mrs. Cade, is that a threat?” Erik didn’t have to wonder where Audrey got her fire from.

“Of course not. You of all people should know it’s a promise.” Mrs. Cade’s voice dripped with serpentine sweetness and Erik’s vicious smile mirrored her own.

“I’ll return her in one piece Mrs. Cade. You don’t need to worry about a thing.”

—o—

With the map in hand and a tank full of gas, the pair of explorers could have set off that second, but Erik had a few things to take care of in town. He parked in front of Oakies as usual, opening Audrey’s door in a heartbeat. Instead of following him in though, she made her way to Junie’s Sweet Shop. If she was really on her way to discover Wakanda, she needed to see her best friend one last time.

When she entered, Audrey tried to remember every little detail. She didn’t know when she’d be back. She waved to the kids out front, giving their new puppy a scratch before making her way to the back. Junie was slamming a wad of dough down on the counter. It hit the linoleum with a slap and the scent of cinnamon and sugar flew through the air to Audrey.

“I’m gonna miss your cinnamon scrolls?” Junie looked up to see Audrey’s exaggerated pout as she whined.

“Why are you gonna miss them young lady? Going somewhere?”

“Kind of. I mean yeah I’m leaving for a bit. I came to say goodbye.” In all the time she’d known her, Audrey had never made a point to say goodbye to Junie. If she ever left, it was never for more than a few days and Junie would see Audrey at the shop the second she returned. Junie could tell that something was different this time.

“Goodbye?”

“For a little while I guess. I’m going on a research trip…with Mr. Stevens.”

“With Killmonger?” Junie narrowed her eyes, though her hands never stopped kneading the dough she was working on. Audrey flinched at the laser focus Junie had on her.

“Are you sure you aren’t eloping?”

“Junie, what? No! Why would you say that?” Audrey sputtered question after question while Junie shrugged.

“People talk Audrey. They’ve seen his ride at your shop all hours of the day…” Junie trailed off suggestively, and Audrey slapped her on the arm.

“We are not eloping. We’re going to find Wakanda. It’s a research trip.” Audrey did her best to emphasize the professional nature of this trip but Junie ignored that in favor of her own assumptions.

“I’m sure you can elope in Wakanda.”

“Junie! We’re not getting married. Now can you pack us something sweet for the road?” Audrey did her best to reign in her frustration. Junie loved to tease Audrey about any and all gentlemen callers she had. She wasn’t technically wrong, Mr. Stevens had spent a lot of time at Cade’s Atlas while Audrey was making the map, but that didn’t mean anything was going on with them.

Junie filled a small box with cookies and muffins and Audrey requested more, sliding a $20 bill into Junie’s pocket.

“Audrey! You take that back! I don’t want your money.”

“Too bad!” In reality Audrey just wanted $20 worth of sweets, because if all she got was that little box, it would be gone before she could blink. In the time they’d spent together, Audrey found that Mr. Stevens tended to eat most of her sweets. She was beginning to think those gold fangs were fillers for cavities instead of intimidation tactics.

Junie loaded up two more cake boxes full of treats and the two women hugged their goodbye. Arms full, Audrey crossed the street to Oakies. Someone opened the door for her and she entered the juice joint for what could very well be her last time. On stage a woman murmured about ‘hell, calling me home’ with a cellist by her side and some kind of electric piano in front of her. She waved to the bartender, taking a seat at the golden booth Mr, Stevens claimed as his throne.

“Killmonger sir, Ms. Cade has returned.” Erik nodded to his best bartender, Emerson as he gathered his bags. Killmonger had already put his club in the right hands, contacted his distributor’s and warned them of his hiatus, and ensured that Mrs. Floyd could air out his apartment every few days. He wasn’t quite sure how long this whole search could take. He gathered the envelope from his father last, and made his way to Audrey.

“Finished with your goodbyes baby doll?” Audrey stood and narrowed her eyes at his tone.

“What? The biggest bootlegger in the County doesn’t have anyone to say goodbye to?” Audrey’s tone was teasing, but for the first time Erik truly thought about it. Most of his colleagues were just that, colleagues. Erik didn’t do friends. Too messy and too much work. But, Audrey may be on to something. There was someone who had been on his mind since this morning. Years longer than that if he was being honest with himself.

“There might be one person. If you don’t mind a little road trip?”

—o—

June 12, 1920: Ridgeland Correctional Institution; Ridgeland, SC

Audrey should really stop agreeing to road trips with criminals. The pair, well Erik, had packed everything into the car with ease. Erik barely allowed Audrey to carry the pastries to the car, and she wanted to kick her fluttering heart for reacting at his gentile act. Mr. Stevens could be kind when he wanted, but Audrey hasn’t forgotten that threat. She doubted she ever would which is why she was pinching herself for agreeing to yet another road trip with Erik ‘Killmonger’ Stevens.

Erik felt…unsure of how he felt. He tried to rationalize his choice as he sped South. Audrey was silent, reading some book about tides and sketching periodically. For once he wished she would open her big mouth and talk, if only for a distraction. Erik needed a distraction so he could stop thinking about what he was about to do. He missed his mother. Of course he missed her, but he made her a promise and he was about to break it. He was about to break a promise he kept for over a decade. All to say goodbye.

“Don’t come looking for me.”

Erik took the long way around. He’d mapped out a route to the Ridgeland Correctional Institution when his mother had first been taken. He knew every road that ran through it, every conceivable way to get to his mother. Still, he never once took it. He’d planned elaborate escape plans in his head, even thought of assembling a team at one point, but never acted on it. He soaked up every detail of the place, from the rotting wooden sign to the cracked pavement.

As he approached the door, he felt excitement bubbling up. The kind he remembered from childhood, when his father would return from Wakanda with stories and gifts. He was going to see his momma. He felt his heart rise at the prospect of telling his mother he was finally going home. He huffed a quiet disbelieving laugh at the realization. After all of these years, he was returning home. He felt closer to N’Jobu just thinking about it.

Audrey walked cautiously behind Erik. She’d never been to a jail before and certainly not the main penitentiary for the county. Audrey wondered if he was meeting with some criminal before she remembered the conversation they’d had this morning.

“My momma’s been in penitentiary since I was six.”

Erik pulled open the door with the kind of confidence Audrey could never muster when walking into the holding cell of the worst criminals in the state. She saw Erik’s small smile reflected in the window of the door as it swung wide. He held the door and ushered her in, and she watched Erik sign in at the front desk. They waited for a moment in silence, and then Erik was called to the front again.

He disappeared through a slate grey door with an old mean-faced white man following behind. Audrey found herself holding her breath as she waited. She watched the seconds tick by on her watch, doing her best not to catch anyone’s eye. She tried, but she couldn’t help looking at the families that sat waiting. Babies and mothers and brothers and sons all waiting to see someone they loved beyond belief, behind the iron bars of a shitty cell.

She caught the eye of a little boy unintentionally. He was staring at her, and she only turned to look at him when she felt his look. He was young, way too young to be in the waiting room of a prison. He had big brown eyes chubby cheeks and ears he might grow into. She gave him a wave and he waved back happy with the attention. Before she could do anything else, Erik burst through the doors. He strode through the waiting area, right past Audrey, and into the bright, hot day.

“Excuse me.” Audrey waved to get the receptionists attention. The white woman drew her blue eyes up to her face, confused and bewildered.

“My partner went back to see someone, but he just stormed out. Did something happen?”

“Name?”

“Erik Stevens.”

“Oh! Yes m’am something did happen.” Audrey raised a brow, encouraging her to elaborate and quickly. Audrey had no way of knowing if Erik would leave her stranded here.

“He came to see his mother, but she…well she passed away.”

“What?”

“He came to see his mother but she died here a few years ago.” Years? Shouldn’t he have been notified? even if he wasn’t next of kin, he was her son. The courts could have sent him a letter or something. There was no point unloading those questions on this broad though. She didn’t seem to be the type of girl with the answers, but Erik deserved something from this place.

“Did she have any personal affects?”

“We throw everything away after a year if no one comes to pick them up.” The woman got a look at Audrey’s face and apologized. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

“Sure you are.”

—o—

June 13, 1920: Rantowles, SC

Audrey was happy to see that Erik hadn’t left her stranded, but she wasn’t sure how to breach this conversation. In the end he opened the door for her, and they didn’t talk about anything at all. The sun was falling fast in the sky and Erik pulled over at a motel, got the pair separate rooms and bade Audrey a goodnight.

Erik wanted to shoot himself in the foot for the hope he let find its way into his heart. He should have known his mother would die in that place. Everybody dies there. Everybody dies. The fact that he let himself believe he might still have one parent alive was the dumbest thing he’s done in a long time. He couldn’t believe he was stupid enough to believe he could see her again, after all of these years. He let his self-loathing put him to sleep, praying to Bast or whoever the hell else could hear him that he’d wake up tomorrow feeling better than he did today.

Morning came and Audrey was up with the sun. She spread the map out on her bed again, feeling the forests they would go through to find Wakanda. A knock sounded on her door, followed by a command to be ready in ten minutes. Audrey was glad to see that Mr. Stevens could still talk, even if it was doling out demands. She couldn’t even begin to imagine what he must be feeling. She didn’t want to. That didn’t stop her from trying to empathize with the man when they were back in the car and on the road.

“If you want to talk, I’ll listen.” Erik gazed at Audrey for as long as he could before pulling his eyes back to the road. They drove for another hour, Audrey noting the sign for the city of Rantowles again.

“What are we doing here?” Erik only slid the clutch into park and let the automobile idle.

N’Jobu always told Erik if he wanted to come home, he should bring a gift. That’s why he made this pit stop in Rantowles. To pick up a little gift. Ulysses Klaue was waiting outside of his gunmetal grey building with a khaki backpack and a maniacal grin. Audrey couldn’t figure out why the hell Klaue was coming along and she “accidentally” stomped on Erik’s foot when he ushered her out of the front seat and pointed to the back seat.

“I’ve got to be honest, I don’t like the idea of being the third wheel on your honeymoon. Why am I needed along this little adventure again?” Killmonger had an easy answer for Klaue, that Audrey had never even heard before now.

“Audrey’s got most of the location figured out, but having you along will help us to be sure we’re on the right path.” Audrey wanted to slap him for keeping her in the dark, but refrained. Besides, you can only hit so hard from the back seat.

“Alright, I’ll come, I’m due for a vacation anyways.” Audrey tried to ignore the shivers that rippled down her spine as Klaue laughed and they sped north on highway 17.

—o—

June 13, 1920: Francis Marion National Forest; Awendaw, SC

Killmonger pulled into a dirt patch and threw the automobile in park. The trio of explorers hopped out the machine, Audrey begrudgingly accepting the assistance of Erik’s hand. She was still getting the hang of these clunky hiking boots, not to mention the pants. The three of them made quite the group, matching in khaki and burdened with backpacks.

“Does this look familiar to you?”

“It’s dirt and trees boy, I need to get closer if I’m going to remember.” Audrey noted the way Erik’s fist clenched at the word ‘boy’ and prayed he wouldn’t do anything reckless. She warily watch Klaue make his way to the treeline making an aborted movement to follow when Erik pulled her back, into his chest.

“Audrey.” Her head whipped around at the sound of his voice in her ear. She stared at him in disbelief. Sure they spent a lot of time together in the past week, but he’d never dared to touch Audrey.

“Hmm?” Audrey reply was distracted by his scent, and that was not what Erik wanted to hear.

“Audrey! This is serious. You need to stay close to me. No matter what.”

“What?” Audrey heard the urgency in his voice but couldn’t understand it. No, she didn’t trust Klaue, but they weren’t going on some crazy dangerous mission. For all intents and purposes, this was just a hike in the woods.

“I made a promise to your momma that I would bring you ba—” Erik rolled his eyes as he was interrupted by Klaue.

“What are you two whispering about back there? Come on love birds! It’s time to find the hidden city.” Klaue nearly giggled with glee. Audrey gave Erik a look that shamed him for inviting this crazy man on their hunt for Wakanda but he only nudged her forward with a palm on her back.

Walking across the treelike was like stepping into another world. Suddenly everything was deeper, greener. The trees enveloped the group and Audrey was grateful for the hand on her back. She could get lost in these woods in a heartbeat seeing as they’d barely been mapped. When Audrey had requested the maps to the area, she found the only ones available had been from the parks’ inception. The ragged edges and faded borders had left a lot to be desired and Audrey noted that she should probably convince the state to let her redo the maps when she returned.

They walked until the sun was high in the sky Klaue leading them north, then south, then west. Audrey protested each time he led them in another direction, but for some reason, Erik listened to Klaue instead of Audrey. In fact, he barely said a word to Audrey the whole time they were out there, instead using the time to banter with Klaue. It’s not that Audrey was jealous, she just couldn’t understand what she had done to make Erik act so cold with her.

Either way, she was sick of their shit. After lunch, she resolved to go her own way, with or without the boys. The trio sat in a clearing where the trees filtered the sunlight. Erik admired the way the light bounced off of Audrey’s brown skin and prayed she remembered their conversation. He had a plan, and she’d already ruined it by coming along. He didn’t need to alter it any further, not even for a pretty little bird.

“Now Klaue, I think you owe me an explanation.” He pulled a pistol from his back, and Audrey stumbled back, behind Erik. They hadn’t even finished eating. Klaue glanced up, bits of ham hanging from his mouth and falling into his beard.

“Woah boy. What’s all that about?”

“Oh this? Just a little incentive. Why are you leading us on a wild goose chase?” Erik sauntered up to Klaue, and Audrey followed behind, under the guise of getting something from her backpack. She had a feeling this is what Erik meant earlier today when he told her to stay close.

“Boy, you better put that gun away”

“Answer my question.” Erik pressed the pistol into Klaue’s temple.

“You don’t want to go there boy. Those people are savages—”

“Wrong answer.”

Bang! Birds erupted from the trees, wings beating loud like the blades of boat fans. Audrey stumbled, falling on her butt as she gaped at Erik’s back. Erik, meanwhile took his time wiping the blood off of his pistol with Klaue’s own handkerchief. He turned and offered her his hand, but Audrey scrambled back before she scrambled up.

“What the hell was that? He was helping us!”

“Was he? He wasn’t leading us anywhere close to where you think Wakanda might be. He was wasting my time. Our time.” Killmonger was annoyed he even had to explain himself.

“So you shot him?” Audrey fired back and began to pace. “Oh lord, I’ve just witnessed a murder.” She whirled on Erik “You made me witness a murder!”

“You said you wanted to come baby doll.” He sneered the endearment. “Besides, we don’t need him to find Wakanda. You made the damn map.” He tucked his pistol back into his pants, and bent down towards the corpse of Klaue.

“So why would you—” Audrey’s voice gave out and so did she. She had no idea what this man was planning, and at this point she was too shocked to try deciphering him.

“You gon’ help or nah?” Erik was busy moving the food off of the picnic blanket while he spoke and the words came out muffled.

“Absolutely not!” Audrey was offended at the mere suggestion that she might help Killmonger move a dead body.

“Well you either need to help out up or dry up. I’m not trying to hear all that noise.” It had been a while since Killmonger had quickly killed a man, and he forgot how much he reveled in the lingering silence of a dead body.

“Whatever.” Audrey scoffed and rolled her eyes. “Once you’re done with that Stevens, maybe you can do something useful like help me look for the country you’re so keen to find when you aren’t murdering people.”

“Watch your tone baby doll. Don’t forget how easily I can snap your pretty little neck.” Killmonger didn’t need to be close to Audrey to scare her. His threat rang in the air between them while he wrapped Klaue’s corpse in their picnic blanket.

“Besides, any white man who’s been to Wakanda ain’t never had good intentions.”

—o—

With Audrey’s directions, the pair and some ‘luggage’ found themselves on the shore of a sandy beach. No rocks or bluffs, just perfect sand and calm waters. That was enough to bring a smile to Audrey’s face, but she couldn’t see a bridge of any kind. She decided to return to the tree line and look for anything out of the ordinary. This time, Erik trailed behind her, dragging the dead man’s body along quietly.

He didn’t touch her again, even when she tripped and landed on her hands and knees in front of him. He watched her fall, and she looked back to see him staring as she rose. Audrey glared back, ignoring the feeling stirring in her stomach in favor of finding anything that could prove her map right. She finally saw something where the trees kissed the sand and sea.

“What kind of tree is that?” Erik was surprised to hear Audrey speaking to him at all, but drew his gaze to the tree she was talking about.

“I don’t know, it looks like all the others.” It wasn’t, and Audrey could see that. Most of the trees in this region were lushly leafy and slender trunked. This tree was the complete opposite. It had a thick gnarled trunk and was bare branched. It almost looked like it was pasted there not planted in the ground.

“No it doesn’t. It looks like a baobab tree. Baobab trees don’t grow in the South, or in this country at all.”

“So?” Ignoring Erik, Audrey started towards the tree, palms out. It felt like a normal tree, though the bark was smoother than she expected. She stopped down to inspect the trunk, roots, and soil, looking for any sign that this was a sign. Erik was a bit more hesitant, dropping Klaue’s body to the ground with a thud. Before he could touch a fingertip to the tree Audrey spoke.

“You said your dad was from Wakanda right? And that they had their own language? What did it look like?”

“I can’t describe that shit baby doll.”

“Did it look like this?” Erik stooped down beside Audrey brushing her small shoulder with his broad one. He was shocked to see the Wakandan alphabet spelling out: Welcome Home. His breath hitched.

“Yeah. It—” Erik ran his fingers over the tree and for a moment the pair could have sworn it glowed blue. He caressed the letters again and there was another ebb of sapphire light. Audrey grabbed Erik’s wrist and pushed his hand on the tree trunk, holding it there with her own.

“Stevens, put both of your hands on the tree.” Indigo light pulsed through the tree trunk like blood through veins. Erik tried to focus on Audrey’s words and ignore her brown hand on his.

“What?”

“Just do it. I think the tree knows you’re Wakandan.”

“That’s the stupidest shit I’ve ever…” Erik couldn’t finish his sentence because the world fell open before him. More specifically, the bridge to Wakanda rose from the sea.

A/N: So this chapter ate my whollllle weekend lol. I wasn’t sure I’d get it out today but it wouldn’t leave me alone either. I thought about breaking it up into two chapters but...that...never...happened? This is basically the end of Part 1 of this story and the rest will be Erik and Audrey in Wakanda, which I’m excited to write! Hope you guys like it!

As always I love reviews and reblogs :)

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#A Map Made in Heaven #erikxblackOC #erik killmonger fic #black panther #bp #black panther fic #mine #my writing #Erik Killmonger #1920's AU

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