#Andre Layton Imagine

[elocinnicole]

Hey! I love your writing so much can you do a Snowpiercer fic? 👀👀👀 Andre and Reader used to be a couple instead of him and Zarah

1,001 Cars 

Rating: M 18+ Minors DNI

Paring: Andre Layton x OFC Black!Reader (Paige Knight)

Summary: Paige and Andre see each other for the first time in years.

1,001 cars wasn’t long enough. It’s been four years since Paige has seen Andre. She didn’t even want to be on this God forsaken train but Andre insisted and back then she did any and everything for him. Well, now it was her turn to be selfish and fuck anyone who had a problem with it. 

She was probably the most hated person in the Tail behind Wilford, but she did what she had to do. A decent job in Third Class was enough for the two of them, it was far from the glamours lifestyle in First or even Second Class, but her small restaurant was better than fighting for small scrapes in the Tail that wasn’t what she imagined for them. 

Paige remembers the day clearly when they heard there was an opening in Third Class cooking. This was it. Their chance out of the Tail. Or at least she thought, when she told Andre of the news she hoped he would be excited to get ahead even if it’s just a little bit. Andre immediately shut her down, told her it was betraying the Tail and everything they stood for to leave it all behind.

“You really want me to turn my back on everyone back here. Just for some funky ass job in Third? Come the fuck on Paige.” Andre whispered loudly, so as not to wake the other Tailies trying to get their rest.

“We’re not turning our back, we—talked about starting a family before all this train shit. I don’t want to have a child in the Tail. I don’t want them growing up like this. What’s wrong with giving a child a better life?”

Andre sighed heavily, “We’re not leaving, not when we’re so close to this rebellion.” Now it was Paige’s turn to sigh

“Come on Andre, you’d rather risk your life for a rebellion than to better ourselves. First, it’s Third Class and then maybe I can finally get a teaching job in Second Class, and you can convince them to give you a job, you used to be a detective.” Paige pleaded, desperately wanting Andre to see her point of view. “Hot food, a shower, God knows how long it’s been since we’ve had good food.”

“You’d give up everything we’ve stood for, for food?” Andre asked, disappointed

“Andre, I’m tired. I didn’t even want to get on this fucking train, but you promised me that we’d get good tickets and look at us. Eating God damn rats!”

“Shush!” Someone whispered loudly

“We’re not leaving, end of discussion.”

“That’s it?”

“We’re on the brink of something here Paige, we can change how this train is run. Just believe in it, us, me. Change is coming to the train. I promise.”

Exhausted with the conversation, Paige merely nodded her head. There was nothing else to talk about.

“Do what you need to do, Andre.”

With that Andre kissed Paige before turning over to go to sleep. That would be the last time she would feel Andre’s lips on hers.

Paige can still hear the insults and the feel the judging eyes on her as she made her last walk in the Tail of the train to move to the Third Class. She remembers Andre not even saying goodbye to her or even being within eyesight. Paige held her head high despite the insults thrown at her, not even giving them a second glance, she left with Ruth forever leaving the Tail behind or at least she thought.

What started off as a job in Third Class led her to teaching the children of the Second Class. Paige started tutoring some children when she closed the restaurant in Third and word traveled that Paige would host weekly sessions with the children. Word moved throughout the train, and she was offered a job in the school which she graciously took. Paige missed being in the classroom, she was a second-grade teacher before Snowpiercer and is what she originally applied for when Andre suggested they get tickets for the train.

Life was going well for Paige until tragedy hit Second Class. A coworker of hers was found dead in her cabin and her right arm frozen solid. Paige found her body when she opened the school that day. She instantly knew there was foul play involved and immediately went to the police.

Paige was supposed to be interviewed by the new train detective after the school day. She had been on edge since finding the body, who could’ve done such a thing and why? Is this what Andre was talking about? The sound of knocks rapping against the door sliding open pulled Paige out of her thoughts. She straightened out her clothes and slide the door open, not prepared to the man standing on the other side.

“Paige Knight?”

“Um, yes.”

“I’m Bess Till and this is Detective Andre Layton. We have a few questions to ask about the death of Ciara Young.”

“Please, come in.” Paige couldn’t bear to look Andre in the eyes. The past couple of years haven’t been kind to him, she could see it all on his face.

“So, here’s how this is gonna go. Detective Layton is going to ask you some question and you’re going to answer those questions truthfully.” Paige nodded, not trusting herself to speak.

“Great, I’ll be standing outside the door while Detective Layton conducts his interview.”  Till removes the handcuffs off Andre’s wrist, before giving him a stern glance and leaving Paige’s suite.

“So, this is what selling out gets you.” Andre lamented as he rubbed his sore wrists.

“Just ask me your questions so you can get back and tell everyone how much of a traitor I am. I’m sure, Josie will love to hear that.”

“And what’s that supposed to mean?”

“Whatever you want it to.”

“Let’s just cut to the chase, when was the last time you saw the victim—”

“Ciara, her name was Ciara Lane.” Andre looked up and saw that she was struggling to hold back tears.

“Sorry. When was the last time you saw Ciara alive?”

“Yesterday evening, we were having drinks in my suite and she left around 11:00 at night.”

“Was she intoxicated?”

“No, we only had two glasses of wine. We’re teachers, it takes more than two glasses to get us drunk.”

“Did she mention anyone else when she was leaving. Did she give any indication that she wasn’t going back to her suite.”

“No,” Paige answered quickly which Andre noticed but decided to leave it alone...for now.

“So, when did you find her?”

“Around 7:30 in the morning. We usually walk together, but she wasn’t in her suite. So I assumed she got an early start, that’s not uncommon. I can in her classroom there she was at her desk…strangled and her arm had been frozen and cut off.” Andre frowned.

“I would like to ask more questions but let’s go to your suite. Since that was the last place you saw her.” Andre suggested

Paige frowned, Andre motioned to the corner of the room where a security camera was watching and listening carefully.

“Okay, we’ve canceled school for the week, we need to find a new teacher. Do you need to ask permission or…?”

“I’ll handle it.” At that moment, Till entered the classroom.

“Finished?”

“I would like to visit Ms. Knight’s suite, as it was the last known location of the victim.”

“Very well,” Till roughly handcuffed Andre, Paige growing angry at the way she was treating Andre.

“I think they’re tight enough.” Till gave Paige a sarcastic tight-lipped smile. It was a silent walk from the classroom to Paige’s Second-Class suite.  Upon entering the room, Andre could smell lemongrass. Paige’s favorite scent, he remembered her apartment always smelling like lemongrass.

“I know all about your history with Mr. Layton here. So don’t try any funny business.” Till said before stepping out of the suite.

“No one’s been in here since the murder, right?” Andre asked, searching her living space.

“No, not that I know of. What are you looking for?”

“Anything that could point me to where Ciara might’ve gone.” Andre noticed an outplace vase on the mantle.

“Have you always had that?”

“Hmm, I’ve never noticed it, no I don’t remember getting that.” Andre grabbed the glass case and found a microphone inside.

“What the fuck—” Andre held up a finger to his lips, signaling her to not speak.

“Can I get some water please?”

“Sure,” Paige quickly poured Andre a glass of water he then put the microphone in the glass.

“Someone’s been listening to your conversations. Do you have any idea why?”

“No, I don’t all I do is go to work and come home.”

“Withholding information can land you in serious trouble. Who knows what fucked up ways they have of making you talk. If you know something you gotta tell me.” Paige sighed as she plopped down on the sofa.

“Ciara was talking about a Rebellion; she had a contact in Third Class. I told her to be careful,” She lamented.

“What happened the last time you saw her?”

“She came over after school and she was talking about the Rebellion finally starting. She said she was getting notes at her door…warnings. She was going to meet her contact in Third and I told her to be careful, there are eyes and ears everywhere. I begged her to stay the night, said she would be fine. When she left a man was waiting for her outside, her contact from the Third class.”

“Did you get his name?”

“Cole. Cole Peterson. That was the last time I saw her.” Andre could see the sadness on her face and couldn’t help but feel bad for her.

“I promise Paige, I’m gonna find her killer and make sure that she gets justice.” Before Paige could answer, the door burst open.

“Ma’am you can’t go in there.”

“Ma’am I told you I’m dropping her daughter off.” A girl no more than three years old, came running into the room. A head full of curls bouncing with each movement.

“Mommy!” the girl said, launching herself into Paige’s arms.

“What happened?” Paige asked looking at the woman.

“She got sick and then I went by your classroom…” while the woman whom Andre assumed to be a daycare worked explained the situation all he could do was stare at the young child and realize how much she looked like him. She couldn’t be, could she? It’s been almost four years since he’s seen Paige, this little girl could very well be his daughter.

“Mommy, who’s that?” The little girl asked, Andre locked eyes with Paige, one question on his mind. Knowing what thought loomed in his head, Paige nodded in confirmation.

“Thanks for bringing her home,” Paige said to the daycare worker.

“No problem, let me know how she’s feeling.” Once again they were alone, the tension in the air thick.

“Mommy, who is that?”

“He’s your Daddy. Andre, meet your daughter, Aaliyah.”

Tagging: @nikole-witha-k @iknowthekoolaidflavor @ramp-it-up @wreakhavoconmacroissantdiggs @blackpinup22 @chrisevanswife0405 @mellie-teh-goblin-queen @azxulaa@luckyfriess @thatdamnlyssa @endless-romantic-stories @daveeds-wife @emilia-i @gothic-slaherfan-weeb@slashersluxsworld @chattykathysquietsister @aliyahsomerhalder @crystalannetem @tuhnayshuh

[jenconnellysshybellybutton]

Chapter 7: The Engine Eternal And Its Creator

Characters: Melanie Cavill, Alexandra Cavill, Andre Layton, Bess Till, Ruth Wardell, Josie Wellstead, Bennett Knox

Warnings: Fluff

The two woke up a few hours later, it was the afternoon now, in a few hours it would be the evening, Melanie took a shower and Alex was going to go to the engine room to check on the others, they were all very concerned about Melanie’s physical and mental health, even Josie, which was hard to believe since Mel practically murdered her...well she did kill her by filling up the room with the cold outside air and escaping her and leaving her to die. Josie knows Alex needs her mom, that’s really the only reason why she would care about the issues relating to Melanie. Out of concern if her mom needed anything she chose to ask just in case.

“You need anything in there?!”

“No, I’m fine, thanks for asking!”

“No problem!"

Alex put some clean clothes on the desk chair along with a brush and a hair tie and left a note saying all she did was go talk to the pirate gang and that she didn’t go anywhere.

***

Alex walked out of the bunk and into the engine to find Ben at the helm writing down some notes in a notebook, Josie was fiddling around with some wires at one of the light towers, Bess was reading a book while drinking a tiny bottle of alcohol, Alex guessed she just found lying around, Layton was walking towards Alex holding what looked like a bowl of oatmeal.

“So” he started “what’s going on with her and you?” they both sat down at the chairs

“She’s...recovering, more in a grieving way but yeah she’s doing better, I’m still not sure though, it’s only been like 2 days so that’s barely any time for her wounds to heal”

“Oh yeah I was going to ask about that, is it like a burn or-”

Alex cut him off “It might’ve appeared like that but no there are two pretty big stab wounds not really, let’s just call them that for now”

Andre had a puzzled look on his face.

“Okay so imagine two spears stabbing you but it did not impale you” Alex raised her eyebrows

“Okay I get it-” he nodded

“Yeah, besides that mentally pretty bad, physically not the best ethier okay pretty bad” she gave him a sarcastic smile

“Has she had any food? I’m assuming she has” he took another bite of oatmeal

“Yes, she made breakfast a few hours ago, she’s a good cook and that makes me half-supprised for whatever reason”

“How come?” he questioned

“Well for one thing I don’t remember at all her making me a meal in my childhood ever, another thing, she’s so” Alex impersonates “ ‘me going to crush the con man taking all my credit!’ and ‘let me go cry myself to sleep’ at the same time…..she’s a difficult person to understand but that’s the beauty of it, one of these days I’ll figure it out. What do you have everyone doing? Whatever they want?”

“Well no, as you can see Ben is doing his normal thing, Till is…” he looks over at her and she’s asleep on the ground again “-doing her own thing and Josie is trying to repair some of the internals for the outside paneling...okay so I guess everyone is doing their own thing but everything is aye okay” Andre chuckled.

“Well thanks for the update, I’m going to see how she’s doing” Alex smiled at him and got up, walking to the door she realized manners still existed

“Melanie, can I come in? It’s me, Alex”

“Yeah come on in!”

Melanie finished putting her hair in a bun after putting on the black T-shirt Alex left on the chair.

“Hey hon”

“Hi, how was your shower?”

“Nice, it always wakes you up, especially when it’s either freezing cold or steaming hot”

Alex walks over to the desk to see what Mel was reading earlier, it was just some records for updates for some boards in the light tower.

“So is it okay for you to head out of your cave now?”

“I wouldn’t call it a cave, more like an I get to spend time with my daughter area but that works too, yeah I’ll have to say something to Josie, or I should just say nothing at all”

“What happened between you two anyway?”

“I froze her to death out of self-defense, I’m not going to elaborate but let’s say I did intend to hurt her only because I had to, to keep ‘order’ like ‘him’”

“Wow” Alex snuck behind her to give her mom another hug out of real kindness “come on, it’s time”

***

Melanie was the first one out, Alex came second, they headed to the front to see the others, Melanie ran her fingers against the walls of her creation admiring it, Alex watched in awe thinking on how much the train meant to her, it felt like it had been forever since she saw any of them. Till was the first one to notice her.

“Melanie? You look like shit, how’s the parenting going?”

“Very mature of you, you too” Mel ignored the parenting question “How are you and Jinju doing?

“We broke up right after the revolution, I don’t even know if she’s still alive”

“I’m sorry to hear that, I hope she is alright, do you mind if I have some?” Melanie pointed to the flask Bess had on the table

“Go for it” and she handed it to Melanie, Alex was looking at some graphs and she left her alone for not even five minutes and Mel was already about to consume alcohol.

“Mom no” Alex swiped it out of her hand “this will only make your healing more painful and miserable, trust me” she gave it back to Till.

“Your kid’s smart, she’s right, it will make it more miserable, plus this isn’t the greatest shit anyways”

“Come on ma” Alex pushed her towards the helm where Ben was sitting, he just turned the train on auto-pilot ‘How convenient’ she thought.

“Get up Ben, go eat some ice cream or something” Mel smirked

“Yes boss, I don’t think we have any- hey! ” He laughed as he got up to go look at the weather screen

“Where’s Javi by any chance?” Meanie questioned

Alex answered that hesitantly “Jupiter got ordered- I’m sorry, but I do think he’s alive” Alex looked down at her feet. Melanie’s expression changed from happy to a murderous rage burning up inside her.

“Then we know who else to get when we get back...anyone else I should know about?”

“That’s all I know for sure but I don’t think Ruth is getting treated the best over there too”

Melanie was now not the happiest camper knowing that her two closest friends were probably being treated like slaves or worse.

“Are the boards in good condition?” Mel asked directing it towards Ben

“Um yeah they’re fine, also we are having more bad weather so that’s just a fyi” he quickly answered also knowing she was in her murder attitude again.

“Well let’s get her rolling at a steady speed and let’s do this thing and hopefully not die in doing so”

“Yes boss” he walked away

“Well Head Engineer Cavill, on your orders” Alex put a hand on her right shoulder smiling down at her. Melanie pulled a soft smile and reached for her hand to hold it, Alex now knew that holding her in some way was the key to her heart.

“How about now?” Alex nodded in response

“Alright let’s fire up the boosters!”

[blog-of-a-multitude-of-fandoms]

Train- Andre Layton

Pairing: Andre Layton x Reader

Characters: Andre Layton

Warnings: N/A

Request: N/A

Word Count: 415

Author: Aaron

“I hope you’re ready for a fight. One second too late and we’re waiting for this baby to circle the world before we get another shot. No way in hell we’re still alive by the time that happens.” Layton stretched a patched, thick, stone grey hat over his head and tucked a slightly thinner woollen cloth over his mouth and under his eyes. “I need to know that as soon as that train stops and people start running, and there will be a lot of people, that you are ready to run with me. I am not getting on that train without you.” From his perch, crouched out of the Snowpiercer’s guards view Layton outstretched his icy fingers and held tightly onto your gloved hand. The thundering, rhythmic churn of the trains engine pushing it’s one thousand and one carriages up the track could be heard from miles and miles away, if it wasn’t for the almost blinding light penetrating the ever falling snow you would have had no idea that the train was nearly here.

“I’m with you every step of the way, don’t worry about me. I am more than willing to dodge a few bullets if it means we get a spot.”

“That’s fine, but are you willing to push other people off? Are you willing to barge that mother and screaming child into the snow if there’s only space for us… or them?” You’d seen the faceless soldiers, clad with armour and armed heavily with rifles and arms, you knew that they would be willing to do whatever it would take to keep you from stepping onto those tail carriages. Not once though had you considered how ruthless you would have to be regarding other people fighting to attend.

“Yeah… I’ll help who I can but if it’s between us and them, I’m wiling to do whatever it will take.”

“Good.” The rumbling of the train became louder and louder until a harsh whistle of the brakes engaged and the train rolled for what seemed like miles to a stop. Once the train had stopped the guards disengaged their safety, brought the sights to their goggled eyes, and waited with great purpose. “We’ll let the first wave go… nobody on the first wave makes it, after that stay as low as you can and just run. Nobody except me cares about what happens to you here, at least that’s how you must see it. Don’t worry though, I’ll keep you safe.”

[writingsnmusings]

about nicole and writingsnmusings

if you found your way here, hi! welcome! this is just gonna be a little about me for myself and this blog.

my name is nicole and i'm 24 years old. i'm a pisces who loves writing and found a home on tumblr with some amazingly talented people. i’ve made so many friends thanks to this website and i’m always looking to make more. my inbox is open for anybody to come say hi or rant about whatevers on your mind!

i've had this blog for around 5 years and it’s gone through a couple name changes, but it’s always stayed about the same content. it’s always been a multi fandom blog with my interests/fixations constantly changing. i mostly write about the fandoms/characters i’m interested in, but my requests are always open for prompts and suggestions.

fandoms i’m into and write for:

vikings (ivar, ragnar, hvitserk, ubbe)

henry cavill (clark kent, captain syverson, geralt of rivia, august walker, marshall)

pedro pascal (marcus moreno, din djarin, maxwell lord)

911 (buck x eddie)

teen wolf (mostly all characters)

[fanfic-addict-98]

@anyone who wants to write Andre Layton imagines/hcs or really any Snowpiercer (series) imagines/hcs: I will love and support you!!

[valwrite]

sinning / grieving; masterlist

status: on hold whilst i finish writing it

Hell has frozen over and, in it’s place, Snowpiercer has emerged. It’s many carriages carry secrets: affairs, murders, betrayals. And that’s only mentioning Andre Layton’s secrets. When a serial killer appears, Detective Layton is called on to the case. Though reluctant at first, he agrees to take on the case when he discovers the first victim is rumored to be a once Tallie, an ex-coworker, an ex-lover: Y/N L/N. What starts as a hunt for her killer quickly becomes a hunt for the truth behind her suspicious death. The Tail is uprising; his ex-wife is back in his line of sight; all eyes of the train are on him; and all Andre Layton can focus on is finding Y/N L/N’s body.

Series warning: Angst, Character Death, Smut, Infidelity.

Chapter One: pride / shock 

Chapter Two: envy / denia

Chapter Three: gluttony / anger

Chapter Four: greed / bargaining

Chapter Five: lust / depression

Chapter Six: sloth / testing

Chapter Seven: wrath / acceptance

Related drabbles/oneshots: The Rock Between Us.

[wingsofhcpe]

SNOWPIERCER S3E6 THOUGHTS: IMPEACH LAYTON

No I don't even care actually I hate him.

Not just because he's killed Pike but because he's so goddamn self righteous about it. If any of you guys have watched AoT, and know of Erwin Smith's character arc (best morally grey leader ever), you'll understand what I mean.

Ruth thinking it was all a misunderstanding and she could "clear Pike's name"... I'm in pain.

Also since I mentioned aot, if this was an anime Zarah would have jumped in to save Layton or Ruth would have jumped in to save Pike. In any case, they would have ended up getting stabbed instead. Now that I think about it, that's a good fic idea... (Don't ask me why I constantly think in Anime Terms. It's just who I am).

And ofc she's gonna blame herself. Of fucking course. Kudos to Pike for not saying he's doing it for her even when directly confronted... but even the implication, the knowledge of it, is enough to drive someone like Ruth insane. She's SO gonna blame herself.

This episode basically confirmed that they really did love each other, that they were just...afraid. Especially Ruth. And now they're never going to get their chance at happiness because Pike was STUPID. Let's be real here, the core of the problem is with Layton, but Pike acted with the clear intent to end up dead. He truly believed the best part of him was dead, there was nothing for him to hold on to, and he wanted to go out at least trying to set things right, to prove that Layton is not fit to be the leader any longer.

Also the fact that he said he would never hurt the baby. Also Zarah idgaf about your ugly cgi doll, fuck you.

(yeah no ok I know she was scared and that's completely fair, I just don't like Zarah in general lol).

This week is mostly gonna be me screaming about Ruth and Pike but also I loved the little details about the Tail traditions. Good to see they remember Old Ivan even after all of this. Also hey Astrid's alive, good to know.

ALSO MILES. HE GREW SO TALL. HIS VOICE GOT DEEPER. MY BABY SON GREW UP.... I MISSED YOU MY CHILD!!!!! I MISSED YOU SO MUCH!!!! I'm so glad you didn't also die of influenza.

Carly's and Alex's interactions were adorable actually, also kinda gay, I ship it. (Though I will remain an Alex/LJ stan forever)

I feel real bad about Wilford and also I'm very angry re: Audrey, but after everything that happened this episode she can honestly go fuck herself (or Till ig).

Speaking of, the little interactions with Till and LJ. Big Sis Till is back and I'm loving it. No Os tho :((

I hope Roche survives at least. Glad to see him trying for Carly.

I love Lights so much and I wish she ended up with Till bc they're great together.

Asha is a mood, I too would like to hide in a dark hole with my comfort object in order to avoid people. She doesn't have as big of a role as I imagined though. At least not yet.

I can't even bring myself to explain why I'm so mad at Andre. Like the fact he literally only agreed to fight Pike because Pike threatened to expose his lies and destabilise his influence/leadership based on said lies... I think that's what really made me go against Layton. He didn't care about solving any of this, he just wanted to buy Pike off as usual, and when he realised he couldn't, and that Pike knew he was bullshitting the entire train, he decided to fight to the death. This is the biggest issue with his leadership and why he's no longer fit to lead.

Winnie putting her lil doll with Pike's dead body.... AND RUTH IS PUTTING THE BOMB IN THAT DOLL IN THE PROMO FOR EP7??? FUCK ME.

Also I've said that already but goddammit Ruth is just not allowed to be happy huh.

Closing this rant off with the fact that the drinking scene between Ruth, Roche and Till was gold. Just a few seconds, but honestly, vibes. I want a scene of them getting piss-drunk together in the next season. I'm talking WASTED.

Also I hope my prediction won't come true but I feel Ruth will start acting like Roche now. Just...more contained. She has a good poker face, unlike him.

Anyway. Till (haha) next week. Also if the show writers even CONSIDER killing Ruth off, I would like to formally announce that I will find you and I... I... I will steal all your snacks! So you better leave my wife alone!! >:(

[itevilhag]

994 cars long

Andre Layton x Reader! Wordcount: 502 Summary: trouble comes sideways... again. A/N: this one is just re-imagine of that scene form ep.10 where mc’s like the Melanie in this story. I rewatched it last weekend and i noticed something about Melanie and Andre’s relationship that i didin’t notice when i first watched it and i thought i’d write this thing.

“Y/N, talk to me” You turned to Andre, who clearly looks confused at the moment and is desperate to find an answer, you sighed softly. With a sense of realization of the situation that you all are in, you explained. “He’s gonna try and board us” Andre’s eyes went wide momentarily, but it still held confusion. It wasn’t really the answer he’s expecting to hear from you after what you said earlier about the other train. He was hoping that it would bring them good; but apparently it doesn’t. “You don’t know it’s him, Y/N/N” Ben interjected, turning to look at you “Who else could it be then? Another merry band of arc pirates” you reply sarcasm dripping off your tongue, the annoyance evident on your face. But that was all a cover up, to mask what you were actually feeling; you were scared, because you are certain that it’s him and knew the man to bone. And once he gets a hold of Snowpiercer, who knows what’s he’s gonna do to everyone. But Andre knew you better than anyone, he can see right through your mask of annoyance. He knew that you’re scared “Hey, Y/N let’s not panic yet. We can do this alright? We’re gonna fight Wilford if we have to. It’s going to be fine” Andre tried to assure you (even though he knows that it probably won’t) he took a step closer to you, reaching to find your hand, you held on to it tightly. “Well, what if it doesn’t?” your replied, nearly snapping, you saw Andre wince at your voice raising, you calm demeanor chipping itself little by little away from you. You hated this, all of it because you didn’t want them to see your vulnerable side. You were suppose to be this calm and poise woman in front of everyone, every single day since you boarded this train, but finally for once you let go. “What If Wilford does board us? You don’t know him Andre. We’re gonna be in something far worse than anything we’ve just come through” you felt Andre’s hand tighten around yours as he looked at you warily. You heard him sigh softly. “Then I’ll get a war party downtrain to make sure that doesn’t happen” He said, reassurance evident on his voice, your gaze to him soften but your current emotions didn’t waver “Andre, remember. When the passengers realize it’s him, they’ll be divided” you remind him, as he started to turn away from you “I can keep us together” he said, with confidence in his voice which made the corners of your lips twitch up slightly “You have to” you simply replied, he looked at you one last time before he turned the other way, away from you. He was just a feet away from the door when you called after him, making his movements stop. “Andre… be careful. Please” you pleaded, he nodded a soft smile forming on his lips, he turned away and walked out the door.

[fatehbaz]

Some of these sources might be useful for anyone interested in indigenous Polynesian and Micronesian ethnobotany, folklore, and astronomy:

-

Abbott, Isabella A. “Polynesian Uses of Seaweed.” In Islands, Plants, and Polynesians: An Introduction to Polynesian Ethnobotany. Edited by Paul Alan Cox and Sandra Anne Bannack. Portland, Oregon: Dioscorides Press, 1991.

Alencar, Victor Aves. “Sky Observation and Mythology: Paths to an Astronomical Culture.” Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union Volume 5 Issue S260, 207-212.

Allen, Melinda S. “Coastal Morphogenesis, Climatic Trends, and Cook Islands Prehistory.” In Cultural Ecology in the Pacific Islands. Edited by Patrick V. Kirch and Terry L. Hunt. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997.

Alpers, Antony. Legends of the South Sea: The World of the Polynesians seen through their Myths and Legends, Poetry and Art. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1970.

Anderson, Atholl. “Epilogue: Changing Archaeological Perspectives upon Historical Ecology in the Pacific Islands.” Pacific Science 63:4 (2009).

Aswani, Shankar and Michael W. Graves. “The Tongan Maritime Expansion: A Case in the Evolutionary Ecology of Social Complexity.” Asian Perspectives 37:2 (1998).

Aveni, Anthony. People and the Sky (Our Ancestors and the Cosmos). New York: Thames and Hudson Inc., 2008.

Bannack, Sandra Anne. “Plants and Polynesian Voyaging.” In Islands, Plants, and Polynesians: An Introduction to Polynesian Ethnobotany, edited by Paul Alan Cox and Sandra Anne Bannack. Portland, Oregon: Dioscordes Press, 1991.

Beckwith, Martha. Hawaiian Mythology. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1977.

Black, Sharon, Thomas Wright and Lynnette Erickson. “Polynesian Folklore: An Alternative to Plastic Toys.” Children’s Literature in Education 32:2 (2001).

Buck, Peter H. Vikings of the Sunrise. New York: Stokes, 1938.

Burley, David V. “Archaeological Demography and Population Growth in the Kingdom of Tonga: 950 BC to the Historical Era.” In The Growth and Collapse of Pacific Island Societies: Archaeological and Demographic Perspectives. Edited by Patrick V. Kirch and Jean-Louis Rallu. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2008.

Connell, John. “Island Dreaming: The Contemplation of Polynesian Paradise.” Journal of Historical Geography 29:4 (2003).

Coppett, Daniel and Andre Iteanu. Cosmos and Society in Oceania (Explorations in Antrhopology). Oxford: Berg Publishers, 1995.

Couper, Alastair. Sailors and Traders: A Maritime History of the Pacific Peoples. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2009.

Crawford, Peter. Nomads of the Wind: A Natural History of Polynesia. London: BBC Books, 1993.

Cunningham, Sean P. “A Story of Yams, Worms, and Change from Ancestral Polynesia.” The Journal of Island and Coastal Archaeology 7:2 (2012).

D’Arcy, Paul. The People of the Sea: Environment, Identity, and History in Oceania. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2006.

Despland, Michel. “Two Ways of Articulating Outsider’s Knowledge of Polynesian Culture and Religion: Melville’s Typee and Mardi.” Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 16:2 (2004).

Devall, Bill and George Sessions. Deep Ecology: Living as if Nature Mattered. Layton, Utah: Gibbs Smith, 1985.

Edwards, Edmundo. “Astronomically-aligned Religious Structures on Raiatea and Raivavae and the Matariki Festival of 1770 on Easter Island.” Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union Volume 7, Symposium S278 (2011).

Eliade, Mircea. “Nostalgia for Paradise.” In The Inner Journey: Myth, Psyche, and Spirit (PARABOLA Anthology Series). Edited by Martha Heyneman. Series Editor: Ravi Ravindra. Sandpoint, Idaho: Morning Light Press, 2008.

Filihia, Meredith. “Shamanism in Tonga: An Assessment.” The Journal of Polynesian Society 117:4 (2008).

Finney, Ben. “Myth, Experiment, and the Reinvention of Polynesian Voyaging.” American Anthropologist 93:2 (1991).

Gladwin, Thomas. East is a Big Bird: Navigation and Logic on Puluwat Atoll. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1970.

Glavin, Terry. The Last Great Sea: A Voyage through the Human and Natural History of the North Pacific Ocean. Vancouver, British Columbia: Greystone Books, 2000.

Gooley, Tristan. The Natural Navigator: The Rediscovered Art of Letting Nature Be Your Guide. New York: The Experiment, 2012.

Goto, Akira. “Archaeoastronomy and ethnoastronomy in the Ryuku Islands: A preliminary report.” Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union Volume 7, Symposium S278 (2011).

Grimble, Arthur. “Gilbertese Astronomy and Astronomical Observations.” Journal of the Polynesian Society 40 (1931).

Grimble, Arthur. Migrations, Myth and Magic from the Gilbert Islands. London: Routledge, 1972.

Groube, L.M. “Tonga, Lapita Pottery, and Polynesian Origins.” Journal of Polynesian Society 80:3 (1971).

Gunson, Niel. “A Note on Oceanic Shamanism.” Journal of the Polynesian Society 119:2 (2010).

Gunson, Niel. “Understanding Polynesian Traditional History.” The Journal of Pacific History 28:2 (1993).

Hamacher, Duane W. and Ray P. Norris. “‘Bridging the Gap’ through Australian Cultural Astronomy.” Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union Volume 7, Symposium S278 (2011).

Hames, Raymond. “The Ecologically Noble Savage Debate.” Annual Review of Anthropology 36 (2007).

Heyerdahl, Thor. Early Man and the Ocean (A Search for the Beginnings of Navigation and Seaborne Civilizations). Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, 1979.

Irwin, Geoffrey. The Prehistoric Exploration and Colonisation of the Pacific. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996.

Kahn, Miriam. “Tahiti: The Ripples of Myth on the Shores of the Imagination.” In History and Anthropology 11:4 (2003).

Kalakaua, His Hawaiian Majesty King David. “Hina: The Helen of Hawaii.” In The Legends and Myths of Hawaii. Edited by R.M. Daggett. Honolulu: Mutual Publishing, 1997.

Kelley, David H. and Eugene F. Milone. Exploring Ancient Skies: A Survey of Ancient and Cultural Astronomy. New York: Springer New York, 2011.

Kirch, Patrick V. “Changing Landscapes and Sociopolitcal Evolution in Mangaia, Central Polynesia.” In Historical Ecology in the Pacific Islands. Edited by Patrick V. Kirch and Terry L. Hunt. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997.

Kirch, Patrick V. The Evolution of the Polynesian Chiefdoms. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984.

Kirch, Patrick V. “’Like Shoals of Fish’: Archaeology and Population in Pre-Contact Hawaii.” In The Growth and Collapse of Pacific Island Societies: Archaeological and Demographic Perspectives. Edited by Patrick V. Kirch and Jean-Louis Rallu. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2008.

Kirch, Patrick V. “Solstice observations in Mangareva, French Polynesia.” Archeoastronomy: the Journal of Astronomy in Culture 18 (2004).

Kirch, Patrick V. “Temple Sites in Kahi Kinui, Maui, Hawaiian Islands: Their Orientations Decoded.” Antiquity 78:299 (2004).

Kirch, Patrick V. and Jean-Louis Rallu. “Long-term Demographic Evolution in the Pacific Islands.” In The Growth and Collapse of Pacific Island Societies: Archaeological and Demographic Perspectives. Edited by Patrick V. Kirch and Jean-Louis Rallu. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2008.

Ladefoged, Thegn N. and Michael W. Graves. “Modelling Agricultural Development and Demography in Kohala, Hawaii.” In The Growth and Collapse of Pacific Island Societies: Archaeological and Demographic Perspectives. Edited by Patrick V. Kirch and Jean-Louis Rallu. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2008.

Lessa, William A. “Origins.” In More Tales from Ulithi Atoll: A Content Analysis. Edited by William A. Lessa. Berkely: University of California Press, 1980.

Lewis, David. “A Return Voyage between Puluwat and Saipan using Micronesia Navigational Techniques.” Journal of Polynesian Sociology 80:4 (1971).

Lewis, David. “Voyaging Stars: Aspects of Polynesian and Micronesian Astronomy.” Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London: Series A, Mathematical and Physical Sciences 276:1257 (1974).

Lewis, David H. We, the Navigators: The Ancient Art of Landfinding in the Pacific. London: Angus and Robertson, 1972.

Luomala, Katharine. Ethnobotany of the Gilbert Islands. Honolulu: Bernice P. Bishop Museum, 1953.

Magli, Giulio. Mysteries and Discoveries of Archaeoastronomy (From Giza to Easter Island). New York: Copernicus Books, 2009.

Makemson, Maud Worcester. The Morning Star Rises: An Account of Polynesian Astronomy. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1941.

Malnic, Jutta with John Kasaipwalova. Kula: Myth and Magic in the Trobriand Islands. Wahroonga, NSW: Cowrie Books, 1998.

Mawyer, Alexander. “The Oceanic Drift in Polynesian Linguistics.” Language and Communication 28:4 (2008).

McLuhan, T.C. The Way of the Earth: Encounters with Nature in Ancient and Contemporary Thought. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1994.

Mercer, P.M. “Oral Tradition in the Pacific: Problems of Interpretation.” The Journal of Pacific History 14:3 (1979).

Neves-Graca, Katja. “Elementary Methodological Tools for a Recursive Approach to Human-Environmental Relations.” In Person, Space and Memory in the Contemporary Pacific: Volume 1: Experiencing New Worlds. Edited by Jurg Wassmann and Katharina Stockhaus. Oxford: Bergham Books, 2007.

Nunn, Patrick D. “Fished Up or Thrown Down: The Geography of Pacific Island Origin Myths.” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 93:2 (2003).

Nunn, Patrick D. “On the Convergence of Myth and Reality: Example from the Pacific Islands.” The Geographical Journal 167:2 (2001).

Oliver, Douglas L. Ancient Tahitian Society: Social Relations. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1974.

Oliver, Douglas L. Oceania (The Native Cultures of Australia and the Pacific Islands). Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1989.

Penprase, Bryan E. The Power of Stars (How Celestial Observations Have Shaped Civilization). London: Springer, 2011.

Poignant, Roslyn. “Polynesia.” In Oceanic Mythology: The Myths of Polynesia, Melanesia, Australia. Edited by Roslyn Poignant. London: Paul Hamlyn, 1967.

Ragone, Diane. “Ethnobotany of Breadfruit in Polynesia.” In Islands, Plants, and Polynesians: An Introduction to Polynesian Ethnobotany. Edited by Paul Alan Cox and Sandra Anne Bannack. Portland, Oregon: Dioscorides Press, 1991.

Rallu, Jean-Louis. “Pre- and Post-Contact Population in Island Polynesia: Can Projections Meet Retrodictions?” In The Growth and Collapse of Pacific Island Societies: Archaeological and Demographic Perspectives. Edited by Patrick V. Kirch and Jean-Louis Rallu. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2008.

Ryan, Anna. Where Land Meets Sea: Coastal Explorations of Landscape, Representation and Spatial Experience. Farnham, England: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2012.

Sahlins, Marshall D. Social Stratification in Polynesia. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1958.

Smith, W. Ramsay. Myths and Legends of the Australian Aborigines. Mineola, New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 2003.

Stone, Benjamin C. “The Role of Pandanus in the Culture of the Marshall Islands.” In Plants and the Migrations of Pacific Peoples: A Symposium. Edited by Jacques Barrau. Honolulu: Bishop Museum Press, 1963.

Strathern, Andrew and Pamela J. Stewart. “Actors and Actions in ‘Exotic’ Places.” In Person, Space and Memory in the Contemporary Pacific: Volume 1: Experiencing New World. Edited by Jurg Wassmann and Katharina Stockhaus. Oxford: Bergham Books, 2007.

Suggs, Robert C. The Island Civilizations of Polynesia. New York: The New American Library, 1960.

Titcomb, Margarex (with the collaboration of Mary Kawena Pukui). Dog and Man in the Ancient Pacific with Special Attention to Hawaii. Honolulu: Bernice P. Bishop Museum, 1969.

Tuljapurkar, Shirpad, Charlotte Lee and Michelle Figgs. “Demography and Food in Early Polynesia.” In The Growth and Collapse of Pacific Island Societies: Archaeological and Demographic Perspectives. Edited by Patrick V. Kirch and Jean-Louis Rallu. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2008.

Williamson, Robert W. Religious and Cosmic Beliefs of Central Polynesia. London: Cambridge University Press, 1933.

Winduo, Steven Edmund. “Unwriting Oceania: The Repositioning of the Pacific Writer Scholars within a Folk Narrative Space.” New Literary History 31:3 (2000).

Whistler, Dr. W. Arthur. Polynesian Herbal Medicine. Lawai, Hawaii: National Tropical Botanical Garden, 1992.

-

My first thesis was about Oceanian environmental knowledge. These are some of the better references I have come across. Two of the most authoritative researchers of early Polynesian knowledge are David Lewis (expert on wayfinding) and Patrick V. Kirch (expert on ethnobotany and land-use); they dominate most bibliographies on the subject. I also like the work of Patrick Nunn, who focuses more on Polynesian folklore.

[aion-rsa]

Snowpiercer Season 2 Gets Release Date, New Teaser

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

Based on the graphic novel and Bong Joon-ho film of the same name, TNT’s sci-fi drama Snowpiercer came around at a peculiar time in TV history. The highly political series imagined a world in which people were forced to live in close quarters amid apocalyptic climate conditions and debate the soul-crushing nature of class differences. And bear in mind the first season premiered in May near the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite that heavy subject matter, Snowpiercer became cable television’s most-watched shows.

During the series’ appearance at the socially-distanced 2020 New York Comic Con, TNT announced a release date for Snowpiercer season 2…and the network is probably hoping that the political and social landscape will be a little more chill when the show arrives this time around. Snowpiercer’s second season will launch on Monday, Jan. 25 at 9 p.m. ET on TNT. Additionally, all 10 episodes of the show’s first season will be available to stream on HBO Max on Jan. 1. As part of the announcement, TNT unveiled a fresh new teaser. 

This teaser abides by a pretty clear cut principle in television advertising: if you’ve got Sean Bean, then you use Sean Bean. Yes, as previously announced, Bean (Game of Thrones) will be joining the cast of season 2 as the mythical Mr. Wilford, creator of humanity’s new post-apocalyptic train home, Snowpiercer. This teaser sees Wilford arriving on his second train, Big Alice, and squaring off with Andre Layton (Daveed Diggs).

TNT’s plot description for Snowpiercer season 2 reads:

“In season two, an entirely new power struggle emerges, causing a dangerous rift as people are divided between their loyalty to Layton and to Mr. Wilford, who has a new train, new technology and a game plan that keeps everyone guessing. While Layton battles Wilford for the soul of Snowpiercer, Melanie leads the charge on a shocking new discovery that could change the fate of humanity. ”

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

In addition to Bean and Diggs, Snowpiercer stars Jennifer Connelly (A Beautiful Mind), Alison Wright (The Americans), Mickey Sumner (Frances Ha), and Steven Ogg (The Walking Dead). Joining the cast for season 2 is Rowan Blanchard (Girl Meets World) as Alexandra. Snowpiercer received a two-season order at the start of its run, which is how it was able to turn around season 2 so quickly even amid the pandemic. Snowpiercer season 3 has not yet officially been announced but is looking quite likely.

The post Snowpiercer Season 2 Gets Release Date, New Teaser appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/3jJFame

[elocinnicole]

Requests Rules

Welcome to my Blog! It’s Nikki here, below are what I write and requests rules

Characters I Write For

1. Daveed Diggs

2. Collin Hoskins (Blindspotting)

3. Hamilton Fam

4. Ashley and Miles Turner (Blindspotting)

5. Andre Layton (Snowpiercer)

6. Blindspotting Film & TV Series

I may add other characters/people in the future. If you have a specific character or person that is not listed, please still free to ask.

What I Write

Headcanons

Drabbles

One Shots

Imagines/scenarios

Fluff

Angst

Comfort/Hurt

I’m still new to smut, so if you request it, please be gentle, (no pun intended, or is it?😏) it may take me a while to get to it. This is a safe space, so don’t be shy in your requests.

If you want to request, please, send an ask or inbox me.

This is a blog for adults. IF YOU ARE NOT 18+ DNI

I love to write and share my work. Enter my house respectfully or you’ll be asked to leave

Love,

Nikki

[jenconnellysshybellybutton]

Chapter 6: Next To Me

Characters: Melanie Cavill, Alexandra Cavill, Andre Layton, Bess Till, Ruth Wardell, Josie Wellstead, Bennett Knox

Warnings: mentions of suicide, heavy angst, hurt/comfort, just sadness and comfort plus mel being with her bby🥺, domestic fluff, melanie can cook! 🍳

The Cavill’s woke up rather well, the next morning very pleasantly to the golden sunlight coming from behind the curtain of the small window in the bunk, Melanie had been already awake for around 30 minutes sitting at her desk with a small lamp that was dim reading some papers.

Alex squinted her eyes closed trying to mostly block out as much light as possible after literally just waking up, she pulled off the cover to move her legs over the railing making the least amount of sound possible but she made a grunt.

Melanie looked over her shoulder from the soft noise.

“Oh hey hon you’re awake, how did you sleep?”

“I could ask the same thing, fine...actually it has definitely been a good while since I’ve slept like a baby, damn good sleep since I was a baby probably” she laughed. Mel sat watching her laugh, resting her fist under her cheekbone, she chuckled back at the answer smiling, the last time she had seen Alex laugh was 2 months- hell 3 months ago now that she thought about it, all she knew was that it felt fulfilling to see that, like a part of the sun was brought back into her heart.

“I had a refreshing sleep but yes, good, that’s good”

They stayed silent for a few seconds. Alex was about to bring up what she wanted to ask last night because she felt now was an okay time to..she thought so

“Can I ask you something?”

“Sure, go for it”

“What went down out there?”

Mel’s subtle smile disappeared as images flashed back through her mind of her traveling through the white.

“.......After...after he passed me up, I had a moment, a moment of reflection of everything that happened, you’ve seen how I am like when those events happen Allie-... I went back to the station, ate the last couple of rats because I truly had given up, I wrote what I thought was my last words...gathered up the data, I was going to run out of power and I did, but then I took one last look at the data, the power finally cut”

Alex’s eye’s widened.

“so I said ‘fuck it and went off and went and kneeled out there one more time, I stayed a some few hours, I thought back to us again and again...and that little thing gave me that spark of hope that I would see you again, whenever it would be here or in the afterlife I got a morsel of it back, and what do you know…..I felt that you came back for me and- and you did, going back to the station again, I grabbed some chunks of torn piping from the station that I brought with me, attached some to my knees and boots and I ran as fast as I could, the storm made it basically impossible to hitch onto its side but I did, my suit ran out of juice so I panicked and I was hanging off and the wind made one of the pipes flew off and got right in me”

Melanie’s eyes were welling up again “Jesus christ mom, god” Alex sat down in one of the chairs in complete shock and disturbed from what her mother was telling her about her experience of dying twice now.

“…then part of the punctured places got a bit too fragile and another got to me too, including my helmet, the cold seeped in, it felt like all of my limbs were freezing, my arms, legs, fingers, my face couldn’t move so I felt for the panel on the siding and then god seemed to like me that day so he gave me the benefit of the doubt, I got in, I felt limp and it felt like I fucking passed out but also died but I did…..and here I am…….I hope that answers your question”

Melanie turned back to her papers to read them, she wiped her tear with the sleeve of her jean jacket. Alex did the same, she felt like she was punched in the face with words folding her hands. Melanie sat in silence not sure what to say to her knowing what she said definitely hurt her doing the deed. She put down her pencil and turned to her.

***

“I’m sorry for telling you all of that but you asked a question so I answered it, I’m sorry I was a bit harsh too…… Can I make you breakfast?...to make this better the best I can? What would you like me to make you? Anything you want”

Alex did and did not want to forget the story she told, for now, she was going to keep it in the back of her mind, right now she needs to be more optimistic so she shook it out of her head, she felt even worse for her mom so she got up, walked to her and gave her yet another heart-filled hug. Melanie did what was the only option for what she felt exploding inside to let out a round of pain again.

“I can’t even imagine what that was like for you, no matter how much of a horrible person you think you are, you shouldn’t have felt that...nobody should...okay maybe except for one individual”

She reached down and put her hand on her cheek to calm her since Allie kinda figured out what calms her and lets her know it’s okay.

“I’m far from good, but still you...still you want me?”

“Yes, without a doubt, you may have left me in Chicago, but that was to save everyone, to save us, I forgive you mom, you don’t have to say you’re sorry anymore, to anyone. We only have each other in this world if you really think about it”

Mel thought she was having deja vu “Thank you for taking a chance on me, you know I didn’t mean to hurt you on purpose right? I couldn’t see and I had no recollection of what was going on...I thought I was back on Big Alice and I thought he was you and he was trying to turn me around at the station but in his way, Allie he wasn’t even there-”

“He’s not going to talk to you no more, It’s fine, I can’t blame you if I wanted to. What do we even have to eat for breakfast? I haven’t checked in the cabinets beside the crappy MRE’s” They both got up from where they were at and headed to the kitchen that was afoot away because the room was so small.

Alex looked through some of the options, She didn’t Care for most of them so she decided on pancakes, Mel asked if she wanted anything on them like butter, bananas, strawberries, she said yes to the strawberries and so Mel turned on the mini stove, pulled out a pan and the ingredients and started making what she requested.

***

Alex was really into her meal “These are really good ma!”

“Well I’m glad honey” Mel smiled, she was eating a part of a leftover casserole from the fridge that was god knows how old but it still tasted good so it should be fine she thought. She got up and put her jacket back on and put her hair in a bun,

“Who else is in the engine besides Layton?” Alex stopped eating and looked up

“Bess, Josie, Ben, yeah that’s everyone who’s on here” Melanie gulped when she said “Josie”

“You mean ‘Josie’ as in Josie the tallie?”

“Yep”

“Fuck”

“What’s wrong?” Mel is at a loss for words.

“I don’t want to talk about it, it’s a conversation for me and the grown-ups alright”

Alex rolled her eyes “Alright before you go right through the door and all hell breaks loose are you sure you got enough rest? I don’t think you did” Melanie now looked at Allie and noticed that there was nothing on her plate “wow you really scarfed that down, yeah I got 9 hours I’ll be fine”

“Are those your famous last words?! I was hungry” Alex laughed “Still you need more”

“Fine, what do you want me to do, go to bed?”

“Exactly, now go on I be there in a second” Melanie took off her jacket. set it on the chair and popped into bed, along with Alex. ¨Have a good sleep mom, sweet dreams¨

¨You too hon¨

¨What did I do to deserve her¨ Mel thought, and they were both left with their dreams.

[blog-of-a-multitude-of-fandoms]

Cell- Andre Layton

Pairing: Andre Layton x Reader (Platonic)

Characters: Andre Layton

Warnings: N/A

Request: N/A

Word Count: 408

Author: Aaron

“Psst.” You peered at Andre’s almost lifeless, beaten body that hunched in the corner of the small jail cell. “Layton!” Still no reply, he was clearly awake but either didn’t care to be harassed by another member of the law or clearly didn’t care for guests. You found a small something at your feet, upon closer inspection it turned out to be a pen lid but it would be more than good enough to throw at him without causing any damage.

“What?” He scoffed without raising his head.

“Layton, it’s me, y/n… I left the tail like… 3 months ago.”

“Huh?” He slowly brought himself onto his unsteady feet. “What the fuck, we though you were dead?” With heavy feet he shuffled over to you. “They… they told us you were dead?”

“They pulled me one night whilst I was sleeping, real scary shit. Turns out they needed people to help cultivate the crops and they found out that kind of used to be my forte. Turns out it’s kind of a rare speciality around here so I managed to bargain myself a cushy life in second.” Layton sneered and backed himself over to where he originally slumped.

“It’s alright for some, glad to know your shit’s all together. They are using me as an unpaid, beaten homicide detective but you don’t see me swanning around second class.”

“Don’t think I’ve forgotten about you all, I got stuff going on! I’ve got schedules noted down.” You turned your voice down to a whisper. “I’m figuring out whose running what, what would be the biggest hits, if you know what I mean?”

“Don’t give up your new life for us, don’t be a fool.”

“Please! As soon as they’re done with me I’m either gonna be chucked out of the train or thrown right back in the tail, these guys don’t care what happens as long as they get what they want. I haven’t forgotten about you all. Besides, life in second isn’t all It’s cracked up to be, you work all day, barely get any time think, never mind anything else. I’m still getting those shitty rations you get and I’m looked down on by everybody I work with and pass in the hall. I’m keeping everybody fed and all I’m getting is a slightly comfier bed.” Layton chuckled.

“Well once you get out give us what you know, maybe then we can bring some justice to Snowpiercer.”

[metawitches]

In episode 5 of Snowpiercer, LJ goes to trial for her part in the murders of Sean and Nikki, Josie goes uptrain to search for Andre and Miss Audrey takes action to ensure that Melanie will get Nikki the justice she deserves. The Folgers pressure Melanie to go easy on LJ. Bess moves in with Jinju and gets a 2nd class chip implant to go with her bourgeois 2nd class privileges.

It’s a tough episode for Melanie, but she manages to find some stress relief.

Recap

We begin with Andre, who is sealed up tight in a drawer. He normally looks so robust, despite 7 years in the Tail, but now he has a grayish cast to his skin. The version of kronole used as a suppression drug is so poisonous that it gives the entire body a death pall, while turning the insides jet black, which can be seen externally by viewing the gums.

As Nikki claimed, it’s not like sleep. He’s having a combination of flashbacks and dreams. He’s back in the Tail, reliving memories of subduing the cannibal cult. That story was real, and largely happened the way he told it, if these dreams reflect reality. But he killed the cult leaders alone, at the insistence of the rest of the Tail, using a shiv they’d created, instead of the story about group solidarity overcoming an evil villain that Andre told in the Drawers.

The Tail leaders did all share in eating the heart, including Josie, Pike, Last Australian, Z-Wreck, Strong Boy, Big John and Lights.

Interspersed with his memories, Andre hears Nikki singing Sealed with a Kiss, the Bobby Vinton song that LJ played for him. He repeatedly sees Nikki’s bloody, mutilated body standing at the end of an aisle in the Drawers, singing the song, staring at him as if she’s the evil little girl in a horror movie.

Was it trading away the ring that doomed him?

Andre knows that he hasn’t really gotten justice for Nikki. He’s gotten an errand boy killed as a literal sacrificial lamb and sent a 1st Class designer accessory out to take the fall, so the mob can feel like someone uptrain paid for the murders of Thirdies.

The person or people who are really responsible, the ones who ordered all of the murders, are still untouchable, free to order more murders when someone gets too close to their business dealings or secrets.

Layton thought he could put his revolution above individual justice, but his dreams are keeping him honest. The bodies of the victims have probably gotten progressively more gruesome with each murder because they’re being used to send harsher and harsher warnings.

Has his subconscious mind figured out who’s ordering the murders, and who they’re warning off?

Miss Audrey’s spoken voiceover: “I see now that as the Freeze killed everyone I ever knew, I mistook my survival for freedom. But justice never boarded and Wilford doubled down with a jackboot on our throats and a fat finger on the scales. Now, some of us are ready to change his terms. It will be perilous, filthy work. More precious souls may be lost. But we didn’t come this far, suffer this much, to give in to the same tyranny that destroyed us in the first place. Even on a frozen dead planet, humanity needs hope. For these are our revolutions on Snowpiercer, 1,001 cars long.”

Audrey is in the empty Night Car, holding a photo of Nikki from before the Freeze. Did they know each other then? Audrey looks ten years older than she does when she’s performing, onstage or otherwise, as she silently weeps for Nikki.

Snowpiercer has taken its toll on her, as it does on everyone.

Her assistant pokes his head in to signal they’re ready. She nods to confirm that it’s time to enact their plan. In 1st Class, one of the Night Car staff switches places with a busboy from the 1st Class dining car. He pulls out a covered dish from the underside of the cart and places it on top.

It’s lunchtime again for Lead Brakeman Roche. LJ is in the cell and she’s as fascinated by his perfectly formed and packed lunches as I am. She asks him questions about himself, but gets no respect. He remains silent, until he finally tells her that anything she says to him is admissible in court.

LJ doesn’t care, because she’s innocent, so she can’t incriminate herself. Since he won’t tell her how he and his wife met, she tells him that her parents met in St Moritz on a chair lift.

Of course they did. The frozen Swiss playground of the rich and amoral.

She’s just getting around to threatening him a little when Melanie brings the Folgers in. It’s LJ’s trial day, so she gets to go home and prepare. Melanie makes sure she understands that she’s on trial for murder, will be judged by a tribunal of ticketed passengers and will be expected to testify.

Melanie says that Wilford will be following along with the trial. Robert is glad, so that Wilford can see how silly the accusations against LJ are. Roche gets angry, since the Thirdies are taking the trial very seriously. They want justice for their 3 victims. Guess that first victim from years ago, when LJ was 12ish, is back on the table.

Lilah reminds Melanie that LJ is a minor child and the actual murderer is dead. Melanie says this was just the required pretrial detainment.

There’s no provision for a judge or Wilford to determine whether she should stand trial as an adult or a minor then? Because it seems like she’s being treated as an adult, but she was arrested based on evidence that only pointed to Erik, not her. Andre made up the rest of the story and she didn’t argue with him, allowing him to persuade her into becoming a public sacrifice.

Rewatch the scenes if you don’t remember it that way. Layton does the talking and LJ never admits to anything, beyond recognizing the J-hook and being close to Erik, neither of which was a crime. She fully cooperates with the investigation. Layton makes up a scenario he finds plausible, then exaggerates it further to make sure 3rd Class will hate the spoiled 1st Class suspect.

He turned her into another Nikki, so Nikki is haunting him. As a cop, he knows the murders aren’t over.

On her way out of the garrison, LJ tells Melanie that she doesn’t belong in the drawers and she just wants to thank Mr Wilford for the chance to prove it.

Roche and Melanie agree that there’ll be trouble in 3rd if she isn’t convicted.

Josie treats the remainder of Suzanne’s arm, which has developed a serious infection. It’s revealed that Josie was a vet before the Freeze. She’s qualified medically to help Suzanne, but has no supplies to work with and no way to keep a wound clean. Winnie brings Josie a new message from Astrid, asking Josie to meet her in sanitation today.

Bess and Jinju are moving in together, which means that Bess gets a shiny new 2nd Class chip inserted in her hand. The Notary and the Doctor go through a little ceremony with them, in which Jinju promises she’ll be responsible for Bess during the probationary period. If Bess makes a mistake, Jinju will be punished too.

With that, Bess is granted access to 2nd Class and all of its entitlements. The officials offer congratulations, then leave the lovebirds to their celebration. They’re both sure about their relationship and very happy. Three months is the longest Jinju has waited to move in with someone.

Still Snowpiercer’s most adorable couple, with no serious competition.

Back in their own car, the Folgers worry that something could go wrong during the trial, leading the tribunal to convict their daughter. Lilah wants LJ to rehearse her testimony again. LJ is distracted, playing a game, then wondering what it’s like in the drawers. Finally she asks Robert if she can… pop out his glass eye and mess around with it, putting it in her own mouth and pretending it’s a mouth-eye.

Robert chuckles, but Lilah is impatient and insists they get serious. She tells LJ to remember to tell the jury, “He forced me.”

LJ: “He did force me. You do know that, right?”

Robert: “We know that, sweetheart. We know.”

Lilah silently walks away. Maybe because she doesn’t believe LJ, maybe because she feels so helpless.

As the breakfast rush empties out of the 1st Class dining car, Ruth orders her assistant, Tristan, to stop staring out the window. He explains that he used to dream of seeing the Amazon, so he likes to watch it when it goes by. As lacking in imagination as ever, Ruth snaps that now it’s just a frozen lump. She tells him to set the car up for the Tribunal once everyone is gone, using the usual floor plan.

Weren’t we led to believe that there had only been one tribunal, Nikki’s? Or did they just mean there had only been the one murder trial, but there have been trials for other, lesser crimes? If there are regular trials, that makes it even more important to root out unfairness in the system.

Audrey’s replacement busboy wheels his cart into 1st Class and over to Sharma’s table. He says to enjoy the dish, complements of the Night Car, then leaves the dining car while the dish is still covered.

Ruth has taken notice of this unusual display- Sharma didn’t order anything and breakfast service is over anyway. Sharma lifts the cover just as she’s telling him not to. Inside, the dish is live bugs served on top of dead bugs. While everyone screams, Ruth sends Tristan to get Melanie.

Melanie visits Miss Audrey in the Night Car and says, “That stunt was beneath you, Audrey.”

Audrey: “No, it really wasn’t.”

If Melanie won’t play fair, neither will Audrey.

Melanie expresses her condolences for Nikki’s death. But she doesn’t understand Audrey’s anger, when there’s one suspect in custody, waiting to stand trial, and another is dead. What more does Audrey want?

Audrey says that the trial is a joke, since it takes place 5 miles uptrain, with a jury made up of passengers from 1st and 2nd, who are judging whether another upper class passenger killed three of her people from 3rd. They have no motivation to find one of their own guilty.

Melanie: “The Night Car is supposed to be Switzerland. Why are you politicizing it?”

Audrey has a thick book open on the counter. She points to it now: “Third has the right to petition Wilford in labor disputes and matters of jurisprudence. We want a new tribunal drawn. One representative from each class. And a delegation to observe the trial.”

Audrey says that Melanie used to try to make a difference, but working closely with Wilford has hardened her. Melanie remembers when Audrey told Wilford she wanted the Night Car to be more than the brothel he envisioned. Melanie backed her up when she explained that she thought the train would need a place to work through their grief. Now the train depends on Audrey and her vision of the Night Car as that place. If Audrey overtly takes sides, her club will no longer be a place where everyone feels welcome.

But Audrey sees her role as the caretaker and voice of the needy on the train, the ones Wilford and Melanie might forget. She might have been separate from 3rd class in the beginning, but she’s seen how much more they suffer than 1st and 2nd. She’s not the type to stand by and do nothing.

Melanie walks the train everyday, so she’s no stranger to its conditions. But people share their inner lives with Audrey in a way they never will with Wilford’s mouthpiece.

Audrey: “We depend on you… On your voice to Wilford’s ear. Recommend a new tribunal.”

Melanie tries to call Audrey’s bluff, the way she did with Lilah, but this isn’t a bluff. Audrey reminds her that Thirdies work in every department of the train and they can make life very difficult.

And with one significant pause, Audrey hints to Melanie that she knows the truth about Wilford.

Melanie’s next stop is the Drawers, where she asks Klimpt what his autopsy showed about how the suspension drug affected Nikki. He says she had necrosis of her adrenal tissue and hepatic insufficiencies, but he didn’t have enough time to find out whether she would have regained her normal mental state. She wasn’t fully detoxed when she died.

In other words, in addition to all of the obvious side effects of the drug, Nikki’s liver and adrenal glands were severely damaged. This is a terribly unethical situation to continue to keep the other Sleepers in.

Jinju asks if the Sleepers have Locked-In Syndrome, a rare disorder in which patients are fully conscious but unable to move or communicate. Klimpt says they might. He insists that the Sleepers need to be awakened more slowly than Nikki was.

That won’t cure the damage to their internal organs.

Melanie says they have 400 drawers, which someday might all hold Sleepers. They have to make sure the Sleepers won’t wake up traumatized. Klimpt says he’s trying.

That’s a lot of prisoners and experiments and a lot of concern for their welfare when they wake up. Something else is going on here. Is she hoping to eventually sell spots in stasis to the highest bidder, so Firsties can sleep through the rest of the ice age instead of using up resources and growing old?

They should start by using a drug that doesn’t turn sleepers’ mouths black.

Jinju has heard the rumor that the Thirdies want a spot on the Tribunal. Melanie is considering giving in. She tells Jinju that LJ may get what she deserves. Jinju doesn’t look as certain as Melanie that it’s a good idea.

Up in the engine, Ben and Javi are also skeptical about upsetting the status quo, especially Javi, who thinks pushing the Firsties too hard will aggravate the train’s class divisions too much.

Which leaves Melanie stuck, since 3rd is already aggravated. She asks Javi to take the wheel while she speaks to Ben privately.

Melanie and Ben go to her cabin, where they have an afternoon quickie on her desk, not even pausing to move Mr Wilford’s paperwork.

What will the boss think???

Afterwards, Ben lies in Melanie’s tiny single bed and says they haven’t had sex since the bees died. He’s sensing a pattern.

You think??? The woman really is a death goddess.

They briefly indulge in remembering what they miss most- Melanie wishes she could open a window or go for a walk. Ben misses the sound of rain. When he asks if she’s really going to change the rules for the tribunal, she says she just wants to breathe.

The tribunal is chosen using ping pong balls randomly drawn from a cage, the way bingo numbers are chosen. Each passenger is assigned a number. The Voice of the Train announces that Mr Wilford has agreed to allow a 3rd Class member on the Tribunal, so one name has been chosen from each class.

Ruth’s face makes it clear that this decision is sure to bring on the general downfall of civilization.

The tribunal members are Firstie Edith Gusterfeld, 2nd Class primary teacher Mary-Elizabeth Gillies, and Thirdie papermaker Walter Flemming. 3rd Class cheers their representative as he makes his way to Hospitality.

Josie has joined the sanitation crew again so she can search for Andre. At break time, Astrid knocks on the second door in the break room and tells the Tailie crew that Josie should meet Terence the Janitor in the Market, at the symbol of the yellow butterfly. She and Josie switch clothes so that Astrid can take Josie’s place until the next break.

Melanie greets the tribunal members as they arrive in the hospitality office. The tribunal members are friendly and open with each other as they get acquainted, even the Firstie, Edith Gusterfeld. She laments that she doesn’t get to mingle with other classes more.

Ruth: “Doesn’t Mr Wilford understand that you can’t just change the rules?”

Melanie: “I guess they’re his rules to change. He chose the will of the people.”

Ruth: “We don’t have will. We have order.”

Ruth walks out. Her assistant opens and closes the door for her.

Guess Ruth missed the page in the Big Book of Snowpiercer’s Rules of Order that Audrey pointed out earlier.

Till and Oz are tasked with bringing the delegation from 3rd to the 1st Class dining car. He accuses her of having joined the bourgeoisie. She retaliates by asking if he’s still trading drugs for sex. He says his probation is almost over. She says she wants to stay at the trial long enough to hear Jinju’s testimony. They achieve a truce of sorts.

He gathers the delegation and makes a speech instructing them to act like people rather than animals while they’re uptrain, then he and Till lead the delegation the 5 miles from the Night Car to the 1st Class dining car, accompanied by a unit of jackboots.

As the delegation moves uptrain, Robert tries to convince Lilah that everything will be fine. But Lilah understands the truth: “You don’t see what’s happening, do you? There’s an idea traveling uptrain, Robert. It wants to live, this idea. It wants to set the train ablaze and all it needs is a spark. All it needs is to wrap its thick fingers around your daughter’s throat and choke her out for the working man.”

Lj enters the room and Lilah tells her they should continue working on her testimony. Lilah must have gotten through to Robert, because he tells her he’ll take care of it.

From Lilah’s prediction to Layton in the drawer, having nightmares about the cannibals in the Tail. It’s not clear if these are accurate, if jumbled, memories, but I’m assuming they are. If so, it’s a strange story, since everyone else made Layton face the cannibals alone. When Layton told the story, he made it sound like most of the Tail had fought the kill cult.

He looks like he might have been drugged into taking the job, as if the rest of the Tail tried to send him back to the cannibals to be their next sacrifice and got lucky when he killed the cannibals instead. He puts Miles up in a bunk to keep him safe. Everyone wishes him luck as they insist he has to save them. Mama Grandé gives him a weapon, then he charges the cannibals’ lair.

Josie finds the Market, then one of the janitors finds her and brings her to Terence at knifepoint. Terence hasn’t been paid for this meeting and is only interested in how it might benefit him. Josie explains that they think Layton is in a drawer. Terence suggests that Layton might have made Wilford mad and have gotten “his head stuck out a port.”

There’s a fun thought. That would certainly make it hard to identify his body, unless you knew him really well.

Terence and Annie were considering taking a trip to the drawers themselves, so they decide to go along with Josie that afternoon, while the train is distracted with LJ’s trial.

Robert and a delegation of Firsties, including Sharma, Eugenia and Martin Colvin, meet with Commander Grey to discuss a regime change. Robert makes it clear that he’s not a bigot. He’s just a conservative attempting to maintain order. It doesn’t do anyone any good for Thirdies to get ideas above their station.

Grey asks if Robert is speaking as a citizen or LJ’s father. Robert says both. The rest of the delegation stand behind him. They’re all afraid that 3rd will come for their children. Grey says his job is to uphold the rules. He doesn’t make them.

Eugenia says that since Wilford has locked himself away, he’s grown out of touch with the needs of the people. Grey points out that Wilford has “the skills to keep us all alive.” He asks what Eugenia brings to the table. She says she has hundreds of millions of dollars in early investor status and “a whole world of pain when it comes to my survival.”

What does that threat mean? She’s talking to the man who commands the only remaining standing army. How does she think she’ll physically harm him? Does she have nuclear codes that she thinks will still work? A mobster shadow army?

Sharma interrupts Eugenia’s rant and explains that they’re fine leaving Wilford to himself. They’re more concerned with the day-to-day aspects of running the train- everything that isn’t military and infrastructure- and feel they’d do a better job in charge of those aspects. Grey asks about Melanie. Robert says she’d be the first to go.

Grey nods slightly, but stays silent.

I thought Grey hated Melanie and wanted her out, but something about that conversation makes me think he knows she’s Wilford and supports her. Kudos again to Timothy V. Murphy. He kills it in this role.

Martin Colvin turns out to be one of Melanie’s spies and runs straight to her with the story. She asks how Grey reacted. Colvin says the Commander just stared at them, coldly.  She tells Colvin she’ll speed up his renovations.

As they leave for the trial, Lilah gives LJ a few last minute reminders: cry contrite tears, make eye contact and be sincere. Robert pulls his Lilahs in for a family hug. A jackboot escorts LJ to the trial.

In the dining car, Ruth acts as judge to keep order during the trial. She says that tribunals are called to handle cases of crime, conspiracy or negligence. LJ is accused of 2 counts of murder.

Roche is the first witness: “Once the accused was apprehended, the brakemen did a full and thorough search of the Folgers’ quarters. There we found the most striking evidence in the case. Hidden in Lilah Junior’s jewelry box were the particularly preserved, severed penises of two male victims.”

Tristan brings out a jewelry box with the souvenirs in it and shows the Tribunal and the crowd.

I hate to discredit Roche, but every witness in this trial has serious issues. LJ looks shocked when the jewelry box is brought out. If it was found in her room, shouldn’t she and her parents have known and been prepared for this testimony? More importantly, it would have been simple for one of the brakemen who searched the room (cough *OZ* cough) to plant the souvenirs in the jewelry box or even just in the evidence file later, in order to falsify evidence.

Most importantly, no teenage girl hides severed penises in her jewelry box, where her mother might find them while looking for a pair of earrings. The souvenirs would have been hidden more carefully. A jewelry box is the kind of place a man would think a woman would put them and would have easy access to during a search when he wanted to plant evidence. Roche may or may not know the evidence was planted.

Erik could have also known he was in trouble and have planted them there to implicate LJ.

Let’s remember how many men have died in recent episodes, from Tailies to butchers to Erik. Penises to preserve and use as false evidence aren’t hard to come by on Snowpiercer. But my guess is that they found the appendages when they searched Erik’s hidey hole in the storage closet, then planted them to ensure LJ’s conviction. Erik was the serial killer and collector, not LJ.

Next up is Dr Pelton, who did her very first autopsy on Sean Wise. She was led through it by Layton, but now she’s an expert, embellishing her findings as well. As she discusses her findings, Tristan shows the J-Hook around, which now has LJ’s fingerprints on it.

That would explain why LJ sat in front of Layton and made the chopping motion with it.

Sometimes I’m extra slow on the uptake. This why I write 10k word recaps instead of 1 page police detective reports.

Dr Pelton: “Sean Wise was bound and choked multiple times with a thin ligature. He was very much alive when his genitals were chopped off.”

Moving on, the Tunnelman who found Sean’s body plays up the horror of finding such a coldly mutilated human being. If you’ll recall, when Layton and Till interviewed him at the cannibal lunch counter, his only emotion was impatience at having to tell the story a second time, since he’d already told everything he remembered to the brakemen.

Then it’s Jinju’s turn. She sells LJ up the river as the criminal mastermind who controlled Erik, her serial killer puppet and partner in a wicked conspiracy.

Jinju: The whole time, Erik’s focus was Lilah Junior. I was as much her hostage as I was his. (Jinju takes a long look at LJ.) That was what they wanted, Erik and LJ, to kill us all in a nihilistic rage. But the Eternal Engine is still here.”

In fact, Erik said “she” had predicted something and Jinju asked if he meant his girl. Erik ignored her. A little later, Jinju repeatedly asked him his name, which he ignored. But Erik was careful to make sure Jinju wasn’t harmed, even when he shot at the electrical box and knew he was about to die. There’s no evidence that the “she” he referred to was LJ and there was no way for Jinju to know what he was thinking about, unless she’s psychic.

Miss Audrey testifies on behalf of Nikki. She tells her listeners that Nikki was a beautiful person who’s been ignored by the upper classes, just like 3rd Class always is. But it’s time for them to start caring, because they depend on Thirdies for their lives to run smoothly. Meanwhile the Thirdies suffer physical hardships 2nd Class and Firsties don’t experience. Miss Audrey says that she hasn’t come to her current political stance easily. In the beginning, she agreed with Wilfred’s order. But after 7 years, the train needs compassion and justice for more than just the rich.

She says Nikki’s name, in a nod to the “Say Her Name” movement, as the crowd erupts. Ruth calls a recess, after which LJ will testify.

Annie the janitor stops Klimpt as he’s on his way back to the trial and pickpockets his keys to the drawers. Josie, Terence and Annie break in, then the two janitors quickly steal large quantities of chemicals, probably the suppression drug or its precursors, and leave. They toss Josie the keys to the individual drawers on their way out and wish her luck, assuring her this isn’t personal, just business. Josie also pockets a few tubes of medication, likely including an antibiotic for Suzanne.

Melanie pulls Lilah aside in the corridor and warns her to stop her political machinations.

Lilah: “Let me tell you a Folger family story. When LJ was 7, she put out Robert’s eye. Lashed out with a fork and punctured it all over his face. And even as the jelly was running down his cheek, he held her through the tantrum, protecting her. So you go ahead with your Hospitality show trial and prepare to suffer the consequences. Because you’re messing with my bloodline.”

Lilah walks away. A group of passengers is standing several feet behind Melanie, undoubtedly eavesdropping, ready to spread the story of LJ’s history. Rather than proclaim Lilah Junior’s innocence to the train, Lilah’s defense strategy is to turn her daughter into a force to be reckoned with, just as LJ wished for in her conversation with Layton about cannibalism.

As always, the eye story may or may not be the whole truth. It doesn’t matter, just like it doesn’t matter with the testimony against LJ. The point is that Lilah claims royal privilege for her daughter and has already proven in words and deeds that she’ll back it up with a scorched earth war against Melanie if her child comes to any real harm.

Josie frantically searches the files and open surfaces in the Drawers, hoping to find something that will indicate which drawer Layton is in. She knows she doesn’t have time to open 400 drawers.

LJ swears to tell the truth, then goes straight for the contrite tears her mother suggested. She says she loved Erik, but he had a power over her that left her afraid and confused. She’s unsure whether that was really love, but Erik said it was.

She looks straight at Melanie when she gets to the important part.

LJ: “He made me watch him do terrible things and I can still hear those men begging for it to end. Uh, but Erik said fear makes people honest. I think that’s true. Sean Wise, just before he died, said he was an informant, a spy for Mr Wilford. Sean said that shadows and lies were taking over our beautiful train, from tip to Tail, from Ag-Sec to the Drawers. “400 hundred secrets that rock us to the rails,” he said. But he would never spill them. (LJ speaks to Ruth) Can I say this part to Mr Wilford?”

Ruth: “Yes, he’s following along.”

LJ: “I am so sorry for the part that I played in this tragedy. I was silent when I should have spoken, but Sean Wise gave his life to save humanity from the darkness that almost swallowed me whole. If the train shows me mercy, I promise to do my part for her, too. That’s all I can say.”

She stops crying to make her promise and looks Melanie directly in the eye. Melanie has been visibly distressed during LJ’s testimony, since she understands that Sean knew and spilled her deepest secrets. LJ offered to trade her silence for her life and help she could give Melanie in the future. Melanie has to wonder how many other people know her secrets and whether LJ wrote anything down and hid it, maybe in a letter sealed with a kiss. This is a turning point in Melanie’s strategy of violently silencing anyone who finds out that isn’t already a close ally.

Ruth calls another break while the Tribunal deliberates.

Josie seems to develop some sixth sense for which drawers hold Tailies and opens a few. The first two hold children who’d been chosen for the apprenticeshop program, Mia and a young boy. Layton is in the third.

Melanie and Jinju retreat to the Hospitality office and discuss LJ’s testimony.

Melanie: “Maybe he told her the drawers are experimental. Maybe he told her about the list.”

Jinju: “Well, that changes the calculus, doesn’t it?”

Melanie sends a note to Ben and Javi through the vacuum tubes. Javi doesn’t like what it says. He’s mad that he’s even working in the engine. He confronts Ben about his relationship with Melanie.

When Josie can’t wake Layton up, she removes a wrist cuff which results in his heart stopping. Oz and Bess are outside in the hall and notice that the Drawers have been broken into. They investigate and find Josie hiding in the drawer with Layton. Oz pulls her out and brutally beats her until Till knocks him out with her baton.

Till, like everyone else, thought Layton had gone back to the Tail. He’s convulsing and barely has a heartbeat. Josie injects him with something which begins to bring him around. Till tells her they have to get out of the Drawers before they get caught.

The Tribunal finds LJ guilty on all counts, by unanimous vote. Jinju and the teacher look especially pleased. In the engine, Ben tells Javi that he has to follow Melanie’s orders for the worst case scenario. Javi doesn’t think Melanie should interfere with the results of the Tribunal. Ben sends a message to the 1st Class dining car.

Ruth reads the message, which says Mr Wilford is commuting LJ’s sentence due to her status as a minor. The 3rd Class delegation explodes into a riot as the Folgers and the rest of 1st Class are rushed out of the dining car.

Till helps Josie drag Layton to Zarah’s place in the Chains. Josie tells Zarah that Layton was drawered and the Tail needs to be able to trust her now. Zarah pretends she doesn’t know about the blue chip. Josie rushes back to sanitation to relieve Astrid. Zarah helps Layton up to one of her hiding spots.

Melanie has a chat with LJ in the Hospitality office about discretion and secrets. Jennifer Connelly earns her pay with some excellent line delivery, as she tries to convince LJ to play by her rules from now on. LJ promises to keep Mr Wilford’s secrets and look out for his well being, but she also seems overconfident. She thinks she’s safe, but she’s now also a very important pawn, since she’s been exposed as the Folgers’ greatest weakness and as a danger to Melanie. She might not go to the drawers, but accidents can happen to anyone.

Till returns to the Drawers for Oz. He’s gone, but the wall next to where he was lying is marked with red blood and black scuff marks, as if a fight took place. It’s not from his fight with Josie. Who found him there and who won the fight? The jackboots?

Layton continues to convulse, with Zarah holding him down so he doesn’t hurt himself. He remembers bringing a heart out from the cannibals’ section of the Tail and slicing it up. Everyone took a piece and said, “Never again,” before eating it. He remembers Strong Boy, Mama Grandé, Santiago, Josie, Lights, Z-Wreck and Last Australian. No one says OneTail.

Then he wakes up and opens his eyes. He doesn’t know where he is, but Zarah is curled around him and kisses his forehead.

Commentary

Will try to add more screen caps soon.

Cannibals, Sacrificial Lambs and Switzerland

The themes of this episode are cannibals, sacrificial lambs and Switzerland. Sacrificial lambs in the sense of a symbolic sacrifice made by a group which is meant to take the place of the group itself. LJ takes the place of 1st Class. Suzanne’s arm took the place of all of the other rebels who escaped, most especially her own lamb, Winnie. Layton may have unknowingly entered the cannibals’ lair as a sacrifice rather than a protector. The shot of him placing Miles out of the way symbolizes Miles as the potential lamb he’s replacing/protecting.

In the film, children tasted the best, so the cannibals went for them first. People place great value on their children, so they would make the best sacrificial lambs. Curtis gives up cannibalism and eventually sacrifices himself for the children in the film. Layton defeats the cannibals in the Tail. But Melanie makes a deal with the 1st Class cannibals uptrain in order to protect her secrets, though she tells herself it’s to protect the train.

The cannibals and the Swiss are nearly equal symbols in Snowpiercer, with the cannibals admitting that they are motivated by their worst impulses, while the Swiss pretend they are neutral. They have situational morality and thus define what is right as whatever is good for the wealthy and powerful, sacrificing the moral beliefs that drive most of the world’s great religions on the altar of greed and ambition.

As Audrey pointed out, though Melanie defines herself as separate from 1st Class, in her actions she is actually no different from them. It becomes more clear with every episode that Ruth considers herself a de facto member of 1st Class, though it’s not clear yet why she believes she’s above the rest of the senior staff. Ruth enjoys every bit of class based injustice she hands out.

The irony of this episode is that 3rd Class was looking for real change, but would have accepted LJ as a sacrificial lamb, had she received a punishment commensurate with her alleged crimes. The problem is, no one would willingly allow their only child to be sacrificed to appease an angry mob, not even the most amoral of gangsters. By convincing LJ to let herself be caught, Layton hit 1st Class in the one place they couldn’t easily defend. They might have abandoned another adult to their fate, but not a child. Now 1st Class doesn’t trust Melanie to protect their children and 3rd Class doesn’t trust her to give them the justice they deserve.

I suspect that the discovery of Mia and the other boy in the drawers will have the same effect on the Tail. I don’t know how Layton could have planned for Josie to find them or if he saw clues while he was in the Drawers as an investigator that led him to believe Mia was in one. But now the Tailies have another reason to rebel, since their children are being taken, experimented on and left to die. Since no new babies are being born in the Tail, in a sense they have nothing left to lose. The apprenticeship program was the one beacon of hope for the Tailies. If they think that’s a lie, there’s no reason for them not to tear everything down.

Lilah is a bit of a Cassandra. with a very strong sense of  where things stand on the train. I think she’s more than just a classist Firstie interested in staging a coup, though she is that. She also wants to preserve the status quo for the safety of her daughter more than anything else and can see how badly a class war would affect the train as a whole. While she’s willing to make the threat of war to protect her daughter and to go through with it, she’d rather win with a bloodless coup.

Lilah and Melanie have called each other’s bluffs now and made the other back down. They’re testing each other’s limits, and sooner or later, they’re going to hit the point where neither will back down.

Or Melanie will find that she’s hit Audrey’s limit on the other side, if she didn’t do it with her pardon of LJ. Audrey wanted a show of justice and Melanie gave her hollow spectacle. Now Layton is waking up to further stir the pot in 3rd and the Tail.

Amidst the talk of cannibals, there’s also been talk of eating utensils. Now that he’s an apprentice, Miles has his own fork. LJ put out her father’s eye with her fork. There are knives all over the place on the train. Jinju’s are some of the sharpest. Roche’s lunches and Melanie’s dinners are precisely made but don’t require a utensil.

Don’t be fooled by 1st Class with their love of money and jewels. On Snowpiercer, food and emotional ties are the true valuables and the best weapons.

  Zarah was very affectionate with Andre once Josie was out of the way, giving hope to my shipper heart. Andre seemed to melt into her more than he did with Josie as well.

I missed Andre in the present day in this episode. At least they found a clever way to include him and he was only sidelined for one episode.

Now that LJ is free and clearly had what she needed to free herself, I can forgive him for his part in her arrest and trial and be angry at Melanie for experimenting on children instead. What the heck are Melanie, Jinju and Klimpt up to? It seems like they’re attempting long term stasis, but Nikki’s results should be enough to stop the drug trials and pull everyone out.

How on earth does Melanie justify doing such dangerous experiments on children when there are so few left in the world? We knew she was cold and classist, but I had hope that she wasn’t as bad as she seems. Apparently, she’s worse. So is Jinju, though she always seems like she might have no choice but to go along with whatever Melanie wants.

And what is the list Melanie and Jinju mentioned? Is it a naughty list or a nice list? Is stasis solely for criminal and political prisoners, or is Melanie afraid it’s the only way humans will survive the Freeze?

Please, can a Tailie computer hacker walk by those server banks and get curious? Or can Javi defect to the rebels and explain what they’re for? We’re shown them multiple times an episode. That’s not a coincidence.

Josie tells Terence that Layton isn’t the dying type. Is this another hint that he was sent into the cannibals alone as a sacrifice but unexpectedly survived?

Wow, Ruth is really invested in the system and the rule of unchanging order. Like to a pathological degree. Maybe Erik was her hitman.

I bet Ruth loves the Big Book of Snowpiercer’s Rules of Order. Where did that book come from? Is it a covenant between Wilford and the passengers?

So Josie is actually a medical professional. The visuals were confusing me. Sometimes it seemed she was just comforting the patient while someone else was doing the doctoring.

Now that Josie’s seen what’s happening in the drawers, will she be instrumental in solving the detox issue or improving the stasis drug? As a vet, she might have a slightly different knowledge base to work from than Klimpt and Jinju. Plus, she has some real world experience with kronole that they don’t have.

Why on earth has Melanie left so many professionals with valuable skills back in the Tail? I’m never going to get over that. Plus, if the train is emptying out cars that were used for food storage, why can’t the Tail expand into some of those?

Melanie could incorporate the Tailies into the rest of the train much more quickly than she is. It’s hard to guess how much she’s dragging her heels because she likes having the example of the Tail to use to scare the rest of the train into doing what she says, so they don’t end up starving and in rags; and how much she needs to integrate the Tailies slowly to keep the resentment of the ticketed passengers to a reasonable level.

Miss Audrey Is Much More Than a Pretty Face

Miss Audrey’s look during the opening sequence is the result of a masterful blend of cinematic techniques which are used to add depth to her character. Audrey (and Lena Hall, the actor who portrays her) is a beautiful, glamorous woman. But in this scene, she looks older and harsher than we’ve ever seen her. Instead of a pampered star, she looks like an aging working class night club manager.

Miss Audrey also looks like a survivor with the moxie to take on 1st Class and Melanie. She’s fought a few wars of her own and isn’t afraid to get down in the dirt. She may work in show business, but she’s not Norma Desmond from Sunset Boulevard. She’s Rick Blaine, the world weary café owner from Casablanca. She knows who she is and who her people are.

She’s chosen her side, because there is no true neutrality, even in the real world.

Switzerland is actually a wealthy country which caters to the wealthy of the world. It’s far from neutral; it simply chooses to protect the wealthiest class rather than taking sides in politics, as Melanie attempted to persuade Miss Audrey to do. Switzerland chooses to remain neutral in political disputes between the factions of other countries and regions not out of some moral position, but rather because choosing sides would interfere with its business transactions. Far from promoting morality, the country facilitates the high crimes and safeguards the fortunes of some of the most morally corrupt people in the world.

Melanie tries to argue that if Audrey takes the side of 3rd Class, she’ll inconvenience the upper classes, who then might feel uncomfortable in the Night Car, affecting business and affecting the mental health of the train, since the Night Car functions as a therapy car. It’s a circular argument which doesn’t take into account the mental health or physical wellbeing of 3rd Class, by assuming the wealth of 1st Class is what keeps the Night Car in business.

Miss Audrey’s look in this scene is achieved through several techniques, such as lighting, hair, makeup and camera work. The lighting is deceptively golden, tricking the eye into thinking it will soften her features, but there’s an underlying clarity of tone to the color and a harshness to the contrast that the shadows bring.

The camera is also in such sharp focus that it brings out every fine line in Miss Audrey’s face, probably because of the lens that was used, but I’m no cinematographer. It’s hard to see this in a screen cap, but if you have a good TV or other screen, pause the scene in a few spots and take a look at how they worked to make the lighting and focus unflattering to Lena.

Lena also positions herself to make her face look sad, old and unhappy by gritting her teeth and tensing her jaw and neck. Her makeup, which is perhaps meant to look like stage makeup, is too intense to be flattering up close, especially her lips and eyebrows, and also helps to emphasize the fine lines in her face. Her hair, which is normally perfect, is dull and bordering on frizzy.

She has a fake (?) tattoo and glitter on her chest and shoulder which almost look like a rash or burn scars at first glance. I thought of this later during her testimony when she brought up the diseases in 3rd Class that don’t get treatment and wondered if the decoration hides something else, like a scar or skin cancer.

Taken together, all of these pieces show us that Miss Audrey may be able to pull herself together to put on a good public show in her widow’s weeds, but she’s privately devastated by Nikki’s death. If you thought the widow’s weeds in episode 4 were simply a dramatic performance, you were wrong.

When her look is combined with the photo and the voiceover, we can guess that Nikki symbolizes everything Miss Audrey has lost. She was the one who Audrey had held onto through the Freeze and the inequality of the train. Now she’s been unfairly taken away and Miss Audrey will be sending some messages of her own. The words of the song resonate for her as well.

Though we’ve gotta say goodbye for the summer,

Hey, I’ll promise you this,

I’ll send you all my love in a letter,

Sealed with a kiss.

Sealed with a Kiss

The way Sealed with a Kiss was emphasized in episode 4 kept nagging at me, since it suggested that the song was more than just a random choice by the creators. This episode makes me certain of that. Layton knows he’s missed something in the case and it’s nagging at him, even in the drawer, in the form of a song stuck in his head.

Nikki sings the same lyrics from Sealed with a Kiss that were emphasized by LJ in episode 4, except for changing “baby” to “hey”: “Though we’ve gotta say goodbye for the summer, hey, I’ll promise you this, I’ll send you all my love in a letter, sealed with a kiss.”

The lyrics, by themselves, suggest a few possibilities.

“Say goodbye for the summer” has obvious significance on Snowpiercer. They’ve all said goodbye to the summer, forever. Movement from summer to fall and winter is also a reminder of the power structure on the train. For example, Roche shook hands a few times with Wilford before they boarded the train, but hasn’t seen him since he holed up in the biosecure engine after the permanent winter journey began. Saying goodbye to the summer was also saying goodbye to the original, accessible Wilford.

In this episode Miss Audrey reminds Melanie that they were once united in convincing Wilford to do the right thing for the lower classes. She hints that she knows Melanie is Wilford, but keeps it ambiguous.

Nikki and Audrey were close. Layton only spoke a few words with Nikki in life, but if there’s some sort of shared consciousness happening between residents of the drawers, courtesy of those endless server banks, he may be haunted by an upload of her mind or seeing and hearing a leftover echo.

“I’ll promise you this” I have a few thoughts here. First, it’s time to mention that Sealed with a Kiss was used in the 2006 cult slasher film All the Boys Love Mandy Lane. In the film, Emmet and Mandy, a pair of bullied high school students, get revenge on their classmates while keeping her involvement a secret. They have a suicide pact, which Mandy reneges on. At the end, Mandy and Emmet fight each other to the death, she wins, and then rides off into the sunset with Garth, a 2nd, cuter boy, who thinks she’s a heroic victim. The film turns the Final Girl trope on its head by revealing that she survives because she’s a villain, in addition to fulfilling the usual characteristics of the trope. Plus she also kills the slasher when he turns on her, suggesting their alliance was tenuous all along.

I’m not sure what the “Mandy” filmmakers were trying to say and I’m not sure where Snowpiercer’s showrunners are going with LJ’s arc, but there are some obvious similarities between these two stories. It rarely occurs to male writers when they write women’s stories like this film or LJ’s arc on Snowpiercer that women are frequently coerced by their violent, abusive boyfriends into cooperating with the boyfriends’ violent crimes. It’s as if Stockholm Syndrome doesn’t exist.

Male creators have often observed women’s behaviors very closely and can write women accurately from an external point of view. But they don’t understand the potential motivations behind the behaviors at all, as if it’s never occurred to them to just talk to a few women who’ve been in similar situations.

They write these shows in such a way that the only understandable motivation for the characters, as written, is that they were coerced and abused. But in the shows, the woman is the femme fatale, the criminal mastermind, the evil Eve or Lolita who led the poor, unsuspecting male astray. And of course an evil woman deserves a harsh punishment. Eve was thrown out of Eden. Lolita was thrown out of the Eden of childhood, passed between men and finally left a single teenage mother. The show becomes nothing but another male fantasy.

Our culture, as a whole, trains us to be oblivious to so many forms of everyday abuse, whether its racism or ableism or sexualized violence or abuse of power by an authority figure. The higher your natural position in the power structure, the less you notice what’s going on around you, unless you’ve been a victim of that particular form of abuse. This is true of everyone. We all live in our own bubble.

The lover in the song promises to send love in a letter, sealed with a kiss. Promises can be coerced. During torture, promises are broken.

A promise is also form of consent, which a minor child like LJ can’t legally give to an adult man like Erik.

This song is associated with both Nikki and LJ. 3rd Class still wants the justice they were promised for Nikki’s death, while LJ has promised to keep Wilford’s secrets and make herself useful in exchange for her pardon. Those two promises are about to start a class war, unless Melanie does some quick thinking. Layton was in the drawer for these developments, but he knew something like this would happen. He helped create Nikki as the ultimate 3rd Class victim and LJ as the ultimate symbol of 1st Class privilege, with both as symbols of broken promises.

“I’ll send you all my love in a letter” I have a few ideas for this one and very little evidence. Something must be tickling the back of Andre’s mind. Maybe Zarah sent a message to the Tail telling him about Miss Audrey’s giant book of Snowpiercer’s rules and regulations. That would be something he could use if they went for negotiation and a less violent revolution. That book will be important in some capacity, that’s for certain.

Maybe he realized the implications of something he read and pushed to the side in the Folgers car. Or another message he received from uptrain when he was still in the Tail. Or maybe Melanie slipped up somehow. Maybe something about her Fight Night message from Wilford clicked in his brain. Was that a message to Erik or another of her minions?

There’s also still that puzzling quote from Erik to Jinju, “She said this was coming.” Was Melanie sleeping with Erik, too? Humbert Humbert sleeps with Lolita and her mother, so the precedent is there.

“Sealed with a kiss.” That can only be secrets and/or poison. Poisonous lipstick, the Judas kiss, the Kiss of the Spider Woman, the kronole stuck in the cheek: there’s just no other way this is going. Betrayal is in the air. Every witness at the trial lied or seriously embellished the truth. Even those we thought were honorable. I’d bet a lot that a brakeman, probably Oz, planted the penises in the jewelry box. That’s just not where LJ would keep them.

The cop in Andre knows he needs to look into the connection between the black market, kronole and the murders. Just as the Tail couldn’t be safe until the cannibals were gone, kronole will cannibalize the entire train unless it’s eliminated. Terence and Annie showed us in this episode that they are far from benevolent.

In her testimony, LJ said that Sean Wise told her and Erik that “Shadows and lies were taking over our beautiful train.” and “Sean Wise gave his life to save humanity from the darkness that almost swallowed me whole.” She’s talking about kronole. That second quote suggests that she was threatened somehow. She also says his death helped save humanity from kronole. How? Was he selling it as well as informing? Did he try to get LJ hooked?

Nikki’s Body and LJ’s Guilt

LJ has an airtight alibi for Nikki’s murder. The entire train saw LJ in the Night Car for the fight, right up until the very end, when the Folgers were forced to leave at last call. That was the period of time when Nikki was being murdered.

When he was done with Nikki, Erik stayed in public for hours, where he’d be seen, in the 3rd Class dining car, perhaps so that LJ couldn’t be implicated. He only left when he knew Nikki’s body was about to be found. Then he went to the bee storage unit, and stayed there until Till and Oz found him.

Was he leading the brakemen to his hiding place, so they could find something important he’d hidden there? The J-hook that he left among his possessions in the Folgers’ car also leads back to the storage unit, providing another tip off to search that area. As LJ basically says in her trial, Erik is the one who tortured and questioned Sean. He heard the secrets Sean spilled. That’s likely why Erik was targeted for death next, after Nikki and Sean. (Remember, someone told him this was coming.)

But whoever Erik works for, or whoever put the hit out on him, didn’t count on him carving up Nikki so thoroughly. Her throat isn’t just slit (well, it might be when he leaves her). By the time Melanie and Andre get to her it’s opened wide and something electronic, with a flashing light, has been inserted inside.

Is that a message for Melanie, the Voice of the Train? Is it a medical implant Nikki had due to a previous injury or illness? We’ve already been shown that Klimpt violates the bodies of the living. He’d have no problem violating the bodies of the dead.

Whoever wanted Erik dead also thought that his secrets would die with him. Melanie was honestly floored to realize how much LJ knows, which means she didn’t think LJ was actually the mastermind who ordered Erik around, or even involved in the crimes at all. She knew the trial was a sham. As did virtually everyone involved in it. They were all playing out a piece of theatre meant to appease 3rd Class so they could get back to their normal lives as soon as possible.

Melanie would never have allowed LJ to take the stand if she thought LJ could reveal her secret. Since Sean was her informant, he had a high likelihood of guessing the truth. Layton guessed that was the real reason why he was brought out of the Tail- because Melanie was afraid Sean told the killer her secret.

Melanie thought her secret died with Erik and that LJ had no involvement, so putting her on trial would show Melanie’s own power over 1st and gain her some favor with 3rd. But either Layton or Erik shared the truth with LJ, or she was really present when Sean died. My money is on Layton giving her the ammunition she needed, but Erik also fed her pieces of the story.

Graphic photos of Nikki’s injures from episode 4 follow. Fair warning if you want to skip them.

Layton is dreaming about Nikki singing LJ’s song with a mutilated neck , with lyrics about sealing letters with a kiss. He knows he’s missed something with this case, and that Nikki’s throat holds a key clue.

Layton must have caught the tiny flashing light inside Nikki’s mutilated neck, but was distracted from processing it by all of the anger and regret in the room. Roche helped heap blame on everyone, extending the argument. That’s not the only time I’ve questioned Roche’s motives lately. Maybe he’s not as  honest as he seems.

No idea what’s causing the light.

  This slideshow requires JavaScript.

  Screen Caps from Opening Credits

Collider interview with Daveed Diggs

Interview with Snowpiercer Production Designer Barry Robison– Includes an in universe explanation of how the chains came to be.

Snowpiercer Zoom call backgrounds

    Essential viewing: Explore the Train

This might be the greatest fan theory of all time.

Images courtesy of TNT.

Snowpiercer S1E5: Justice Never Boarded Recap-Layton is in a drawer, Melanie is stressed out, LJ is on trial & Josie uses the chip again. But Jinju & Bess find some happiness & Melanie & Ben find some stress relief. #Snowpiercer In episode 5 of Snowpiercer, LJ goes to trial for her part in the murders of Sean and Nikki, Josie goes uptrain to search for Andre and Miss Audrey takes action to ensure that Melanie will get Nikki the justice she deserves.

[valwrite]

the rock between us; andre layton

masterlist

summary: the train changes everything: faces, futures, feelings.

warnings: angst, hints of infidelity. 

fic style: drabble.

word count: 968

author’s note: okay, hear me out, there is not nearly enough andre layton related fics out there and it bothers me. so, i’m writing a seven part andre layton series and this drabble is a little peek into what the dynamic between andre and the reader will be. please know that the actual series will deal with dark themes such as murder and trauma, there will also be a theme of infidelity throughout the whole fic, which will be told from andre’s point of view for the most part and will alternate between the present time on snowpiercer and the past before the planet froze over. anyways, i’m excited to share the series soon but, for now, please enjoy this drabble. as always, any feedback is appreciated.

There’s an unusual quiet that’s fallen over the Tail, a place where the poorest souls of the surviving humanity are so often yelling and hollering for a chance at a better life. Tonight, it seems like the only things yelling are the train’s wheels as they squeak along the ice coated tracks below, shaking the cabins.

In this moment, she’s thankful she doesn’t deal with motion sickness.

A cringe takes over her features as she hears the unmistakable sound of some of the Tailies, the more sinister ones, chewing away at whatever comrade had overstayed their welcome. Andre brought it up last week- she thinks it was last week but, really, it’s becoming hard to tell the difference between night and day- and she has to silently praise him for it. He's the only one brave enough to bring up their monstrous behavior.

Erik would have never brought it up.

The dull pencil moves in her hand at it’s own will, branding the scrap of crumpled paper with swirls and lines and shades of gray. She knows she’s drawing a face- a man’s face - yet she carries no recollection of when it had even started to take shape. When her eyes flicker over her work in progress, she notices the little things about his face that have changed since the cold struck: his hair has grown out; the bags under his eyes have become more noticeable; he’s lost the softness of his cheeks, the drastic decline of daily meals taking it’s effect; his wrinkles are a little deeper when he frowns.

She used to draw him before the cold, too. When the dim light of a hotel room or the flickering bulb of the station kitchen was all that illuminated them both, he’d let her sketch him a portrait of what he looked like right then and there. The station sketches were always prim and proper, his badge peeking at the bottom of it and his so called “serious detective” stare encapsulated his eyes. The hotel sketches were more free, more messy. She’d sometimes add the tiniest detail of herself into them: her hand on his bare chest, her naked thigh draped over him, the tips of her hair splashed across his pillow. He always loved the hotel ones best.

“I see Miles gave up some of his paper, huh?”

Her eyes strip themselves away from the drawing of his face to his actual face. He’s waiting for her to invite him to sit next to her and she’s never appreciated his gentleness more. Maybe that’s why she pats the empty space next to her.

Maybe that’s what she tells herself to avoid the fact she’s missed being so close to him.

“He’s a sweet kid.” She doesn’t know what else to say. Conversation between them just doesn’t seem to come as easily as it once had. They always worked best when there was a case to work on or clothes to rid each other of. 

“Sweet, my ass.” He grumbles jokingly and it almost makes her laugh. God, she misses laughter. “He’s got a crush on ya.”

“What can I say? The boy’s got good taste”

“Sure does.” The deeper meaning behind his answer isn’t lost on her but, what would she have to gain from acknowledging it? “Listen, I wanted to thank you. For earlier, with the rest of the Tailies.”

“Oh, yeah, no problem.” She’s folding the paper over now, hoping he’s not aware of her artwork. She knows, deep down, that he noticed it the second he arrived. “S’not a problem at all.”

“I know they all think we should leave the whole cannibalism issue alone. Think it’s easier because they haven’t killed us yet. But, I mean, it’s only a matter of time, right? Guess we’re the only two that get that.”

She thinks of how, when he was giving his big speech to the group, he seemed so much like the detective he’d once been. All self-righteous and justice seeking. If she hadn’t been missing him before, she certainly is now. “Sorry about Erik, by the way. You know he can be a little, y’know, quick to anger.” She misses speaking comfortably with him, as if there wasn’t constantly a pair of extra eyes on them. She wonders if Andre misses it too. Misses her too.

“I can handle Erik, don’t you worry.” He could handle Erik, and then some. “I know it can’t be easy to speak against your own husband. So, thank you, again.”

She knows that he’s focusing on that word just as much as she is. Husband. But, of course, there’d been a time where she was going to separate herself from Erik, in the same way that Andre was going to separate himself from Zarah. Unforeseen circumstances came in the way of their happiness.

She couldn’t help but feel it was karma for all the harm their little secrets would cause.

“Are you happy, Y/N?” It’s been so long since the last time she’d heard him say her name, as if he were fearful of using it. “With Erik, I mean.”

Zarah left the Tail a while back, and it wasn’t like her and Andre had been getting along before she’d left. There’d been a point in their history where she would have jumped at the opportunity to be with Andre. But there was Snowpiercer now, that was their life. A life where Erik would always exist between them, for better or for worse.

“As happy as I could be.” She swallows, fearing the disbelief for her own words will seep into her voice. “On Snowpiercer, of course. Erik’s just, uh... He’s my rock.”

“We all need rocks, don’t we?” Andre’s eyes are burning as they stare into her own. She’s always loved how he was so passionate. “You’re lucky, Y/N.” She bites back a plea to hear him say her name again.

[valwrite]

O1 pride / shock; andre layton series

general masterlist

series masterlist

series taglist: @gollyderek @fanfic-addict-98 @lets-love-little-me

summary:  hell has frozen over and, in it’s place, snowpiercer has emerged. it’s many carriages carry secrets: affairs, murders, betrayals. and that’s only mentioning andre layton’s secrets. when a serial killer appears, detective layton is called on to the case. though reluctant at first, he agrees to take on the case when he discovers the first victim is rumored to be a once Tallie, an ex-coworker, an ex-lover: Y/N L/N. what starts as a hunt for her killer quickly becomes a hunt for the truth behind her suspicious death. the tail is uprising; his ex-wife is back in his line of sight; all eyes of the train are on him; and all andre layton can focus on is finding Y/N L/N’s body.

series warnings:  angst, character death, smut, infidelity.

chapter warnings: mentions of suicide, details of murder.

fic style: series.

word count: 4292.

author’s note: apologies for the delayed posting of this, i was on holiday and forgot to queue this post. the first chapter follows very closely the actual series but, the following chapters deviate and will follow their own plot, whilst still maintaining some of the show’s main plots. as always, any feedback is welcomed.

Of all the things Andre Layton had thought about when it came to life further up the train, smell was the last thing he'd ever considered.

Crouched over on the floor, he takes in a whiff of the air. There's no thickness to this air, unlike the Tail's air. There is no stench of sweat; or blood; or tears mixed in with the breath he takes. The air in the Tail tells a story of it's inhabitants struggle for survival, all the daily hardships they endure leaving behind a foul stench the Tailies had grown to find comforting. This air is clean. Perhaps a little too clean, the faintest hint of bleach is tickling at his nose. He knows from experience what the smell of bleach could be covering up but pushes those thoughts to the side, preferring to live in blissful ignorance for just this one breath.

His head is pounding, the very first headache he's had since, well, he's forgotten how long it's been, actually. There's always the thought of how maybe the headache is chronic in the Tail, never ending and, therefore, never beginning, bringing Andre to a numbness when faced with such pain. But it's been hours now since he had been forced out of his home, perhaps the quiet consumed him enough to remind him of a life without noise and headaches, only to snatch the rug out from beneath his feet and hand him the worst one he'd dealt with.

Andre's in disbelief still. He knows the Tail is in chaos. The chaos is what kept them all alive, what will continue keeping them all alive. But, uptrain? He's always assumed they were tranquil. What he's quickly discovering is that, while tranquility may have been the surface layer, if someone even begins to dig just slightly, they'd very easily stumble upon savage beasts wearing sheep's clothing. The Tail may very well be a dark and difficult place to live but all of it's travelers had learnt long ago to find empathy in each other, working together rather than just for themselves.

A murder has taken place. Well, actually, two. Possibly three, from the way Officer Till had been arguing in hushed whispers with her superior earlier on, after Andre took a few beatings from the British officer, who's name began with O and ended in asshole. The death tally isn't his main focus either way, rather the job they are attempting to enforce on him is.

It's not like he doesn't understand why or how they came to the decision of requesting - he believes they were more demanding - his services. They have a potential serial killer on the loose and they claim he's the only one on the train with experience in such a field. Of course they were going to come knocking on his door. Only, he's not technically the only one on board with familiarity of crime scenes, just the only detective. And, see, if it weren't for the fact he'd spent however many years has passed watching how the upper class men on the train came and stole food, medicine, life from the Tail, then maybe he would have been a little more giddy about stepping back into Detective Layton's shoes. Alas, they'd made their beds and it was about time they started to lay in it, because they weren't about to get any help from him.

For all he cared, the killer could have at them all till there was no one left but the Tailies. They were the only ones good for anything on Snowpiercer.

"So, you got a body?" Andre stares up at the Brakeman- Doshe? No, no, Roche! - and the voice of the train, the woman who'd introduced herself but he'd tuned out her name. He doesn't need to know the name of the woman who spoke for Mr. Wilford. It was bad enough the man had been too coward to ever properly address the Tail by making a physical appearance, never mind the fact he won't even speak to them over the announcer. He sometimes imagined Mr. Wilford, with a pot belly and a whitened beard, surrounded by nothing but lavish. "Good for you, keep it for yourself, like everything else you lot have."

"This killer is taking lives on board this train." The train's voice starts up again, staring down at him with not a wrinkle of emotion behind her callous eyes. He's met a few women like her in his life, who's eyes remained devoid and near lifeless even when faced with some of the most horrific acts a person could do. "Like it or not, you're a member of this train and-"

"That's the problem with your lot, the Tail's only part of the train when it's convenient to you."

"The tail was always part of the train, just not it's inhabitants." Roche fires out, his brows furrowed and he uncrosses his arms. "The rest of us payed to be here, as workers or as passengers."

"That means my people deserve to pay with their life?" He can feel himself becoming more riled up by the minute, the pain from his previous beating being pushed to a side as he contemplates the repercussions of brawling with the older man. 

"Roche, that's enough." Melanie interrupts them, stepping in the way of Roche and giving Andre no choice but to stare back at her empty eyes. Upon further observation, he catches the first sign of humanity in her. The bags under her eyes, subtle yet there. Dark, wrinkled, pillowy. It seems that exhaustion unites them both, even if their reasons for it are worlds away from similar. "The people on this train need security, Layton. If they found out there's a serial killer on board, the classes would break out in chaos-"

"You seem awfully sure there's only one killer and not just a copycat." A serial killer requires a minimum of three bodies. They has two. Andre wonders if this Melanie woman is unaware of such a technicality and had used the term flippantly, or if there is another body, a third body, he's being kept unaware of. If so, who? And, why?

"All of this, everything Mr. Wilford has worked so hard to keep in order and working, will have been for nothing if we can't maintain the peace. I'm not going to beg for your help, Layton, but just know you'd be saving us all. Including the Tail. You're the only one on board experienced with this."

"Guess the rich didn't consider the fact they'd start killing their own."

"So, will you help?"

This was the question Andre has been asking himself from the moment they'd stripped him away from the Tail; from his people; from his family. He knew, from the second the blonde haired woman had called out his name and butchered their plans for attack, that there was something they wanted from him. It was the same for anyone else who got called up train, there was something needed from a Tailie and it was never something good. 

He can perfectly picture the faces of the Tail all staring back at him as he demanded to be taken back, armed men using all the strength they could summon to pull him out of the way of the closing doorway. Some looked on in horror, fearing for his life under the watchful eyes of the rich. Others gave him nothing but betrayal and anger in their eyes, as if they seemed to believe he'd orchestrated everything to have himself rescued from the Tail. Maybe, Andre wonders, some of them believe Zarah had it planned out, especially after leaving the Tail herself. Perhaps there was someone else they thought had saved him, someone who'd only recently left the Tail. 

If Andre were to choose between being rescued by Zarah or her, Zarah's name wouldn't even begin to cross his mind.

The Tail is angry with him, he knows that for sure. By pure luck, they'd seemed to elect him as their leader, even if they worked as a united force and not an army. If he wants a chance to repair any damage caused to his people, his only real hope is to find his way back home and stay there, until he can charge onward with the Tailies and claim the train for themselves. Leaving the killer out in their playground of terror may just assist him in collapsing the fragile system of the train.

"No." Finally, he has his answer and it pleases him to hear the confidence in his voice, the pride he has for his status as a Tailie shinning brighter than ever before. 

"No?" The train's voice echoes as Roche simply shakes his head behind the woman, muttering some intangible curse under his breath.

"You heard me. Solve your own shit."

She pulls back from him, turning her back to now face Roche and though Andre can hear both their voices speaking in whispers, he can not make out exactly what they are saying. She'd walked out of the small room before he can even register what's happening and Roche has him standing back up onto his feet, a hand firmly grasping at his forearm whilst he carelessly shoves him back into the hall of the train. 

The quiet settles in again and Andre's fleeting attention sinks into memories from life before the cold, a fairly common habit of his which seems to be happening more than usual as of late, since she'd left the Tail much like she'd left him at the park, and the sight of the mutilated body he'd been brought out to investigate which brought back every memory of every case he'd taken on.  

In this current memory, Andre walked into an apartment. 

The room was trashed, with smashed glass and flipped furniture scattered all over the place. Upon first look, he suspected a robbery gone wrong. All around him, officers pulled him each and every way, all sharing their tid-bits of information regarding the on-going investigation, from suspects to who'd discovered the body to begin with.

The body. God, he hadn't even seen it yet but there's already that sinking feeling settling in his gut, the feeling that arrived every time he witnessed another crime scene. It was comforting to him, though disturbing, that such a thing could still rattle his bones and disturb his soul, the overexposure to it not making it any easier to deal with. Andre enjoyed the fact he had an emotional response still, the very thing that proved he was very much human beyond his detective work.

The sinking feeling grew when he saw the victim. A young woman, probably no older than his Zarah, who he liked to think was smiling; or laughing; or simply breathing and alive as he viewed the sight of that deceased woman. There were marks all down her left arm and blood on her fingertips, suggesting a chance that the victim struggled and fought for her right to live. It' was only one bullet wound, right between her eyes, yet that one simple wound ended an entire life. Killed any future, diluted any past and destroyed any present the victim had. 

But there was someone else in the room with him, another woman, though that one was breathing. Her hands were covered by medical gloves and she was crouching by the victim, a pair of tweezers in her hand as she picked at something in the victims hand. 

"Who are you?" She jumped at the sound of his voice, staring up at him with a look of discontent and frustration.

"You made me drop the DNA sample, dude. Not cool." She went back to her tweezers work. "I'm the department's new forensic scientist, Y/N L/N. I take it you are detective Layton?"

"I am." He nodded his head once, taking out his notepad and pen as their task at hand came barreling to the front of his mind, reminding him of the fact there was a very clear murder  victim between the two of them. "What do we know of the victim so far?"

They had made their way down a hatchet hole, with Roche in the lead and Andre a few steps behind, cuffed and with his head held high. His hair brushes gently against his back, a strangely comforting repeat of motion that accompanies his less than pleasant travels throughout the train's cabins. 

"You gotta take me back to the Tail, man." He pleads after Roche announces he's not heading home but, rather, to the man's holding cell. There was a time where it was Andre Layton who would be the one dumping someone in a holding cell whilst proclaiming he would be returning home to his wife, but now he had no wife; and no cell; and no badge that mirrored his past. "The Tail's all I got in the world."

The lead Brakeman does nothing but shake his head in response and Andre sighs, tired of fighting but nowhere near ready to give up. 

They're plunged into chaos suddenly, sirens echoing up the train as Andre feels himself be stripped away from Roche and slammed full force into the metal caging surrounding him. The fresh bruising on his ribs screams in pain but Andre only hisses, his teeth clenching to bite back the grunt of anger begging to escape him. A man, around the same age as Roche and the same stature as himself, stares back at him with pure hatred. He's dressed in blue armor gear and his knuckles are turning whiter as his grip on Andre's collar tightens. And when he speaks, he spits every word out: "Now we've got a hostage, too."

Even in times of utter devastation, mankind finds a way to create division between themselves. In his life before the weather changed, he was targeted for the color of his skin. Now, he's also chased after for his status on the train. A filthy Tailie. 

"Commander! Let him go." The voice of the train comes from nowhere and everywhere all at once, and Andre is actually glad to see her when he feels the grip on him dissappear. 

"The Tailies have revolted again." The small mouthed women, who Miles refers to as the Executioner but is actually named Ruth, speaks next. 

"Yes. Mr. Wilford is aware."

"Look, whoever they are, I know 'em, okay?" He steps in, hoping to bargain with them. This may be his only chance to both save the Tailies and prove his loyalty to them. "I can help."

"Things are going too far with him-" Ruth's irritating voice pipes up again. 

"Please." He continues nonetheless, focusing only on the voice of the train, who he'd heard be referred to as Melanie. "They'll listen to me."

The Commander is the one to lead him to the Tailies. His grip on Andre is tighter than before and it feels purposeful when he shoves his side into the wall. His Irish accent is distinct enough to remind Andre that he and this man have history, from the initial revolts started by the Tailies, where they fought to keep the very small space of the Tail. Many were lost in the war but it wasn't in vain, it helped the Tailies learn to rely on each other and be a family.

"You've got three minutes." The Commander gives him one last shove, right into a masked soldier's shoulder. 

He's only in the doorway and already Andre can see just how much damage his people have done. It's what they'd been training and waiting to do for so long, he never imagined they'd fail. Bodies lay all over the place, some of Tailies but most of them soldiers. Blood splatter paints the wall in red and lights are flickering at the end of the hall. His people had fought hard. They'd now need to fight harder, once he revealed his very hazy plan to them.

"Tailies! Who's left?" He listens to his own voice echo down the train. "It's Layton."

It takes no more than a second for a familiar voice to chime in, calling back to him: "Layton, you're a coward!"

It's Pike, which doesn't really surprise him at all. The man had always questioned Andre, always been ready to point out his mistakes and share his wrongdoings. 

"Pike?" He says, after a sigh and an eye roll.

Andre finally steps into the bloodied carriage, carefully placing each step on the ground as quietly as possible. So far, all he knows is that Pike is there. And there's no guarantee that man wouldn't try take Layton down given the chance, meaning he had to be subtle and careful in his approach. He steps over arms; and legs; and torsos, the stench of blood so thick in the air he can almost choke on it.

"We don't want you here!" Pike speaks again.

"I'm coming in."

"No, you're not!"

"Who's with you?" No matter what, Andre tells himself that finding out who remains is his top priority. And keeping Pike talking may just distract him long enough for Andre to disarm him in a sudden approach. 

There's three of them on the other side of the cabin. Pike's at the front, blood drying on his hands and a makeshift weapon clasped in one of them. He's stewing in his own anger, on guard each step Andre takes. The other two are pretty much in the same positions, only the biggest of them all has a familiar, though terrified, woman captured in his arms: Till, one of the brakemen who'd been with Andre earlier on that day. 

"How's it going?" He's trying his best to calm them down.

"Yo, Layton, where you coming from, man?" But the betrayal is already so evident in their eyes, their voices, their body language. To them, Andre is looking less like a Tailie than when he was dragged out of there.

"Uptrain, man." Honesty may be his best policy, if he plays his cards right. "Yo, they pulled me up to solve a murder. You believe that?" He sure as hell still didn't. "They're doing us a favor and killing each other up there."

"Bullshit." Pike is still angry but what's new? Andre knows he needs to redirect his anger off of himself and back onto those who are the real enemy. "You're a traitor! This will only end one way."

"Yeah." Andre's hand comes down on Pike's weapon, clasping it in his own strength and pulling it out of Pike's shaking arms. "They're gonna storm in here, and they're gonna butcher us. Everything we've fought for, everyone who's lost their life for this to even be achievable, it will all have been in vain."

"Two minutes!" The Commander's voice yells down the hall and suddenly they're all on edge again.

"I got a family, man. I can't die like this."

"Shut the fuck up, Z!" Pike's grip has returned to the weapon, widening Andre's eyes as he fears the man may strike him down in irrational anger.

"I got a wife and a kid on this train, Pike." Z fights back, enunciating each word with the passion of a devoted husband and a loving father. "Old Ivan offed himself, man. We're dong this for him. He hung himself with an electrical cord. That's what sparked this whole thing."

"Pike," Andre wants to grieve and break down, the loss of Ivan, a gentle soul in a world of unkindness, shaking him to his very core. But he can't. There's no time. "whatever happened between us, we're brothers." Pike's breathing slowly begins to deescalate. Andre loosens his grip on the spear between them both. "I think I got a way for us all to get outta this alive." At last, Pike lowers his weapon, his head shaking as he fights back his emotions. Andre seizes onward, making eye contact with the woman. "Hey. Till, It's okay. It's okay." It doesn't take long for him to convince the Tailie holding her captive to lower his weapon and, with an abrupt apology he wishes was sincere, Andre punches her in the face and watches how she falls down.

There's commotion straight away, with all three Tailies bringing their weapons back up and pointing them at Andre, the fire returning to their blood as  they look at the man they would call traitor. 

"What the hell, Layton!?"

"You need to surrender yourselves to the drawers!" He rushes out, before any of them can harm him. 

"No way!" Pike says.

"It's like sleep! They put you to sleep!" He'd seen them himself, zombiefied in the drawers as different wires and tubes kept their bodies alive whilst their minds slept away the revolutions the train done around the frozen landscape. 

"Okay. For how long?" Z seems more willing to cooperate.

"It's a goddamn coffin, Layton!"

"Listen to me! By my count, I went uptrain 130 cars today, okay? I seen shit none of us could've imagined, alright?"

"What? You seen your traitor wife!? Or your traitor girlfriend?"

"Pike, Old Ivan dreamed of this! I can piece together floor plans, maps, security details. Everything we could ever need to properly storm uptrain, all the way to the engine."

It's in utter tears that all three men throw down their weapons, Pike the most exhausted of all. "Look at the blood!" He cries, crouching on his knees. "I'm done, Layton! I'm done."

"One Tail, remember? It's only a matter of time until the day we take that engine, we're gonna need you waiting uptrain." Andre watches as the other man nods, standing up straight again and clearing his throat.

With the Tailies now in agreement, Andre finds himself stuck between the Commander, Ruth and Melanie, all demanding and fighting over what the fate of the Tailies should be. There's only one thing left for Andre to do, one last sacrifice of his pride to make.

"I'll do it." He speaks only to Melanie really, the others being drowned out in the sound of the train's wheels turning against the frozen track below. "I'll solve your murder. I will get your order back, and in exchange, you'll give mercy to the train."

"Mr. Wilford demands justice. But we can't afford to lose another life. Ruth will take an arm from a Tailie tomorrow." 

Hours have passed since the agreement was made and in a small holding cell lays Andre, his muscular build uncomfortably fit onto a small cot. He misses his bed in the Tail, the bed in his house, the bed in room 322 of the Marigold hotel just down the road from the station. It was the luxury of feeling refreshed every morning; of having a cup of coffee placed on his desk, her familiar handwriting across the attached sticky note that he'd taken advantage of for years. Now, he never even sees her face outside of his own memories. 

For the past half hour, he's been feigning sleep. Roche has been sat guard near his cell the whole time, though he believes the man should be on his way home soon, to his own bed and his own wife. The voice of the train interrupts this though, sneaking her way into the room so quietly Andre nearly opens his eyes and blows his cover.

"Nice work on getting him to cooperate." Roche is the first to speak. "How'd you know he would?"

"I could see it in his eyes. He'd do anything for the Tail, even if it means helping us." He hates the way Melanie speaks about him, like she understands every little thought in his head, every action he makes. Like he's a puppet and she's the puppeteer, moving him around with the strings she'd tied onto his limbs. "We'll get him started tomorrow with the proper investigation. I'll send you a list of anything and anywhere Mr. Wilford deems off limits."

"And what about the victims? Is he gonna get the full rundown or?"

"There's things he doesn't need to know about."

"Like the fact the first one was a Tailie?" Roche asks matter-of-factly and Andre swears he can see him cross his arms, that smug look across his face.

When the voice of the train speaks again, it knocks the wind out of Andre's lungs; stops the beating of his heart; freezes every thought in his head.

"The body of Y/N L/N is to be kept top secret.Detective Layton is not to even hear about her. Understood?"

He hasn't heard her name, her full name, in so long. He knows it's wrong but he loves to hear them call her by her maiden name, instead of by her married name. It's as if, on the moving life of the train, her husband doesn't exist, never existed. Perhaps reality would have been better that way, perhaps they could have survived longer to become more than dirty secrets reserved for nights of pleasure and mornings of ignorance. To even begin to fathom that she was no longer alive, on board the train, feels like more of a betrayal than when he'd last seen her walk out the doors of the Tail. He can remember it now, the anger he'd felt the next day when she'd never returned. It had stung more than when Zarah had left. To think he spent so long resenting her for abandoning them, when there's now the fact she's nothing more than a body in a serial killer case brings bile up Andre's throat.

There are secrets haunting the train. Between the murders and the politics, Andre begins to fear he's now stuck in the mess of it all, swimming blindly in a  sea of lies and being expected to be an honest man. He knows his only hope is to tear the train apart, limb from limb, and peak into the darkness it's trying to cover up. 

If that means uncovering Y/N L/N's fate along the way, so be it.