#The Lockbox📼🔓

[radioactivebowtie]

In the depths of night, I realized that I never wrote a dedicated post for Finn and Reagan’s lil relationship?? Not very fair for it to only be discussed in big long posts about other stuff when others get their own if you ask me!

Warnings: Rand Ridley is in this- (I’m so sorry) -Like very toxic parental relationships, and mental health issues (code for project jellybean being mentioned) Other than that just spoilers for the show and mayhap references to other posts you can find on my blog? 

Ok! So I have mentioned in my post about project Jellybean (And how it would affect Finn and such-) that Finn and Reagan used to be friends. I do however have an amendment to that- They absolutely acted more like let’s say,,, partners, something like we could say we are dating and you wouldn’t bat an eye, that kinda shit.

So something about the fact that these two were close enough to shatter Finn’s heart when they think Reagan doesn’t remember them, or that they weren’t important enough or something is just SCREAMING- “We had a fucking dope friendship and Reagan was basically adopted into our family!” Isn’t like it would be the first adoption-

But even despite that, JR would absolutely eat these two up? It would be pleasing for him to know that Reagan genuinely wants to be Finn’s friend, unlike the kids who go to their school. So she would be over all the time, whether or not he would tell Rand the real reason is debatable.

OK so I don’t like Rand who does?? BUT he would actually have some part in this unfortunately so let’s get this sorted.

So Finn just wants to hang out with Reagan, and Reagan wants to hang out with another friend who likes them for them and treats her like her actual age. And let’s be honest, JR knows Rand isn’t the best with kids, especially his own

So when Finn comes to him literally BEGGING to have a sleepover with her? 

HE ABSOLUTELY LIES SO THAT HIS BABY CAN BE HAPPY!

So Finn and Reagan act like she just lives there with them, like she is their best friend and just do regular kid stuff!! It helps to make them feel normal. 

So they make dinner! And then have to get someone on the staff to make it because WOWZA can Finn ruin a fucking meal- Everything they try and cook burns so fast ISTG

They watch movies and cartoons in their jammies! Filling the entirety of downstairs with joyous and genuine laughter.

And honestly? JR treats her better, He enjoys seeing Finn so happy, and even if he has to lie to make it happen - honestly not that big of a deal-breaker - He absolutely will, he will do it as many times as they need him to.

So, when Finn isn’t sneaking Reagan over somehow for a sleepover? Finn is hanging out with her in the still, somewhat empty halls that are outside of their dad’s offices. Reagan has her nose buried in whatever textbook she has for her class and Finn is desperately scribbling in their math homework Albeit mostly with Reagan’s help- But Finn brings her candy, specifically sour patch kids! 

It is the most Reagan candy and you cannot convince me otherwise

So Finn is sharing candy with her in the hallway, head-bopping to Sk8ter Boi by Avril Lavigne the year after it came out. Singing along happily and off-key to the song playing through their iPod mini, a single earbud in one of their ears each. Only pausing when Reagan throws it out of her ear the moment Rand comes into the hallway to make sure she’s doing her work.

But then it happens, Finn is just barely out of Fifth grade when it happens. Fresh out of elementary school and- now their missing their friend.

Finn knows how hard it is for them to make school friends, especially now that Cognito is really getting off the ground and their fathers’ reputation seems to mean more to the kids in their private school than Finn’s feelings and friendship, But it gets even worse when all of a sudden they aren’t allowed to see Reagan.

Now Finn isn’t stupid by any means, but they weren’t ever going to guess the real reason why Reagan didn’t remember them or could no longer talk! And there was no way in HELL that JR was about to try and explain to his 12-year-old kid who is already very traumatized that he isn’t going to bring Finn to Cognito or anywhere NEAR Rand now that he’s seen how he treats Reagan.

And especially not after Reagan suddenly doesn’t remember Finn. He doesn’t even mean to find out, it was inevitable though. JR asking her passively how she’s doing and whether or not she’d like to come over to study with Finn.

His eyes widen and his heart drops to his stomach when she asks who that is. He can’t get an answer out of Rand, the room full of smoke from Rand’s god-awful cigarettes. He goes home early that day, taking Finn out for Ice cream but not telling them why. It’s awful to have to lie to his kid, he knows it’s fucked up. He doesn’t give a shit about lying to the public, but this is his kid! They’ve been through hell and back because of him! They deserve better than this, better from him.

So even if Finn is confused and missing their friend? They don’t know what they can do about it so, they just,, continue on.

They go to school and talk to people, but none of them are as nice and genuine with Finn as Reagan. But they make it work. They keep playing soccer and doing their work and before they know it, they see that Reagan’s already passed college, already heading to the finale, working at Cognito.

They remember it was something they had talked about as kids, popping sugary candy into their mouths as they watched cartoons on the couch in their living room. Reagan’s smart, they both know that. No matter how normal Finn treats her it’s hard not to notice the friend your age being in high school before you’ve hit middle school. So when Reagan tells Finn that their dads letting her work in the company Finn’s totally excited for them! It’s just that,, they just don’t think they’ll make it there. They know they COULD get in just by asking their dad but that felt like cheating, no matter HOW much they’d want to work with Reagan. How much fun they think it’d be.

So, when they see she did make it, and that she’s doing super well with the stuff she’s been good at for as long as Finn can remember is exciting. And then once they graduate JR asks if they want to work at Cognito- and Finn hesitates? They kind of did? But they didn’t think they deserved to? But they tell him as long as it’s for something they’d be good at and they have to actually apply. No special treatment. So they - and by they I mean JR - trial Finn in a bunch of different areas, and while none of them quite fit they all notice something.

Finn notices things, really specific things that others would probably not? Like they can’t focus, something that’s very much not a new problem. But the stuff they notice during the parts where they can’t focus on the main thing that they’re supposed to be working on is shocking. Finn will just casually know who’s walked by and can probably say all their names, they can tell you how many times someone would get up during a meeting to get water, and they will know the exact time someone will turn into the media manipulation hall when they try learning in there. So, they put them into the security team! And Finn does great! They keep tabs on everyone in a way anyone else barely anyone understands if they’re honest. But they get the job! Fulfilling half of their childhood dream to work at Cognito with Reagan.

But then they figure out what the power of the cameras bring. The chance to see their old childhood bestie in action!! They see a lot of people on the cameras sure - A true people watcher at heart - But now they get to pretend that they both did it together, like sure! Technically they are co-workers, the plan still happened! They just didn’t get there the way they intended to. And they very much assumed they would be working together which didn’t end up happening either. So instead, Finn sits on the sidelines in their monitor office, watching the gang and cheering them on! They respond to any audio they can pick up as if they were there and are in a constant state of “GO RAE GO!!”

But then they actually cross paths. 

And despite how it totally may seem, it doesn’t go great- fuckin shocker

So okay, Finn will absolutely not clock onto the fact that something has been done to Reagan- We cannot blame them, Rand is too evil for their sweet mind  -So Finn is sad when she introduces herself. Just like she was a stranger, as if Finn didn’t already know them. And honestly, as sad as it is. They just assume that Reagan forgot about them? Finn’s mind just assumes that they weren’t important enough, and it isn’t like JR goes waving around that their related so that wouldn’t help them. Plus they don’t exactly look like the tiny feminine brunette they used to be anymore. none of this is true-

But they can’t prove that their theories are wrong? Because even if they did ask Reagan she would have no fucking clue what they were talking about. So Finn doesn’t say anything in fear that if they do Reagan will just stop talking to them fully, thinking they’ll annoy her away again. So Finn’s just being themselves, overly excitable and talkative. Reagan thinks Finn is nosey, but they do their job.

Finn shows up in Reagan’s office a lot. Something that annoys Reagan to no end, at least at the beginning! So in the beginning there were some missteps! Like Finn going to touch something and Reagan throwing something at them to try and stop them, or Finn overstepping personal boundaries and trying to act like they did when they were kids! Something that probably would have been fine if Reagan actually remembered them- Something that Finn is aware of they do not blame Reagan and they have adjusted to her needs and wants - And eventually Reagan just expects them to show up at some point in the day? It feels weirder when they don’t stop in at all if she’s honest. But she can’t tell you why

And she guesses that Finn doesn’t really do anything? They just talk? Like a lot. It becomes some honestly really nice white noise while Reagan works on stuff? And Finn doesn’t really mind if Reagan isn’t fully listening while they talk! They don’t really need that, for them being around Reagan again is enough. Sometimes Finn brings Reagan little gifts? Reagan definitely appreciates them, even if she’s unsure how Finn knew her favorite kind of candy? She doesn’t think that she’s ever mentioned that she likes sour patch kids? 

At least she doesn’t remember doing so- 

Finn doesn’t explain it to her until y’know, The mindscape trip. Suddenly all the things Finn does and did do in the “beginning” of their interactions. Even the little things, like the candy and the nicknames, start making more sense.

But there’s a lot going on and neither of them has literally any time to figure out their friendship issues when Reagan’s worried about the fact that her entire childhood is a lie and that Rand has taken over the company, and Finn has to worry about the fact that their dad might now be dead and that they may now have lost their only family for the second time. Y’know just their worlds being on fire. 

So instead, they don’t talk about it until it’s at least a little calmed. I mean nothing is correct or fixed. But when they do get to have an actual talk it absolutely is full of tears? Finn is overwhelmed and happy okay. Reagan remembers them! She remembers all the things that they used to do! Finn doesn't feel fucking insane anymore! Even if they now have a million more reasons they want to both die and absolutely throttle Rand fucking Ridley.

But eventually, they would have some talks? Like, the first few are tenser. Finn’s still dealing with losing their dad and Reagans still reeling over basically her entire childhood and the fact that her dad is now running Cognito inc. something that she had thought was her dream since she was little. Both are what would be described as a more than reasonable excuse to ignore your relationship issues! So when they do get to actually have that talk that kind of, explains the feelings and emotions that they’ve been feeling since y’know childhood.

It honestly goes well? Like at the very least, better than either of them was expecting? I don’t think that it would change much at all if I’m honest,,

They both talk and Finn discusses how they felt while Reagan didn’t remember them. But I might go over their talk in another post-

Okay,,, that’s all for now,,,, I spent a month or two on that I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did <3

[radioactivebowtie]

I AM WRITING THE DOMESTIC INSIDE JOB CONTENT WE DESERVE!

It may be a little sad, but it may be a little emotional! But we deserve some good fatherly JR, some good motherly Delaney, and LOVING. FRIENDSHIP. INTERACTIONS!

I absolutely recommend reading my post about Project Jellybean because this post? I am absolutely elaborating on some of the more emotional parts of that. BUT you don’t have to!

Characters I mention even if briefly! Delaney @sin-sidejob (Nobody should be shocked at this point) 

Warnings: Sad moments, EMOTIONAL, Like a slight allusion to character death, and as always spoilers to the end of inside job

It’s been a little while since JR has “allegedly” passed. Finn was feeling a little better, they were actually showing up to work again.

Their interactions with people had definitely lessened, their energy however had seemed to take a nose-dive into erratic. Delaney was now monitoring their sugar intake to make sure they weren’t going overboard.

Finn was closing the door to the camera room, something they had been known to not do since they had started working in Cognito. It felt less inviting and warm. But that was to be expected, the workplace was filled with devastation and hardships. Honestly for the number of people inside who had ripped on JR while he was the boss,

(Which is valid he didn’t always have the worker’s interests in mind.) 

It was very clear that Rand was worse, He played a lot more mind games. Whether or not the people who were being used or fucked with had even realized it. Nothing felt the same and it was clear.

BUT THAT WAS OKAY! Finn could just brush that to the side! God, they felt like actually looking into the files of those therapists that Delaney had not so subtly put on their desk a while back. But now wasn’t the time for that. Today was their break day.

Finn was just getting ready to leave. Delaney was going to take them on some kind of trip. It was the first thing that they had been excited about in a while. She said it was going to be a surprise, that in itself was exciting. But then Brett had accidentally spoiled that they were all going to come! Finn was a little overwhelmed at first- But they did miss their friends, clearly, this wasn’t all the people that Finn cared about but The gang and Mom? They made Finn feel safe too.

Speaking of Brett, Finn jumped when he knocked a little jingle on Finn’s office door. “Hey hey hey! You ready? G-Money got one of the good cars with the blackout windows so we could bring Myc along! And she and Delaney are driving it upfront now! A group trip! Isn’t it exciting?”

Finn smiled weakly, seeing Brett so excited was starting to rub off on them. He was ever the optimist, whether it was misguided or not. 

“Sweet, alright let’s go! Group trip!” 

By the time the two of them had taken the elevator down the two floors, Gigi and Delaney were getting out of the car and the others were entering the car. It looked like Myc had spread out in the back of the van they had chosen and Glenn was trying to negotiate a place to sit so everyone could fit.

Everything felt so normal? It was like any other day. It was nice.

“Hey Finn, You ready?”

Finn looked up, shaken out of their daze giving a quick nod “Oh! Yeah sorry!”

And they were off!

Finn sat in the back, Delaney and Gigi were upfront talking, Gigi said they needed to catch up and that they should take her seat. But when Finn saw it was right next to Reagan they knew Delaney had asked her and she had just agreed. They were sitting in the back right next to Reagan and Andre.

Finn hummed buckling their own seat up and kicking their legs back and forth before looking up “Do any of us know where we’re going? Like at all?”

Andre shrugged “Myc tried to read Delaney but she threatened to cut him, And she didn’t tell any of us anything other than that this was supposed to be a-” He lifted his hands to mock air quotes, “Group Bonding activity.”

Finn hummed.

“So we just got into the back of a van because your mom said we were going on some kind of school fuckin field trip?”

Finn snickered “Guess so?”

“It’s great that one of the leading teams for the shadow government doesn’t listen to advice you’d give a small kid.” Reagan shook her head with a laugh.

Finn chuckled “Well I mean Delaney isn’t a stranger? So I don’t know if that counts? And according to Brett Gigi was the one to suggest the Van so Myc could come?”

They could all hear the eye roll Myc would be giving them if he could as he spoke, “Oh yeah cause I love being stuck inside of a car when you all can go out! Makes my day to be trapped like a weird fuckin dog in a hot car.”

Finn rolled their eyes “It’ll be fine! Delaney wouldn’t let you overheat!”

“Besides I’m sure we’d all rather be away from the hell that is Cognito right now?”

Finn nodded “Reagan’s right-” they smiled a little when Andre squeezed their hand, “Besides she has like all the connections in the world who knows we could be going somewhere that Myc could walk around in and look normal at!”

Reagan snorted “Like what Comic-Con?”

“Fuck you!”

The van came to a stop, reverse, and another quick stop. They were already here? But they didn’t even drive very far.

The door opened and Gigi tapped her nails against the side of the car “Everyone but Myc can get out, give Andre your order or something and we can meet back out here-”

Finn shook their head at the sudden intrusion of light, the no windows and only slight view through tinted windows so black that they were basically one-way mirrors making the suddenly opened door seem like they were seeing God. But when the light became more tolerable they felt a little sick.

“Oooo! Ice cream!” Brett clapped clambering his way out of the van. Glenn right behind him seemed to nod in agreement, but then seemed to take a moment to stretch, hunched over in the van for too long.

“Sweet! They better have superman? Is that what it’s called here?” 

Reagan had looked over briefly, right after looking out the door where the now visible ice cream shop was. Finn knew Reagan knew. Reagan knew they knew. But she quickly left the car too, letting out a loud ‘fuck!’ when she hit her head on the top of the van on her way out. 

Delaney’s head popped into the back of the van “Hey cuttlefish you ready to go?”

Finn once again had to shake their head to break out of their daydream, they nodded taking Delaney’s offered hand and walked out of the van towards the little shop.

The gang had seemingly already entered and Finn sighed opening the door, they felt like lingering outside would lead to an uncomfortable conversation and they didn’t want to deal with that.

“Finn look they did have superman! And you like Cookie dough right? They have that too!” Andre was smiling accepting his obscene tower of superman ice cream.

Finn snickered a little “Did you at least get Myc his?”

Andre turned and watched as Gigi rolled her eyes “I got it I got it-” Finn smiled again with a little chuckle, “I know the ice creams good Andre but get the man his ice cream too!”

Andre chuckled again as Gigi and Glenn passed him on their way to the door “We’re gonna meet at the car, Give Myc the ice cream before it melts and he asks us to buy another one.”

Finn hummed walking up and ordering their own ice cream, Finn was snickering when they could feel Andre’s presence bouncing on his heels before them. “Andre calm down!” they laughed as he bumped into their back right before the lady behind the counter handed them their own ice cream cone.

Delaney sighed with a smile watching Finn laugh at Andre’s antics, Brett was talking to Reagan for a moment before politely ordering his own ice cream. Reagan doing the same.

Finn smiled elbowing Andre. “C’mon let’s go see if Myc has some revolutionary opinions on their strawberry flavor!”

Andre snickered grabbing their hand and leading them to the door, Brett following behind with a quick ‘wait for me!’

Reagan snickered at their behavior, ignoring the look of annoyance and walking outside.

She opened the door and saw her friends running to the van. You could absolutely see Myc’s tentacles wrapping around the strawberry cone and pulling it into the van out of sight.

Regan shook her head for a second before looking to the side to see Delaney leaning against the wall and looking the same way that she had been. Reagan looked away when Delaney caught her eye.

“They missed you.” Delaney hummed, seemingly already down to the cone of her own food.

Reagan blinked a couple times. She didn’t know what to say.

“Finn missed you a lot, they talked about you while we were at their house. You two seemed to be very close, I assume Rand was the one who made that end?”

Reagan stuttered a little, “W-well probably- JR did stop bringing them after a while, and then I stopped coming too?”

Delaney hummed watching Reagan nervously eat her own ice cream, chewing on the little brownie bit way longer than she probably needed to.

I mean she didn’t know what to say! What was she supposed to say! This is all emotional and they haven’t talked to Finn like that since they were like nine?

Delaney hummed a little bit, “They talked about how nice you were to them. How they wished they could have helped. And they were worried about you and how you were taking things-”

Regan turned a little “What? They have so much going on to! They don’t need to worry about me!”

She watched and Delaney snickered a little, finishing off her cone of mint oreo with a little sigh.

She gave Reagan a little wave as she walked down the stairs. Her mission seemed to be to talk to Finn who was laughing with the gang in the mostly empty parking lot. She let out a sigh looking down at the stairs.

She may not have been there for the entire time JR was taking care of Finn. She had only been thereafter she was working at Cognito. But they had all been here before, all of them sitting together and enjoying some ice cream even if they didn’t exactly know what they were supposed to be celebrating. 

She was a little tired but she had gotten through. Finn was looking happy, more so than they had in the past couple of weeks. Now they just have to wait to see if the shadow council would be able to take him out. I mean she had been working with them for ages, that has to mean something right?