#add in the fact that i technically like to put scuttle and her together it looks EXTREMELY funny

[wackywatchdotcom]

nobody on this site even knows i ship pomni gangle and zooble together

(and to a lesser extent pomni w gummigoo AND pomni w ragatha)

[bamf-jaskier]

Here and Queer: The Witcher

Hi, I’m Aaliyah, and this is Here and Queer, Canon Queerness in The Witcher books. 

I already started this series by talking about Ciri here. Her relationship required a fair amount of analysis because it began nonconsensually but continued for months after the fact and spanned three books so there was quite a bit to cover. 

However, while she is the main character there are other characters who are also queer in the books including Triss Merigold, Philippa Eilhart and Geralt himself!

Let’s jump right in by talking about our first queer character: Triss. 

She is explicitly confirmed as Queer in Blood of Elves during this internal monologue: 

As far as her erotic life was concerned, Triss Merigold had the right to consider herself a typical enchantress. It had began with the sour taste of forbidden fruit, made all the more exciting by the strict rules of the academy and the prohibitions of the mistress under whom she practised. Then came her independence, freedom and a crazy promiscuity which ended, as it usually does, in bitterness, disillusionment and resignation. 

Then followed a long period of loneliness and the discovery that if she wanted to release her tension and stress then someone who wanted to consider himself her lord and master – as soon as he had turned on his back and wiped the sweat from his brow – was entirely superfluous. 

There were far less troublesome ways of calming her nerves – ones with the additional advantages of not staining her towels with blood, not passing wind under the quilt and not demanding breakfast. That was followed by a short-lived and entertaining fascination with the same sex, which ended in the conclusion that soiling towels, passing wind and greediness were by no means exclusively male attributes.

Finally, like all but a few magicians, Triss moved to affairs with other wizards, which proved sporadic and frustrating in their cold, technical and almost ritual course.

Sounds here like Triss enjoyed her relationships with women but the forced heteronormativity of society caught up with her. This actually hits quite a bit for me as Triss states that her relationships with men seemed lacking after she had relationships with women. 

Of course, there is also this scene in The Tower of Swallows: 

The brilliant beam of light, broken by the diamond, flashed on the surface of the mirror. Yennefer stretched out both hands and began chanting a spell. The blindingly bright light reflected and concentrated into a fog. Soon, a picture began to emerge. The image of a room whose walls were covered with colorful tapestries.

A movement at the window. And a troubled voice. “Who? Who's there?”

“I'm here, Triss.”

“Yennefer! That you? Gods! How did… Where are you?”

“It does not matter where I am. Do not block the image, because the picture varies. And take away that candle, it’s blinding.”

“Right. Of course.”

Although it was late at night, Triss Merigold was wearing neither lingerie nor her work clothes. She wore a dress for going out. As usual, high-collared and closed.

“Can we talk freely?”

“Of course.”

“You're alone?”

“Yes.”

“You're lying.”

“Yennefer…”

“You are deceiving me, brat. I know your face; I know you too well. It’s the same look you had when you started sleeping with Geralt behind my back. Back then, you put on the same sheepish, innocent mask that I see on your face now. And it means the same thing now that it meant back then!”

Triss was red. Philippa Eilhart appeared in the window next to her, dressed in a dark blue men’s jerkin. “Bravo,” she said. “As usual, quick. As usual, perceptive. As usual, hard to grasp and understand. I am glad to see you in health, Yennefer. I am happy that your crazy teleportation from Montecalvo did not end in tragedy.”

Gonna be very honest here, as someone who has had to hide their girlfriend when a friend or parents walks into your room, that is exactly how I read this scene. Yennefer saying Triss has the look on her face of someone who just got laid? Philippa coming out of hiding and calling Yennefer perceptive? The fact that when Yennefer first called Triss didn’t let her see what was going on and then appeared fully dressed after blocking the image? I don’t know about anyone else, but I read this as Yennefer catching Triss and Philippa together romantically. 

However, even if you don’t buy this scene as explicitly showing a relationship between the two of them, Triss is still queer as well as Philippa. 

From Time of Contempt:

“So it is!’ said Marti Södergren, leaning over and wrinkling her nose, after which she picked up a goblet and looked at the traces of crimson lipstick on it. ‘Ah, Philippa Eilhart. I should have known. Who else would have dared to do something so brazen? That revolting snake. Did you know she spies for Vizimir of Redania?’

‘And is a nymphomaniac?’ risked the Witcher. Marti and Keira snorted in unison.

‘Is that what you were counting on, fawning over her and flirting with her?’ asked the seductress. ‘If so, you ought to know someone’s played a mean trick on you. Philippa lost her taste for men some time ago.”

Another Philippa scene from The Tower of Swallows:

Philippa Eilhart was in a short nightgown with thin straps, and her face and neck had traces of lipstick. Assire, with a great effort of will, contained an expression of displeasure. Never, ever, will I understand this. And I do not want to understand.

“Can we speak freely?”

Philippa’s hand made a sweeping gesture. And she surrounded herself with a magic sphere of discretion.”

Answering a telecomm with lipstick all over ur neck is such a queer power move and honestly Philippa might be manipulative but damn the energy she exudes. 

As well as Philippa and Triss, there is the infamous bath scene with Geralt and Borch from Sword of Destiny: 

“Let’s make merry!’ Three Jackdaws leant across the table and slapped Téa on the backside. ‘Let’s make merry, Witcher. Hey, landlord! Over here!’

The innkeeper scuttled briskly over, wiping his hands on his apron.

‘Could you lay your hands on a tub? The kind you launder clothes in, sturdy and large?’

‘How large, sir?’

‘For four people.’

‘For… four…’ the innkeeper opened his mouth.

‘For four,’ Three Jackdaws confirmed, drawing a full purse from his pocket. ‘I could.’ The innkeeper licked his lips.

‘Splendid,’ Borch laughed. ‘Have it carried upstairs to my room and filled with hot water. With all speed, comrade. And have beer brought there too. Three pitchers.’

The Zerrikanians giggled and winked at the same time.

‘Which one do you prefer?’ Three Jackdaws asked. ‘Eh? Geralt?’

The Witcher scratched the back of his head.

‘I know it’s difficult to choose,’ said Three Jackdaws, understandingly. ‘I occasionally have difficulty myself. Never mind, we’ll give it some thought in the tub. Hey, girls. Help me up the stairs!”

Now, there’s a lot of people who read this scene and say: hey now, Geralt didn’t actually sleep with Borch. They just slept with two women. Together. In a bath. Now, I don’t know about any of you, but when four people are naked in a bath together all having sex it’s not a situation where you can say no-homo bro and call it a day. 

Also, you know, there is this line later on in Sword of Destiny: 

“Véa, already mounted beside Téa, waved.

‘Véa,’ the Witcher said, ‘you were right.’

‘Hm?’

‘He is the most beautiful.”

Of course, this is in reference to Borch’s dragon form but considering the last person to call Borch beautiful was Véa who slept with him...well. Geralt is at the very least open for a variety of sexual situations. 

Finally, there is Sorel Degerlund in Season of Storms who says this about Ortolan, the elderly mage of the town: 

“As you’ve doubtless observed,” continued Degerlund, “I have exceptional looks and women have been known to call me an ephebe. I’m fond of women, indeed, but in principle I didn’t and don’t have anything against homosexuality. Under one condition: if it is to be, it must help me to advance my career.

My physical intimacy with Ortolan didn’t demand excessive sacrifices. The old man had long passed both the age limit for capability and desire. But I did my best for people to think otherwise and believe he’d utterly fallen for me.

Believe there was nothing he would refuse his gorgeous lover. Believe that I knew his codes, that I had access to his secret books and notes. That he was giving me artefacts and talismans he hadn’t previously revealed to anyone. And that he was teaching me forbidden spells. 

Including goetia. And if previously the great men and women of Rissberg had disdained me, now they suddenly began to esteem me. I had grown in their eyes. They believed I was doing what they themselves dreamed of. And that I was achieving success.”

So this is a very minor character who only appears in one adventure but he is queer. Well, to clarify he is queer for...career advancement? Honestly I have no idea if asaps is trying to make a statement here or if he was writing this and thought to himself: what if the mage was queer but only in order to advance his career? Sounds fun, let’s do it. 

So overall, there are queer characters in The Witcher, from Ciri to Triss to Geralt to Philippa to guy who is gay to advance his career in Season of Storms. There are likely other minor characters I might have missed, so feel free to add them!

I hope to see these characters as queer in the show and it’s really nice to have this type of representation in fantasy, especially a series such as The Witcher. And yes, there are a number of problematic tropes and issues this writing can stumble into but it is still nice to see a variety of sexualities, especially in the main characters such as Ciri and Geralt.  

[greenbriar-j]

Muscle Memory, full wip, unedited 4.7k, scroll at ur own risk; tagging some people who showed previous interest @halleiswriting @chazzawrites @pe-ersona @druidx and also @pens-swords-stuff this is what I’ve been up to lately

Saint Joseph’s Catholic Church bustles with activity. It’s peculiar, for it being a weekday. More peculiar still that the bustling is being done by young men and women who could very well be engaging in… more satisfying summer indulgences.

The Youth Group’s power couple sweeps in an hour late, ever put together even when, by all rights, they ought to be melting right out of their fancy outfits. Cheers rise from the crowd when they appear, each splitting off in their own directions to their own stations.

Y Nhi beelines for the painters, flicking her sleek ponytail to make sure it’s out of the way. The girls hand her a brush while detailing what’s left to be done. Vinny bustles for the sound technicians - who, really, are already done for the day, but are staying for the social factor.

Two things to note about St. Joseph’s power couple:

Y Nhi isn’t sure she believes in God very much anymore.

They are not a couple, but it’s easier to let everyone think so than to correct it.

“Jude,” Mary says (everyone calls her Jude because she and Vinny made a big deal of it years ago), “Are you sure you can’t help out during the week?”

Y Nhi shrugs. She’s not busy or anything, but it feels wrong to shepherd children into a religion she’s falling out of - even if Vacation Bible School had been one of her favorite summer memories for her entire life. That’s where she met Vinny, after all.

Vinny, laughing with the guys at the sound booth. To be more accurate, Vinny himself is only smirking, but that’s as close to a laugh as he gets around here. Stupid smirk. Stupid boy.

“I have work. Unfortunately,” Y Nhi mutters, dragging her brush across a cardboard cutout. “Vinny’s taking the week off, so I’m picking up his slack.”

Mary grins widely at that. “I swear it’s like you’re married.”

For whatever reason, Y Nhi’s heart clenches at that. Picturing herself and Vinny in wedding attire on the altar sickens her, but putting a faceless someone in her place makes her feel worse. But it’s not like she likes him. She’s sworn to herself that she’d become a cat lady in her old age - her army has already begun with a fluffy black kitten. It’s not looking too good for her future; Toothless likes Vinny more than her. She’s already failed as a parent.

Belatedly, Y Nhi realizes she’s supposed to be engaging in a conversation, not thinking about Vinny and their co-parenting of a cat. If it can be called that.

“Don’t hold your breath. The wedding is a long way off,” she says tightly. Like. Never. Never is a long, long way off.

“I wouldn’t be too sure.”

This time, Y Nhi lets the comment slide. She paints while singing under her breath, as she always does. A long time ago, she had no qualms about belting it out, but time has weathered away her volume, reducing it to only this. No one’s noticed the change or found it strange.

The conversation turns to something - anything - else. Degrees, internships, other boys who don’t dress in all black and aren’t named Vincent Truong. Y Nhi listens, but doesn’t contribute.

By the time the call goes out for a lunch break, Y Nhi is finishing three tasks at once. One of the other girls brings her a burger, slathered with ketchup and mayo and tomatoes. Y Nhi thanks her and continues wrapping one of the white pillars in cardboard paper to simulate a palm tree.

Not long after, someone nudges her. Eyes flickering upward, she’s met with the bored eyes of her very best friend. “Bite.”

She doesn’t, not yet.

Vinny wiggles the burger he’s holding in front of her mouth. “Only half a slice of cheese. No tomatoes. Freshest patty of the batch. Eat.”

She still doesn’t take the bait, even though he’s tailored this burger to her weirdly specific tastes.

Vinny sighs. “Jude. No one’s watching you. I promise all they can see is my back.”

“That’s not what I’m worried about.” It’s true she had a complex about eating in public for a while, for reasons she’s never told anyone including him. “Just not hungry.”

“Not very Gucci of you to lie in the house of God.”

“Not very Gucci of you to breathe.”

“Jude! The fuck, man.” But he’s grinning. Not the half-assed grin he gives everyone else, but an honest, mirthful grin reserved for Toothless and Y Nhi only (usually Toothless. Damn cat).“Just eat this, okay? I’ll eat the other one.” His whole demeanor softens as he picks up the burger she had ignored - the one that is surely cold by now.

She is hungry. After all, the reason they were late is because Vinny had to coax her to every step of getting ready this morning. He even applied her eyeliner with the even strokes of a practiced hand - so practiced that even Y Nhi admits it looks like her own work. If she had a choice, she would waste away in bed for the day, but Vinny has never been much of a fan of that plan.

According to her own plan, Y Nhi had been wasting away since before yesterday’s dinner. Famished might be a better word to describe her present state.

But today is one of those days that she feels guilty cementing the married couple narrative any more than it needs to be. They’re not getting any younger, Vinny and Y Nhi, and just because she’s sworn off marriage doesn’t mean he has. How’s he supposed to get a nice girlfriend if she keeps hanging around?

Objectively, it’s a stupid reason to risk passing out in a church of all places, but something about him just makes her stupid. Always has.

The longer she ignores his peace offering, the twitcher he gets. He finishes his own burger in ten massive bites. When Y Nhi still doesn’t eat hers, he eats that whole thing too. “We’re leaving early. Say an hour? Think about what you want to eat.”

With that, he’s gone. Y Nhi is not hyper aware of his presence as it moves through the open space. She does not miss having him next to her. Not even a little.

-

Y Nhi writes, appetite??? in her journal when she gets home. It’s the third time something of this nature has appeared on its list which isn’t titled - but if it was it would be something like “Things About Vinny T. that Don’t Make Sense.”

Even after inhaling two burgers, he took her out for pho and Thai tea, and he ate so slow that his noodles expanded in the broth. Still, he finished a medium bowl with relative ease, and Y Nhi was content after she’d finished a small.

How does someone who eats like that look like that? It has to be some sort of stupid freaky metabolism. Genetic polymorphism, she thinks, then adds that she might be incorrectly using the term she’d heard in class about two semesters ago.

She writes freeloading on the list. It’s not technically true, but he spends enough time at her place to make it feel like it. Right this minute, he’s setting up the living room to sleep in, awaiting her delivery of the overnight bag he always leaves stocked in her apartment for emergencies.

That goes on the list too. Definition of ‘emergency.’

According to recent months, an alarming amount of things fit under this category of Vinny’s mind. It might be nearing time to stage an intervention, but who’s Y Nhi to tell him to relax when she’s the one bordering on anxiety attacks all the time? Only god knows how many times he’s clutched her shaking hands until they stopped.

Y Nhi closes the journal. Snaps the band over the cover. Shoves it under her pillow. Vinny wouldn’t dare read it to begin with, but for some reason, she doesn’t even want him to know of its existence.

Quickly divesting herself of the impeccable outfit she’d worn for the day, she slips easily into one of Vinny’s large, large shirts and the shorts she affectionately calls game day shorts. Ever since high school, she’s worn them for events that require equal amounts of comfort and courage - or just for comfort, to be honest.

“Hey, loser,” she greets Vinny, emerging from her room. He’s got her guitar in hand, and is humming some tune that she recognizes but can’t place. “Your stuff is on my bed. Have you seen Toothless?”

He nods, and keeps playing. It’s in experience, being stared at with such intense eyes while trying not to stare at the other party’s stupid pretty hands playing her guitar. Fuck him, honestly, she thinks angrily.

Leaving him there, she pours each of them a glass of water in the kitchen. A shadow looms on top of the fridge, and she jumps. “Toothless, baby. Please stop napping on the fridge.”

Toothless is not napping. He stands up, shakes his tiny body and hops to the counter, then to the floor, twining around Y Nhi’s feet before scuttling off.

Vinny is singing now. It’s a new song, she supposes, and it sounds like a love song.

Slowly, Y Nhi moves around the kitchen, making as little noise as possible while doing absolutely nothing. She just wants to listen to Vinny and his new love song without him watching her reaction.

Once she gets past the lyrics about gentle touches and midnight escapades, she realizes something. Re-entering the living room, she deposits his water on the table. “Is that my melody? Why would you steal it?”

The guitar is placed awkwardly on the floor, the neck of it leaning on the couch. “Oh, is that where it’s from? Thought it was familiar,” he says with mild disinterest. “Well, I wasn’t that attached to it anyway.”

“Are you saying it sucks?” Y Nhi settles on the floor on the other side of the table, pulling her knees into her chest. Glancing through her lashes, Y Nhi watches Vinny’s expressions.

“I’m saying I’m not taking your work, you brat.” Then he hesitates. “I mean. Can I, just for one person?”

“What the fuck.”

Vinny twitches, finally. “I… Wrote the song for someone… So I’d like to sing it for her, just once.”

Something vile rises in her throat, and she wishes Toothless would notice her distress. Hugging the cat might make her feel a little better about the fact that Vinny’s written a song about a girl using her melody - and it’s not about herself and for some odd reason, that bothers her.

“Can- Can I hear it?” Y Nhi asks in a tiny voice. It’s easier than No, you cannot take my song to sing to some other girl who will take you away from me.

“Haven’t you been hearing it?”

“Vincent.” Because that’s easier than You colossal idiot, what shit are you pulling after two years?

“Jude-”

She stands suddenly, fleeing to her room. Shutting the door, locking it, she tries to breathe. Of all people, Vinny should be the last person to push her to this reaction. She doesn’t know what to think.

Vinny knows.

Vinny knows where her hard limits are. Technically, he hasn’t passed them. But he’s pretty damn close.

Y Nhi slips into the shower, leaving it on the hottest setting to boil the emotions out.

-

For the next two days, Y Nhi doesn’t emerge from her room. Her phone dies, and she lets it. Her body self-destructs in hunger and dehydration from crying, and she lets it. She stays in bed for most of it. Whether Vinny continues to sleep on the other side of the wall for those nights, she doesn’t know. Nor care.

It’s punishment for believing she might be ready to give love another chance.

-

The third day, a letter slips under her door.

She almost flushes it down the toilet without reading it. Everything is in position to do so, paper fluttering in unsteady hands above the toilet bowl. But she wants to know. What can Vinny possibly say for himself?

Jude. I wrote the song for you. I didn’t mean to steal your tune - honest to god, I didn’t. But when I found out, I thought it was fitting that we’d worked on it together. (“Together”)

Jude, the song is up to your interpretation, but it’s yours. I wrote it from my core, and it’s yours. Charge your fucking phone and check the lyrics I sent you.

Take a shower, and call me when you’re ready. You have a few days’ worth of takeout in the fridge. Please take care of your health; I know you’re not right now. I mean it in the best way.

It cuts off there. Unceremonious and blunt, and so very him. She hates it very much.

Y Nhi charges her phone while she showers. Working quickly because she’s so unsteady on her feet, she does the bare minimum before stumbling into the kitchen for food.

While she nibbles on the stir fried noodles he left, she pens her own note.

Vinny,

I will not read the lyrics. I don’t want to know, and you don’t have to pretend it’s about me.

Your joke took two years to reach completion. Congratulations. I hope I was amusing and that my downfall wall be the stunning conclusion you wanted.

She tapes it on her front door so he’ll see it the next time he comes over. Soon, probably.

Momentarily, she wonders if she’s being rash. Is it so impossible to think that he could find romantic attraction to her?

Then she remembers. Y Nhi is not built to be loved, if her history is anything to go by. Even if she’s wrong, even if Vinny loves her for real, she will resist. Losing him this way is better than the alternative: watching him dissolve to some monstrosity while loving her.

-

Nothing changes after that. Apart from Vinny’s absence from her apartment, they interact in exactly the same way.

Vinny says something borderline rude.

Y Nhi retorts with something blatantly rude.

They laugh about it and move along.

There are no gentle touches to avoid because Vinny rarely touched her to begin with - despite the way he slings his arm around everyone else, he wasn’t like that with her. No arm around her shoulder, no hugs, not even extended contact with her hair.

Y Nhi pretends not to notice when he goes through a full dinner with an arm draped over the back of his friend Justin’s chair. He leans on it, adding the tiniest space between himself and Y Nhi. He still passes her the condiments and spices she likes before she asks for them. He takes her home at the end of it.

This should be enough. Up until now, it always had been. These tiny acts were his long distance hugs. It had always been enough, but now it isn’t, and Y Nhi doesn’t know what to do.

Isn’t this what you wanted? For him to get a life away from you?

“How’s that girl?” She asks on the way home, just because the silence is killing her and perhaps because she’s a masochist. “The one you wrote the song for?”

Vinny looks at her for a brief moment, something like grief in his eyes. It’s a confusing expression. “She hasn’t really talked to me since.”

Y Nhi tries not to sit straighter at this revelation. “Oh, really? Hm. That sucks.”

“Yeah.”

Something about the word is profoundly heartbroken. She can almost feel the emotions hurtling off him in waves, but he doesn’t lash out at her. All it does is enclose each passenger of the car in a separate bubble. This is the closest they’ve been in a long time, but Y Nhi has never felt so isolated.

Her throat constricts, and her hands start to shake. “Do you… Know why?”

Vinny thinks for a moment, tapping his fingers on the wheel. “I think she doesn’t believe me. But I don’t really think it’s me, I think she thinks that love is meant for everyone except herself. She’s pretty bent on self-destruction now, as far as I can tell - No, don’t say anything yet.”

Every girl Vinny’s talked to in the last week pops up in her mind. Which of them seems most self-destructive? If she can’t keep herself by his side, he should at least have someone who can care for him. She could talk to them, probably, if she knew who it was.

“I… She thinks this is sudden, but I’ve been in love with her since I was fifteen. Or something. Like it kind of just happened over time, and I thought she knew.”

Fifteen means Vinny’s been futilely in love with someone else while she fell for the guy who ended up cheating on her.

They were happy in high school. It was college that broke them. Distance. The communications became less frequent in an inverse relationship to Y Nhi’s alcohol intake. Her grades suffered, and she convinced herself that she was too stupid for higher education. On his birthday, she drove for hours to his dorm to surprise him, only to find him making out with another girl. Sober.

Not that any level of inebriation could excuse him, but perhaps it would’ve hurt a little less.

Vinny isn’t done. “I fucking cut fruit for her every time we hung out. I did her dishes sometimes. I don’t know, I- I thought I did everything right. My mom thought I was doing everything right.”

“You tell your mom about your love life?”

Y Nhi doesn’t. Her parents don’t care enough to know anything about it beyond that she let go of a future doctor and that she’ll never find another because she’s past her prime. That’s what it feels like, anyway.

She’s literally twenty four. She has time.

“Not really. But they’ve met.” Vinny parks the car in front of her apartment, but he makes no move to get out or to let Y Nhi get out. “Jude, listen to me.”

“I’m listening,” she says. Training her eyes on her kitchen window, she thinks about the dishes she hasn’t done yet, the fruit she hasn’t cut yet, and how she hates thinking about it because it reminds her Vinny is fading.

Human adaptability is a remarkable thing. One more week, and this new normalcy will cement itself.

“The girl I love is you. Okay? I’ve walked around the topic for years, and I understand if you’re still not ready for it. But I know you’re getting the wrong idea in that head of yours. It’s you, and it’s always been you, and I’ll spend the rest of my life proving it if you let me. I’ll also bow out forever if that’s what you need from me. But I need you to talk to me. I-”

Holy shit, is he about to cry? With wild eyes, she glances at him. If she’s made him cry, he’ll return the favor five-fold. No, she backtracks. That’s not Vinny. That’s the behavior of her second ex, the one that reduced her to a stiff puppet of a girl.

“Come back to me,” he says in a small, strangled voice. “I don’t even care if you break me in the process, but please come back to me. You can do whatever you want, as long as you do it by my side.”

For the longest moment, they say nothing. Then Y Nhi opens the car door. “Can you cut my strawberries for me? They taste better when you cut them.”

-

Vinny washes her dishes and her strawberries and quarters the already small fruit for her. He deposits the snacks in front of her and watches her eat - slowly, since they’ve just come back from dinner, after all.

“So it’s me?”

“Always has been.”

“And you never said anything.”

“I did. You ignored it on purpose.”

“No, I’m just a stupid hoe.”

“You’re not stupid. Or a hoe.”

“You’re always calling me stupid.”

“Not like that, stupid.”

“You’re going to have to undo a lot of damage if we date.”

“I know. I’ve been working on it already, didn’t you notice?”

“Yeah, but it’s gonna get worse if we date.”

“Have you considered therapy?”

“Vinny, I’ll be a pariah.”

“A happy one, maybe.” Hesitantly, he reaches for one of her hands. Halfway, he flips the palm up and waits for her to complete the gesture on her own. “You don’t have to decide right away. It’s just a thought.”

She puts her hand in his a little too eagerly, then pulls back a little too harshly. It feels like touching the flame of a candle.

A defeated look momentarily crosses Vinny’s eyes, but Y Nhi barely has the time to look at it before she steels her nerves and takes hold of his hand again. The coldness of his rings grounds her somehow. “We need a list,” Y Nhi says, “of things. First, you’re going to Google touch starvation.”

Her best friend jerks in a little victorious motion, jamming his knee unceremoniously on the table leg as he does. “Fuck, that hurt.”

“What was that about?”

“I wasn’t sure if you were actually touch starved or if you didn’t like men touching you.”

“And you didn’t ask?” Y Nhi is incredulous.

“How am I supposed to ask? ‘Jude, when I touch you, does it remind you of your sleazy ex boyfriends?’ You’d say no. Like a liar. Or so I thought.” He pauses. “Anyway, this means I can hug you now, right? 24/7.”

“If you ease into it.”

“And you’ll stop wearing those gigantic shirts that literally drown you.”

“...No. What?”

“Okay, never mind, nothing. What else? What other boundaries do we have?”

Of all questions she’s been asked today, this one is probably the most confusing. Her previous relationships are no help; she hasn’t exactly had the best exposure to “healthy relationships.” She’s aware that the bare minimum counts as decadence for her, so the question has her a little frozen.

After watching her face flicker through whatever emotions it’s displaying, Vinny rubs a thumb over her knuckles. “How about this: I have a specific thing I want your help with, and when things come up, we can talk about it.”

Y Nhi nods, though they both know she won’t talk about shit. But perhaps watching Vinny sort out whatever issue he needs sorted will give her inspiration on how to approach this. “Can we-?” She starts and stops abruptly.

Vinny blinks, then feeds her a strawberry slice. “Go ahead.” It’s a tactful move. Putting food in her mouth means she has to chew, meaning she has a few more seconds to gather herself and her thoughts, or at the very least, the desire to continue speaking.

“Can we not label this?” She finishes. “Whatever is between us.”

To her surprise, Vinny nods and acts like she hasn’t asked the bitchiest question of the night. “Sure.” You can do whatever you want, he’d said, as long as you do it by my side.

“And… Get rid of Jude.”

“What?”

“Jude. You remember why I picked that name?”

“Because of some fictional fairy queen that had the same name? You thought she was a conniving boss ass bitch and-”

“Shut up. Saint Jude. Patron saint of?”

Technically speaking, he hasn’t been wrong about the fairy queen bit. Unlike the suckers who fell for Cardan Greenbriar, Y Nhi’s wimpy ass was all in for Jude Duarte, mortal queen of the fae. And it was easier to admit that than to admit the truth that was dawning on Vinny’s face in 3… 2...

“Hopeless causes,” Vinny answers easily. Then his expression sobers. “Oh.”

Y Nhi nods. “But the me with you isn’t a hopeless cause. I don’t want her to be, anyway.”

There’s a lot that goes unsaid, but she’s certain Vinny hears it. Logically, she can’t keep relying on whatever instinct says, He’ll understand because he’s Vinny, but up to this point, it should work out okay.

Gently, he says, “Y Nhi,” reacquainting himself with the syllables of her given name. “Y Nhi.”

“Yes, Vinny?” She says just as gently.

He lowers his voice to a husky whisper, “You’ve never been a hopeless cause. You were a cause for hope.”

-

Vinny’s request is this: that Y Nhi teach him to be soft again.

The request makes her question if she and Vinny exist in the same dimension because who the hell convinced him he wasn’t soft? Hardened, prickly souls don’t master winged eyeliner for the sake of their loved ones. They don’t volunteer extra hours at Vacation Bible School while working graveyard shifts at the hospital. Don’t do the dishes because as much as they hate them, their roommate hates them more.

Vinny is soft, and Y Nhi is out for blood. “I need names, Vincent. And addresses if you have them.”

“My ex,” he says.

An awkward sound emerges from Y Nhi’s throat.

He raises an eyebrow at her. “What? I dated around. Didn’t think I should be hung up on you, but nothing ever went as planned. Anyway, my one ex did a really good job making me become someone I wasn’t. I didn’t like the person she made me, but it was kind of too late to turn around.”

Again, Y Nhi is confused. The narrative is promising, though, so she lets him continue in hopes that it’ll clear something up.

“If you don’t know me, how would you describe me?”

“Vinny.” She doesn’t have an answer, she just doesn’t want to say it. It’s not all good, and they just came back from an awkward fight. Was it a fight?

They’ve slipped back into their normal existence so easily. Nothing has changed, but at the same time, everything has.

“Just- The rings and the black and the tattoos. You’d think I drove a motorcycle or something, right?”

“You drive a Lexus. It’s the same in terms of your fuck boy vibes.”

“Y Nhi!”

“BMW would’ve sealed the deal. How many Hennessys do you drink a night, again?”

A pout settles on his face. She likes this version of him. “I see you get my point. I look like a baddie.”

“Yeah. Bad at life.”

“I swear to god.”

“Don’t do that, that’s a sin. Don’t use the lord’s name in vain and all.”

“Anyway. You of all people know I am soft, actually. She didn’t like that. And so I gained a second personality and-”

It’s rude, the way Y Nhi interrupts, but Vinny doesn’t seem to mind at all. “So if you’re always soft, what’s left for me to help you with?”

“You’ll see,” he says. “Actually. No, I’m going to tell you. I get embarrassed about my relationships. So if it ever looks like I’m pushing you away… I’m just really fucking embarrassed, at least for this first stage. Do what you will with that.”

- bonus/epilogue -

They return home for Y Nhi’s mom’s birthday. They’ve always rode home together, since they are neighbors no matter where they are. No one finds it odd that they hold hands more than before, that Y Nhi is still averse to touching everyone but him.

They appear at social events hanging on each other’s arms. Commentary about their status as a “married couple” breeze over their heads, but they never confirm nor deny anything. In public, they remain aloof to each other. They show tenderness in only the smallest of gestures.

In private, they are as they ever were. Vinny still does her eyeliner on her bad days, but now she cuddles him on the couch on his bad days. Between the two of them, there are a lot of bad days, days when they almost threw in the towel.

But they didn’t. Instead, they’ve introduced all manner of pet names (Vinny’s favorites to use are love, darling, and lately, em. Y Nhi’s favorites are Vinny and anh). They write songs to each other, for each other, with each other. Every morning, they make the choice to keep loving each other the way they have since they were fifteen - and while they joke that they wasted so much time, it was a necessary time for them to spend apart to learn how to exist together and how to choose each other even when it’s the harder choice than letting go.

Even I get lonely too

It’s not hard

Every question’s got an answer

And mine is you

Where you go then I will follow

All my life

You’re the name that I will whisper to the night

[fr-jedicreed]

Looking for Answers

(continuation from here!)

Note--all dragons are in gijinka’d forms, unless otherwise noted!

--

Daasdrei grumbled under her breath, pulling her cover around her. She hated going into the city. It was dirty, full of lower-class citizens, and was too crowded. Too full of buildings, stalls, and just people. Only a few that she passed smelled delicious, but she resisted. She had her fill, after draining Xuvo. She’d be good for a few days. No need to overindulge.

Besides, her killing Xuvo is why she was here in the first place.

No body was found. She had watched him fall out of the window, and heard him hit the ground. He was dead, she was sure of it! So then, why wasn’t his body discovered? Why hadn’t it been found? Why didn’t the Troopers understand how awful this was? Corpses couldn’t just...get up and walk away!

And Chiqail wasn’t close enough to the palace to revive any corpses like that.

Instead, Daasdrei left in the dead of the night, heading to the only place that would possibly have answers for her: the City of Executrix’s Morgue.

All lights were out. But these fellows worked all through the night, right? Right? But even if they were asleep, she was the Empress of the Executrix Empire. They had to rise and shine, if she came a’knockin’. And a’knockin’ is just what she did.

“Open up!” she called out, pounding on the door with her fist, “I have a question, open the door!”

She paused, waiting for someone to come. But there was just silence. And just as she raised her fist again to pound on the door, she heard a lock jingling, the doorknob twisting, and soon the door opened, revealing a well-dressed Guardian. It stunned her a little, as he was in a slightly different form than what she was used to. He had all the Guardian features, only he was bipedal. He didn’t look like herself, having softer features. Interesting...

“I need to know of a body you have in your...place.” said Daasdrei, struggling with what to call the Morgue. She couldn’t ask ‘what they had in stock’ as that was just strange. And a bit morbid.

The well-dressed Guardian tilted his head, before making gestures with his hands. It took Daasdrei a moment to realize he was signing, and she waved a hand, dismissing that.

“I don’t understand sign language, and don’t have the time for that.” she said shortly, “Do you have something to write--?”

As if on cue, he reached into his pocket, and pulled out a notebook. As he quickly scribbled down, Daasdrei noted that his eyes were a messy, Plague infected mess. Plague Primal eyes, she realized. She didn’t understand how he could see, but he apparently could, as he wrote down something, before showing it to her.

‘The manager of the morgue is asleep right now. What may I help you with?’

Daasdrei sighed, “I need to know of a Ridgeback corpse that you might’ve acquired. Do you have one?”

The Guardian tilted his head, moving to sign again, before remembering and writing more down, before showing the note to Daasdrei.

'We might have some Ridgeback bodies. Who in particular are you looking for?’

“I’m looking for a water Ridgeback named Xuvo. He was...killed...near the palace a few nights ago. I need his body, though, to confirm something about his death.”

The Guardian frowned, tapping the pencil on the notepad, before writing something more.

'I’m afraid we don’t have a water Ridgeback here. Perhaps he’s not really dead? Or someone else had taken his body?’

“How can you not have him? He’s dead, so that means his body would’ve been brought here!” hissed Daasdrei, causing the Guardian to step back a little, “And if his body was on palace grounds, then those who took his body would be tried for tresspassing! And I know he’s dead, because--”

She paused, chewing her lip. Should she admit that she drained him of blood? That she was the cause of Xuvo’s death? But before she could go further, a mighty yawn escaped from inside the morgue, and a large Ridgeback emerged. But not the one she was searching for.

Like the Guardian, he was bipedal, but retaining the majority of his Ridgeback features. ...Or at least, Ridgeback-like features. It looked like his skin--no, his body was sitched and patched together from various things. Other dragons? Other Ridgebacks? It was strange to see. He yawned again, before looking at Daasdrei and the Guardian.

“And what might we have here, hm?” he asked, leaning against the frame of the morgue, smiling almost lazily at Daasdrei, “And so late at night, too. You do know us morgue workers need to sleep, too.”

The Guardian jumped in, before Daasdrei could speak, putting away the notepad and quickly signing to the Ridgeback. He nodded, humming in thought and affirmation, “I see, I see. Thank you, Igor.” He then turned back to Daasdrei, “I am Rhes, the owner of this morgue. And this is my assistant, Igor.”

He gestured to the Guardian, who gave a friendly wave to Daasdrei.

Daasdrei rolled her eyes, “Okay, now that you’re done wasting my time with that, can you answer my question?”

“Which is?”

“Do you have a water Ridgeback in your morgue? Red coloring, would look like me, drained of blood, and possibly heavy trauma from falling several feet?”

“Nope.”

Daasdrei blinked, “P--Pardon me?”

Rhes shrugged, “I don’t--” The motion, however, made one of his arms fall off, landing with a thud on the ground, where it twitched. Daasdrei let out a noise, seeing it moving around, scuttling around the ground, searching for it’s owner. Igor quickly picked up the limb, and put it back in the right spot, moving to sew it back on, “Ah, thank you, Igor. See? Not enough sleep, and I keep falling apart!”

He laughed, and even Igor looked like he was laughing silently.

Daasdrei felt herself turn red with anger.

“How dare you treat me--and this matter--lightly!” she hissed, baring her fangs, “Tell me if you have him--!”

“And I don’t.” said Rhes simply, “I have many bodies in my morgue, and I know exactly who and what they are. And I do not have a water Ridgeback, drained of blood, with fall damage, in this morgue. That’s the facts.”

He nodded his thanks, as Igor sewed his arm back on. He moved it slightly, nodding his approval before looking back at Daasdrei, “And why would someone like you want a body? Is it to cover up something that you did?”

“Excuse me?!”

“You said you were looking for a Ridgeback, ‘drained of blood.’ And it’s no secret that you’re a vampire, Princess--”

“Empress!”

“--So anyone can put two and two together.” Rhes continued, ignoring Daasdrei’s outburst, “And if you’re looking for a corpse drained of blood, it means that you’re the cause of it. Though, being a vampire for so long, you’d think that you’d check to make sure he’s dead, before leaving him be. You’re sloppy, Prince--excuse me, Empress.”

Daasdrei could feel her blood boiling with how laid back and rude this Ridgeback was being! “Are you insinuating something, Rhes? Choose your words carefully, or else--”

“Or else you’ll drain me of blood, too?” asked Rhes cooly, before shrugging--carefully, “I’m afraid you won’t like what I have. I technically don’t have any blood flowing through my veins. And Igor here has been experimented on so much, that his blood might basically be poisonous to you. So your threats mean nothing.”

Daasdrei growled, but said nothing, allowing Rhes to continue.

“Have you ever sired anyone, Empress?”

She paused at that, “...Sired? I’ve birthed heirs, if that’s what you’re--”

“No no, not that.” said Rhes, waving a dismissive hand, “I mean, have you ever sired another vampire? Some legends say that, you have to just barely leave a victim alive, before they start to transform. Is that the same with you?”

Daasdrei fell silent.

“...Bingo. I think you have your answer, as to why I don’t have your Ridgeback here in my morgue.” said Rhes, simply, “If that’s the case, then we’re done here. We’re going to go back to sleep now. Good night.”

He gave her a smile and a wave, before leading Igor back inside, ignoring her, as she opened her mouth to protest, only to be met with a closed--and locked--door.

--

Once inside, Rhes yawned grandly, and started to head towards his room, an add-on to the morgue, “Back to sleep. You may continue what you were doing, Igor.”

A tug on his sleeve made him stop, as he turned to face the young Guardian.

‘That was Empress Daasdrei. Won’t we get in trouble for being so short with her?’

Rhes shook his head, “No, my dear Igor. She has no power here, in the morgue. When she dies, she’ll end up here, too. Same with Janto. Same with anyone here in the city. We’re in no danger.”

Igor frowned, ‘But what about the Ridgeback she’s looking for?’

Rhes shrugged, “Not our problem. He’s alive. ...Well, ‘alive’ so to speak. But since he’s living, he’s not our problem. We deal with the dead.”

Igor nodded. Rhes yawned again, heading towards his room again, “I’ll be up, come morning. Feel free to head to bed, when you’re ready.”

Though as Rhes headed to his room, he couldn’t help but wonder what would becoming of the poor Ridgeback that Daasdrei unknowingly turned into a vampire. The City of Executrix was in the middle of a desert. During the day, the sun was scorching. A vampire would burn up within seconds. He’d be very lucky if he was still alive.

...Rhes hoped that he had survived.

[2700fstreet]

THEATER / 2018-2019

The Play That Goes Wrong

Written by Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer, and Henry Shields of Mischief Theatre Company Directed by Mark Bell

So, What’s Going On?

In the aptly named The Play That Goes Wrong, very little goes right—and, as promised, just about everything goes wrong. The curtain rises on the actors and crew of the modern-day Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society preparing for their own curtain to rise; it’s also opening night for their whodunit, Murder at Haversham Manor. Their murder mystery takes place in 1922 at the home of Charles Haversham, who lies “dead” on stage as the curtain rises on Act I of the drama society’s play.

(Are you getting all this?)

As Charles’s friends and his fiancée Florence express their distress over his death, a series of plot twists unfolds, and technical difficulties begin to complicate the production. Sound effects go awry, set pieces malfunction, and misplaced props thwart the actors’ efforts to fulfill their dramatic intent. They persevere nonetheless, steadfastly carrying out their prescribed roles with absurd adherence to their scripted lines and movements, even when these actions no longer make sense.

With her groom-to-be’s body barely cold, Florence finds herself on the receiving end of a new proposal! (How timely!) Meanwhile, the Inspector arrives to investigate Charles’s death. Could Florence’s brother have been involved? Or Florence herself? What about Charles’s brother—who also happens to be Florence’s lover…?

(We warned you there’d be plot twists and turns.)

As the investigation continues, the action becomes increasingly madcap. A door hits Sandra, the actress playing Florence, who passes out, and Stage Manager Annie must replace her, with script in hand. Miscues, missteps, and misinterpretations lead to growing chaos as a poorly constructed set puts the actors in danger. The fake elevator’s floor breaks, the second story of the manor tilts precipitously, and too many actors to name end up nearly crushed or otherwise imperiled.

(And so, you have to ask…)

Can the Inspector solve the mystery of Charles’s murder? Will Sandra regain consciousness? If/when she does, will Annie be willing to give up playing Florence? If/when she isn’t, which woman will prevail? And has anyone noticed the set’s too-loose chandelier...?

It looks like most characters will survive the play-within-a-play. But will they survive The Play That Goes Wrong?

Here’s a sneak peek (“The Play That Goes Wrong at The Kennedy Center”): https://youtu.be/1EyI5mAFY90

Who’s Who

Here’s a very, very helpful note: In The Play That Goes Wrong, names are two-for-the-price-of-one, with each actor playing a character and each of those characters acting in the play-within-a-play. Good luck keeping them straight! (If in doubt, focus on the names of the murder mystery characters, as they’re used more frequently.)

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Characters in The Play That Goes Wrong

Characters in Murder at Haversham Manor

Annie, stage manager for the Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society (CPDS)

Fills in as Florence Colleymoore (see below)

Trevor, lighting and sound operator for CPDS

Fills in as Florence Colleymoore (see below)

Chris, head of CPDS; director of Murder at Haversham Manor

Inspector Carter, esteemed local official

Jonathan, actor for CPDS

Charles Haversham, deceased

Robert, actor for CPDS

Thomas Colleymoore, Charles’s old friend

Dennis, actor for CPDS

Perkins, Charles’s butler

Max, actor for CPDS

Cecil Haversham, Charles’s brother, and Arthur, his gardener

Sandra, actor for CPDS

Florence Colleymoore, Charles’s fiancée and Thomas’s sister

The Play Within a Play

There’s a long dramatic tradition of performing plays within plays, though the inner production does not usually comprise as much of the overall show as in the case of The Play That Goes Wrong. Among the most famous early examples, Shakespeare made use of this technique in his comedy, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and in Hamlet, a tragedy.

In Hamlet, the title character devises a theatrical performance intended to mirror a crime he believes his uncle to have committed in order to prompt a reaction that will prove his uncle’s guilt. Much more recently, the comedic musical The Producers told the story of two theater producers who put on a show they intend to be a flop, Springtime for Hitler, and find that it is an unexpected hit.

In The Play That Goes Wrong, the “inner” show is the entirety of the performance we see, with our Act I corresponding to the characters’ Act I, and the same for Act II. We see the story of an amateur production gone awry. Just as in Hamlet, the inner show is a murder mystery (but this one is set in 1922 and is not being performed for the purpose of catching an actual murderer).

Caption: In The Play That Goes Wrong, the standing clock becomes a stand-in for a character (who is stuck inside); here, it has “fainted” and is resting.

The Language of Stagecraft

Because you’re watching two plays in one, you might like to familiarize yourself with these words related to theatrical productions:

Blackout: what happens when all the lights on stage go out (on purpose); often occurs at the end of an act.

Company: a group of theater performers.

Cue: a line that prompts an action to take place, including another actor speaking a line, entering, or exiting; a change in lighting; a sound effect; a scene change; or a prop placement.

Interval: another word for intermission, which is the break between acts.

Opening night: the first official performance of a theater production.

Stage manager: a person who takes charge of “tech,” or the technical elements of a show, including sets, lighting, props, and costumes. In this show, Annie is the stage manager for the Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society.

What to Look and Listen for…

In The Play That Goes Wrong, actors use physicality to emphasize the absurdity of their show’s unraveling. Exaggerated physical movements also known as “slapstick” (a term originating from the loud sound produced by hitting two wooden sticks together to mimic a slap), help to promote the insanity as the cast tries mightily to perform their play.

The show’s promotional materials reference Monty Python, an apt comparison to the 1970s British comedy group also known for its physical humor (search for the sketch “The Ministry of Silly Walks”—and then, if you still have a taste for British physical humor, search for “Mr. Bean”!). In The Play That Goes Wrong, watch for ways that the actors take advantage of carefully rehearsed “accidental” movements to make their actions funnier.

Caption: An actual slap stick Accessed from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slapstick#/media/File:Bic_(instrument).jpg

Keeping all of this in mind, check out:

How the murder mystery actors point to their verbal uncertainties by using their bodies. Dennis, who plays Perkins, refers to cues he’s written on the back of his hand when he needs to say a difficult word, such as “façade” or “morose.” And when Annie fills in for Sandra to play the role of Florence, she reads directly and without subtlety from a script.

How the show takes advantage of all set pieces and props, finding ways to break or mishandle each one to add to the comedic effect. The stretcher’s canvas rips, leading the actors to carry it out absurdly without Charles Haversham’s body. The door jams, the door handle falls off, the contents of the coal scuttle catch fire, and the entire second floor begins to tilt Titanic-like. Anything that can go wrong does.

The way characters must rush to compensate for (deliberate) structural problems on the set of the murder mystery. When the Stage Manager, Annie, can’t attach the mantelpiece to the stage wall, she has to hold props herself (see below). When the actor playing Perkins can’t leave through the door, which is stuck, he instead climbs into the clock. The actors are flexible when it suits them but stick to the script rigidly at other times—all to maximize comedic effect.

Caption: With no mantelpiece in sight, Stage Manager Annie becomes a human candelabra.

Think About…

How, in addition to featuring a play within a play, the cast of The Play That Goes Wrong breaks the fourth wall (between themselves and you, the audience) when bookending the acts. Look for cast members to solicit help from or speak to the audience.

Moments of dramatic irony, meaning that the audience enjoys the tension of knowing more than a character does and awaiting the results. We know, for instance, that the Stage Manager, Annie, has replaced the empty bottle of “scotch” with a flammable (and potentially toxic) product, though the actors don’t notice—and we also can foresee their horrified reactions before they take their first sips.

How half-hearted pantomime adds another humorous element to the action, as when Max, playing Arthur the Gardener, walks in with a leash and no dog. “Get down!” he tells the empty space. “Quiet, Winston!” he shushes into silence. And, ultimately, to remove the dog from the house—“I’ll put him outside”—Max throws the leash out the door.

Caption: Max and Sandra—as Cecil and Florence—almost kiss.

Take Action: Challenge Yourself

Mischief Theatre has made good use of the “goes wrong” concept, from The Play That Goes Wrong to Peter Pan Goes Wrong to The Nativity Play Goes Wrong. In fact, much of comedy relies on surprise outcomes, from the slipping-on-a-banana-peel gag to the trickery and mistaken identities that fuel the plots of farces. Mishaps are the underpinning of the concept of irony—when what you expect to see or hear is not what ends up appearing. That’s certainly the case in The Play That Goes Wrong.

You, too, can make use of this technique to drive your own comedic productions. To practice, pick a short story, a scene from your favorite movie or play, or even a historical moment. Then try to rewrite it and have everything go wrong. Perhaps Little Red Riding Hood is color blind; or Barack Obama decides to run for president of the marching band instead of President of the United States of America; or the Grinch steals Chanukah instead of Christmas, and his dog Max keeps stopping to eat latkes and loses track of their sleigh. Imagine all the wacky potential of just one altered plot element—and then add more!

If you’re comfortable sharing on social media, post your comic composition to your favorite platform using the hashtag #storiesgonewrong.

Caption: The set’s window provides a more reliable entrance than the door, which gets stuck shut.

EXPLORE MORE

Go even deeper with the The Play That Goes Wrong Extras.

-

All production photos by Jeremy Daniel.

Writer: Marina Ruben

Content Editor: Lisa Resnick

Logistics Coordination: Katherine Huseman

Producer and Program Manager: Tiffany A. Bryant

-

David M. Rubenstein Chairman

Deborah F. Rutter President

Mario R. Rossero Senior Vice President Education

Theater at the Kennedy Center is made possible by

Major support for Musical Theater at the Kennedy Center is provided by

The Kennedy Center Theater Season is sponsored by Altria Group.

Major support for educational programs at the Kennedy Center is provided by David M. Rubenstein through the Rubenstein Arts Access Program.

Kennedy Center education and related artistic programming is made possible through the generosity of the National Committee for the Performing Arts.

© 2018 The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts

[qqueenofhades]

Uh uh. Nope. We got enough of the Lucy/Flynn betrayal heartache in the finale, I cannot handle it in the trash saga too. Fix it! Fix it now! ... please?

yadda yadda the trash saga of flynn and lucy methinks you know the drill

The door shuts with a thump, Wyatt mutterssomething about could that proprietor have been giving them any more side-eye(to be fair, turning up with an injured, clearly dangerous, armed lunatic in towdoes tend to have that effect) and he and Lucy heave Flynn onto the bed ashe continues to glare red murder at both of them. His bullet wounds aren’tlife-threatening, but they still need attention, and to judge from the amountof blood already spattered on his jacket, that should be sooner rather thanlater. Wyatt desperately needs to go back out and find the Lifeboat before JohnRittenhouse comes looking for it (let him be good and distracted at thismeeting of his, Lucy prays) and to try to find a way to contact Rufus. And asgerm theory, Louis Pasteur, and Robert Koch are still another forty years away,any surgeon they can find here will be only marginally better than useless.Lucy knows more about it than they will, and she’s a doctor of history, notmedicine. They had enough trouble finding a boarding house as it is, with thecity packed for the inauguration, and Lucy isn’t sure she wants to drawattention to herself or their hiding place by going out and looking. “Wyatt,”she says. “You go. I’ll… take care of things on this end.”

He cocks a skeptical eyebrow at her. “Really? With himsitting there looking like he wants to bite your head – or other parts of you –off?”

“I can hear both of you, you know,” Flynn growls. “In caseyou were wondering.”

Wyatt shoots a black look at him, then turns back to Lucy,putting a protective hand on her arm. “Look,” he says, still more quietly. “Idon’t know everything that happened while we were apart, and this is badenough. But if Flynn has it in his head to hurt you for something – ”

“He’s not going to hurt me.” Let Flynn overhear that,if he’s so inclined. “You know we need the Lifeboat back online yesterday. I’llfigure something out. Rittenhouse could be sending out a squad to get it rightnow, and if we lose it too, we’re done for. Take care of yourself, okay?”

Wyatt pauses for a long and loathing moment, then nods tersely.His hand lingers on her arm (something that Lucy most assuredly sees Flynn’s eyesflicker to, for all his affection of viciously ignoring them) and then he letsgo, turns away, and checks that he has his gun and it’s loaded. He takesFlynn’s too, with a very pointed look. Then he lets himself out, footstepsthumping away down the hall, and Lucy and Flynn are left alone in the smallroom, staring each other down, the tension thick enough to not only cut with aknife but serve for dessert lightly chilled. For the longest moment, neither ofthem says anything. Then Lucy goes to the wardrobe, opens one of the drawers,and starts rummaging around. Flynn watches her until curiosity finally gets the betterof anger. “What on earth are you doing?”

“Trying to figure out how to stop you from being a dead bodysewn into a mattress,” Lucy says shortly. “You could be the origin of the urbanlegend, you know.”

Taken by surprise, Flynn barks a laugh, which turns into agrimace as more blood soaks into his jacket. Then he glares at her, evidentlyresenting her even more for it, and Lucy struggles with a brief and intensedesire to just pick up the cast-iron coal scuttle and brain him with it.Instead she pulls out sewing scissors, a needle and thread, some rags, a bottleof the kind of old-timey medicine that proudly lists its ingredients asalcohol, cocaine, morphine, heroin, “and other Healthfull Substances,” and abizarre metal instrument that can work as tweezers. She scoops them all up,goes downstairs to the kitchen, and quietly asks the black maid who works there(she hopes she’s free, not a slave, but history has not been designed to makewhite women feel comfortable) for some boiling water. For the man upstairs.He’s hurt, and she needs to tend him.

The maid is skeptical, but also doesn’t want the trouble ofa death on the premises, and agrees to boil all Lucy’s tools and rags, althoughshe clearly has no idea why. Lucy tells her it’s a new theory in Paris, fromwhence they have recently arrived (hopefully this will account for anystrangeness of their clothes or behavior – when in doubt, blame the French) andthe maid nods gamely. Then, when the tools are well boiled and thus as sterileas they are going to get, Lucy washes her hands in some of the water that is ashot as she can stand it, scrubs them with the cake of rough lye soap, rinses,and takes her impromptu surgical kit back upstairs.

She half expects Flynn to have pushed open the window andescaped, limping across the city leaving a trail of blood, with a Bowie knifein his teeth to track down John Rittenhouse and gut him like a pig in front ofhis horrified disciples, but he’s still there, more bad-tempered than ever.“Are you done looking for your craft supplies yet?”

“I’m trying to stop you from dying of gangrene,” Lucyinforms him coolly. She knows he’s upset, she knows he’s hurt, but she’s stillnot intending to sit here and not give him a few whacks with the reins,especially if he is doing his stubborn-ass routine and jerking them every whichway. “Take off your shirt.”

He arches an eyebrow at her in a way that clearly says hehas about a hundred comments to make here, but will, for the moment, charitablyforbear. He reaches up with a grunt of pain, loosens his cravat, and unwindsit, pulling it off his neck, and then unbuttons his shirt, struggling to get itover his head. Then he looks at her defiantly. As if to say, here he is. Takeor leave him.

Lucy can’t help glancing at him sidelong as she reaches forthe tweezers. Despite everything they’ve done, she hasn’t really seen himnaked; their trysts have generally taken place with most of their clothes on,grasping and swift and greedy, falling into each other and burning up andrushing on separate orbits again, until they inevitably crash together oncemore. He has plenty of old scars that must come from his clandestine servicesdays. Her eyes trace over the breadth of his shoulders, the heavy muscles ofhis arms, the solidness of his barrel chest and the slight jut of his hipbones.The bullet wounds are in his left shoulder – fortunately not in the meat, thatwould be tricky and bloody – and low on his right side. Clean exit through theshoulder, a fragment still left in his side. Lucy normally faints at the sightof blood, and she’s feeling more than a little woozy now, but she is still theonly one who is going to handle this.

Lucy glances at him, as if to say that she will unavoidablyhave to come closer, and he flicks an insolent look at her, but doesn’tprotest. She slides the chair up to the bed and sits between his knees, movingto explore the bruised, lacerated flesh with the tweezers, as he sucks in his breathslightly but is too Slavic-stoic to show other obvious discomfort. She wonderssuddenly where he grew up. His mother was from Texas, as American as apple pie,but she doesn’t know where Asher Flynn was from. The half-brother he saved,Gabriel, now lives in Paris. He was an asset for the NSA embedded in EasternEurope, and to judge from the accent, his first language is probably one ofthose, though he speaks English flawlessly. Probably others. There is so muchof who this man is, who he used to be, that is so burned and buried far beneaththis blackened shell, this wreck of him, nothing left but the promise ofvengeance, the fading dream of solace. Of rightness. Of happiness. Of goodness.Of ease. He must wonder if he had imagined all of it.

Flynn shifts and grunts as Lucy locates the bullet fragmentand carefully disentangles it, pulling it out and dropping it on a cloth. Shehas to look away, light-headed, at the fresh scarlet ooze that results, andFlynn notices her reaction. “Don’t like blood, do you?”

“Or small spaces, no.” Lucy tries to keep her tonematter-of-fact, but she remembers her confinement in Rittenhouse’s root cellarlast night (and, you know, fifteen years ago) and her voice trembles slightly.She can taste bile in the back of her throat, and swallows hard. “I’m notreally cut out for adventures outside of books.”

“And yet,” Flynn says, with something either mockery orsincerity. It’s always so hard to tell with him. “Here you are.”

“I think that’s thanks to you.” Right, she can do this. Onemore hard gulp, and Lucy gets back to the task at hand. Rinses the tweezers ina diluted concentrate of the alcohol-cocaine-morphine-heroin super-solution,wets a folded rag with it, and presses it to Flynn’s side, as he hisses throughhis teeth at the sting. Yeah, that stuff probably packs quite a wallop. Morethan Bactine, that’s for sure. Once it’s mostly stopped bleeding, she takes therags away and tries to judge if she can stitch it. God, she really doesn’t wantto do that. Maybe she can wait until Wyatt comes back. He was in the army, hehas to know about field medicine, and besides, he would probably thoroughlyenjoy stabbing Flynn a few times, even if only with a needle.

“Actually,” Flynn says, with his typical, bullheadedinability to concede an argument, even when he’s getting his bullet-riddledcarcass pieced back together, “technically, it’s thanks to you.”

“I beg your pardon?” Lucy has been preparing to tackle his shoulder wound, but at that, shestarts. “You stole the Mothership, you started allthis.”

“Yes,” Flynn says. “Because Mason Industries was making itfor Rittenhouse all along. Connor Mason was so far up their ass that he sawdaylight whenever they yawned, and I could not let them get it. Ask your friendRufus if you don’t believe me. Of course,” he adds viciously, “now they do have it, so that’s all gone fornothing, hasn’t it?”

Lucy flinches slightly at the venom in his voice. “Flynn. .. Iris… we’ll get her back, I swear, we’ll find her, we won’t stop – ”

“Is it true? What Emma said? That you handed her over tothem?”

“It…” Lucy doesn’t feel up to recounting the whole sagaof Emma’s betrayal, especially since she’ll have to tell him about JohnRittenhouse, and everything that has come as a result of her stoppingFlynn from killing him. “It’s complicated.”

“Complicated,” Flynn repeats, with cold, bitter contempt.“How did I know you were going to say that? Things are always complicated for you, Lucy. You thehistorian, you the scholar, always looking for so many nuances, so manypossibilities, so many arguments. You can’t even acknowledge evil when it’sstaring you in the face, you have to try to explain and rationalize your wayaround it. Like a good little academic. There’s always another hypothesis. Something you can publish ina paper, debate about over cocktails at a conference. It’s a game. That’s allthis is to you. You’re a coward.”

This is so breathtakingly unfair that Lucy wants to slaphim, and yet it strikes at exactly what she was terrified of in the rootcellar: that she has been protecting Rittenhouse, not history, because she’snot brave enough to do what it really takes to stop them, and finds this theeasier, safer, more existentially comfortable way. She thinks of that saying,how the real enemy of goodness, the thing that allows evil to take root andflourish, is simple indifference. People don’t bother to care, as long as itdoesn’t affect them personally. And by the time they do care, it’s too late.

She digs rather more violently into Flynn’s shoulder thanshe needs to, teeth gritted, not trusting herself to answer. Finally she says,“I did not hand Iris over to them willingly. I never would have. It was a trap.Everything was a trap, set up by Rittenhouse. And you’re not the one who erasedme in the present. They did, so I would turn to them, need them, once all ofyou were gone. We did exactly what they wanted us to, the whole time. Hands ontheir clock face.”

This takes Flynn aback enough that he doesn’t have anotheraccusation to level at her, and Lucy continues to work on his shoulder.Finally, he says, “What?”

Shortly and succinctly as possible, Lucy explains whathappened with Emma. The revelation that she’s Rittenhouse, that she braggedabout tricking Flynn into coming here, the meeting with John. The plan to jumpthem here in the Lifeboat, so he could see in person the results of hisglorious enterprise. And now, Emma with the Mothership, and them, well. Fucked.

It’s hard to say what part of this staggers Flynn the most.As Lucy straightens up, needing another opportunity to look away from hisshoulder, he repeats, “John Rittenhouse is here.”

“Yes.”

“The same one you stopped me from shooting in 1780.”

“Yes.”

Flynn’s face contorts into something sneering and ugly. “Andnow he’s a grown man, thinks he’s going to marry the guardian angel who so benevolently saved him when he was aboy, and have a dozen scions of his new master race, does he? I told you! Itold you, Lucy! That he believed the same thing as the rest of them, that hewould get away and found it anyway! And now it doesn’t matter if I shoot himtoo, because he’s already planted his foul seeds for years, has dozens,hundreds of followers! You stopped me,and you’re the reason it happened!”

“Maybe it was seeing his father gunned down in cold bloodthat made him make that decision!” A burning red heat rises into Lucy’s cheeks,eyes snapping back at him. She stands up, wanting whatever self-possession shecan get for this argument; even sitting, he’s still not much shorter than her.“That’s always the thing about prophecies – whatever you do trying to avert themends up inadvertently makes them happen instead! It always works that way!Always!”

“Oh? In your books?” Atruly horrible light sears Flynn’s face like the flames of hell, and for amoment, Lucy almost is downright afraid of him. “That’s what you mean, isn’tit? It always works that way in your books!Because nobody’s ever tried to do it in real life, nobody’s ever had theability to actually change history, so we don’t know what the rules are! If Ihadn’t killed Rittenhouse, he would have done the same thing! And now, thanksto you, we don’t know if I could have stopped Rittenhouse at the start! Savedeverything, everyone! All it would have taken was you to be braveenough to step aside and let me killhim!”

“Oh? Me? To be brave enough to stand aside from a derangedman with a gun and let him kill an unarmed, terrified child? That would havebeen the brave thing in thissituation?” Lucy spits back at him, too angry to pull her punches, especiallywhen she’s so sick of him, of this, of everything. “Oh, but yes, I’m a coward.I don’t understand, I have nothing on the line. When I’ve lost my sister and mymother has lied to me my whole life, my father is Rittenhouse, my friends and Iare on the run, I can’t go home because I don’t exist, and I’ve beenresponsible, even without meaning to, for turning your daughter over toRittenhouse and letting them get the Mothership! While you and I and Wyatt aretrapped here, and God knows what Rufus is facing back home, in a history thatdoesn’t even look like ours! But yes, I forgot. You’re the only oneof us to ever lose anything. To ever understand.How dare you. How dare you.”

She’s almost in tears, taken with a mortal urge to actuallyhit him, but whirls on her heel and stares at the wall, the silence thunderingbetween them. It feels so good to finally say everything, to lash out atsomeone, at him, that she could keepgoing, but she’s too raw already, too weary, too wounded to keep wanting todrive the knife into her own heart and twisting, twisting. Why can’t he justshut up and be a half-decent person for once. Why can’t she just break down inpeace. Why isn’t Wyatt here. He mightknow how to comfort her.

The silence goes on until it is almost physically painful.Then Flynn says, very quietly, “I’m sorry.”

Lucy, who has been braced for another angry reprisal, iscaught completely off guard. She doesn’t want to ask him to repeat it in caseshe misheard. She sniffs instead, smudging her nose with the back of her hand,until most unexpectedly, he touches her chin, lifting her face with his thumb.He looks very tired and older than he is and sick at heart. “I’m sorry,” hesays again. “I… I think I’ve put too much on you. That was my mistake. Ijust…” He trails off, as if trying to think how to put this. “This wholetime. I’ve wanted to see you again.”

“What?” Lucy looks up at him, startled. “What do you mean?”

Flynn pauses again, then goes for it. “When I said it wasyou that started this, not me. I stole the Mothership, I knew about itsexistence, because I had your journal. Because it told me.”

“My journal.” Lucy still hasn’t gotten how that’s supposedto work. “But where did you get it, when I haven’t even written it yet? How didyou get – ?”

He smiles at her. It doesn’t reach his eyes, which look upat her like a drowned creature from the bottom of a well. “You gave it to me,Lucy.”

“I…” She opens and shuts her mouth. “What?”

“I met you two weeks after my wife and daughter – after…they.” He stops, looking away. “You age quite well, just so you know. Youcomforted me. You told me there was something I could choose to do, if I wantedto, and – after I talked you into it – you gave me the journal. You said we’dbe meeting again soon. And we did. At the Hindenburg.That first time – for you.”

Lucy’s mouth is still open, but nothing is coming out. Shethinks madly of John Rittenhouse, waiting to see her again since he was a boy,and now of Flynn, apparently waiting to see her again as a young woman. If he’sknown her older self, if they’ve – if she’s– none of this makes any sense at all,but that is time travel for you. “So you met – me – in 2014. When I gaveyou the journal, supposedly. But you didn’t steal the Mothership until 2016.”

“Because it said in your journal that it wouldn’t befinished until 2016. It was still two years away from completion in 2014. So Iused that time to prepare. To learn everything about where I might be going,about who I would meet, about who I might need to target. Who was Rittenhouse,and what I would have to do to take them down. No matter what.” He looks at herunflinchingly. “I used to wonder if I had in fact dreamed the whole thing. Butthere was your journal. It gave me something to hold onto. Something to keepgoing for. So I did.”

This is still a lot more than Lucy feels adequately preparedto take in. She rubs both cold hands over her face, trying to come up with anykind of response, this revelation that this – that they – are so much more than she has ever known. So he does knoweverything about her, or at least a version of her – a stranger, a person shehas never met, the uncanniest of uncanny valleys. And has, all this time, beenhungering to get back the one person he has had to lead him through that shadowof death, the one person he has trusted, the person who is supposed to lead himback to what has been so long and lost. And that, somehow, is her.

Lucy is shaken. Staggered, almost. She doesn’t know what todo with such depths of trust and belief, even as twisted and badly expressed asit has been, and understands slightly better how terrible such a loss must be,if he thought that she had forsaken him. Emma’s voice echoes mockingly in herhead. Reads your stupid journal all thetime. Thought you could do anything. So this is going to really sting, won’tit?

They sit there, still looking at each other. He appears tobe waiting for her to say something, fire back, to shout some more. They fightwell, they always have. Especially since, for whatever confounded reason, evenwhen it would make more sense – and perhaps this is it, this is the reason –she has never been afraid of him.

Lucy considers it, to be sure. It’s enjoyable. Comforting.Safe. But for all that, it is so very not what she wants to do right now.

Instead, she leans forward and kisses him.

Flynn’s breath catches in shock. Their kisses before havebeen of the hungry, possessive, taunting, testing variety, one of them or theother pushing each other’s limits, usually a prelude to a hot and hard fuckagainst the nearest wall; the closest they ever got to a bed was the one shechained him to in 1787, and there was that chaise they nearly broke in 1912,but otherwise, tenderness has not been much of a feature.Lucy cups his face in her hands, turning his head slightly, opening his mouthwith her own, able to actually enjoy it for the first time, rather than burningthrough it to another unsettled parting and lingering haunting. He makes a moveto raise his hand, and grunts in pain as his bad shoulder catches. He tries itwith the other hand instead, knotting it in the loosened hair at the back ofher neck, pressing her into him. There is a vast, unspeakable hunger in him, aneed to be touched gently, to be seen, to be wanted. No man is an island, Lucy thinks. But God, but God, Garcia Flynn has been living on onefor as long as he humanely can, and chasing away anyone who tries to swim out.

She shifts forward onto his lap, trying not to jostle hisside, as he scoots back on the bed to give her better purchase, as her kneesslide to either side of his hips. He is a very good kisser, especially whenhe’s not actually trying to tear her face off, when the rage that burnspermanently in his depths seems to have been, at least for the moment, banked.His mouth is warm and wide and generous, and Lucy utters a small sound into itas she grips his hair, her lips brushing over the fine-cut corner of his, hisnose, the rough scratch of his jaw, the underside of his chin. His good handrests low on her back, pulling her solidly against him. His shoulder isstarting to bleed again, but he also doesn’t appear to care.

Finally, Lucy pulls back, flushed and breathless, handstrembling as she reaches for the rags, wets them again, and begins to fashion amakeshift bandage. She really doesn’t feel up to trying stitches; she’ll askWyatt later. How long will he be out, anyway? It would be awkward for him towalk in on them again, though if he doesn’t have any good news about theLifeboat, it won’t matter. Lucy feels obliquely ashamed, but not entirelyenough to avoid the risk altogether.

Flynn’s dark eyes flick to her. Lucy can feel him trying alittle too hard to be nonchalant about the way her arms are almost around himas she ties the bandage into place. Then abruptly he says, “Rittenhouse. JohnRittenhouse. Did he hurt you?”

“I think I hurt him more, actually.” Lucy concentrates onthe knot; the wet rags are slippery. “I hit him over the head with a candelabra.”

Flynn grunts a surprised laugh, then grimaces. “Ah,” hesays, half to himself. “That’s my girl.”

Lucy has to swallow an unexpected warmth in her stomach, asher cheeks heat faintly pink. She’s almost tempted to tell him about theRittenhouse thugs throwing her into the root cellar overnight, see if hisoutrage extends to hearing about her being mistreated, but she also doesn’twant to prod or grub for his sympathy, and her fear, her struggle, is moreimportant than being a prop for whatever wrong conclusion he would draw fromit. Besides, the last thing she needs is to give him another reason to try tobust out of here and try to take down John with his bare hands. She pulls thebandage tight over his shoulder, and can’t resist smoothing her own handsacross the strong planes of his bare chest. Their eyes lock. It’s not only himshort of breath.

Slowly, deliberately, Lucy slides forward on his lap,straddling him, until his back is against the wall and she is fully on the bed.Their foreheads touch, breath hot on each other’s cheeks, his nose against theside of hers, as he brushes the back of his fingers on the side of her neck,with a gentleness and hesitance he has rarely shown with her. Their couplingshave been rough, insistent, hard and heavy – perhaps because both of them knowthat the other is strong enough to withstand it, and perhaps because, untilnow, tenderness is the last thing they have wanted or expected from each other.Sex is understandable, defensible. Intimacy, less so.

Lucy traces a finger over Flynn’s bottom lip, as he suckslightly on it, and she leans closer, breath catching in her throat as shehitches herself up against him. She puts one hand on his shoulder, thencaresses from his collarbone down his stomach, sliding under the waistband ofhis trousers. He shifts with another muffled grunt, holding her back, as hedoesn’t do well with not being in control of things, of thinking he’s lostfocus on the mission even for a moment. But she gives him a look, reminding himthat if he wants this, if he wants her, he plays by her rules right now.

After a moment, he shifts again, granting silent permission,and her fingers continue their downward course. Both of them gulp, mouths open,as she touches him, cupping his smooth hardness in her palm, stroking andcircling. He thrusts up into her grip, swears under his breath as thisapparently is uncomfortable for his multiple bullet wounds, and then apparentlydecides to fuck with it, literally. Lucy can’t help grinning slightly into hischeek, keeping a light touch on him, enjoying the weight of him, the solidness.When he seems rather short of breath, she kisses him on the undersideof his jaw, nips at his pulse point, and slides slowly down him, as he looksstartled. Moves to shift his trousers down off his hips, brushes her lips alongsolar plexus to stomach, then lower. Noses at the cut of his groin, and then takeshim in her mouth.

Garcia Flynn seems to stop breathing altogether, staringdown at her like a man in a dream, as Lucy licks lightly at the tip, then movesdeliberately up the shaft, sucking slowly and thoroughly. He reaches out as ifto grasp her hair, stops himself, takes a fistful of the bedclothes instead,and braces himself, almost afraid to move if it would stop this, if she mightcome to her senses. He looks down to watch her head rising and falling on him,this woman, this angel, reaching him in the uttermost depths ofdarkness. If I ascend to heaven, Lucythinks, remaining intent on her work, ifI make my bed in the reaches of hell. IfI take the wings of the dawn, if I dwell in the remotest part of the sea.

Flynn groans, bucking up into her, as she reaches out totake hold of his hips, pushing him back down, intensifying the pace of her slowand deliberate fucking with lips and tongue and teeth and breath, taking hersweet time about it. He almost whines, if it’s possible to imagine him makingsuch a sound. Lucy doesn’t relent, finds herself enjoying the control, thepower almost as much as the action itself, the way it feels to have a man likethis – this man – completely at hermercy. She takes him briefly, wetly almost to the hilt, sucks fiercely, and dragsher lips back down, curling her tongue and flicking him. He whispers something thatsounds half like a prayer.

Lucy pulls back, shifts onto her knees, and turns around,beckoning for him to unbutton the back of her dress. He does, though it takesslightly longer than usual with one good hand, and she lets it slide off hershoulders, revealing her corset beneath. She wraps her hands around his head,pulling him toward her as he presses kisses into her cleavage, worshiping atbreasts and shoulders and collarbone and throat, having clearly had enough ofletting her have the upper hand. Swings her around beneath him, grimacing asblood shows on his bandages, and they stop kissing frenziedly long enough for Lucyto whisper, “Your shoulder – we shouldn’t – ”

“Shut up,” Flynn says into her mouth, getting a hand betweenher legs (hopefully his good one, but she’s not sure he’d notice at this pointif it wasn’t) and both of them gasping as he finds her wetness, teasing at herwith a thumb but not quite slipping into her. He toys at her clit, then all atonce, enters her with two fingers, building a gentle but relentless rhythm asshe arches her hips, desperate for the friction as he rubs and rouses her. He movesfaster, and it’s her turn to whine, pulling at him, starving for his mouth, buthe won’t let her kiss him. “My rules now, Lucy.”

“You’re a bastard,” Lucy manages, conscious of how true thisis in just about any aspect of Garcia Flynn’s life, but especially this one. Shejerks at him, well aware that this is payback, as he shifts his weight, braceshimself on one arm, and slides his hand out of her. Then he rucks up her skirtsaround her knees, glances at her, and when she gives him a breathless littlenod, plunges into her hard and fast.

Lucy practically sees stars. Oh god, oh god, it feels so good that her entire body clenchesaround him. Normally this is the part where they commence on their hot andmindless rush to release, but he doesn’t move right away. Seems to be taking itin, considering it, remembering it, before he finally starts with lighter,shallower thrusts. Her head tips back, hair spilling in shining dark locks overthe white pillow, his knee riding along her hip as he changes the angle. She clutches at him, wanting, wanton. Can feel the strain and strengthof his strokes, the rasping against her, the hunger. She is ascending, unmade.

After everything, it doesn’t take long for either of them,and he pulls her half upright as he rides one final, heavy thrust into her,both of them gasping and heaving, and shuddering and burning and blazing in theheat of climax. They fall back entangled into the bedclothes. The bandage onhis shoulder is half off. He really might accidentally kill himself one ofthese days. And yet perhaps if he died like this, he might not even care.

By the time Wyatt returns later that evening, they are bothdressed and sitting carefully apart and not sure how to talk, or ifthey should. Lucy can sense that things aren’t entirely mended between them,and won’t be as long as the questions of Iris and the Mothership remainoutstanding. Flynn isn’t outright furious at her anymore, at least, but whatwas said earlier, what Lucy realized, about the weight of what he has given her,what she’s broken, intentionally or otherwise – that isn’t something that ismended in a day, hot sex or otherwise. She could still lose him from here, shethinks. Easily. Perhaps even more easily than before, as if the knives havebecome sharper, the fall more perilous. She isn’t sure what she feels aboutthat, other than that it terrifies her.

“Well?” Flynn says grumpily, when Wyatt doesn’t speakimmediately. “Are you going to give me my gun back now, so I can go take careof the bastards?”

“Yeah,” Wyatt says. “I’m not so sure that would work out foryou.”

Flynn gives him an even blacker look. “I’m happy to be wrongif it doesn’t.”

“No. I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t.” Wyatt runs a hand throughhis hair. “I don’t even know what’s going on, but it’s major. They weren’tkidding about this being some kind of meeting. Look, man. Even you and I togetherwith both our guns wouldn’t stand a chance. And…” His eyes flick to Lucy. “I’mnot sure that’s a wise idea anyway.”

Flynn frowns. “What are you talking about?”

Wyatt takes a deep breath. “Remember how we got to 2017,” hesays, determinedly offhand, “and discovered that the reason Lucy doesn’t existin the present was because her mom’s side of the family had somehow vanished?”

Lucy and Flynn glance at each other. This is news to her,but apparently not to him, as he pauses, then says, “Yes?”

“Yeah. Well. The name of the woman leading this… thing?Major Rittenhouse hootenanny?” Wyatt’s jaw tightens. He looks at Lucy again, asif he really wants to spare her from this, but can’t think how to do so. “Ididn’t see her, but I heard her name. It’s Carol. Carol Preston.”