#and yet here i am [redacted] years later still with the same kind of brain

[prettyboysdontlookatexplosions]

inspired by @honeybabydichotomy​ some time back / me wildly needing a series of small brain breaks from trying to plan this remote lesson while sleep deprived because i simply could not fall back asleep after 3:15 this morning and my brain is feeling A Wee Bit Totally Deranged, here is my vague/wishy-washy to-write list!

things you can more or less properly call WIPs:

*the story i am actively working on right now, in which eliot & quentin take a miserable vacation together and i attempt to set a world record for number of words devoted to cultivating the precise emotion of Agonized Horniness. i thought that this was going to be short and it is definitely going to be well over 20k, big lol @ me for wildly underestimating the quantity of feelings i had about eliot waugh! but actually i am having extreme amounts of fun with this deeply self-indulgent project, which has both let me try out some things that feel new for me and also unexpectedly become very personal but not at all in the way i usually mean when i say that a story is very personal, to the extent that not only am i not (as i usually am by this point in a fic) incredibly impatient to finish it, but also i am a little sad at the prospect of no longer living with it in my head all the time! i have superstitiously grounded myself from posting any more snippets of it but taken as a set i think these do capture the vibe.

*a quick & slightly goofy resurrection fic set as a kind of episode tag for 5x03 set in an alternate universe where the “plot” of season 5 is not really happening but alice and eliot still wind up on the top of grief mountain. my motivation for this one decreased as season 5 continued to be Like That to the point of erasing any desire to keep anything from it in my personal magicians canon, but i like the central conceit which involves rewriting alice’s golem spell as a collaborative spell because i’m a sucker for any and all pieces coming together imagery, and also i feel like for me personally actually succeeding in writing something light and breezy would be a really instructive and cool learning experience!

*i am too bashful to publicly describe the last item on this list and may yet prove to be too bashful to ever finish it but it started out as me trying to imagine a conversation in which quentin tells eliot about Ye Olde Sex Magic Escapade and has sort of evolved into like me thinking a lot about eliot’s ability to trust himself? trying to find the right tone/voice for this one has been a beast largely because quentin turning 800 shades of red while he explains to eliot that a stranger had to give him advice about how to give his girlfriend the orgasms he didn’t know she wasn’t having is the funniest thing in the entire world to both me and eliot, but then every other Concept i have for it is, you know, not so much. i would like to persevere though for precisely the reason i am so bashful about it, which is that i am interested in trying to do what like 80% of people into fic do several times a year, namely write a story that moves through characterization & emotional beats mostly through the mechanism of Doing It.

wisps of half-assed notions floating idly in my brain which may or may not ever result in any actual writing:

*i have two vague epilogue/coda notions for wild geese. one is that i’d like to just check in on that version of quentin a few months later and get to see him feeling like a functional person and enjoying & reflecting on the novelty of that, learning to lean in a little more to who he is and what he wants, possibly via [redacted for reasons of bashfulness], possibly just further toying with the hugely entertaining to me notion that one lingering side effect of his death/undeath is that he suddenly becomes a foodie. or he gets into, i dunno, kickboxing. just very Wow I Have A Body times. the other idea is that i am charmed by the notion of quentin and julia getting a brakebills grant to do summer fieldwork at a hedge coven/hippie commune in like maine or something, both because i like the idea of q & j getting to have a fun low-stakes magic adventure together (they deserve it!!!) and because i’m amused by the extent to which julia would be like “this is an extremely fun way to spend exactly 2 months of my life after which i would fully go out of my mind” while quentin is like “idk maybe i do want to join a hedge commune? i wonder if eliot would be into it.” also q & e writing interdimensionally transmitted letters!

*some.... thing... about julia and eliot becoming friends, either like a snapshot of them bonding while trying to resurrect q, or else a post-resurrection fic where the process was very quick so they never really bonded but now that eliot and quentin are dating julia just shows up one day like “hello eliot who is dating my best friend and therefore also my best friend now! :D” and eliot’s like “wait what now” because he’s so used to imperiously friend-seducing people in the weirdest way possible that julia texting him a link to showing of john waters shorts at metrograph is not something he knows how to process

*some... thing... about alice figuring out how to Be Okay after quentin undeads and they break up. she gets really into some niche hobby or takes herself to some scenic location and hates it or finally tries pot. shit, maybe i am accidentally talking myself into casually shipping alice/josh. but also maybe she doesn’t hook up with anyone? maybe she gets to just have... a... friend? (kady?)

*the night of the s5 finale what i really wanted more than anything was some kind of wildly, exuberantly happy ending for eliot and the mechanism for that which popped into my head was an old school kinda 5-times-ish fic centered around a series of new year’s eves. (1) yes i have written this exact conceit before (2) yes this was partly influenced by the fact that new year’s day by taylor swift REMAINS the eliot love song of all time and “i want your midnights / but i’ll be cleaning up bottles with you on new year’s day” is still the most infuriatingly perfect description of eliot in love humanly conceivable. the heart wants what it wants.

*something exploring my vague headcanon that quentin and julia absolutely accidentally did magic as kids but it was always in the structure of being dreamy kids playing at magic and half-convincing themselves in that dreamy-kid way it was real, so that when later they outgrew that they also mentally filed those experiences away as playing pretend with great intensity.

*some............... thing........... involving present day post-s4 (alive) quentin and arielle’s... grave? great-grandchild? i dunno man, like, teddy never existed without quentin going back in time, but arielle was presumably a real person and not some weird quest-generated cipher, and i just can’t imagine that a version of quentin who remembers even as much as her name and that they were married has access to fillory and some free time and doesn’t try to figure out what did happen to her. or, like, eliot comes across someone in a familiar town with familiar eyes and is like, q i think there is someone you maybe have to see. for most of my half-assed notions i would probably be almost as happy to read a fic that already exists instead of writing it myself but for this one in particular if anyone has read one please do send it my way. it just feels like an odd gap to read so many fics where quentin and eliot are thinking about The Mosaic and Their Family and not at all interested in the branch of that family that like, concretely in this timeline lived. in my brain this is NOT a depressing story but it is admittedly hard to see how that would work out in practice.

*as you can tell from this list i am not generally a big AU person in terms of writing, because by the time i’ve exhausted the things poking at me from canon to resolve or play around with i have historically lost my stamina for that fandom. BUT, the one gratuitously self-indulgent non-magic AU i want in the world is one where quentin and alice were college sweethearts who got married at 23 and divorced six months later and quentin reacted to this by deciding that love/joy/hope/happiness/dreams are for children and stupid people, and now it’s like... 6-10 years later idk and quentin is “fine” in that he shows up to work on time and pays his bills on time and doesn’t often feel sad but lives a very small life in which he doesn’t often feel much of anything or have much of a connection to himself or other people, enter of course eliot having gone through some Rough Times but eventually turned a corner towards getting his shit together and whose joie de vivre / general hotness / open-hearted affection shakes things up in ways that are both thrilling and totally horrifying!

uncategorizable by the headings listed above:

*on december 28, 2019, i started a google doc titled “magicians underworld breakout fic” which i have sporadically been adding notes towards ever since, inspired mostly by how much i think it was a missed opportunity to never have quentin and penny come to any kind of mutual understanding of each other (or even of their own reactions to each other!) except via fake pod person underworld nonsense, and how potentially fun it would be for them to team up to make it back to life. it currently contains just under 3600 words, but they are exclusively things such as:

hades and the underworld library? hades and the whole library? what’s cool about god motivations is they are almost definitionally stupid

or:

They have been taught certain things and those things are lies - connecting to how Margo got her axes

similar to #3 on the WIP list above, the reason i may never write this is the same as the reason i very much want to actually write this, which is that it is by necessity very plotty, something i have never, ever, ever done. i started brainstorming in the last few days i was wrapping up wild geese partly because i was so excited to have written a story where like magic events happened and only like 96% of the plot could be described as “and then a person has a feeling” as opposed to my usual 100%. i have generated a lot more ideas than i really expected to (some of which i like a lot!) but also am still extremely far from having a workable story, although i also have not dedicated any purposeful time to it really, just kind of let it percolate. also it is tough because every version of how it might be told i come up with definitely involves multiple POVs and so far seems to involve more than 2 partly because like a bunch of my other magicians grudges/missed opportunity wishlist items keep sort of working their way in, which is... a lot. i feel like a sensible thing to do would be to come up with at least one (1) kind of mid-tier plottiness concept, somewhere between “50k words of And Then A Person Has A Feeling with a couple thousand spent on Magic Things Happen, Which Are Also Feelings, But Whatever” and like “5 strands of plot drawing together for me to work out every single one of the 700 beefs i have with this show at once” but AS YOU CAN SEE i literally do not have any ideas that fall into that category at the moment, so. we shall see!

[serendipitous-magic]

Question Game - AKA Oversharing Hour

I was tagged by @the-angry-pixie​! And I’m a chronic oversharer, so this was fun. I’ll put most of it under a read more line because there’s a LOT.

1. Do you prefer writing with a black pen or blue pen? 

Black. Dunno why.

2. Would you prefer to live in the country or city? 

City city city city city city city city. I’m already going fucking batshit as it is, trapped in suburbia. I want to be able to actually do things, anything. Anything other than just being around the house and / or work. (And I felt like this before the pandemic started.) If you live in the city you can walk out your door and be somewhere else within like 5 minutes. A city park, a cafe, a train/subway, a local attraction, a museum, an artist’s booth, an outdoor market, etc. etc. 

Living in suburbia is like, well, to go literally anywhere you have to get into your car first and drive like 10 minutes minimum to get out of the neighborhood, and then if you want to go anywhere that’s not the grocery store you have to drive 20 minutes to get to another area of town, and then once you get there that’s the only place you can be without getting into your car again and getting a nice shot of anxiety from having to drive in traffic and have aggressive drivers roar up on your ass because you’re going 5mph above the speed limit and they want to be going 15mph above, and god help you if you have to merge, and oh by the way this is your only option to get around because public transit doesn’t really exist in any useful way in Big Suburbia, and nothing in within walking distance of your house except like 2 playgrounds and maybe one (1) gas station. (I hate it here lmao)

If I was trapped in the country I’d probably be chill with it for about a week, and enjoy the break, and the on day 8 I’d snap and go on a murdering spree out of stir-craziness.

3. If you could learn a new skill what would it be? 

I want to learn German and eventually be fluent in it. But since I’ve already started trying to learn and I don’t know if that counts, I’ll say cinematography. As in the actual working of the camera and lighting and all that. I can dream up some pretty striking images but actually getting the camera to do the settings needed to capture them is another story entirely.

4. Do you drink your tea/coffee with sugar? 

Nope. I drink coffee and tea both, and I don’t put any kind of sweetener in either of them. I used to put a shitton of sugar in my coffee and honey in my tea, and then I had some mild eating disorder struggles in college and I never got back in the habit of putting stuff in my hot drinks after that. It just tastes wrong now, after being used to plain black coffee.

5. What was your favourite book as a child? 

Either the Harry Potter series or The Hobbit. My grandma would take care of me a lot when I was really little because my parents both worked full time to support us, and every single time I was at her house she’d sit us down at the dining room table and read something to me. Not Junie B. Jones or anything, either, but real, big, thick books. I loved the shit out of Harry Potter and The Hobbit; I would request them repeatedly. We pretty much went back and forth; we’d read Harry Potter, and then The Hobbit, and then when a new Harry Potter book came out we’d read that, and then The Hobbit again, and so on and so forth.

6. Do you prefer baths or showers? 

Showers. I love baths, they’re magical, but ain’t nobody got time for that unless it’s a special occasion. I got too much shit to do to spend an hour lying in the bathtub.

7. If you could be a mythical creature, which one would it be? 

Vampire. Purely on the basis that if I was immortal maybe I’d finally have time to get my to-do list done and accomplish things. I’d miss the sunlight though.

8. Paper or electronic books? 

Paper. Here’s the thing, I really want to enjoy ebooks, but they just don’t hold my attention at all. Maybe I’m too conditioned by the internet to have a short attention span when I’m looking at a screen, idk.

9. What is your favourite item of clothing? 

I have a dark gray hoodie from the Seattle Aquarium from when I went on a road trip across America with my BFF a few years ago. It’s still my absolute favorite thing. I also enjoy my hiking boots a lot. (I wear them all the time, really they should just be called “everyday boots” haha)

10. Do you like your name or would you like to change it?

I like my name and I would also like to start going by something different. Probably just because I’m a restless soul and I feel the best (and least trapped) when I’m on the move or when things are changing. The second I get somewhere I want to be somewhere else. That’s just how I am. Gwen is a cool name (I’ve personally met maybe 3 people in my whole life with the same name, face-to-face), but there’s a lot attached to that nickname that I don’t necessarily want to carry with me when I eventually escape my hometown and start down a new path.

11. Who is a mentor to you? 

A friend and former professor whom I usually refer to online as Producer Man. He’s a producer (as you may have guessed) who kind of took me under his wing after I was in one of his film classes in college. We work together on film projects now and he’s teaching me bit-by-bit (usually by way of long, rambling, tangential stories / lectures) about the industry. He’s a really good guy. Like, he for sure has a case of Old White Guy sometimes, but his heart is absolutely in the right place. “He’s a little confused, but he’s got the spirit.” He’s always leaving $10 tips at coffee places and working himself to the bone to get his students connected to jobs and internships that will help them with their careers. 

12. Would you like to be famous and if so, what for? 

Yes, my stories. Actually, “famous” is not the right word. It’s just that fame is so tightly associated with success in our society. I want to be successful. Whether I’m widely known or not is pretty inconsequential to me. I want to make stories and I want them to have an impact. Books, film, etc. It’s about as simple as that.

13. Are you a restless sleeper? 

Oh yeah. I have trouble  sleeping as much as I should because I usually kind of jerk awake in the morning with this vague feeling that I forgot something or that I’m late for something. Also I stay up later than I should because I’m a night owl, and yet I like being up early because early mornings are great. And usually if I dream at all it’s something kind of stressful, like I dream that I forgot something important or did something wrong. I’m a Stressed Bean. 

14. Do you consider yourself a romantic person? 

I think so, yeah. I’m pretty obsessed with the idea of romance (I mean look at my OTPs), but heteronormativity got me fucked up enough that I’m bad at actually navigating real romantic feelings or relationships because society never prepared me for The Gay.

15. Which element best represents you? 

Fire, probably.

16. Who do you want to be closer to? 

My mom. We fight a lot and there tends to be a lot of tension between us. It’s a long complicated story. It boils down to, she really hurt me when I came out as not-straight at 15 and she lost all of my trust and even though she’s working on being less homophobic we’re still kind of trying to repair that divide seven years later.

17. Do you miss someone at the moment? 

Dude, I miss everyone. I’m an introvert and I’d love to be at a big party right now. I miss socialization. (As does everyone.) 

18. Tell us about an early childhood memory. 

The first time I experienced deja vu, I was about eehhh 6? And I legitimately believed, for several years of my life, that I had future-predicting abilities. Like, supernatural-level future-predicting abilities. Because I didn’t really know what deja vu was, so I thought, every time it happened, that I had already ~seen~ that moment in my dreams or something. 🤣

19. What is the strangest thing you have eaten? 

Hm. (My immature ass brain yells “DICK.” No, brain. Those were dark heteronormative times. Also, grow up.) 

Probably some of the sushi in Seattle. I actually love sushi, it’s just that when it has full-on legs and eyeballs I start getting a little squeamish. I like the rolls and the kind where there’s some fish meat laid out on a nice little bed of rice, that’s delicious. But when they brought out the whole shrimp with legs still attached, I was like “How in the (redacted) am I going to chew / swallow that.”

20. What are you most thankful for? 

That I happened to be living with family when this pandemic hit. I was supposed to move out (and across the country, actually) as of... like 4 days ago, as it happens. That was the plan. Plane ticket was gonna be booked for 7/15/20. Obviously, things didn’t quite work out that way, because of the pandemic and a few other reasons. But I can’t imagine if I had been in an apartment living with roommates, or in an apartment on my own struggling to get by, when this happened. A lot of people couldn’t pay rent and lost their homes. I was very, very lucky to be where I was, when I was, and very lucky that I have family who let me stay in their house pretty much indefinitely while this clusterfuck of a year happens.

21. Do you like spicy food? 

Yes! I looooove spicy thai food especially. I miss the massaman curry from a local Thai place so much 😭

22. Have you ever met someone famous? 

Um. Maybe? I met Veronica Roth once at an author talk in the library where I work, although it was before I worked there. And I met some guy from New Zealand who’s famous for his sword fighting skills because my dad does sword fighting stuff. Don’t remember his name though.

23. Do you keep a diary or journal? 

Yep. I have to write down everything or I forget. (I often say I have the memory of a goldfish.) Also, I have this compulsion to record and preserve my experiences in life, because I feel like our time on Earth is so fleeting and if I don’t write down what’s important to me, I’ll forget it and lose it.

24. Do you prefer to use a pen or a pencil? 

Pen. Pencil gets smudged.

25. What is your star sign? 

Scorpio, which is ironic because they’re supposed to be ~hyper sexual~ I guess, and I’m like gray-ace or something in that zone.

26. Do you like your cereal soggy or crunchy? 

Crunchy. Who eats soggy cereal? Are you okay? Do you need help? This is an intervention. 

27. What would you want your legacy to be? 

My stories. Life and sentience, as we experience it, is made up of just that: experience. And I read somewhere that, on some level, the human brain doesn’t differentiate that much between real life experiences and fictional experiences. I think that’s true. If you read or watch or hear the right story, it can really touch you and change the way you see life, or even change the way you live life. Stories have an incredible amount of power, both in individual people’s lives and in larger society. A huge amount of power. I want to be able to give people experiences that will Enrich Their Lives (do I sound like a lifestyle coach yet? 🤦🏼‍♀️), but also stories that actively do good in society. Positive representation, body positivity/neutrality, diversity, healthy relationships (Hollywood has a real problem with that). Hope. It’s the best thing I can think to give society, and storytelling is what I love to do.

28. Do you like reading, what was the last book you read? 

I love reading. I wish I did it more. Part of my problem is that I get caught up in the hectic Rat Race of modern society and I never feel like I have time to sit down with a book for hours. Another problem of mine is that I start too many things at once, meaning I currently have like 5-10 (I lost count) books that I started reading, and I want to finish all of them, which means no progress ever gets done on any of them.

I last finished The Goldfinch, and I am currently working on The Secret History, Good Omens, Dune, a book my dad wrote, Directing Actors, Shot by Shot, The Way of Kings and I forget what else.

29. How do you show someone you love them? 

Physical affection, acts of service, words of affirmation, quality time, and gifts, in that order. If I’m close to someone, whether romantically or not, I want all the affection. And I’m kind of dying in quarantine. 

30. Do you like ice in your drinks? 

Depends. I usually don’t put any in, because it’s just gonna water down the drink and get in the way of drinking it (you know when the ice attacks your face?), but I don’t really mind ice in my drinks.

31. What are you afraid of? 

Helplessness. I Have Control Issues. ✌️ Also stagnation.

32. What is your favourite scent? 

Amber. Or any scent that’s kind of autumn-y. You know what I mean. Some other examples include dryer sheets, wood smoke, cigarette smoke (my big sister used to smoke a long long time ago, and although I never saw her do it, I still associate the scent with her), pine resin, rain, that Mahogany Woods scent from Bath and Bodyworks.

33. Do you address older people by their name or surname? 

If they introduce themselves as Pam I call them Pam. If they introduce themselves as Mr. Brown I call them Mr. Brown.

34. If money was not a factor, how would you live your life? 

 If “money is not a factor” means I have an infinite amount of money to spend as I wish, then: buy land, build film studio complex on land, found company, hire fellow creatives, make movies.

If “money is not a factor” just means that I don’t have to work 40 hours a week to afford rent, then: move to Chicago, rent a nice studio apartment, write stories, maybe work 15 hours a week at a used bookstore or coffee shop to get me out of the house and socialize. Go to museums, go to the park, walk along Lake Michigan, go to gay bars, ride the train, brave the Illinois winters, own a cat, paint, play guitar. Build my actual career on writing / storytelling. Probably also do some filmmaking.

Alternatively: buy an RV (not like an American Trailer Park shitty RV, I’m talking the NOICE ones), buy good film equipment, be a freelancer, live in RV driving around to wherever the next filming location is. Life is a road trip and I’m doing what I love. Writing, storytelling, filmmaking. My home would travel with me. Writing in cafes; roadside attractions; early mornings on the road with coffee in the cup holder as the sun comes up; being able to go anywhere to film; always experiencing something new.

35. Do you prefer swimming in pools or the ocean? 

I’ve lived in a landlocked state my whole life, so I guess swimming pools. And, listen, I CANNOT get water in my mouth at the beach without wondering exactly how many kids have peed (or worse) in that water. (I know that’s a thing with pools too, but pools get cleaned.)

36. What would you do if you found £50 on the ground? 

Wonder what some poor European is doing in America right now. But if it was $50, I’d probably yell “DID ANYONE DROP THIS?” and then take it if no one speaks up.

37. Have you ever seen a shooting star? 

A few times, yeah.

38. What is the one thing you would want to teach your children? 

Grades are not the end-all-be-all. Skip some homework assignments to spend time with friends. Skip class sometimes. I’m serious. If you make school your top priority, even over your own personal life, you will come away with good grades and a lot of regret and missed opportunities. Learning is HELLA important, and very very little of it happens inside a school building. Get a 15 hour weekend or after-school job in high school, befriend your coworkers, and have fun with it. Use your paychecks however you want. Join a school club - one that you’re actually interested in. Do stupid shit. Light your textbooks on fire after graduation or go to the 24 hour Wendy’s at 2am with your friends or kiss that person you met at summer camp or sleep on the porch because it’s too hot to sleep inside. Be smart and safe, but follow your whims. If you let yourself fall into routine, apathy will poison you.

39. If you had to have a tattoo, what would it be and where would you get it? 

I already have a couple small ones, but the one I want next is a four-leaf clover. Don’t know where. Maybe my right inner wrist or maybe an ankle. Or like behind my ear. Luck has saved me so many times. (See above, with how I happened to be living with family when COVID hit.)

40. What can you hear now? 

Swamp cooler downstairs, the clock ticking in my office, cars outside, people moving around the house. I’m surprised the neighbor kids aren’t shrieking their absolute heads off as per the usual. 

41. Where do you feel the safest? 

When I’m alone and unobserved. 

42. What is the one thing you want to overcome/conquer? 

TMI warning, but I absolutely despise public bathrooms. How am I expected to pee when there’s somebody sitting like three (3) feet away, with only a partial wall between us, hearing everything that’s going on? My fight or flight response simply will not allow it. It’s too awkward and therefore Not Safe. Either that public restroom has to be empty except for me, or it has to be so loud and bustling that ain’t nobody hearing anything. Anything in-between and I’m in hell.

43. If you could travel back to any era, what would it be? 

The ‘80s. Let’s be honest, even that far back makes my life (as a woman, and as a gay person) hella difficult. But, consider this: it’s the ‘80s. Furthermore, consider this: a part-time job might have actually supported me and paid rent back then 😱 Holy fucking shit. Sign me up. I just wouldn’t want to go any further than than like 1980, because again: lesbian. Being a woman in the past = even harder than it is today, being gay in the past = even harder than it is today, being a gay woman in the past = oh no.

44. What is your most used emoji? 

In order of descending frequency:

😂🙄😊😁🤦🏼‍♀️👀😬🌈🤷🏼‍♀️😙

45. Describe yourself using one word. 

Creative

46. What do you regret the most?

Wasting my entire teenage experience. (See #38.) I did quite literally nothing with my life except homework for like 18 years. If I had taken even a tenth as much time for myself as I did for school, I would be so much farther along as a person today.

47. Last movie you saw? 

In the theaters? ........ uh. Shit, I don’t actually remember. It’s been like 5 months. (As it has for everyone.) But the last movie I watched was Lights Out, because I’ve been watching the director’s youtube channel. You could tell it was low-budget and that the director was still kind of finding his stride, but it had a lot of heart behind it and the creators clearly gave a fuck, which made it enjoyable. I am firmly in the camp of “not everything has to be a Magnum Opus or have a multi-billion dollar budget to be a good movie.” If I engaged with it and got some sort of emotional experience out of it, and if it had a good message, I consider it a good movie.

48. Last tv show you watched? 

I don’t usually watch a whole lot of TV shows (who has the time?) but I think the last thing I watched was either The Witcher or that new Unsolved Mysteries miniseries on Netflix. Oh and I was watching Dead to Me because I just love Linda Cardellini’s face and I want to wrap Judy up in a blanket and cuddle the shit out of her and protect her from all things 🥺 My precious beautiful unstable sweet murder baby.

49. Invent a word and it’s meaning. 

Apapanic. It’s where you’re so stressed about things that half of your brain is panicking but the other half is so overwhelmed that it circled all the way back around to being calm to the point of apathy, so you just kind of sit there like

[iatethepomegranate]

Homecoming Chapter 26

Tumblr is being a pain and hiding this from the tag again, so I guess I’ll have to take out the masterlist link again. Because functioning websites are for losers, apparently.

This is part of the Human Connection series. You can find the masterlist linked on my “tags and fics” page.

Pairing: DickTiger

Rating: Teen (this chapter)

Length: 3.2k

Summary: Tiger has his debriefing with Maxwell Lord.

Notes: Angsty chapter incoming.

Warnings: discussions of torture (with some detail), discussions of violence (with some detail), panic attack, vomiting, discussion of a past relationship age gap

***

Chapter 26

Maxwell Lord’s office was sparsely decorated with the barest of necessities: a desk, three chairs, a computer, a filing cabinet, a shredder. It was clear he did not intend to remain here full time. He sat behind his desk with a recording device. Tiger sat on the other side in a chair that was too soft for comfort. He felt like he was sinking.

“Well,” Maxwell Lord said, folding his hands on the desk. “It seems you’ve had an eventful few years.”

Tiger wanted to comment that Lord knew most of this information already because only a fool would send an agent undercover without any kind of oversight, but thought better of it. Dick and Helena took his comments in their stride, but Checkmate was more… formal. In some ways.

“Yes,” Tiger said. “I have.”

“I understand you are still in contact with Bertinelli,” said Lord. “She has provided recommendations of her own. I would be interested to hear yours.”

“Most Spyral agents who remain were unaware of their employer’s true intentions,” Tiger replied. “They could be rehabilitated...”

“But?”

“We need to discuss Bannon.”

“You were light on the details of his involvement,” Lord said. “I take it you wanted to speak about his behaviour as a whole?”

“Yes.” Tiger glanced at the recorder. It was still working. He was uncomfortable, but if this conversation did not go on record, it would be much easier for Checkmate to ignore his opinions.

“This recording will be transcribed and redacted,” Lord told him. “You know it’s confidential. No one can access it without authorisation. You can speak freely.”

Tiger had to remind himself to take a deep breath. “I ask your patience in this matter.”

Lord nodded. “Granted. Is this a difficult topic for you?”

Admitting weakness to his superiors never felt right… but it felt necessary this time. “Yes.”

“You have mentioned multiple encounters with Bannon. Shall we work through them chronologically?”

Tiger didn’t know what else to do, so he nodded.

“Tell me what happened after you were abducted from the store.”

Tiger did not like to think about it, let alone talk about it. He had only shared the barest of details at best, and only with Dick. Putting his thoughts in order felt like putting sandpaper on his brain.

“Bannon chained me to a wall,” Tiger said. “By the wrists. It was uncomfortable on its own, but then he struck me repeatedly in the face and torso. He demanded to know where I had been, where I was going and where Grayson was located. I refused to answer. He broke three of my ribs. My nose did not break, but I bled profusely. Those are only the injuries which left a mark.” He balled his hands into fists on his knees to stop them shaking. It was not effective. “He kept the room cold. He would leave me alone between beatings until I felt it. Shivering was painful, but I could not stop it. I was denied water. Had Grayson not come for me, denial of food was also likely.”

Lord sighed. “Tiger, the unfortunate reality is most spy organisations use these interrogation techniques for a reason. That is why we train our agents to withstand them.”

Tiger had to fight down the urge to punch him, or to run out of the room. He was not sure which would have prevailed if he had been unsuccessful.

“If you are implying that I am weak—”

“That is not what I am implying.” Lord was lying. Tiger could hear it in his voice.

“Shall I continue?” Tiger said, not waiting for an answer. “He knew which ribs were broken. He deliberately struck them to cause more pain. I am fortunate my lungs were not punctured by bone fragments.” Breathing hurt, as if his ribs were broken again. “I do not recall that as a common interrogation technique from my training. Risking the death of your prisoners seems counterproductive. The man simply enjoys hurting people.”

“He’s a rare breed,” Lord said. “We don’t have many people who are willing to inflict that level of suffering for interrogation purposes.”

“I know you have read the research: torture as an interrogation technique is ineffective. Prisoners, once they reach a breaking point, will say what the interrogator wants to hear, even if it is inaccurate.”

“Did you?”

“I was not in his grasp long enough. Grayson was, when his time came.”

“Had Grayson not located you, do you think you would have answered his questions?”

“I had hoped to delay long enough that information about Grayson’s location would be outdated.”

“You were in no condition to fabricate a believable lie?”

“I do not know.” Tiger gripped his knees, because if he didn’t hold onto something there was a chance he would walk about. Or punch Lord.

“So, you’re telling me Bannon was an effective enough interrogator that it’s difficult to lie to him?”

“No. Grayson lied to him often.”

Lord rubbed his chin. “That is interesting. Now, you say you encountered him again later.”

“He stabbed me in the shoulder. We were allies by then, to his knowledge.” Tiger hating thinking back to that fight. “Bannon started the fight when Bertinelli brought me back to Spyral. I did not expect he would attack an ally and was unprepared.”

“Do you know why he started that fight?”

“He said he wanted to prove my weakness to the director of Spyral.” That was something else Tiger hadn’t discussed with Dick. Dick knew there had been a fight, but not the details.

“Was he under orders to do this?”

“I am uncertain. Daedalus might have ordered him to weaken my connection to Bertinelli, but I have no evidence.”

“I suppose I’ll just have to ask him.”

Tiger’s stomach lurched. “I would prefer you did not.”

“Are you concerned he will know you spoke to me about this?”

“You know the answer to that question.”

“Well, it’s an important thing to know. If he chose to attack you while you were, to his knowledge, an ally, that does raise concerns. However, if he was under orders…”

Tiger wasn’t sure how much more of this he could take. “What of Grayson?”

“Grayson has a great deal of valuable knowledge.”

“He forced me torture him. He placed Grayson in a machine he knew caused long-term medical problems. Even then, Grayson did not provide the information he demanded.” Tiger’s voice was rising, and he couldn’t stop it. “He caused Grayson severe life-changing injuries for no reason. He tormented me for no reason after I had already been forced to obey his orders. Bannon finds joy in hurting people. He likes it. After all the bullshit I went through to stop Spyral, the fact you want to recruit the man who—”

Lord held up a hand. “Tiger, enough. I understand this situation is distressing, but you must recognise you are too close to give an objective assessment. If you were in my place and you had a perfect candidate before you, who could save millions of lives if his energies are channelled correctly… if the only problem was he had harmed an agent of yours, can you tell me you would not consider—”

“No,” Tiger snapped, “I would not employ somebody who treated an agent in my care the way Bannon has treated me. I would be more concerned about retaining the talent I had instead of—”

“Do you intend to return to the field, Tiger?”

“I will not pass the psychological assessment. Because of Bannon.”

“But if you did pass?”

“I cannot answer that, because I would be a different person.”

“Your point about retaining talent is irrelevant if the talent is not retainable.”

That sentence was a knife through Tiger’s stomach. He’d never before considered that Checkmate would stop caring about him the instant he was no longer useful to them.

He should have known that. The foolishness of his youth had come to betray him once again. It did not matter that he had completed a high-risk years-long mission for Checkmate. It did not matter he had put his life, body and sanity on the line for them. If he was no longer useful, why would they care about his opinions, or even what happened to him?

Tiger was not a fool… until he was.

He wanted to leave.

A hand fell on his shoulder. He flinched.

“I’d like you to take the evaluation,” said Lord, “regardless of whether you believe you will pass. Same time next week. Afterwards, we can talk about your future with Checkmate. You’re a good agent, Tiger. It would be a shame to lose you.”

Tiger wasn’t sure if he wanted to cry or hit something.

***

After the meeting, Tiger shut himself in a bathroom. In such a private building, each bathroom was clean and self-contained with a toilet, shower and sink. There was also a bench, on which Tiger now sat with his head cradled in his hands, trying to remember how to breathe.

He was failing.

He desperately wanted to hear Dick’s voice, but his devices were downstairs with the security guard. Tiger was not up for the journey yet.

Lord was going to recruit Bannon. What he’d done to Dick and Tiger did not matter. Tiger should have expected this. Checkmate may have been home to him once, but they were still spies. People were tools. They might try to repair them when they broke, but they would not hesitate to discard them if they thought it was a better use of their time. Especially when someone was too broken to be fixed by stitches and a few therapy sessions.

If Tiger was lucky, they might give him a medical discharge and some compensation. Assuming they didn’t discharge him for insubordination.

He felt sick. He threw up in the toilet. Then he sat on the floor, shaking.

This had been a bad idea. He should have known Checkmate would recruit Bannon, that what he said would not matter. Many of the people involved in Checkmate also had their hands in other operations… such as the Suicide Squad, which recruited violent criminals because they were violent criminals.

Bannon’s recruitment was nothing to these people. Tiger should have known better. He should have been prepared. This should not have hurt him as much as it did.

But he was hurt. Badly. He did not know how he would find the strength to get off the floor, walk down that long corridor, into the elevator and through security. Where would he find the strength to pretend he was okay long enough to get home safely?

Home.

Wayne Manor.

He was not sure how he felt about that. Checkmate had once been home to him, too. Even Spyral, after a while.

Spyral was gone. Checkmate was not the safe harbour it had pretended to be. Wayne Manor was…

Dick was there. Jason. Damian. Tim. Cassandra. Stephanie. Alfred.

They seemed to care about him. But so had Checkmate.

A knock on the door. “Tiger, get out here.” A woman’s voice. Helena.

What was she doing here?

Tiger pushed himself to his feet, flushed the toilet, washed his hands. Opened the door.

“What are you doing here?”

“You’ve been gone a while,” Helena replied.

“How—”

“My temporary clearance from my meetings with Lord still works,” she said. “Come on. Dick and Alfred are waiting, but Dick doesn’t look too good. We need to go.”

Tiger took a breath. “Okay.”

They started down the corridor.

“How did you know I was here?”

“I ran into Eimal at the security checkpoint.”

Tiger was quickly reaching his limit of surprises. “And how do you know Eimal?”

“He was part of the handover team who took the prisoners off our hands,” Helena replied. “Mentioned he knows you.”

“Knew me.”

Helena raised an eyebrow. “Ah, he’s your ex. Bit old for you, don’t you think?”

“Ten years is not—” Tiger stopped himself. “We are not having this conversation.” They reached the elevator and Tiger stabbed the down button. “I regret telling you I had an ex.”

“Ten years is an age gap I’d be concerned about for how young you were at the time.”

“Helena.”

“And I know he hurt you, so I don’t think I’m wrong.”

“It was a long time ago,” Tiger muttered. The elevator arrived. They entered.

“I was there when you started your mission with us, Tiger, even if I didn’t know your allegiances at the time.” Helena stared hard at him. “You were a mess.”

“I was not a mess,” Tiger lied.

Helena chuckled darkly. “Not only were you a prickly bastard, you were so… pensive.”

“Pensive.” Tiger almost wanted to laugh, but in his state, it would likely result in sobbing.

“You thought no one noticed how you’d just stare into space with that little frown of yours?”

She was saying things just to bother him now. “Little?”

“It’s a good thing I didn’t know he was your ex when we worked together,” Helena continued as if he hadn’t spoken. “I probably would have punched him.”

“I can take care of myself, Helena.”

“No, you can’t.”

Pain swept through Tiger’s chest and he had to bite back tears. Helena must have been it, but she kept quiet. If Tiger were smarter, he probably would have filed his reaction away to examine later, but instead he tried to push it into a tiny corner of his mind that he would never visit again.

Helena sighed. “I hate to ask, but how did your talk with Lord go?”

“Badly.”

“They’re recruiting him?”

“I think so.”

“Fuck.”

“You suspected. Admit it.”

“Well, when I have to drag you out of a bathroom, that’s not the best sign.”

“If you tell anyone…”

“I won’t,” Helena promised. “But you should talk to someone when you feel up to it.”

Tiger held tightly to his composure. They reached the ground floor and stepped out. Muscle memory carried him through the security checkpoint, because his mind was finished. He placed the communicator back in his ear, strapped his watch to his wrist and slipped his phone into his pocket. And then that was it, until Helena pushed him to the car.

“I’ll talk to you later,” she said. “Take care of yourself. I mean it.” Then she walked off.

Dick waved at him through the car window. Tiger slid inside. He couldn’t quite get the seatbelt to click into place—his hands shook too much—so Dick did it for him.

“Are we ready, sirs?” Alfred asked from the driver’s seat.

“We’re good,” Dick said. “Let’s get out of here.” He leaned his head on Tiger’s shoulder as Alfred pulled away from the curb. “How’d it go?”

“Can we discuss this later?” If Tiger lost his composure now, he would not find it again for a long time.

“Sure.” Dick twined their fingers together. “Didn’t expect to see Helena today, but at least it was a nice surprise.”

Tiger chose not to comment. “How was your appointment?”

“Fine, I guess. They did lots of tests and shone a light in my eyes so now everything kinda hurts. They’re gonna call when they have results, then maybe I’ll start trying some medication. Assuming they’ll work when the migraines were caused by machines and not the frailty of the meatsuits in which we live.”

Tiger chose to ignore the end of that sentence. “Do you think traditional medicine will work?”

Dick shrugged. “Like I said, I’ll try anything. Obviously, I couldn’t tell them why I’m getting these migraines, which might be a problem. So, trial and error, I guess. We’ve got connections with researchers, so maybe we can figure something out.”

Tiger, not for the first time, had a terrible thought that Checkmate, if willing, could probably help. He did not voice it.

After today, he was not sure Checkmate would give him anything… even if he had lost years of his life to an undercover mission on their behalf.

He had to stop thinking about it before he broke.

Dick nuzzled his shoulder. “I’m gonna try and nap for a bit. Maybe it’ll buy me some time before my head explodes.”

“My shoulder is your pillow,” Tiger replied.

Dick laughed softly. “Thanks.”

***

Dick had to go straight to bed when they arrived home. It was bad timing; he knew something was wrong with Tiger, but he couldn’t do anything about it.

The migraine had eased somewhat by dinnertime. Dick didn’t feel up to eating, but he could use the company. And check on Tiger. The man gave him space during his migraines, since it was hard to tolerate another person’s presence, but that had also robbed Tiger of one of his usual private spots. And Tiger had looked like he needed some privacy… and a listening ear.

A soft knock on the bedroom door interrupted his thoughts. Dick called for them to enter. Bruce stepped inside.

“How are you?” he asked quietly. He didn’t reach for the light switch. Dick was grateful. He could use a few more minutes in the dark.

“A little better. Was thinking about coming to dinner.”

Bruce sat on the bed with him. “I tried to speak with Tiger earlier. He asked if it could wait, and Cass insisted he train with her instead. So, I called Helena.”

“Did she know anything?”

“She knew a little. Unless Tiger misread the situation, which I think is unlikely, it seems Checkmate will proceed with recruiting Bannon.”

Dick’s nausea returned. He had to take a few deep breaths. Bruce put a hand on his back, grounding him.

“So, that’s it,” Dick said when he felt well enough to speak. “They’re doing it. They’re fucking doing it.”

“I’m sorry.” Bruce rubbed his palm across Dick’s back in wide, slow circles.

“Tiger just took down Spyral for them, and this is how they repay him?” Dick glared into the darkness, thoughts spinning too fast for his head to take them in his condition. “Shit, just take me out of the equation for a second here. This guy repeatedly tortured and psychologically tormented one of their agents… and they’re cool with having him on board? How the fuck does that make any sense?”

“They don’t want to give up a resource they think they can use.”

“That’s the fucking problem. They’re not seeing Tiger and Bannon as people. They’re seeing them as resources.”

“You’re not wrong, Dick.”

The remnants of Dick’s migraine were quickly forming into a rage headache. “This is fucked.”

Bruce gently squeezed his shoulder. Dick tried to breathe out some of his anger; it wasn’t productive right now, and he didn’t want to make Tiger feel any worse when they would next be in the same room.

“I’ll see what I can do,” Bruce said. “I’ve had dealings with Checkmate in Gotham before. If they want those dealings to remain cordial, they need to respect this family.”

The significance of what Bruce said was not lost on Dick. “So, when are you telling Tiger he’s part of the family?”

“When we train together. Let me know when you think he’s up to it.” Bruce got up and offered Dick a hand. “Tiger and Cass are training in the batcave. We’ll grab them on the way to dinner.”

[f-117-nighthawk]

More playlist meta bc I don’t wanna do homework and Jimmy kicked me out of the TA room saying I’d been in there for far too long for a Friday (it was four hours! Interspaced between classes! Workshop kit inventory is just an excuse to blast Gloryhammer to me, it’s fun)

Since I was talking about Ten Thousand Against One earlier, I’ve been thinking about the timeline and which event the songs are connected to. Long post under the cut

Turn the Lights Out is... sort of an odd case. It’s not like Remnants of Stars, which is about Galran and my philosophy about how we were created, what happens to us when we die, and the cycles that power the universe. Of course, Remnants of Stars is a little more than just philosophy. It actually describes (in a rather metaphorical way) the actual process of the marthinazik filtering quintesence into new stars, planets, beings, anything you can think of. It also has a very important lyric for much much later like, post Sticky Notes later. Now that I think about it, it actually defines a good chunk of that maybe-sequel-maybe-idea era in conjunction with Soul Extract’s Filaments. 

Anyway, back to Turn the Lights Out. It’s an odd case because it’s sort of like Remnants of Stars in that it’s more about the philosophy, but it’s before Remnants of Stars because it’s also kind of an event. If you read interviews with Delain about Moonbathers, Charlotte states that Turn the Lights Out is about Neil Gaiman's Sandman comics, specifically the character of Death. I confess I haven’t read those comics, but my interpretation fits her rather well I think. To me, Turn the Lights Out is about a gentle god who accepts they will not always be seen as who they are but will give their everything to protect those within their universe. Now, who does that sound like? Which characters have been around since the birth of the universe, under various names, whether they be Ibeshganszá, ‘kibrraldíl, Marduzbazí, or Vôltrôn? 

You can make an argument for Your World Will Fail to be directly after Turn the Lights Out, but I rather like it after Remnants of Stars too. Turn the Lights Out is the beginning of the universe, so naturally, it goes first. Sentient life needs to evolve for Remnants of Stars to truly fit, and even though Your Would Will Fail technically can happen at any point between the first Plank time and the next, it also happens when the comet that becomes Voltron crashes into Daibazaal. The Your World Will Fail/Dark Matter/Eater of Worlds trio is both a general, entire timeline-spanning idea, and a specific event. 

(Your world will fail my love/It's far beyond repair/Your world will fail my love/It is already there)

(Bring me your soul/Bring me your hate/In my name you will create/Bring me your fear/Bring me your pain/You will destroy in my name)

(Can't imagine the violence/The rage and the love in my madness/I am the eater of worlds and I'm looking for someone to feed me)

And then, right after that event, or even during, you have Apocalypse 1992. The death of the dream, the final madness before the triumph of chaos. 

You Keep What You Kill is very much the odd one out out of everything. Helion Prime based it off a book I forget the name of, but here it’s purely about Zarkon’s empire. The “Holy Half-Dead” have lost so much of their culture, of the family bonds that kept them together even when their mistakes threatened the destruction of all, but they still remember the songs of glory. And they do keep what they kill. 

And then there’s a rather large time jump of about five thousand Earth years to The Seven Sisters. This song is pretty well encapsulated in Child From the Stars (Lost in the Dark) (which is a lyric from Closure, but Closure is later for Reasons), but the other half of it is connected to Memories of a Girl I Haven’t Met.

Who Will Save You Now has gone through so many iterations of what it’s connected to I honestly don’t remember what it actually is anymore. Given its placement between The Seven Sisters and Nobody Gets Left Behind, I think it’s related to the SFSS Genesis’s disappearance. But it could also be placed in conjunction with A Simple Plan and be about something slightly different...hm, I’ll think on that. This song has such a Dark Matter vibe to me, but it hasn’t found a home that sticks in my brain yet. 

Nobody Gets Left Behind is really there bc it’s a fun song and when I found 1551 I immediately had to put something in. BUT it is a good song about family dynamics and, well, that’s Voltron in a nutshell right? (and then you get, right there in the first verse, “Don't even try to pretend/That you're rough and just as tough/As when you're missing a friend/Attack and take him back/Cause when the team isn't whole/You've got a hole in your soul/So step up to your fucking role/We might get hurt/We might be taking some hits/But when you're taking our friend/Then that's some personal shit” and you cannot tell me that’s not everybody’s mood post Battle in the Sarnan Nebula) 

A Simple Plan is a new addition in the past few weeks. I rediscovered The Spiritual Machines a few weeks ago and the lyric “How long can we hold off ending/How long can we pretend we're ok” hit me right in the Keith feels. So this one is in conjunction with the first verse of Nobody Gets Left Behind. The entire song actually reminds me of Dark Matter with how it’s centralized at one event but contains hints of other things (The truth arrived too slow).

Memories of a Girl I Haven't Met is maybe one standard year (so six earth months-ish?) after A Simple Plan. 

String Theory is... weird. It’s mostly there for the title, but the lyrics do contain themes found in other parts of the playlist that fit really well but don’t map to the event I associate the song with. It’s honestly about Shiro missing Adam and the rest of the people on Earth. Which, granted, given the point in the timeline the title is associated with makes a certain amount of sense but...idk. And the bit that begins with “You don’t believe in space” is about something entirely different. It’s confusing, but all inexplicably related to the title event.

Interesting fact: My Dark Matter drafts/ideas folder is actually split int pre- and post- String Theory folders. It was originally because String Theory is such a pivotal moment in the Coalition’s efforts, but it also ended up vaguely the middle of the timeline. It’s the point where things absolutely, truly, have no relation to what happens in canon. The butterfly effect stemming from the events of Shatterpoint (and an implied secondary shatterpoint in another fic) have changed things enough that apart from one general event, nothing happens the same way (and that event is for drastically different reasons). All in all, it fits the weird vibe of the song rather well.

Next is Belgrade, the Ultimate Klance Song, about three months later. Fun Shenanigans happen in conjunction with this absolute bop.

Here’s the surprisingly big gap of just over a standard Earth year, in which several important events happen that don’t have songs attached to them (Roentgen, maybe)

Then we get Birthright/Firewall, a set of songs about reclaiming yourself from the depths of hell with just a liiiiiitle bit of help from your family.

(It's time to take ahold of what belongs to me/It's time to walk away with no apologies/Voices in the mirror start quietly/And now they're screaming back at me!)

(This force knows what you can do/And what you can make/With your tattered shell)

Here Comes the Reign technically starts during Birthright/Firewall, but doesn’t come into full effect until a month later, and then even fuller around five months after that. Meanwhile, we have The Day the Earth Collapsed, which is rather self-explanatory.

A few months later there is Darker Matter. The fic connected to this is real weird, but also real important. Suffice to say it’s gonna be confusing, and a universe doesn’t like the Paladins for a while.

And then we have Closure. Child From the Stars (Lost in the Dark) is actually the first of four fics inspired by Closure’s chorus. (I also drew a picture for each fic. They’re combined into my desktop background, and the first one is still my phone background and my pfp) “I am the child from the stars/That got lost in the dark/Between heaven and hell/I am forced to live on/I am the cause when you sin/I am the demon you skin/But there is no more tears to beautify/This is my last goodbye”

Closure is a rather sad song actually, but the way I’ve interpreted it ends on a bright spot of hope. The first related fic I’ve already posted/talked about, the second would be around the time of A Simple Plan. The third is somewhere in the gap between Belgrade and Birthright/Firewall. I’ve placed Closure at the approximate time of the fourth fic. I actually just moved it while writing this, because I realized this makes more sense after Darker Matter and with the Fall of [Redacted]. I’ve chosen to interpret the last line as finally deciding to stay instead of the (probably more likely given the rest of the album) darker interpretations.

After Closure is Ember, which is actually super connected to Darker Matter which is why I originally had them next to each other. The thing is, all three of these songs are connected to very specific events, the latter two of which are in direct response to the first even if there is a month or two between them. Ember is on the playlist for two reasons: the first is the line “dark matter falling from the sky” that basically required me to put it somewhere; the second is the fact that I keep mishearing the lyrics. “chthonic” is not “cuthonic” (which is not a word, but I interpreted as meaning Cthulu-like) and it’s “riches to embers” not “witches to embers.” Make of that what you will.

And finally, after almost seven Earth years, we get to The Reckoning/This is a Call/World on Fire/Louder Than Words. The Reckoning sort-of picks up where The Day the Earth Collapsed left off, spanning at least a year before going full force into the frantic five days of the other three songs.

(In blood and tears/A thousand times/We rise against/We'll always hold the line/Of reckoning)

(This is a call to action/This is a call to arms/All lives for one, together/There are no false alarms)

(World on fire with a smoking sun/Stops everything and everyone/Brace yourself for all will pay/Help is on the way)

(We have the force to fight/We have the blinding light/A war is more than heard/Coming in louder than words)

[devilsknotrp]

Congratulations, Meredith! You have been accepted for the role of Ariadne Guzman (FC: Odette Annable). Ariadne is an interestingly positioned character. She could easily be written as a passive love interest for Mike... or as an active member of the police force. Your application made it clear where she stood: and it’s on her own two feet. You said it so well in that she is firm in her convictions and who she is. Ariadne is clumsy and well-meaning and entirely endearing, and that came across so well in your application. You have an ear for her character and it was a true delight to read your interpretation of her. Thank you for such a great application! Please have a look at this page prior to sending in your account.

OUT OF CHARACTER

Name: Meredith Age: 18 Pronouns: They/them Timezone: EST Activity estimation: In the summertime (so, now!) I am extremely active, posting probably every other day, though I will make an attempt for every day. I’m starting college in the fall, so that adjustment might put a bit of a damper on that, but I’ll maintain posting as often as I can. I have no issue staggering posts out so I’m still on the dash, even if I prefer to post all my replies at the same time. Triggers: REDACTED

IN CHARACTER: BASICS

Full name: Ariadne Rose Guzman Age (DD/MM/YYY): 11/24/1967. Sagittarius sun, Leo moon. Gender: Cisgender Female Pronouns: She/her Sexuality: Bisexual Occupation: Police Officer Connection to Victim: Blurry television screens and terrifying accusations only bring back memories of the horrors of ‘84 — and that’s what primarily fuels her determination to bring Brian home. Simply imagining all the horrors that happened, but instead to a little boy is enough to make her stomach turn. Ariadne knows Linda vaguely from church, mostly from chatting the other woman’s ear off after presenting a particularly shitty cherry pie at a church potluck. Alibi: Ariadne was on the job when Brian went missing. It made things more horrifying and more real, but she’s grateful that it’s solid. She knows what kind of paranoia small towns cook up after trauma like this. Faceclaim: Odette Annable, Shay Mitchell, and then the original face claim of Natalee Linez.

WRITING SAMPLE

Shit. Fuck. Shit. Shit, fuck. She’s halfway through the train of expletives, mind moving erratically — like a wonky washing machine in a seedy laundromat, thunk thunk thunking against her skull, or television static after a particularly nasty rainstorm knocks out the cable — when she remembers why exactly her alarm clock is losing it’s shit at such an early hour. Church. Well, perhaps early isn’t the best word for the situation, even considering the time at which Sunday service began was still in the single digits. Not early; Ariadne is indisputably late. She knows it well the whirs and chirps and blaring of the three clocks she has stationed around her room all reminding her oh-so-sweetly. She’s always been a heavy sleeper, especially with the sheer amount of glass bottles that line her recycling bins. Sam Adams, Pete’s Wicked Ale, Coors. It’s something reminiscent of a baby cooing and falling asleep with drool trailed across plump cheeks, after his bottle, the way she curls up under the blankets in the fetal position after three or four or five ( it’s not five often, she’d swear on it ) of her favorite brew. There’s even a raggedy looking plush dog, with worn patches in his fur and an eye gone rogue somewhere between toddlerdom and childhood, that she keeps in the corner of her room. Too grown to sleep with it, too nostalgic to tuck it — even if him is the pronoun the mind conjures, one can hardly forget all the details of childhood stuffed animal lore — away somewhere far from here. It gets lonely in her apartment. But she’d headed to church, not Sunday school, damnit, and she’s going to act like it.

Speedily, hopefully, and though she rams her funny bone against the headboard as she makes a spastic attempt to slam the first alarm button as she yanks off pajama pants. She hops on one leg, half to mitigate the pain, or at least let herself think she’s doing so. Hobbling now, to the second —— aaand, the other half of her reasoning is left in a crumpled lump on the floor. I’ll pick them up later, she thinks, as she hunts for dress pants. A skirt, maybe. Should she wear a skirt? Fuck, does she need to shower? She yanks long brown locks in front of her face for a moment, inhaling deeply. Still smells like mango, her arm through it still smells like Dove soap and dollar store shampoo. No one could say she wasn’t distinct.

Third alarm is slammed off, and sweet, sweet silence fills the apartment once more. Other than the clank of pipes, of course, and she shakes away thoughts of ghost stories she tells herself when she wants to be too terrified to sleep. Criminals, she could deal with, but Casper the Ghost was pushing it. Skirt, skirt, skirt … “ Make an effort to look nice, Ariadne. ” Words are mumbled, and it takes a moment for brain to measure up with scattered thoughts and realise she’s talking aloud to herself. Great. Something fluttery and pale blue that ends at her knees is snatched off a hanger that looks terribly lonely in her closet, and she feels like a school girl as white blouse is added and respectively tucked in as neatly as she can muster. There’s no time for makeup – thankfully, she absolutely despises wearing it — or doing her hair, which she doesn’t mind so much. Hopefully not a rat’s nest. A single yank of the string dangling from crooked blinds, and she sees that the sky matches the cardigan she yanks on in hue. Dress shoes are pulled on, and she knows she’ll get a blister along with the dirty looks from a church elder or two for legs not clad in pantyhoes. Keys, keys, keys — deodorant, a swipe under each arm — keys, keys, keys.

She’s out the door now, and never more has she wished to feel sunshine on her skin. But, she only only gets overcast, and in spite of it, she skips two steps at a time down the back of the building. Cramped in spite of beautiful hardwood floors and a relatively spacious kitchen — relatively being she could turn around in it and not smack her ass against a hot stove, the apartment doesn’t really feel like home. Not yet anyway. Home. That’s a concept, that, to Ariadne at least, exists somewhere in the mythical sphere between familiar and intangibly distant. The way she’d grown up, at least, of dress collars stiffened with cornstarch and staring out bedroom window at the blinking of city lights in the distance, wishing she was doing something — that didn’t quite feel like home either. She loved her parents, she did, is how she would explain it when offering too much information, but in the same way a zookeeper might like an elephant before it sits on their chest and suffocates them to death. Time spent in Devil’s Knot still felt like a vacation. A novelty, really, some shitty tchotchke that ended up breaking the moment you vaguely manhandled it. But the illusion of small town community hadn’t shattered yet, not under hands delicate even through callouses. Nothing could, only time itself wearing down the sheen. But for now, things were bright and real and good, crisp September air shirking off summer humidity on that Sunday morning. There was a buzz of possibility — or maybe it was just anxiety at the thought of bursting through church doors too late to not interrupt the hymns.

Maybe that buzzing was what home was.

ANYTHING ELSE?

I made a pinterest board for Ariadne here, and a playlist here. Both are constantly in progress, as right now they’re looking a little sparse.

BACKGROUND / THE STORY SO FAR

Religion was always a part of Ariadne’s life, but it didn’t fall into her lap quite so perfectly until she was in Devil’s Knot. She grew up going to a stuffy church every Sunday, with old men half asleep in the pews and slow, heavy hymns that didn’t exactly put the joy of the Lord into her heart. Sunday school was a drag, and her mind was always moving far too quickly for her to pay attention. Why does God make bad things happen? She asked her mother one day, after a collection plate had been filled with sweaty fistfuls of coins and crumpled one dollar bills at the revelation that someone in the congregation had cancer. God doesn’t, her mother said sternly, giving the meat she was tenderizing another smack. Ariadne jumped. People do.

Ariadne never believed that, though, not for a long time. Not until she was seventeen, and her parent’s mumbled words by the television set caught her attention. Murder. Gruesome as could be. She could feel the sinking in her belly of anger, at the cruelty and callousness of the situation. It was in that moment she vowed — she wanted to make a change in the world. She wanted life to not be so cruel. She followed each word of the trial with rigid attention, praying a resolution would be found. And then she saw Max Acosta’s face, and her mother’s words rang true in her mind. People do. People were not a supernatural force, nor an unstoppable one. People — people she could fix.

Being a cop specifically isn’t what she’s always dreamed of — it’s helping people. Ariadne’s people skills, empathy, and desire for change had her toying with the idea of becoming a therapist for a while, but she’s never been particularly focused. The idea of sitting around all day, only using her words … it didn’t feel like enough. Still confused and lost as to how she could possibly make a difference, Ariadne lurked around the local community college for two years, taking enough classes to get an associate’s degree in psychology. The scientific parts bored her, but one class caught her interest particularly well. The Psychology of The Criminal Mind. She knew then that this, that becoming a cop, was what she was meant to do. She didn’t have to save people — she could protect them.

Moving to Devil’s Knot was an easy decision. If there was one thing Ariadne craved, it was connection. People. And a small town, one with a shitty diner and church picnics and the trial that started it all … it just felt right to her. Weren’t those the people that most needed protecting? People who had already been burned? From her tiny apartment, Ariadne poured over police manuals, pushing herself through the academy and finally, finally becoming a trainee officer. Now that she’s in full force ( ha! ) at the force, she’s lost none of her shine or enthusiasm for what she’s doing. She’s certainly not a kiss-ass, because it’s all painfully genuine. She really does want to work more hours, she really doesn’t mind the extra paperwork. Anything that needs to be done, she’ll do it. It’s just what’s right.

HEADCANONS

She doesn’t mean to be a shameless flirt, it’s just how she comes off. She’s bright and she’s funny and she’s warm, and a cheesy smile or a hand placed on a shoulder only comes from that place of kindness. Banter rolls off her tongue easily, and compliments are always genuine. She’s been like this for as far as she could remember — fourteen and charming the wits of all the boys in the freshman class. That mouth’s gonna get you in trouble one day. Her father told her then, through a half baked smile and the reeking stench of whiskey as he ruffled her hair, even though Ariadne thought she was far too old to have her hair ruffled.

Ariadne has always had to work harder than other people. Her mind just doesn’t seem to focus right. That’s part of the reason she’s so meticulous when it comes to police work, the same way she was with assignments throughout her school years. Room is always messy, clothes mostly untucked and never quite ironed properly, but she’s a marvel when it comes to facts and evidence. She likes to let people believe it’s all natural, but the amount of time she’s pulled all nighters perfecting things because everything else is just too interesting for her to focus is more than she can count.

As friendly as she is, Ariadne is not a people pleaser. Firm in her convictions and quick to spout them, shutting her mouth isn’t something she knows how to do. More often than not, these can turn into arguments — though as anyone that’s spent more than an hour with her can tell you, any spat with Ariadne is brief, because forgiving and forgetting is just a part of her personality. She’s always ready to go back to being best friends, and start the cycle over the next time you disagree with her — realistically, the next day.

No one is a worse chef than Ariadne Guzman. Except, well, she doesn’t know it. She tries, always, but she’s the type of person to burn water. Chicken comes out uncooked in the middle, pasta falls apart into mush as soon as you twirl it on a fork, cookies and cakes are burnt and runny, respectively. But she still shows up wherever she’s invited with something disgusting that she’s deemed her new specialty. Suspiciously, after the response, her specialty is never cooked again. Following instructions isn’t exactly her forté when lives aren’t on the line, so it’s not really a shock to anyone but her things turn out badly.

Ariadne loves holidays. Something about not doing much outside of her family as a child, Christmas and Easter and Thanksgiving and even Halloween were always huge celebrations for her as a child. She has spirit for everything, and is the best gift giver in all of Michigan. Even though it’s a rarity that anyone sees it, her apartment is decorated as neatly as she can muster for each of them, and she never complains when stores break out their decorations a bit too early. Don’t you feel the spirit in the air?

[nickscorza]

This is a story of mine I’ve been unable to find a home for.  I don’t normally do this, but I’ve decided to post it here, because it seems kind of scarily relevant in a way it wasn’t when I first wrote it:

To the Backers of the New Tongues Anthology of Poetry in Translation

This morning I received a package—a jumbled scree of handwritten notes, in no discernable order, stuffed into a Manila envelope that looked like it had passed through three layers of hell.  The handwriting is Allison’s.  It is the last word I have received from her, and I am afraid it is the last I ever will…

Forgive me, let me start again.

I owe you an explanation, or at the very least an apology. You have generously shared your support for literature that as I’m sure you know receives far too little attention in the English language, and now it’s my unfortunate duty to inform you that there will be no New Tongues anthology.

As to why that is, well, I will share with you the same information I shared with the police.  Perhaps you will be able to make sense of it where they or I could not.

The anthology was to consist of poetry from twelve languages little-read in English, translated by Allison, myself and ten other poets of note, each paired with a native speaker and scholar of her or his nation’s literature.  It is a reflection of the high esteem I hold Allison’s abilities as a poet that I chose [redacted] for her.  I understand it is somewhat notorious among linguists.  It certainly had nothing to do with our history. As for the country itself, I hear it is one of those tiny European principalities whose main industry is serving as a tax shelter.

The thing is, I know I did research when planning New Tongues, but I can hardly recall anything about [redacted].  I can’t even seem to find it on a map.

For weeks, my messages went unreturned.  When I came to her apartment, no one would answer the door. Then I received the notes.

I have tried my best to put them into readable order, and to take other precautions I hesitate to believe are necessary, yet which I cannot also bring myself to do without:

--M                      

…just my luck this ‘Mr. Note’ lives miles from the nearest subway, in a part of Brooklyn that’s all dingy old townhouses like rows of molars.  It’s the kind of place you can’t tell is safe or not from first glance because it’s so quiet, like a De Chirico painting with uglier buildings – a blank street that could be anywhere in the world.

What kind of a name is ‘Mr. Note,’ anyway?  Is he English?  I thought I was supposed to be working with a native [redacted] speaker.  Then again, I wouldn’t put it past Malcolm to beg me to participate in his little project, then give me an assignment designed to make him look good by comparison.  Good one, Mal.

I feel compelled to point out the falsity of this.  I chose [redacted] for Allison because she is the greatest poet I know.  The past is dead, and I harbor no more hard feelings.            -M

Mr. Note’s building looks just like all the others – four units each, with buzzers by the door.  His just says ‘NOTE,’ an imperative sandwiched between three other names whose ethnicity I can’t determine.  Maybe we’ll hit it off and he’ll let me call him by his first name. Maybe it’s ‘PostIt.’

“Who are you?” his voice crackles in the speaker, old and gruff.  What kind of accent is that?  I can’t place it.

“Allison Mandel, the poet, from the anthology.”

“The what?”

“New Tongues, the poetry anthology.”

“New tongues adorn the palace gates.  They blacken in the sun.”

The speaker dies in a burst of static.

A few moments later, the door unlocks with a buzz like angry wasps…

“You are a poet?”  His first words are a brusque question, as if he cannot believe what he sees.

I grimace, bracing myself for a fresh pile of old world macho bullshit. I’ve heard it all before; all the bitter, fungal professors that see your mere existence as a desecration of their favorite literary corpse-host.  Every university seems to sprout at least one.

Watching Allie lay into a pompous Pound scholar at a faculty luncheon is among my most cherished memories of our time together.   -M

Cable news is on a constant drone in the background. Oh lord, Mr. Note is some kind of political nutjob.

Then something in his pinched little face softens, and I think, it’s not that, it’s something else.  He’s small, no taller than my shoulder, and stooped.  His skin is etched everywhere by age, creased and blotched.  Only his hair could be called beautiful, fine and almost pure white – so delicate it is like the ghost of hair.

“Forgive me,” he says.  “It is only that poetry means something different in our language.”

Well, I have my work cut out for me.

Most good translations are the work of a poet and a scholar – and both will tell you good translations are impossible. Classical Chinese poems, for example, gain significance by their characters’ lateral as well as vertical arrangement – a web of meaning we can’t echo in English.  Languages have different tenses and thus different views of time.  Vestigial lumps in one tongue are the beating hearts of others.  If you keep at it long enough, you start to think we’re not all living in the same world.

I brought a copy of Bridal Flats with me in case Mr. Note wanted to read my work. He stares at it, confused, through little half-spectacles, as if I have handed him a pinned insect.  At his shirt cuff I can see the blue-black lines of a tattoo that must creep further up his arm.  I wouldn’t have picked him as the tattoo type.

He smiles as he reads my collection, real delight showing in his face, and I feel bad for my early appraisals of him.  Then he seems to remember something troubling – I can almost see the other shoe dropping in his brain.  His face sags into a frown.

“This will not work.  It is a terrible idea,” he says.

I swallow all the things I want to say to him. Instead I point to the table.

“Show me.  Teach me about your poetry.”

He laughs, short and bitter, but he obliges me.

We open a musty old book in his language. The alphabet is Latin, but the words are flecked with accents and strange marks I can’t guess the significance of.  Neither my fluent French nor my smattering of German is of any use.  Not a single word evokes anything familiar.  I cannot even imagine the pronunciation.

“What do you know of [redacted]?” he asks.

“Nothing.”

“I am not surprised.  We are so small, and ours is an orphan tongue, with less family than even Finnish, Hungarian or Basque.”

He hands me a battered spiral notebook.

“These are some transliterations I began.  In [redacted] the originals have a rhyme and meter which is quite complex.”

I am surprised he has done even this much—he seems so opposed to the project, but I think I can see a glimmer of desire as he watches me read over his rough, literal translations.  Some secret part of him has wanted this very much.

“The apple has a radius of

1.9 inches.  It is light red,

The variety known as Gala….”

Here I picture the perfect, questioning arch of Allison’s eyebrow, the subtle narrowing of the opposite emerald eye.  A look I knew well...                    -M

“What’s the significance of this?” I ask him. “Are they big fans of William Carlos Williams in [redacted]?”

“The apple is something real.  Something on which to hold in troubled times.  It is… safe.  Read another.”

“There are precisely 740 steps

In the National Stadium, provided

Of course you do not neglect to

Count the two emergency stairs,

Which many often do.”

He nods at this, though he winces slightly at the words ‘National Stadium.’  What kind of government does [redacted] have, anyway?  I remember Malcolm saying it was one of those little countries that never bothered to abolish the monarchy.

Something on the TV sets Mr. Note off, and we turn away from the book.  On the screen one of those dictators the West pretends is not a dictator because of favorable trade agreements is addressing the UN.  Nothing to do with [redacted], as far as I can tell, but Mr. Note is engrossed, shifting as he watches between anger and an acid, hopeless humor.

“Kim Jong Un spends millions to bring basketball stars to his birthday parties while his people starve.  They say his father forced them to listen to him sing rock and roll songs, dressed as Elvis Presley.  Saparmurat Niyazov of Turkmenistan erected a golden statue of himself that rotated so as to always face the sun.  Moammar Qadafi, before he was deposed, was guarded always by a harem of warrior women.  There are stranger things, worse things.  You do not understand, here, what it is like.  An absolute ruler styles himself a father to his people, when in fact the opposite is true.  He is a child, and nothing is so terrifying as to be ruled by the cruel whim of a child. You want to laugh, but heaven help you if you do.”

He speaks these words in anger.  Then, after they have escaped his lips, he grows pale and looks around the room nervously.  When he sees nothing out of the ordinary, he smiles.

“Let us read another.”

He leans over the notebook.  I can see the lines of the tattoo peeking out of his collar, creeping up his neck.  It’s strange, but they almost seem to be moving—little drops of blue-black blood flowing in reverse.

He lets me take his notebook home with me to read. I confess I’m surprised by the trust. He was happy when I left; smiling like a little boy who’s just founded the world’s greatest and most secret club. I’m glad at least one girl was allowed.

It’s raining outside, and the streetlights make the drops of water on my windows into little flecks of light.  Inside my apartment is small and empty.  I remind myself I can get a pet of some sort anytime I want to.  I can leave all my clothes in a big pile in the middle of the room.  I can paint the walls whatever stomach-churning color I desire. Malcolm is gone.  Why, after two and a half years, does it still feel like he’s looking over my shoulder?

I’m sure I was hard to live with.  I don’t pretend otherwise, but if only-  

No, I have run out of words on this subject.  Perhaps if I had listened and kept my mouth shut more often, the past would have been different.    -M

I stare at Mr. Note’s precise, blocky handwriting, trying to imagine what the poems of [redacted] sound like in their native rhythm.  On the page they seem constructed to be as flat and dead as possible – a poetry of the mundane.  According to his notes these go back hundreds of years, unchanged.  When everyone else was writing dense, metaphorical sonnets, the poets of [redacted] were talking about the ideal type of wood for barrel construction. They were either modern way before it was cool or else the world’s most boring culture.

The square of [redacted] contains

34,000 bricks, and a fountain…

And that sort of thing.

In the town of [redacted] they grow

Barley, and their little lives rise and

Are cut down like stalks of grain

Beneath their master’s scythe…

That’s odd… I was trying to copy a poem in Mr. Note’s manuscript that was all about agriculture in [redacted]—I don’t know what made me write those creepy lines. Looking back at the original, they’re not there.  It’s all about the yearly size of barley crops.

Reading too many of these poems must be numbing my brain.  I’m spending more time staring at my desk than reading.  Stupid Malcolm, I bet he did this on purpose.  Anything to look good in his own anthology.  

Then, as I stare at the wood of the old desk, I see something… a face.  Funny I never noticed it before, it’s uncanny—not just jumbles of lines that look kind of like eyes and a mouth, it’s an unmistakable face.  It’s simple, abstract, but every time I look at it I see something more.  The mouth and nose are an impassive mask, but the eyes…  I can’t believe what I’m looking at is just the grain of cheap wood. I have never seen eyes so hard or so cruel… I quickly look away, back to the book—only all the poems have changed. I can barely bring myself to scan the words.  Everything is blood and death.  The square is lined with crow cages, the palace walls with severed heads.  New tongues adorn the palace gates.,,

I have to leave the room after that.

The next morning, yup, nothing but the plain old wooden desktop, with two knots in the wood grain that might have been those eyes that freaked me out so much.  The poems are all as boring as I remember them.  Am I becoming one of those people who sees the risen Christ on a piece of toast?  Way to go, Allie.  Malcolm would swoop in here with the word pareidolia, then explain that it means the human tendency to see patterns and images in random nature, even after I tell him yes, I know what it means.

Of this I am certainly guilty.   -M

But I can’t forget seeing those eyes…  It’s crazy, I know, but some part of me thinks they saw me too.

I try to start planning for the fall semester, maybe even start on a new poem, but I can’t.  Whenever I sit down to write I see those eyes.  The only words that come to me are the ones I saw in the changed notebook, all blood and power and madness.  What’s going on here?  What was Malcolm thinking, giving me this?  

This afternoon I ring Mr. Note’s buzzer until he opens the gate and keep it ringing a few seconds longer for good measure. I’m furious and still shaking from last night.  This is too damn weird.  He looks happy to see me at first.  His smile crumbles when he sees the look on my face.

“What is going on here?”

He stays silent; his face drained of color. At least he doesn’t pretend not to know.

“What is the big secret with these poems? What’s your real name, anyway?”

“Names are not given lightly where I’m from.”

“Are you a refugee or something?”

“To be that, I would have to believe in refuge.”

“Ok, this isn’t going to work unless you tell me some things.  Who or what is the prince of-“

“Do not say it!”

His face is white, his body trembling.  He is feeble, a dry old leaf, but his hand reaches out to grip my arm, and his fingers close with a desperate, shocking strength.  The blue-black lines of his tattoo stand out like fresh wounds.

He starts to talk.

“Once, perhaps we were like other places.  We knew history.  We knew the freedom of our own language.  His poets changed past and present, meaning slipped away from the words we used, replaced with things we did not feel in our hearts.  Now he has always been there, and always will be. He leaves nothing pure, seeping into every corner of our lives.  With a few strokes of the pen, so much is gone.  People are gone.  You never see them again.  He has eyes everywhere, hounds trained for the hunting of men, and traitors hang from his palace wall.  You have already seen too much.”

“Don’t worry.  Take your notebook back,” I said.  “I’m done.”

I practically throw it at him.  I don’t need this in my life.  He lets it drop to the floor.

“It was foolish to want this,” he says. “Forgive me.”

As I turn away he stoops to pick it up.  The ink from his tattoo has crept down his hand and on to the page, its blue-black tracery spreading across the papers he is holding.  Something is putting down roots…  I do not stay to watch.  I cannot.

My walk home is silent, and I fight to keep from breaking into a run.  The first chill of fall is in the air, and the sky looks like it could rain on a whim and stop a moment later.  Everything is gray and waiting.  I met a Czech poet once, one of the samizdat guys, who said there were always two types of secret police – the ones everyone knew were secret police, there to remind you, and the ones no one knew were secret police, there to deal with you.

Oldřich—I always hated the way he looked at you.   -M

I keep my eyes on the street on the way back, try not to meet anyone’s gaze, and when I get home, I lock and bolt the door and collapse against it, breathing heavy.

For a moment, I almost consider calling Malcolm. Luckily, that foolishness passes quickly.

I wish you had.  Oh Allie, what happened to us?  What happened to you?  -M

In my dream, I am in a dark place.  I have forgotten the light.  I know myself by feel, but the face I touch does not feel like mine, nor do the hands that touch it.  My body is no longer related to itself, its parts are discrete, unknowing. Mr. Note’s voice is in my ear:

“The worst thing is how easily it happens. The people are willing to believe, to do whatever is asked of them.  You must merely present it as normal, as the logical choice, and it has always been thus.”

Then there is light—ghastly, painful, and white corridors, and hands on me, washing me, a mirror.  Is that really my face?  So thin, so lost.  There is a humming by my arm, and a burn as I feel the first bite of the electric needle, see the blossom of blue-black ink on my flesh, the lines that are taking shape… words, volumes I dare not read are scrawled on my skin.

[redacted]

[redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted] [redacted]

I will not leave the apartment.  When my phone rings, it is all clicks and whispers, the whirr of listening machines.  I have unplugged it from the wall.  When I creep out to get my mail I find it has been opened.

I will not leave the apartment, but I can’t stop thinking of Mr. Note, the last look of sadness giving way to terror on his face as the blue-black lines spread from his hand to the pages he held.  One day I cannot stand it anymore, and I take the subway, then the bus, then walk to where he lives.  I know I am followed every step, though I see no one.  When I get there, I find another name on the entrance to the building.  I ring the buzzer, and a woman answers, speaking a language I cannot recognize. I speak into the box, asking about Mr. Note, but there is no response.

The new semester will be starting soon.  I have already missed two faculty meetings. I don’t know what I will do once classes start.  It’s been days since I’ve written, and I’m too afraid to read even the newspaper.  I know what words I’ll find there.

My chair is heavy wood, old, scarred and pitted and stained-over many times.  It was purchased at a yard sale.  My desk- no, don’t look at the desk.  The eyes. The face.  My apartment is about 600 square feet, pre-war, with off-white plaster walls.  My walls are lined with bookshelves, some dark wood, some that cheap wood-composite stuff you get at IKEA, a mix of plastic and organic.  My books are the only thing I really keep organized, alphabetical by author, poetry and fiction and theory and general nonfiction.  The titles are all familiar and dear to me.  The Complete Works of Emily Dickinson, Millay, the Rossetti’s, Elizabeth Bishop, Lyrical Ballads, Self Portrait in a Convex Mirror, Four Quartets, Les Fleurs du Mal, The Glory of the Ruler, The Exalted Prince of [redacted], the baying of the hounds, the heads of traitors hung from his walls, wreathed in flies.  New verses are writ each day in his honor.  New tongues adorn the palace gates, they blacken in the sun.

That’s the end.  But there is more, or there was.  When I read these notes the first time, there was a poem in ink on the back of the last page, a true translation.  I confess it chilled my blood.  It is gone now, and I would not reproduce it here even if I could.  Allison is gone with it.  Not even a trace remains.

It is seventy-five steps from my office to my car. The sun is setting.  The parking lot is empty, but I know I am followed all the same.