#but the only difference in felix and locus is that Locus changed his mind last second so he didn't deserve to die like felix?? idk

[ancient-romes]

Since the shisno trilogy has been retconned can i just say i never actually believed in Locus redemption

[rvb-is-gay]

ok so now that the final episode of rvb0 is out for everyone, lets get into some discussion about it! please note that post isnt a topic of debate but rather just my personal thoughts about everything, so dont go arguing in the replies

(fair warning ahead of time for any fans, this is mostly criticism and negative feelings about it, so keep scrolling if you dont wanna read it)

When RVB0 was first announced, I remember everyone was first upset that the Reds and Blues weren't in it, including me. But now that I've watched the whole thing, I can say with confidence that my only issue with RVB0 isn't the lack of the Reds and Blues, but rather everything. the dialogue, some of the animation, the characters, the delivery, the pacing, the ridiculous amount of clichés, etc. I don't dislike RVB0 just because there's no Reds and Blues. I dislike it because I just found the entirety of it bad.

When I first started watching it, I went in with an open mind that maybe this season could actually be really good. I’d also be lying if I said that there wasn't a single scene that I liked. There were actually a few, but they still didn't make up for just the overall badness of the season. But please note that I don't blame the voice actors for any of this or even just Torrian Crawford for the season coming out a giant mess. Many people worked for this season and always had the opportunity to improve or change things but didn't. But anyways, let’s get into some of the criticisms I have for this season.

1. Smaller and more opinion oriented criticisms

This isn’t really criticism or anything important, but rather just a few things I found a bit weird to me personally.

First, the term “ragtag team of misfits” was used to describe Shatter Squad (and was even actually said out loud by One in the last episode, which sounded just so cliché and dumb in my opinion). I don't think this describes them at all?? Everyone has, at the very least, decent relationships with each other (save for One and East who were competitive with each other (which I also fucking hate in RVB that all the girl characters are always competitive with each other)), but that still doesn't really fit the term ragtag) and they all fight very well. I think ragtag fits the Reds and Blues more than it does Shatter Squad; they're bad at fighting, they argue and fight all the time, they're idiots, and that's why we love them. If they had just stuck with “a team of misfits”, that would've made more sense, but again, this is more of a personal opinion than genuine criticism.

Second, I don’t really like the aesthetics this season had. Everything felt a bit too neon and bright and then some stuff just felt like it came straight out of World of Warcraft or something. It didn’t really feel like RVB.

Third, my feelings about Carolina constantly calling Wash David can be summed up by what Michael said in the first episode of Halo 4 LASO: “Now we’re just gonna throw his name around all willy nilly. It used to be a secret.” When someone is called by their real name in RVB or just any story in general where everyone goes by code names, it’s usually a big deal and indicates something serious. Carolina wore out Wash’s name the first time she said it and it just got more and more irritating from then on out and lost its value.

Fourth, who was the blue and purple soldier in the first teaser we got? Was that One? Did they decide to change her armour colour? I don’t know, I just randomly remembered that and thought it was weird but I guess it must’ve just been a colour change.

Now, onto the more serious criticism.

2. Animation and dialogue

The second thing I wanna talk about is the animation. Don't get me wrong, the fighting animation is probably the best compared to everything else and it was pretty good to watch, but the talking and idle animations and gestures were..... kinda yikes. I know that it could be chalked up to “well we’re not used to seeing animated gestures since all of RVB usually has everyone just holding their gun and using the regular Halo models” but there were still some pretty bad parts.

Take the scene from Encounter at 3:26 as an example (I uploaded the scene to YT to put here, but obviously it was blocked for copyright):

This scene is probably one of the worst when it comes to not only the animations, but the dialogue, pacing, and delivery. When I first saw this, I honestly laughed. Here's a list of my problems with this scene and what made it so laughable:

The overexaggerated hand gestures. I get that because everyone's in armour and a helmet, it can be hard to show expression, but this feels like a bit much. Especially when One says “what? You’re pulling us off the mission? You cant do that!” I think that one scene in season 15 when Grif stays behind on Iris while everyone leaves and it slowly zooms in on Simmons’ visor somehow does a lot better at expressing feelings than this.

East immediately making the connection between Axel and Zero feels weird. I don't know if its just me who feels this way, but I think it should've been a little bit longer before she immediately is just like “you know Zero don't you”

Axel saying “I... I do... I did”  also sounds weird and like he was trying a bit too hard to sound dramatic. I don't really know how to describe it its just such a weird delivery of the line.

The way they all immediately start yelling at each other.

One saying “Axe, I trusted you” right after saying “tell us the truth”. Girl, you gave him no opportunity to explain and just immediately jumped to not trusting him anymore. Speaking of which, I don't think this was ever really mentioned again and had no meaning or importance to it.

The echoing of “I trusted you” also feels cliché to me, but this is more of a minor thing.

I think this one comment on one of the episodes on the RT site that says the dialogue “seemed acted rather than natural. It didn't really sound like how people normally talk, more how actors talk in plays” is how I feel about all of the dialogue in RVB0.

3. The villains

Zero and Diesel both felt like they didn't really have any motivation at all for being villains. Phase is probably the best when it comes to this. She was essentially abused by her father as a child and forced to undergo being experimented on. This is an actual good and understandable motivation.

Diesel we know basically nothing about, and then on the other hand, all Zero wants is power. But for what? Why? I can understand that power is a pretty common thing for people to want, but it still kind of felt like there wasn't really anything there.

Some previous good villains in RVB include:

Temple: Temple witnessed his best friend be brutally murdered right in front of him by 2 soldiers who didn't give a shit and just left him to die, especially right after he told him he was having a baby. Of course it’s understandable that he has a hatred of Freelancers after this. Any normal person would.

Felix: Felix was probably the best villain of all of RVB, to be honest (right beside the Director). He was just somehow so likeable and had so much personality, despite being an asshole. His ultimate motivation was money and being rich, which is another thing I can understand; the more money you have, the more you can essentially do whatever you want and live in luxury. I mean, even so many people in real life do horrible things just for money. I don't even have to give examples for this. Felix in general is also just a psychopath.

The Director: The whole reason the Director did what he did was because he lost the person he loved most in the world: his wife. He was willing to do literally anything to bring her back, leading to all of his actions in the Project Freelancer saga. You can find many examples of movie/TV/book/etc characters/villains seeking vengeance as a result of loss of a loved one and grief. Despite being a horrible person, the Director actually managed to be a villain you could even sympathize with, making him even better.

Sharkface: Although a bit of a more minor villain, similar to Temple, Sharkface is a villain because he wants revenge on the people that killed his team, the people he considered to be the only family he’s ever had.

4. Tucker & the swords

The fourth thing I wanna talk about is the whole thing with Tucker and the swords. I always found it kinda weird how both Tuckers sword and now Locus’ sword in the chorus trilogy were the same, but then in RVB0, Zero’s sword looks and acts completely different, but that might just be a little nitpick of mine.

As for Tucker, it was so good to see him. Although I don’t know if it was just me, but he seemed a little OOC. What I didn't like about seeing Tucker again was that he did literally nothing the entire episode. He was useless. He said “I can fight” at one point but then all he does during the battle is get held at knife point, run away, and then get stabbed and have his sword taken. Tucker isn't an amazing fighter, but he’s definitely a lot more capable than just this. We’ve seen him in action many times and I just feel like he could've done a bit more. It almost feels like he was purposefully nerfed and tossed aside just to advance the plot.

Another thing that I and probably a lot of people are upset about is the fact that Tucker might not even own his sword anymore?? When East stabbed him, he apparently died and the sword was rebound to Phase, but it wasn't very clear that this was the case. Although the beginning of the next episode starts with hospital beeps and a flatline, I don't think it was still really clear enough that Tucker actually died long enough for Phase to reclaim the sword because I saw a handful of people confused in the comments and, like me, even thought it was just bad writing at first and that the writers completely forgot about the rules of the sword established over several prior seasons.

When in the hospital, Wash tells Tucker that he almost died. Although I actually liked this scene because it was nice to see wash and tucker bantering again, I think it could've been made better and made the plot clearer if instead of saying he almost died, Wash said something along the lines of “Tucker, you died. Your heart stopped, but they were able to bring you back thanks to their advanced medical tech” and then in response Tucker freaks out because that means his sword will now work for Phase and now they know how urgent the situation is.

I really really hate that Phase just has Tucker’s sword now and nothing is even said about it. If Tucker was to give his sword away to someone, I think many people would prefer that it was at least someone close to him, like Junior for example, but instead it goes to a random girl he hardly knows.

5. Pacing

The fifth thing I wanna talk about is the pacing. This season was definitely a lot shorter than normal and I think that’s one of the things that really prevented it from being good. The entire story just feels rushed and while I understand that it can be really difficult to build a good story and characters in such a short time, I think there’s still ways you can do it without it feeling like there’s so much missing. I think the long intros and outros are also responsible for less time and maybe they should’ve considered cutting them to give more actual episode time. Here’s a few things that were poorly done as a result of bad pacing:

The final battle against Zero: The whole battle just somehow felt like a typical video game boss battle that ends super quickly to me. Shatter Squad didn’t even defeat Zero, he just up and got disintegrated or whatever from Black Lotus.

Shatter Squad giving up on their mission: After receiving the silly deep voice filtered message from Zero, everyone on Shatter Squad just immediately gives up on finding him.

One’s speech: One’s speech wasn’t awful or anything and I didn’t really have any problems with the speech itself, but rather just how quickly the team went from “we can’t do it.. it’s over..” to “you’re right! I’m in! Let’s go get them!” Compare this to Doc and Sarge’s speech to the Reds and Blues after Church and Carolina leave in season 10 episode 20. It just felt a lot more genuine (this is probably because the Reds and Blues had a lot more time to be developed, though) and was only given after some time passed rather than 2 seconds later. The scene and context also transitioned well into it and at first, nobody was on board with what Doc was saying, which is more realistic in my opinion. People’s minds won’t just instantly change, they’re still gonna think about it and maybe have a few doubts at first.

Phase and West: During their fight, West talked a lot about how he regrets giving Phase away to Starlight, that he won’t hurt her, and is even willing to die for her. Their scene together ends with Phase punching him in the head and then leaving to join the others and nothing else about them is mentioned. We don’t know if Phase forgave him or not, we don’t know how West feels, etc.

Tucker’s sword: Phase still has Tucker’s sword and like the scenario with West, nothing about it is mentioned. We don’t know what she’s going to do with it, if she’s going to keep it, if Tucker’s gonna do anything about it, etc.

6. Clichés

Clichés aren’t inherently bad and can be really impactful and good if done right. But when it comes to RVB0, it’s jampacked with clichés that aren’t good. Here are a few examples:

Everyone gives up until a speech is given: All of the points for this are the same as above, but I wanted to include this scene as a cliché as well.

Every female character is competitive with each other: RVB falls into this a lot, like I mentioned earlier. It happens again with East and One, although luckily they seem to resolve it, but not until literally the end of the season.

West’s fit about East: All of the lines and delivery in this scene were just atrocious and cheesy. I think West’s dialogue just could’ve been a bit more original, but instead we’re given this boring predictable “I won’t lay a hand on her. I promised her. I promised her mother. I promised she’d be safe” spiel that has no emotion to it in his voice.

The whole “I got this, you go ahead” thing: This isn’t like a super cliché thing, but I found it pretty interesting how it happens twice in the same episode.

I think this is pretty much all I can think of at the moment. If I think of anything else, I’ll add onto this. Overall, I think RVB0 would’ve done a lot better as just an RVB spinoff so that it could have more episodes and seasons dedicated to developing characters and a good plot. I’m really disappointed with this season and I hope whatever comes next is better than what RVB0 was. I hope the team that worked on it can learn a few things that come from the good and valid constructive criticism given to them. And if I had to pick, I think I’d say Raymond was my favourite out of all the new characters. He just felt the most relatable and realistic to me.

[secretlystephaniebrown]

Back to Prison: 5/5

Summary: The Tartarus makes good things hard to hang onto. So when a couple of mercenaries offer Wash his freedom, he can’t help but think it’s worth whatever price they might ask. Even if it brings him into direct conflict with the Reds and Blues once again.

Mercenary Wash AU.

And here we are, at the end of things! Thank you SO MUCH to everyone who's read, commented, left a kudos, or reblogged or liked on Tumblr! This has been a very fun journey, and I hope you all had nearly as much fun as I did!

One last special thanks to @jomeimei421 for drawing the art that started it all, and @sroloc--elbisivni for being a brilliant beta!

Also on Ao3

“Your turn, Wash,” Felix says, after he comes out of the true warrior test. Something about Felix is jittery, more manic than usual, after that. Locus is silent, pensive, and preoccupied, far too busy talking to Chrissie about setting up the trap to pay attention to them.

“Not a chance,” Wash says. He’s seen the men come out, terrified out of their minds, having lived their worst nightmares.

Wash’s nightmares are a lot worse than any of theirs.

Felix laughs, and Wash’s skin crawls. He reaches for his knives on instinct, and barely manages to stop himself from doing something truly, dangerously stupid.

“I wasn’t asking.”

There’s the thing about Felix that Wash understands. Felix doesn’t respect people, at least not in the way that people normally mean. Everyone, everything, is disposable to him. The closest thing to respect is whatever Locus has.

Wash is a tool, a pawn in Felix’s games.

And, ever since Tucker’s escape…

Wash feels like he’s become just slightly more disposable of one.

But being shoved, head first, into the bright, alien light, is still unexpected.

He’s standing in the snow, looking down at a body wearing his armor.

Someone grabs his elbow and he looks down, into the helmet of Lavernius Tucker, the man who he barely knows, but who has, for reasons that Wash can’t begin to understand, decided to save him.

“Focus,” Private Tucker hisses. He’s not that tall, being shorter than Wash, shorter than Caboose, shorter than Epsilon’s body had been. But he somehow manages to radiate fierceness. “Don’t you fuck this up, okay?”

“Okay,” Wash says, trying to stay upright even though the edges of his vision are beginning to blur with pain. His ribs are probably broken. Blood loss has made his head too light, and Doc hasn’t had much time to help him, not while they’d been busing getting the armor switched.

They make it through the inspection, they make it into the Warthogs, and they leave Epsilon’s body behind in the snow, for the soldier’s to deal with, and Wash tries not to collapse the second he gets into the back of the warthog.

Tucker takes off his helmet, turning around to face Wash. His features are handsome, his skin dark, his hair long, and his mouth a thin, dangerous line.

“Don’t make me regret this, okay?”

“I won’t,” Wash promises, one part earnestness, one part desperation, and one part something that Wash can’t even begin to name. “You won’t regret this.”

“I better not,” Tucker says, putting his helmet back on and turning his attention back to the road.

He doesn’t say what will happen if Tucker does regret this, but Wash can fill in the blanks well enough. Prison, a bullet in the back of the head, or even just killing him in his sleep…

Wash has earned that, he realizes with a horrible shudder. He doesn’t know much about Tucker, and the man doubtlessly knows little about him, but Tucker, the leader of Blue Team, owes him nothing. He has given Wash this second chance as a favor to Caboose. He captured Simmons, he held Doc hostage, and he shot—the pink one.

He doesn’t even know the pink one’s name. He thinks Simmons might have said it, but he can’t remember.

Wash’s fate rests solely in Lavernius Tucker’s hands.

For days, Wash is paralyzed by fear, trying to stay out of Tucker’s way, trying to be useful. He almost misses the Leaderboard, because at least then he had been given concrete evidence of his use, his worth, rather than trying to read a man he barely knows, who wears armor all the time.

The Reds fear him, dislike him, and resent him in turn. They’ve closed ranks, glaring out at the Blues with unconcealed hostility and rancor, and Wash hunches his shoulders and tries to make himself invisible as Tucker argues with the Reds over the radio about something specific that Wash can’t understand.

“I’m sorry,” Wash tells Tucker.

“Does it look like I care?” Tucker snaps. “Just… look, Caboose likes you. I’m not about to make him cry again.”

And don’t you go making him cry either, Tucker doesn’t say.

Slowly, things change. Tucker wakes him up after a nightmare, and blocks the knife that Wash tries to bury in his shoulder without so much as a wince.

“Dude, calm the fuck down, it’s me.”

For a moment, Wash doesn’t know him, thinks that the teal helmet is someone else, and he nearly calls out Carolina’s name, before he catches himself, and freezes.

“Tucker—” he gasps, staring at the hand wrapped around his wrist, keeping his knife trapped. “I didn’t—”

Tucker releases him. “Dude, it’s fine. Do you think you’re the only one who gets nightmares?”

He’s not. Tucker has them too—screaming ones, ones that lead to him making horrifically sexual comments all the next day, and spilling anything he holds because his hands are shaking so hard. Caboose has ones that lead to him crying, soft, shuddering gasps, whispering a litany of names—his sisters, Wash learns—and not stopping until he manages to get them all right.

“Tex had ones like yours,” Tucker admits, one night. His face is streaked with sweat, and his hands are trembling as he tries to wrap his fingers around his mug of hot cocoa. “She taught me to grab the wrist. She used a gun, not a knife, but she made me do it over and over again, until I was fast enough. I had to wake her up, because if Church did it, it was… bad. And if we let her sleep, it was worse.”

“Couldn’t you have… taken her gun?”

Tucker gave him a look. “It was Tex. She had guns all over Blue Base. I found one in Caboose’s cereal once.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah,” Tucker says, and smiles at him—wide and brilliant, despite Tucker’s exhaustion. “She was an asshole like that.”

“You miss her,” Wash says, surprised.

“She was my friend,” Tucker says. He passes Wash his own mug of cocoa.

They sit in silence for a few moments, before Tucker looks up at him.

“You know you are too, right?”

“What?”

“My friend.”

“… oh.”

Carolina comes back, after that. Carolina, scarred and green eyed, her hair still dyed bright red, and her entire body coiled so tightly with tension that Wash thinks that, one day, she’s going to lash out and bring down everything with her.

It’s just like Freelancer.

She hasn’t changed a bit in any way, except now, her devotion towards the Director, has turned around on its head.

“Revenge, Wash,” she promises him, her hand extended. “For both of us.”

Wash reaches out and takes her hand.

The Reds and the Blues tag along, into a series of wild twists and turns, until it brings them to a room, large and strange, with Epsilon’s hologram hovering over them all…

And Carolina raises a gun against Tucker’s head.

“Well, what about now?”

“Carolina!” Wash says, but he doesn’t move. “That isn’t necessary!”

“We found the Director! We can make him pay! This is what we wanted!” Epsilon says. “Tucker, c’mon! He screwed you guys too!”

“Really? That’s what you guys want?” Tucker demands. He’s wearing his helmet, but Wash knows that he’s staring right at him. “Revenge? That’s the only thing that matters?”

“You don’t understand, Tucker,” Wash says, slowly, carefully, keeping half an eye on Carolina and the gun.

“I don’t want to understand!” Tucker yells, striding forward despite the gun that’s still aimed at the back of his skull. “Fuck, Wash, I thought you were—I thought you were better! But you’re not, are you? You’re still that selfish fuck who shot Donut and got Church killed and—” He reaches out, as if to grab Wash—in a hug, or a strangle hold, or something else entirely.

Wash raises his own gun, and Tucker falls silent.

“Carolina,” Wash says, staring down the barrel of his gun at Tucker’s helmet, familiar and teal. He doesn’t want to shoot, but he will, if Tucker moves. He doesn’t want to, but it’s just a fact, and Tucker knows it too, from the way he’s staring at Wash, but keeps staying absolutely still. “We don’t need them. Let’s just go.”

“Right,” Carolina says, holstering her own pistol, still radiating fury.

The two of them walk away, with Epsilon.  

“Fuck you, Washington,” Tucker whispers, at his back.

“So… they were right, not to trust you,” a voice, booming and alien, fills the world, and—

Wash is standing in a blank, empty room, driven to his knees by the intense pressure of that voice.

“What—what was that?”

“A different world… a world you wonder about. You wonder, what would have happened, had Lavernius Tucker chosen differently. I showed you what would have happened. I showed you that he was right, to leave you there. You are, and always will be… this.”

“No,” Wash says. “You’re wrong about me.”

“Am I?”

Wash grits his teeth, his hands clenched into fists by his side. “You are. I’m—I’m not like that.”

“I see no evidence of that.”

“You don’t know me.”

“I do. You saw it for yourself. You were offered everything you say you desired… and you threw it away, to seek satisfaction from the man who wronged you. As you throw away an entire world in the name of vengeance. You are NOT WORTHY.”

Wash falls backwards, out of the portal, gasping for air, and he stares down at his own hands.

What does that… thing know about him? He thinks, ignoring Felix’s laughter in the distance. There’s no way it could do what it says it can, reaching across worlds, and pulling that out.

Lavernius Tucker…

“You killed Church! You tried to kill Donut! What, was I supposed to fucking drag you along just because Caboose liked you?”

“It’s clear bringing you along would have been a fucking terrible idea.”

“Bet you would have thrown the rest of us under a bus the first chance you’d have gotten. If you hadn’t killed us all in our sleep in a fit of Freelancer paranoia first, at least.”

… had he been right?

There’s an ambush, today. An entire army, being led into a kill box. An army, that, according to everyone that Wash has ever talked to, includes teenagers.

And Wash is party to that. He’s been party to a lot, in his life, but this…

“So shove the broody righteous hero attitude, cuz guess what? You’re the goddamn bad guy here.”

Lavernius Tucker had been right about him, all along.

But that…

That doesn’t mean that whatever was in that portal was.

He can… there’s still time.

He can still change things.

Wash moves away from the portal and follows the rest of the pirates. He’s supposed to stay back, to prepare for a raid on Armonia.

That will be a good place to start, Wash decides.

He’s still trying to figure out how he’s going to manage to sabotage a mission that he’s leading without making himself a too obvious target for his own men, when Chrissie makes the call.

A tower that kills a planet… and a key that lets them do it.

Well.

It looks like Wash’s defection might have to be a little more obvious than he’d hoped.

The Temple of the Key is a craggy, strange building on a snow-covered mountain, and Wash immediately hates it when he gets there. There are cliffs, which are already awful, but there’s also snow, and the air outside is so cold that Wash can almost imagine he can feel it through his environmentally controlled armor.

“Any sign of them?” He asks one of the pirates, trying to ignore the prickles of memory poking around the edge of his mind.

“No sir,” Ross, one of the men who was here before the Tartarus, replies. “But the Temple is fucking with our equipment, so we can’t be sure.”

“Fan out and secure the perimeter,” Wash says, switching out his pistol for his rifle. “Radio me if you spot them.”

“Yessir.”

The interior of the Temple is huge, in a way that Wash… isn’t used to. Interiors of buildings and ships are always… small. Even the Tartarus’s center, open for floors upon floors, had always felt claustrophobic. But here, the ceiling is a high arch, curved in such a way that every slightest sound is audible, and the sleek, steel ramps curve around the walls, hinting at a never-ending maze of rooms. The light is a strange greyish blue and… alien.

And there, in the center of the room, is the handle of a sword just like Tucker’s.

“Do you truly think you are worthy?”

Wash turns around, and gapes.

An alien being, made entirely of dark red light, stands in front of him, gazing down on him with contempt.

An artificial intelligence. An alien artificial intelligence.

Wash really hates his life.

“It doesn’t matter if I’m worthy or not.” Wash turns his back to the A.I. and strides across the room to the sword.

“You don’t believe it matters?”

“No. What matters… is what I do next.” He crouches down, beside the hilt, which sits, like it has sat for probably hundreds if not thousands of years, before picking it up.

It feels… different, from Tucker’s sword. It’s still heavy, but the weight of it is different, and there is no feeling of wrongness spreading outwards from his hand. Instead, he thinks he can feel the pattern of the grip changing in his hand, shifting itself to suit him, and when he raises it, it bursts to life in front of him, forming the familiar lines of a Sanghelli Blade.

He looks up, and the alien is gone.

Wash almost wonders if he’d imagined it, but he knows that it really doesn’t matter.

The sword is bound to him until he dies.

“You really think the Chairman'll let you go?”

A sword, which, in Felix or Locus’s hands, could easily spell the end to this entire planet.

“Tell that to the sixteen year olds running around wearing armor.”

Teenagers in an army, fighting a war… a war that Wash can’t even begin to comprehend.

“You’re also willing to kill an entire goddamn planet just so you end up okay? Your freedom is worth that much, huh?”

Wash is in this war, on the wrong side. He can’t deny that. Felix and Locus would do anything to get their hands on this key. They will do anything to kill off this planet and collect their paycheck.

But it’s not in their hands.

It’s in his.

Wash lowers his hand, and the blade flickers out.

He knows what he has to do next.

His radio pings, letting him know that Felix is trying to establish a connection. He’s on his way to join Wash, and he’s probably excited about getting his hands on the sword. He doesn’t know Wash already has it.

He doesn’t know what Wash is planning on doing next.

Wash takes a deep breath inside of his helmet, trying to appreciate the safety, the security, of his armor. Because, soon, he won’t have that.

He’s going back to prison after all.

He’s survived… everything, and in the end, it’s all for nothing.

He shakes his head, because if he dwells on that, he might change his mind. And he knows he can’t. He has to follow this through, has to face the consequences of his actions.

Lavernius Tucker might be irritating, but he was right about at least one thing.

Wash isn’t the good guy in this story.

He keeps walking through the Temple, out into the wide open, snow spotted mountaintop. He clips the sword to his side, like he’s seen Lavernius Tucker do, and it clicks into place, proving once and for all that ancient alien technology is a strange, indecipherable thing, that can somehow interact with modern human armor systems.

In the distance, he sees a Federal Army of Chorus pelican circling, and he breathes a sigh of relief.

Felix’s radio pings his again, but Wash still doesn’t open the channel. If he’s about to turn traitor, he doesn’t have to listen to Felix’s voice anymore, and he’s going to take full advantage of that.

Wash turns around, and there’s a sword at his throat.

“Washington,” Tucker says.

“Tucker.” Slowly, Wash raises his hands in the air, dropping his rifle.

Tucker stares at him, slowly, incredulously.

“I surrender,” Wash says, just to make sure he’s getting the point across.

“You expect me to believe that?” Tucker demands.

“Felix and Locus will kill everyone on this planet if they get this sword.” He watches as Tucker’s helmet twitches slightly, probably having only just noticed the sword clipped to Wash’s leg.

“And since when do you have a problem with that?” Tucker lowers his own sword. “Whatever happened to “We’re fighting an army, not a planet,” huh?”

“Are you really going to argue with me about surrendering?” Wash demands, feeling a headache beginning to build.

For a moment, Wash thinks Tucker’s about to follow through on his earlier declarations, and just kill him right on the spot.

But then Carolina emerges over Tucker’s shoulder, keeping her gun trained right on him. Wash feels his heart speed up in his chest, and he does his best to not allow it to affect his stance, with his hands still held up in the air.

“He surrendered,” Tucker says. “Anyone got any handcuffs that aren’t pink and fuzzy?”

“You expect me to believe you don’t?” Carolina’s voice is tinged with affection in a way that completely throws Wash off. But her gun doesn’t waver from Wash’s helmet, aimed in such a way that Wash knows that one shot could put him down for good.

In his mind, Carolina has always been like she was during the project; stressed, competitive, and on the verge of collapse, just like the rest of them.

But, standing next to Tucker, the two of them unfathomably comfortable, Wash realizes, with a lurch, that she’s changed.

The vision the alien A.I. had provided had gotten it wrong, at least about Carolina. Carolina, standing here, is different from Freelancer. She’s grown. She’s changed. She’s happy.

Envy sweeps through Wash, strong enough to choke him.

“Did you not just hear me say that mine are pink and fuzzy?” Tucker says. “Donut swapped them all out because he says that metal ones are a hazard in the bedroom.”

“What makes you think he didn’t get mine?”

“Because you’d have switched them back.”

Carolina lets out a soft laugh that freezes Wash in place. “Cover me.”

Tucker switches out his sword for his gun, and Wash is shoved against the side of the mountain, cuffed, and relieved of his weapons. Wash grits his teeth so tightly that they hurt as the cuffs close around his wrists, keeping them trapped behind his back, but he doesn’t protest.

Carolina attaches the sword to her own leg but leaves the rest of his weapons there in the snow, and Wash doesn’t say anything, even though he wants to.

“Move,” she says. “Epsilon’s jamming your radio, so don’t even try to call for help.”

But the shove against his back isn’t as harsh as Wash might have expected.

The two of them lead him into a tunnel, dark and damp and cramp.

Wash struggles to keep his breathing even. It’s not prison. He’d never been in his armor in prison. He’s not there… he’s not injured, he’s not at the crash site. He’s… he’s fine.

This is fine.

“Why did you do it?” Tucker demands, suddenly.

Wash can’t help but turn around to look at him, even though it means that Carolina’s rifle digs into his shoulder.

“Do what?” Wash asks, so focused on how close the ceiling of the cave feels that he doesn’t realize the obvious answer as to what Tucker’s talking about.

“What do you think, dude? You let me go. Why?”

Wash should say something poignant, something clever; maybe even try to convince them that he’d always planned on betraying Felix and Locus, and that was him trying to prove it to them, use it to try to help his own situation.

But he’s exhausted and trying to stave off the claustrophobia, so he just tells the truth.

“Felix was going to kill you.”

“… and you care?”

“Tucker,” Carolina says quietly. “Later.”

“No! Not later.” Tucker steps forward, and shoves Wash backwards. Wash stumbles, but manages to stay upright, his boots sinking further into the snow. “I want to know why the fuck you’re changing your mind! You wanted to kill me, so why the fuck does it matter if Felix did it?”

“Because…” Wash’s breath is stuttering in his chest, and he feels like the ceiling above them is about to give, or maybe that’s just because he’s shaking so hard inside of his armor that absolutely nothing is standing still.

Nothing except the two figures in aqua armor in front of him, who aren’t even aiming their weapons at him anymore, just watching him.

“Wash, focus!” Carolina demands, her voice cutting through the haze in his head.

The world stops spinning, and Wash realizes he’s leaning against the wall of the tunnel, having a fucking panic attack.

“Why?” Tucker demands again.

“Tucker,” Carolina growls in warning, but Wash looks over her shoulder, right at Tucker.

“You were right,” Wash whispers, his throat dry. “I was just… following orders.”

“And that makes it okay?”

“No.” Wash tries to stand up straight, and stumbles. Carolina catches him by the elbow, more gently than she has to.

More gently than Wash deserves, that’s for sure.

“You want a choice again,” Carolina says, softly. He can’t see her expression, but her grip on his arm is supporting, not gripping.

“Yes,” Wash says. “I’m… you were right. What Charon is doing is wrong, and I was helping them, and I… I just wanted to not go back to prison.” He swallows. “I’m a soldier. Not a killer. Or at least… I’m supposed to be.”

Carolina and Tucker look at each other. And, in a flash of light, Epsilon pops into view.

“Well, what do you think?” Carolina says.

“Eh, good enough for me,” Epsilon says, his avatar shrugging.

“Kimball’s not going to like this,” Carolina says, sounding amused.

“Oh, and you think Doyle will?” Tucker snickers.

“Eh, it’ll be good for them to agree on something,” Epsilon disappears and reappears closer to Tucker.

“That’s true! And we can probably sell Kimball on probation!” Tucker nods, enthusiastically.   

“What?” Wash asks, not sure if he’s at all following.

Carolina turns away from him. “Grif, prep the Pelican, we’re going right for the Communication Tower.”

“What? You got it! Holy shit, you’ve got a sword now?”

“Noooot exactly,” Epsilon says, sounding way too amused about all of this.   

“I don’t understand,” Wash says, still dizzy with adrenaline and confusion, as Tucker takes a step towards him.

The handcuffs fall into the snow, and vanish, too heavy to stay above the surface.

“Man, you Freelancers are kind of dumb sometimes, aren’t you?” Tucker says. “Welcome to Blue Team, Washington. If you fuck this up, Kimball will probably kill you before I can, but hey.”

“What? Why? After… after everything I did? You’re just… letting me go?”

“No, we’re letting you join the team! Dude, don’t you pay attention?”

“That makes no sense!”

“Look dude. You’ve got an alien sword that’s almost as cool as mine, we’re super outnumbered, you’ve decided to be less of a dick, and I already apparently owe you my goddamn life.”

“A second chance, Wash,” Carolina says, turning to face him. “Don’t… question if you deserve it or not too hard.”

“You can’t possibly be okay with this,” Wash says, staring at Tucker.

Tucker suddenly looks serious.

“Look, I’m not saying we’re buddies or best friends or anything like that dude, don’t get the wrong idea. But hey, you kiiiiind of only went to prison cuz we bailed on you, and I mean, Felix probably would’ve fucking killed you if you’d said no to helping him out, and you didn’t hand over the weapon that’d let them kill an entire planet.” He shrugs. “That counts for like, something.”

“Come on,” Carolina says. “The others are waiting for us.”

“Bet Caboose is going to love this,” Tucker says. “C’mon, Washington.”

He turns away from Wash, and keeps walking, out of the tunnel, leaving his back completely exposed.

Wash stares after him a moment, completely thrown off balance by all of this.

But, tentatively, he puts one foot in front of the other, and moves out of the tunnel, following Tucker and Carolina into the harsh, blinding light of day.  

[itsagrifthing]

One Door Closes

A/N: Oof it’s been a while since I’ve written an rvb fic, but I’ve been going through my WIPs and I really liked this one

Summary: Grif, alone on the moon after the Reds and the Blues went off to save Church with Dylan and Jax, is forced to fend for himself. He comes to terms with each of the Reds as he learns to adapt. 

Tags: Anst, nightmares

Misc: Takes place during season 15, Carolina is red team you can’t change my mind!!! 

DAY 18 SINCE THOSE CRAZY FUCKERS DECIDED TO GO OFF ON A WILD GOOSE CHASE AND KILL THEMSELVES

It had been the second fucking night in row that Grif couldn’t sleep. Which is ridiculous.

Sleeping was his thing, after all. Laziness and sarcasm and food and all that shit. The sole purpose in his life is to seek better naps, darker horizons. He has dreams of sleeping on some faraway island, in a hammock, in a place Sarge or Simmons or all the rest could never find him (except maybe Lopez. Grif always got the feeling that Lopez was kinda cool).

Instead, tonight he roamed the empty, quiet hallways of their stupid makeshift fort. Alone.

He passed Sarge’s room, but still couldn’t bring himself to look inside. Grif had closed that door the day they all left, and it stayed tightly shut to this day. Simmons’s room was a whole other matter, of course-- Grif already raided it for leftover food, and graffitied all over the posters of Sarge and, horrifically, Transformers, hanging up on his wall (he also added a nice handlebar  mustache on every picture of Simmons in Red base. Gotta have a little cultural diversity, right?)

Grif automatically made his way to the kitchen, winding between the beat-up cutout of himself that Sarge propped up in the living room, and the blow-up AirChair Grif smuggled out from Chorus, and stopping right in front of the refrigerator.

He opened the door, licking his lips, eager for something wholly unhealthy and equally delicious. He expected to see Oreo’s (which were definitely better cold), or Cheese Sticks, or leftover pizza, or hell, he’d even settle for some chocolate syrup.

But it was empty. Completely empty. The lettuce was gone. They were even out of goddamn soy sauce!

Fucking hell, Grif thought to himself. He had forgotten that the food had run out about a week ago, and he was always too lazy to go out and find more. His poor, neglected stomach rumbled. There were only so many times one could eat those blue Meth-meth shrooms, after all.

So, instead, Grif turned back down the hallway and began walking.

Walking.

Here was Dexter Grif. Alone. On a little paradise island. Without Sarge or Simmons or any of the fucking Blues here to ruin his life. He could be doing literally anything he wanted.

And he was walking? Fuck that.

But he guessed it calmed him down a little bit. It cleared his mind, and sort of made the dark corners in the base seem a little less dark. And besides, it gave him time to talk with his friend.

“So, I think I’ve figured out the secret to life,” Grif said as he walked out of the base and down toward the beach.

Simmons, keeping up step by step with him, rolled his eyes. “Let me guess, fatass. The secret to life is Twinkies.”

Grif considered this.

“I guess those could come pretty close, with the sweet, sweet cream filling and spongy exterior…” he close his eyes briefly, imagining it. He could almost taste the calories. “Yeah… I’m gonna call those a close second.” He opened his eyes and shook his head. “But no. The secret to life is…” He trailed off, hesitant to say it out loud.

“The suspense is killing me,” Simmons interjected sarcastically.

“I’m pausing for dramatic effect.”

Simmons sighed. “Please, just tell me. I’m dying to know.”

“Alright, here goes. It’s… perspective.”

“Perspective.” Simmons quieted for a moment, considering it for a second. “Explain.”

“Think about it. For years, we’ve been in life-threatening situations, fighting enhanced super-soldiers, or robotically fucked up A.I.’s. We’ve thrown ourselves into the middle of bullshit wars, gotten dragged along on the Blue’s stupid drama throw-downs, and it was the most important thing in the world to us.”

“So…?”

“But look back on it. We’ve been to the very edge of colonized space and back, and I’ve seen it all. It’s all so fucking enormous… There’s so many planets and people and lives and stories and drama. Put into perspective, we… we really haven’t done jack-shit.”

“That’s not true!” Simmons protested. “Stopping the war on Chorus, we’ve saved lives! Stopping the director--”

“We didn’t stop the Director, Carolina handed him a pistol and told him to go fuck himself! And Chorus… well, you heard what Locus and Felix said. It’s just one meaningless planet in a universe of millions and millions of meaningless planets.”

They were quiet. Grif realized that he had stopped walking, caught up in the heat of the moment. He had sunk slightly in the sand, and the waves crept up slowly around his bare feet, sparkling in the bright moonlight. Wind ruffled his hair.

“You don’t mean that,” Simmons said softly. Grif sighed.

“Don’t I?” He could barely bring himself to meet Simmons’ reproachful gaze. The look of disappointment, of pity. The look Grif saw on his face the day they left, and he stayed. The look that screams ‘you’re better than this!’ But he really wasn’t.

“You’re not even real,” Grif muttered, waving his hand, and Simmons disappeared.

He was alone again.

DAY 24 SINCE THOSE ASSHATS LEFT GRIF ALONE ON AN UNINHABITED MOON

Grif hadn’t been talking lately. What was the point? There wasn’t anyone to talk to anyways.

Simmons hadn’t returned since that night, good riddance. Grif didn’t think he could bear to see that look on his face one more time, at least not in person. The look was still etched in his mind, seared into his memories. It ached constantly, a reminder.

Grif shut Simmons’ door last night, and locked it from the inside. The graffiti wasn’t funny anymore.

On the bright side, though, Grif managed to find more food. He’d finally reached the point where he was so desperate for anything that didn’t send him on one hell of an acid trip he raided Blue base for some rope. He collected some leaves and branches too, and sat himself down on a rock for an hour, teaching himself how to make traps.

It wasn’t too hard, he learned eventually, and it was actually an ideal way to hunt. You literally set something down on the ground, and wait for the food to come to you. It was almost too good to be true.

But he soon found out the equalizer the first time he caught a rabbit in his trap.

He watched the creature struggle in vain, it’s limbs flailing helplessly. He stared into its beady, desperate little eyes. He watched as the little creature never stopped trying to escape from its predator in its lost and hopeless battle, and Grif, sickly, felt a little bit of what Locus must have felt when he stalked his prey.

Perspective, Grif thought glumly, then let the rabbit go.

He decided to try his luck at fishing.

He still managed to find other ways to avoid work: he dug a roomba out of the Blue’s basement so it could vacuum up the crumbs that Grif spilled (he never really cared about that before, but it attracted ants, which then stole bits of his other food--and he needed that, desperately), and found some fire-starters to cook the fish with. He burned the books from Wash’s bookshelf instead of gathering sticks (he figured that if the guy ever came back, he would have been through enough shit to not worry about a few lost books too much).

But the obstacle he often ran into was heat.

Sure, the fire-starters started the fire (duh), and, sure, the books kept it going. But it never burned long enough or hot enough for the fish to cook decently.

He needed some sort of fuel, some kind of accelerant, something to make the flames bigger. He racked his mind. They had run out of gasoline ages ago, since Sarge used it all in his stupid war against gravity, and Grif drank all the cooking grease once they ran out of soda. No, he needed something different. Something like… something like… something like…

Perfume.

After much debating, Grif decided to raid Donut’s room that night. The main detractor was, of course, whether or not he could handle seeing whatever pink and lacey monstrosity was in Donut’s room. It was very likely filled with various cleaning products, and nice-smelling chemicals and pretty things.

The very thought disgusted him.

But his need for properly cooked fish out-weighed his apprehension, and, besides, who knows? Maybe Donut’s hiding some spices or shit in his room.

So that was how he found himself standing outside the room of the mildly-frightening, pink, frivolous member of Red team, his hand resting lightly on the doorknob.

He hesitated for a second. Do I really want to do this? he thought. But his stomach rumbled.

He opened the door.

Immediately, bright, flashing lights blinded his eyes, and the scent of grapefruit and vanilla cream overwhelmed him. Grif rocked on his feet as a wave of sensory overload hit him, making him double over with nausea. Lace poured from the ceiling, and the clouds of smells clogged his airway, choking him. Grif gasped and coughed and sputtered, covering his eyes, his mouth, his nose, and he began to feel all his organs beginning to shut down, one by one, as all things pink weaseled its way into every pore, every orifice, taking over Grif’s body and mind--

Okay, it wasn’t really that bad.

Actually, the room was fairly mildly decorated compared to what Grif expected. The walls were a soft shade of coral, accented with neat, white trim. The room was tidy, too-- Simmons would have been impressed-- and a few smartly placed candles sat nicely by the coral-pink bed.

Sure, the room smelled more than slightly of grapefruit and vanilla, but it wasn’t overwhelming. It was actually… kind of relaxing.

Of course, Grif will never admit that. To anyone.

He cautiously walked into the room and made his way straight to the vanity. Perfumes and little bottles of lotion were arranged neatly by both size and color (again, Simmons would be proud), and Grif peered at them. He wondered which one, if any, would work the best. His hand hovered a smaller bottle, then over a large one, then one with an amber liquid, then one with a lilac liquid. There were too many to choose from…

In his indecision, his eyes strayed over to the other side of the desk, where a picture frame sat.

The picture frame was probably the most normal thing in the room, not outfitted with bows or lace or pink decorations, and Grif was surprised he didn’t notice it earlier. It was simple and brown, and though it had a ragged design, he got the feeling it had more heart behind it than anything else.

Grif picked it up and looked closer. Inside the wooden box was a picture of them-- of the Reds and Blues and Wash and Carolina and the Trainees-- all on Chorus. It was clearly a candid photo; in the foreground was Simmons, both clearly startled by the picture being taken and the close proximity of Jensen in all her braces and freckles and pimply teenager glory. Sarge was gruff, his arms folded over his chest and glaring at the camera (but there was a twinkle in his eye). Tucker was arguing with Palomo in the background, while Wash stood a little farther away, eyeing the two of them apprehensively. Grif saw himself sitting on the floor next to Bitters sharing, sharing, a candy bar. Caboose pranced about happily in the background, while Carolina was mid-eyeroll. Kimball and Doyle stood neatly in the background (a little farther apart than necessary), and in front of it all, grinning widely and throwing up a peace sign, was Donut.

Grif could barely remember Donut’s face, but he was pretty sure that was the happiest he had ever seen the guy (and that's saying something).

He set the picture down gently on the vanity again after dusted off the glass. Sunlight bounced off the gleaming frame, scattering particles of light onto the wall behind him, the vanity, and, oddly, a small bottle of orange Chance perfume as if were a spotlight. Or possibly a big arrow saying “this one here!”  

Grif grabbed it and got the hell out of the room.

He hurried downstairs and out onto the lawn where his firepit was set up. His fish were still set out on a clean rock, though he did have to chase off a fly or two. Grif tossed in a few of Wash’s books and pulled out his fire starter. Within seconds, the fire had started and caught, but it still wasn’t as high as Grif needed it to be. He pulled out the tiny bottle.

He unscrewed the top and held it over the fire, hesitating. Would this work? Fire was never something Grif was particularly experienced with. He didn’t want to accidentally burn off his eyebrows or something else important.

He sighed and began to tip the bottle. At the very least, maybe the fish would smell good.

Immediately, the flames caught the liquid and lept into the air. Grif stepped back quickly, startled by the loud woosh the flames gave off as it grew. But the fire continued to stay hot, high and controlled. Grif studied the bottle in his hands. The perfume had worked perfectly.

“Good choice,” Donut said, sitting on the log next to him. Grif glanced at him and began to skewer the fish onto sticks.

“You helped,” he muttered, placing on over the flames. His voice was a little raspy from being unused. Donut beamed.

“You got my message!” Grif sighed.

“Could you have made it any less dramatic?”

Donut shrugged good-naturedly. “A little flair for the dramatic is good for the soul.”

“Says the hallucination.” Grif didn’t look at Donut when he said that, but he knew, just knew, the guy was pouting.

“I’m as real as you want me to be.”

Grif didn’t respond to that, only sat by the fire, turning the fish over and over again. His method was a little slow, but it brought out the juices in the meat. Grif learned that by trial and error, after many dry and undercooked fishes. Though he’d have to change his technique a little with the new heat.

“So,” Donut started again. “You’re learning to cook.”

“If this is cooking,” Grif snorted, gesturing to his setup.

“Well, what else would it be?”

“I don’t know.”

Conversation with the pink guy never came easily to Grif. They were just too different, and unless they were both teasing Simmons, or Grif was yelling at Donut to quit hanging up lace in his room, they never really talked. Not like he and Simmons did.

“Grif? You know you can  always spill your load on me, right?” Grif rolled his eyes. Donut sat straight up, eagerly and sincerely. “I’m serious! I’ll listen to whatever you say. What’s going on?”

Grif didn’t respond for several minutes, focusing instead on the fish. But Donut sat perfectly straight the whole time, his young and honest eyes boring a hole on the back of Grif’s skull.

He sighed.

“Look, I’m just… I…” He hesitated, unsure of what to say.

“I miss you guys,” he blurted out, immediately turning away. Donut didn’t reply, only sat there. Watching.

“It’s been… it’s been so hard by myself. I mean, at first it was awesome. I got to sleep all day and watch TV and eat all the food. There wasn’t any Sarge or Simmons or… or you. No Blues, no Church. Nobody to make my life hell. I finally got a break from it all, all that bullshit.”

Grif took a deep breath and shook his head.

“But now I can’t sleep and this is the most I’ve talked in a long time. I have to fucking hunt for my food. I’ve had fish for breakfast, lunch, dinner for nearly a week now, and I’m sick and tired of it! And…” He paused. “Well, it’s boring here. Like a repeat of Blood Gulch, except now I’m by myself.”

He caught his breath, shocked by the sudden avalanche of words that had come tumbling out of his mouth.

Donut blinked.  “Oh.”

“I miss you guys,” Grif repeated, and that sentence was so heavy he had to sit down on the log just to keep it from crushing him. He buried his head in his hands, and Donut scooted over to pat his shoulder comfortingly.

They sat on that log for what must have been minutes, or hours, or days, or years. The time that passed was non-existent, the breeze that fluttered past the two of them was endless and the night was eternal. It had been forever since they had left; it had been forever since he left them. How long had it been since Grif had someone to talk to? How long had it been since he last saw Simmons, his friend? His family?

It must have been forever.

“You know…” Donut started, breaking the silence. “We’re still here.”

Grif lifted his head slightly, and Donut reached over. He tapped a spot on Grif’s chest over where his heart was. “We’re still right here. We’ll never really be gone.”

“But…” Grif sniffed. “What if you di-- don’t come back?”

Donut laughed quietly. “Even then, we’ll still be with you. As long as you remember us. We’ll sit by the fire with you, we’ll talk with you, we’ll live with you. Just as long as you remember.”

Grif held on to Donut’s words, pulling them tightly to his chest. He pictured each of his friend’s faces, wrapping them in a little bundle and locking them in his heart. Each detail, each little mark, each little stray piece of hair, Grif etched into his mind. He’ll remember them. He goddamn better.

He sighed.

“I’ll tell you what,” Donut said. “You know that picture on my vanity? The one you found today? Why don’t you keep it. It’ll help.”

Grif nodded seriously. “Thank you, Donut.”

Donut laughed softly.

“Now who’s being dramatic?”

And then he was gone.

Grif went in later that night. He placed the empty bottle of perfume on the vanity, and picked up the picture frame. He took one last look into the horrifying, pink room, and smiled before he closed the door, locking it forever.

DAY 32 SINCE HIS FRIENDS BETRAYED HIM

“Grif!”

The scream was loud, long, painful. It grated on Grif’s ears, and stung his throat. Dust covered his eyes, sucking out any moisture. Grif wanted to call back, but his voice was stuck, it wasn’t working. His limbs ached with incredible pain, like he was being ripped apart. A gun was held tightly in his hands, but he couldn’t feel a thing.

“Grif…” The call was more of a whimper now, at his feet. The smell of gunpowder in the air, the taste of metal in his mouth. Someone had been shot.

Grif looked down, past the gun shaking in his hands, and at the body lying beneath him.

Maroon armor.

Simmons was curled up in pain on the ground, clutching at a gaping hole in his abdomen. He gasped and sputtered, while blood seeped through the cracks in his armor.

He blinked.

Pink armor.

Now it was Donut at his feet, it was Donut who was curled up in a ball, it was Donut who was dying, again, and the smell of blood was so strong, so strong.

He blinked.

Red armor.

Sarge.

And he wasn’t moving.

Grif shot up in his bed, sweat pouring down his back. He panted, shoulders and chest heaving, hands shaking. The dark was confining, but all Grif could do was sit there and listen to the voices calling his name over and over again.

He ran a hand through his hair once he could finally move and sighed.

He was cold.

He threw back his covers and left his room. The darkness was too small, so he made his way to the living room. There, he flicked on a lightswitch and dropped down on the couch.

Eager to distract his mind anyway he possibly could, Grif turned on the TV.

He flipped through channel after channel, from the news station (who watches that anymore?) to the sports station, to food network, to the comedy channel, and back to the beginning. He cycled again and again through the channels, but nothing was a good enough distraction for him.

Grif groaned. “Damn it…” he muttered aloud, tossing the useless remote to the floor and flopping back on the couch.

He covered his face with his hands and tried to remember just exactly how his life turned to shit.

It was smooth going for a while, as smooth as it could be. Just Grif and Kaikaina, fending for themselves on some rundown moon, living day by day, flying by the seat of their pants. Of course, there was always money troubles and Grif could distinctly remember sleeping in an abandoned warehouse for a while, so it wasn’t completely amazing. But back then, Grif didn’t need to worry about killing anyone, or aliens, or robots or a corporate conspiracy that went so far as to try to massacre an entire planet.

“It was so much simpler back then,” Grif muttered aloud, not fully aware of even saying it until he heard the response.

“Hmph. Tell me about it.”

Grif became aware of a presence next to him, and between the gruff voice and the stench of diesel, he didn’t have to guess who it was.

Grif rolled his eyes. “What are you talking about? Weren’t you just always in the military? You fought in the Great War, didn’t you? How is that easier?”

Sarge sighed. “Son, when you get to be my age--”

“Jesus christ, here we go,” Grif muttered.

“--you begin to believe you’ve learned everything there is to know. Back in the day, it was black and white. We were good. The Covenant was bad. We had to win, or die trying. Simple.”

Grif snorted. It didn’t sound so simple.

“But now…” Sarge said with a shake of his head. “Red vs. Blue, Blue vs. Red… it’s all the same. I was given a gun and told to fight. I put my faith in the Chain of Command! But it turns out it was all just a lie... It was all some big elaborate scheme cooked up by a couple of greedy scientists. I didn’t know what to think anymore… Without something to fight, there can’t be a Sarge.”

Grif was silent.

“Wow, Sarge. I guess I underestimated you. I never knew you could be so… heartfelt.”

Sarge, not about to insulted like that, cocked his shotgun. “And that’s why I declared war on Gravity! Our true enemy was right beneath our feet this whole time, and we never knew it! Oppressed, by ourselves! Where will the torment end?”

Grif sighed. There was the Sarge he knew.

“Whatever, Sarge. I’m gonna go back to bed.”

“Hah! I always knew you were a coward Grif!” “Hey!”

“I always knew you were a lazy, good-for-nothing--”

“Come on, man, you aren’t even real.”

“But this is too far! What in Sam Hell do you think you’re going to accomplish by just running away?!”

Grif snapped, whirling around and storming right up to him. “I am not running away!” Sarge glared down at him through his thick white beard. “You were the ones who ran away! AGAIN. You were the ones who went off on a stupid wild goose chase, the ones who aren’t gonna come back because for some goddamn reason you are all so bent on throwing away your goddamn lives for some asshole!” He was screaming, spittle flying everywhere, but he didn’t care, he didn’t care, he was so angry. “And you aren’t gonna come back ever, and it’s just gonna be me all by myself, stupid Grif alone on a stupid moon, stupid lazy Grif who can barely even feed himself--”

“Son.” The word, uncharacteristically firm and final, stopped Grif in his tracks. “Now you listen here. You aren’t gonna get anything done by pitying yourself like this!” Sarge’s voice was gradually rising, and with it, his presence was growing larger and larger until he was practically towering over Grif. “Stop this whining and get on with it! Boy, you ain’t gonna make it a minute like this. In my day--”

“Sarge?”

“In my day, we didn’t have the luxury of complaining! So you’ve only eaten fish, so what?! At least you have fish! In fact, I’ll be damned, you have a whole island full of food! So stop moping around for Eisenhower’s sake, and get off your ass. So you don’t like it? Change it! Because whether we come back or not, you can’t depend on us to save your sorry behind anymore. And I’m sure as hell not gonna come back to find my Private dead.”

It wasn’t until the silence hit for at least a good few minutes that Grif’s head stopped reeling.

“I’m technically a Captain now,” he said meekly. Sarge exhaled heavily and began to shrink down to a normal size.

“Does it really matter?” Sarge asked. He sat down on the couch. “There aren’t any ranks on this island. That’s why I couldn’t stay.”

“Because you need action?”

“Because I need purpose.”

It was funny. Only a few seconds ago, Sarge had been so extraordinarily large, literally and metaphorically, but now on the couch he looked so very small and tired. Grif sat down next to him.

“Purpose, huh.” He chewed on it for a second. “I don’t think I know what my purpose is anymore.”

Sarge turned to look at him. “No one does. That’s why you gotta make your own.”

So maybe that was why the Reds and the Blues left. Because on the moon, without someone to fight, someone to save, they felt as small as Sarge looked now. Because they were purposeless, so they needed to find something even if it was as ridiculous as saving Church yet again.

“Ehh, tell you what.” Sarge scratched the back of his neck, as if he were starting to realize how different he was acting. “I left my old hunter’s manual back in my room. It’ll teach you how to set up traps, or find nuts and berries you can eat. And maybe you could make up some maps, or keep track of animals or something. Just, you know. Something to do.”

Grif met his gaze appraisingly, and though he appreciated the kindness his old C.O. was showing him, he couldn’t resist a jab.

“You know that’s what the internet is for, right?”

Sarge hmphed. “Internet. The cheater’s tool! Maybe one of these days I’ll declare war on the internet too!”

“Good luck with that.”

Sarge’s room was about as military-like as he expected. A plain cot, an empty gun rack, a barrel which, Grif assumed, was used to hold ammunition. A packet of cigarettes sat on the desk, next to a small pistol and another object. Grif pocketed the cigarettes and picked up the book.

The hunter’s manual was old and leather-bound, filled with detailed pictures and descriptions, notes in painstaking cursive and more. It was worn, and some pages were falling out. Holding it, Grif could just barely picture a younger Sarge, trekking through the jungle with his shotgun, carefully tracking a deer. He flipped through the pages, pages covered in these illustrations all the way until he reached about two-thirds of the way through.

The rest was blank.

Grif’s stomach rumbled.

He snapped the book shut. Tucked away the pistol. Pulled out a cigarette.

And shut the door behind him.

DAY 56 SINCE THEY LEFT

The nightmares were getting worse every night.

And they were different every night, that was the thing. If they were the same over and over again, maybe Grif would have been able to brace himself for the images to come. Somehow, he could prepare himself, block out the screaming.

But it wasn’t always screaming.

Sometimes it was cursing as his teammates surrounded him in a circle of hatred, stabbing him with insults like they were knives, blaming him for their own deaths, blaming stupid, idiot, lazy Grif for screwing up again.

Sometimes it was cries as his friends and family were being slaughtered right in front of his eyes and there was nothing he could do. Sometimes he was frozen. Lately, he’d been asleep. Again.

Tonight, it was silence.

Never before had he ever heard a silence so empty, so devoid of life and love and meaning, so dark, so… completely… quiet.

He stood alone on the hill overlooking their bases--on the moon--the Gulch--Chorus--Valhalla--as the sun set in front of him.

Waves washed silently on the shore--sand blew across the canyon--the beacon pulsed--the engine whirred--and he reached for the bases, the bases where his friends should have been, smiling or laughing or bickering and so, so alive.

But no one was there.

His own heartbeat throbbed in his ears, the bases flickered--GulchChorusValhallaMoon--and he opened his mouth to shout, to scream, to say anything at all, but he couldn’t even make a sound and all the while…

Silence.

Grif woke up for the nth time clutching at his sheets, drenched in cold sweat.

Light streamed through the cracks of the hammock in which he slept outside (the base was too empty for him to sleep at all) and he shielded his eyes as he slowly unfolded the fabric that surrounded him.

Sunrise never seemed fresher than this cool morning on the moon, as the breeze glided through the rustling trees. The air never smelled cleaner; the salty smell of the ocean, crisper.

He stepped out of the hammock, carefully watching his footing. His armor was strewn on the ground before him, bright against the green grass which had regrown since the RedBlues last set the bases on fire.

An alien creature, a mix between a bird and a dog, lay curled next to the pieces, soaking up the newly-risen sun. Grif had found him one day while hunting, and in the midst of a bout of loneliness, decided to keep him as a pet. He still couldn’t think up a name for him, though he toyed with naming it Simmons just to see the look on his face if he got back, so he just called it ‘it’ or ‘you’ or ‘pet’ or really any word that would indicate he was talking to the half-dog.

His rifle leaned up against the tree next to Pet. Grif, needed to fill his days somehow, had created a routine of cleaning it every morning it.

Cleaning it. Grif. In a routine.

Yeah, the Redblues were sure to get a kick out of that if they came back.

He wasn’t really sure when he stopped saying ‘when’ and started saying ‘if’, but now his life had more important things to do.

“Come on Grif, come on, come on, get up,” he muttered as he fell out of the hammock. He had changed much on his time alone here. His hair now unfurled down to his shoulders. He’s got the stubble of facial that desperately wants to grow in, but doesn’t have the genetics to back it up. He’s considerably leaner and tanner, hunting for food just to eat every day would do that to a person. His body looked like almost a new person.

His mind hasn’t escaped unharmed either.

“Busy today. Busy busy busy. Busy as a bee. Bzzzz. Buzzy bee-body. Busy buzzy beezy bodies.” His armor took exactly sixty-point-zero-two seconds to put on. He knows, he counted every one. His record was forty-five-point-five seconds. “Bees buzz. Flies buzz. No, flies fly. Busy bee bodies busy and fifty flies fly far...far… far away.”

To be fair, there really wasn’t much else to do but talk now.

“Come on, come on, come on, Pet.” He gently pushed the half-dog up. “Lots to do today. Lots and lots and lots of stuff do to.”

They trudged through the wilderness, today like every other day: him gripping his rifle, Pet plodding alongside him. They went through one by one and methodically checked the traps.

Still empty, a relief. Grif had long since forced himself to start eating the small creatures caught in the traps, but he still hated seeing the creature struggle like it did. It still sickened him. But beggars can’t be choosers.

“Nah, who can choose?” Grif laughed as he brushed the leaves back over the rope on the ground. “Cheaters. Cheaters can choose. I’m not a cheater. I’m Grif. I’m not a coward. Well, not all the time. Right Sarge? I’m not a coward all the time. I’m just doin’ my purpose, y’know? Just my purpose.”

“What is your purpose, Grif?” Carolina asked as she stepped quietly next to him.

“Oh hey, Carolina,” he greeted cheerily. He liked Carolina. Cool Carolina. Not-a-coward Carolina. She made him feel strong. “Today it’s to get this damn deer to stop eating my garden.”

“And tomorrow?” Silly Carolina. She’d always do this. Always try to make him think about tomorrow, the tomorrow that might be sad, the tomorrow that didn’t matter to him right now.

“Nah, just today,” he said to her.

“Grif,” she pressed. Together they crouched down behind a bush. “You need to start thinking about a tomorrow.”

“Why?” he asked. “Why do I have to? Why does tomorrow even matter?”

Carolina frowned. “How could it not? Don’t you want to get off of this moon? DOn’t you want to see your friends again?”

“My friends?”

“The Reds and the Blues.”

“Oh. Right.” In the distance, a creature raised its head. Grif shifted slowly to get a better view. “Nah. They’ll come back. I just have to wait.”

“Grif…” He heard her sigh behind him. “What if waiting doesn’t work? What if they’re in trouble and they need you save them?”

He mulled that over, then waved it off. “They’re the Redblues. They’ll be fine. They’ll come back. They’ll come back for me.”

“What happens when they don’t--”

“If!” With sudden force, Grif whirled around. Carolina leaned back in surprise. “It’s ‘if’ now, don’t you know?! If they don’t come back! If they do! ‘If’!”

“I’m sorry,” she said quietly. “I didn’t mean--”

Grif slammed his rifle down angrily, and the deer in the distance, spooked, sprinted away. “Because I see them! In my dreams! They’re sad and hurting and if they don’t come back, then I’ll know the dreams are true and I did nothing! I stayed behind! Like a coward!”

“Grif,” Carolina said, placing her hand on his. “It wouldn’t be your fault. You did what you thought was right--that doesn’t make you a coward.”

He sniffed. “Yes it does.”

“No, it doesn’t. You know why? Because every night you face the darkest dreams and your deepest fears. Anyone else would have gone insane by now, but you face the worst possible outcomes every night. That doesn’t make you a coward. It makes you the opposite.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“Carolina… I miss them. But I’m scared to see them again.”

“The Reds and the Blues are your friends,” she told him firmly. Carolina knew what he meant. “Whether they come back or not, they’ll will always love you. Love you. Do you get that?”

No they won’t, Grif thought, but he couldn’t say that to Carolina. Simmons won’t. He won’t forgive me. He couldn’t bear to think of a tomorrow in which Simmons didn’t forgive him. He couldn’t bear to think of a tomorrow in which Simmons didn’t come back.

“I just…” he sniveled. “I just wish I could say sorry to him.”

“Take a deep breath,” Carolina soothed. “And I’ll tell you what. I don’t have something from my room to give you, but I think I saw some volleyballs in the garage.”

Grif looked up at her, eyes wide. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. Maybe you can use them to practice saying sorry. You know, for if they come back. You can make things up with Simmons.”

He nodded. “I do miss him a lot too.”

“Alright then, it’s settled.” She stood up and dusted herself off. “I’ll show you where they are.”

In the end, he still got to go in Carolina’s room.

It was pretty and neat. Nothing personal. Just a couple of dog tags resting on a letter from Kimball on the nightstand. The clothes and other objects (typically running gear, that was what she did now) she didn’t take with her were folded neatly in the closet.

But the dresser was different story.

Her dresser was littered with half-full paint tubes and brushes and crayons and markers and pastels and all different art supplies. Paint stains covered the smooth wood finish, and the drawers were crammed shut with papers of all colors and sizes.

Grif took some glittery gold paper and red paints of varying colors and retreated out of the room.

“Thanks for letting me use these,” he said to her, his eager hands clutched with the supplies. “You’re cool, Carolina. I wished I talked to you more before you left. You aren’t that scary after all.”

She laughed, a nice sound, a pretty sound. “Any time. And who knows? Maybe you’ll get another chance soon.”

He smiled and reached for the doorknob, but she stopped him quickly.

“Are you sure? I’m the last one. I won’t be there to talk to you after nightmares anymore.”

“I know,” Grif said. “But I’m not a coward. I think it’s time I take those on myself.”

She frowned then, when she was supposed to smile, supposed to be supportive for him. “You know… you don’t have to take them on all alone.”

“I’m already alone,” he replied, surprising himself a little. “But I’m done talking to ghosts now.” He gestured to the paints. “I’m ready to write the script now.”

Carolina nodded with cool respect in her eyes. Sometimes he didn’t remember that Carolina, cool, nice Carolina used to be a hardass Freelancer. Now, however, he wondered how he could have ever forgotten.

She stepped back and saluted formally. “Good luck, Captain Grif. Make yourself a better tomorrow. And… when I get back, stop by once or twice, okay?”

He nodded. “Okay.” He saluted back.

And shut the door.

DAY ZERO

“Listen Simmons. Shhhh, I got… some things to say. To you. Some things I’ve gotta get off my chest buddy. Buddy? Nah, not buddy. Stupid. Friend? Friend. Fr--no, definitely friend. Anyway, I’ve had a bit of time to think about some things. Lots of time actually. Oodles of time. Oodles of buckets of times of time. Tempo de mucho! Mucho de tempo! Now, listen Simmons. Simmmmmons. Sim--Sim--Cinnamon--ah! Focus Grif!

“Now things ended really bad out there, buddy--no, friend!--and I’ve been thinking. Thinking, thinking, thinking. I need to tell you that I am super duper, I am so incredibly--”

[relationshipcrimes]

RvB Rec Day - December 2017

Simulations and Variables by @grubus (Gemi) - a cool AU where the simtroopers are AIs for various characters, which means you get some real interesting character combinations, ones that you might have seen hints of in canon and were never explored or ones that were never ever shown in canon at all but nontheless are super interesting to explore the possibilities about!! the different combinations put together tell you so many new things about all of the characters involved, and are usually really sweet, because the simtroopers are, like, condensed good people living in people’s brains, so!! check it out!! a real cool idea, quick and easy read, great characterization!! go go go!

Agent, Agent, Can You Read Me? by @goodluckdetective​ - real cool AU done for the reverse big bang where kai is agent hawaii and gets tex (beta) as an AI!! like a lot of kais in fandom, she’s a lot smarter than she lets on, and the author does a great job of keeping her still vaguely incompetent military-wise and uncomfortably sexual while also keeping her smart af in a way that’s cheerful and just the right side of “possibly entirely unintentional”!

Numbers are a pain by @primtheamazing​ - SO I KNOW THAT PRIM’S GOT ALL THE GOOD PORN, and we all know this and love her from atop her smut mountain, BUT how about this caboose-centric character study from the angst war where caboose goes back home and finds that like half his sisters are dead? REAL good interpretation of the inside of caboose’s head in the aftermath of loss, REAL fascinating inside-look for a character who, it seems, is literally constantly in the state of grieving someone or something, wonderfully believable interpretation of a character who walks so many grey areas in his characterization that he often escapes even canon writers. give it a shot!

Half Life by RedTeamShark - i found this one last fic rec day and i still think about it and laugh; it’s a short read that does a great job of elaborating on the frankly terrible life events that occur when you grow up, like the lieutenants did, in a civil war; but it does so with such that real awkward “group bonding time gone wrong” feeling that is absolutely a) IC to lieutenants and wash, and b) so true to the real life situations in which this occurs. ANYWAY IT’S GREAT

The Plan Sucked, We’re Changing It by @aryashi - because we as a fandom are all in a state of grieving church, here is TWENTY-THREE THOUSAND words of an AU where alphachurch survives the finale of season 6, which means everything gets REAL awkward and REAL weird for wash and church REAL fast, by which i mean alpha’s character arc doesn’t get wrapped up into the nice “and then he died” ending, so now alpha and wash have to, like, actually deal with aftermath. not only the physical aftermath of having blown up project freelancer, but also the emotional aftermath of, well, church being alpha. it gets real messy. time to do the one thing that rvb never seems to be able to make church do, and that’s live with ur choices, kids!!!! 

Everything Lolix by wllw - and let’s be real, probably all the rvb content wllw has written, too; i just haven’t gotten around to reading the last one. i know i’m fairly late to the locus game, specifically these stories, but im in a CONSTANT STATE of losing my mind over them ever since i read them like, three weeks ago?? Break Into Pieces has both locus and felix POVs, which means you get insanely insightful renditions of both of them at the same time AND some real awesome explanations of what exactly those two were doing during the great war. some lines in there kill me forever because of how accurately they hit the nail on the head when it comes to the experience of being in a dysfunctional/codependent/abusive relationship like this—aspires to pin the subject matter down without pretense of pretentiousness. Bed of Nails is technically pwp but is secretly one of the best felix character studies i’ve ever read; it’s as if all the felix povs in “break into pieces” became longer, bigger, better, and more vicious, and now that i’ve gotten through this sentence i realize how much this description is asking for a dick joke???? LMAO. ok an-y-way Edge of Mourning is a take on locus’s post-felix life that came out before season 15′s pacifist code; also another eerily insightful rendition of locus that’s both so true to canon and takes it one better step than canon in the only fanfiction can be. the line “he didn’t love me” haunts me EVERY DAY.

OKAY THAT’S IT THANKS FOR READING!!

[kouvei]

locus and red team (mostly sarge) saying how bad their orange team mates were on and/off the battlefield? and have donut say too soon after they thought he had just died again

I hope this is what you had in mind, Anon! Thanks for the prompt!

http://archiveofourown.org/works/11238792

Locus ran his fingers along the spines of the books in a bookcase in Donut’s room. There were some classics, some cookbooks, a few magazines, but overall nothing Locus found exceptionally fascinating.

“Can’t believe he’s gone,” Sarge muttered from across the room, looking through Donut’s closet.

“You know he’s probably not dead, right?” Locus asked in a dull voice.

“We all saw him get blown up, then eaten by that carnivorous plant, then saw it explode!” Sarge cried.

“Take it from someone who tried to kill you people, he’s not dead,” Locus deadpanned. “Besides, haven’t you seen him almost die repeatedly?”

“But this time, he’s really dead. Ten-four, good buddy!” Sarge said as he folded up one of Donut’s casual civilian shirts and put it in a box.

“I will bet you twenty bucks he’s alive,” Locus said as he carefully began taking books off the shelf and into another cardboard box.

“Done! Sucker,” Sarge said as he reached into the closet once again. Without his helmet on, Locus could see Sarge’s face twist into an expression of disgust. “Ugh, it’s spreading!”

“What?” Locus asked, not even concerned. Had Sarge made that exclamation a few weeks ago, he would’ve been on high alert with his gun pointed at the closet, but at this point, he barely registered any level of concern. After being on Red Team for almost a month now, he was more than used to their eccentricities.

Sarge pulled out an orange, collared shirt on a clothes hanger and stormed over to shove it in Locus’s face, who promptly recoiled, more out of shock than anything else. “The orange plague! It spread to Donut! Poor soldier, he must’ve been in such agony before he died, to turn to wearing orange on his days off!”

Locus frowned as the color brought back unpleasant memories of a certain gray and orange mercenary, but just sighed and went back to packing up the (totally not) deceased Donut’s stuff. “Don’t get bent out of shape just because Donut has one orange shirt. Honestly, the only reason I’m surprised he has that is because it’s too much of an ‘autumn’ color and doesn’t match his eyes.” As Sarge stared at him, he hastily backtracked. “I- it’s his words, not mine.”

“But what if he was turning into another Grif?” Sarge demanded.

“It’s Donut. Donut.” Locus stressed the last word. “He once screamed because he saw a moldy sandwich in Grif’s bedroom that Grif had left lying out. I thought we were under attack. Besides, Grif’s not the worst orange soldier in the history of the universe to be like.”

“Insubordination!” Sarge exclaimed. “Have you met Grif? Who could possibly be worse?”

“He had a scout helmet, was a manipulative psychopath who tried to commit planetary genocide, and would stab you with a knife if you added ‘the cat’ after his name,” Locus deadpanned.

“Felix? Please! He would actually do something! Granted, everything he ever did was barbaric, but I bet he never skimped out on cleaning the base or gathering intel on the enemy!” Sarge argued.

“No, but he always made me do all the cooking,” Locus retorted. “‘Locus, I’m hungry! Locus, I want some ribs! Locus, can you bake a cake? Locus, go make some waffles! Locus, I’m really craving some chocolate chip cookies, can you make me some? I don’t care if we don’t have any chocolate chips, go get some!’” mocked Locus, letting out some pent-up aggression against his late partner.

“At least he didn’t eat all your food! Have you seen how much Grif eats in a day?” Sarge retorted.

“At least Grif never has ‘booty calls’ that keep you up all hours of the night,” Locus replied.

“I bet Felix never back-sassed you as much as Grif does to me!” Sarge cried.

“He whined and yelled at me all the time,” Locus said.

“I said ‘as much,’” Sarge clarified.

“Grif never tried to murder an entire planet,” Locus pointed out.

“Felix never did CPR for a head wound!” Sarge retorted.

“Do you have any concept of how different those two things are?” Locus asked.

“Felix is dead, Grif is alive. Therefore, he’s worse,” Sarge said.

“I changed my mind, forget the twenty bucks; if Donut’s alive, you concede that I’m right,” Locus said.

“And if he’s not, you admit that I’m right!” Sarge bargained.

“Deal.”

“You’re still wrong, regardless,” Sarge added.

Locus rolled his eyes. “Really?” he asked in a disbelieving voice.

“Grif never does his work!”

“Felix was reckless and never listened to common sense!”

“Grif always forgets the ammo!”

“Felix was always overconfident and I had to babysit him constantly in the middle of battle!”

“I have to yell at Grif constantly to get him to do anything!”

“I had to be ninety-percent of Felix’s self-control!”

“Grif is lazy!”

“Felix was violent!”

“Grif is a slob!”

“Felix was a neat-freak!”

“Grif is insubordinate!”

“Felix was willing to kill all his subordinates!”

“Guys, you’re already packing up my stuff? Come on, too soon!” The two stopped arguing as they heard a familiar chipper voice from the doorway. They turned to see Donut, with his armor heavily damaged and his helmet missing, standing in the doorway, frowning slightly in that vaguely disapproving way he often did when Red Team did something ridiculous, when a normal person would just start yelling at them.

Locus glanced over at Sarge and couldn’t help but smirk. “I win.”

Sarge just narrowed his eyes and glared at him. “I am never admitting it.”

“What?” Donut asked, looking thoroughly confused.

“Nevermind.” Locus waved it off, pushing bitter memories of Felix to the back of his mind. “I’ll help you put your stuff back. We should probably let Simmons and Grif know you’re alive.”

“Oh! Right!” Donut exclaimed. He leaned around the doorway and shouted, “I’m alive, guys!”

“You owe me fifty bucks, Grif!” Simmons yelled.

Locus and Sarge looked at each other in shock, then smiled at each other.

“Come on, you two need to help me reorganize my exotic oils collection! You messed it all up!” Donut fretted, walking back in. Locus watched the pink(or lightish-red) soldier for a second, then started unpacking the bottles from a box on the floor. One in particular, however, caught his eye.

“What on earth is ‘headlight fluid’?”

[arirashkae]

Okay, prompt for literal fluff. Felix-is-a-cat AU, only now BOTH of them are cats. Maybe something where they are totally just cuddling up for warmth... Bonus points for Locus cleaning Felix (G-rated) who reluctantly sits and positively does not enjoy it of course. Lol.

I almost didn’t get to this because I kept getting called away. But! I am here! Have an AU scene to FQPRCC for Fluff Week! (Also, Google Translate is the best when doing Red vs Blue XD. “Look what the cat dragged in”, which interestingly is different than “look what the cat dragged in”)

Quod Cattus Respice In Trahebatur

Characters: Felix, Locus (not written to be shippy, but I’m not gonna say you can’t read it that way)

Rating: T/M for Felix’s usual command of the English language

Warnings: involuntary shapeshifting, accidental intoxication, forcible cuddling

Word count: 1698

AO3

@rvbficwars​ (just in case XD)

‘Oh,that is not fucking fair.’Felix’stail lashed angrily as he pulled back on Locus’ undersuit, helpingthe enormous and fluffycatthat was his partner to extricate himself from the jumble of armor.

Locustwisted to look himself over. ‘Thisdoes seem to be a problem.’Somehow,Locus managed to come out of this twice Felix’s size.

Theyhad almost made it to the door with the crate holding Felix’s armor.Unfortunately, ‘almost’ only counted with horseshoes, hand grenades,and tactical nukes, and Locus had been caught in the same beam oflight that had enveloped Felix when he’d tried to circle the room. 

‘No,I mean even as a goddamned cat you’re still a beast,’Felixgroused. Locus just shot him an unimpressed look and concentrated onstanding up properly.

Thetwo of them picked their way out of the room, trying to hurry whilenavigating the unfamiliar mechanics of having four legs.'Technically,that is the definition of a cat.’Theystopped just outside the door and turned back. Their armor lay a fewyards inside. They had come so close, and yet nowhere near closeenough.

'Oh,go fuck yourself. You know what I mean.’Felixyawned, showing off every single one of his nice sharp teeth. Locusremained unimpressed. He turned away and sat down just outside thedoorway, studying what he could see. As if that would give them anyclues as to what the fuck had just happened or more importantly howto fucking fix it.Felixconcentrated instead on coordination and processing the flood ofinformation his new senses were bringing in.

'Ithink we can safely assume that the researchers also ran afoul ofthis device.’Neitherof them even bothered questioning how they were still able tocommunicate so effortlessly. After so long having each other’s backs,sometimes Felix was amazed they even neededtospeak to each other any more. Not that Felix was taking a vow ofsilence any time soon, mind. Irritating Locus was one of the thingsthat got him out of bed in the morning.

'Gee,you think?’Felixtook another few careful steps. Embolden by the lack of wobbling, hetried a few small hops. The more he moved, the more natural this newbody felt. Twitch an ear thiswayto catch noises over there,curl the tail justsotohelp counterbalance a jump …

Hestopped and cocked his head. Locus was still peering into ThatFucking Room, the tip of his ridiculously fluffy tail curled aroundhis feet and his whiskers twitching slightly. Felix tilted his headthe other way, gauging the distance.

Hecrouched and crept forward, stepping carefully to be as quiet aspossible. When he was fairly confident he could make the leap, hepounced–

 –andended up slammed to the floor as Locus whirled and smacked him,pinning him down with his own body weight. 'Iwas wondering how long before you tried something like that.’

Felixtried to twist free, but Locus was easily double his size, evenbefore accounting for that coat. He huffed. 'Oh,come on. Like you aren’t tempted to try.’

Locusdidn’t answer, but he did let Felix up, cuffing him lightly in thehead. 'Weshould at least attempt to access the records. Hopefully the team wasable to find somethingthatwill help us before they disappeared.’

'Withour luck, they’ll be locked by fingerprints or retinal scans or someridiculous key one of them made up.’

'Whichis why we were given the decryption overrides. 

Theythreaded their way through the cleared rooms, eager to find the exitas quickly as possible. Neither one of them liked leaving their armorand weapons behind, but there was very little they could do about it.

Thesun was almost too bright, the jungle around them too loud, when theyfinally made it out of the temple complex. 'Idon’t know if you’ve looked at yourself in the last few minutes,Locs, but I don’t exactly think either of us is going to be flyingthe Pelican over there any time soon. And carrying any of those padsthrough this mess is going to be exactly easy.’

Aftera few moments of getting their new bearings, they struck out fortheir Pelican. 'Wewill figure something out. We are still alive, and more importantly,still awareofwho we are, regardless of what we look like.’

Neitherof them needed to say it, but they both heard the 'for now’ at theend of that statement.

'Fiiiine.Be the optimist.’Felixtrotted ahead, pausing every so often to sniff a plant or try topounce on a bug. He had just stopped, staring at a particularly luridflower and trying to remember if he’d noticed it on the way down,when Locus barreled into him. They tumbled down the path, Felixyowling in indignation as he clawed for purchase to stop them.

’Bequiet,’Locussnarled. He whirled to face the flower and backed up slightly, stillsnarling, ears pinned back and poofed out to look even larger. Itwould have been hysterical, if not for the fact that the flower wasnow turned towards them – and there was a splotch of pollen onLocus’ face.

Felixcaught himself flattening to the ground in fear and shook himself'Whatthe fuck was that?’

'Idon’t know, but it looked like it had been leaning towards you andthat can’t have been good.’Locuskept backing up until he was even with Felix. 'Didany of it hit you?’

Felixtwisted, managing to roll completely over as he checked. 'I’mclean. You get hit any worse than that?’

'Idon’t think so.’Locusshook his head and took a few swipes at it with one paw. 'ButI did inhale some of … some of it…’Hetrailed off, shaking his head again.

'Locus?’Felixcrouched again, unsure if his partner was going to go berserk, dropdead, or–

–orstart … laughing?

'I’mmmgood.’Locusswayed on his feet, before flopping down on one side, blinking up atFelix.

Felix’sears flattened almost immediately. ’…Locus?’

Hispartner twisted around, ending up almost flat on his back and curvedin a semi circle. 'Yyeesss?’

Felixgaped at him. Then he realized that rumbling noise was Locus purring.'Holyfuck, are youhigh?’

'AmI?’Locusblinked up at him, tail swishing lazily. He took a swipe at the emptyair above him.

'Ohfuck me,’Felixbreathed. As if this day couldn’t get any worse – or any moreridiculous. Now not only were the two of them currently fucking cats,but his stoic and taciturn partner was currently rolling in the grassand batting at imaginary butterflies or some bullshit like that.

Hehad to smack Locus a few times to get his attention, but eventuallyhe focused on him. 'Getup, asshole. You can’t stay here. With our luck, you’ll get steppedon before we change back.’ 

’…Felix?’

'Oh,Jesus Christ, get on your fucking feet and let’s go.’Felix practically had to shove Locus into sitting up, but once he wasthere, momentum or what-fucking-ever took over and he stumbled to hisfeet. And stopped there.

Itprobably looked ridiculous, but Felix face-palmed – face-pawed? –anyway. He bumped his shoulder against Locus’. 'Thisway, asshole.’Hestarted back down the path to the ship; Locus trotted after him,purring happily and his tail straight up like a banner.

'Fuckyou, fuck this place, fuck this job,’Felixgrumbled. At least he could still manage the keypad for the Pelican.That meant he could herd Locus into the fucking ship – 'goddamnit,thisway’– andlock the ramp behind them. He silently apologized – something hewould never do out loud – for every time Locus had hauled his drunkass back to wherever they were holed up. If he had been half as badas this, then Locus had the patience of a goddamned saint.

Ofcourse, now they had to figure out what the fuck to do next.Hopefully this shit would wear off soon; Locus stoned and happy wassomehow even creepier than he was sober. Probably because it was justso wrong.

'We’reprobably going to have to eat the MREs cold until we get our bodiesback. I don’t trust something won’t fuck up if we try to heat themand–’

Forthe second time in less than as many house, Felix found himselfsquashed beneath his partner. Thistime,however, Locus was purring like a goddamned chainsaw and nuzzlingthe back of his neckwhatthe fuck?'Youworry too much.’

'Yeah,because that’s usually yourjob,asshole. Now let me up.’

InsteadLocus, fucker that he was, just sprawled even more. 'No.’M comfortable.’

'Locus,I swear to fucking God–’

Felix’sthreat was cut short by the swipe of a rough tongue across his head.He froze in complete shock. Locus repeated the motion, somehowmanaging to purr even louderinthe process.

'Locus,’Felixhissed. 'Whatthe fuck do you think you’re doing?’

Locusjust shifted until he was less sprawled and more curled up acrossFelix’s back. 'Quiet.You’re too tense. Need t’ relax.’Hecontinued fucking groominghim,and started kneading his shoulders for good measure.

Almostagainst his will, Felix didfeelhimself start to relax, between the purring and the kneading. 'So,what? Are you suggesting a catnap?’Nowaywashe going near the groomingwitha ten-foot pole. If he was lucky, Locus wouldn’t remember any of thiswhen he sobered up.

'Yes.Sleep. Tha’ would be good.’Locusgave a jaw-cracking yawn, and Felix couldn’t help mirroring him. Hehuffed a sigh as Locus dropped his head on top of Felix’s own. Thatactually did sound pretty good right now.

’…you know you’re an asshole, right?’

Locusput one paw over Felix’s mouth. 'Shhh.Sleep now. Argue later.’Henuzzled the back of Felix’s head and dropped off almost immediately. 

Ofcoursethefucker would snore rightinhis ear. Asshole.

(Have some cat!mercs 😁💕)

[secretlystephaniebrown]

The Sacrifice Part I: Bargain

Summary: When Felix comes back from the dead, Locus makes a deal with the devil to keep the Reds and Blues safe.

The Reds and Blues assume that Locus betrayed them, until they uncover the truth. But they might be too late to save Locus.

Right, so buckle in folks, this will be a rough one.

After I finished "Deprivation", I told myself I'd take a break from angst. And then a few friends of mine started throwing around some ideas for a Locus whump concept (you know who you are), and I couldn't resist. This was supposed to be a one-shot, but it got LONG, so I've broken it up a bit. Should hopefully be a three-parter. We'll see.

Please read the warnings; things are going to get worse from here (check Ao3 for details). Decide for yourself if you can handle this; if you need details, PM me on Tumblr and I'll let you know things so you can make an informed decision about your reading experience.

Special thanks to @birdsbeesandlemonadetrees for being my beta on this project!

Warnings for chapter 1: discussed character death and torture. Implied/background pairings include Tuckington, Grimmons, Docnut, and some possible Lucker pining can be read.

On Ao3

Locus doesn’t intend to follow the Reds and Blues back to their new home, but it’s how things turn out. Washington survives his injuries, the reporter goes off to find new stories, and the Reds and Blues retreat to their moon.

And Locus, outside of his better judgement, goes with them.

They accept him, which is surprising. He expected that he would be lurking in corners for a while, before they turned on him and threw him out. But that is not how they chose to operate.

Instead, they give him a room and a place, as long as he agrees to follow these rules.

1)     He is not supposed to leave the moon without the others.

2)     He is not supposed to contact people from his mercenary days

3)     He is not to hurt anyone, except for sparring sessions

4)     He must cook dinner on Friday nights

Locus accepts these conditions easily enough. He thinks it will be temporary; until they embark upon their next adventure or until he is called away.

But instead, he stays. He spends his days sword fighting with Tucker and sparring with Carolina. He spends time with Grif and Caboose, and allows himself to be subjected to numerous “treatments” at the hands of Donut, which tend to involve creams on his face.

It’s simple and calm and confusing, but Locus finds himself enjoying it. The Reds and Blues are oddly kind to him, and there is something contagious about their antics. Locus has no right to it, but… there is something almost like home, here.

Six months into this however, things change.

Because Felix comes back from the dead.

In Locus’ dreams, Felix always comes back with a laugh and a blade in his hand.

He’s never really gone away, not to Locus. He’s always there, in the corner of his eye, whispering poisonous thoughts into his ear, miming violent gestures towards the Reds and Blues as Locus falls into these strange patterns alongside them. Even in death, Felix has entrenched himself so thoroughly into Locus’ mind and soul that he knows that he will never be free.  

So when Felix comes back in reality, his fingernails digging into Locus’ cheek as he clasps one hand over his mouth and the knife digs into his throat, it takes a moment for Locus to realize that he’s really there.

He reacts with a lurch, reaching for a weapon, but the blade digs into his throat and Felix makes a soft noise to hush him.

“Calm down, it’s me,” Felix says, and for a single dizzying moment, Locus thinks that the last few years have been a dream, that they’re back on Chorus, that—

And then he sees the scars on Felix’s face; ragged, unhealed lines, lines that look like—

They look like the scars someone might get if they fall off a cliff and their helmet shattered against their face upon impact.

Locus freezes up, staring at the nightmare unfurling above him with wide eyes and a racing heart. Felix laughs in a ghost of his old one; it’s bitter and short and cruel sounding. “Don’t scream, or you die,” he whispers against Locus’ ear, his breath hot against his skin. Panic builds in Locus’ chest, wanting nothing more than to get away, to run, to wake up.

But this is not a dream, and Locus doesn’t scream when Felix removes his hand from his mouth.

“How?” Locus whispers. This is Felix, almost exactly as he had been when he died, with only those new scars to assure him that things have changed. The weight of him is familiar, the grin on his face is familiar; it’s all horribly, intimately familiar, but now there is danger. And Locus might have known about the danger before, but now he cares.  

“What?” Felix traces Locus’ cheek gently with the knife. Locus holds himself stock-still, but Felix doesn’t break the skin on his face, although he feels something damp on his throat. It’s not deep enough to kill him, just enough to be a reminder. “Did you really think I didn’t have a plan in place for my death?” He smiles, the expression a parody of kindness. “Of course, I didn’t think you would be the one setting me up for the firing squad.”

Locus reacts without thinking. Felix is out of armor and the knife is just far enough away from anywhere vital. It gives Locus the opening he needs to grab Felix’s head in his hands and snap his neck. Locus has done this action a thousand times, and in that moment, it’s no different. He twists, and there’s a horrible crack, and for a moment Locus thinks it’s over. He has averted a disaster before it could occur; now all that is left to do is to find the Reds and Blues and try to figure out how this all happened—

And then Felix, instead of crumpling in a lifeless heap on top of Locus, starts to laugh. He grabs Locus’ hands and pulls them up to the headboard, and before Locus can even think to fight back, there’s the snap of handcuffs, and he’s trapped.

“This isn’t possible,” Locus says, feeling numb. Felix grabs his own head between his hands and readjusts it, until—

“Don’t think too hard, Locs, you were never good at that.”

Locus growls at the insult and the horrifying absurdity of the scene above him. “You should be dead.”

“Twice! And don’t think you’re not going to pay for that second one.” For a moment, Locus thinks he can smell death and decay, thinks that a corpse is what is in his room. But the moment passes, and all he can smell is Felix’s expensive cologne and his own blood. “I took a few precautions. Let’s just say that Tucker won’t get lucky this time.”

“No,” Locus breathes, panic settling in. He opens his mouth to scream, to warn them, but what’s the point, if Felix can’t be killed?

“Just be a good little soldier, and stay there until I go kill those other idiots,” Felix says, getting off the bed to loom over him, still smirking. Locus tries to lunge upward, but the handcuffs hold him back. “Do you have a favorite? I promise to kill that one slow.”

“No,” he snarls, pulling at the chain, hoping beyond hopes it will snap. He can’t let Felix go to find the others, can’t let him hurt them.

Felix stares at him a moment, then he starts to laugh, and laugh, and laugh.

“You care,” he marvels, reaching forward to cup Locus’ jaw. Locus tries to flinch away, but there’s no room to move. The cuffs clink together uselessly, and he knows, given time, he could find the right angle to break the headboard, but he also knows that Felix won’t give him that kind of time. “They broke you, didn’t they?”

“They helped me,” Locus protests, yanking at the handcuffs again.

“I’m sure they did,” Felix laughs, a sound so horrifyingly familiar that Locus does not know how to handle it. “Tell you what, partner. Let’s bargain.”

And so, handcuffed to his bed, a dead partner above him, Locus makes a deal with the devil.

“What do you want?” Locus asks. Part of him knows, and he’s torn between the numb acceptance and the waves of terror that battle inside of him.

“What a good question,” Felix muses. “I want Lavernius Tucker to pay for that grenade. I want those idiots to suffer. And I want you to die alone, like I did. So how do I get all of those?” Suddenly, he’s straddling Locus’ chest again. “Do they trust you?” He demands, and his eyes are alight, like he’s just gotten an idea. “Those idiots. Do they trust you?”

“I won’t hurt them,” Locus says, feeling nauseated at the very idea. A traitorous part of him wonders if he would hurt them, even kill a few of them, to save the rest, and he’s terrified that Felix will push him to find out.  

“Shh, don’t worry about that,” Felix says, patting his cheek with the flat of the knife. “They do, don’t they.” It is not a question.

Locus jerks, trying to throw Felix off him, only to get a slap for his troubles. It’s not that hard, but Locus still grunts and grits his teeth, sure that it’s left a mark.

“Behave.” His smile is cruel. “Tell you what. You betray them.”

Locus stares up at him, a sinking feeling in his stomach as he tries to process what is being offered. “And then you will leave them alone?”

“Yes,” Felix says. “You get to pay their price. All of it. You betray them, you come to me, and then you let me do whatever I want, for however long I want, until I get bored and kill you.”

“And you won’t harm them,” Locus repeats, for surety.

“Yes, I just said that.” Felix rolls his eyes in annoyance. “I’ll give you three days to betray them. All that trust. All that understanding. You’re going to break it, you hear me? Break it into a thousand pieces, grind it up to bits, and then you’re going to leave them to pick up the pieces.” His smile is wide and feral. “And if you tell them about me, or if you don’t show up at the end of day three, I’ll burn them all alive, and make you watch.”

Locus’ mouth is dry as a bone.

But there can be no other answer, and Felix knows this. Felix knows him too well; even now, even changed as Locus is, Felix understands him better than anyone else possibly could. And as horrifying as that is, Locus knows it says more about him than it does about Felix.

“Deal.”

He goes for a walk to clear his head.

There is a stretch of beach, on the island, that seems to go on forever. Locus takes off his shoes and socks, rolls up his pants to his knees, and wades into the water.

The water is biting cold, but Locus doesn’t react, just closes his eyes and savors the sensations of the waves moving around him, and the sand shifting beneath his feet.

The night is beautiful, and it feels cruel. The planet the moon orbits isn’t visible at the moment, but the stars are scattered brightly across the inky sky, forming constellations unlike the ones that he had grown up with.

Finally, he starts walking, keeping to the edge of the water. The waves move in and out at a leisurely pace, splashing over his feet and then retreating, washing away his footprints in a few movements.

The sand is cool and damp beneath his feet. Every pass of the waves leaves it bright and shining, ever footfall of his pushes the water back out, leaving it dull in his wake until the ocean reclaims it.

Locus hopes that is how it will be for the Reds and Blues as well. Felix thinks that his betrayal will shatter them, but they have gone through worse than this. They will rally, and hopefully it will leave as few marks as Locus is leaving on the beach itself.

He is not arrogant enough to think it will be nearly the worst betrayal, the worst departure, that they had faced in all their years of adventures. He knows the names of those missing from their lives, the ones that feel as if they are always hanging over the Reds and Blues. There is Church, Sheila, and Agent Texas. There is Epsilon, whose loss is still fresh for many of them. Donald Doyle, Tucker’s squad, the Freelancers killed by the Blues and Reds are also a presence that Locus knows the Reds and Blues blame themselves for.

For Washington and Carolina in particular, there are even more names. Freelancer names that they don’t speak about, that he only knows from their files. Connecticut, Maine, York. Perhaps the Dakotas, Florida, and Wyoming as well.

Who is Locus, compared to that? He is a murderer, a monster, a killer. They hide him on this island despite the outstanding warrants both Kimball and UNSC have issued. He does not pretend to understand their logic or justification for aiding him, for concealing him from the courts. When he leaves, he will be a footnote in their stories, soon forgotten.

Locus himself should have left long ago; he has more debt to pay, more people he might be able to help. But instead he had allowed himself to fall into the rhythms of living with them, not making amends to the galaxy.

He comforts himself knowing that, had he left, he might not have been able to stop Felix from taking his vengeance. They might already be dead, and he would be none the wiser.

His debt to Chorus can never be paid. Locus knows this. He can’t seek forgiveness for what he did. There is no one who can speak for the dead, to reach out and pardon him. All he can do is try to do some good with the years he has left. What good will rotting in a prison do? Vanessa Kimball might argue that there is justice there, but can there be justice for what he has done?

Locus has never believed so. He is past justice, past absolution. He is a broken man, left to carry the burden of his sins until he dies, and no prison cell or execution will change that.

He has sent documents to Chorus; evidence against Hargrove that he has gathered, information about Charon and his empire that will help them protect themselves. He just wishes he had thought to hand over information about Felix or even himself, before this. Now, there is no chance. Felix would know, and he would retaliate.

There were many things he should have done, before Felix had returned to make him pay for his crimes.

No, not his crimes—Felix could not care less about the blood that Locus carries on his hands, except his own.

Felix will make him pay for his betrayal, for Felix’s death, for every slight and insult and injury that Locus might have dealt him over the years.

The thought is terrifying; it’s worse than a return to the way things were, in a way. They will not be equals, partners, comrades in arms. Felix had always been reluctant to turn the sharpest edge of his temper against Locus. If the alien A.I. is to be believed, it was because of fear.

And now, Locus has agreed to sharpen the knife and bare his neck, so long as Felix will stay his hand against the Reds and Blues.

“Locus!”

He nearly falls over, turning to see a figure standing behind him. In his reverie, the sounds that aren’t the ocean had faded into the background, allowing him to be surprised. Foolish, he knows. It could easily have been Felix, changing his mind.

Lavernius Tucker is concerned, Locus can tell as he recognizes the person in front of him. It is only then that he realizes that the sun has started to rise in the distance, transforming the color of the water.

He has been pacing all night, since Felix has slipped from his room, unseen by the others and making off with the sword that Locus had once taken from him. Locus makes sure not to touch the mark on his neck, knowing Tucker will probably not notice it unless Locus does so.

Tucker wears white shorts and a tank top in his signature aqua, his dreadlocks falling loosely over his shoulders and down his back, the elastic that usually holds them in place visible around his wrist. He stands ankle deep in the sea, in front of Locus, and he looks concerned.

“Grif says you’ve been out here all night,” he says, and Locus’ mouth goes dry. Of course they’ve noticed something’s wrong. He’s been careless.

“It’s nothing,” he says. Tucker snorts, skeptical, like he did on those early nights when he’d found Locus in strange places when he was supposed to be asleep. So Locus relents. “I couldn’t sleep.”

Sympathy flickers across Tucker’s face. “Bad dreams?”

Locus looks away, and for a moment, the truth bubbles out before he can stop it. “Felix.” He bites his tongue instantly, so hard that he tastes blood, but Tucker just nods, thinking it an explanation of the content of his dreams. There is no way for him to discern the truth from that one slip; that Felix has returned from the dead, and now cannot be killed. That he wants vengeance for his death, and that Locus is going to do everything he can to shield Tucker and the others from the consequences of this for as long as he can.

There is no way for Tucker to know that Locus is about to betray them again.

The waves crash around them, and when Locus licks his lips nervously, he tastes salt.

“Want to talk about it?” Tucker says, reaching out and putting a hand on Locus’ arm, and Locus takes a deep, shuddering breath, jerking back from the contact.

In three days, Tucker will regret looking at Locus with any degree of kindness or sympathy. Anything that Locus takes now; comfort or kind words, Tucker will use to blame himself somehow. It is best to make this clean, to refuse this, to stay away.

“No,” he says, and turns to walk away.

Tucker grabs his elbow, trying to pull him back. And at any other time, Locus might have let him, might have allowed himself to be tugged into an embrace, or perhaps even taken advantage of the momentum and tackled Lavernius Tucker into the waves.

But this is now, and Locus digs his heels into the sand, each beat of the waves making him only steadier in his stance.

“Sam,” Tucker says, and Locus’ breath hitches. Tucker never uses that name, and now it’s like a knife, slicing through him, and he wants to fall to his knees and weep, and confess everything that is about to happen. “It’s okay. I have those dreams too.”

And just like that, Locus’ knees lock in place. He cannot break. He must keep his silence.

“Lavernius,” he says, and he curses himself for his choice to use Tucker’s first name. It’s too close, too intimate, it’s everything that he was trying to avoid doing before leaving. “Let me go.” He hesitates, but he needs to get out of here, needs to run before Tucker manages to break through his resolve. “Please.”

For a moment, he thinks Tucker will push and pry the truth from him, to undo him with a few simple questions and sympathetic smiles. But instead, the hand withdraws, and Locus walks out of the sea, and he tells himself the damp and salt on his face is only the ocean spray.

The worst part is, he knows exactly what he will need to do to convince them of his betrayal.

Felix has given him three days, and Locus makes use of them. He goes into his accounts and sends vaguely worded messages to people with strange usernames, and then does a basic scrub that Simmons will be able to reverse easily. And when he does so, they will be convinced that there were more messages that he cannot recover, once Locus is done with the rest.

He thinks of trying to warn them, of trying to leave some hints of danger, so that they’ll run. But if he threatens them, Carolina and Washington might chase him, the others not far behind. They will not take a threat lightly, and they would chase him into the lion’s den and die as well. It is better they think he was using them and has moved on, nothing more. They are transient by nature, always being lured into strange new events. Hopefully by the time that Felix is done with him, they will have found a new adventure.

He breaks into every computer he can get his hands on, and deletes any photograph with his face. It’s painful, going through the memories, going through the proof that he had been accepted, that he had been trusted, knowing that he is shattering it beyond repair.

This is for them, he reminds himself

He empties out his room in silence, scrubbing the base clean of fingerprints while he goes. They know his first name, but they’ve never tried to locate who he really is, his last name or his history. When they realize he’s left, someone will think to try, but they will have nothing to go on, and they’ll realize this was intentional.

There’s a cave that none of them know about, and he digs a large pit, throwing all the things he wants them to think he’s bringing with them but he refuses to let Felix get his hands on into its depths. Every single strange item that Caboose had given him is carefully wrapped in tissue paper and placed in a box. He places the crude shirts that Grif buys him in plastic, airtight containers and puts them besides Caboose’s presents. His own copies of the photographs he has destroyed elsewhere go there too; it’s selfish, perhaps, to not destroy his own copies, but he wants some reminder of the time to still exist. The mug he drinks tea with, and even the boxes that contain his tea join them.

Then he buries his weapons, except the sword. Felix has that, a reminder that this was not some strange dream.

The last night, Locus does what he knows will convince them.

He breaks into the room that Washington and Lavernius Tucker share while they sleep.

The two of them look peaceful, limbs tangled together and with the sheets, Washington’s head against Tucker’s chest, Tucker’s dreads spread out across the pillows. No nightmares are disturbing them tonight, and Locus drinks in this sight, knowing he is intruding, but unable to make himself care.

There had been a time that Locus remembers, when Tucker had not slept peacefully. His nightmares had been haunted by Felix, among other demons. They had spent many late nights, drinking coffee or tea together, not speaking about the contents of their dreams, but instead talking about silly, banal things, both of them ignoring the dark circles under their eyes or the way that their hands trembled when they picked up their mugs.

Locus might not be able to protect Lavernius Tucker from every evil that the galaxy can create, but he can spare him this.

He steals the physical photographs with his face on them that are scattered across the room, and then he takes Tucker’s sword from its place under Tucker’s pillow, a location that Tucker had told him about once, comforting Locus about his admission that he had weapons stashed all over the base, for peace of mind.

He touches nothing to do with Junior, knowing that any potential threat to his son would cause Tucker to chase him to the ends of the earth. No, this betrayal cannot involve a threat. It’s just him returning to his old ways. In his search history, the Reds and Blues will see that he has researched the value of the swords, and they will think he intends to sell Tucker’s sword, and maybe his own, to fund wherever it is he’s going to do next.

He puts the Tucker’s sword in the cave, not wanting to bring it to Felix, who might find the temptation of a second energy sword too great and go after Tucker.

He does not bury it. He cannot bring himself to.  

He leaves no note for them, no answers or explanations. It can’t seem at all personal. His removal must be clinical, detached from their lives. He puts on his armor, and he burns the physical photographs in a corner of his room, making sure just enough of them survive so that they will know what it is, and realize that he’s destroying evidence.

When he’s done, there’s no sign that Locus was ever there.

It will be like he has vanished into thin air, just another ghost moving out of their lives.

Leaving the base feels like suffocating. Wearing his armor again is bad enough, but he walks through the base invisibly. He shouldn’t spend time on goodbyes that the others don’t get to be a part of, but he indulges himself selfishly. He will never see them again. He wants to be sure he has something good to remember.

He finds Sarge, asleep in his workshop. Lopez stares at him suspiciously from his position in the corner, but Locus just puts a blanket over Sarge’s shoulders and moves away, closing the door behind him. Even if the robot tells them what happened, none of them will understand him, or believe him if they could. Sarge will believe that Lopez did it, in his fondness and delusions.

He finds Grif and Simmons asleep on the couch instead of the room that they refuse to admit they share. Their limbs are tangled together, and they lean on each other in an intimacy they would refuse while awake. A movie plays on the television in front of them, and popcorn is scattered all over the ground.

Locus wishes Grif were awake. He would ask Locus what he was doing, perhaps even invite him to sit with them. He’d see right through Locus, and ask him what was wrong. But if he did…

Perhaps it is for the best that Grif sleeps on.

Donut is asleep in the room he shares with Doc, and Locus stands in the doorway, watching. The two of them are curled against each other. It is a tranquil image, the two of them surrounded by Donut’s fondness for frills and lace in interior design, Doc’s medical texts and yoga mat scattered on the floor.

He finds Carolina in her room, a tablet on her chest, having fallen asleep while reading the news or something similar. Locus resists the urge to take away the tablet, and place a blanket over her, or worse, to wake her up, kneel at her side, and confess what he is doing. If anyone was capable of helping him drive off Felix, it would be her, surely. He imagines her killing Felix, freeing them all from this…

But he thinks about the sound of Felix’s neck snapping, and the way that he had straightened up right after.

Felix has become more dangerous than ever, and Locus can’t take the risk. Maybe she could handle him, even if Locus doubts it, but at what cost? Who would die before they put him down like a rabid dog?

It is much better that Locus is the only one to pay the debt that Felix demands. Locus will happily die a thousand times over, if it means that Felix never touches any of them.

He does not visit Washington and Tucker again. He has said those goodbyes already. Instead, he goes searching for Caboose.

Caboose is on the roof of the base, asleep in his armor. He’s sitting upright, his feet dangling over the edge, and Locus gives into his urges, and shifts Caboose, so that he is lying down in a more comfortable position.

“Sam?” Caboose asks sleepily, waking up slightly as Locus moves him away from the dangerous edge.

“Go back to sleep, Caboose,” Locus says, allowing his voice to show all the affection and exhaustion that he has been hiding these past three days. It does not matter if Caboose remembers this in the morning. The others will not listen if Caboose choses to protest Locus’ innocence, and in time, Locus’ absence will convince Caboose of the betrayal. He is no Leonard Church; Caboose will not expect him to return.

“Okay! See you in the morning!”

Nothing he could have said would have been more agonizing. Locus closes his eyes and waits until the sounds of Caboose’s snores fill the air before he goes back into the base. His home, were it possible for Locus to ever have such a thing. For a while, it had felt like he’d belonged here.

He does one last sweep, and then walks out, panic rising in his chest as he realizes there is now no turning back. He goes to the beach, where Felix is waiting in the pelican, hovering above the water so that there are no marks on the sand to tell of his method of departure.

“Is it done?” Felix asks, holding the sword that both of them are bound to in his hands. He’s wearing his old armor. It’s dented and broken in places, and the paint is peeling. Felix has made no repairs, and the effect on Locus is visceral. He does not want to look, but he knows he must.

“Yes,” Locus replies, the words like ash in his mouth.

“Good. Then get in, and take off that armor.”

Felix starts the pelican, and Locus obeys, taking off his armor piece by piece. Once, he might have considered this some sort of humiliation, being forced to remove it while Felix remained armored. Now, Locus is more comfortable in his own skin and he knows that being out of armor is nothing to be ashamed of, normally. But fear sinks into his stomach as he exposes himself, vulnerable to whatever it is that Felix is planning. It’s final, removing his helmet and placing it on the table. He will never wear it again, he knows this.

Felix keeps his bargains. He won’t harm the Reds and Blues. He will take his vengeance out on Locus, and then…

Locus doesn’t know what happens then.

Felix returns from the cabin and picks up his helmet. “They’ll be waking up soon,” he says. “Let’s see if you kept your end of the deal, shall we?”

He handcuffs Locus to the railing in the pelican, and then he pulls out a tablet that shows surveillance footage of the base. Locus had spotted the cameras when he’d looked, but hadn’t removed them, despite the violation of privacy. Felix would have taken that as betrayal and slaughtered them all.

There’s no sound, as the scene unfolds. Felix makes Locus watch, and laughs and laughs and laughs, as they run around, looking for the sword, for Locus, for the destroyed evidence. They go into his room and tear it apart. They put on their armor and grab their weapons. They argue. Caboose cries. Locus tries to keep his face still and calm, but there’s no helmet to hide behind. Felix can read his expression like a book, and does so gleefully, mocking him every time he recognizes an emotion.

Messages arrive to Locus’ account, from the Reds and Blues. Felix reads them all from his helmet, mocking their voices so that Locus knows who sent which message.

“Where are you?”

“Dude, everybody’s seriously freaking out right now, this isn’t funny.”

“This isn’t true, right?”

“When are you coming home?”

And then finally, Washington is the one to send the final message.

“If I see you again, I’m going to kill you.”

Locus closes his eyes and sags in relief. It worked. They’re safe.

He doesn’t even struggle when Felix injects him with something that makes his limbs grow numb and his eyes grow heavy.

Nothing else matters.

The Reds and Blues are safe.