#fitz is just one deep character man

[dragoncookies]

Sophie is Fitz's "lacy"

Think about it! As of late in the series Shannon brings to jarring light, in the cognate inquisition scene, the jealousy Fitz has of Sophie and how Fitz puts her on a pedestal. So, all at the same time, he views her as perfect, is jealous of her capabilities and has feelings for her. I can't help but hear that phenomenon when I listen to Lacy. The lyrics in Lacy are also just so juicy and fun to analyze.

Full lyrical analysis below the cut (it's a lot, but I love doing this sort of thing)

Lacy, oh lacy, skin like puff pastry.

Aren’t you the sweetest thing on this side of hell?

Dear angel lacy, eyes wide as Daisy’s,

Did I ever tell you that I’m not doing well?

(this is the longest paragraph, I promise)

The first lyrics here set up the whole song by characterizing the subject of the song. The emphasis on calling lacy “sweet” and an angel is the narrator criticizing this person for the fact that they can never seem to be wrong, and that they just seem like an angel who always has the best intentions. Of course, these lyrics are also just literally calling the person sweet and caring in nature (most of this song has lyrics that have double meanings, which is why this song fits Fitz’s feelings about Sophie as of the latest book so well imo). Sophie is a pretty sweet girl, but most importantly she calls all the shots and doesn’t get as much flack for what she does, whether it be a good call or not. For example, Sophie was BARELY held accountable for when she let Alvar go in Legacy (not hating on our favorite Sophie, but that was a horrible choice). In Marella’s short story, Marella is faced with a hard choice and so she thinks of what Sophie would do in her place. For Fitz, it seems to him that Sophie can just do whatever she wants and not get any criticism for what she does. Where HE wants to be perfect and always do what is right, he seems to only do what is wrong, and compared to how Sophie can only seem to do what is right it is probably frustrating for Fitz. Of course, none of this is Sophie’s fault. Fitz needs to learn find peace in himself and not to make Sophie something other than mortal (I would say human but they’re not actually human are they?). Fitz cannot do this at the moment, however, because he’s “not doing well” as is said by the song. He still never fully has gotten to process his feelings about Alvar, as for the ENTIRETY of Flashback he literally had to bottle all his emotions or he would die. That’s lowkey traumatizing. 

Fitz is just not doing his best, simply put. 

Ooh, I care, I care, I care.

Like perfume that you wear, I linger all the time,

Watching, hidden in plain sight.

The emphasis on “I care” reveals that the narrator is pained by the degree to which they care. They don’t want to care as much as they do, but still they’re always watching and needing to know more about the “lacy” that they loathe. Fitz doesn’t want to let his jealousy affect his friendship and his feelings for Sophie as much as they do.

Ooh, I try, I try I try,

But it takes over my life, I see you everywhere,

the sweetest torture one could bear.

Fitz really does try. He’s always saying he’s working on himself, and he does. Yet, the progress isn’t instantaneous, and the rate at which Sophie’s success conflicts with his own is greater than the rate at which Fitz tries to manage his feelings. Fitz’s entire life is supposed to be about being the greatest and the most “perfect” elf there is, but when Sophie comes in and starts to fill in all those standards, it can’t help but conflict with Fitz’s pursuits in an ugly way. So the lyrics "it takes over my life" and "I see you everywhere" are pretty fitting. 

Yet, Fitz wants her. He wants to spend his life with her. Fitz admires her and can’t help but develop feelings for this pretty girl who was a breath of fresh air from his life of perfection (though distorted by the warped view elves have of romance because of the matchmaking system). So, torture though it is for Fitz to watch Sophie take his place as the greatest, it is sweetened by the fact that he’s watching someone he admires (matching the lyrics "the sweetest torture one could bear). 

Smart, sexy lacy, I’m loosin’ it lately

I feel your compliments like 

bullets on skin

Coming from someone above you, compliments can feel untrue, and when you’re jealous of that person who is above you, those compliments can just feel painful. 

Before Legacy, Fitz and Sophie were on the same page, and their relationship with each other was great, too great. Fitz also seemed be more useful in past books in the series, but as of late he hasn’t been very useful (as Rayni joked about in the beginning of Stellarlune. It was funny but also I felt bad for Fitz). 

Sophie starts to ghost Fitz during Legacy. Then when Fitz tries to find Alvar by searching through Cassius’s mind (bold, Fitz), Fitz finds out Cassius was playing him the whole time! Cassius was never really going to tell Fitz where Alvar was, but Cassius had no problem letting Sophie know. Sophie was just better than Fitz in that she could search Cassius’s mind and that she found Alvar. In a single day, Sophie did both of Fitz’s projects for him. Then Sophie reveals in book 10 that actually she has feelings for Keefe, so even romantically he isn’t good enough. Ouch. As of late, Fitz is loosing control of his perfect facade and of his ability to control his life, and so in turn he spirals inside and looses control of all the little things he used to be able to control about himself. 

Dazzling, starlet, Bardot reincarnate, 

Well aren’t you the greatest thing to ever exist?

While Sophie isn’t aspiring to be an actor, she is aspiring to be a “star” in the sense that she’s the symbol of change and she’s aspiring to be something great (referring to the lyric “starlet”). From the moment she entered the lost cities, Fitz's pride in life, everything he was made to be and told he had to become, starts to be fulfilled by this talented girl named Sophie. She begins to overshadow Fitz in a lot of ways during the series, like how she ends up in the nobility (Fitz's dream job) or ends up finding Alvar (something Fitz has been trying to do for months and months). So the judge-y tone in which Olivia sings “well aren’t you the greatest thing to ever exist?” are a pretty great way to represent the contempt Fitz likely seems to feel.

Ooh, I care, I care, I care

Like ribbons in your hair, my stomach's all in knots

You got the one thing that I want

The simile of “like ribbons in your hair, my stomach’s all in knots” describes a feeling emotional turbulence. Which, in relation to Fitz, is fitting since he likely feels strongly about his current relationship with Sophie. The beginning scene of Unlocked actually details it. When Keefe could feel Fitz’s emotions, Keefe said he felt, “Sadness. Nervousness. Regret. Loneliness. Plus a hefty dash of anger” (idk what page number). He really does like Sophie, their friendship is priceless. 

The lyrics “you got the one thing that I want” have a double meaning. On one hand, Sophie is the one he wants. She stole his heart (and now she broke it, oops). On the other hand, she has leadership, a position of power that makes Fitz secretly so jealous. All these conflicting feelings surely turn his stomach up in knots.

Ooh, I try, I try, I try

Try to rationalize, people are people

But it's like you're made of angel dust

These lyrics convey that the author struggles to view this person as a normal human being because they’ve idolized this person in their mind. 

What is also frustrating is trying to be rational about someone when you’ve idolized them. In the cognate inquisition it was revealed that Fitz viewed Sophie as this strong, fearless and perfect leader. Now that it's become a problem, he has to try to see her as a normal elf, full of flaws (just like everyone), but it's hard for him to let go of the expectation of perfection he’s lived under his whole life.

I’ve often wondered if that’s why he views Sophie the way he does. Maybe he’s just been projecting his own need to be perfect onto her, and has been falling for the Sophie in his mind that would please his Vacker family instead of the real Sophie. 

(bridge)

Oh, oh, oh

Oh, oh, oh, oh

Oh, oh, oh, oh

Oh, oh, oh

This doesn’t have to do with the lyrics above (it's just “oh” so not much to go off of), but the way Olivia sings this whole song is whispery and angelic, but strained, almost as if she’s fighting herself. She’s singing a song about an ugly flaw in a beautiful way, painfully unearthing the jealous side of admiring someone on top of condemning them for being seemingly perfect. Fitz himself is this image of perfection. He’s the epitome of elven culture. He’s a beautiful, ethereal elf, who has the most perfect life and does everything right. Yet, his flaws are such a stark contrast in comparison. The way Shannon has written him has a heavy emphasis on his struggle to work on his flaws. His whole character sort of symbolizes the elven world, in that it's so pretty and perfect on the outside but broken and hiding horrors inside. As the elven world crumbles throughout the series, so does he. 

An angelic song about one’s own flaws is very fitting for him, I'd say.

Lacy, oh lacy, 

it's like you’re out to get me. 

You poison every little thing that I do.

This last, whispered bit of the song reveals the true loathing. For every lyric before the this point, any feelings of true loathing were braided into comments of adoration. Here, however, it is confessed that the author is scared of the way this “lacy” threatens them. This “lacy” really effects them, she poisons the authors life. The speaker feels targeted by lacy’s success, like it's a personal attack, and to the author it is personal. This “lacy” makes the author feel smaller in comparison. It's a deeper, hidden self loathing. The author is jealous of lacy’s perfection because the author loathes themselves for not being perfect like lacy is. So everything the author does seems to be disgustingly unworthy compared to what lacy does. 

This is how Fitz feels about Sophie in a sense. Maybe not as strongly, but certainly Fitz’s subconscious desire and pressure to be perfect generates feelings inside him that parallel what Olivia Rodrigo describes here. 

Sophie is Fitz’s “lacy”. 

Lacy, oh lacy,

I just loathe you lately,

And i despise my jealous eyes and how hard they fell for you.

Yeah, I despise my rotten mind and how much it worships you.  

Fitz never used to feel this way about Sophie, at least not to the degree that he feels now. As things have shaken out, he’s been loathing her. 

This is something that likely frustrates him, because he likes Sophie. She’s his best friend besides Keefe (debatable). Nobody wants to be obsessively jealous over someone they love. Yet, this obsession with Sophie, the reasons that he is jealous of her, are also why he started to fall in love with her, and pretty hard. This is why the lyric “I despise my jealous eyes and how hard they fell for you” goes so hard (excuse my un-academic language). His mind is poisoned by the need for perfection that growing up as basically elven royalty, as a Vacker, conditioned him to. He has a spoiled mindset, he’s used to getting what he wants, and for things to go his way (relating to the lyrics "my rotten mind”). Maybe he just wants to get Sophie out of his head, maybe he just wants to stop feeling for her the way he does. 

Maybe he just wants Sophie to stop being the thorn in his heart that she has likely, unfortunately, become because of his "rotten mind". 

(none of this analysis is Sophie or Fitz hate. We love Sophie in the household, and we also love Fitz in this household)

[jewishdainix]

Dislike how characters will literally be queer in canon but people will act like its fanon because the authur/creator hasnt confirmed it or it wasnt said explicitly (despite being explicitly shown)

[princessmisery666]

Retirement Plan

Summary: After Six rescues Claire, there are no mission details to follow, no designated escape route, and no arranged extraction. However, Donald planned for the day Six would learn there is more to the Sierra Program than dangerous operations and battle scars.

Warnings/Genres/Troupes: angst, drink spiking, canon-type violence, flirting, murder, flashbacks. 

W/C: 8.5k

Characters: Sierra Six, OFC, Claire Fitzroy, Lloyd Hansen, Donald Fitzroy. 

Pairing: none. Platonic friendships. 

A/N: first time writing for this fandom, please be kind. I know this is long but I didn't feel there was no good place to split it. I had to post before I lost the courage and decided I hated the whole thing.

Beta(s): @deanwinchesterswitch

Graphics: made by me on Canva// @slytherkins created the OFC image.

Master Lists: Main // Other Fandoms

2021

The multiple yellow warning triangles that line the road should be redundant after the big, bold, capitalized lettering warning of RADIATION RISK. PRIVATE PROPERTY. DO NOT ENTER. TRESPASSERS WILL BE SHOT THEN PROSECUTED (if you survive). Yet Six continues to drive. He hopes the warnings are an attempt to keep people out because he has little in the way of choices. It’s either risk radiation poisoning or…well, he doesn’t know what other option they have at the moment.

The alarm sounds, pulling Carmen’s attention from her task of scrubbing the internet of any trace of the man who just trespassed on her land. The screen switches from the split view to track the vehicle as it crosses the property line. Shit. 

Six wonders if Claire got the coordinates wrong. He’s been driving on an uneven dirt road for well over a mile, surrounded by nothing but trees to the right and chest-high grass to the left. He can’t blame the kid, Donald made her memorize coordinates and a random password during a stressful situation. He’d understand if she got confused or misheard him. But Six is not about to wake her to check the intel for the hundredth time.

The car isn’t speeding, so it’s not an emergency, but its occupant still shouldn’t be here. She rushes up the basement stairs, unclipping the safety button on the sheath holding the knife on her hip. The stairs lead directly into the sitting room, and she grabs the gun from under the couch, checking the magazine as she walks toward the front door. Before stepping outside, she plucks the baseball cap off the hook in the entryway. The car is on the horizon, a quarter mile out, and she tucks the gun into the back waistband of her jeans, making sure her oversized shirt covers it.

The sun is quickly descending, and Six doesn’t want to drive this uneven path in the dark. The dirt road finally gives way to gravel, and Six sees the house. A figure steps out onto the porch, watching his arrival. He didn’t see any cameras, but there must be surveillance because how else would they know he was coming? 

Gravel crunches beneath the tire, kicking up a cloud of white dust as the car pulls to a stop a little too close to the porch steps. 

The engine cuts off, and Carmen cautiously waits for the occupier to step out, wondering how he knows about this place. Fitz would have called if there was trouble because no one else knew of her existence here. 

Six looks at the woman through the window. Her long brunette hair fans out from under a navy blue baseball cap, concealing most of the right side of her face. Suspicious in itself but not cause for concern. Yet.

The tall blond man, who she knows only as Six, steps out of the car and eyes her suspiciously before uttering, “Password: Portal to another world.”

Fuck. Her throat tightens, and her chest constricts, feeling heavy with pain. The spoken words mean one thing. But still, she asks, “Fitz is dead?” 

She sucks in a deep breath and waits for his reply. That she had a relationship with Donald is apparent from her reaction. He hates being the bearer of bad news, but he has to deliver it and nods once. 

She knew this day was coming. It was only a matter of time. Fitz got too close to the kid - well, man now - and it wasn’t ever going to end well. She’d told Fitz as much on one of their many - almost daily - phone calls, and he always told her to stop worrying so much. Maybe she was too close to Fitz, too, because she constantly worried about the man. 

A fat lot of good that did. He’s dead. And his protege/son/weapon is staring at her. She lets him stare. Everyone does. It’s human nature. She pushes back her shoulders, slipping off her baseball cap, and shakes her hair off her face as best she can without lifting her hands to aid the process. He’ll see that as a threat. 

Six keeps his eyes on hers for a second, beautiful amber eyes that wouldn’t look out of place on a Hollywood star. His eyes fall to her nose and trace the deep scar, made by a sharp blade, running from the bridge of her nose, curling around her right cheek and up into her bottom lip.

He traces it twice before meeting her eyes again, and she returns the cap to her head. “Got somewhere for the kid?”

“Claire?” she asks, dipping to look into the car's window.

He nods again.

“Through the living room, upstairs, second door on the left.”

Carmen watches him gently rouse the girl, enough to get her to release the seat belt and allow him to scoop her up. Six winces as he stands, but he doesn’t let whatever pain it is stop him from carrying her into the house.

The walk to the stairs is painful. He’s probably popped some stitches by carrying her, but he doesn’t care. He grunts and groans as he climbs each step and pauses to catch his breath at the top. Thankfully, the corridor is short, and the door to the room is slightly ajar, allowing him to kick it open and shuffle in sideways.

“Six,” Claire groggily says as he places her on the bed. “Where’re we?” 

He wants to let her rest some more, so he tells a white lie, “We’re safe,” because he’ll be damned if anything happens to her. He waits for her to settle again, rolling onto her side. To back up his statement, he does a bit of recon.

Carmen hears Six moving around while she waits for the coffee to brew. She can’t blame him for checking out the place. He’s never been here, doesn’t know her, and now Donald is gone. There’s one less person on the planet that he trusts. He’ll fall back on his extensive training and try to use whatever he can to his advantage. 

Six doesn’t care about manners today. He doesn’t know this scarred woman even though she apparently knows Donald, so he searches the house and is not quiet about it either. There are weapons stashed in obvious places, and the hum of computers draws him down the open door at the bottom of the stairs. Eight steps lead to a concrete floor. Cautiously he walks down, and if he weren’t so damn tired, he’d probably have let out an appreciative whistle. 

The place looks like a NASA command center, with four monitors, multiple tower systems, a large-screen TV, and Six’s photo on the middle screen. A program is running at speed, a jumble of white numbers and letters scrolling over a black box, and occasionally, images of the mess in Berlin pop up and then disappear. Why is she looking for him? 

Carmen knows Six will find all of her weapon’s stashes. They aren’t that hard to find, and if he’s bold enough - which he is - he’ll walk down the stairs disguised as a linen closet that leads to the basement and see her computer system. He’ll make his own assumptions as to who she is. 

Apparently, having decided to switch tactics, he sneaks up on her. She hears him just before he reaches for the gun in her waistband. As he pulls it free, she turns to face him. Using his lower body to pin her between him and the edge of the counter, he wraps a hand around her throat, cutting off her air. She hadn’t expected his assumption that she’s an enemy to hurt as much as it does, but he’s had a shitty few days, so she forgives his behavior. Although, she’s not going to go down without defending herself. 

Raising the gun to her temple, his deceptively calm voice demands, “Who are you? Why is my face streaming on your monitors?” 

Carmen doesn’t fight back, though she could if she wanted to. She’s as skilled as he is. One arm is trapped between their bodies, and the other rests on the marble countertop near the coffee pot. While he obviously doesn’t feel it, the small knife she pulled from the sheath as she turned is resting on the inside of his thigh.

When she doesn’t attempt to answer, he forces the heel of his palm into her larynx, compelling her to bend further backward to keep from passing out. She could grab the carafe and drench his face in scalding hot coffee, but it would only escalate the situation. Instead, her solution is to tap the hand wrapped around her throat three times, conceding.

He loosens his grip but doesn’t move. She gasps, sucking in much-needed air, and he allows her three deep breaths before he asks again. 

“I just told that girl she’s safe. Are you gonna make me a liar?! Who are you?” 

“I’m Sierra.” the pressure on her neck lightens further but doesn’t disappear. “Donald gave me strict instructions: if he doesn’t check in every two days, I’m to scrub the internet of any mention of you or anyone matching your description.” she pauses, giving him a second to process, but he’s still as a stone. “The agency has done their part, the news outlets have stopped running the story, but your little escapade in Berlin is still doing the rounds on the internet.”

Six remains in place, gun grinding into her temple, strained muscles fighting against the burn of fatigue, as he debates what to believe. It’s plausible but still doesn't answer his question. 

“Do you work for the agency?”

“No. I work for Fitz. Off the books. Or at least I did.”

The coffee finishes brewing, and their labored breathing is the only sound for a tense moment. “Six,” she says, as softly as she can with his hand so close to being able to crush her windpipe.

He does not react, so she taps the blade resting on the inside of his thigh, dangerously close to his femoral artery, to make him aware of its presence. 

“Let me go,” she demands. 

He’s not ready to trust her or at least be calm enough for a rational conversation, so he keeps her pressed against the countertop.

As best she can, in her most professional voice, she utters the sentence she hopes will make him recognize her. “Oscar One to Sierra Six. Safe to talk.”

“Star,” he murmurs, letting his hand fall away and taking a half step back after putting the gun on the countertop beside her. 

Cautiously eyeing him, she rubs her neck, greedily inhaling the oxygen he deprived her of. “Star?”

He’s not willing to explain and instead apologizes. “Sorry. I always imagined you as a short, rotund woman with glasses on the tip of her nose like a librarian.”

That’s a lie. He had never seen a picture of her, so all he had was imagination, and though librarians often came up, she was never short and rotund in his vision. 

Carmen chuckles, rolling her eyes, “Yet you still flirted with me.”

He did flirt, and not because it gained him perks; fancier hotels, restaurant recommendations, a rush on an evac team when needed, but because it was nice to have someone to talk to who knew the job and, in a way, knew him. He shrugs with the smallest of smirks, denying nothing.

“Disappointed?” She asks, gesturing up and down her body.

His eyes travel the length of her body and back up to her eyes. “No. I’ve always had a thing for librarians.”

She laughs out loud, shying away from his gaze and turning back to pour the coffee. She’s not so sure he’d have flirted had he known what she looked like. “Are you hungry? I can make you a sandwich.”

“Starving,” he says. The danger has passed, and now Six understands why Donald sent them here. Oscar One is a friend. Donald trusted her, and Six does, too. 

The enormity of the realization hits him hard, and suddenly, his whole body aches. “Got somewhere I can freshen up?”

“Yeah, bathroom upstairs. Everything you need is in the closet in the bedroom, third door on the left.”

He leans around her, picks up the fresh mug of coffee, and smiles, but she doesn’t see it. Stirring sugar into her coffee, she uses it as a pretense to keep her face averted, but he senses it’s because he’s on the side with her scar. “Thank you.”

2019

The park had been relatively empty, but it’s growing in popularity as the proverbial lunch bell sounds at the bordering businesses. The benches surrounding the central attraction, a lake containing a large floating fountain, quickly become occupied with people reading newspapers, eating lunch, meeting friends, and scrolling their phones. Ducks, swans, a few geese, and greedy seagulls all vie for the spoils of the humans offering bread and seeds. 

Six leisurely jogs laps around the lake. He’s not working on his cardio, which is good because he keeps having to slow down and dodge around people, but he is working. 

The women, with babies in strollers, track his movement, whispering to one another and giggling whenever he passes and nods a polite greeting. They think he can’t hear their lewd comments and salacious musings, but the AirPods aren’t piping music. They’re providing a connection to his operation specialist. 

At a safe distance from prying ears, he pulls his phone from his pocket. Pretending to press the screen as if making a call, he says, “Sierra Six to Oscar One, safe to talk.”

The voice comes back almost immediately. “Oscar One to Sierra Six confirmed, safe to talk.”

Translation: secure line. No one else, including top brass, is listening. 

He heads toward a tree, making the most of the shade to unnecessarily stretch because he’s barely broken a sweat. He looks up at the blue sky, with no clouds in sight, and knows Oscar One can see him via satellite and the cameras located around the park. Though he has no idea as to her location, she is his eyes and ears. Essentially, she holds his life in her hands. If he needs a quick escape, he relies on her to provide the safest route.

“What’re you doing after this?” 

She sighs dreamily, “There’s a bottle of red cooling in the fridge and a pizza with my name on it somewhere.” 

“Want some company?”

“I’d love some,” she says wistfully, then chuckles it away, “but it might take you a while to get here.”

He sighs at the thought. Wine and pizza sound like a fun night to him, and it’d be nice to put a face to the name Oscar One. He knows that’s not her name, just like Six isn’t his name, though he much prefers Six to the name his father gave him.

He starts up a light jog again, going in the opposite direction around the lake, just to change things up a bit. “Where is here?”

“If I could tell you, I would.” 

She means it, too. It would be nice to have company. She’s been alone for so long she’s acclimatized to the solace, but she was supposed to be a field agent and craves to be where the action is. But she lives vicariously through Six and makes the most of being able to take control of cameras around the globe to see what’s going on in the world.

Six believes her. They’ve established a good relationship over the sixteen years she’s been his Northern Star, as he likes to think of her. She’s helped him out of multiple sticky situations - she’s smart, calm in a crisis, and possesses great communication and observational skills - she’d be excellent in the field. Still, he’s glad she isn’t because he relies on her to be a guiding light to safety when he needs it. 

Fitz speaks highly of her, sometimes too much, and Six believes him to be the reason they are paired together more often than not. It’s rare that he gets an assignment where she is not his partner, and he questions it whenever she isn’t. However, he still finds it inequitable that he has no idea what she looks like, yet she can probably see the mole below his left temple.

“It is unfair, you know.” he swerves around a businessman shouting into his phone. “That you know what I look like and where I am at any given moment.”

“It’s part of the job,” she reminds him, not for the first time. “I promise, one day, we’ll meet and share a pizza.”

“I’m holding you to that.”

Six continues his jog and listens to One tapping keys and humming along to the radio. He contemplates asking her real name, but a part of him likes the mystery of it. The story and images of her he creates in his mind are far more fanciable than the truth. Their stories are morbidly similar.

The lunch crowd dissipates, and Six completes twelve more laps before One pipes up again. 

“Target identified,” One says at the same time Six spots him. “Southwest entrance, heading your way.”

With a light tone, “Bad guy identified,” Six confirms, returning to the tree to do some stretches, a little necessary this time.

The target doesn’t look like a typical bad guy. He’s clean-shaven with slicked-back hair and wearing an immaculately tailored suit and expensive shoes. He looks like a banker. Arguably, he’s probably as much of a crook as any easily identified ‘bad guy’.

“Is he a bad guy?” One wonders ruefully. “He’s just a whistleblower.”

Six isn’t one to get mixed up in feelings or emotions. He’s here to do a job. The assignment is basic: collect a document dropped ‘anonymously’ and then follow the mark. 

One is accustomed to Six’s indifference when the conversation gets deeper or potentially contentious, so she provides her own answer. “It helps me to think of them as bad guys that deserve whatever the agency is going to do to them rather than potential good guys that are in the way of someone's agenda.”

Six understands the logic, but he’s never had much of a problem with it because whatever he’s tasked with is better than the alternative. 

“He’s made the drop,” One informs him. “On the bench a hundred yards…” 

A loud pop echoes around the park, and the smartly dressed man is no longer so well put together. A red dot blooms on his chest, and he falls to his knees. Someone screams, and Six takes a step to go after the file to complete the mission. 

“HOLD!” One yells in his ear. It’s as frantic as he’s ever heard her, and he freezes. “I can’t see the shooter. I don’t have eyes.”

The first echo dies down, but another quickly follows. The already downed whistleblower takes a kill shot to his head. People begin to scatter in every direction except Six. He waits under the tree, hopefully out of sight of the killer, deciding on his next move. 

“Six,” One impassively states. “I need you to be a civilian. Run.” 

“The file.” 

“Forget the file,” she grits. “Do you trust me?” 

“Yes.”

“I need you to run, please,” she begs. “If you ever want to meet me for that pizza and wine, I need you to run.”

His Northern Star has never steered him wrong, so he doesn’t protest. He turns away from the bloody murder and runs in the opposite direction, following the crowd of scared civilians.

One is strictly professional, but the relief is in her tone. “I’m hacking the target’s phone. He took photos. I have the files.” 

“Thanks for the save.” 

“Always.”

2021

Carmen sits on the porch, wrapped in a blanket, listening to the running water upstairs. It’s odd to have a guest, let alone two, but she’s thankful for the company. She figures that now that Donald is gone, like Six and Claire, she doesn’t really have anybody left. Tears prick the corner of her eyes, but she dilutes them with a sip of scotch. It’s horrible stuff, something Fitz left behind, but she’s drinking it in his honor.

As Oscar One said he would, Six finds all he needs in the bedroom next door to where he set Claire down, including clothes and bandages. It’s been a long, stressful couple of days, and it’s not until he steps into the shower that he realizes he hasn’t asked her real name. Once he’s ready, in clean sweatpants that fit and a fresh white tee thrown over his shoulder that’s also his size, he seeks to remedy that situation. 

The half-nakedness isn’t to show off his physique or to reassure Oscar One that they both have scars. It’s to let his freshly dressed wounds air dry. Luckily, he didn’t pull any stitches while carrying Claire.

The smell of bacon hits Six as he steps into the kitchen, mouth watering at the sight of the film-wrapped sandwich on the countertop. The whole thing is about two inches deep. Fluffy white bread holds chunks of white chicken mixed with salty bacon, sliced tomato, and the greenest lettuce he’s ever seen. Once he unwraps it and lifts a corner of the bread, he finds a healthy serving of mayonnaise.

Living alone is something Carmen is used to. Sometimes, she thinks the solitude surrounding her has helped fine-tune her hearing because she hears Six remove the film wrap from the sandwich and sniff it. “There’s chips in the pantry,” she calls from the porch.

The sandwich looks plentiful, so he takes it out to the porch sans chips. Crickets chirp, a distant bird sings as the night draws in, and Six walks to the edge of the porch, taking time to appreciate the spectacular view — trees and green as far as the eye can see. The world could end, and they’d never know.

“Find everything you need?” she asks.

“Yeah, thanks. How’d you know my size?”

“Donald Fitzroy,” she says, fondness and grief coating his name as she raises a glass of mahogany liquid to the fading sun. “He’d visit every couple of months, always had a suitcase of crap with him.” 

Six walks across the porch, hoisting himself and his sandwich, to sit on the wide brick wall. “He knew I’d come here,” he concludes, looking out at the forest and the dirt road he drove up. 

“He had a plan for everything.” She explains, “That was part of my deal, to stay on this side of the bars.”

Six turns to look at her again. Although she said she was Sierra, it hadn't occurred to him that Fitzroy could have found her the same way he found Six, on the wrong side of the law, rotting in a jail cell. 

She continues, “I had to take you in if you ever needed it,” motioning with her half-empty glass to indicate all of his wounds and bruises, “and it definitely looks like you need it.”

She’s right. He had no plan other than rescuing Claire. After that, he had no idea what he was going to do. They drove as far as a full tank of gas took them, and when Claire fearfully asked him what they were going to do next, he had no answer. Claire was the one to offer the solution, and honestly, they had nothing to lose.

“I’m guessing you know my story,” Six states rather than asks, and she gives a slight nod. “How did Fitz recruit you?” He takes a huge bite of the sandwich and hums appreciatively around a half smile. 

2000

Carmen shuffles inside the interrogation room, cuffs on her ankles and wrists. She understands the precaution, but it's ridiculous. Despite her crime, which she has never denied, she has no ill intentions against anyone.

Donald sits at the desk, laptop open, an official brown document folder beside it. He nods to the guard, who then backs out, closing the door behind him once she’s taken her seat.

“Hi,” he says with a gentle smile. “I’m Donald Fitzroy. I’m going to cut right to the chase.” He turns the laptop around, pulls a slip of paper out of the document wallet, and slides them both over to her. He watches her eyes flick over the instructions on the page and expects the cocked brow she gives him. “I need you to get me access to that.”

She doesn’t ask why. It’s not the first time an unidentified or lettered government agency has asked her to do such a thing, and she doubts it’ll be the last. She taps a few keys and bypasses the government’s supposed firewall - they really should find someone better equipped to build the thing - in forty-five seconds. If her hands weren’t cuffed, she’d pat herself on the back. It’s nice to know she hasn’t lost her touch during her incarceration. “What kind of access do you need?”

“View only is fine.” 

Donald waits for her to ask what’s in it for her or why he wants it done. But she taps away at the keys. His eyes flick to the clock, and he waits a full five minutes before interrupting her concentration.

“It’s a tough one, huh?”

She shrugs, “Not really. I got in three minutes ago. I’ve been playing solitaire.” She turns the computer back to him with a playful smirk.

The screen shows him exactly what he expected it to show him, but regardless, he smiles. He knows he has the right person for the job and loves being right. He opens the document folder again. “Carmody, initial H, born nineteen eighty. Got your first taste of the correctional system in nineteen ninety-four, juvenile prison for cybercrimes, before we really understood what cybercrime was and hit the big leagues in nineteen ninety-eight, life without the possibility of parole for first-degree murder.” 

She rolls her hands as best she can and bows her head as if thanking the audience. “At your service.” 

“You're wasted here.”

“I do my part,” she argues, “I teach women who wouldn’t otherwise have a chance how to use a computer and software to give them better options when they get out. But seeing as you addressed me by my surname leads me to believe you know I take great offense to being called by my given name, which means you know more than you’d like me to know that you know, and all this,” the chains rattle as she motions toward the computer, “was a test.” 

“Like I said, wasted.” Donald smiles. “You're two years in and never appealed the decision.”

She looks decidedly bored. After all, he’s only telling her things she already knows. She was there, she lived it, and she suspects he knows she didn’t appeal because it would have been a waste of everyone’s time and money.

Though, there is one thing he doesn’t know, so he asks, “Still think it was worth it?” 

“Every goddamn day. I go to bed with a smile on my face and sleep like a baby.”

“Fair enough,” Donald nods, “I’d be the same. He deserved everything he got.”

“Actually, he deserved a slow, agonizingly painful death, but y’know,” she shrugs, “I was pressed for time.”

She’s deathly serious - excuse the pun - and Donald sees why the judge threw the proverbial book at her. She has no remorse, and in his opinion, rightfully so, but life imprisonment is a waste of her talent, talents of which he thinks can be adapted and grown.

“What would you say if I told you I could get you out of here and you wouldn’t be pressed for time should you encounter a similar monster?”

“I’d say tell me what I have to do.”

2021

It feels like a lifetime ago, the day Donald changed her life, and while Carmen talks about it, she gets lost in the memory. It’s bittersweet. She owes a lot to Donald Fitzroy and will do all she can to pay it back. 

“I was in the field for just over a year before this,” she points at her face. Her pause is born of grief, a reminder of the life before she was mutilated.

There is and will forever be a before and after, like how people treated her or how she felt about herself. Society treats beautiful people differently. It isn’t, nor has it ever been right, but it was the way of the world, and as Sierra, she used it to her advantage. She’d never been exceptionally vain, but still, some days, she found it hard to look at herself. Even now, she has days when she’s bitterly angry about it. 

Six recognizes her beauty, scars and all. She doesn’t strike him as a vain person, but he can understand how it must have affected her life. Sometimes, he’d get a glimpse of himself, passing a window or the stupid front-facing camera on his phone, and it’d take his breath away because he’d see his father. 

Mirthlessly, she smiles, and a hint of bitterness seeps into her tone. “Can’t be inconspicuous with such a recognizable face, and I, for sure, thought they’d dump me back inside.”

“But Fitz kept you on.”

“I don’t know what story he fed the agency, but for all intents and purposes, I was gone, wiped off the grid. He set me up here, checked in almost every day, visited once every couple of months, and now I think I understand why.”

Six nods, agreeing with her line of thought. “He was building his retirement plan.”

“Not his,” Carmen corrects. 

The scenery is no longer interesting and Six pulls his attention away from it to look at her because now he doesn’t understand her thought process. 

“He was ensuring your retirement,” she says softly as if that will make the realization sting less. “There’s nothing in those wardrobes,” she points back inside the house, "that would fit Donald. They are all in your and Claire’s sizes. He’s been doing it for years, bringing new stuff and taking stuff that would be too small for her as she grew. Donald was never going to retire here, Six, or he never thought he’d get the chance, but he planned for you to be here.”

Sierras aren’t known for riding off into the sunset or surviving to the point of retirement age, but her assumptions and the evidence to back up her claims seem correct. 

Six scoffs, the idea almost laughable. He doesn’t quite believe it was a plan, more of a fail-safe, to keep Claire protected should Donald ever meet his maker. Then again, why would Fitz bring clothes for Six if he didn’t expect Six to be Claire’s savior or perhaps guardian?

Contemplative silence lingers for a while, and the birds fall silent as the sun disappears and the nocturnal creatures begin to wake. 

As with most Sierra operations, there’s never a paper trail. Most of it gets swept under the rug, so Carmen isn’t aware of the circumstances surrounding Donald’s death. Perhaps she’s better off not knowing. Ignorance is bliss, so they say. Six won’t offer the information without prompting, but in the twilight, she decides she’s not ready to hear it. 

Eventually, the questions and quest for knowledge interrupt the thoughtful reminiscing, and Six has to ask, “How do you survive out here?” 

“There’s a Walmart a couple of hours from here and a small town with a Farmer’s Market not too far from that. I do a monthly run, two if I can stretch it.”

“And no one knows you're here?” he questions skeptically. 

“As far as I know, only Fitz,” she says, sipping her drink to douse the grief in her tone. “The only people who know I’m here now are you and Claire. There’s no family or friends.” She’s not bitter about the fact. Carmen smirks, “So if you want to off me and seize the place, it’s yours for the taking.”

“Maybe when I’m feeling better,” Six deadpans.

All joking aside, she looks somber. He's hiding it well, but there’s a slight wince to every movement, a noticeable slower pace for a man his size. “Last couple of days are starting to take their toll, huh?”

It’s a segue to, hopefully, get him to tell her what happened, but he’s not easily swayed.

He grumbles as he slowly pulls himself to the edge of the wall and takes his time to stand up. He stretches his arms high above his head, and Carmen watches until she realizes it could be misconstrued as checking him out and averts her eyes. 

“Last couple of days or years,” he says, mid-stretch adding, “and Lloyd fucking Hansen.” as he drops his arms again. 

Carmen's reaction is immediate. She shoots to the edge of her seat, distaste and hatred sneering at her lips. “Wait, Hansen was involved?”

The reaction isn’t surprising. Lloyd usually has that effect on people, but Six recognizes that it’s something deeper than having a run-in with the guy. “Yes,” Six tells her.

“Of course he was,” she snaps, lips tight with agitation. “I should have known, this shitshow has his fingerprints all over it!” 

Her chest heaves with simmering anger while she fits the pieces together in her head. The CIA keeps Sierra-involved missions close to their chest, strictly off-book, so she hadn’t been able to garner sufficient information to understand precisely what happened. 

“Was it…. Was he….” she can’t find the words because she already knows the answer. She’d always thought it inevitable that Lloyd would be involved in her grief again someday. “Donald,” she starts again, clearing her throat of emotion, “it was Hansen, wasn’t it?”

Six nods and chews his bottom lip before elaborating, “Fitz got shot in the escape. He wasn’t going to make it. He knew he was slowing us down. He cornered Hansen and some of his guys, then pulled a pin off a grenade.”

The anger yields to a mild hopefulness. “So Hansen is dead?”

Six nods, “The trash ‘stache is no more.”

Carmen smiles, satisfied. “That was too quick a death, but I’m glad it was Donald.”

“That’s not how he died,” Six explains. 

The anger returns in the form of her hand gripping the chair's arm tightly, knuckles turning white. “What happened?”

Six recounts events from the takedown of Four to his rescue of Claire and Donald from the house in Croatia, taking them through a quarter bottle of scotch and three beers each. Carmen asks questions, and he answers them as best he can. She fills in some blanks on the Carmichael side, and it all helps to get Six’s thoughts in order and clarify a few murky details. 

“Clarie blew off a few of Lloyd’s fingers. He burnt her face with a flare gun, and of course, if you know Lloyd and from your reaction, I assume you're acquainted, he tried to prove he was better than me. I beat him pretty good, but then Suzanne Brewer put one in his chest.”

“Fuck,” Carmen gripes, “he should have fucking suffered.”

“So you’ve definitely met the guy,” Six notes flatly.

She meets his gaze with a heavy sigh. “I had the displeasure a few times.” 

Six isn’t one to pry, but he’s shared details about himself, okay, more so about the mission he was involved in, but he put everything on the line to save Claire and Donald, though he failed the latter. He knows that tells Carmen a lot about him, more than he’d willingly share with most people.

He isn’t staring at her scar. He’s mesmerized by her eyes, momentarily lost in trying to figure out if they are amber in color or if the orange-tinged sky reflects in them. She gives him little time to decide, shying away, but he uses a gentle finger beneath her chin to bring her gaze back to his. “Is Hansen the one who did that?” 

She doesn’t need to answer. The wriggling out of his grip and avoiding eye contact to look at her fidgeting hands in her lap is enough confirmation, but she takes a deep breath and gives him a half smile. “If you wanna hear about it, we’re gonna need more booze.” 

2003 

Being a cog in the Sierra machine has its perks. Not being stuck in an eight-by-eight cell is an obvious one, but seeing different corners of the world, having fun pretending to be someone else, fine dining, and luxury hotels were top of the list. There were drawbacks, too. Having to be incognito and traveling to distant places usually meant cargo planes, which weren’t exactly first-class service, but Carmen never complained. Donald had given her a second chance, and she’d never take it for granted.

Except when she had to team up with Lloyd Hansen.

“Fitz, c’mon! Why am I here?” she whines into the phone. The fact that she’s lying in the middle of a queen-size bed staring up at a half-million dollar chandelier in the penthouse suite of a hotel in Dubai isn’t lost on her. She’s grateful for the opportunity but sick of being Lloyd’s maid. 

“He asked for you.”

“He asked for me? That means he’s already screwed it up, and I’m here to clean up his mess. Again! Isn’t it about time you locked him up and threw away the key?” she asks, already knowing the answer. He’s a sociopath, psychotic at times, but nine times out of ten, he’s effective - until he isn’t. “This is the third time I’m cleaning up his mess, and the last time he almost blew my cover acting like a petulant child ‘cause he didn’t get his own way.”

“He’s a petulant child because he likes you,” Fitzroy tells her, not for the first time.

The idea of having Lloyd’s affection makes her skin crawl. He’s all mustache and sharp edges. “That’s not a compliment,” she says. 

Fitzroy sighs, and she imagines him running a hand down his face. “Don’t worry, this will be the last time, I swear. I have his replacement ready to go,” he explains in a hushed whisper, not wanting to be overheard from his office.

Curiosity peeks, and though she knows he won’t give her concrete details, she asks, “Sierra?” Lloyd isn’t technically part of the Sierra program. He was kicked out pretty early during the process, but he has friends high on the food chain. 

“Uh-huh,” he confirms. “Six. He’s excelling in the program. Almost better than you.” The teasing smile filters into his tone. “I just need to get him on a few smaller missions before I set him loose. And he has a full beard, like a real man.”

Carmen chuckles. She forgets how much Donald pays attention. She’s complained about the mustache before, so he knows that's ten percent of her issue with Hansen. “Fine, he better be cute,” she concedes. “And if Hansen happens to be collateral damage during this mission, there’s to be no questions asked.”

Fitz heartily laughs, “Deal.”

The mission is a success, despite Lloyd’s involvement, and unfortunately, for Carmen at least, he survives without a scratch.

“Come on, one drink,” Lloyd insists. “We’ve got the night to ourselves. Fitzroy put you up in this beautiful hotel…” 

Yes, Fitzroy did put her in a different hotel from him, on purpose, to avoid this very situation. 

“...What’re you gonna do instead,” he snarks, “go crochet a sweater for Donald?” His declared, “Boring!” echoes around the marble reception area, and she silently apologizes to the few guests who turn to look. 

The implication of a close relationship with her handler is nothing new, so she doesn’t bother responding. But Lloyd isn’t a man who gives up easily.

“One drink,” he repeats, walking beside her toward the elevators. 

The last thing she wants is to spend any time with him and his molester-esque mustache on a professional or a social level, but Lloyd is a persistent fuck, and she has no doubt he’d likely follow her to her room and push his way inside. At least if she sits at the bar with him, she’ll have somewhere to escape.

“Fine,” she sighs, rolling her eyes, “I’m going to the bathroom. Get me a Cosmo.”

“What room number? I’ll put it on the tab.” 

She rolls her eyes. He asks her to go for a drink, but apparently, the agency is paying for it. Such a gentleman. “Penthouse.”

His positively disgruntled scowl makes her day, and she kind of wishes she’d invited him up to see it. She manages to hide her laugh until she’s in the bathroom.

The Cosmo is one of the best she’s ever had, and if she doesn’t look directly at him, he’s not that bad of a conversationalist. Unless that’s the booze talking. She’s only had two, yet her head is swimming. Something’s not right. Was there something in the drink? Is their cover blown?

Lloyd seems fine, but she’s having trouble focusing, so it’s hard to tell. He’s droning on about some ‘dipshit’ he had to deal with on his last mission, so she eyes the bartender. He doesn’t appear interested in them. There are no surreptitious glances their way or feigned ignorance of their conversation. He probably can’t even hear them as he’s at the other end of the bar, slicing lemons and restocking his condiment tray.

“I don’t feel too good.” she twists the stool to face away from the bar, needing to see who’s around.

Two other couples are in the bar, but they are too far away for drink spiking to be an effective plan. She looks back to Lloyd, and his twisted smile makes her realize the error she made in trusting him.

The floor seems to be getting awfully close. “Woooo, there,” Lloyd says, wrapping an arm around her to keep her from face-planting on the tile. Her head lulls against his shoulder, tilted far enough to see the bartender is now across from them.

 “Sir, is everything okay?” The bartender asks, but it sounds so far away. She tries to form words to ask for help, but her tongue feels heavy and thick. “Please-"

Lloyd preempts any further response from her. “Everything’s fine. We’re celebrating our engagement. A little too much excitement and too much alcohol… Put the drinks on the penthouse tab, please.”

She’d never heard him be so polite or sound so…human. That’s the last thought she has before her world goes black. 

Carmen’s eyes flutter open, adjusting to the dusky light of the room. They focus on the ridiculously priced chandelier above her. She wonders how the hotel installed it. It’s big and looks heavy. It must be a bitch to clean! 

Her thought process is murky, and she tries to lift her arm to push the hair off her face. It’s tickling her cheek, but her limb doesn’t move. She tries to sit up, but none of her limbs respond. Her chest rises and falls, but she only knows that from the panic-filled breaths she hears exiting her lips.

“Finally,” Lloyd huffs from somewhere in the room. “I thought you were never going to wake up.”

She turns her head, and to her surprise, it moves. Lloyd sits on a plush chair beside the bed, looking bored and agitated at having to wait for her to come around.

“There she is,” he sighs, almost wistfully, and if it weren’t for the flick knife he’s expertly twirling in his hand, she might have thought he was genuinely concerned. 

“Lloyd,” she mumbles, “what’s going on?” 

He continues to expertly twirl the knife, ignoring her question. “You know I really did like you. You’re smart, formidable, and a pleasure to work with when you aren’t being a complete bitch.” Venom laces the word, but he keeps his face void of emotion. “You are beautiful. It’s almost sickening that they locked up such beauty. Maybe that’s why Fitzroy recruited you. Too wasteful to spend your youthful years in a cell and not seducing people for your country's benefit.”

“Geez, you like the sound of your own voice.” It’s too slurred to portray her boredom as effectively as she’d like. 

“Because I’m the only one that makes sense,” he shrugs, smiling smugly, underlining the arrogance of his belief in that statement. 

Carmen rolls her eyes, along with her head, to look away from him. She’s bored of this already. The disrespect angers him, and he reaches over, grabs her chin, and violently jerks her head to face him again. “Those eyes,” he grits his teeth, “those damn fuckin’ eyes that do nothing but look at me with repulsion.” Elation and admiration cement his tone, “WOW, mesmerizing!”

She could get whiplash from listening to him. “Just do whatever you're going to do,” she growls, wincing when he pinches harder, putting almost unbearable pressure on her jaw and teeth. “Save me the monologuing.”

“Fine,” he leers, sinister and taunting. “Carmichael showed me the report from the last mission. What was I? Unhinged, chaotic, reckless, and dangerous.”

Through gritted teeth, she snarls, “There’s only so many professional ways to say bat shit crazy.” She manages to wriggle her face free and turns away, looking back up at the ceiling. 

Before her mind wanders back to the chandelier because it's way more interesting than Lloyd, the bed bounces, and he's on top of her, straddling her hips. If she weren’t numb from the neck down, she’d feel where his knees crush her hands against the bed. “We could have been a team.”

She scoffs, using the fear as fake bravado, “I’d rather go back to prison.” Tears spill, and she feels them drip down her ears. Instinctively, she tries to lift her arm to wipe them away but it’s as unresponsive as the first time she tried. 

“Oh, that’s where they’ll send you,” Lloyd smiles, genuinely happy, “because you’ll be no good to the agency anymore.”

“Whatever you do to me will be the end for you.” 

“Oh, I’m counting on it,” he admits, “I’m so sick of Fitzroy and all his bullshit. But what you fail to realize is that Fitzroy won’t be in charge forever!” Gently running the cold blade down around her cheek, almost like a lover’s caress. He continues, “Don’t worry. I’m gonna spare your eyes. I want you to see how everyone reacts to your new face.”

“You're proving I was right, Lloyd!” Carmen snarls and works up a wad of saliva to spit it in his face. 

The consequence of the action is immediate, and Lloyd doesn’t bother wiping it away. He presses the blade to the bridge of her nose, “every time you look in the mirror, you’ll remember me.” 

2021

Carmen wipes away a tear, and Six is polite enough to look away to give her a little privacy to reign in her emotions.

It’s funny that she didn’t cry or scream when it happened. She wouldn’t give Lloyd the satisfaction, but now, whenever she recounts the event, she can’t stop the tears from falling. She’s never really processed it, at least not in a healthy way, and having to relive it every time she looks in the mirror, as Lloyd promised, she feels it all over again. 

“Sorry,” she apologizes to Six, who’s clearly uncomfortable at the show of emotion. 

There’s nothing to be sorry for, so Six doesn’t acknowledge the apology, and Carmen doesn’t really know why she offered it.

As the conversation and drinks flow, so does the night. It doesn’t feel like they have been talking all that long, but when Six checks his watch, he realizes it’s been a long while.  “Sun will be up soon.” 

“You should get some rest,” she says. “Can’t imagine you’ve slept much lately.”

That is the understatement of the century. Except for his drug-addled sleep in Miranda’s trunk, he doesn’t remember his last full night's sleep. He stands and stretches his arms over his head, feeling his muscles and bones pop.

Six thinks of wishing her a good night but realizes he didn’t remedy the situation as he had set out to do earlier. He’d been distracted by the delicious sandwich. “This is awkward. We’ve been talking for a few hours, but what’s your name?”

She looks up at him, the porch light highlighting her amusement. “It’s not Oscar One.” She chuckles, “It’s Carmody. But Carmen is fine.”

“Carmody,” he repeats, “sounds more like a surname.”

“It is. My first name is Haven.”

He stares for twenty seconds, waiting for her to laugh or deliver a punchline, but she stares back. It isn’t a joke. 

“I wish I were making it up,” she says finally. “It’s stupid and ironic, and I hate it because of who gave it to me. So I’d appreciate it if you don’t use it.”

He nods solemnly. He understands more than she realizes. He hates his name simply because of the man who gave it to him. He much prefers Six and the man who gave it to him.

To be a good guest, he collects their empty beer bottles and takes them inside. Following Carmen’s instructions on where to put them, Six deposits them in a bin labeled ‘Glass’. She does her part to help the environment, so her monthly supply run includes disposing of any recyclable materials.

Six notices the wine glass turned upside down on the drainer, and he remembers a conversation from long ago.

“Carmen,” he calls softly through the house, knowing the breeze will take it to her through the open doors and windows. 

A few short seconds later, she steps through the backdoor, a crease of concern in her brow that he may need something. “Yeah.” 

“What’re you doing after this?” he asks, unable to keep from smiling.

It takes her a half second to remember. She shrugs, matching his joyful smile. “There’s a bottle of red cooling in the fridge and a pizza with my name on it somewhere.”

“Want some company?”

“I’d love some.” She shies away for a millisecond before her smile turns to a devilish grin, and she jokes, “But I never said I’d share either.”

Six huffs a laugh through his nose, slowly continuing his path through the house. “Goodnight, Carmen.”

A/N (2): okay, I read it through again before clicking post and I absolutely love it and if you made it this far I hope you did too.💜

Feedback is soul food and I appreciate it more than you will ever know 💜

Master Lists: Main // Other Fandoms

[thefanboyhub]

Cannon Things In KOTLC People Seem To Forget:

Also me just being mad that people don't talk about something I love lol

- Sophie is SHORT. She is SMALL. Which also means Dex was even SHORTER in the first book or two.

- Biana feels left out and forgotten by her parents because of Fitz.

- Alvar was a glass child. Invisible, which is ironic considering his ability, but yeah. He was pretty much outshined by his siblings. (Probably gay to tbh.)

- Fitz has daddy issues and he's spoiled. Have you seen how Alden is with him? If I had a dad like that I'd have tantrums too. (Lucky me I got a pedo dad and an mostly absent mom... ✨ yay✨)

- Keefe is a year ahead of people his age, he's younger then Fitz too but is still second place in class ranking.

- Marella's mom had a head injury. She has brain damage. People don't talk about that enough.

- Sophie has crippling anxiety and self worth issues because of her up bringing. She was literally bullied and if that wasn't enough she had to hear what EVERYONE really thought about her. She is literally so brave and has incredible patience. (Y'all need to hop off my home girls ass, she's literally so fucking interesting.)

- Bronte has curly hair... WHY DOES NO ONE TALK ABOUT THIS???

- Everyone has british accents but crisper. (I always forget this when I read unless it's Fitz talking 💀)

- Cognat's are like married couples. (PRENTICE AND TIERGAN MAN— GET TOGETHER ASDNJSJD)

- There are a lot of blond haired characters. Like... a lot.

- Stina is a tall girl with curly hair and is so pretty.

- Dex, Lex, Bex, Rex, and Kesler are RED. HEADS. GOD DAMNIT. STOP MAKING THEM BLOND.

- Edaline and Julien are sisters. I feel like we don't talk enough about that and we don't see enough of them being sisters.

- Most of the adults are manipulative, even the good ones. Edaline and Kesler are like the two safest options in the series.

- Ro cares a lot about Keefe (it's buried deep but it's there.)

Anyways. That's all. Oh and my name is Ollie ✨

[my-fool]

This thought is gonna keep ruminating until i "say" it but whnvr i read username instead of thinking of the English word fool i think of the dish "Ful medames, or simply fūl" and i dont know why because when i read fool in a sentence i dont think tht. But sth about it being alone makes me think about the food specifically the canned version my dad likes

I saw this at work and i didnt want to respond then because if i use my phone to respond i was a little worried tumblr was going to eat it but in the mean time i came up with so much i wanted to say so excuse this response being unreasonably long.

I quite like fava beans but my favourite beans is butter beans (lima beans) and sometimes i think a fava bean is a butter bean and get disappointed when it isn't. But that's not the fault of the humble fava bean. I think this is some of the best involuntary associations, beans are so underrated but are so good for you. They can be quite hard on my stomach but after I'm done disgesting I feel so much better and my body feels much healthier.

I hadn't heard of ful medames before but I kinda want to try that recipe now. I think another reason "my-fool" doesn't register as the english words because it's quite unusual combination of words. I wanted it in second-person because the fool in question isn't *me*, my url is named after the fool in the realm of the elderlings series by Robin Hobb. In November last year I started a boring below minimum wage job which has the unique benefit of a nice manager that lets me read when there's no work to do, so I started reading the realm of the elderlings series.

The fool is an ethereal, mischevious yet deadly earnest and loving character who is not quite male or female, not quite human or fae, not quite local and not quite foreign. He sees the future.

A lot of fans wrote a lot about how homophobic the books are about his unrequited* love for the main character/narrator of 9 out of the 16 books in the series, FitzChivalry Farseer. But I think the fool is treated with a great amount of love and respect by Fitz, it's just that the fool exists in a world that fundamentally doesn't understand him. The hostility the fool faces is never justified by the narrative, Hobb doesn't write the fool as a freak to laugh at, but he is a stranger in a strange land, and his foreign understanding of sex and gender is at odds with the deeply repressive and traditionalist society he travels in to.

*unrequited = imo, it's by no means unrequited. Every paragraph from Fitz's perspective concerning him reverberates with love for the fool. He sometimes awkwardly clarifies that he loves the fool "as a man loves another man" (whatever that means), and I think there's a line later in the books where he says he doesn't want to have sex with the fool. So you could ignore all the chemistry and say oh they're just good friends. But I don't see it that way.

To show what I meant, I wanted to share a snippet of Fool's Errand (book 7), and I didn't want to share one of the really romantic, memorable lines -- I wanted to share literally just the last section I've read his very afternoon which is about them discussing magic charms they bought at the market. (a White = ancient fey race which the fool belongs to).

“They are tuned to humans. You forget that I am a White.” The statement left me as speechless as the insidious little sketches had. I looked at the Fool and for one blink I could see him as if for the first time. As attractive as his coloring was, I had never seen any other person with it. There were other differences, the way his wrists attached his hands to his arms, the airiness of his hair . . . but when our eyes met, I was looking at my old friend again. It was like jolting back to the earth after a fall.

from page 264.

I think if I make any tired "bro is it gay to --" jokes it will be disrespectful to the honest & earnest deep love Fitz has for him is. It makes every page warm.

[zalrb]

I feel like older tv shows treated a man trying tp force himself on one of the female characters as something that was kind of dick-ish but ultimately not that deep, which makes the viewing experience awkward bc it obviously is a big deal but the narrative doesn't acknowledge that (eg. Fitz trying to force himself on her, tyler in s1 of tvd, chuck w i think Dan's sister? etc)

I don't really agree with this tbh.

Shows in the 2000s, especially Shonda shows, portrayed relationships where the woman is resistant and the man relentlessly pursues her or he comes on strong because she actually does want the relationship, she just needs to be chased and I know some younger viewers or viewers who were around then and rewatch it now have deemed that predatory or uncomfortable, but I don't think assault in general was treated casually. I just think Olitz was treated casually and Gossip Girl really fumbled with Jenny and Chuck.

[crymeariveronceagain]

If you could write the character arcs of all the characters in the Keeper gang (sans Wylie bc I feel bad that he's included given they're all 15 and he's in his 20s so I think he should be an older brother type w his own gang of friends) how would you write them? Including Maruca here tho. I'm talking like, from book one. I'm not sure if this counts as a closed ask or not so sorry if it is.

okay technically this is a closed ask but this is such a good one i will make a teeny tiny exception for you

Sophie: Socially awkward girl who doesn't know how to be a normal and desperately wants to be -> actually maybe she's normal and okay and is going to be alright -> trauma child -> overpowered and losing her mind -> exhausted and tired and has lost her mind -> broken and exhausted and a beaten down wreck of who she used to be -> wins the battle -> learns how to feel alive again -> is still learning how to keep on living at the end of the story

Keefe: broken boy with a broken family doesn't know how to love -> gets caught in a web of lies he's been told his entire life -> has to fight to free himself from the grips of what the world has demanded he become -> is shown how to love for real and for good -> can't handle the idea of real love -> learns how to handle the idea of real love -> loves endlessly, hopelessly, madly, and purposefully

Fitz: golden child who is protecting his sister -> anger to block out the sick and horrified feeling in his gut -> only coping mechanism is failing him -> burnt out gifted kid syndrome -> desperate for approval -> reaches breaking point and does something drastic(not against murder for this tbh) ->eventually frees himself from the pressure -> finds true peace

Biana: invisible child who is constantly overlooked and has to fight for attention endlessly -> discovers that she doesn't need the approval of others -> desperately wants the approval anyways -> gives up on getting the approval -> learns that she is good enough as she is

Tam: golden child -> protective brother who would do anything to save his sister -> protective brother who literally does everything it takes to save his sister -> it costs everything in him -> legitimately doesn't know how to exist as his own person -> starts to make choices for himself once his sister is safe -> learns how to become his own person for the first time in his life

Linh: scapegoat -> murderer -> hopeless, worthless, can't do anything right, dragged her brother right down with her, she's evil and she's horrible and she will never be anything good -> does everything in her power to become good -> fights to wipe out the red in her ledger -> is endlessly kind -> learns that she was always good, deep down, and that she doesn't have to be afraid or ashamed of who she is

Marella: anti-social in just the right ways that make it hard for her to have friends -> social outcast -> literal pariah -> starts making friends -> can't escape her outcast nature -> learns that she isn't alone -> learns that she never should have been turned into such a pariah -> devotes all energy to destroying what made her an outcast so that no one will ever have to live through it again

Dex: not a perfect soldier but a good man -> forgotten and cast aside -> is desperate to prove himself -> makes some big mistakes -> does everything he can to fix the mistakes -> continues to be forgotten and cast aside -> fights to stick up for himself -> learns how to stick up for himself -> refuses to let himself get pushed around -> not a perfect soldier but a GOOD. MAN.

Stina: popular bully with confidence issues -> popular bully with confidence and anger issues -> bully with confidence and anger issues, and trauma -> angry girl with confidence issues and trauma -> broken girl with anger and confidence issues -> learns how to get over herself -> learns how to let go -> learns how to love herself

Maruca: bad at friendship -> isolates herself -> discovers that she's useful -> makes being useful her whole identity -> wears herself out by being too available and too useful and too helpful -> has to quit because it's just too hard -> self worth issues -> broken self-esteem -> breaks down about it eventually and just gets hugged by her friends who tell her she doesn't have to be something to be loved -> learns how to let go of her need to constantly be useful

Glimmer: broken, broken, broken girl -> taken advantage of and manipulated by evil people -> makes a friend who has her best interests at heart actually -> escapes evil people with friend -> learns how to exist as a member of a family -> is loved for who she is and what she is becoming

[lizziestudieshistory]

Top 3 Authors on my Shelves - #top3authorsonshelf

I was tagged to do this by the wonderful @stefito0o! Sorry for taking a while to get to this (and I hope I'm doing it right?) 😅 I don't think my answers will be much of a surprised but nevermind

1. J.R.R. Tolkien

Anyone who's been around me or this blog for about 5 seconds will know how much I love Tolkien. He's the author I return to time and time again and always find something new to love. Reading his books, especially Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion, feels like returning to old friends - and they have become old friends at this point. Tolkien's world enchants me, it fills me with so much joy and wonder when I open the pages of any Middle Earth book. I've had a lot of favourites wax and wane throughout my reading life - but Tolkien's Middle Earth is the one constant, the thing I'm always in the mood for, and I prize my Tolkien collection more than any other books I own.

2. Robin Hobb

Robin Hobb is an author who would not have been on this list 9 years ago when I first read the Farseer Trilogy. I enjoyed the series but didn't love it, however, when I returned to it a couple of years ago I fell in love and I've gone on to devour the rest of the Realm of the Elderlings.

Through this series Robin Hobb has taught me so much about myself, who I want to be, and about my relationships with the people around me - this can be both love, hate, frustration, and grief. There is so much depth and heart behind these characters, I feel so deeply connected to them - particularly Fitz and the Fool - and my world would be a darker place without them. (I'm still putting off reading the Fitz and the Fool Trilogy because I don't want to say goodbye to them!) Hobb is the best character and relationship writer in fantasy, and it just shows with how much I've connected to her characters over the last few years. She's a mature writer and requires a certain level of empathy to enjoy but she's stunningly profound.

3. Terry Pratchett

So where Robin Hobb has taught me so much about myself, Terry Pratchett has taught me about the world. His ability to encompass all of humanity in all our forms is astounding. He presents the world as it is and how we should want it to be with satirical honesty. Pratchett holds up a mirror to the world - particularly the world I know here in Britain - and shows us ourselves, warts and all, and STILL makes me remember the beauty in humanity.

Pratchett was an angry man, he saw the injustices in the world and wanted to change them. He used his characters (my particular favourite being Sam Vimes) to show us all the flaws in our worldview and made us reconsider them. But he showed us that anger and sense of justice through comedy. He makes us laugh while reconsider our (often deep seated) prejudices and change! I've never encountered an author who can simultaneously love and laugh at humanity quite like Terry. He's a man the world should mourn the passing of and I'll never get over not having another Pratchett book to read.

Tagging: @dooareyastudy @oneanxiousstudybuddy @dauen @therefugeofbooks @appleinducedsleep @howtophd and anyone else who feels like doing this!

[cecebookworm07]

Here are my thoughts after rereading KOLTC: Exile! Now, this time around I didn’t annotate the book because it’s a newer copy and I would have felt bad for destroying it. Also, this is my least for book (In my opinion! I know a lot of people hate Flashback but we’ll get there eventually)! Anyway, here!

- Fitz… UGH! Oh my god I hate him. We all know why, but he can still go to hell.

- Watching Alvar in this book was so funny. Because it’s like, when I had first read this series I was like, “Oh he’s being so nice because he’s starting to see Sophie as a little sister.” And then now/after Neverseen I’m just like, “This little shit! Acting like he cares so Sophie doesn’t (possibly) shatter from the guilt and ruin the Neverseen plans! AGHHHHH!”

- Silveny. No thoughts. Just the queen herself.

- I actually felt so bad for Alden in this book. GOD DAMN! In my last post I talked about how he sucked in the first book, and he still sucks from Flashback to Stellarlune, but I honestly think I really like him from Exile to Nightfall. He’s a very complex character, and seeing his clearly deep remorse for what happened to Prentice was painful.

- Sophie is so much more proactive in this book than I remember. Girl was READY to fight.

- SANDOR! Not having him in the first book, and then his relationship with Sophie being awkward in the first half of this felt so wrong, man. But finally, the iconic duo can return.

- Keefe was more involved then the last book and the flight scene with Silveny is still as adorable as I remember it. I’m very excited for him to become more important from now on.

- That scene still doesn’t make a lot of sense to me, and the one thing I’ll agree with Bronte on in this book is that they didn’t have to use HER. I mean seriously? We know pegasi exist, and yeah there smaller, but there also less valuable then quiet literally the most important animal in the entire WORLD. So so so so so convoluted.

- Grady’s arc in this book is still as sad as I remember it. Probably one of the saddest moments is when he’s like, “I don’t blame myself for Jolie’s death, I blame them.” (IE: The Black Swan) because of the whole, “Were they threatening me because I’m a Mesmer and that would be really useful?” Thing. AND then you get to the end when you find out they didn’t murder Jolie and he said, “So it’s not my fault?” I am shot through the heart every time.

- I remember seeing a Tumblr post pointing out the mention of the Fountain Of Unity thing in Prentices memories and when I read it I almost started screaming. Iv reread this book at least eight times and I never caught that and probably wouldn’t have had someone not pointed it out. Thank you dear KOLTC fandom for pointing out future plot points that Shannon just leaves us to figure out ourselves.

- I had totally forgotten why I put it in my notes “PAGE 313!” And when I checked I was like, “Oh right” because omg is the conversation between Tiegran and Sophie so relatable. That is literally me and my dad on the regular.

-Wylie was a small part of this book but still painful. I remember seeing a few comments on Pinterest saying that they didn’t understand why he acted this way, but of course he was going too, his dad is basically gone because of her (not saying it’s her fault as she didn’t even exist yet but it also TECHNICALLY is). Any way, sympathetic king.

- Knowing that Everblaze to Flashback is a single year is… something. I mean seriously. Elves must be miserable. (Also, believe me when I say when Flashback comes I will have many MANY thoughts.)

- I still think this is my least favorite book.

I am EXTREMELY excited to start Everblaze. It’s dramatic, it’s iconic, and oh boy am I not ready for baby Keefe’s anti-hero arc yet.

[trashy-bowtie]

My Hero Academia Characters and the Music They Listen to

This is my first time writing headcanons on Tumblr so be nice and don’t be afraid to like/reblog!

✨Aoyama - I feel like he’d obvi listen to French music. I also see him liking pop stuff (bubblegum pop). Artists: Poppy, Katy Perry, Bananarama, Aqua, and New Kids on The Block

🥊Mina - For her I see her as more hip hop since she can breakdance well. Artists: Doja Cat, Nicki Minaj, Eminem, Run D.M.C, Charli XCX, Technotronic, and OutKast

🐸Froppy - She’s very chill so I picture different kinds of lo-fi like Japanese and Rainy lo-fi. Artists: Florence + The Machine, Fitz and the Tantrums, and Weezer

👟Iida - I honestly couldn’t even tell you a specific genre. I can’t really picture one, only just certain artists. Probs some synth wave if I’m being honest. Artists: Queen, Lost Years, Timecop, Børns, MØ, Lumineers, Holy Ghost, and Lord Huron

🥰Uraraka - I feel like she’d be into indie and pop! Probs k-pop too. Artists: HyunA, 4Minute, Blackpink, Alt-J, Christina Aguilera, Stevie Nicks, and Marina

⚡️Kaminari - I get glam rock vibes tbh but also dance hits of the 2000s/2010s with this man. No inbetween. Artists: Duran Duran, David Bowie, ZZ Top, Jay Sean, Taio Cruz, Lady Gaga, Black Eyed Peas, Breathe Carolina, 3OH!3, and The Runaways

🪨Kirishima - I feel like he’d go for anything upbeat and stuff that would make my manly mans hype himself up and feel good! Artists: AJR, The Weeknd, B-52s, Survivor, Young MC, Sean Kingston, and John Cafferty

🎧Jiro - My bestie would be all over the rock, grunge, and alt scene for sure. Probs into some mo music too. Artists: Nirvana, Pearl Jam, The Clash, Cutting Crew, Thousand Foot Krutch, Ramones, Breton, All Time Low, Sur, Fit For Rivals, and Sleeping Wolf

🦅Tokoyami - Also into alternative, but more darkwave and industrial. Artists: Type O Negative, Portishead, Massive Attack, Widowspeak, Just Mustard, and Ministry

❄️🔥Todoroki - Very traditional Japanese. I feel like he would hardly listen to music with words, but if he did it would be hella chill with deep meaning. Artists: Sia, Modest Mouse, Grateful Dead, M83, and Pip Blom

💥Bakugo - Rock and Metal. Pissy, angry, loud music. His music and him are 100% on the same page at ALL times. Artists: Nine Inch Nails, KMFDM, Lunatic Calm, AC/DC, Disturbed, Green Day, Hollywood Undead, The Exploited, Dope, Orgy, and Quiet Riot

📖Momo - I feel like she’d listen to classical music as well as just lowkey, chill music. Artists: Valerie Broussard, Ann Marr, Mother Mother, Twenty One Pilots, Lana Del Rey, and Lorde

👊Midoriya - Aw smol bb. I feel like he’d have a well rounded taste. Like tbh he’d be down for really anything. I def get 60s vibes from him though. Artists: The Zombies, Van Morrison, Avicii, They Might Be Giants, The Turtles, The Monkees, and Silversun Pickups

🧠Shinso - Ohoho this man. This MAN is DEFINITELY all over the 80s alt scene. I feel like he’d like stuff that sounds happy or even chill, but the lyrics are depressing. Artists: The Birthday Massacre, Depeche Mode, Pet Shop Boys, Bauhaus, The Smiths, Caravan Palace, Tears For Fears, Oasis, Bronski Beat, Oingo Boingo, Peter Gabriel, and Genesis

🔥Dabi - Another pissy rock alt bitch. I feel like he would also have deeper meaning in his music without meaning to. Artists: Rammstein, Marilyn Manson, Ice Nine Kills, Motionless in White, Deftones, Pantera, Lil Peep, Grandson, A Perfect Circle, Rob Zombie, and Sisters of Mercy

🩸Toga - hard to decide, but I feel like a girly alternative. Also some k-pop too. Artists: Block B, Melanie Martinez, Ke$ha, Spice Girls, Grimes, K.Flay, Insane Clown Posse, Skynd, and Halsey

[grapecaseschoices]

find the word tag 🔍

@laufire-writes tagged me .,... idk when lmao. with the words:  COSTUME, DECAY, MAGNETIC, FAVO(U)R.

COSTUME

Kendis’ lips curved into another grin; this a pale manifestation to the sudden, bright bubble of excitement that threatened to burst through her. “Right!! Like, all right, the whole waking up with someone else’s memories is like some deep shit. But come on! You also wake up a whole superhero! Think about the things you could do! The people you could save? I know this is kind of out there, or maybe it’s not. I mean. Like, come on.” As they’d been saying ��out there’ was re-defined. Why couldn’t people go and redefine what it meant to put good back in the world? “People could get costumes! Secret identities and like alla that.” 

from an old thread in 2019 where (og) kendis and a heart sibling talk about the sudden influx of past lives & powers.

DECAY

She took a careful step closer, and cocked her head like a bird inspecting the scavenged sight left before it; clinical --- displeased. She huffed out a little laugh, a disparaging sound. “That little bitch.” She closed her eyes slowly and breathed in just as carefully. “Crafty.” Lupe murmured, curious. Crafty yet disrespectful. She supposed that summarized who and what the town had been dealing with for months. “The body isn’t decaying.”

Lupe turned to the group -- she almost looked impressed, still very much displeased, yet impressed.

She mulled her words for a moment before she continued to explain: Even a body set to be preserved by human means was set to decay, eventually. But the means preserving Cass were far from human. It was almost as if magic was holding her death hostage.

another old thing, about last year; a mini-narrative. one of my characters Lupe - whose abilities involve death - is analyzing a body of someone she knows that’s been fucked with magically.

MAGNETIC

She hesitated before her gaze moved toward his, dark eyes met brown, as if unbidden. Even though it had been lured toward his like the attractive sound of 'psspss' to a cat. He asked and she felt compelled to answer; not like a puppet on a string, not like metal to magnet -- but rather a faced tugged close by a warm hand. There was the choice to pull away but was it really a choice when the best option felt like saying yes? 

Their breath caught as something warm filled their chest -- he still smelled like citrus, like sharpness and brightness was at the core of him and couldn't be washed away by the grime of 2023. Something warm tried to fill their chest but panic drowned it over. 

Kendis tried to swallow but took, stumbled, a step back. He had such pretty eyes. And maybe it was because they were smarter now, because Kendis a few years ago would've thought their eyes were open and fallen into their own hubris -- as they had with Dove. 

This time they were -- This was... No.

"I need to go.  So I'm gonna ... leave. Bye." They turned abruptly and began walking away.

listen, this is the best i got. at least this one’s THIS YEAR. formerly titled: ‘The Ugly Meet Cute. Or is it The Cute Meet Ugly?’; originally Fitz and Kendis’ first meeting but we tweaked it, and they ran into each other two times before this (at Pride!) lmao

FAVOR

"I did not know!! Delilah, I swear it upon your mother, I did not know. I am not to blame. I could not lead them anywhere, it was all by chance. It is the gods, it is the gods!!"

"You would not.

"Delilah, please."

"Do not whisper your begging, bitch. Let your gods hear it, let them know, and understand that I will grant their "righteous" rebellion the same leniency that they placed upon my family. Beg me for the mercy that they did not grant Kyrios or our children -- in all the fucking lands, in all the fucking homes, they chose mine to rebel in. My husband may have been ambitious and arrogant, but his connections to the praetor were no stronger than any other man seeking favor. They could have struck any other family. Yet they came to my city. How odd, how odd, indeed."

funnily i have a lot of threads/narratives with the word favor, most of them involving kendis -- and i think a majority of THOSE involving their various past lives. this one centers around one of the most recent ones delilah and is a snippet from a narrative that showed her downward spiral to ‘villainy’ (i mean yes she killed a lot of people - and some of the “wrong” ones - but they killed her family first, so is that BAD?)

tagging i have too many writers (not ACTUALLY complaining) 234rew umm @equusgirl-writes  @writerray @wayhavenots @shady-saint @thelittlestspider @lizzybeth1986 @impossible-rat-babies and really and TRULY whoever wants to (also ignore if you want <33) !!

your words are CRACKED, FAUNA, IMAGE, FREEDOM 

[nuadha-airgeadlamh]

tiergtice is canon; the hard facts

so we all know Tiergan is queer and in love with Prentice but here is the HARD TEXTUAL EVIDENCE proving these facts:

the initial information we learn about him in the first book already gives him some queer undertones. he is unmarried and has a deep bond with another man so strong that he resigned from his job over his mistreatment and adopted his orphaned child (adopting Wylie becomes even stronger evidence later when we learn that Wylie had other living family members from Cyrah’s side but still went to Tiergan instead of them). his relationship to Prentice is one of the most defining parts of Tiergan as a character: it fuels many of his decisions and opinions on others in the books (see his hatred of Alden). probably the biggest piece of evidence that Tiergan has some sort of hidden feelings about Prentice is what he says while discussing cognates in Neverseen. He says that he “never found anyone I could partner with” as a cognate and explains that it is because sharing secrets is something he himself has never been comfortable with. how is this possible when it is hammered over and over and over again into the narrative how close a relationship he and Prentice have? they seem to care for each other much more than Alden and Quinlin, one of the other confirmed cognate pairs in the series! how is it that Alden and Quinlin could have maintained a cognate bond with each other for that long when Tiergan and Prentice could not? they are literally both in the same secret organization! What could Tiergan be unwilling to share with Prentice? That he’s in love with him!! this also provides a nice parallel with Sophie, who was scared of forming a cognate bond with Fitz for these exact same reasons. even just looking at the way Tiergan interacts with him is evidence that Tiergan is secretly in love with him. just look at the way he “cradles him like a baby” when they get Prentice back in Neverseen! the way he holds him and whispers, “it’s going to be okay,” is just so tender and sweet. 

Tiergan and Prentice would also be a really good way for Shannon to continue critiquing the matchmaking system and the Lost Cities’ government as a whole. a conflict that has been explored in the books through characters such as Dex’s parents, Brant and Jolie, and Sophie herself is how the matchmaking ignores actual love in order to prioritize passing on ‘good genetics’ to the next generation. having Tiergan open up about his true feelings for Prentice would be a great medium to discuss the existence of queer people in the Lost Cities and how clearly they are discriminated against by the matchmaking system. I’m not entirely sure that Shannon would want to go there (this is a middle grade book, after all), but plenty of mature themes are explored in this series, and I don’t see why this can’t addressed, too. Whether or not Shannon actually intended Tiergan to be queer, she certainly wrote in a lot of telling subtext. I desperately hope that this will be talked about in some way at some point in this series. please Shannon let Tiergtice be canon!!! 

[jewishdainix]

While I do totaly understand how Fitz's reply to Nettle in their ride from Jaamphe in Fool's Assassin is seen as just a silly attempt to deny queerness , there is actually a lot to analyse about it!

When you dissect it it actually shows Fitz's failure to both bridge the gap separate his and Beloved's relationship with/from queerness, and the Six Duchies' understanding of it.

Let me explain.

The view in the Six Duchies on queer relationships* seems to be that they are Scandelous relationships that are purely sexual.

The homophobia we see from the characters shows that: When Starling was insulting Fitz she said that she was sure he whispered Molly's name while Lord Golden was fucking him; when Dutiful asked Fitz if he and Lord Golden were sleeping together, but not if they were in a relationship; when Chade told Fitz he knew he didnt sleep with men; Lant saying he was afraid when he first met Fitz because he heard rumers Tom Badgerlock also desired men.

Even during The Quarell Fitz talked about that same sexual aspect, saying he would never want to sleep with the Fool.

When Nettle asked him about his and Lord Golden's relationship, and if the rumors about them were true, she brought back that old idea of the Scandelous, purely sexual nature of queer relationships.

And that wasn't what Fitz and Beloved's relationship was.

Whether or not you interprit Fitz being secualy attracted to Beloved, their relationship was not what the Six Duchies' idea of queer relationships was. It was an emotional connection that their relationship was built on, not a purely sexual one with no care beyond sexual desire.

Which is why Fitz said there was nothing "improper" about their bond. Why Fitz said that what they had wen far beyond that.

Fitz was still unable to separate the idea of being in a relationship with Beloved with that view of queerness (he almost did, by the end of Fool's Fate, but whatever progress he made was undone by him repressing his love for Beloved all those years apart. Admitting he loved Beloved would have meant he was not able to pretend he got the Happy Ending he so desprately clung to, buts thats a whole other post).

But thats just the part about him not being able to seprate queer relationships from the view on them in the Six Duchies. Because of those views, he doesn't know how to recognise his feellings for Beloved (and other men) as what they are.

When Riddle told him how he remembered that he and Beloved were "very close" Fitz didn't oject like he has done with the acusations/questions that were related to the supposed sexual nature of his relationship with Lord Golden. He hadn't replied with anything, but mentioned that his silence said more than any thing he could have said himself.

When meeting with Carson, Fitz immidietly mentions how he felt a "feelling that sometimes comes of insant connection, a deep friendship that could have been".

Lets dissect that aswell, since I already put this under a readmore and dont care about how long this post gets. (@tragediegh and I talk about this quote every couple of days so everything I say here is recicled from our dms lol)

"Instant connection, a deep friendship that could have been," implies that the relationship Fitz is thinking he would have is very close, but it is not based on an actual expirience with that person, rather their first impression on Fitz - their vibe and how they look (interesting how Fitz says it about Carson, a gay man).

"That sometimes comes" shows that it is an - if not a common one - an occurence that happened multiple times.

This sounds like someone describing a crush/romantic atraction without knowing that what they are feelling is that!

The reason Fitz describes it as a "deep friendship" and "instant connection" and not "romantic feellings towards men" is because how he still view queer relationships from that homophobic view the Six Duchies have, and because of that is unable to connect his feellings towards men (amd beloved) to what they are.

...

* mlm relationships, technically. We havn't seen what they think of sapphic ones (even in The Willful Princess and the Piebald Prince Felicity mentions how possible homophobia only briefly, though they do seem to not consider lesbian sex as not actual sex which makes since with how their culture views reproduction) and I'm pretty sure Six Duchies people don't know about trans/genderqueer people because *gestures to everything*

[jonsa101]

Max Goodwin and Randall Pearson: The Well-Meaning, Incredibly Self-Centered Leading Men We’ve Grown to Love.

Hey fam! Like I said, I’ve been writing a ton of meta lately and this is another one that’s just been sitting in my drafts. It’s basically a This Is Us and a New Amsterdam meta which is something I haven’t done before but something I want do more of. In my Game of Thrones days I used to write a lot of meta about shows and characters that had similarities so this is fun for me. I hope y’all enjoy this. ALSO THIS HAS SPOILERS FOR BOTH SHOWS!!!!!!!

Without a doubt the two most popular shows on NBC is This is Us and New Amsterdam. And what’s not to love? They’re both emotionally driven, heartfelt, shows that focus on incredibly deep and complex topics. Though one show focuses on family dynamics and the other focuses on the healthcare system, these shows are very similar in more ways than one. Case in point, Max Goodwin and Randall Pearson. The more I watch these two shows, the more I realize how these two characters are so alike!!! These two men are kind-hearted, well intentioned, individuals who genuinely want to make some sort of positive difference. They are incredibly ambitious and always have “bright ideas” and “goals” they want to accomplish and somehow they’re able to meet those goals without ever having to sacrifice their wants and needs. By every definition these men are the “main characters” or the ultimate “protagonists.” These are the folks that we are supposed to root for. At the same time, though these men have many traits to be admired, when you truly look at it both of them can be incredibly self centered and selfish especially when it pertains to their romantic partners and love interests. No matter how appealing you make these characters out to be these men clearly fall under the Behind Every Great Man trope.

The Behind Every Great Man trope has been used countless of times throughout Cinema and TV History that I’m sure that I don’t even have to explain it to you but for the sake of this meta this is how it’s defined.

“Behind Every Great Man...stands an even greater woman! Or in about a hundred variations is a Stock Phrase referring to how people rarely achieve greatness without support structures that go generally unappreciated, and said support structure is a traditionally female role via being the wife, mother, or sometimes another relation. This trope is specifically about a man who is credited with something important, but owes much of his success to the woman in his life.”

This trope usually has a negative connotation (and rightfully so) because the man who often benefits from this is an asshole and unworthy of this type of support!

For example:

Oliva and Fitz

Cristina Yang and Burke

Cookie and Lucious

Ghost and Tasha

There are countless others but these are a few of the couples that come to mind for me. Randall and Max aren’t comparable to any of these men that are listed above but they are still operating under the same trope. It just looks nicer because Max and Randall are inherently good and inspirational. They are the heroes of the story. I would even argue and say that both men fall under the Chronic Hero Syndrome trope which is defined as

“Chronic Hero Syndrome is an "affliction" of cleaner heroes where for them, every wrong within earshot must be righted, and everyone in need must be helped, preferably by Our Hero themself. While certainly admirable, this may have a few negative side-effects on the hero and those around them. Such heroes could wear themselves out in their attempts to help everyone or become distraught and blame themselves for the one time that they're unable to save the day. Spending so much time and effort saving everyone else can also put a strain on the hero's personal or dating life.”

Just because Max and Randall have these incredibly inspiring aspirations, is it fair that their wives and love interests are always expected to rise to the occasion and support them. Is it ok for their partners to continuously sacrifice their wants and needs because they love these men? 

Let’s dive into it. 

Truth be told, Beth Pearson, Helen Sharpe and Georgia Goodwin had to endure a GREAT DEAL to emotionally support the dreams and aspirations of these men while sacrificing so much of themselves in the process. In media we often see women sacrificing so much of their wants and needs out of love for these male leads and rarely do men do the same thing for their romantic partners and love interests. All three of these women clearly fall under the Act of True Love trope defined as

“The Act of True Love proves beyond doubt that you are ready to put your loved one's interests before your own, that you are truly loyal and devoted to them. Usually this involves a sacrifice on your part, at the very least a considerable effort and/or a great risk. The action must be motivated, not by morals or principle or expectation of future reward, but by sheer personal affection.When your beloved is in dire need of your help, or in great danger, and you do something, at great expense to yourself, for the sake of their safety, their welfare, or their happiness, thus proving beyond any doubt that you put their interest ahead of yours.”

Over the past few seasons we have seen all three of these women truly live up to this trope without any true consequences or accountability from the men they’re making all these sacrifices for. For example, in Beth and Randall’s marriage, how many times did Randall spring an idea on Beth without truly talking to her or considering her wants first? Everyone thinks these two are an ideal couple but she has endured A LOT for Randall.

Randall has spontaneously quit his job, moved his dying biological dad into their home, bought his biological dad’s old apartment building, fostered and adopted a child and also ran for city councilman outside of his district. In all of these decisions, Randall “consulted” Beth about it but at the same time didn’t really consult her. In a way there has always been this expectation of Beth to just go along for the ride with what Randall wants. Is anyone else exhausted from reading that list?! That’s a lot for partner to endure and lovingly support. But Beth has endured and has been Randall’s rock through it all!!! What worries me is that the one time Beth spoke out about her wants and needs of pursuing dance again, he couldn’t match the same energy she was giving him and eventually it led to world war three between them. Though things are looking up in their relationship  and he’s starting to support her more, has Randall nearly given to Beth as much as she’s given to him? Absolutely not!

Similar to Randall, Max also had a wife who was a dancer. in fact, she was a prima ballerina. Unlike Randall and Beth, Max relationship with Georgia was rocky from the start. When we were first introduced to them Max and Georgia were separated and rightfully so. Georgia was never Max’s first priority. The hospital always came first in their relationship. He couldn’t even dedicate a full night to her for their proposal. In order to “save” their marriage they decide to have a baby and they both committed to taking a step back in their careers in order to do so. The problem was Max didn’t keep his side of their commitment and took a job to become the medical director at the biggest public hospital in the U.S. She gave up her career to start a family and he totally and completely betrayed her trust. So throughout season one we see them trying to rebuild their marriage but even in the midst of trying to rebuild a marriage based on trust and mutual respect Max still keeps things from Georgia. For several episodes he didn’t tell her that he had advance stages of throat cancer. He only told her when Georgia asked him to move back home. That’s fucked up! Then throughout their pregnancy he was never fully there for Georgia because he was either to preoccupied with the hospital or himself. At the end of it all, Georgia died tragically at the beginning of season two and really had nothing to show for it in her relationship with Max other than her daughter Luna.

Now let’s bring Helen Sharpe into the fold. While all of this stuff was going on with Max and his wife in season one, Max was developing a deep friendship, borderline emotional affair with Helen. Their relationship started out with Helen being his oncologist. As the new Medical Director of New Amsterdam, he swore Helen to secrecy about his diagnosis so that he could still run the hospital. Through that secrecy they eventually formed a deep bond but as his cancer got worse his secret was let out of the bag. He realistically needed someone to step up and run the hospital when he was going through chemo and though Helen already had commitments she stepped up and became his deputy medical director. Somewhere along the lines Max and Helen started developing feelings for each other. As Helen becomes aware of those feelings, she made a choice and decides to remove herself as Max’s doctor. He BITCHES about it but eventually accepts the boundary she’s clearly trying to set. Mind you, as this is unfolding, like Max, Helen is also in a new relationship with her boyfriend Panthaki. As Max’s cancer seems to be getting worse with his new doctor, she goes back on her boundary and decides to be his doctor again. This pisses her boyfriend off because he could already peep the vibe between them and he breaks up with her. When we get into season two, Max’s wife died and Helen set him up in a clinical trail (with a doctor she previously fired) that’s helping his cancer.  Unbeknownst to Max, this doctor ends up holding his life saving treatment plan over Helen’s head and in order for his treatment to continue she gives this doctor half of her department!

Helen has sacrificed a lot for Max and now in season three she’s finally prioritizing her current wants and needs first! Like Randall, Max is starting to turn a page and is starting to support Helen and truly listen to the wants and needs that she has. All of this is good but my question is did any of these women have to sacrifice so much for the men in their lives to get a clue?

Why is it that this is a trope we see in media time and time and time again? Even if these men are good, why don’t we still keep these male characters accountable when they put their significant others in these situations that are clearly not fair? I’ve watched countless tv shows and I’ve seen a lot of tv couples but I think I have only come across one couple where the male counterpart has selflessly loved his significant other and has always put her needs above his own. 

That character my friend is none other than PACEY WITTER

I might be mistaken but I think Joey and Pacey are the most popular ship in tv history and honestly, rightfully so! This is only example I can think of where the male in the relationship so willingly puts the wants and needs of his partner first. It is a completely selfless and sacrificial love. He never wants to hold her back and he never asks her to compromise her wants or needs for him. That’s why I think so many women love Pacey because in a sea of TV relationships, Pacey Witter is a fucking unicorn.

So to wrap this up does this mean that I hate Randall Pearson or Max Goodwin? No! I adore them. I love both of their characters so much. I just think that when we see the media continuously play out the sacrificial wife/love interest for the sake of their male counterparts, it should be called out. I’m all about sacrificial and selfless love but it should come from both sides.❤️❤️❤️

Anyway I hope y’all enjoy this! As always my DMs are opening here or on Twitter @oyindaodewale

[n1kolaiz]

THE GREAT FITZGERALD

thank u @dazaistabletop for getting me so interested in Fitzgerald's character. ur my favourite Fitz kinnie ok mwah( ˘ ³˘)♥

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald's novel— The Great Gatsby— was a love story that involved Jay Gatsby, whose mannerisms and characteristics appear to be quite similar to Fitzgerald in the Bungou Stray Dogs adaptation. I just finished reading The Great Gatsby so I thought I'd just make a comparison between the main protagonist of the novel and the main antagonist in BSD's Guild Arc.

Other than the fact that both Jay and Fitzgerald share similar character traits (ambitious, arrogant, and optimistic) the relationships Jay had with the other characters of the novel and the interactions that Fitzgerald had with the other characters of BSD are quite similar, too. I'll focus on three specific associations that both Fitzgerald and Jay experienced in a parallel manner:

Zelda Fitzgerald and Daisy Buchanan

Tom Buchanan

Louisa May Alcott and Nick Carraway

SPOILERS FOR THE GREAT GATSBY!

in case anyone hasn't read it but wants to :)

To avoid confusion, every time I mention Fitzgerald from here on out, I mean the character from BSD; I will specify my references if it comes to the author.

The Great Gatsby had its plot set around the time of the Roaring Twenties: the aftermath of World War I, the peak of socialite culture, and the growth of a prosperous economy and general wealth altogether.

The Roaring Twenties was also a time of luxurious pleasure and liquor, where people indulged themselves and got addicted to hedonism— the pursuit of gratification.

The Great Gatsby was actually written on the basis to prove how corrupt this age was, and the existence of such corruption was vaguely hinted by various factors, one of which included Jay Gatsby's actual source of income: being involved in the affairs of the black market. This proves that illegal activities were not uncommon around that time, as people did anything they could to achieve materialistic gains.

This isn't a history lesson, I promise.

Both Jay Gatsby and Fitzgerald had grown up in poverty and disliked the concept of being anything short of wealthy. They both worked extremely hard to attain financial abundance.

I presume that not everything they did was actually legal when it came to gaining money. As mentioned before, Jay was involved in criminal activities which founded the basis of his wealth, while Fitz once mentioned that in order to own a gun, he had to kill 4 people. He goes on to tell us that he ended up owning that specific gun's manufacturer eventually.

Daisy Buchanan and Zelda Fitzgerald.

The Great Gatsby is actually centered around Jay Gatsby's rather obsessive infatuation with Daisy.

Daisy was a beautiful lady with a incredibly charming nature— she didn't have much trouble with attracting many men back then before she got married to Tom Buchanan, the antagonist of the story and the rival of Jay Gatsby.

"Her voice was full of money," he said suddenly.

That was it. I'd never understood before. It was full of money— that was the inexhaustible chair that rose and fell in it, the jingle of it. the cymbals' song of it... High in a white palace the King's daughter, the golden girl...

Daisy and Jay Gatsby fell in love right before he was sent off to war and a few years before she met Tom. Before they were separated, Jay's dream of gaining wealth and status was primarily flamed by his intention of reaching Daisy's social ranking in order to be worthy of her love.

Initially, because of how passionate he was about his love for her, Jay lied to Daisy about his wealth. It was only after the War did he actually gain the riches he aimed for. By the time he did achieve his monetary goals, Daisy had married Tom already. Consequently, Jay hosted a bunch of lavish parties in order to gain her attention, prove himself and his love for her, and ultimately, win her back.

Jay perceived Daisy as a literal angel, void of any flaw whatsoever. He even tells Nick, the main character, that the fact that numerous men got romantically involved with such a lady just increased her value altogether.

But what gave it an air of breathless intensity was that Daisy lived there— it was as casual a thing to her as his tent out at camp was to him. There was a ripe mystery about it, a hint of bedrooms, of gay and radiant activities taking place through its corridors, and of romances that were not musty and laid away already in lavender but fresh and breathing and redolent of this year's shining motor cars and of dances whose flowers were scarcely withered. It excited him too that many men had already loved Daisy— it increased her value in his eyes. He felt their presence all about the house, pervading the air with the shades and echoes of still vibrant emotions.

As the story unfolded, Daisy's character was torn apart for a proper, more brutally realistic perspective of her true character, revealing a shallow, selfish lady who solely placed her interest in money and luxury, the things which she often took refuge in when things went wrong. As the plot developed itself, the actuality that Jay fell in love with the idea of Daisy, instead of Daisy herself, was much more evident. And it took quite some time for him to discover and acknowledge the truth.

Fitzgerald's love for Zelda was very apparent, too, except that it seemed more genuine and pragmatic. Not much is speculated about Fitz and Zelda's relationship in the Guild Arc, but his love for her was very deep, as everything he did was for her and their deceased daughter.

Side note: Fitzgerald (the author) based Daisy's character partially on Zelda, as both women were brought up in wealthy families and took a general liking to lifestyles revolving around money and ease.

Fitzgerald was in love with Zelda, a woman plagued by a debilitating illness. In The Great Gatsby, Jay was in love with a woman who was plagued by the deceptive addiction of self-satisfaction gained by pleasure and whatnot. Zelda was impaired by an mental illness, while Daisy was intoxicated by the security of money and prestige. This is an abstract suggestion though. Personally, that's how I interpreted this correlation when it came to examining these dynamics in their respective universes.

Tom Buchanan

As mentioned before, Thomas Buchanan was Daisy's husband and Jay's rival who had similar characteristics in matters of personality. The Toms in both book and anime were arrogant and cunning, which pretty much vouches for their selfishness.

In the book, Tom is supposedly the love of Daisy's life, except that she just married him for his money instead of waiting for Gatsby. Then again, Tom was involved in a love affair outside his marriage with a lady named Myrtle Wilson. Tom cheated on Daisy by getting involved with Myrtle. On the other hand, Daisy was unfaithful to Tom by keeping her love and relationship with Jay a secret from him.

The climax of the story partly revolves around Myrtle dying in a hit-and-run car accident. The grand twist was that Daisy was the one driving the car, and the car actually belonged to Gatsby. Because the car belonged to Gatsby, George Wilson, the husband of Myrtle, was bent on revenge and tracked down the car. He ended up killing Jay Gatsby, and soon after that, he killed himself.

It was quite a scandal, but Daisy estranged herself from such a tedious matter. In fact, when Jay died, she did not even attend his funeral. Tom was under the impression that Gatsby was the one who killed his mistress, not Daisy, his wife. Either ways, Nick described them in a way that sums up what became of them after Jay's death:

They were careless people, Tom and Daisy— they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made...

It's interesting to note that in chapter 45 of the BSD manga, Tom appears as the antagonist who was later found guilty of murdering his employee, but the blame was originally put on T.J Eckleburg, the inventor of the Eyes of God.

Side note: T.J. Eckleburg was actually an optician who appeared on a billboard advertisement in the novel. This billboard was used as a personification by Nick Carraway, which was meant to embody the representation of a displeased overseer who observed the events that unfolded before him. The Eyes of God has a similar concept: scrutinising everything with an accuracy of 97%. It's a personal speculation, but the Eyes of God was proven to be of utmost importance in the Cannibalism Arc when it came to capturing Fyodor Dostoevsky. Likewise, T.J. Eckleburg's eyes showed how corruption and misconduct never escaped his judgmental visage.

sorry about the quality of the manga panels ;-;

In the manga, Fitzgerald manages to triumph over Tom by betraying his trust altogether in order to obtain the ownership of the Eyes of God and Tom's company. This stands in contrast to what became of Jay in the novel, but the protagonist got what he wanted in this universe.

Keep in mind that Fitzgerald didn't act according to fulfil what justice required; it was purely business. Just like Jay Gatsby put on the facade of a plain, rich man who was really just bootlegging his way to opulence, Fitzgerald wasn't afraid to betray someone's trust to get what he wanted.

Nick Carraway and Louisa May Alcott

If I were to pick a character that represented Louisa May Alcott in BSD from the book, I'd pick the narrator himself: Nick Carraway. Again, this is my personal interpretation, so the association between these two characters is just my personal opinion.

Nick Carraway was known as the more reserved, cynical protagonist compared to Jay. The both of them developed a cordial friendship as the story progressed.

Nick initially took a liking to Gatsby, who was his neighbour. The enigmatic aura Gatsby emitted called for Nick's attention, and in the same way, Gatsby reciprocated his interest in Nick by making the effort to acquaint himself with him.

He had one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced, or seemed to face, the whole external world for an instant and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself.

There were a few times which suggests that Nick didn't like the way Gatsby acted or spoke. Nevertheless, Nick was the only one who stuck with Gatsby until the end.

"They're a rotten crowd," I shouted across the lawn. "You're worth the whole damn bunch put together.

(This was the last thing Nick said to Jay before he died.)

At first, Nick was intrigued by Jay's mystical nature and peculiar idiosyncrasies, but found that Gatsby was a very strange, but 'morally bad' man. However, over time, Nick became one of the few who managed to recognise Gatsby's idealistic ambitions; he saw through all the fame and wealth and found a mere human being capable of being entrapped by love's snares. Basically, he understood Gatsby, despite disagreeing with his actions and even his behaviour at times.

As for Louisa, well, it is a known fact that she was loyal to Fitzgerald because of how much she respected and trusted him.

Both Nick and Louisa were intelligent, witty people with generally nice, honest, and reserved dispositions. Their self-contained demeanours make it very easy to get along with the more exurbent/dominant personas of Gatsby and Fitzgerald. So in the event where each pair was isolated from the rest of the world, they had each other to depend on.

Next morning I sent the butler to New York with a letter to Wolfsheim, which asked for information and urged him to come out on the next train. That request seemed superfluous when I wrote it. I was sure he’d start when he saw the newspapers, just as I was sure a there’d be a wire from Daisy before noon – but neither a wire nor Mr. Wolfsheim arrived; no one arrived except more police and photographers and newspaper men. When the butler brought back Wolfsheim’s answer I began to have a feeling of defiance, of scornful solidarity between Gatsby and me against them all.

Such a dynamic created a close bond of trust. Just as Nick was not hesitant to stick by Gatsby's side, Louisa went to great extents just to return Fitzgerald back to his former leading position and work together with him.

Side note: Nick Carraway is suggested to have the INTP personality type, while Louisa is most likely an INFP. Both these personalities are strikingly similar in many ways. They are individualistic in thinking and described as 'seekers' of their place in the world. If you're interested in a more detailed comparison, check this post out

Alright, that's about it for my speculations; I hope they weren't too messy. Thank you so much for reading!

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”

- Nick Carraway, The Great Gatsby

[kanerallels]

Heyy, I saw your prompt list— could you maybe do Mackelena (with a side of Philinda and Huntingbird, if possible) and soulmates? Congrats of 111 followers!!

Thank you so much!!! I hope you enjoy this-- it's my first AOS fic so here goes nothing!

Pairing: Alphonso Mackenzie/Elena Rodriguez (minor Philinda and Huntingbird)

Word Count: 3,143

Tags/Warnings: rated G (for giant simp, which Mack is, good talk), character death mentioned, as is divorce

For most of his life, Mack had believed in soulmates. He’d grown up being taught that he’d meet someone, and when they first touched, their respective soulmate marks-- for him, a mark on his right hand, very dark brown streaked through with honey-gold-- would light up, and they would share a Moment. A brief snippet of time from the future that would show them their life together, if they chose to move forward with their relationship.

Some didn’t. Mack knew people who hadn’t stayed with their soulmate. But he’d seen, overwhelmingly, that when a person found their soulmate and stuck with them, they were far happier than if they didn’t.

He’d always thought that the only woman he’d ever be in a serious relationship with would be his soulmate. But then he’d met Nicole. The two of them had fallen hard and fast, and even now, after their divorce, Mack would never say he regretted it. Regretted how it ended, yes. But he had loved Nicole, even if she hadn’t been his soulmate.

Some days, Mack wasn’t sure if he’d ever find his soulmate. But he was fine with that for now, fine working at the mechanic shop that he co-owned. He had friends around him, and he visited his brother whenever he could. So he’d wait, and that was okay for now.

There were days, though, when he wondered. Was there really one woman waiting out there for him somewhere?

The sound of arguing broke Mack out of his musings, and he looked up from the car just as Fitz stalked into the back of the garage, looking irritated. Running a hand through his already messy hair, he said, “I’ve had about enough of this, it’s your turn. Have fun.”

“Have fun with what?” Mack asked, wiping his hands off on the rag he had resting next to his toolbox. “Something wrong, Turbo?”

Clearly trying to calm himself, Fitz took a deep breath and pointed over his shoulder. “There’s an irate customer out there, demanding that we hurry up and fix her car. I tried telling her that we’ve got a queue and we’re going to start on hers soon, but she didn’t exactly give me a chance. She wants to talk to the mechanic who’s working on her car.”

“Which name is that?” Mack asked.

“Rodriguez-- she’s on your list, I think.”

“Great.” Suppressing a grimace, Mack set aside the rag and headed towards the door that separated the garage where they worked and their main office. “I’ll be back in a minute or two.”

“If you’re lucky,” Fitz muttered.

Ignoring that, Mack stepped through the doorway. He spotted the customer almost immediately-- a Latina woman with dark brown hair braided back from her face, dressed in a black leather jacket and jeans. She caught sight of him and stomped up towards him. “Oh, you must be the turtle man who’s working on my car,” she said, her low voice furious.

One of Mack’s eyebrows shot up, despite himself. “Turtle man? We’ve only had the car for a couple weeks.”

“Yes, and I need it fixed,” the woman said emphatically. “Fast, so why don’t you get a move on? If I’d known you were going to take all year--”

Holding up his hands, Mack said, “I understand you’re upset, Ms. Rodriguez. But one of our best workers quit last week, and we’re having a hard time catching up. Obviously we’ll get your car done as soon as possible, but there are a few other cars before it. I should be done with them over the next few days, and I will personally make sure that your car is taken care of. Does that sound fair?”

Ms. Rodriguez eyed him for a moment, looking skeptical, but then let out a sigh. “Okay. I’m-- I’m sorry, I didn’t know you were short-staffed.”

“Nothing we can’t handle, it’s just a little backlog,” Mack assured her. “But I promise you, Ms. Rodriguez, your car will be one of the next ones.”

“Good to know,” she said with a nod. “And you can call me Elena. I mean, it’s the least I can do considering I kind of chewed out your friend back there. And you.”

Releasing a chuckle, Mack said, “Fitz can handle it. You can call me Mack, and we’ll call you as soon as your car is ready.”

Shaking her head, Elena said, “Oh, I don’t think so, Turtleman.”

“Sorry?” Mack asked, caught off guard.

“After how long it’s taken already? I’m coming back here to make sure you don’t start ignoring me again. I’ll be back in two days. See you then.”

With that, Elena breezed out of the office, leaving Mack with his mouth open as he stared after her. Huh, he thought, eventually turning to head back to his work. It looked like he’d be seeing a lot more of this Elena.

Sure enough, Elena was back two days later, just as Mack finished work on the last car and had started an assessment to see what was wrong with Elena’s. The short answer was, he soon learned, everything. This car was not going to be a short project.

When he told Elena that, she just shrugged. “Guess you’ll be seeing me a lot, Turtleman. Get used to it, and get to work.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Mack said, hiding a grin as he headed off to find his toolbox.

~ ~ ~

“Soulmates definitely aren’t real,” Bobbi told him.

Mack raised a skeptical eyebrow at his friend. “What makes you say that?” he asked, taking a sip of his drink. They were at a bar, celebrating the promotion Bobbi had gotten at her job-- although Mack had a feeling there was another reason they were here. He’d known Bobbi long enough that he could figure it out when there was something she wanted to tell him.

“It doesn’t make any sense, scientifically,” Bobbi explained. “And it’s definitely not logical. I mean, touching someone and you see the future? It doesn’t really make any sense, Mack.”

“Maybe not,” Mack admitted, deciding not to expand on his own theories in that area. “But there’s a lot about love that doesn’t make sense, and it’s not like the whole world had one mass hallucination.”

“Maybe not,” Bobbi said, sounding skeptical. “But unless you can provide me with a scientific explanation for it, I’d say it’s a load of bull.”

“Uh-huh,” Mack said. “So the soulmate thing had nothing to do with the fact that you’re back with Hunter again?”

“Of course not--” Bobbi stopped. “Wait. You knew?”

“Didn’t take much to put it back together,” Mack said wryly. “You only take me out for drinks out of the blue like this when you need to tell me something important, and it’s usually about you and him. Also, he changed his Facebook photo to you and him again.”

“Wha-- I told him to be subtle!” Bobbi let out a groan, burying her face in her hands. “He is so typical.”

“So, you are back together,” Mack said, and he saw a small smile start across Bobbi’s face.

“Well… yeah. We are. We’re taking it slow, and he’s at least trying to not make soulmate comments-- but that’ll last.” Giving him a sideways glance, Bobbi asked, “How do you feel about this?”

“What, you and Hunter?” Mack took another drink to avoid answering right away. “I’m happy for you two, obviously. I just don’t want to see either of you hurt again. I’ve had to bail Hunter out of too many drunk tanks for that.”

“I know-- that’s part of why we’re taking it slow this time,” Bobbi said with a laugh. “For your sanity.”

“My sanity appreciates the effort, but I’m not the one in the relationship,” Mack pointed out. “It’s up to you two, not me. But seriously, I am happy for you guys.”

“Thanks, Mack,” Bobbi said. “By the way, I might have asked Hunter if he’d meet us for dinner nearby.”

“I had a feeling there was another part to the plan,” Mack said. “Well, if you two are paying, I’m in.”

They made their way to the restaurant where Hunter was waiting, and had just settled down at the table with him and were starting to flip through the menus to order when Mack’s phone buzzed.

“Ah-- hang on one minute,” he told them, pulling out his phone and checking it. He was pleasantly surprised to see it was a text from Elena, who had gotten his phone number the second time she’d come by the garage, in order to ‘make sure he was keeping on task’ in her words.

The text held an image of a turtle, and the words, at the zoo earlier. I think I found your long lost brother.

Mack found himself grinning as he texted back, For someone who wants their car fixed fast, you’re not very nice to the guy fixing it.

Elena’s response was quick. What, are you gonna not fix it now? I found your long lost brother! Mack chuckled as her next text came a few seconds later. Besides, you’re too much of a softie to refuse to finish the job for me.

Guess you know me too well, Mack responded.

Well enough to know you’re a softie.

Shaking his head, Mack put away his phone and looked up to see Bobbi and Hunter watching him, both wearing sly grins. “Who was that?” Hunter asked, innocence dripping from his tone.

“Just a friend,” Mack said. He knew better than to give Hunter too much information when he was in a mood like this. Grabbing his menu, he flipped it open and started browsing, ignoring the sly looks that Bobbi and Hunter exchanged. He was going to get interrogated about this, he knew already. But there would be nothing for them to find out. Elena was just a friend, after all.

~ ~ ~

“By the way, soulmates are definitely real,” Phil Coulson told him.

Mack gave him a surprised look as he took the paper bag from the older man. He’d stopped at Phil’s coffee shop on the way into work, as he did from time to time, and was picking up coffee and desserts for the shop. “Why do you bring that up?” he asked.

Shrugging, Phil said, “Something Bobbi and Hunter mentioned when they were in here yesterday.”

“Let me guess-- Hunter brought up him and Bobbi being soulmates again?” Mack said, grinning wryly.

“Surprisingly, no,” Phil said as he rang up his bill. “They were discussing you. Hunter is under the impression you’ve met your soulmate for some reason, and Bobbi was telling them that they don’t exist.”

“Huh. Sounds about right,” Mack said, trying to hide his surprise. Although it shouldn’t shock him that Hunter immediately made the leap from “texting someone he likes” to “he has a soulmate and hasn’t told us”. Bobbi would probably handle things a little more cautiously, thankfully. “Looks like I’d better tell him he’s wrong.”

“Really? No one yet?” Phil asked.

Mack shrugged as he handed over cash for the order. “I have no idea who she is or where she is. I have been married before, but I guess that was part of why we didn’t last. Part of it, anyway.”

Nodding, Phil said, “I know the feeling. I was in love quite a few times before May and I finally met.”

“Really?” Mack said in surprise.

“Sure. Just because there’s one specific person out there for you doesn’t mean you won’t be attracted to other people. It’s normal.” Putting the cash in the register, Phil said, “But there’s something different about the woman who’s the one for you. I could tell right away that she was special. Just took a while for us to realize just what was different.”

“What he’s not telling you,” came the voice of Melinda May as she came in through the front door, a duffel bag over her shoulder, “is that it took us two years to finally figure out that we were soulmates, and it was only because he’d just been hit by a car and I had to give him CPR.” She held up one hand, stained a sunny yellow.

“We all find love in different ways,” Phil said, giving May a soft, loving grin. “How was class?”

“We’ve got some new idiots to beat up on,” May replied, moving behind the counter to drop a kiss onto her husband’s cheek. “And Daisy kicked a practice dummy through a wall, so she’s getting even better.”

“My wife and daughter are terrifying,” Phil said, grinning even wider. “Here’s your change, Mack.”

“Oh-- thanks.” Pocketing it, Mack gave May and Phil a nod before heading out the door and down the street.

It only took him a few minutes to walk the short distance back to the garage, and when he got there, he found a familiar, slight figure waiting for him next to her car, with a sly grin on her face.

“Late again, Turtleman,” Elena teased him as Mack set the paper bag down on the nearest clean surface.

“I’m pretty sure you’re always here early, Yo-Yo,” he told her.

“Yo-Yo?” Elena lifted a curious eyebrow at him.

“Yeah, cause you keep coming back here.”

“You’d almost think you minded me showing up,” she teased as Mack pulled open the paper bag and pulled out two disposable cups of coffee.

Handing her one, he said, “I don’t mind.”

The smile Elena shot at him was brighter than the sunshine coming through the window in the corner, and it warmed Mack as he got to work.

~ ~ ~

“Hey, Mack?”

Mack looked up from his work on Elena’s car to where Daisy was sitting in the back of her dad’s 1962 Chevy Corvette, which he affectionately referred to as “Lola.” However, Lola needed a little work done, so Phil had relinquished the car into Daisy’s hands, and she’d brought it to Mack for him to look at.

“What’s up, Tremors?” he asked.

Daisy didn’t respond right away, fiddling with the edge of her jacket as she bit her lip. “Do you believe in soulmates?” she blurted out.

One of Mack’s eyebrows shot up, and he almost asked what prompted the question-- but stopped abruptly as he remembered what day it was. A year to the day since Daisy’s boyfriend, Lincoln, had died when a robber had broken into his house and shot him when he’d tried to protect Daisy. The man had been arrested, but Mack knew that only soothed part of the pain for his friend.

“I do,” he said cautiously-- he’d never learned whether Lincoln was Daisy’s soulmate or not. Regardless, he decided to speak the truth. “I believe in soulmates. But I also believe you can be truly, deeply in love with a person who’s not your soulmate. It doesn’t make them any less important to you and your life.”

Daisy jerked a quick nod, staring determinedly up at the ceiling. “He wasn’t mine,” she said suddenly. “Lincoln. May and Dad already know, but I just…” She trailed off, blinking hard.

Mack nodded slowly. “Maybe he wasn’t. But I knew Lincoln. He was happy with you, and he loved you. In the end, that might matter more than being someone’s soulmate.”

Taking a deep breath, Daisy nodded. “Thanks, Mack.”

“Any time, Tremors.”

They dropped into silence after that, until Mack heard someone knock on the office door. “Hey, Mack!”

Mack felt a smile crossing his face as he moved from behind the car to see Elena strolling towards him, hands in her pockets. “Hey, Yo-Yo,” he said, and Elena returned the smile.

“You know, the nickname is growing on me, Turtleman.” Turning her gaze to the car behind him, she said, “So? Do you have good news for me?”

“I do,” Mack said, patting the side of her car. “After almost a month of work, I finally finished it. Your car is finally fixed.”

A grin flashed across Elena’s face. “About time-- but thank you. I owe you. Literally and figuratively. I probably owe you for all that coffee you bought me.”

Waving a hand, Mack said, “Don’t worry about it. I was happy to do it.” He paused, the reality of it finally hitting him. If his work was finished… he wouldn’t be seeing Elena again.

No sense in moping about it, he told himself sternly. Grabbing the keys from the table next to him, he dropped them in Elena’s outstretched hand. “All yours,” he told her.

Elena nodded, stuffing the keys in her pocket. “Thanks, Mack.” She paused for a second, then extended a hand to shake.

Mack blinked in surprise-- he hadn’t expected such a formal goodbye. But he went to shake her hand, and it was only as his fingers were curling around hers that he noticed the dark blue soulmark on her palm.

A flash of light radiated from their hands, and Mack felt himself transported away from the garage:

He was sitting on the couch in his apartment, leaning back and relaxing. He could hear voices in the kitchen-- a man’s baritone, and Daisy laughing-- and music was emanating from a radio a little ways away.

A soft noise from next to him caught his attention, and he glanced over to see Elena, curled up next to him, her head resting on his chest as she hummed along to the song. Mack wrapped an arm around her and dropped a kiss onto her forehead, and she let out a soft noise. “Te amo,” she whispered, and Mack felt a smile pull at the corner of his mouth.

“Love you back,” he said as a wave of contentment swept over him.

Mack’s eyes snapped open and caught hold of Elena’s. To his shock, a slow smile was spreading across her face. “I knew it,” she said.

“Oh, you knew it?” Mack said, trying to steady his voice. “How exactly did you know it?”

“You’ve got your mark on your hand, too,” she said with a shrug. “Other than that… put it together, Turtleman. I wasn’t just hanging around here waiting for my car. Well, other than the first time.”

Mack felt a smile start to grow on his own face, and then another voice broke through his thoughts.

“Holy. Crap.”

Both of them looked at where Daisy was still lounging in her dad’s car, her eyes wide and a huge grin on her face. “This is awesome,” she said.

Mack exchanged a look with Elena. “I’ll call you?” he offered, and Elena snorted.

“Knowing you? I’ll call you first, Turtleman.” Shooting him a wink, she turned and strolled out of the garage, a spring in her step. For a long minute, Mack watched her, feeling himself grinning like an idiot. Then he turned back to his work, making a mental note to learn Spanish.