#skyscraper should have been the title track

[girlsgenerati0n]

oooooof ummmmm..........

[fisherrprince]

HEY. HEY PLEASE ELABORATE ON BLAINE IN SPRAWL. HEY

so imagine something for me

Imagine a REALLY big robot, like many many skyscrapers tall, on a desert planet, very very old and grown over, but alive, and it has water and electricity for you for free so long as you keep it alive and happy. You build your society around it and keeping it alive because it is not that hard to do, it just needs someone to pilot it, so someone goes and pilots it (and that door stays shut for two hundred and forty seven years, and we all pretend we’re not worried about that because the electricity still runs), and you get water and crops going (in the desert!) and power and a livable house.

Two hundred and forty seven years later, the power shuts down.

The pilot is dead (you bury her and someone grave-robs years later and she hasn’t rotted at all). The big robot needs another, it can't run without someone in the driver's seat. But it doesn’t want some random guy. It wants its pilot back. It nearly kills the person you send to take that position temporarily because it understands how to work with Its pilot, Its friend, not him. It doesn't understand. You need its pilot.

You cannot perform necromancy, but you can cheat to survive. Thousands of years later society still runs on this infinite renewable energy robo-god, but we have figured out that in order for it to run, the pilot must be willing to give up the rest of their life. The pilot must be capable of handling the neural load of a million-ton synthetic system. And! Most importantly! The pilot must act exactly according to script.

That’s not great PR. Let’s only publicize the noble parts, okay? You could make a religion out of this. You do. It becomes tangled when they realize you can use it to justify some things.

You are now Brain. You’re in the program that trains pilots with your friends, you’ve been a disciple for at least ten of your eighteen years, and you are very good at what you all do! You’re proud of yourself. Even if you don’t become Candidate, the pilot, even if you don’t make it there since there’s only one of those every few hundred years, you’re on track to becoming a Foreteller, one of the actual leaders of society (Candidacy is an important, but ultimately figurehead, position. Pilots don’t legislate, really). You all go through the graduation process to the next class up and receive chips that will allow you to converse directly with the big robot — the Divine, let’s call it by Its title.

And then everyone else in your class seems to hear something you don’t.

Let’s get this clear; you can hear when It says “stop”. You can hear when your trainer says stop. But you don’t have to stop, when you hear it. Your friends will stop when commanded. Something went wrong, with you.

This whole agency and self-determination thing sends you into a spiral and you are determined to keep the fact that you’re 100% your own person to your darn self as long as possible.

(Your friends are fine. They’re not mindless, that’s cruel. Remember: a pilot is a person, but a person acting according to a script. Foretellers, which you will be if you’re lucky, are people acting according to their wills. You are playing dangerous games).

You have to leave. You have to leave a place there is no leaving because everyone chose to be here, everyone knows what’s happening, everyone is fine with it. You have to leave a place where the only way to leave at this point in your journey is to die. You should have left last week. You didn’t know last week.

You, however, are very, very smart. You are a clever, lucky, stubborn brat.

You leave.

It’s a long story. It involves convincing your friends to come with you without getting the deity or your trainers involved. It involves a loooooot of secrecy and quite a bit of learning code, surprisingly. You need to make your friends hear what you hear, which means making their chips work like yours. But you leave, in a mech you had one of your friends hijack for you (he’s useful, even if he’s a little spacey these days, he’s a class above you and having deity in your head 24/7 is a little disorienting, you imagine, and suddenly hanging up the phone a bit more so).

And then you crash.

:/

There’s other cities, aside from yours, that don’t appreciate a military vehicle flying straight into them. You were going to leave the planet, but escaping the sights of a very large robot is very hard, even if you left while it was asleep. It’s not anyone’s fault, it almost worked. So you crash, angry at yourself, and your friends are gone, and you will die, but.

But.

The one who finds you wants what you have. What he wants, he says, is to let everyone hear what you do. What he wants is to carry out what is basically revenge on your behalf. (What he wants is to show the world you had been following a false god. That you don’t need to do any of this, really, he knows the truth, he can show you, you can show everyone. You are dying though. You don’t stick around for the details). All you have to do is give up the thing in your head.

You have yourself a deal. You die. You haunt.

[pa-stella]

for the prompt thingie

can I

can I ask 4 with kuujyu...? 🥺💜

Yep! Sorry for the late reply, but tumblr was acting weird this afternoon.

I'm not really happy with the final result and it's mostly one character playing with the other's hand. Sorry in advance.

Title: Just a moment Fandom:Hypnosis Mic Pairing: Kuuko/Jyushi Prompt: Playing with each other's fingers

“Oi, Hitoya, didn’t you say you wanted to offer us breakfast? Where the fuck are we going?!” Kuko complained when they stepped into the lobby of the skyscraper. Right next to the monk, Jyushi got quickly distracted by the luxurious hall.

“Lower your voice, kid.” Hitoya replied and walked towards the elevators. “Last time I let you two choose where we should meet, the coffee was terrible. I don’t want to risk that again.”

“I’m not a kid.” 

“Don’t act like one, then.”

“You…”

The short bickering got interrupted by the liftman, who closed the door of the elevator and pushed one of the many buttons. 41? Were they really going to the 41st floor?

When the trio finally reached the right floor, they were met with a long line in front of a small café. Without batting an eye, Hitoya just cut through to speak to the hostess at the front desk. 

“Ah, yes, a reservation for a table by the window, right?” The woman smiled while confirming their reservation. “Follow me, please.”

The rest of the group got at the front of the line, trying to ignore the dirty looks they were receiving from those still waiting for their table. Inside, the place was crowded but the atmosphere was still relaxed and quiet. Until the waitress showed them their table.

“Oh, Kuko-san, look! You can see the entire city!” Jyushi exclaimed. He placed his hands on the big window. His eyes were almost sparkling. “I have never been in a place like this!”

“And I understand why…” Hitoya sighed and forced him to sit down. “Kuko has a bad influence on you.”

“Ah, sorry…” He lowered his head a little, making Kuko chuckle. He was right though. The view was sublime. There was not a single cloud in the sky and the monk was sure they could have seen the temple from there if the café had been on the other side of the building.

The two teens were almost ready to order (both settled for waffles with different toppings) when Hitoya’s phone rang. He looked at the screen and sighed. “Work.” He explained and stood up. “Order a cup of coffee for me, okay?”

“Nothing else?” Jyushi asked and pouted. 

“Mh, chiffon cake.” He was about to leave the table, but he stopped on his tracks. “Please, behave.” He looked at Kuko, then moved his eyes on Jyushi. “Take Amanda out of your bag. She’s in command while I’m away.”

The last comment made Kuko roll his eyes. As if he was scared of an inanimate object like that. He looked at the plush that was in Jyushi’s hands. Well… she was kind of creepy in a sort of way. He observed her empty eyes for a few seconds before ending the staring contest and focused on the other teen’s hands instead.

“Oh, you got a new ring?” He asked and gestured for Jyushi to show him.

He nodded, resting his hand on the table. Kuko took it and started to examine the jewel. It was a simple silver ring with a crown symbol. “Yes, I bought it when I helped Ichiro-san in Tokyo.”

The monk nodded, but if he had to be honest, he wasn’t listening. Jyushi’s hand was warm and soft as usual. He slowly touched his long fingers decorated with many other rings.

“And… There is this second-hand store in Ikebukuro, it’s quite hidden…”

Kuko didn’t register the way Jyushi’s voice trembled. He was just too focused on his hand. There were a few calluses and bruises on his fingers, clear evidence that he had never stopped practicing guitar. But they still looked elegant and curated. He played with the fingertips as if they were keys of piano before finally filling the spaces between Jyushi’s fingers. Holding his hand was calming, soothing…

“K-Kuko-san…”

He looked up to see a very flustered Jyushi. He was blushing, but a small smile adorned his face. Suddenly aware of what he was doing, Kuko released his hand and coughed a little. “Sorry. I got distracted. What were you saying?”

“Ah… I… I don’t remember…” Jyushi murmured. His blue eyes were fixed on the now free hand. He looked deep in thought as he was lightly biting down his lower lip.

Before Kuko could say anything, the waitress came over to take their order. The moment was gone, but the warmth of that hand against his was still there.

I was inspired by Cafè du ciel which is a real place in Nagoya. It's actually at the 51st floor of a skyscraper. The second-hand store in Ikebukuro is probably my favorite shop of the chain Closet Child.

[antigonick]

Out of sight

DISCLAIMER : Everything belongs to Malin Rydén and Fallen Hero, as you must know by now. THERE’S ALSO : I guess this one and this one feature the same idiots, though they all work as stand-alones. WHAT TO EXPECT : Well, I said I’d do a bit of farm-angst for Una, so that’s where we’re at. I’m still trying my hand at their POV, and it’s all very vague and very where-are-you-going-with-this, I have no excuse, I just had a free night and stopped using my brain halfway through.

2013. The Farm.

You’re not closing your eyes now, not in this place, not ever. Blink and you fucking disappear. Things have changed. You’re just biding your time. You’re just crouching low. You look at them straight in the face and if they’re too soft you bare your teeth to make them stumble back. You can smell the fear on them, the unease. They’ve seen you quick, they’ve seen you wild. They can prod, they can slice, they can tear. You don’t care. You lock your muscles and you give them a smile that will turn their dreams to anguish. Oh they know, that they’re threading dark water. 

What did they expect? 

You fled once, and you had no-one then. They don’t stand a chance this time. No slipping away into the night. No fleeing on silent feet. No mercy. You’ll be ready when the cavalry breaks down the door with a quip and a zap. Any day now. Keep your eyes open ’til then.

─────

No windows underground. No clocks in the labs, only watches that the white coats hide under long sleeves. They keep you awake, but you wouldn’t sleep anyway. Your brain left to its own devices tends to spew a bloody-black tar of vertigo. Your eyelids feel vellum-thin and your fingers mauve-cold, and that’s all fucking fine. Jittery means paranoid, paranoid means alert, alert means lethal. Or as lethal as you can be when they tie you to the exam table and inject you with enough tranquilliser to kill a small dog. Guess you shouldn’t have slammed your forehead in a-too-close-nose on—when was it? Day three? Day four? No more than that. 

You can see your synapses blink and flash on their black screens. Their speech is muddied, but it trickles in eventually, molasses-slow; sometimes it comes back quick and sharp when you break the surface of awareness, heart mad with the return of life. 

In the morning (is it morning?) they pin your tongue with a metal probe that tastes like a gun barrel and your name screamed too late.  You’re not worried though. Too late once, but not twice.

─────

It’s not that you can’t do it alone. They’re not stashing you in the same facility, weapon that you are now, but you’re starting to get the hang of the layout, stumbling in blinding corridors between two guards, listening to a stray hint and a whispered conversation. If you take them by surprise—a well-placed elbow when they free your wrists—you might be able to slip and hack your way through those keypads they thumb carelessly. The white coats don’t have guns, but the guards do. You’ve become more than adequate; you should be able to beat one of them up, even if your limbs right now feel like pulp, even if your mind— The dampeners make your telepathy buzz and writhe inside your skull—too long, too long without stretching itself, without extending its fingers to brush at a reality blurry as a nightmare.  Experienced like this, stuck inside your own body, bereft of those mind thresholds that allowed you the grey freedom of liminal spaces, the world has grown unreal. Maybe it is. Maybe you’re not here. Maybe you’re already gone.

Hey, come back. What were you saying? You should be able to beat one of them up and run run run to that metal door you hear shut like a sigh when the white coats finish their shift. Really—it’s not that you can’t do it alone. It’s just good thinking. You’re stronger with someone on the outside. When he comes, you can split this place open like a bruised fruit. 

You just have to hold out a little longer.

─────

Any day now.

─────

You don’t know what’s happening to your eyes. You’re not closing them now, not in this place, not ever—or maybe just a minute, only because the light needles at your optic nerve like a nail—you can feel it shift inside your pupil, nudging your brain with a wet ripe sound, all the way… All the way, far far far down to the back of your throat. 

Stop. 

Where are you? You haven’t seen your face in so long. Behind the mask there’s a mask that hides a mask that hides a mask. No—that’s not true. It was all real, it was, it was. You remember your face, unveiled on a grey-fog night, glimpsed one last time in the glass panes before they shattered into emptiness—it can’t have been more than a week. You know he’s coming for you like you always come for him. They’ll be here. They’ll all be here. They’re heroes after all. You’re heroes after all. None of you would let the world fester like this. None of you would let the tubes leak black, the air turn to rust, the HOWL enter you until it spreads and slashes at your brain, until the trigger clicks. Where are you? You haven’t seen your fa—Wait. Rewind, don’t get lost, he’s coming for you like you always came for him. Shouldn’t you prepare yourself? Get up? Move fast? Cover your bare spine, your naked legs? You wouldn’t want them to see your skin. 

You’re running now. There’s a good chance you’re running. Remember? Remember? Remember the city how the windows reflect the street how the skyscrapers melt into the sky how the sky dissolve into the dark mad sea? The pavement is thumping against the sole of your feet and the heat is swarming up your legs up up up through the tip of your fingers to the root of your hair. Yes you remember the heat. Outside, inside. Heart bursting with it. 

You think you gasp awake.

─────

Don’t forget again, you have to keep your eyes open. Blink and you fucking disappear.

─────

Time is sluggish around here. No clocks, and you miss the toxic purple of the Los Diablos sunset, the velvet cover of the night, you miss, you miss, you miss Anathema, their voice, their hand on your shoulder, that smile you saw melt like too-hot play-doh under their stained fingers—shut up—you miss the heat of the sun on your nape—yes that’s better—you miss coffee rich and dark, you miss the mind-voices weaving in and out of your head, never alone, always alone, you miss the supple cover of the suit, the darkness of the mask, you miss you miss you miss your name so roundly shaped by tongues warm and familiar. 

You remember your name, right? One of the white coats joked about it the other day. Asked you if anybody ever fell for that cardboard Irish heritage you aimed at. They’re growing bolder now; they get in your face, they laugh, they don’t hesitate before they pull at your eyelids, stab at your arm, open your jaw. Too close, too cocky, leaving on your tongue the foretaste of revenge.

One night (is it night?) two of them move around you snake-like in the yellow daze and while they stick their electrodes on your scalp they jeer, they circle, they ask again and again—so did you like it, the glitter, the fame? Say, how was it? Did you party your heart out? Did you touch your heroes? Did you wear a dress? Did you think you could be a person? Did the tattoos turn your little friends on?

As if they didn’t know that what you snatched for yourself back then was only a half-life, hidden and veiled like prey, every opening making you weaker, making you reckless, making you—what? Hopeful?  Still they shouldn’t, shouldn’t snicker, shouldn’t touch, shouldn’t spit. 

You could still bite. You will, won’t you? You were supposed to be crouching low. Feels like you might have fallen to your knees instead.

─────

Time is running out. You’re not stupid. You can feel your palms turn soft, your muscles turn liquid, the mellow ginger fuzz growing thicker and thicker when you slide a hand on the head they shaved—when? A week ago. A month ago. A century ago.

Any day now. He knows you can take it until he’s ready. He must be planning something big. Silly man, always so dramatic. He’s had time to track you down now, to gather what he needs, to convince Steel, even. You can see it now, the bursting in all guns blazing, the brilliant grin, the righteous anger, the flash of blue and white. You’ll be ready, you’ll be ready.

It’s not that you couldn’t do it alone, but you’re a little tired. It’s so much easier when someone’s got your back, right? He taught you that. You should tell him when he gets here. You should tell him a lot of things.

Hours—days—weeks—seconds unfurl like a shroud.

They leave you alone a little sometimes and when nothing moves when nothing hurts it’s difficult not to sleep. Pain soft and hushed has settled at the base of your spine, reminding you where your body starts and stops. You haven’t felt the edges of your mind in so long, you have to cling to flesh. 

Today they’ve settled you in the familiar lab, sitting slightly swaying on the exam table, waiting, useless and empty. Your patient gown is thin and papery, gaping at the back like a hungry mouth. The air is hot and humid, the neon tubes sizzle and pop like bug zappers. On the white boards, they left a few of your scans—lovely colourful waves on translucent black. On the nearest work table, you can see the coffee growing cold, and two library books wrapped in neat plastic covers, and even a trashy tabloid with a cover so crisp and new—  So crisp and new—

You know that smile. Suddenly swallowing is stretching your throat. You know that stupid fancy shirt. You know those camera flashes. You know that lazy hand caught in a cheeky wave, two fingers up. You know that sloping shoulder, that arm wrapped snugly, warm as a secret and light as electricity.  Oh yes yes you know that sun-drenched happiness. You don’t know the girl, you don’t see the venue, you can’t read the title, but it doesn’t matter.

You’ve seen enough.  You close your dry eyes before they burn. He’s not coming. Nobody’s coming. You fucking disappeared. 

[yuzukult]

under the moonlight || junmyeon & reader

title: under the moonlight pairing: junmyeon/suho x reader  genre: ceo!reader, hint of soulmate!au, slow-burn words: 8.4k notes: continuation to [city lights]’s junmyeon, journey to him healing his own heart after letting go of his first love for her to be with his best friend who so happens to be her soulmate (chanyeol) // did this because junmyeon deserves some love & also may be a second part + will profread when i get the chance!!

part one || final

Though the living room was filled with laughter and yelling from drinking games, Junmyeon’s attention was locked on the girl of his dreams who stands in the kitchen in the arms of her soulmate, face snuggled into his chest while mumbling a ‘thank you’ for the surprise birthday party that he’d planned for her. In response, he lets out a chuckle as he places a delicate kiss onto her forehead.

Junmyeon knew it would’ve been selfish if he neglected Chanyeol’s wishes when he barged into his bedroom of their shared apartment, hair disheveled with a stressed look washed over his face. “I can’t do this anymore, I need to be with her. She’s all I think about, night and day. I haven’t even had a real conversation with her yet I know everything about her... and I love but hate everything about her because she makes me feel like I can’t live unless it’s with her.” He was aware that the younger male was going through the side-effects of refusing a relationship with his designated soulmate, evidently on the brink of detonation. It was time to let her go, no matter how much he loved her. She belonged to Chanyeol. 

The moment Junmyeon picked up the phone to ask Chanyeol to check up on her while on his business trip, he sensed over the phone Chanyeol’s wariness at the sight of the girl’s frame in bed, shivering from a fever. It was that very second it became clear to him that Chanyeol was biologically her soulmate, someone she could never let go even if she tried. Both of their dreams would be flooded with the thoughts of each other, sleepwalking mid-day to meet unconsciously, and yearning for the embrace of one another though far apart.

Goodbyes were rough. But the goodbye with her especially was the worst. 

Telling her that she wasn’t made for him and that they couldn’t be together while her eyes were brimming with tears was the hardest moment of his life. Breaking the heart of the woman he still loved was never in his plans. But Chanyeol was his best friend and watching him deteriorate day by day was just as painful for himself. 

So he sacrificed his love so that they could be together.

“Junmyeon, you don’t know how much it means to me that you came.” She says, voice soft. They’re standing in the corner of the living room, separated from the group just enough to hear the other speak. “I know how uncomfortable it must be for—”

“Don’t say that.” He interjects, adjusting the black beanie that sits on his head. “I meant what I said that day months ago. Just because we aren’t together like that doesn’t mean I won’t be in your life anymore. You were more than just a girl I dated, I loved you.”

He lied. He still loves her. But he’d never say that.

She’s chewing on her bottom lip, hair cut shorter from their last exchange that strays fall out from the hair-tie and over her face. He wishes he could push it away and behind her ear but that’s crossing the line.

“I loved you too, Junmyeon. You know that.”

“But you love Chanyeol now.” He adds, grabbing his jacket off the coat rack. Junmyeon was ending his night earlier than the rest, claiming that he wasn’t feeling too well from having to wake up early and sleeping later for an assignment at work when really he couldn’t bear to watch the two of them together for long, his heart still healing. “And I’m happy that it’s working out.”

His first love stands there for a moment, silent, despite the sounds coming from the main area as she walks him toward the front door. “Why are you so quiet?” Junmyeon questions, raising a brow.

“Chanyeol and I talked about the topic of marriage.”

Marriage. He hasn’t even fully recovered from the break-up yet and she’s already moved on entirely. 

“But... I’m not ready. I still think of you.” The words would have been more comforting if it resulted with her in his arms instead.

“We both need to move on.” He sighs, one hand on the doorknob and his heart still in hers. “It’s going to take some time but it’ll be worth it in the end. The torture from being without him will stop.”

“How did you know?”

“Know about what?”

“That I had those side effects. I never told you about it.”

Junmyeon sighs, finally turning the handle to open the door. “You started looking more and more tired each day and you complained about it often. So I did some research to see what was wrong. It’s a side effect from denying your soulmate.”

Forcing himself into work everyday was hard.

After spending so much time with his first love, she was close to convincing him to drop his day job for a career in music. Working in a corporate office was gnawing on him alive, not to mention how unbearably stiff the suits were while he sat at his office for over 8 hours a day.

“Hey,” Someone says. Her voice is tender and calm, capturing his attention. “Junmyeon, right?” You were peeking your head into his cubicle, too short to completely reach over the walls.

You were the CEO of the company he worked at, the founder of a skincare line that you developed the formulas on your own with hands-on operations and testing, utilizing your degree received after University where you studied in the States. He’d only been part of the business team for a short period of time and hadn’t even gotten to meet you yet, despite how heavily involved you were on the floor.

“Yes, I’m Junmyeon,” He says quickly, breaking his gaze before standing up, bowing and extending his hand for a shake. “Sorry about that. Wasn’t expecting to see you.” You repeat his actions and if he didn’t know any better, he’d think you were mocking him.

“Sorry, it’s okay. I came unannounced. Should’ve probably called or something right?” You ask, scratching the back of your head agonizingly, slightly unsure how to act in social situations. “I just thought I could stop by to talk to you.”

“I’m available to talk. Something wrong?”

Straightening the pencil skirt that hugs your lower half, you grin cheekily at him. “I’ve been going around lately, trying to understand the jobs of the people who work here. We’ve been doing so well that I wanted to meet the people who were extremely involved in the impact. Would you like to go out for lunch with me?”

Blinking blankly, Junmyeon is taken aback. You— the woman ran an entire company with products on the shelves of huge department stores to high end private shops just for the elite to take him out to lunch?

He glances over at his lunch bag that sits on the corner of the desk, pausing for a moment. And almost as if you read his mind, you say, “We could always put it in the fridge for tomorrow. Come. Let me take you out for lunch, Junmyeon. Company’s treat!”

Dropping by your office before making way out, you snatch the jacket off the back of your office chair, slinging it over your shoulders.

Junmyeon just stands in the doorway entering in, leery about coming in any further. Despite you being the one asking him to tag along, he still felt the invisible wall between the two of you, a CEO and just some guy in the business department.

Your office was massive— the windows were stretched from corner to corner, ceiling to floor, with a view of the city that was breathtaking. On the opposite side had a glass wall, seeing out to the rest of the floor where employees work, but oddly enough you never had the blinds of it opened.

“Why are you standing there so awkwardly?” You chuckle, grabbing your wallet, phone and keys from the top of your desk. “You know that you can come in here, right? I don’t bite.”

“Sorry,” he mutters, rubbing his nape anxiously. “Just kind of feels like I don’t belong here.”

You roll your eyes, walking toward him and out the room as he follows, closing the door behind. “Junmyeon, you’re always welcomed in my office. Any problems you have are mine as well. Don’t hesitate to talk to me about anything, I own an entire company for God’s sake! I would do anything I can to help a fellow employee.”

In his department, you had a reputation. Men thought you were hot— so attractive that whenever you’d walk by and greet everyone on your way to your office, they’d drool, eyes never leaving your bare legs or bottom. Women were more of a split category; some resented you for gaining the attention of men so easily, others admire your hard work and ambitions, yet trying very hard to accommodate any of the employees’ issues personally. It was hard to please everyone.

“Johnny,” You call out your assistant, his desk sitting several feet outside of your office. “I’m having lunch with Junmyeon today.”

Johnny is a skyscraper. But when he’s sitting down, he seems so small next to you, almost like a little grocery store in the corner of the block of a big city while at his desk.

“So you’re ditching Eunwoo today?”

“Never said I agreed to having lunch with him. If he comes, just say I left. I’m having lunch with Junmyeon.”

Leaning back in his seat, he has his arms crossed against his chest, squinting at you. Junmyeon always questioned the relations between you and Johnny, but after observing the entire conversation, it seems like he’s just a concerned friend. Most likely why you keep him around.

“Should I say you’re having lunch with Junmyeon? Might piss Eunwoo off.” He says, gesturing toward Junmyeon when he says his name.

“Why are you trying to piss him off? I said I was over it.” You click your tongue, waving off Johnny in dismissal afterwards. “Whatever, I said I’m leaving. See you after lunch.”

“You’re probably wondering who Eunwoo is,” You unlock the doors of your car, opening the drivers side when Junmyeon stops in his tracks. “He’s my ex.”

“Wait— you’re driving?”

“Yeah, how else would we get there?” Sliding into the driver’s seat, he hesitates for a moment before following into the passenger side.

“Just didn’t think you’d be driving.” Junmyeon responds, putting on his seatbelt over his body. “Were you supposed to meet with your ex today?”

“He assumed.” Pressing the start button, the engine of the Audi roars, a sweet sound to any car enthusiast’s ears.

“You don’t think I drive?”

“More like... I thought you had a driver.”

You shake your head, pulling out of the garage of the company’s building, driving in the direction of a restaurant he’s not familiar with.

“Where are we going?”

“Pick: a five star restaurant or a restaurant that deserves it?”

“The latter.”

“A man after my own heart,” You joke, glancing over his direction with a sweet smile. “My favorite spot. It won’t take long.”

It’s a ramyun restaurant hidden within a large city without much foot traffic, but he wasn’t going to doubt your plans.

After handing the waiter back your menus with your orders, you rub your hands on your skirt sheepishly. “Uh, do you have a girlfriend?”

Shocked by the sudden question, Junmyeon’s jaw slacks.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that. I mean, have you met your soulmate yet?” Once the words leave your mouth again, you groan at your lack of execution of holding small talk. “Sorry again, ignore that. Didn’t mean it like that.”

“I don’t have a girlfriend and no, I haven’t yet.” He thought your reaction was cute. It was understandable how people were so easily smitten by you. “Do you?”

“No,” You say, voice a bit disappointed but your face doesn’t show it. “But I’m too busy anyway. I meant to ask because you’ve been working endless hours and I was afraid it was taking you away from someone at home.”

You were worried about him. It was different from the way his first love showed that she cared, she was more of a person who showed that she was worried, less vocal than you.

“No,” He chuckles light heartedly. Coming into your car, he was tensed and intimidated by your presence, but seeing the way you stuttered your words made you seem more human than how the employees made you out to be. “I’m alone. No one is nagging at me at home.”

“Ah,” You say, tapping your fingers onto the wooden table. “I see. I’m really impressed with your work, Junmyeon. How did you get into your career field?”

“Just seemed simpler at the time,” He admits, leaning back into his chair. “It was an easy major that my group of friends were considering, and although I really wanted to pursue music, I knew I needed some stability.”

“Music?” You ask as the waitress comes by with glasses full of water as you bow your head in appreciation. “Are you still interested in it?”

“Mm, sometimes. I’ve produced some songs here and there, I enjoy working with my creative side.”

“Would you venture out of your comfort zone?”

“I mean, if I could I would. But I have bills to pay, so I stay where I am now and do the best I can at it.”

You’re quiet for a moment as the server comes by, delivering your bowls of ramyun to the table. The aroma coming from the food made your mouths water, and your stomach growling in hunger in the process. “Sorry,” Your cheeks flush pink. “I’m kinda hungry.”

“Don’t apologize,” A smile tugs on the edges of his mouth softly. “It’s natural.”

Your stomach tightens at his smile but you brush it off as just a reaction from starving yourself from yesterday’s lunch. Business has been blooming, taking time away from your everyday from actually taking care of yourself. Taking Junmyeon here was supposed to be a learning experience about him, something you said you’d try doing frequently with your employees, but getting to eat at your favorite restaurant was your own version of self-care.

“How would you consider working in my marketing department? Well, more of the design or creative team. I have commercials and clips they play in stores to produce, and if you’re interested, maybe you can dip your toes in that. Both working with music and filmography?”

Junmyeon stops in the midst of blowing the steam from his raging hot noodles, lips pursed. “Wait, what?”

After chewing a mouthful of the delicious ramyun that awakens both you and your tastebuds, you blissfully lean back in your seat. “Jesus, just one bite takes me away.” You compliment before sitting back up, preparing yourself for another spoonful. “What I’m trying to say is, if you’re interested, you should consider working in the marketing department. I can’t offer you a record deal, but I can get your foot in the door somewhere.”

“I haven’t shown you a portfolio or anything.” He says, sweat beads forming on his forehead, and he’s not sure if it’s from anxiety or the temperature of the noodles.

“You don’t need to. It’s a learning experience and you grow and improve as you go. I trust that if you enjoy it enough, you’d get better with it. If you don’t, that’s okay. Feel free to tell me and I’d be more than happy to put you back in the business department, hauling away with meetings and conversations with both men and women that you probably hate with a fiery passion.”

“You’re not serious, are you?”

“Do you want it or not, Junmyeon? I’m a busy woman, I’m trying to eat my noodles.”

Knocking on the tall wooden doors that lead into your office, he discreetly opens it slightly, peering before completely entering. He calls out your name, the gentlest sound you’ve ever heard as your head snaps in his direction. “You asked for me?”

“I did!” You point to the seat across from your desk, gesturing for him to get comfortable. 

“What could I do for you?”

You’re finishing up an email, eyes glued on the monitor before hitting the ‘send’ button before fully giving your whole attention to the male in front of you. “It’s been a week since you’ve started in your new department. How is it?”

You were right, it had been an entire week since you’ve last spoken, occasionally exchanging glances in the office, and Junmyeon can’t believe how quickly time had passed by. You had transitioned him in the marketing department, with hopes that he could get some more exposure to a different part of the industry since his dreams fit more with dipping into his artistic skills. He was enjoying the new experience so much that he had forgotten how much time had passed, assuming he’d only seen you several days go.

“It’s been a week already?” He says without thought, running his fingers through his lightly styled hair. You can’t help but notice the way he makes your breath hitch but you dismiss the feeling by clearing your throat. “I guess I’ve been enjoying it so much I haven’t even noticed how quickly time has passed.”

“That’s good to hear!” He actually seemed delighted with his new job. One of the perks of being in your position was being able to do things like this and see people change, see people be happy. If it fit your means to do it, you’d make it happen. “I’m glad. Please feel free to tell me if you’re having any issues. I’m flexible, if you’re not content with what you’re doing, I can always transfer you somewhere else within the company, or even back to where you were.”

“Can I ask something?”

“Sure, shoot. What is it?” You rest your arms on your large glass desk that seemed so tiny in your spacious office. 

He’s quiet for a moment, licking his lips in thought. “Why are you doing this? I didn’t think it was possible for me to... just switch out of my department and do something entirely new. I don’t have the skillset for it, nor a degree or anything.”

Shrugging, you purse your lips, eyes circling the room. “Because life isn’t easy. Not everyone is going to find what they enjoy in their high school years when they’re applying for colleges. Hell, college isn’t necessarily the place you’re guaranteed to find what you like anyway.”

“But you did?”

“I did, but I got lucky. I’ve witnessed enough people go through those feelings. Graduating from a university with a degree you worked hard to obtain in four years, only to realize that this isn’t what you want?” Taking a brief moment to organize your thoughts, you continue. “I want the people who work for me to be happy, Junmyeon. I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for them, if it weren’t for people like you. In actuality, I think I work for everyone here since everyone is working to make my dreams come true. It’s only fair if I try to do the same.”

Junmyeon wasn’t quite sure why, but he was comparing you to his first love again. 

There was a huge difference between the both—few similarities like how independent the two of you were, how immersed in your careers you’d been, and how much you cared for other people. It’d been the first time in a while since he’d been so observant and drawn someone, so distracted from his ex that he found himself wanting to know more about you.

“That’s... selfless.” 

“Just a thought.” You grin, tapping the pads of your fingertips against your desk again. It’s a habit of yours when you’re dubious about your next action, he picks up. “Do you think you can show me some of the things you’re working on before they air?”

“I heard you got a new job,” Chanyeol says from beside, startling Junmyeon as he’s grabbing a couple pieces of pork onto his plate. “How’d you land such a great deal? You’re producing the commercial for that skincare line you used to work for, right?”

“Somewhat right,” Junmyeon responds, a bit distracted by cooking the raw meat, placing the completed ones on Chanyeol’s plate. “I still work for that company. They just transferred me out the department to try something new.”

“No way.” Chanyeol’s eyes are huge, but they’re bulging out his head from surprise. “How did that happen?”

Junmyeon shrugs however a smile sits brightly in his face. “CEO asked what I wanted to do, I told her, and here we are.”

“Sounds like she likes you.” Minseok interjects into the conversation, popping open another bottle of cold beer. “You won the heart of the big CEO lady already? Sounds like a Korean drama,” He says, wriggling his brows suggestively.

Junmyeon denies. “Honestly, she does this thing where she has lunch with several employees to get to know what they do everyday since there has been growth in the company.”

“So you’ve had lunch with her?” Jongin is in on the conversation now, eyes from all the men at the table glued into Junmyeon.

“Uh, yes?”

“So, it was a lunch date.” Sehun invites himself in.

“No, it was just a boss and employee lunch. What’s up with you guys?”

“You’ve never really... talked about a girl lately.” Jongdae points out faintly, almost like he’s scared to pull a nerve. “At least, not for this long.”

“She’s nice... I just don’t think someone like her would ever like someone like me, though. She’s attractive, nice, and caring— but guys, come on. She owns an entire skincare line that are on the shelves of every store.”

“Stop talking down on yourself,” Chanyeol’s speaking now, and his warm orbs are comforting when they meet with Junmyeon’s. “There’s no guarantee that you’ll meet your soulmate, especially since the age is coming up. Doesn’t hurt to try shooting your shot with her, right?”

The age. The age where once you turn thirty, your chances of ever meeting your soulmate declines almost to 2%. Junmyeon has already hit the ripe age of 29 with only a year left before his probability descends into the abyss.

“I can’t hit on her.” He furrows his brows, stuffing his cheeks with a bite of kimchi. “She’s my boss.”

“Be discreet. Give her some subtle hints. If she doesn’t reciprocate, then abort mission and pretend you were just being nice.”

Junmyeon rolls his eyes at his friends’ advices. They were constantly interrupting each other with new ideas after another before someone taps his shoulder. “Junmyeon?”

“Oh— hey. Hey!” He says your name; he always says it the same way, the way that it warms your heart to the point you just wish you could grab his arms to wrap around you so you could doused yourself in his scent. He had an impact on you but you held your composure. Maybe you were starting to crush on him, if you haven’t already, because he was just so kind but he’s the type to be kind to everyone.

“Uh, guys. This is my boss...” He introduces, scratching his head. He continues on naming the rest of his group, hesitant about the whole ordeal as you wave cheekily to them all.

“You guys can just call me by my name, I’m not Junmyeon’s boss outside of the office.” You turn to look at the older male, hands stuffed into the front pockets of your jeans.

Even in the horrible brightness of fluorescent lighting, you managed to still look seamlessly beautiful in Junmyeon’s eyes. Your attire was distinct from the everyday work apparel yet you still appeared put together. Maybe Junmyeon was the one crushing.

“Come join us!” Chanyeol says quickly, gesturing the seat on the other side of Junmyeon as Jongdae slides over to give you enough room.

Junmyeon clicks his tongue, feigning a hit to Chanyeol before looking over at you. “I’m sorry, are you here with someone? I don’t want to take you away from them or force you to sit with us if you don’t want to.”

“Ah, honestly, I was just going to order something off the menu and take it home to eat. Unless you don’t want me here?” 

“Oh, no, of course I want you here, come,” Junmyeon responds, tapping the empty seat beside him. Timidly, you shrug your shoulders before taking up the offer and settle at the side of Junmyeon. 

Throughout the night, being with Junmyeon and his friends let you discover a completely new side of him. With them, he was considered the ‘mother’ of the group, nurturing and looking out for the rest of them, despite not being the eldest. He’s admirable, so Yixing remarks, but also selfless because he never has himself on his mind other than his friends and family.

When Junmyeon excuses himself to the bathroom, you learn that he sacrificed his relationship with the girl of his dreams so she could be with her soulmate regardless of the fact that she didn’t want to be with him because he rejected her. You find out that Chanyeol was the friend, and that he wants nothing more than to help find happiness for him as well. 

You pay for dinner. Junmyeon argues with you about it for a brief moment before you jokingly threaten that his job was on the line and he pouts in return. You’re almost bold enough to tell him that if he lets you kiss his pout that he could pay.

“Uh... Why are you in my office?”

“You cancelled on lunch last time. And a few times before that. I wanted to come so I can spontaneously take you out for dinner instead.”

You squint your eyes at the male in front of you, throwing the pen in your hand on your desk heatedly. “Catch the hint? I’m not very interested in the idea of having lunch with you. Or anything, really.”

“The idea, but you haven’t done it yet.”

Eunwoo is probably the cutest guy you’ve laid your eyes on but after dating for three years, it became evidently clear that the two of you didn’t click at all. Girls were at his beck and call, and you were growing tired of having to tell him which girls had bad intentions. You felt like his mom. He’s too sweet but it was starting to hurt your pride a bit when rumors were going around that he was flirting with others so you immediately put a stop to the relationship. 

“Eunwoo,” You sigh heavily, leaning back in your swivel chair. It’s around 5:00PM at this point, your day filled with meetings and tasks regarding a new launch approaching soon. “This... is really sweet of you. But we broke up.”

“I’m obviously here to try again.”

“You’re so oblivious about women all the time! I’m tired of teaching you, I need someone who doesn’t need to be groomed to fit me.”

There’s a knock on the door, and both your heads snap toward the direction to only see Junmyeon’s head peeking into the room. “Uh, sorry, am I interrupting something? Johnny said I could come in.”

You wanted to call Junmyeon your own personal superhero because he’s standing there in what seems like his best work outfit, and you’re almost drooling at the sight of him. Maybe it was because it was already so late in the day, and he looks like he’s been at his desk for a long time since his tie is loosened around his neck, and a button is undone.

“No, please, come in.” Eunwoo’s glare could pierce through you right now but you keep your gaze away. 

“Sorry,” Junmyeon bows at the other male before Eunwoo takes a seat in the corner of the room where the black leather couches were. He wasn’t backing down any time soon. “I... finished the video.”

“Oh?” He’s handing you a small flashdrive that you take willingly, inserting it into your computer before clicking around on your desktop before you reach your destination.

“Do you have headphones or something?”

Your brows crinkle in confusion. “What?”

He pulls out his keys, flipping open a case that holds his AirPods, placing it into the palm of your hand as you tilt your head when he rounds your desk, helping you bluetooth the device in. “Why are we doing this again?”

“Just a bit embarrassed about my first project. I don’t actually want to see you watch it.”

Eunwoo has his legs crossed, eyes shooting darts in the direction of you. He must be bursting with jealousy with how Junmyeon is seemingly close to you, making his way back to the seat in front of your desk, settling comfortably. Eunwoo observes that this is definitely not the first time the other male has been in your office.

After a few moments, you pull the buds out from your ears, placing it back into the white case and returning it to Junmyeon. “Wow... I--... Honestly, Jun, that was one of the greatest things I’ve ever seen. I mean I have some notes, don’t take it the wrong way, but... this is different.”

“I hope you mean a good kind of different?”

“Of course.”

He’s gifting you that warm smile again. “Send them over. I’ll take a look and send you an updated version.”

“You like him.”

“Hm?” You hum heedlessly, typing away on the computer with your comments still fresh in your mind. Junmyeon had left your office moments before, taking his leave home.

“You have a crush on that guy. I just saw you give him that look.” Agilely turning your head to face your ex-lover, you heave out a sigh. “What look, Eunwoo?”

“You used to look at me like that. I remember it because it’s when I knew that you returned those feelings for me and I went for it.” 

Frustrated, you push your keyboard away. “What? I can’t just look at a guy now? All of the sudden you’re an expert at these things? And why does it even matter? We’re not together anymore.”

“Because he’s competition? What else?”

“Eunwoo, get the fuck out please.” You say through your gritted teeth before throwing a post-it note stack at him as he makes his way out your office. “Okay, okay! I’ll be back though!”

There’s another knock at your door. Glancing at the clock that hangs above your desk, it reads 8:30PM and you could have sworn you told Johnny to go home hours ago. If it wasn’t Johnny, then...

Getting up from the couch full of loose papers and your laptop, you walk up toward the door, swinging it open. “Eunwoo, didn’t I tell you to fuck off—”

“Uh, I take it that the guy in the room earlier was Eunwoo then?”

In a pair of grey sweats and a T-shirt, Junmyeon is standing in your doorframe underneath a baseball cap. In his hands are bags of takeout, raising it up for your viewing once your eyes laid on it.

“What’s this?” You step aside to let him in, watching as he reorganizes the papers on your coffee table and places them onto another part of the couch, setting up the food. “You didn’t seem like you were going to cave into having dinner with that guy, and the launch is happening soon. I figured you’d still be here and skip dinner.”

In all honesty, this is what you would’ve wanted Eunwoo to do. Back when the two of you were dating, you had been stuck in the same scenario— couped up in your office, drowning yourself in paperwork without any time to make back home until the night before the launch day to get ready for the event. You wanted Eunwoo to take notice, doing something similar as to this, bringing food to you instead of forcing you to go out when you didn’t have much time to spare.

“I— I don’t know what to say. Thank you, Junmyeon, really. I was starving, but with how security is at the door at this time of night, delivery would’ve been a bit of a hassle.”

“Don’t sweat it, boss.” He jokes as you sit on the couch and he plops himself onto a seat across from you. “I got you the ramyun you had last time from that place you took me.”

“You did? How’d you remember what I ordered?”

“It was so spicy, I smelt it and sneezed a couple times.” Snapping the disposable chopsticks, he hands you the pair. “Plus, who would forget a name like ‘the Diablo Ramyun’? There’s a picture of a dragon breathing fire right next to the name on the menu.”

Junmyeon kept you company that night. He eventually started reading Webtoon comics on his phone after having dinner, laying on the couch before falling into a deep slumber, mouth agape. Grabbing a spare blanket you kept for nights you spent in your office, you drape it over his body, and pulled off his hat.

He looks angelic like this— albeit he has drool streaming from the sides of his mouth. Not obligated to stay, but nonetheless he did, all because he didn’t want you to be alone or feel lonely. Although you insisted he should go home, he contends, eventually winning the argument by comfortably designating the spot on the couch to himself. 

You don’t miss those soundless nights in your office anymore. Junmyeon’s snoring along with your tumultuous typing sets a new standard of bliss.

It’s been about two months since that night and Junmyeon is frequent in your life. 

He’s on speed-dial when you want to try new restaurants or go to events that are in the city, and he never fails to come by your side to keep you company. Sometimes, his smile catches you off guard, fluttering your heart, but other times, you think he feels as though his presence is necessary because you gave him his dream job.

“So, rumor has it: Junmyeon sleeps over at the office.”

“What makes you say that?” 

Johnny eyes you suspiciously. “Other than the fact that he leaves your office bright and early in the morning with slightly damp hair with an outfit that’s just barely different from the day before?”

Your breath stops, but your fingers continue to tap away at an email. “Does he?”

“So, you sleeping with him?” You stiffen, scowling at your assistant. “No, I am not.”

“What’s he doing in here then?” 

“He just... sleeps over whenever I’m having a late night session.”

“Oh, so you are sleeping with him.”

“Johnny.” You say firmly. “I am not. He just keeps me company ‘cause I’m all by myself here and it’s dark out.”

He’s reclining in the armchair in front of your desk, toes pushing off the ground while rocking the seat. “Why don’t you just ask him out if you like him that much? Why are you wasting your time just... ‘keeping company’ instead of... being his companion.”

“I’m his boss.”

“And? That’s a sexy thing. He might like a strong, self-sufficient woman. Hell—I know I do. But you’re not into me, so I’m gonna help Junmyeon if I can’t help myself.”

Ears now crimson, you admit defeat and lounge in your large work chair with a cumbersome sigh, playing along with his game. “I don’t have time to date.”

“He’s here at least once a week spending the night with you. You have time, and if you don’t, he’ll make the time to be with you.”

Pausing a moment in thought with a hum, you hit the tip of your fingers against the glass desk. “I’m not his type.”

“Oh hush, I see the way he looks at you. He thinks you’re gorgeous.”

Pursing up your lips, you assert, “I don’t believe that. What if I meet my soulmate?”

“Stop doubting your looks, he practically salivates at the sight of you that it’s all over the floor. Also, that soulmate thing? That never stopped you from dating Eunwoo, so why is Junmyeon any different?”

You shrug, playing with the pen in front of you. “His ex dated him and ended up being with her soulmate.”

“You honestly think you’re going to meet your soulmate? Tell me. You were in that research group for a couple years, what’d you gather from that?” If it wasn’t for HR, you’d probably have you hands wrapped around Johnny’s giraffe neck by now.

Back in University, you decided to partake in the Soulmate Research Group for your co-op program, rationalizing that this could help you find your ‘the one.’ The group resulted in slapping you into reality, educating you the chances of finding your soulmate had declined to almost none when considering the probability. It was the worst year of your life, having to come to terms that this fairy-tale that everyone in your life had made love seem was just something that only lucky people got to cooperate in.

“I... yeah, I know. It’s just so many goddamn people met their soulmate already, what about me? What makes me so different from the bunch?”

Johnny says your name, this time sweetly with a tone he never uses. “I never met my soulmate either. But Junmyeon is almost hitting 30, right? Imagine how he’s feeling. He can’t even get laid by a pretty girl that he sleeps in her office for on the most uncomfortable couch, let alone find his soulmate.”

“Do you like me?”

“What kind of question is that?” He glances at you quizzically, fixating his attention back under the hood of your car, twisting off the cap of your car sump, checking the oil levels. An oil light had popped onto the dashboard a couple days ago and you texted Junmyeon what he recommended to do, only for him to dispute that he’d check it himself.

“I don’t know, just answer it. Do you like me?”

He chuckles, shaking his head in disbelief as he wipes the oil rod with a rag. “Of course I like you. Why else would I hang out with you and change your oil?”

“No,” You groan, leaning against your front headlights, slouching in annoyance. “Like... not as a friend. As a woman. More than a friend, someone you want to date.”

He stands, slack-jawed. 

“Listen— I totally get if you don’t see me in that way, but Johnny said he saw the way you looked at me, and I figured, ‘hey, why not try to ask him out’ so—“

“Of course I see you that way. Who doesn’t? I kind of just assumed you weren’t into me since you were always rejecting my advances.”

“Advances?”

Lifting up the dirty rag in his greasy, stained hands, the sides of his mouth twitches upwards. “Like I said, why would I change your oil? Plus, how many nights have I slept in your office on that god awful couch? I also have a toothbrush in your bathroom. And spare underwear. Need I say more?”

Chewing on your bottom lip and watching as he finishes up, closing the hood of your car, you tap your shoes anxiously against the concrete ground. “Can I ask you something else?”

“What is it?”

“Can I kiss you?”

You can already imagine how difficult showering is going to be later, but with Junmyeon’s plush lips pressed against yours, how could you complain about his tarnished hands underneath the fabric of your shirt, caressing the skin of your waist?

Guiding your hips to sit onto the hood of your car, your arms snake around his neck, playing with the longer strands of his hair that brush against his nape. The way he kisses feels like he’s going to suck the air out of your lungs but you couldn’t care less— you finally had him in your embrace and you weren’t going to let go.

He’s amiable, even though it’s contradicting that he’s tugging on your lower lip between his teeth, your lips swollen and plump from the aggressive make-out session. He doesn’t push too far, just right where you’re comfortable, especially when you’re in your opened garage out for your neighbors to see. 

You’re not sure how much time has passed but he’s already claimed the territory in the middle of your legs, towing you close with a grip on your thighs. Placing the palm of his hands on either side of you on the car, he grins cheekily after pulling out of the kiss, heavy pants against each other’s face.

“Did my boss just make-out with me?” You slap his chest, rolling your eyes in unison. “Stop it. I know you’re enjoying this, I feel it.” Wrapping your arms around his lower frame, you pull him close, pressing your crotch against his as his groans. “Now you stop it. I’m not taking you here.”

Junmyeon is a gentleman. He declares that he wouldn’t be taking you anywhere near the bedroom until he takes you out on a proper date, in spite of the fact that you both had broken his rule of no kissing and no sex before a date. 

If you thought that you had everything you wanted before, you were wrong. Not until you met him.

“I met my soulmate.”

Straightening the paperwork on your desk, pretending to preoccupy yourself from this conversation and stay cool, you place the manila envelopes flat back on your desk, eyes eventually locked on the figure in your office. “Okay?”

“This means we can’t go back to what we ever were again...”

Feelings of uncertainty arise in your stomach—it’s obvious it’s jealousy. Was it because he found his soulmate and he was never coming back or that you haven’t even met yours? 

Eunwoo stands in the middle of the room, hands in the pockets of his dress pants, contemplating what to say next. 

“We’re not together anymore.”

He knows this—he knows this so well with the amount of times you remind him that it’s embedded in his brain, nonetheless in the general picture of things, Eunwoo always thought that you’d find your way back home and into his arms. He’d tell you this, despite the amount of times you’ve rejected him, but hearing now that he really won’t come back because he has a soulmate hits different. 

Maybe Eunwoo had been a back-up plan. There’s never 100% bliss in a relationship, and you never saw yourself getting married to him and having kids but the thought of having Eunwoo in the back of your head meant that even if you didn’t find ‘the one,’ Eunwoo would be the replacement. It sounds fuck-up, it all sounded fucked-up but who would love a woman who ran an entire company by herself and barely have time for anyone else in her life?

“It means... I officially can’t come back to you anymore and you can’t expect for me to fall back into your hands like putty. I’m done... but it doesn’t mean I don’t love you anymore.”

“I know, Eunwoo.”

“It’s just— it’s my soulmate.”

“Don’t miss out on that opportunity.” You say sternly. 

Thwarted by your reaction, he snaps. “I’m so sick of this. I should’ve just given up sooner—I’ve been in your life for 6 years, we dated for 3, and you can’t even be happy for me? You can’t even tell me that you still love me although you’re the one who left me?”

Head dropping onto the back of your chair, you close your eyes for a moment. “Eunwoo, I’ll always love you, I never thought I had to remind you of that. But we never worked out, we stopped clicking after a year in. We’re on different pages, we’re doing different things, and I never had the time to spend with you anymore.”

“It wasn’t that you never had the time, you never made time.”

“Don’t say that. I didn’t have time. You never made the effort to spend it with me.”

“What?” He says sharply. “Tell me, what could I have done differently? I want to hear it?”

Running your fingers through your strands of hair frustratedly, you grumble in discontent. “I wanted you to be here with me on those nights I spent in the office. I wanted to have dinner with you here, but you always insisted we go out. I wanted you to be part of my projects, do things with me because we’re in the same field, yet you couldn’t even do that. I wanted you to be around and try in other ways even if it was hard to spend time with each other.”

“You’re the one who stopped trying!”

“I stopped trying when I saw how much effort you were putting into meeting these girls instead of me! How do you think I feel when you’re out buying coffee and delivering it to your co-worker? You couldn’t even do that for me.”

Clenching his jaw, he gives you a look before saying his last words. “You’re right. Maybe we weren’t right for each other.” As he’s walking toward the doors existing your office, you silently say, “She was your soulmate, wasn’t she? The co-worker.”

He turns to look at you, eyes sudden soft compared to moments ago. You were right. You��re always right.

Junmyeon is handsome in this lighting but it’s difficult to focus on the date with your argument with your ex from earlier.

He planned everything for the night—the lights, the picnic blanket, and wicker basket filled with delicious foods that he had cooked himself, a skill that he had been trying to improve lately since his roommate, Kyungsoo, had left for the military, and Chanyeol moved out to live with his soulmate. 

Pulling out two wine glasses, following with a bottle, he pops the cork out before pouring some into yours. “So, what’s on your mind?” Snapping back into reality, you laugh awkwardly, rubbing your arm.

“I’m sorry? Did you say something and I missed it? Nothing’s on my mind.”

“No, something is definitely up in there. I can see it in your face.” Handing the glass to you, he’s taking out the rest of the food from the basket; he’d packed everything from kimchi to kimbap, even cheese and deli meats. There was also pie— jesus, did he have to try so hard to get to your heart? You would be melting in his affection at this point if your head wasn’t so occupied.

“Uh... honestly, there’s something. But I’m not really in the mood to talk about it because it might ruin our date.”

“I’m afraid it would ruin our date if you don’t say anything.” He raises a brow.

Shoulders dropping in defeat, you take a sip of your wine for a boost of confidence. “Fine, fine. Eunwoo met his soulmate.”

Junmyeon nods, lips pursed. “Ah, I see. And you always thought that if it didn’t work out with someone else, you’d at least have Eunwoo?”

You freeze.

How’d he know that?

Almost like he read your thoughts, he’s speaking as he’s unraveling the plastic off the plates and containers. “I can kind of tell. You never fully pushed him away. If you didn’t want him in your life at all, you would’ve asked Johnny and the building to kick him out once he went through the lobby doors. Never happened— he’s even on your calendar for lunch, even if you don’t go.”

“You’re rather observant, aren’t you?”

“So I’ve been told.” He grins, taking your hand and giving it a light kiss. “Listen, I understand. Does it have to do with the soulmate thing?”

“A bit...” 

He shakes his head in condemnation, gaze drifting off at the sun that slowly begins to set in the horizon. “I hope you’re not upset because of me just because my ex left me for her soulmate. Not everyone meets their soulmate, you know? So if you met whomever it is, I’d want you to be with them.”

Ugh, Junmyeon is the epitome of a perfect man. It had been a thought that was on your mind recently, although you knew your chances of meeting your soulmate was slim, there was always that chance. 

“Thank you, Junmyeon. I feel the same way about you, you know.” With that, he nods in agreement before sticking a fork into the cheese, lifting it up to your lips. “Less talking about sad stuff now. Cheese?” With a smile, you comply with his offer and open your mouth.

The sun has long disappeared for the night and his friend, the moon, makes an appearance. Junmyeon is even more beautiful under the moonlight, if possible, laying on the blanket with his head resting on his arm as he admires the stars in the sky. 

Dinner was amazing— Junmyeon never fails to impress. You have to thank Chanyeol’s soulmate later on for going back to him because if it wasn’t for their bonding, you would’ve never actually met him. The previous year had taken a toll on you; the constant traveling from Japan, China, and Korea was deteriorating your health that you’d spend most of time in your office. Junmyeon didn’t even meet you until about two months ago. 

Your mind wanders off. Questions like: ‘how did Chanyeol meet his soulmate’ and ‘what stopped him from wanting to get to know the girl’ or ‘did any of your other friends meet their soulmate’ all flooded your head. You figured the night had been going so well you’d avoid the topic of soulmate and save those questions for another time. After what seemed like a moment, another inquiry lights a bulb over your head.

“Wait... we never talked about this before, but do you have a marking?”

“Of course,” He looks at you confusingly. “We all have markings.”

“But I never saw yours, and you never saw mine.” You clarify, and he nods at your statement. “Well, okay, yes, that’s true. Did you want to see it? Where’s yours?”

“On my hip-bone.” You respond, tugging down on the fabric at the hem of your shirt gingerly. Eyes bulging at your response, his body tenses. “What?”

Meticulously lifting the end of his shirt up, there’s a daisy that sits on his hip-bone and you finally understand why he’s giving you such a strange reaction. Mimicking his actions, you show him yours— a daisy.

[magalidragon]

targaryen’s seven | a Jonerys drabble

A/N: I could not help myself and just threw down this Drabble. I  don’t want to post it on Ao3 just yet because is not a full one-shot nor is it going to be multi-chapter (in the near future, maybe one day I will come back to it) but thought you guys might like it.  Enjoy!

The wind bit at her exposed skin, cheeks pinking without any aide of blush or tint.  It whipped over her silver curls and braids, already pulled back taut from her face.  It would have chilled anyone’s bones, except hers.  Her bones were heated from the heavy thud of her heart against her breastbone, the rush of blood in her veins, and the fire raging inside her soul.  The fire which rose to sparkle in her lavender eyes, redden her plump and pursed lips, and thirsted for revenge.  

In the dark winter in the North, far beyond the everlasting lights and skyscrapers of King’s Landing, the craggy peaks of the Vale, and the marshy flats of the Riverlands, no one walking by on the quaint lantern-lit light posted street with its cozy restaurants, pubs, boutique hotels, and little shops devoted to preserving the heritage of the Realm’s largest, sparsest, and remotest kingdom.  

The woman standing against one of these lightposts, her hands in the pockets of her designer black trenchcoat, hardly paying attention to the bustle of people.  There were locals intermixed with tourists—it was the Dawn Festival soon—going from building to building, stopping to take photos in front of silly little cardboard cutouts of ice zombies and Northmen.

Only a few stopped in their tracks to glance at her, for she stood out among the darkness and the cold snow, her silver hair a moonlit beacon, her entire demeanor that of someone who should not be trifled with nor confronted.  One glance of her purple eyes and they were on their way, bewitched almost to forget she was even there to begin with.  

She lifted her left wrist up to peer at the heavy silver men’s wristwatch, ticking softly under the wail of the wind.  Daenerys Targaryen tsked under her breath.  “He’s late,” she murmured.  She supposed it was silly to think he would actually honor her summons.  He would not be coming then.

Well I suppose I will have to go looking for him.

Her heavy black combat boots crunched under the fresh snows, hands returning to her pockets, walking slowly down the sidewalk.  The last time she was here had not been pleasant.  The Northern History Museum had been far more difficult to crack than she’d originally planned.  She had barely made it out of there with the silver wolf circlet she’d broken in to steal.  Retrieve, she preferred, even if the authorities had different views on the matter.

The silver wolf circlet allegedly belonged to a Northern queen, who rebelled against the kingdoms and ultimately died of starvation when all her allies abandoned her. It was exceptionally expensive and the funds of which now had been siphoned into a series of orphanages the Northern government had been sorely neglecting.

Her walk took her from the local streets a bit farther off the beaten track, the lamps extinguished or nonexistent, the people fewer and fewer, until she was the only one on a darkened street.

Dany paused in front of a pub, glancing down at her phone.  A message from her hacker—Missandei—informed her his cell phone had been pinging from that location an hour ago.  She glanced up, smirked at the worn sign-- The Wildling -- hanging on one hinge.  It was not for charm, but because the owner no doubt didn’t care about it.  Perfect.

She entered the pub, which suddenly went quiet.  Everyone stared at her.  Dany reached up to pull at one of the buttons on her coat, her smile amused, gaze sweeping from one end to the other of the less than desirable establishment.  She was not a local, she should not be there, but she did not care, purposefully striding towards the ancient bar, where a gigantic man with thick red beard and wild eyebrows surveyed her with bright blue eyes.  

“Ale please,” she ordered, sweet.

The man chuckled.  “You’re not from around here.”

“Nope.”

“You lost?”

Dany smiled, taking another look over her shoulder at the clientele, all of whom were still staring at her. She met the man’s gaze again, shaking her head.  “Nope.”

They looked at each other, unblinking, for what seemed like several minutes, but was only a couple.  A boom of laughter finally broke their silent pissing contest, the man slapping his dustbin lid sized hand on the bar, pointing at her, grinning darkly.  “I like you.”  He reached under the bar for a pint.  “Attitude like that, first one’s on me.”  

“I was hoping you could pass something along for me to one of your regulars.”

“Can’t say anyone you know would be in my pub,” the man said.  He set her pint glass full of darkened ale.  He grinned again.  “But try me.”

Dany slipped her fingers into one of the inner pockets of her coat, removing a slim black box.  She set it down on the bar, pushing it with one red manicured finger towards him.  Another enigmatic smile did the trick. “This is for Jon Snow.”

The entire pub might as well have gone on mute.

The jovial bartender immediately hardened, those twinkling blue eyes now chips of ice.  He was gruff.  “Don’t know a Jon Snow.”

“I think you do Tormund Giantsbane.”  Dany climbed off her stool, took a long pull from the ale glass, and wiped the foam from her upper lip.  The gruffness of the bartender dropped like a mask at her sudden use of his full name.  She liked to stun them.  It was fun that way. She turned, calling over her shoulder.  “Put it on his tab.”

The heavy oak door swung closed behind her with a deafening thud.  Dany liked the taste of that ale, making a note she would have to return if she was ever in the mood for it again.  She tugged her phone out, now a message from her ghost, warning her that this was a bad idea and they should try some other way.  

Barristan had said the same thing.  So had Daario.  Grey and Gendry might have also agreed, if Missy and Arya hadn’t been as forceful as they had with their displeasure.  Sometimes it was bothersome to have members of a team fucking, but Dany accepted the two couples because they worked well together and did not usually let their personal issues bleed into the world.  

Plus they all had reason for this job.  Well, not Daario, but he would do anything she asked because he was in love with her.

They all tried to convince her to get someone else.  There were plenty who would kill to be a part of her team.  To join them in this endeavor.  No one else would do, she told them, calm and quiet.  

It had to be him.

She returned to her car, parked in a community lot near the main square, and paid the exorbitant parking fee, even if it probably would have been easier to just use one of Missandei’s contraptions to hack her way out of the 15 stags.  She drove off, humming along to a silly pop song playing from whatever radio station had been on when she picked up the car at the Winterfell International Airport.

Ah Winterfell, so many memories.  The castle loomed large over the city that bore its name.  It was a museum now, even if the Stark family still retained some ownership of it.  Somewhere on the other side in more modest accommodations a few of the Stark family still lived. 

The Starks weren’t as big as they once were.  They were desperate for cash.  All they had were their titles, such as they were.  Dany thought about Arya Stark, her ghost, who technically bore the honorific Lady, but if you thought of calling her that you would get a knife in the gut.  It was part of her reason for taking this job.  

They all had reasons and now she just needed the final player in the game.

In lieu of a hotel, as much as she would like someone to pull back her linens and prepare a fire for her when she turned in for the evening, she rented out a luxury cabin several miles away.  It afforded her privacy, stunning views, and a large sunken tub.  Dany liked a sunken tub.

She parked, walked up to the front door, and smiled to herself at the threshold.  So obvious. She slipped in the key and entered, turning to plug in the code for the alarm panel.  When she turned back, she slipped off her coat, and walked into the large stone paneled living room, with its great fireplace—already crackling—and mountain filled wall of windows.  

“Hello Jon.”

The chair before the fire turned, revealing its occupant, who sat rather bored, legs crossed and fingers tapped against his temple.  He looked the same as ever, she thought, if not better.  Dark raven curls, wild around his face, which had been chiseled from marble.  Dark beard dusting over his jaw and upper lip, his gray eyes black in the shadow of the fire.  All black ensemble, which she knew hid a body that was as chiseled as his face.  Smooth planes and sharp edges, he was a masterpiece.

And he was deadly.  

The gray eyes glinted, just a hint of red.  Could have been from the fire, or it could have been something else.  

Her smile peeled over her teeth.  “My white wolf,” she purred.

Jon Snow smiled in return, although it did not meet his eyes, rather cold, as cold as the storm that began outside, the faintest hints of howling wind sounding.  “Daenerys Targaryen,” he said, in his rumbling Northern burr.  He kept smiling, until he wasn’t.  

And then he was at her throat, his fingers digging into the slim column, tilting up her jaw, his breath mingling with hers, warm and raspy.  Her eyes threatened to roll back into her head and her body ignited, fire consuming her.  He barely touched his mouth to hers, barely breathing.  “I thought I said I would kill you the next time I saw you.”

Now it was her turn to smile.  She lifted her hand, his eyes rolling down to it.  The cold steel of her dragonhead knife was against his jugular.  Even if his thumb was pressing down on her carotid, threatening to cut off her oxygen, she knew he wouldn’t.  Just like he knew she wouldn’t kill him.  Draw blood maybe, but she could never kill him.  “Darling, I think you forgot, it was I who said that.”

“Hmm.”  He drew in her scent, nostrils flaring, and eyes going red again.  The wolf, she noted, her skin prickling, and her body straining towards him.  Not to break free, but to join him. There would be time for that later. His thumb dragged over her bottom lip and she darted her tongue out to touch it.  He groaned, his nose pushing to hers, laugh deep in his chest.  “You came looking for me.”

“I will always come looking for you.”

“I don’t want it.”  His dark brows arched, the feral wolf flickering over his features again, hiding his obvious desire for her.  She bucked her hips against him, reminding him.  He laughed.  “Peace offering, huh?”  He immediately let her go and flicked the box towards her.  He growled.  “You stole that from me.”

“And I’m giving it back.”  She opened the box, revealing the white wolf head pommel from the ancient Valyrian sword he kept in one of his many safehouses.  She sighed.  “I realized that it really belongs with you.”

“No, you realized no one would buy it.”

She shrugged, flicking the box towards him and he caught it one-handed, setting it down on a table behind him.  “Po-tay-toe, Po-tah-toh.”

“I’m not joining you again.”

Ire flared, her eyes darkening to indigo.  “I am no longer asking you nicely.”

“Funny was that what it was when you tried to kill me?”

Of course he would bring that up.  She waved her hand dismissively.  “It was an accident.”

Jon dragged the collar of his shirt down, pointing at a knife scar on his collarbone.  “That is not an accident!”

“Oh yeah, well you stole from me!”

Now it was his turn to shrug it off.  “That money needed to go to the Night’s Watch,” he mumbled, arms crossing over his chest.  

They squared off against each other.  This was not how she planned it to go, but nevertheless.  She narrowed her eyes on him, staring.  He stared back.  No one blinked.  Until they were at each other, grappling, tugging, and tearing at each other, mouths a frenzied clash of tongues and teeth.  She drew his tongue in between her lips to slide along hers, moaning into his mouth when his large hands slipped from her shoulders to cup the sides of her breasts, straining in their cashmere sweater cage.  She lifted herself against him, remembering every feel of him, every dent and ridge of muscle, every nervous quiver, and every bump and drag of scars.

He tore from her first, a hand tangled in her immaculate braids, fingers digging into the ridge of her skull, and another on her hip, holding her to him.  “The answer is still no,” he whispered.

Dany shook her head, whispering.  “You haven’t heard my proposition.”

“I’m out.”

“Even when I tell you the mark?”

He shook his head again, although she knew him.  She’d known him since they were teenagers, misfits and unwanted, trying to scrap by on their wits and wiles.  They had bled together, fought together, fucked and almost died together.  They’d gone to jail together.  She nibbled his lower lip again and he flinched, barely, but she felt it. He still wants to know. “No,” he repeated.

“Yes.”

“I don’t want it.”

She cocked her head, her fingers smoothing over his cheek, dropping to cover his heart with her palm.  Eyes steady, breath even, she smiled again.  “I need my second Jon.  I need my partner.”

They all wanted her to bring in someone else.  Even someone she might have worked with in the past, none of them matched to the trust she had with Jon Snow.  He was her equal, the one she could trust above all else, the one who knew her deepest and darkest fears and desires.  Jon Snow came from nothing like she had and built himself up.  He was the only one she would ever feel comfortable doing this job with.  

There was also the fact that she was still in love with him.

Trivial thing really, she lied to herself.

Whatever they said about him, she didn’t believe it.  He was out, he was done, he’d gone straight…all lies.  He was just like her.  They were wild, they could not be tamed, and he could never settle for a boring law-abiding life.  

The irony of Jon Snow was he was the most honorable criminal she had ever met.

“No.”

Now it was time for the final play.  Her other hand cupped his head and fingers twirled with his hair at the base of his neck.  “Even if I tell you that we’re going for the Targaryen crown and dragons?”

His dark eyes lifted to hers, his breath stilled.  He said nothing.  

Her tongue dabbed her upper lip, her pupils dilating wide, smile curving again.  “The crown and the eggs will all be in a single location, for the Conquering Day Celebration, and Tywin Lannister himself will be there, to give a speech, to commemorate the day.  Robert Baratheon, Cersei Lannister, and that little fucker Tyrion will all be in attendance.”  She brushed her nose over his, whispering.  “Can’t you feel it Jon?  That wolf inside your heart?  The one howling?  What does he want?”

She knew what it wanted, just like he did.  All she needed was for him to say it.  

Jon closed his eyes, shivering, and his arms tightened around her.  “Revenge,” he murmured.  He didn’t need to say it but draining the Lannisters of their stolen riches would also be a bonus.

“Exactly.”

He gazed down at her, lips dropping to hers again, and she knew it.  She knew before he even whispered the words to her, before he kissed her and before they decided to start talking terms.  

“When do we start?”

[theshipsfirstmate]

Agents of SHIELD Fic: We Always Walked a Very Thin Line

post-7x10, Daisy-centric angst fic, with a fair bit of dousy.

Title from “Exile” by Taylor Swift feat. Bon Iver. Let me be the 10,000th person to title a fic from folklore (but Justin Vernon did what he needed to do on this track).

We Always Walked a Very Thin Line (AO3 - wc: 1357)

Daisy’s thought a lot about all the ways that death could come for her -- all the ways she could bleed out or burn up or be torn to tiny particles by the powerful emptiness of space. She never thought it could be like this.

She feels it in her chest and down her spine, when Malick snaps Jiaying’s neck, and instinctively, she looks down at her hands, some small part wondering if she’ll just fade away instantly. But it doesn’t happen like that, either.

May gets the shot off behind him, and takes chase when he runs, and then it’s just the two of them in the empty hallway, Daisy and her mother — a woman she could barely look in the eyes just minutes ago, but is connected to in even more ways than their shared DNA. The whole world goes fuzzy around her and she lowers herself to the floor, taking in shaky breaths that leave her lightheaded.

She can’t tell if the metal walls of the base are actually shaking with tremors, or if that’s just her. Her bones have been shuddering since the moment she prepared to fire back at Malick and it’s not going away. Another lightbulb explodes overhead and she barely registers the sound or loss of light. It feels like the early days of her powers, like she could flatten a city block or turn a skyscraper inside out, like the whole world could come apart at the seams if she just stopped trying to hold it together.

She sees her reflection flicker in Jiaying’s lifeless eyes, strokes a hand through hair that feels like her own, and wonders if it might come apart anyway.

“Sometimes trying to do the right thing comes out all wrong.”

It’s the kind of lesson every child deserves from their mother, and it’s one she’s spent 30-plus lonely years learning time and time again all by herself. It shouldn’t ache like this, to have had a tiny, stolen taste of the compassion she’s always craved, and then have it ripped away. There shouldn’t be this much space to mourn someone she never really knew.

But the universe is cruel, and a sob rips from her chest before she even feels it coming. She can feel herself starting to crumble, and worries this time it might be permanent.

They’re losing. The battles, the war, their people, all of it. They’re just barely scraping by every single time and she promised herself she’d fight until the bitter end. But what if she can’t?

It must be minutes later, but it could be hours, even days, before she feels hands on her shoulders, a familiar timbre in her ear. Everything sounds muffled, like she’s been packed in cotton, and she’s barely any help at all as they pull her to her feet.

Simmons and Deke are gone, May relays, and part of Daisy slips even further away. What happens to her if the timeline has bent around the circumstances of her birth? There are maybe three people in the whole universe who could make a close approximation, and their lives are all in immediate jeopardy.

Then, in her line of vision, there’s Sousa, with his unwavering, steadying presence. Daniel, her brain supplies privately. It’s okay to call him that here, it’s okay to think of him that way if she’s not going to live to regret it.

He takes her face in his hands and she can’t tell if they’re burning or freezing, or if she even feels them at all. She can read the concern in his eyes more clearly than she can hear it off his lips.

“I think she’s in shock.” He’d told her before that the things that scared him didn’t show on his face, but this one does.

“Jiaying,” May pauses before she finishes, like she knows what this will do to them both, “was her mother.”

Daisy watches two faces register the agonizing truth, and remembers, slowly — May does know what this means. To both of them. She can feel it. 

Daniel turns back to her, and the way devastated shock melts immediately to selfless compassion in his eyes is enough to break whatever’s left of her heart.

She kissed him once, in another time. It feels like a tragedy now, that he can’t remember. Or maybe it’s a mercy. Part of her thought she might get another chance to try for one they’d both know was real. 

It’s been so long since she hoped for anything like that. 

And if she drowns in the rapids they’ve created in the timestream, if she vanishes into the ether of things that never were, what then? Will he forget her? Will they all?

Daniel’s a soldier, he carries these things with him — the tarnished flip side on a medal of honor. Daisy doesn’t think enough of herself to believe he holds her as highly as he does Peggy Carter, but she knows it’ll hurt him if something happens to her. And that’s quickly become the last thing she wants to do.

She’s never been someone who longed for the trappings of a “normal” life, not for a long time, anyway. But standing here now, on knees that feel like they’re about to buckle under the existential weight of an unwinnable fight, that feels like another regret. A world where she gets to watch her friends — her family, she’d insisted to Enoch when he warned her — grow old together, lead long, joyful lives full of love and laughter, it might as well be a fairy tale. 

The focal point on humanity has sharpened down to a pinhole. There’s no room for dreams, there’s only their team, and the fight for continued existence. 

Daniel helps her to an empty bunk, and she protests weakly, knowing there isn’t any time to waste. But her body follows him instead. She’s just so tired.

Don’t let me fade away, she wants to tell him. Don’t let me go.

She fairly certain she doesn’t say it out loud, but somehow he knows. It shouldn’t surprise her by now, but it still does, when he settles into a chair next to her bunk and reaches out to take one of her hands firmly in his own. She can still feel it, or at least she thinks she can.

“Daniel,” she whispers, the first time she’s called him by his first name, the first time she’s spoken out loud since calling helplessly after her mother. 

If he’s surprised, he doesn’t show it. He meets her eyes with his usual resolve and the question she’s been working herself up to ask comes out as little more than a breath. “Will you stay?”

He squeezes her hand and bows his head and she wishes she could tell him that he’s a mirror image of the man whose eyes twinkled in a telling way when he admitted he’d like be the one to pick her up after she ran into a brick wall. He’s still that man, she realizes. She should have kissed him again when she had the chance.

Daisy’s been preparing to die for years now. But it seems so unfair, that it could come just as she was remembering what it felt like to live.

Then Daniel answers -- “Of course I’ll stay. I’m where I need to be.” -- and she remembers what it felt like when he promised her they were going home. 

She was hazy then, too, in and out of consciousness and mired in the torturous pain her mother knew before her. But she’d heard him say it, over and over again, and she knew he believed it even now.

Home.

If she’s still here when she wakes up, maybe they’ll finally get there.

[knightotoc]

"I took care of them:" Lightsaber Color Transformation and Identity

Clickbait Title: Why Ahsoka's S7 Lightsabers are Blue

Very vague spoilers for Jedi Fallen Order (and Rebels and the KotORs) below! The JFO spoilers are marked if you want to skip them.

When Luke changes from a blue to a green lightsaber, it signifies both a break from Anakin (and Obi-Wan) and his own personal transformation. (And also, the necessity for the saber to stand out against a blue sky during the movies' first outdoor fight.)

Ezra's change mirrors Luke's -- he also moves from matching his master's color to carrying his own. His experience at Malachor, while different than Luke's at Bespin, was equally harrowing. Both students' fledgling understanding of themselves as Jedi were shattered -- Luke can no longer want to be like his father; Ezra has seen the power of hatred.

The thing which gives a lightsaber its color is its kyber crystal. The movies wisely avoid this mechanism, but the cartoons, videogames, and Disney parks can't get enough of it.

If you buy the lightsaber creation experience at Disneyland, they have you meditate to pick your color. (I didn't go for this, though I did buy Maul's which was more expensive and twice as big. Hey, he's magic and I'm not.) I read a Polygon article that described the meditation as a surprisingly sincere spiritual experience -- a real connection to a specific color. And I watched a GameGrumps where they discussed buying extra kyber crystals on Etsy so that they could have all the colors. You can even change the color yourself with some YouTube engineering.

(I should also point out that as I was messing with my Maul sabers the other day, one light randomly turned green for a second. The integrity of these Disneyland saber colors is fragile indeed. Or maybe I am magic.)

But could an in-universe crystal change color? Luke and Ezra just got new ones -- did the new colors just happen to reflect their new identities? Or did the new identities alter the color?

And what if you were taking care of someone else's?

The KotOR games are the richest example of using lightsaber colors for storytelling. Jedi tradition during this ancient time had the colors signify your specialization -- blue for the hardy Gaurdians, green for the wise Consulars, and yellow for the Sentinels with their, uh, miscellaneous talents. You can change your lightsaber color any time you like depending on what crystals you find in caves or boxes (and they've got almost the whole rainbow out there), but the rules of meaning are written for you to follow or break. Still, you couldn't change any crystal itself until ...

Darth Mom Loves You

... KotOR II. You CAN change the crystal you find at the darkest part of the cave back home on Dantooine -- indeed, you must! As your mysterious mentor Kreia explains:

"That crystal is bonded to you. Through you it acquires its character and strength. And through it, your power is enhanced."

This bonded crystal changes in two ways: its color changes to align with your morality (black for a dark side player, white for a light side player, and three -- count 'em -- shades of gray), and its glow changes to align with your level (below level 12, it is opaque; above level 33, it "radiates an immense amount of light, almost blinding anyone who looks at it").

It is a beautiful way to keep track of your progress in the game as your Exile regains their lost powers and redefines themselves in a scary new world. Especially since you can only change your crystal with Kreia's help -- you need to talk to her about it, go to the workbench, remove it, and hand it over to her, trusting in her guidance and wisdom and the eerily powerful bond you share. (I, uh, love this game.)

She takes care of it for you.

The thing is, this crystal does not affect the color of your weapon. KotOR lightsabers actually mash THREE crystals up in there -- one for color, two for power. Changes in your identity affect your weapon in a tangible, yet invisible way.

Of course, a blindingly bright power crystal doesn't sound especially sustainable -- no matter how fascinating your arc or powerful your bond.

An ad from the brilliant Jedi Academy book series.

***🎸🤖Spoilers for JFO🤖🎸***

JFO is a far more aesthetically-driven game than the KotORs -- not just because it's a lot prettier, but because the rewards in chests only affect your appearance, not your stats. You can find new lightsaber hilts in the same places you can find new ponchos. But unlike the KotORs, you can't find new crystals until you've been sufficiently harrowed. And then, suddenly, it's the most thorough rainbow of all.

You begin the game with the ability to switch between blue and green, with no connotations attached except what you bring with you. But after Cal's own breakdown on Dathomir -- a more internal struggle than those of Luke and Ezra -- and its continuation and eventual healing on Ilum, we are finally inside the mind of a Jedi as they build their lightsaber -- and choose their color. Cal holds his battered crystal up to the light, and as he turns it, we see a spectrum of seven colors, all contained within one kyber crystal. You pick your favorite and go.

His rejuvenation in the Force gives Cal the ability to choose the color of his lightsaber. And he found this crystal in the darkest part of a cave from his childhood -- just like Exile and Luke found theirs.

So is that ... how it works? Do you get to pick? Does the color emerge from your broken little wizard soul?

If any Star Wars media was going to argue that, it would be JFO, where visual customization is so dear.

***🎸🤖End Spoilers🤖🎸***

Skip Here for the Ahsoka Theory

Why do Ahsoka's lightsabers change to blue? Certainly, she has had her own harrowing experience -- but it wasn't followed by any caves nor rambling old ladies trying to get her in touch with her spirit. Just a smug young man and a knowing expression between the two of them. It's cute as hell but why did he do that?

She didn't change them blue; he did. Did he switch her crystals? Why? Do they really need to be replaced like batteries? (The ancient lightsaber Ezra found on Malachor still worked.)

He changed them blue to put his own spirit in them. He missed her; he wants her to stay. It's a symbol of a bond, like the orange helmets -- but while the clones changed their armor to match Ahsoka, Anakin changed her sabers to match himself.

Possessive, yeah. Sweet, sure. Pitiful, maybe. Especially considering the sabers' fate. And that almost all the other Jedi who switch their own saber colors move away from their masters, not towards them (except Luke in his battle on Crait in TLJ ... I could gush about that too, but this is already so long! It's certainly a moving parallel to S7 Ahsoka).

What interests me about these silly crystals is the possibility that they change along with their Jedi. "This weapon is your life" -- then what happens if your life changes? Or if this weapon becomes someone else's life?

What if he changed them blue unintentionally? His proximity to the crystals, his hopeless wish for her return, for them to understand each other -- Darth Dad loves her, too. From her, he acquires character and strength. And from him, her power is enhanced.

Of course there are no caves -- these are city Jedi. The cave is the dorm room. Home is a skyscraper.

He took care of them. They were not better -- they were just his. And she was not.

[girlsgenerati0n]

rin!! 💖 based on your posts, it doesn't seem like you like "ay-yo" as much (and i do agree that it felt... sparse; it's okay, but something felt *missing*). but...! we move! what did you think of the new songs in the repackage?

lum my beloved!! 🫂💖

oof, yes... ay-yo was not good.

i genuinely have never disliked a nct 127 title track before. i like some more than others, but never have disliked them completely. i'm very surprised that it's not even "nct bad" it's BAD LMAO. it feels empty... like the rest of the song minus the chorus is kind of funky, i like that but. the chorus just washes it all away. it sounds slightly like limitless but like. if limitless was done by another company as a blatant copy lol.

it's a kenzie song too so i thought i was really going to like it lol. but i don't blame her. 😌

but! you're right, we move on!

dj is MUCH better. i don't really like it, but it's objectively a better song than ay-yo.

skyscraper is AMAZING, totally an nct 127 song. it should have been the tilte track. also, i believe it's a dem jointz song so like OF COURSE it's good.

thank you beloved for letting me rant lol!! i hope you've been well!! 🥰💖

[peterstanslizzie]

Reacting To: Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts (Season 3 Episode 9)

Emilia is such a monster...

Episode Title: Prahmises

Spoiler Warning: Kindly proceed if you’ve already seen the episode or are able to handle spoilers

1. Dr. Emilia backstory? This should be interesting! We are taken back in time  to when Emilia was a young woman, living with her dad and brother, Liam in a burrow (probably the same burrow Lio and Song lived in). Their dad puts immense pressure on his kids to be part of the generation that will solve the Great Mute Outbreak. 

2. He is especially concerned about Liam, whom he tells Emilia to make sure he stays focused on their mission to bring humans back on top. So this is why Emilia is so determined to cure the mutes; It’s because of her dad and how he doesn’t want his kids to live underground anymore. Despite seeming like a hard-ass, I get why he’s so tough like that. 

3. Back in the present day, we see Wolf stopping Scarlemagne in his tracks to inform him that she’s going to help him kill Emilia. She also sprayed some lavender air freshener to make sure Kipo won’t be able to track their scent. They reach Skyscraper Ridge where they notice that Emilia isn’t there with Hoag and Greta and assume that she’s back on her boat. 

Kipo looks beautiful and Benson looks mighty dapper in his suit

4. Prahm is coming together quite nicely; Everyone is putting the finishing touches on the venue and its decorations. Some of them (including Kipo, Benson and Troy) are already dressed-up. Oooo fancy! However, Kipo is still upset that Wolf and Scarlemagne have ran off to do their thing. She wants to give Emilia a chance but everyone else feels like she isn’t capable of change. 

5. Can’t they just meet somewhere in the middle? Instead of killing her, why not imprison her like I suggested in my last review? I’m sure the humans will be able to understand; They don’t seem to be that pro-Emilia anymore. 

6. Song then tells Kipo of some of the things she heard Dr. Emilia say when she was a Mega Monkey. We then get a flashback of Emilia being awarded with what I’m guessing is a lead position in their burrow’s anti-mute/find-a-cure  research movement. She tells Liam that she wants to get a sample from one of the mutes to develop the cure and they proceed to head to the surface.

7. They split up and eventually, Emilia manages to get a sample from a spider mute. On the other hand, we see Liam hitching a ride from Brad and Amy! He’s really friendly towards them and vice versa. After the rats drove off, Emilia confronts her brother for making friends with the mutes. He mentions after talking to Brad and Amy, they are going to build an amusement park that is a safe haven for mutes and humans. Ahhh, right! So, that’s how Ratland came to be! Too bad it’s destroyed now. 

8. Liam tries to reason with Emilia by telling her that mutes and humans can co-exist on the surface together because what they were taught about mutes was wrong. Emilia then does a complete BITCH move by killing her brother in clear daylight because she doesn’t want him to get in the way of everything they’ve worked for. What the heck Emilia?! I can’t believe she killed her own brother just because he disagrees with her. And it didn’t take long for her to do that. She is messed up! 

9.  Not only is she a killer, she’s a liar because she goes back to the lab faking hysteria by saying that the mutes killed her brother. Girl, bye. I hope Scarlemagne/Wolf ends you. 

10. Basically, what Song heard from Emilia as the Mega Monkey was that she has been lying to everyone this whole time about the mutes killing her brother when it was actually Emilia herself. What a heartless monster. Back to the present; Who the hell died and make Kipo queen? Even after this story, she’s still willing to give her a chance. WAKE UP KIPO! People are capable of changing, just not those who are willing to kill their siblings without much hesitation. Kipo literally went from wanting to drown at least 50 humans on a boat to not wanting to kill the most evil person in Las Vistas. Like can you please be more consistent?

Troy and Benson in these suits is a vision

Aww, a reunion between Label and Zane. I still remember him saving her from getting cured. That was a great moment. 

Aww x2, Amy and now normal rat, Brad. Side note: she called him her best friend. I had to point this out because all this while I thought they were a couple. 

11. The mutes have arrived and it’s almost time for Prahm to start. Meanwhile, Wolf and Greta are fighting each other and at first, it seems like they are evenly matched but Greta ends up kicking her butt. Ouch! Scarlemagne is working up a sweat so that he can use his pheromones to mind-control Greta. After some struggle, he manages to splatter his sweat directly onto her face. Unfortunately, Wolf knocked her out unconscious before he could ask her where Emilia is lol. 

12. The other humans plus Hoag arrive at Prahm with Hoag demanding for his daughter to leave the party. She’s definitely not going to listen to him. I hope Hoag will just drop it and join Kipo. 

13. Okay, is anyone else getting middle school mixer vibes here when watching the humans and mutes trying to have friendly conversations with one another? It’s sooo awkward. Kipo entrusts Dave and Benson to be like the middle-men between the two groups. Troy and Jamack are also forming a team to do the same thing. It’s going to be a competition on who can make more friendships. That sounds weird but okay. 

14. Greta wakes up and instead of using pheromones, they manage to get her to reveal Emilia’s location by bribing her with pancakes. Interestingly, Greta brings up a great point by asking Wolf why she’s wearing wolf skin if she and everyone else is so positive that mutes and humans can be friends. That’s true but every individual group has its own bad apples. Humans can kill other humans too as proven by Emilia. But you don’t see humans trying to segregate from their own race lol. 

15. After listening to Greta, Wolf thinks that if they kill Emilia, this might cause the humans to lose trust towards the mutes. Yes but like I said, why don’t y’all just capture her and put her in jail, just like you did with Scarlemagne? I don’t think doing that would upset the humans. Scarlemagne is actually agreeing with Wolf’s reasoning and they set Greta loose. Ugh, why? Just keep her restrained. 

16. We get back to the socializing between the humans and mutes and things are going too well lol. Like I’ve said earlier, it’s super awkward. Maybe they should play a game together or something instead of trying to force conversations. 

We also get a reprise of Hyun Soo and his groupmates’  catchy Kpop song feat. Doag. 

17. And finally, Hoag is able to see that his daughter is happy dancing with the Korean Narwhal mutes. He then proceeds to join his daughter and dance with her. Thank goodness he changed his mind about the mutes. 

Aww he turned his old blanket into a tie. Cute!

18. Wolf and Scarlemagne are now at Scarlemagne’s Court to look for some Prahm outfits left by some of his old Nobles. He is also reflecting on his past decisions and expresses to Wolf about how he regrets not going after Emilia and not trying to free Song and have a life with her, Lio and Kipo. That’s true but look at what you have now Scarlemagne! I swear, if Scarlemagne dies...I will be so pissed.

19. It’s now night-time and it looks like the mutes and humans are getting along much better. We even see Jamack dancing with the old lady, Mrs. Graham? Troy and Benson are having a cute dance of their own too. Kipo is feeling down because Wolf isn’t around to enjoy Prahm with her, especially since their song, “Heroes on Fire” is now playing. 

20. But look who decided to show up at the right moment. Kipo is thrilled! Scarlemagne then gives his own speech to the mutes and humans to ask for their forgiveness. This in turn, makes the humans apologize to the mutes for the bad things they’ve done to them too:

Such a tender moment

21.  Hoag then feels guilty and tells everyone that he and Emilia had sabotaged the fireworks that were just about to go off so that it will shower everyone with the cure. Phew, that was close! 

So Emilia still has followers! Okay, that makes things even more complicated. I thought this whole issue can be solved simply by locking up Emilia but she’s clearly got the loyalty of some of the humans no matter what.

22. After making this revelation, Emilia and her remaining army decide to make their grand entrance. She’s even dressed for the occasion. The episode ends with Emilia setting up the fireworks to go off and they did. But the episode stops here.

23. 1 more episode left! Ughhh, I’m so sad that it’s all coming to an end. But I’m looking forward to see how this whole show is going to end. I hope I’ll be satisfied with the ending. We shall see tomorrow for when I will post my review of the SERIES FINALE episode! Thanks for reading! Bye!

[veryfantasticstudent]

Cyberpunk for the 21st Century: ONF’s “Sukhumvit Swimming”

If I write about a K-pop group, chances are I have been a fan of them for a while. This is not the case for ONF. M-Net’s Road to Kingdom brought this group to my attention, and though I checked out some of their work it is the sextet’s latest comeback, Spin-Off, hooked me to them. The title track for this mini album is “Sukhumvit Swimming”, a tropical house track with a touch of ONF’s signature heavy synths and guitar. The MV continues ONF’s science fiction-inspired scenarios and hones them down to a particular subgenre (my favourite)—cyberpunk. I wouldn’t label any k-pop concept as through-and-through cyberpunk until now, but “Sukhumvit Swimming” borrows and adds enough to that subgenre to be considered a part of that class of literature. The MV borrows from cyberpunk in spirit and setting but combines them in fascinating new ways.

“Sukhumvit Swimming” by ONF on Woolim Entertainment’s YouTube Channel

Cyberpunk is a subgenre of science fiction that came around in the 1980s and was fascinated by hacker culture. It was was thinking about the Internet, bodily augmentations, AI, mind uploads, all in the setting of dystopian cityscapes were corporates ruled the world. The Cyberpunk archetype is a hacker who uses the oppressive technology of the corporate to figure out the flows of late capital and direct them to his (usually, the protagonists are, unfortunately, male) goal: freedom. The “technology” is generally an Internet-like technology, and hence the “cyber”. The cyberpunk also hacks systems like the cityscape to fight corporate domination. The “punk” came from the rebellious and stylish punk-rocker, and it denotes cyberpunk’s fascination with the power of leather-clad, heavily-mascara-ed punk-pop culture. Neuromancer by William Gibson, Schismatrix by Bruce Sterling, Wetware by Rudy Rucker, and Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner are some works that found the tradition in the West. Altered Carbon by Richard K Morgan, The Matrix, and Westworld kept it alive in later decades. Ghost in the Shell, Akira, PsychoPass, Serial Experiments: Lain are some iconic works from Japan that have pushed boundaries for the subgenre. Amidst its neon landscapes, grubby alleyways, gore, and shiny machinery, cyberpunk asks a simple question: what place do we, humans and individuals, have in this “global village” of money and information? Each cyberpunk finds their own answer, and the city always plays an important role in this discovery.

Wyatt rides a tuk-tuk in cyberspace

So, where is Sukhumvit in “Sukhumvit Swimming”? The only thing remotely related to Thailand in the MV seems to be the tuk-tuk that Wyatt drives through a CGI cyberspace landscape. At first glance, even this is jarring—why would one drive a tuk-tuk through cyberspace? The answer is: why not? “Sukhumvit Swimming” insists on mixing the local with the global. The cyberpunk always stays true to their roots even as they dive into popular culture. Cyberspace, in most cyberpunk, is a visual fest where one can look like whatever they want. If one wants to traverse it with a tuk-tuk, so be it. In a way, all the six settings in the MV are Sukhumvit. They are all a bizarre mix of human-nonhuman, past-future, real-unreal, categories that cyberpunk always confuses to question their boundaries. This confusion allows cyberpunk to figure out, in distinct ways, how an individual’s life is embedded in global capital.

These androids are hella creepy. This sequence seems heavily inspired by Westworld, a cyberpunk work set in an amusement park where artificially intelligent android “hosts” gain sentience and rebel against the abuse that the human guests of the park have practiced on the androids for year.

Each setting of the MV evokes Sukhumvit as a tool, and it is what makes “Sukhumvit Swimming” a clever study of cyberpunk. The first setting is Hyojin’s 1920s American railroad. Whether we are to think of the “people” on board with Hyojin as literal androids or grotesquely mechanised human beings, there are disturbingly few differences between androids and people working like clockwork to their schedules in a metropolis. Our cowboy is different from the rest of the occupants on this train; he is not dressed in the stuffy clothes of these robots—he is a (console?) cowboy, a punk, a rebel. 

Hyojin as the cowboy. 

U, too, seems to be on this train, but he is, well, high. He drinks a bright blue liquid from a glass and things start to swim. With time stopping and MK floating in space, questioning the reality of our disparate, mediate, postmodern existence should not be too difficult for us. In fact, stimulants of various kinds are an integral part of cyberpunk. Apart from their performance-enhancing effects, drugs are always connected to altering/understanding reality much like the technology of the cyberpunk universe. 

Kids, don’t do drugs.

Is the virtual world, where we are all information, more real than our world, where we are just expressions of biology? Is the train that U is on real? The minute U consumes that glass, “reality” is up for grabs[1].

The second major setting of this MV features J-US in the sunburnt ruins of Greek columns and skyscrapers.

J-US’ suburnt world.  Blade Runner 2049 has very similar visuals to this post-apocalyptic world.

This odd, out-of-time combination is another reason why “cyberpunk” jumped to my mind. Cyberpunk likes to juxtapose history with the present times and ask: what is the place of history in a time when technology has skewed our perception of time? The anxiety of technophobes is often that these revered worlds like the cradle of Western Civilisation will be forgotten. The survival of these cultures without context—just stone columns in sunbaked worlds—reminds us of the tyranny of the object. Long after humans are gone (extinct or only alive in a virtual world), these traces of us will be left. Until then, we can only absorb and re-write these monuments into our present alongside the skyscrapers of the capitalist world—much like the pastiche cityscape of Sukhumvit.

E-Tion is on the moon. The moon landing was faked, btw. Or was it?

E-Tion’s moon landing is a particularly strange setting. The others, in one way or another, can be found on earth, but why is E-Tion on the moon? Distance and travel in this MV are unstable concepts. If one can travel through cyberspace in a tuk-tuk, one can definitely grow flowers on the moon. In a patchwork fantasy world (like Sukhumvit), anything is possible. More than that, scale is another notion “Sukhumvit Swimming” is determined to throw in the trash. When virtual worlds are accessible to us through stimulants and technology, the moon is no longer the symbol of extraordinary achievement or emotion (“shoot for the moon,” it is said). Even the moon can be subsumed in the network of capitalism--just ask Elon Musk.

MK really reminds me of the Master here.

The only setting we are now left with is MK’s scenario with the mysterious machine. It could be the machine that is responsible for these strange visions; it certainly looks like the Twelfth Doctor’s time-travelling machine, the TARDIS, from BBC’s Doctor Who. Perhaps it is even one of the machines from The Matrix, that are determined to keep humans as only bio-powered cells for the energy they can provide (bio-powered batteries would not generate enough energy, by the way. That’s one of the flaws in the Wachowskis’ reasoning). Strangely enough, no-one touches the machine; MK disappears from the scene towards the end of the MV, leaving the machine perpetually working. The machine never stops and the dreamers (assuming that there is a particular “real” world) will not wake up—unless, of course, something brings them out of the illusion.

That brings me to the “storyline” of this MV. There is certainly one, mixed within the fantastic shots of this MV. All the members start from different settings but towards the end, they all arrive in the desert that J-US started from. The trigger? Hyojin readies his gun to shoot at J-US in quite a memorable scene:-

I said this MV likes to mess with scale, didn’t I?

Unexpectedly, Hyojin is the one who is shot. All the members snap out of their “illusions” and end up in the desert with J-US. Everyone is dying or has at least passed out, except J-US who has been in this setting since the beginning. The cyberpunks come together, out of their illusion—or perhaps into one. Time unfreezes and Hyojin is nowhere to be seen on the train. Our cyberpunks have lived and fought in the blink of an eye (or rather, the three-odd minutes that the MV lasts) to disappear with no trace. Fast, suave, and unreal, the cyberpunk is gone once the fight is over. But what have they achieved? 

The cyberpunk cityscape is the place for the rebel to explore the strings of corporate domination. In the case of cyberpunk, relations are usually technologies embedded in the logic of capitalism. When ONF creates a temporary Sukhumvit on our screens, they tie together the disparate scenarios of the MV. Now, the hidden relations that linked the moon to a spaghetti Western train and post-apocalyptic world can be read. 

If all the members end up in a dystopian, suntanned terrain, it is because this is where all history leads. “Sukhumvit Swimming” is a slow but certain dive of the world into a spiral of destruction there is no coming back from, a process of the destruction of the world that begins slowly but certainly from the days when human beings began to abuse fossil fuels. The trains, the tuk-tuks, the rockets of “Sukhumvit Swimming” are as much a part of the process as the fireworks that explode in front of E-Tion’s moon.

When the MV ends, Time begins its work again, moving inexorably towards the end. Sukhumvit is a tool to understand how the flows of global capital have isolated humans (and even technology) into our own fantastical worlds, worlds as small as our phone screens, without seeing our connections to the outside world. Our work is to make/find our Sukhumvit, our tool for understanding our place in these networks that seem to mysteriously guide our lives. The cyberpunk has disappeared, but there is someone that still remains: it is you, and your battle has just begun.

[1] Stealing this expression from Cavallaro, Dani. Cyberpunk and Cyberculture: Science Fiction and the Works of William Gibson, pp. 38. 

[sighmurderbot]

Irish Coffee Chapter Four

Title: Triple Shot Espresso

Chapter Rating/Warnings: G, I don’t think there’s even any profanity in this one

Word Count: 2.9K

Summary: They meet over coffee and Kierkegaard. There was a spark in his honey-brown eyes that drew her to him. There was a sadness behind her bright smile that drew him to her. Spencer Reid/Original Female Character. Slow burn coffee shop meet. Strangers to friends to lovers. This fic is also available on AO3, it’s ahead of tumblr currently!

previous chapter//next chapter

"I felt it shelter to speak to you."

-Emily Dickinson 

The sun dawned on my fourth day off work, and my late alarm roused me. Somehow I woke up tired and rested at the same time. Shooting my boss at the coffee shop a quick text, I hopped in the shower. Sure, another day off might be nice, but I couldn't really afford it if I wanted to stay on track with my plan, plus losing my diner job was still fresh in my mind.

It took less than an hour from my alarm going off to the door to my apartment shutting behind me. My coat felt like gauze as gusty winds chased each other down valleys of skyscraping office buildings, so I hurried my steps to the shelter of the coffee shop.

The bittersweet scent of coffee surrounded me as soon as I opened the door, pulling me in like hands tugging at my sleeves. My eyes fluttered shut for a moment as I basked in the cosy warmth. After missing it for a few days the smell of fresh coffee was heady, and I could almost taste it. It pulled me back to a hazy memory of the sun streaming through tall windows and laughing with my mom, teasing each other about how we liked our drinks. I had always drank mine black, but she poured enough creamer and sugar in to turn the dark liquid almost white. 

I opened my eyes and smiled a little, holding onto the image as I nodded to the boy at the counter. Evan gave me a short nod back, clearly displeased with his current situation as he served the woman in front of him.

Even though I was a little early, I still dropped off my things in the back room and slipped on my apron. It was easy to fall into the motions of making drinks and packaging baked goods, supporting Evan while he handled the orders. I enjoyed working in the back, close enough to give the customers a smile with their snacks but far enough to not have to converse with them. 

If only we could justify keeping two people on all the time, I thought, handing the next customer their boxed up bearclaw with a smile and a nod. However much I wished, I knew the owner couldn’t afford it. We weren’t close, but she had been a friend of my mother’s, and I was sure that’s how I still had this job. 

After an hour of handling customers, the torrent of bodies pouring through the doors slowed to a trickle, and Evan grumpily took his leave. I made my short rounds of the tables, ensuring everyone was settled and happy, and then hurried back to the counter. Propped up on a short stool so it was out of sight of anyone coming through the door, my laptop hummed to life.

I quickly lost myself in the world of scholarship applications. I did qualify for more now that I’ve been working longer, and the notepad open on my screen was populating nicely with links and notes on what scholarships I should apply to and what each required. So absorbed I was in my work I almost missed the annoying ring of the bell above the door.

 Thankfully, the awful, high pitched sound was seared into my brain, and before I had even consciously processed it I was standing with a picture-perfect customer service smile on my face. A man and a woman entered the shop, looking around curiously as if they were expecting a surprise.

“Hi!” I greeted, cheerfully. “How can I help you two?”

The man, an imposing, muscular specimen with no hair but eyebrows to make up for it, turned towards me. As soon as his dark eyes fell on me he not-so-subtly elbowed the woman beside him. She was just as imposing, with straight black hair and an “I operate within the law but just barely” vibe. Despite the fact that they both looked like they could snap me like a twig I didn’t sense anything dangerous about them. A second cursory glance revealed they both had weapons on one hip and government-issue IDs on the other, and I nodded to myself. 

Knew it.

The man approached the counter first, with a swagger in his step and a barely-restrained grin on his face. The woman was half a stride behind, looking for all the world like she was physically restraining her eyes from rolling.

“Hey,” the man said, flashing a bright smile. “When did they let such pretty girls work here? Am I really so out of touch with my local cafes?”

I returned the smile. Years of customer-facing jobs had quickly taught me how to weed creeps who flirt with women on the job out from guys joking around. This guy struck me as a jokester, so I was happy to play along.

“Looks like it, maybe you’ll have to come by more often to make sure they keep me around,” I replied. The woman made an exaggerated gag expression. 

“Sorry about him,” she said in a conspiratorial tone. “Doesn’t know when to cool his jets.”

I gave her a reassuring wink. “Not a problem. Can I get you guys something to drink?”

“Sure can,” she replied, relieved at the thought of caffeine. “I’ll take a triple espresso.”

The man beside her turned to her with one bushy eyebrow raised.

“Trying to get off our next case with a heart attack?” he asked. She scoffed.

“I wish. Just trying to stay awake to get through the consultations.”

“And for you, sir?” I set the espresso to brew and returned to the counter.

“Just a dark roast with a splash of milk, please.”

“Coming right up!”

I could feel two pairs of eyes boring into me as I turned to prep the drinks after accepting payment. A surreptitious glance over my shoulder showed the two whispering, but there was no chance I could hear them over the sound of the machines and the everpresent underlying tone of music and conversation that always filled a coffee shop. 

A few moments later I returned to the two. Their eyes were piercing but they smiled their thanks when I handed over the drinks.

“Funny name,” the woman said, raising her cup to show the shop’s logo. “Just naming your coffee shop ‘Coffee Shop’. Must be hell for branding.”

I shrugged with a chuckle, I got comments occasionally about the unusual name.

“Makes it easy to remember at least!” I replied. 

“Guess so,” the woman said, still seemingly perplexed by the name.

“Thanks for the coffee, sweetness,” the man said.

“You’re welcome, have a good afternoon!” I smiled. 

“Thanks,” the woman’s eyes dropped to my nametag. “Katie. Nice meeting you.”

“You too.”

They left, heads bent together as they conferred. I shook my head a little. They were a strange pair, but friendly. Maybe they’d be back one day.

 Spencer

It had been four days since Spencer had gone out for coffee. Yesterday he had tried to go back to his old usual shop, right on the corner, but the music had given him a headache and the coffee was too strong and he hadn’t returned.

Still, he thought about the coffee shop called Coffee Shop every day at 2:15pm. So when Morgan and Prentiss strolled off the elevator at 2:10 holding cups emblazoned with the circular logo he clocked it instantly.

“-coffee’s good too,” Prentiss said, taking a sip from her cup. 

“You’d like anything that had enough caffeine to hype up a horse,” Morgan teased. Prentiss only shrugged with a half smile.

“Perhaps.”

Her eyes flicked to Spencer, who quickly tried to look busy.

“The barista was pretty too,” she said, a little louder than before.

“You can say that again,” Morgan agreed, also glancing at the resident genius. “She was friendly too.”

“Women are always friendly to you.” Prentiss rolled her eyes. 

Spencer’s ears were burning. Was Katie there again? Maybe he should go back, just to see...plus she made damn good coffee. Yeah, the coffee was the reason why he was shoving his things into his bag and pulling a scarf around his neck.

“Where ya going, pretty boy?” Morgan called after him before Spencer even realized he was halfway out of the bullpen. 

“Out for coffee,” came the short reply.

“Oh, we would have got you some,” Prentiss said, raising her cup. “We tried out a new place, it’s pretty good.”

“No, that’s okay,” Spencer said hurriedly. “I like getting my own.” He went to leave, then remembered something and turned back. “Thank you.”

With that he strode purposefully out the glass doors, electing for the stairs instead of the elevator. As the door to the stairwell swung shut, Prentiss and Morgan allowed cheshire-like grins to spread across their faces.

“I’m just glad there’s something that’s getting him out of the office,” Morgan admitted, draining his coffee.

“You don’t think it’s odd that he’s so...I dunno, squirrely about it?” Prentiss asked. 

Morgan shrugged.

“The kid doesn’t have a lot going on in his life. If this is the one thing he decides to keep private for now, I say we let him have it. He needs something.”

“Especially now.”

The two coworkers and friends exchanged a sober look as they sat at their desks. It was a few moments before one broke the silence.

“They’d be cute together,” Prentiss said, not looking up from the file she was perusing. Morgan glanced up with a lopsided grin.

“Yeah, maybe,” he replied, then returned to his own paperwork. “I just hope she’s ready for our boy genius.”

“Ready for him?” Prentiss almost scoffed. “Has he ever been in a relationship? Maybe we need to help him get ready for her.”

“Relationship might be hoping for a bit much, I just hope she doesn’t hurt him.”

“I hope so too, but honestly, I hope he gives her the opportunity.”

Morgan looked up sharply at Prentiss’ words.

“Why would you say that?” he demanded. Prentiss made a soothing hand motion.

“Because it means he’s allowed himself to be vulnerable to someone outside of the team.”

Morgan’s tense shoulders relaxed a little and he nodded slowly.

“That’ll be the day.”

“Mm, you said it.”

The two bent their heads again, diving back into work. A few blocks away, Spencer nervously fiddled with the strap on his messenger bag.

He was stopped just before the coffee shop windows. He wasn’t sure why he was stopped, only that he was anxious for some reason. Taking a deep breath, he stepped forward and glanced to the counter before he could stop himself.

Katie was leaning on the counter, propped up on her elbows. Her long, golden ponytail flopped over her shoulder. Eyes fixed on a small yellow notepad in front of her, she tapped a pencil against her lips, thinking. 

Spencer pushed the shop door open carefully, so as not to send the bell above the door swinging wildly. He had noticed her winces of annoyance when other customers carelessly shoved their way in. 

Still, it made a small noise as he entered, and she looked up quickly. As her grey eyes met his, a smile broke across her face like the sun piercing through cloud cover on a rainy day. Spencer matched her expression instantly. 

“Spencer! You’re back!” she exclaimed happily, setting her pad and pencil aside. Spencer felt his chest tighten a little, he couldn’t remember the last time someone had been so genuinely happy to see him.

“I could say the same for you,” he replied. Katie nodded, twisting a corner of her mouth apologetically. 

“I was sick, sorry. I hope you were able to find a decent caffeine fix while I was gone.”

She had been sick, of course. Spencer scolded himself for not thinking of the obvious answer sooner.

“Let’s just say I’m really glad you’re back,” he replied, and Katie laughed.

“I could say the same for you,” she parrotted his earlier words with a twinkle in her eye.

 Katie

I felt almost giddy when Spencer walked into the shop. Perhaps it was a sign I needed to get out more, but I enjoyed his company and conversation so much that I couldn’t help it. We bantered for a moment. Watching him smile was like a breath of fresh air, not only after the days alone in my apartment, but after a morning of grumpy customers. It didn’t hurt that he had one of the greatest smiles I’ve ever seen. We laughed as I made his coffee, and when I handed it over he took an appreciative sip.

“Scholarships?” he asked, nodded to the notepad on the counter beside me. I quirked an eyebrow, and he blushed a little.

“Sorry, I can read upside down, I kinda saw before I knew what I was looking at.”

I gave him a reassuring smile.

“No apologies necessary,” I replied, pulling the pad towards me. “Scholarships indeed.”

I scanned down the list of names, amounts, and deadlines.

“Where are you hoping to go?” He asked. I sighed.

“Honestly, wherever I can afford.”

“Dream school,” he countered, and I smiled down at the paper.

“George Washington,” I admitted. “I’ll never make it, though.”

Spencer’s eyebrows drew together, wrinkling his forehead.

“Why?”

I shrugged, unable to meet his eyes. 

Of course he can’t understand. He probably had colleges tripping over themselves to give him full-rides.

“I’m a pretty good student but GWU is picky,” I explained. “Plus they’re expensive. No way I’ll get enough of an offer from them to be able to swing it.”

I sighed, encroaching anxiety worrying at the corners of my mind.

“I’ll probably just have to move.”

“Where would you go?” Spencer sounded a bit sad as he asked.

“I’m not sure...New York, probably. Or Virginia. Wherever I can afford.”

“You don’t want to leave.”

It was a statement, not a question, but I nodded.

“I really don’t. I have an apartment in the District, I like working here.”

I let out a big sigh, dropping my head onto my hands where they rested on the counter. 

“I don’t know what I’ll do yet. I don’t want to leave but if I stay I’m stuck. I have to move forward, ya know?”

I looked up to find a surprising amount of sympathy in his amber eyes.

“Keep at it,” he encouraged. “You’ll find a way.”

The smile I gave him was small and weak, but it was the best I could manage with the impossibility of my situation hanging over me.

“Thanks, Spencer.”

I stood, shaking my head at myself.

“Look at me, rambling on. You come in for your coffee and I just talk your ear off about my problems, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” he replied hurriedly. “I’m always the one talking your ear off, I’m happy to listen.”

“Yeah, but I actually like hearing about what you have to say,” I chuckled, slipping the notepad under the counter.

“You do?” He seemed confused by the prospect.

“Yeah,” I looked up to find him frowning at his coffee. “You’re the best part of my day.”

The words left my lips unbidden and a blush quickly spread across my face.

“Sorry, that sounded weird,” I backpedaled. “I just mean-”

“You’re the best part of my day too,” he cut me off. His own cheeks were red and he was looking anywhere but at me. I felt butterflies start to flutter in my stomach.

“I am?”

He nodded, apparently mute in sudden embarrassment. 

I haven’t made a friend in so long, I thought, blinking shyly and dropping my eyes to my fingers nervously twisting around each other. What if I mess this up?

My mother’s gentle voice sounded in my head, quoting Emily Dickenson once more.

“The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience.”

An ecstatic experience might be a little dramatic, mom. But...maybe this could be a good one. Maybe this is the silver lining to losing my diner job.

“Do you want to get coffee after work?” I blurted out. The sudden break in silence startled Spencer and he looked up. 

“Coffee?”

My rush of confidence was quickly fading.

“Yeah, I mean, it doesn’t have to be coffee. And it’s not a date or anything, don’t worry.”

As if someone like him would ever go out with someone like me.

“I just…” I took a deep breath and forged forward. “I get off at eight and I thought it might be nice to talk while sitting down. If you want. We don’t have to.”

I fell quiet, studying his face carefully, but his expression was unreadable. Hopefully I hadn’t just scared him off…

“Sure, yeah,” he said finally.

I let out the breath I hadn’t known I was holding and smiled.

“Cool! So...if you want to stop by at eight, I know a nice tea shop nearby that does good coffee too, and they’re open late.”

He seemed to be warming to the idea, nodding as I spoke.

“Alright, eight it is.”

I tried not to smile too wide.

Damn, act like you’ve been there, Katie, I scolded myself. Making a new friend is something people do every day.

Spencer glanced at his watch.

“I should be getting back,” he said, regret tinging his tone. 

“Oh, yeah, no worries,” I replied. “I’ll see you later, then.”

“See you later,” he repeated, raising a hand in farewell and slipping out the door. I looked at the clock above the door as it closed behind him.

2:30. It’s going to be a long shift.

[jasontoddiefor]

Title: When in Gotham, do as Batman does

Summary: Desmond Miles, the mentor of Gotham, and Batman have a serious discussion. (Meanwhile, Robin shows the little Novice accompanying their local Assassin how to do the coolest flips.)

AN: AssCreed/Batman Crossover for the 2nd day of AssCreed Week - Assassin Brotherhood.

Desmond loved Gotham. It was like Florence or Venice or Rome, except better because it was his city. You could tell that it had been built on the bodies of Templars and Assassins alike, particularly the Assassin influence was hard to miss if you had their training. Every corner was easy to disappear into, the buildings were high and the houses crammed into each other to create one fast-paced track for rooftop chasers. Not to mention the abandoned underground railroad tracks or the catacombs sleeping even deeper below. Gotham was built for its shadowy protectors and took good care to hide them all away.

Shaun and Becca had declared him officially mad for settling in this city. He could have gone everywhere in the world. Assassins as skilled as Desmond were hard to come by and currently needed all around the globe.

But Desmond had died for their cause once already (and then been fished out of terror-filled green pits of screaming nails on blackboards) and so they had allowed him to pick.

And Desmond had chosen Gotham.

Or maybe the city had chosen him.

People didn’t really move to Gotham, Desmond had noticed. Nor did they ever leave despite having the funds or the motivation. They cursed and screeched and begged, but they never went further than a vacation away.

And some people didn’t leave at all.

It was a moderately warm September night still. They had been blessed with a warm summer, and its remnants were still chasing through the winds, rolling in-between the skyscrapers. Gotham’s chaos had been calm lately. It was only a question of time until the first Rogue broke out of Arkham again, but right now everything was still. It was one of those nights in which they actually had time to look out for the candles and the flashlights asking for their help. Desmond had sent most of his recruits out for training, errands and information gathering. Maybe also a little blackmail depending on how they brave they got tonight. Instead of supervising from their headquarters, Desmond had chosen to take their youngest recruit out. Though Jason, by all means, wasn’t really a recruit as much as he was a kid that had realized the city’s Thief guild might support him on the streets, but the Brotherhood could get him away from them.

Or as away from them as Jason wanted to be.

He’d seen Desmond teach the Novices how to do a Leap of Faith and that was it. He hadn’t stopped pestering Desmond about teaching him, even at the bar where minors definitely weren’t allowed in, until Desmond had agreed. Jason wouldn’t stop arguing that Robin couldn’t have been much older than Jason either when he had started tailing the Bat. However, Jason also didn’t know that Robin had been trained to be an acrobat (and unknowingly an assassin) from birth.

Desmond knew because he had made it his business to know what was going on in his city.

The identities of its brightest protectors were simply a part of that. Batman had been here before Desmond, had bled for this city. Sure, Desmond could argue he had died for the whole world, but at sixteen he had run away from it all, unlike Bruce Wayne, who had already known his destiny then.

This was also the reason why Desmond’s Brotherhood didn’t kill. He respected Batman’s code as the superior rule. Even law enforcement worked with him while they certainly didn’t know about the Brotherhood.

(Well, they did to an extent. You couldn’t miss the spray-painted As that had shown up all over the city, but the police thought those belonged to a random tagger or, at worst, a gang.)

It was another matter that had his out of town Assassin contacts roll their eyes and bite their cheeks at. Desmond had no problems with assassinations. He was freakishly alright with them so much that he wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out the Isu had engineered him that way.

However, their Brotherhood’s no-kill rule was the only reason the Bat tolerated their presence. Maybe the fact that they had quietly gotten rid of the Court of Owls had contributed as well. It wasn’t murder if you cryogenically froze them to be picked up by the Justice League later on.

The Gotham Brotherhood didn’t kill. It made them child-friendly enough that Desmond had given in to Jason’s demands and let the eleven-year-old become his protégé.

And so here they were, standing on a rooftop and waiting for the Bat to drop in.

“How much longer do we gotta wait?” Jason asked.

After tonight, Desmond would work on the boy’s situational awareness. He remembered a few games Ezio used to play with his recruits and their children to teach them how to observe. They also had the neat side-effect of detecting whether someone was predisposed for eagle vision. Desmond thought he had seen Jason’s eyes flash gold once or twice, the speed at which he managed to track down people certainly spoke for it, but he couldn’t be sure.

He knew Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson both had the gift though, and that Wayne was aware of it. You didn’t train with an old splinter group of the Brotherhood for years to be ignorant of eagle vision.

“Mask on, kiddo?” Desmond asked instead, studying the shadows to their right that had become just a little too dense.

He had felt ridiculous the first time he had put on a mask, he didn’t need one to obscure his face, but masks made people think of vigilantes, and it was better to be mistaken for those (and honestly in these times the border between Assassin and Vigilante had become thin) than be known as the Brotherhood. Gotham was mostly Templar free and Desmond would like to keep to this way. He didn’t need their attention, not when his people weren’t strong enough yet. Nowadays, Desmond was used to the weight of the mask covering his eyes. He had grown fond of the red and gold Venetian Rebecca had bought him as a joke.

“Never took it off.”

Desmond smiled. “Good.”

Then he turned back to the shadows. “Hello, Batman. Robin.”

Behind him he could feel Jason tense, looking around to spot the vigilantes Desmond had already identified.

“Mentor,” Batman greeted him and finally stepped forward, Robin following him easily, being just a step behind.

“Oooh, who is that?” The Boy Wonder asked, mustering Jason.

“My protégé. Don’t take him too far, please, he’s untrained still.”

“What do you mean ‘don’t take him too far’?” Jason asked, but Robin had already crossed the distance eagerly.

Desmond wasn’t sure whether Batman took Robin along to these meetings precisely to have him distract the companion Desmond had chosen to take with him or if Robin really was just that sociable. The Bat’s intentions were hard enough to read on the really good days and Desmond had better things to do than waste hours on that particular headache.

Within seconds Robin was talking with Jason, contributing most of the conversation, while Jason nodded at the right moments, his eyes never entirely leaving Desmond.

“He’s young.”

Batman too was observing the boys’ interaction. He had his arms crossed over his chest, suggesting a relaxed posture, but his shoulders were tensed.

“I have questions about Abstergo, Desmond Miles. And about those you call Isu.”

Desmond sighed. He had wondered how long it would take Batman to actually figure out his identity. They had pretty much erased Desmond Miles, or any other alias he had used before Abstergo had captured him, from history. By all means, Desmond was a ghost. But apparently, even death couldn’t keep the world’s greatest detective away.

“Alright, Mr. Wayne,” Desmond replied. “But does that mean I can take a look at the Piece of Eden you keep at your manor in turn? I don’t want to criticize, but these things really shouldn’t be handled by someone without experience.”

Batman fell silent. On the rooftop next to them, Jason was shouting in joy while Robin performed his quadruple flip for him. He should watch that jump. It was common knowledge, at least for those interested in acrobatics, that not many people could perform it – Gotham’s resident prince Dick Grayson being by far the youngest person. It was even on his Wikipedia page.

“And you have that experience?”

Desmond tugged at his hoodie’s right sleeve, revealing his black glove first, and then his burned arm beneath. The golden circuitry was shining brightly in the dark. Once he stopped using eagle vision, it would return to a muted yellow you could mistake for tattoo ink.

“You’re standing in front of the world’s expert on these cursed artifacts.”

His smile was weary, but there was no point in lying. Ever since his death, Desmond had been able to feel these remains of Eden if he got close enough to them. They didn’t make him uncomfortable, but he could almost tell what each piece had been crafted for, and the thought of letting them lie around left to their own devices was fear-inspiring.

“We have much to discuss. I’ll contact you. Robin.”

Across, Robin perked up and moved from his handstand into a bridge and then into a stand. Batman waited just long enough for Robin to plunge into a print and jump over the gaps between the rooftops before he too leaped away into the alley on their right.

Jason wasn’t far behind Robin, crossing the space between houses without hesitating. Whatever Robin had demonstrated or told him, its effects were already showing.

“You done already?” Jason asked.

“Mhm. Why are you asking?”

Jason clicked his tongue and shot Desmond an annoyed look. “Nothin’s true. I should ask questions.”

“I taught you that sentence,” Desmond replied and began to walk into the direction of tonight’s second destination. He’d drop Jason back home on the way. Sure, the kid had seen much already, experienced too much for his age, but Desmond wasn’t going to take a ten-year-old to the Foxglove. Not even for information gathering. “And I’m sure it definitely had nothing to do with Robin.”

“Oh, c’ mon, D. It’s Robin. He’s the coolest. So you gotta tell me what you talked about ’cause he was gonna teach me how to do the neat flip.”

“I’m sure you’ll get another chance to learn from him. Batman just asked for some credentials.”

“Credentials? That can’t be everythin’. Come oooon, tell me. Tell me, tell me, please. You know I can do this all night and day.”

Desmond didn’t doubt him, he knew better. Jason’s presence at his side was proof of that.

“I know. You showed me that you had endurance and now you’ll learn patience.”

“What? You can’t be serious! Des- hey!”

Desmond chose that moment to jump from the balcony into the dumpster beneath. The smell of these containers really made him miss the haystacks of his ancestors.

“Patience, Novice,” Desmond repeated.

Batman would tell him soon enough when he wanted to meet up. You couldn’t shake off Batman once you had his attention.

(And true enough, he got an invitation to Wayne manor a week later. He didn’t dwell on the fact that Batman knew where he lived. It was only fair.)

[soveryanon]

Aaand reviewing time for MAG142.

- I have no idea whether it was a conscious decision or a recording accident, but Jonny’s voice, when reading the episode title… was different – less filtered, closer, with more “grain”? And it was telling you, right away, that something would be off and different.

- VA E. Lockley was… incredible and yeah, the woman’s delivery (the distress, the stuttering, the messiness, the slightly rambly bits)… made her feel even more present and “close” than Helen (in MAG047) for me. Character-with-her-own-situation, who got messed up, who is in distress, who is not fine and is trying not to crumble. There were even a few parallel with her experience (after the Buried encounter) and Jon’s, post-Prentiss, that made her even more heartbreaking: like him, she did physio (MAG050, Tim: “Well, there was a police woman asking after you. You know, the one who came to look into Gertrude. […] Uh… yesterday. You were at physical therapy.”); unlike him, she went to therapy (MAG058, Martin: “Look, look, you just got to let me work through this. Alright? I suggested therapy, but he just says no, so–”) and… like she said, “did everything [she] was supposed to do”:

(MAG142) WOMAN: I had pretty bad, uh, nightmares, claustrophobia, I mean… Obviously, right? But, uh, but–but I did my physio, and, you know, talked wi–with the counsellor they gave me? Look, I did everything I was supposed to, and–and yeah, I… I guess I was fine.

… and everything got utterly ruined because of what Jon did to her, while she doesn’t even have enough knowledge to blame him. But we… we know. It was very important to hear her voice indeed? And Martin handled her with proper care – not doubting for one instant that she was telling the truth, leaving her space to tell her story, validating her, even though the story wasn’t what he wanted to hear… or what we wanted to hear, either. (And because of the content of the story: no, there is no way she could have been written as lying or putting things out of proportions – she even pointed out how the police would treat her, it would be absolutely insensitive to write someone filing a harassment complaint as lying or misinterpreting things. So, everything she told really happened to her in the TMA-verse, even though it’s not a pleasant truth.)

- … yeah, so we have Jon going after “stories”: they’re not “statements” anymore, he didn’t use his markers (“Statement begins/Statement ends”) with Floyd and the woman didn’t make any mention of them either, nor did he give the date and the person doing the recording – we only had an indication about the date thanks to the (meta) episode case. It’s not about archiving, it’s about… consumption. And he’s not receiving the stories either: he’s extorting them, forcing people, instead of them coming to him (as statement-givers coming to the Institute). It’s even more symbolically significant that Daisy went to talk to Martin right after the woman’s departure since… so far, Daisy had been the only person we knew for sure had been forced to give her statement, back in MAG061, as she pointed out to Basira later:

(MAG061) ARCHIVIST: Whatever you like! Fourteen years, you must have seen a number of paranormal things. DAISY: And you want me to tell you about them? ARCHIVIST: I–I… DAISY: Okay. ARCHIVIST: What? DAISY: Okay! I’ll give you a statement, about how I got my first section 31. You look surprised. ARCHIVIST: I mean, I was largely asking as a formality. Basira didn’t give the impression you were the… sharing sort. DAISY: Maybe you caught me in a good mood. […] ARCHIVIST: Right! Thank you! Are you quite alright? DAISY: No. I never told that story to anyone except my old Sergeant. ARCHIVIST: I’m not sure I, uh… DAISY: I should go.

(MAG091) BASIRA: Just let him go. DAISY: You don’t know what he is. You don’t know what it’s like to have your secrets pulled out like teeth, just because he asked?

It had been… softer and subtler, when he had done that – it was striking that Daisy didn’t want to talk, until Jon began to probe and she began to accept (Jon himself had been surprised by the change); the compulsion had only been confirmed by her harsh departure and the way she recalled the events. Meanwhile, the woman, in MAG142, was absolutely preyed upon, cornered, violated, and her voice actor did a fantastic job? But oh Lord, was it so, so hard to listen to, even without factoring in that it was Jon doing that to her. I think we’d never had something this violent and desperate…?

Meanwhile, from Jon’s portrayal in MAG142 (two weeks ago) and what we saw in MAG141, he seems to be getting more… frantic? He waited for a while before interacting with the woman, but he almost jumped on Floyd, although he had just been told they would still be sailing for two days (so they would be stuck on the same boat for a while). And it does… kind of fit with something we know about Jon:

(MAG092) ARCHIVIST: And you can’t just give me all of the statements? ELIAS: Jon, even when you had them all at your disposal, you barely got through one statement a week. Why do you think that is? It takes its toll on you. And I know you’ve had problems with moderation.

… that little problem about “moderation”. (Which was probably tying in with the fact that he used to smoke before the Institute, and has been back to smoking at least by the end of season 2, when he left Leitner to have a cigarette – and he still had cigarettes on him when Daisy went through his stuff in MAG091 and with Gerry in MAG111. Not to mention the whole Web lighter affair, whatever it’s actually doing to him.) It’s also… kinda… relevant… that The Woman in MAG142 described him as being fed through her reopened trauma:

(MAG142) WOMAN: His eyes, like… his eyes, like, we–were… drinking in every fragment of my misery. I can’t… It… [PAUSE] And then it was over. And he looked… he looked at me like he’d just eaten… like, a perfectly cooked steak.

Because Elias had narrated Beholding’s influence on “The Archivist” as creating hunger, precisely:

(MAG120) ELIAS: And at last, the Archivist looks up. At last, he looks into The Eye that sees all, and knows all, and clutches at the secret terrors of your heart. The Ceaseless Watcher of all that is, and all that was; the voracious, infinite hunger that tears at his soul, invoking him to discover, to observe, to experience all and everything and forever.

Fuck you, Beholding.

… and I’ll allow myself One Joke about the whole ordeal, because:

(MAG115) ARCHIVIST: [DEEP SIGH] I suppose in some ways it’s strange I’m not a vegetarian yet, what with everything I know. But… I rather think someone in my position has to take their small pleasures where they can, and if it occasionally delights some grotesque meat-god, well… c’est la vie.

You REALLY should have tried to go vegetarian back then, Jon :/

- … Which makes it a bit curious that he… was described as “tired”, then?

(MAG142) MARTIN: … Ah, uh, alright. Hum… Did he… [SIGH] … Did he look like he hadn’t slept in like– WOMAN: Mm–mm. MARTIN: –a week? WOMAN: Yep, uh… MARTIN: … Right…

Like, obviously, it was… in a dark humour way, hilarious that Martin was able to guess it was Jon with just “someone from your Institute stalking me” and that his way of describing Jon was to point out the lack of sleep – Jon Is A Perpetual Tired Man and this is the man Martin has a crush on. Confirmation that it’s not about physical appearances (Canonically mlm and hot Tim was RIGHT THERE, Martin, and you went for “that”, and we still don’t know why or when it began, but there’s still so much room to shame your tastes.)

But you would think that… if Jon had been going around pulling statements out of (unwilling) people, he would be/look… rested? Well? So: was she the first one? Was Jon trying to avoid his dreams, until he snapped? Is this a matter of “starving” and only going for it when he was too hungry…?

- ;; Jon looked… so one-dimensional in that state? And as Martin said amongst his hypotheses, all “instinct”. Which makes me think about three things, and they’re not happy:

* Mike smelling a prey, actually?

(MAG075, Stephen Walker) “It was as Grant was making his gradual ascent that I saw the man with the scar. He was stood there, just across the street, watching us. […] His pale eyes were entirely focused on Grant making his excruciating way up the ladder. If he noticed me watching him, he gave no sign of it.” (MAG091) MIKE: A… uh, a Paris skyscraper, was it you said? I honestly, I, I can’t say I recall it in detail, but that does… sounds about right. Sometimes it’s hard to keep track.

(DO YOU KEEP TRACK, JON.)

* The whole thing about the Creature Under Alexandria reaching for Sergeant Walter Heller (especially since… Heller might have had a Spooky encounter before meeting it? So was it attracted to that story?) and HUM…

(MAG092) ARCHIVIST: So it’s… it’s back to breadcrumbs, and statements, and risking my life talking to things that barely remember how to be human anymore? […] Am I… Elias, am I still human? ELIAS: Jon, what does human even mean? I mean, really? You still bleed, you can still die. And your will is still your own, mostly. That’s more than can be said for a lot of the “real’ humans out there. … You’re worried about ending up like that thing, lurking in the dirt under the streets of Alexandria? Don’t be. Just do what you need to, and you’ll be fine. Understood?

Elias, why are you so full of lies. (Though it’s possible that, indeed, Jon didn’t do “what he needs to”, and that he’s been… doing extra-work/is out of control. But MMMM. MMMMM.)

* *CRIES IN TIM*

(MAG114) TIM: So, why don’t you “Archivist” me, then? Just pull it straight out. ARCHIVIST: Because I don’t want to! I am not your enemy, Tim. TIM: [DISMISSIVELY] Like that matters! These things aren’t human. It’s… instinct. You can’t not. ARCHIVIST: [SOFTLY] I’m still me, Tim. [TIM HUFFS] I’m still… me. TIM: [EXHALES DEEPLY] … You know what? You’re actually right.

LIKE WOW??? RUDE??? TIM STOKER DIDN’T GO OUT WITH A BANG FOR THIS??? (It’s… super-upsetting, to me, that Jon Is Currently what Tim had accused him of being/turning into back at the time ORZ ORZ And if we get Jon back, and/or if he’s confronted about it, I wonder if… the fact that he would be disappointing Tim would be a point to be made.)

- So, turns out that MAG141 indeed wasn’t a first try, and there is the obvious question of… how long Jon has been extorting live-statements here and there, since the fact that we didn’t hear any recording of the woman beforehand means that we haven’t been hearing Everything of Jon’s spook-related activities before MAG141. Possibilities regarding the turning point:

* Since Jon woke up and was released from the hospital (after MAG122).

* Since… after the coffin? Given Elias’s comment in MAG135 (“Consider it a test – things are… coming, things that will need Jon to be far stronger and more willing to use his connection to our patron. His performance during The Unknowing was… disappointing. I needed a way to force him to harness his ability more acutely than he had before. The coffin was a useful tool; Daisy an adequate bait.”), I don’t really feel like it could have been a thing before – I mean, the way Jon behaved in MAG141 and was described in MAG142 screamed “very willing to use his connection to their patron”… And Jon had mentioned a few things after the coffin:

(MAG135) ARCHIVIST: I don’t… like interacting with the rest of the Institute these days. The way they look at me, I– … I don’t know. I don’t know what they’ve heard, what the rumours going around are, but… they have definitely heard something…! [SIGH] And they can’t wait until they don’t have to talk to me anymore. Can’t honestly say I blame them, none of this is easy. Everyone’s just trying to get through as best they can. Living one day at a time. [SIGH] But I can’t afford to be just living one day at a time, I need… a plan. But I don’t even know what I’m trying to achieve… And no one… no one wants to tell me.

(MAG137) ARCHIVIST: Ever since I crawled out of that damn coffin, I feel like I’ve been… adrift. Filling in blanks and diving into History, but only…! [EXASPERATED SIGH] The breadcrumbs I’m finding are… stale. Old. … What the hell is The Watcher’s Crown? […] I feel like I’m on a deadline, like I’m running out of time somehow – and I don’t even know where to go! What to look for, o–or… [EXHALE] Just casting around blindly for more clues to just… drop into my lap. Everyone else is… running towards something, or running away, and I… [SIGH] I don’t know what I’m doing. [PAUSE] [SIGH] I’m just tired. Think I might go lie down for a while. Get a cup of tea. [HUFF]

(Though, I feel like this option is reaching and stretching… a lot: because DUH, the staff would have had a lot of reasons to be wary of Jon or of the Archives in general without even factoring in the possibility of rumours that Jon had been mentally manhandling people (he… was losing it a bit already in season 2? He ran away and got accused of murder for two months before coming back? He spent six months in a coma after a wax museum exploded? Tim was ranting to everyone about being bound to the Archives, and people thought it was mostly depression, but then he died in said explosion?); and DUH, Jon would feel aimless after the coffin, when his return to the Institute had been a succession of settling back in, trying to get updated on the assistants’ current state, saving Melanie from the bullet, almost immediately focusing on the Rescue Daisy mini-arc from episode 128 to 132, leading to her coming back and… then nothing else, no Main Goal anymore, and just time passing.)

The biggest clue that someone could have been happening behind the scene after the coffin is Jon’s intake of statements: there were 10 between MAG122 (February 15th?, Jon waking up) and MAG132 (March 24th, inside of the coffin), including one extracted statement (Breekon’s, MAG128), one tape from Gertrude (with Lucia, MAG130), one live-statement (Jared’s, MAG131) and one recording from Jon (rescuing Daisy, MAG132), so 9 “active” pieces of content in six weeks if you exclude Gertrude’s… and then, only six until the end of May (MAG140), including one recording from Gertrude (MAG137), so five “active” pieces of content in two months if you exclude hers (+ 2 statements read by Martin, if assistants count – they seemed to, back in season 3, since Elias was pushing them to regularly read statements because Jon was “too inconsistent” about it).

* Since after MAG139, because Jon tried to sneak a peek at Peter’s plans and it backfired. It could have the added tragic bits that… Jon had been wary of his Inner Door, told Basira that opening it would mean drowning; and he eventually purposefully tried very hard to Know about something, deliberately… because he was too worried for Martin.

* Since after MAG140 and Basira told him about the plan to Ny-Ålesund.

MAG142 gives more credentials to a change having happened around MAG139/MAG140 on account of the given timeline:

(MAG140) BASIRA: Summer solstice is the 21st of June. So we leave in a fortnight. ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] … Right. BASIRA: And should arrive about a week before.

(MAG142) WOMAN: Look, life went back to… normal, I… I was fine. Until… [CHOKING] about two weeks ago. MARTIN: And that was when you met J– … Er, one of our employees. WOMAN: … That’s when he showed up.

Which means the succession of events was likely:

MAG139: somewhere at the end of May => MAG140: one day after MAG139 (Jon referred to it as “yesterday”) => events described in MAG142 => Jon&Basira departing => MAG141 (June 11th) => MAG142 (June 12th).

If Jon had been going around taking statements for a long while, I think the woman’s story would have been dated from a few more weeks, or months prior, just to get that point across? Though it’s also possible that, like MAG141, the date is a red herring to keep us into a false sense of (relative) security still: Floyd’s story is mysterious enough that it might contain something that could be used against The Dark, so there is still the possibility that Jon extorted it for that reason… but MAG142 was without hesitation a Buried one, so not actual data, so it has nothing to do with actual information but just about feeding, and we’re slowly running out of rational explanations which could motivate Jon’s sudden harshness (“it’s because it was important information, and just one time, to someone mostly innocent but involved in fishy business with a reccurring character” => “there was no relevant information to the current case, and Jon had done this to people before, and he targeted absolutely innocent people”) so… could be that It All Began just before the trip, or could be that we will discover that it had been going on for longer than that.

- However long Jon has been doing that… I don’t think that the punchline was that he had been utterly lying on tape throughout all of season 4? Honestly, I… wouldn’t find this interesting – I’m too used to twists being that your (unreliable) narrator was actually Evil/Really Bad all along and, precisely, the series had taken a more interesting approach with this in season 1 (with the fact that Jon appeared as pompous and elitist and sceptic and dry… and, okay, was a bit of that, but also scared and trying to hide it), so it would feel a bit of a let-down if that was the case in the end? And we’ve had a few occurrences of Jon not immediately being aware that he was recorded (he hadn’t spotted the tape recorder at first in MAG122 and MAG123, the tape recorder was in Martin’s room in MAG129 when Jon entered), and he acted exactly the same as when he was in control of the recording. When he accidentally compelled Melanie in MAG136, he immediately apologised (which means he knew he had wronged her, which means he still had a spontaneous sense of morals, or at least, of understanding when he was crossing a line and doing something harmful and unwelcome).

One thing that might be true, however: if season 1 showed us one thing, it’s also… that through his recordings, Jon can present the world how he wishes it were. So, if he’s been… extorting and assaulting people for their stories all along, I really don’t think he lied and feigned the empathy for the victims, nor the fact that he was feeling doubts and concern, but more like, that he wished it were as simple as this…? Though it would also come across as a very… unsavoury way to Appeal For His Life – there is a big distinction about sighing about his inhumanity because he’s feeling aimless and unsure of what he’s supposed to do, and doing it while aware that he’d be causing harm here and there.

And the thing with MAG141 and MAG142 is that it’s supposed to feel like a shock; there was no progression(/degression) in Jon’s speeches during the season, no growing apathy towards victims. He kept expressing sadness and uneasiness! Before trying to take a look at Peter’s plan, he had launched into a rant about having “feelings” and “doubts”! It’s not even that he was feeling more and more isolated – since he got Daisy back, they’ve been bonding, Jon confessed to liking her (… and even went to such extremes as listening to The Archers with her). And suddenly, we’re faced with Jon doing… a complete face-heel turn: there is nothing comparable, nothing… progressive between the way he “extracted” Breekon’s statement in MAG128 (partially in defense, because Breekon was on the verge of attacking Basira) and received Jared’s in MAG131 (something that Jared forced on him: Jon had just been told that someone had commanded the attack over the Institute, and Jared went for that form and made it a deal against Jon’s rib), and going… after innocents, as consumption, as food, because statements are a “meal” and he doesn’t care much if that means wrecking people forever. The woman from MAG142 was the most innocent you could ever get: she didn’t know about the Magnus Institute, didn’t want to tell what had happened to her, didn’t even blame Jon for the after-effects and her reopened wounds (“Look. I know that’s not… [CHUCKLE] That is my brain. I’m not blaming him for, for being in my dreams. You know, I guess I can’t! [SNIFF] That’s absurd, right? It’s not… [PAUSE] But I feel like I’m seeing him when I’m awake, as well?” … although we know that it was directly his fault). She didn’t even express contempt or disrespect at Martin; she was calm, her story didn’t involve any shady business. She had her initial trauma and, as she said, she worked and fought by herself to get well (“But, uh, but–but I did my physio, and, you know, talked wi–with the counsellor they gave me? Look, I did everything I was supposed to, and–and yeah, I… I guess I was fine.”) before Jon came in and ruined her life – she can’t work anymore, her whole ability to function has been impacted, she’s in clear distress. What Jon did to her was… absolutely unwarranted and gratuitous. And… honestly, except for willingly launching The Watcher’s Crown, I have trouble picturing what he could possibly do that would be worse than this?

Season 4, at least on tape, hasn’t been Jon’s slow descent into monsterhood; it has been a constant string of Jon expressing doubts, sadness for victims, and trying to regain contact with the assistants. So what happened, for him to suddenly dive in and become so instinctive…? Or if it had always been there, out of record, what was going through Jon’s head…? (What was going though Jon’s head, when he was watching the woman as she was waiting for her date…? Because she was alone, at first, and yet, he didn’t immediately came for her…)

Basically: we’re missing pieces, and that’s the point, but uuuuuh…

- Anyway, meanwhile, I’m guessing that Elias got put into solitary confinement because the amount of [PLEASURED EXHALATION] he must have breathed out in these past two weeks made the guards AND the other inmates too uncomfortable.

- Aaaand the trend of people who had a Beholding-related encounter and are especially uneasy at the Institute keeps going:

(MAG053) GERTRUDE: One other thing. That feeling of being watched… have you ever had it since? WALTER: Well, I wasn’t sure whether to say anything, but… yes, I have, just now. That… funny turn I took on the way down the stairs, I felt it again. All those eyes, watching me.

(MAG060, Rosa Meyer) “Not that I could rest anyway. Those eyes still haunt my dreams, and follow me through the waking world. Even here. Especially… here.”

(MAG142) WOMAN: But I feel like I’m seeing him when I’m awake, as well? I’ve been… I’ve been having a lot of problems, since he talked to me, well, since I talked to him. […] Every time I do, every time I get that… panic just rising up my throat… I see him. He’s there. Not when I look properly. But just at the edge. The corner of my eye. And he’s gone. […] I, I… I can’t… this place… I… I can’t be here. I have to… [OPENING DOOR] MARTIN: Uh, no– WOMAN: Bye!

Which. Is still a possible explanation as to why there are so few Beholding statements outside of the letters addressed to Jonah: because people have to be exceptionally tough to not feel crushed and even more pressured inside of the Institute, if they’ve already been marked/offered to Beholding.

- I… hadn’t really given much thought about it, but actually, the distinction between feeding/being fed from, for the Archivist, might be through respectively live and written statements? Back in season 3, Elias had highlighted to Jon that they were taxing on him, and Jon had mentioned to Georgie that he was experiencing the fears himself, when reading them:

(MAG089) JUDE: It’s like you’re not even listening. You have your god, as I have mine. Feed it, fearlessly and without hesitation, or it will feed on you. ARCHIVIST: But I don’t… I don’t… I mean, I mean, what do I feed it? JUDE: I don’t know? You’re the one it picked. Not a great choice, if you ask me.

(MAG091) MIKE: That’s… that’s all, I think. Since then I’ve embraced my new life; gladly fed that which feeds me.

(MAG092) ARCHIVIST: And you can’t just give me all of the statements? ELIAS: Jon, even when you had them all at your disposal, you barely got through one statement a week. Why do you think that is? It takes its toll on you. And I know you’ve had problems with moderation.

(MAG093) ARCHIVIST: You’ve seen monsters? GEORGIE: Not the time, Jon. ARCHIVIST: Right, it’s… it’s just I think I’m turning into one. GEORGIE: Really? That’s… not great. ARCHIVIST: Yeah. Ever since I took this job, I’ve felt a compulsion to read out some of the statements. The ones that really touched the supernatural. And when I do… I… I feel them. I feel their confusion and fear. I tried to write it off, but…

Though Jon doubled-over at the end of MAG094, after the Hellish Five Days covering MAG089 (Jude’s live), MAG091 (Mike’s live), MAG092 (Elias showdown), MAG093 (written statement), MAG094 (Georgie’s live). And a written statement was enough to perk him up in MAG107. But I wonder if, now that Jon has… “become something else”, the live-statements aren’t precisely feeding him, and more tempting, while the written ones make the Beholding feed from him…? The woman in MAG142 was insistent over the fact that Jon looked… replenished, after he was done with her, and Jon told Basira in MAG141 that Floyd’s was helping him to go “full power”, so it definitely looks like it’s the actual way to feed for an Archivist… while it used to be pretty neutral, effects-wise, before his coma?

(And even in season 4, Jon didn’t sound that much lively in MAG131, after taking Jared’s, so…? Was that because Jared is a spook, and it’s less nourishing? Or is it because a new dependency/feeding system has grown alongside Jon’s powers, developing through the ordeals – after the coffin in MAG132, and/or after he tried to take a look at The Lonely in MAG139?)

- Amongst things that have apparently changed, relatedly to Jon’s powers… the effects of taking live-statements did: Daisy and Basira only mentioned dreams, but the woman in MAG142 made it clear that it wasn’t just that. It sounds like, additionally to the dreams, Jon re-traumatised her (since she has been plagued with panic attacks every time she’s triggered, although she used to be able to handle it), which makes her relive the fear of The Buried… with additional Feeling Of Being Watched. So, feeding both The Buried and Beholding? (How come only The Lonely is financing the Institute and getting all chummy with them, then, if Beholding has the potential to give back to the other Fears the snacks that had managed to get away?)

So why did the live-statements Jon extorted have different effects than usual? Multiple parameters have changed since the ones from the first three seasons. Is it because he’s more The Archivist now, after having chosen, and this is what true full Archivists do to people? Is it because The Watcher’s Crown is coming closer and Beholding is reaching its peak power? I’m reminded of Smirke’s letter (MAG138), when The Eye was precisely haunting both his dreams and his daily world, and that’s how Smirke came to the conclusion that Jonah was on the verge of doing something regrettable. Other option: … Assuming there wasn’t any tape recorder indeed: is it because the statement hadn’t been recorded, back then, and the recorders alleviate the Beholding effect…? (=> I’m still amongst the people considering hard that the tape recorders are actually Web, so, it could be a matter of hijacking Beholding’s dominion a bit…?)

- ;; Whether The Watcher’s Crown attempt is planned for the end of season 4 or for later into season 5… you can feel, meta-wise, that Something Beholding is coming closer and closer. There had been very few statements about The Eye throughout the entire series so far (full-on Eye: MAG023, MAG53, MAG060, MAG120) and… we’re already at three new ones in season 4 – MAG127, MAG138, MAG142.

- One of the themes of the episode seems to be about the temptation of the Dread Powers: Lonely for Martin, Beholding for Jon, Hunt for Daisy.

(MAG142) MARTIN: Th–the worst part is I don’t even want to talk to him about it. I’m just… [SIGH] I suppose I’m just getting comfortable with the distance. [SIGH] Cut off. [DRY CHUCKLE] “Lonely”. [INHALE] Mind you, Peter’s not wrong. It really is easier than actually just trying to communicate with people. […] They told you about Elias, right? DAISY: Yeah…. Basira said. Don’t like him being alive. Trying not to think about it too much. Don’t want to get too angry. Start to… hear the… blood. […] MARTIN: I mean… I guess. It still sounds really dangerous. DAISY: Yeaaah. Wanted to go with them, protect them, but… [PAUSE] Life’s always more complicated than that, isn’t it? MARTIN: Not really.

Daisy got enough distance, in the coffin, to delimitate herself separately from The Hunt, which had shaped her life until now – it’s a looming threat, and keeping away from it means accepting sacrifices, in the form of not being there for the people she cares about (now, “Basira and Jon”: not Basira anymore):

(MAG132) DAISY: I’m sc–scared, but… Mm–mm… But I… I feel more, feel more m–me than I have for years. Maybe all my life… The, The Hunt was me, b–but I don’t, I don’t think I liked it. I think it just made me… need… it…  I hurt… a l–lot of people… and some who… who I shouldn’t have. Did you ever hear the, the story Elias told me? About what I did. How I am… He, he didn’t get a detail wrong. The Hunt… Hunger was in me all my life. Telling me who to chase, how to hurt them. I never needed to think… who I was outside of that. But down here, where I… I can’t hear the… blood anymore, I d–, I don’t… I don’t know who I am without, without the chase… I just know… that I… I don’t like who I was back outside. I don’t want to be her again. I want… to be… better…

(MAG133) ARCHIVIST: [EXHALES] She is trying to keep a clear head. Stay away from The Hunt as much as possible. You valued her purpose. Her resolve. The sort of things–

(MAG140) ARCHIVIST: Is Daisy coming? BASIRA: … No. ARCHIVIST: … Oh. I, I–I just thought– BASIRA: We’ve talked about it. If The Hunt takes her again… we don’t know if she’s coming back. And neither of us want that. ARCHIVIST: … No, o–of–of course.

As it was presented with the last two episodes, Jon crashed and burned himself through Beholding; whatever he is right now, however he thinks, he’s deep in – and though he may (or may not) have been initially trying to use his powers for good, or with a goal in mind… it’s now about consuming, about feeding, about indulging, whether he had realised it or not. Meanwhile, Martin is seeing appeal in the Lonely – Peter’s magic/management is doing its work (and Gerry had warned us that the Lukases were good at grooming their own). Respectively reformed, currently into it, and tempted to give in, because the powers offer something they crave: being a fighter and having the power to protect or to strike at those who offended her for Daisy, getting information, knowledge and obtaining new pieces to complete the ongoing puzzles for Jon, being at peace of mind and not heartbroken anymore for Martin.

(- And Martin has been closing himself off without… realising to which extent, apparently:

(MAG142) DAISY: Yeah. Just a… a bit empty around here. You know? MARTIN: Not really. DAISY: Melanie’s out, and… [EXHALE] Jon and Basira’re still off. Bit worried. But they can take care of themselves, you know? MARTIN: Again, not really. [SHORT HUMOURLESS LAUGHTER] No one talks to me anymore. […] Anyway. So, what’s this field trip they’re on? DAISY: They, uh… they didn’t tell you? MARTIN: [DRY CHUCKLE] No, I… What. … [QUICKLY] Daisy, where have they gone? DAISY: You know that town in Norway? MARTIN: What? I… Wai– Wh–what?! You don’t mean Ny-Ålesund? DAISY: Yyyeah. They reckon there’s a ritual they need to, you know… MARTIN: Yeah, but Peter didn’t even men…! [OPENS DRAWERS, SHUFFLES THROUGH THINGS] I don’t believe this!

Basira had mentioned that she had stopped trying to reach for him, after his mother’s death; but Martin had accepted to cut off from Jon entirely, and has shown multiple times that he’s been relying on Peter for information. Maybe Basira stopped trying, but it’s mostly… that Martin made himself so inaccessible. And there is something very fitting (though sad) with that? Because indeed, Martin kept trying to make connections with people and being rejected or betrayed – his attentions never meeting their goal. He took care of his mother for years; he was quite mistreated by Jon even when trying to make things a bit better, or less bittersweet (prime example being the beginning of MAG069, when he brought tea for Jon, and was turned away). And as he spat to Elias’s face in MAG118, he was very aware that the “good” moments he had spent with Not!Sasha had been cruel lies, that he felt bad for spending with Sasha’s murderer? And his relationship with Tim had deteriorated through season 2 already, reaching the point in season 3 when… Tim didn’t factor him in at all, focused on his revenge and didn’t spare any thought for Martin because he didn’t know him like he knew Sasha? And Martin never really managed to form any connection with Melanie nor Basira, and Daisy used to frighten him. So, the temptation of the Lonely makes a lot of sense… and maybe Daisy will manage to pierce through it? She’s been a constant surprise in season 4 – actually bonding with Jon, and now managing to… have a meaningful talk with Martin? The fact that they shut down the tape recorder while still together might mean that they’ll keep talking and that it… could do Martin some good? That they could act on something together?)

- The clock in the background made it sound like the scene was taking place in Elias’s office again? (I think the sound the door made was the same, too?) So, “Assistant to Peter Lukas”, really? Nah. Martin has been slowly taking over all of Elias’s tasks: taking care of the Institute’s administration

and

receiving

the complaints about Jon.

(I’m not even joking: the first time ever that we heard Elias talk… was when he relayed to Jon that Naomi had filed a complaint about him, in MAG017. And now, it’s MARTIN taking care of even that. I don’t want Martin to become the new Head Director because that can mean anything good, but UUUUUh at the same time. All these tiny ways in which he is literally replacing Elias are hilarious but, accumulated, are beginning to get suspicious.)

Plus, I do love

(MAG142) WOMAN: I don’t, a– Look, I just need to, to talk to a… a–a manager, or something? MARTIN: Okay, uh, well, uh… Uh, yeah, actually, [CHUCKLE] I’m a, I’m a manager. G–go on?

How more and more confident he’s getting at Bullshitting… but AT THE SAME TIME. Martin is managing Peter and used to manage Jon. He does deserve to be called “a manager”, okay.

- MARTIN IS STILL A BEHOLDING BABY!! After the (glorious) mess that was MAG100, Martin had been the only one of the assistants to take a live-statement: Tim’s, in MAG104, though, okay, Tim was also an assistant himself and it was… probably a Beholding effect that allowed him to be so articulate? But Martin technically took another one with MAG142, and the woman’s story was clearly messier and less “fluid”, she had a lot of trouble explaining things, and the point that it wasn’t the first time that she was telling her story (“And I start to tell him… everything. About the job, about the collapse, ab–about the hand… And more than I told you, even, and–and…”)… but still. Beholding might not be giving up on him, uh?

Also, it’s Aza’s pet-theory that Martin might be compelling/manipulating people to do what he wants by asking “Please” (even though there is no static), and MMMM… both Tim and the woman uncoiled and began to talk after he said that word…

(MAG104) MARTIN: Please. TIM: [EXHALEs] Fine. Fine. I’ll tell him in person, when he gets back from… wherever it is that he’s vanished to. MARTIN: China. And if you try to tell him in person, you’ll just end up at each other’s throats. You know you will. TIM: … [BITTERLY] Statement of Timothy Stoker, on the disappearance of... of my brother, Danny, four years ago. June 14th, 2017.

(MAG142) MARTIN: Just… just tell me what happened. Hum, please. I–I won’t judge. [SILENCE] WOMAN: Alright. Uh. So, you… [SIGH] You’ve, uh… you’ve got to understand my job, okay?

(+ Melanie relenting when he went “Melanie. Melanie, please.” in MAG118, etc.)

- Anyway, I’m so so glad that Martin’s pettiness has been skyrocketing in season 4.

(MAG082) DAISY: Well, if your witnesses appear back in this universe, maybe the situation will change. Otherwise, it’s an easy choice: answer my question or I pin it on you. MARTIN: Y–you can’t! Th–that’s not how this works. [SILENCE] … Is it? DAISY: Let me tell you how this works, Mr. Blackwood. I’ve got a hell of a workload, no partner and full operational discretion to make this whole situation go away. That means you help me or I make things very unpleasant for you.

(MAG142) DAISY: I said… I don’t want to talk about it. [SILENCE] MARTIN: I know. [PAUSE] Not nice being interrogated, is it? DAISY: I… [EXHALE] Oh. MARTIN: Yeah. [SILENCE] DAISY: [INHALE] I’m sorry, Martin.

February 2017 vs. June 2018, it was sixteen months ago, and he didn’t let that go. FORGIVE AND FORGET? NO AHAHAHAH RESENT AND REMEMBER.

- AND I’M SO GLAD THAT DAISY APOLOGISED… that she understood on her own why Martin was so petty and cutting at her – that she had given him reasons to!

(And uuuh… that parallel between Daisy-towards-Basira and Martin-towards-Jon… I didn’t know how much I wanted Daisy and Martin to have an Actual Conversation until now, but… they work… so fine… hopeless pining gays aware that their crushes are fucking idiots throwing themselves into things without plans, all of them…)

- Uh! So Martin listened to MAG061’s tape!

(MAG142) MARTIN: I listened to your old statement. Wasn’t your partner down there? DAISY: Yeah. Didn’t find him. MARTIN: You don’t wanna go get him? DAISY: I’m not going back. MARTIN: Hm! I thought you would have at least tried, or–

(As an aside, we know Jon had taken the tape along with him when he went into the coffin to rescue Daisy…)

So why and when did Martin listen to that specific statement and remember about that detail…? (He’s usually… notoriously pretty bad at cross-checking information or remembering names from one statement to another, see how he didn’t remember about “Rayner” back in season 3.)

- Speaking of tapes, there were a few things:

(MAG142) MARTIN: I should probably try to get him this tape, let him know what happened, that someone came in to… But then, ahah, would that just come across as an accusation? Like, because I don’t wanna… And then, then I guess he’d… hear this bit as well, so… I… I… [LONG EXHALE] What do I do…? […] DAISY: … [INHALE] You recording, or…? MARTIN: Hm? Uh, oh… Oh, no, there was– Hang on… [CLICK.]

The fact that the woman’s complaint and story was recorded was a conscious decision from Martin, or at least, he was aware of the recording (=> it didn’t… sneakily begin to record without him noticing). But it’s strange that the woman didn’t mention any tape recorder with Jon when he preyed on her – maybe it was there, hidden, but maybe there wasn’t any…? If that’s the case, why…? (…………… if it was recorded, that means there might be a hidden stash of… encounters like this, of Jon pressuring people into giving their statements…)

- We got quite the roundabout of Martin’s ambivalent bits this episode: he was good towards the woman (treating her with the respect she deserved), expressed offense and disgust at Jon’s actions………………… and then right away, went back to being Considerate Of Jon’s Feelings and to worrying over him the instant he was given the incentive:

(MAG142) MARTIN: Uh, but you didn’t give me your– [DOOR CLOSES] … name. [SIGH] [RUFFLING PAPER] [SILENCE] [SIGH] … What the hell do I do with that?! I mean, Christ, Jon, that’s… that’s not okay! Oh, that can’t– that can’t… I mean, it’s not him, is it? Not, not really? It’s, what, addiction, instinct, maybe mind control, something like that? I… can’t believe he’d choose to do something like that. … No, no, I, I can’t think like that, though, I, I can’t let myself, ‘cause I mean, if, if he‘s already gone, then all of this is just… […] MARTIN: No, no, it’s… thank you, I just… [CLOSES DRAWER] For God’s sake, can he not stay safe for like, for like ten minutes?! DAISY: I don’t think that’s an option for him anymore. MARTIN: Yeah, I mean, sure… [SLAMS A DRAWER SHUT] But he just…! He doesn’t think! He always just immediately charges straight off into danger with whatever… whatever half-arsed plan o–occurs to him at the time! I don’t get it!

… It’s probably not a good thing that he’s… so prompt to getting worried over Jon instead of reconsidering things through his actions (it’s like he had… immediately forgotten the woman’s story as soon as Daisy explained that Jon was going into Danger territory) but… it makes sense with Martin’s point of view – because he had agreed to some sacrifice for the others’ and Jon’s well-being, and, indeed, if he were to accept that Jon is gone… then, it means that it was partially for naught – unless Martin manages to find New Reasons. (But it kind of confirms that Martin really doesn’t have many things he cares for/about left in the world…)

-  Whatever is happening with Jon, it’s either not one of the options that Martin considered, either a mix of all of them (“addiction, instinct, maybe mind control”)? We know that Jon has had ~problems with moderation~ and Jon had discovered and acknowledged that he was getting addicted to written-statements, back in season 3, without… giving it much thought:

(MAG107) ARCHIVIST: I feel… a lot better! … I’d love to rattle off a lot of potential other reasons for this, nice rational causes of recovery, but… I feel we’re past the point of transparent rationalisations. It looks like the recording of statements has now passed over from psychological compulsion into… a more physical dependence. I don’t know whether this is… some sort of classical addiction or something a bit deeper. But either way, this is not the time for experimentation. I’m on a deadline, and if I need to be reading statements to stay well enough, then I suppose that’s what I shall do.

And the way Jon was described kind of remind me of Trevor’s relationship with The Hunt? (MAG056, “In the early 80s, I was deep in the grip of my twin addictions. As I mentioned, after a while, the hunt became an addiction of its own. Of the two, I’ve always found heroin the easier one to quit. […] But the hunt… the hunt is a purpose. It’s not just a way to get through the day, it’s a reason for there to be a day at all.”)

There has been so much talk about “choices” this season that… the bottom line will probably be that yes, Jon did choose it and will be aware of it. Either it was something he was trying to get under control, for a Greater Plan (trying to Power Up to fight The Dark?), either it was mainly hunger when he began to do these things but… despite Martin’s repulsion at the idea, I don’t think the answer will be anything less than “yes, maybe he was influenced, but Jon did choose it”…?

- You can feel that Daisy is a bit older/more experienced than the others and… it’s interesting that, in the end, she’s knowledgeable about human behaviours and able to decipher them?

(MAG142) DAISY: I, I mean, it’s pretty standard stuff. MARTIN: What?! DAISY: Used to see it all the time back in the force, especially with the Section’d. Not like there’s… “normal” trauma, you know? But it’s pretty common. The most important thing becomes control, engaging on your own terms. Even when it’s stupid or dangerous. Anything to not feel helpless.

(She was Section’d for fourteen years, she had been working in the police for sixteen years in December 2016, so she’s at the very least 35-ish years old, while Jon&Martin are around 30.)

AND I LOVED HOW SHE REMINDED MARTIN THAT SHE USED TO BE A DETECTIVE…

(MAG142) MARTIN: … Yeah. [LONG INHALE] I suppose. [LONG EXHALE] You’re… you’re pretty observant, you know? DAISY: Detective, remember? MARTIN: Yeah, you did mention. Would have thought Basira would’ve had more sense, though. DAISY: When Basira and I were partners, I’d see this happen sometimes. She can read a… situation like no one I know, always seems to know the right move, but for all her research, she never wants to put a plan together. I think she just hates all the unknowns, the… variables. [SIGH] Contingencies. If she spots an advantage, she’ll… grab it, and trust herself to figure out the details as she goes.

Elias has been nagging Basira, calling her “detective” (and Georgie called her one in MAG122, and Peter referred to her as such in MAG134) but… it was Daisy, officially – Basira was only a Police Constable. Daisy had it in her to lean towards Beholding, uh…? And it’s nice to see that Daisy didn’t have that title for nothing? And it’s interesting to see the contrast between her and Basira – with Daisy, initially being presented as savage and violent (a “rabid dog” according to Elias), actually attuned to the way people work, and Basira, quieter and “soft” (according to Daisy in MAG061), seemingly level-headed… being actually the impulsive and chaotic one.

- But WOOPS.

(MAG140) ARCHIVIST: So what’s the plan? BASIRA: I’m getting us passage on a boat heading up there. ARCHIVIST: … Right. BASIRA: I bring all the guns from Daisy’s old stash, you bring the spook you used to mess up that delivery guy. [SILENCE] ARCHIVIST: Wh… at? That’s it? [PAUSE] Christ, I thought my plans were half-arsed. BASIRA: It’s all about when we go. ARCHIVIST: … I don’t follow. BASIRA: Summer solstice is the 21st of June. So we leave in a fortnight. ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] … Right. BASIRA: And should arrive about a week before. No danger of sunset or darkness for a long time. Stands to reason that they will be at their weakest.

(MAG141) ARCHIVIST: You were the one who suggested we go by boat. BASIRA: Didn’t think I… urgh… [SNIFF] … I hadn’t really done proper boats, before…

Confirmation that Basira barely has any plan for Ny-Ålesund and is mostly planning to improvise.

- Here’s hope that Martin talking with Daisy will help a bit to get him out of his shell… Hilariously, Elias had warned Martin about getting too secluded?!

(MAG138) MARTIN: I think he wants me to join The Lonely. ELIAS: Then it sounds like you have a decision to make. […] Don’t forget to keep in touch, Martin. There are so many people in here, but without one’s friends… [DOOR LOCKING] it does get rather lonely.

And Daisy came in and was the surprise!friend. At the very least, Martin got another demonstration that Peter is not trustworthy when it comes to the information he shares (or doesn’t share). Martin, despite his official wariness, has been relying on him a great deal, but maybe the news that Jon hoped out to stop another ritual, and that Peter didn’t even deem it worth it to notify Martin or to provide help, will allow distrust to sink in again…? (Oooh, I hope we will hear Martin confronting Peter about it, because Martin will probably be deliciously snappy and cutting…)

- … So Melanie had been “quiet” and now she’s away again (“Melanie’s out, and… [EXHALE] Jon and Basira’re still off.”), and we haven’t heard from her since her first session with that therapist, and I’m Worried About Melanie. And on that subject, I liked how Daisy casually supports Melanie’s past intention to kill Elias:

(MAG142) MARTIN: I thought you believed him…! You were doing all of his dirty work. DAISY: Well, wasn’t willing to call his bluff. Not the same thing as “believing”. Just too big a risk. MARTIN: … Not for Melanie. DAISY: Well, maybe she was the only one with any sense. Even if he was telling the truth [EXHALE], if we all… died… There are worse things.

… because we definitely know that she didn’t have much sense given that it was confirmed that she had been infected by the bullet.

(But hey, Daisy, give yourself some credit:

(MAG092) ELIAS: Ah, of course. Er, sometimes I forget how new you all are to this. Basira is now tied to the Institute. All of you are. Like fingers on a hand. And I am the beating heart of it. Should I, or the Institute, be destroyed, you will all, unfortunately, follow suit. MELANIE: Wait, what? TIM: Yup, that sounds about right. ELIAS: And it would not be a pleasant death. DAISY: Bullshit! ELIAS: Then shoot me. Just squeeze the trigger, and watch the only person you care about die screaming. Your last connection to humanity. Do it. BASIRA: Daisy…

You did call it “bullshit”, back then!)

- It’s quite impressive how much Elias has managed to be omnipresent even in absentia in season 4, but especially in this episode. The scene seems to take place in his office; we got reminders of how he had trapped Daisy to work for him; he’s still an element threatening Daisy to tip over; and he’s in prison… but still a bit here, somehow.

(Urk, he had mentioned that Jon was “at a very delicate stage right now” in MAG127, hence him making sure that Jon couldn’t get in contact with him… but I wonder if, upon his return from the Pole, Jon will get visitation rights because… stuff happened.)

- And what Jon is thinking/doing/meaning is… a gigantic mystery right now. It was a weird episode in that regard, because the first half of the episode was presenting him as a Monster, as absolutely… a danger? A threat? A “It” violating people and feeding from them? Because even if he wasn’t aware of the apparently new Beholding effects, Jon was absolutely conscious and reminded of the dreams plaguing statement-givers:

(MAG130) GERTRUDE: Shame about the dreams; I would avoid them if I could.

(MAG132) DAISY: I realised you were in my dreams. Reliving t… this. The coffin. You were there. ARCHIVIST: … Yes. DAISY: Didn’t think it was real. Not really… Just my mind putting you there, because I h–hated you but… no. One night, you turn up in a new shirt. Didn’t fit you. Not your style. I didn’t think much of it, it was just a d–, a dream. Then you come back from the States and… guess what you’re wearing. ARCHIVIST: Oh… DAISY: Realised what was happening then. Realised you weren’t human. Needed to die, as soon as it was safe. Never mind Elias and his… insurance.

(MAG136) ARCHIVIST: It, uh… Hm. Is, uh… Weird question, but… I… [EXHALE] I haven’t seen you in my dreams? The last couple of weeks? […] So… no more dreams. DAISY: Not of you and your weird eyes. Just the coffin. ARCHIVIST: Is that better…? DAISY: ’T’s mine. ARCHIVIST: … right.

(MAG141) BASIRA: And now he’s going to see you in his dreams as he relives that for the rest of his life! ARCHIVIST: [INHALE SHARPLY] BASIRA: Because… because a tape recorder told you to do it?! ARCHIVIST: Yes, Basira, he is. And I am sorry about that. But we needed it. Anyway: you’re the one who wants to be like Gertrude. [SILENCE] You think she’d give a damn about a few bad dreams? BASIRA: … No. ARCHIVIST: No. She got the job done, and didn’t care about the costs. BASIRA: But I thought you did.

… and still Did What He Did, and has forced himself on people, and is enjoying it, and… messed up the woman (and potentially Floyd – his stories were about travelling by sea, can he still work as a sailor if he starts getting panic attacks?! – and potentially… others).

But then, the second half of the episode rolled in and insisted on his human sides and qualities and the fact that he was a victim, too. It made sense for Daisy (since she got in touch with the Jon who doubted and was “moping around”), it made sense for Martin (because, as much as he’s able to snap and take none of Jon’s shit, he’s also showed a propensity to making excuses for him, hence Tim’s bitterness in season 2), but it was still… a weird mix. Because you were shown someone suffering and in distress, and right afterwards told that her tormentor was in a bad place and deserved to be loved and for people to worry for his well-being and state of mind…? It’s indeed good to get confirmation that what Jon has experienced left its marks on him, since we had glimpses of it before:

(MAG133) ARCHIVIST: And give Daisy a break. She was there eight months. [EXHALES] I was only in there for three days, and I–

(MAG136) DAISY: [QUICKLY] You’re not babysitting me, alright?! I know that’s what the others think, sometimes, but… that’s not it. I just… don’t like…  being on my own if I can help it. You know. Flashbacks, panic attacks, the usual. Just trying to avoid it if I can. ARCHIVIST: I know, Daisy, I–I do. It’s hard.

… but it happened at a weird time, after the woman’s story. At least, with how Daisy went back to Jon’s words, pointing out that he was “self-destructive”:

(MAG136) ARCHIVIST: My– [PAUSE] [INHALE] [SIGH] My memories of the coma are not clear. But I know I made a choice; I made a choice to become… something else. Because I was afraid to die. But ever since then, I… I don’t know if I made the right decision; I–I’m stronger now, tougher, I can… … If I do die, now, or get sealed away somewhere forever… I don’t know if that’s a bad thing. And I don’t want to lose anyone else so, if I can maybe stop that happening, and [DRY CHUCKLE] the only danger is to me, I– I’ll do it in a heartbeat; worst case scenario… the universe loses another monster. DAISY: That’s messed up. ARCHIVIST: [LOW SELF-DEPRECATIVE DRY LAUGHTER] … Yeah. I suppose it is. DAISY: Did you know the coffin wouldn’t kill you? ARCHIVIST: I– guess I thought imprisonment wouldn’t… wouldn’t be as bad as it was. DAISY: [SHAKY SIGH] ARCHIVIST: And it’s a lot easier to make that choice than it is to actually… endure the result. You might have noticed when I was in there with you, I… I had regrets. DAISY: Yeah. I remember. ARCHIVIST: Plus, I thought… [PAUSE] W– [SIGH] Well, I didn’t know what being down there had done to you. DAISY: You thought I was gonna kill you? ARCHIVIST: It was a possibility.

(MAG142) DAISY: And of course, for Jon, there’s survivor’s guilt in there, too. He thinks he’s not human. Makes him very… self-destructive.

… I think we might definitely be heading towards the idea that at some point, in a shape or form, Jon did (and likely does) intend to sacrifice himself to stop The Dark…?

(- Alright, though.

This bit is more a disclaimer for Behind The Scenes/Less Comfy Time than full-on review: I initially had a very hard time with this episode. By that, I mean it physically messed me up for a day or two, before I was able to pinpoint why, and managing to get what the issue was alleviated the feeling a bit: it’s because, beyond the harassment case (which was indeed treated as it deserved in the episode, as “enough” to feel messed-up and warrant a complaint), I felt/read/received the woman’s story and encounter as openly coded as se*ual assault, and I was unprepared to this – creepy man hovers around a woman who was having a romantic meeting, corners her when she is alone, forces her to do something she was unwilling to do, “thanks her” for what he extorted from her and is satisfied by the experience, and leaves her a crying wreck, traumatised and with her whole life messed up, down to the detail of the woman not putting the blame on him, partially presenting it as her responsibility (“I’ve been having a lot of problems, since he talked to me, well, since I talked to him. Ever since I told my… story. […] May–maybe, maybe it’s just me, maybe I’m… Maybe I just, I met him once, in a coffeeshop, and he was a creep, and it messed me up…! But that’s enough. Right? [SHAKY EXHALE] That is enough.”) since she didn’t have the codes to explain what had truly been done to her. On its own, I felt that this wasn’t escapist horror anymore but way closer to “real-life horror” than what TMA usually does; it was even strengthened by E. Lockley’s performance, which was absolutely amazing… and also very intense, shaking and rough; and there was the added fact that… the abuser, in this case, was someone (the protagonist) who had been presented as sympathetic until now. Separately, it would have been a lot already; together, it was unbearable for me upon listening, and even after… it also makes me a bit uneasy, story-wise; as in, “oh, after 140-ish episodes, is this series really for me, after all.”

Because the second half of the episode made it pretty clear that Jon will be held accountable for what happened, but also… that he is a victim himself. And he’s still (unless this is The Shift) our main character, that we were meant to sympathise with until at least MAG140, and who was still written as sympathetic in the second half of the episode. Meanwhile, this character… exposed how her life was wrecked, is condemned to suffer, was harmed by someone who knew to some extent what he was doing, and she probably won’t be seen ever again. She didn’t do anything; Jon did. And it’s Jon’s story, and I’m sure that there will be Lots Of Guilt if Jon is meant to stick around as our protagonist, but the fact remains: the person who was (one of) his victim(s) still had her life wrecked, knowingly, and is probably not “important” enough to receive focus and to achieve protagonist status, unlike… her abuser. And I feel like I read enough stories focusing on the person who chose to harm rather than the person who was hurt and will be perpetually hurt? And I’m not too fond either of serious stories going the “edgy” route of protagonists behaving as uncaring asshats for a long while…? I had always assumed that when Jon would Fall, it would be either gradually, or the point when he would lose his Protagonist/sympathetic status? But right now, it feels like it’s most likely heading towards Reforming and coincidental Manpain territory (which… TMA had been great at avoiding until now), and aesthetically, I’m not super ready to open myself to feel sympathy for a character who caused harm while aware of the effects, even if he feels like crap about it afterwards, and even if I was until now very engrossed in his story and loving him a lot as a character. It works fine in derivative works, I love the various explorations, but in a canon… it’s always something else, it makes me feel uneasy, I am always pursued by the reminder of “but why does this character’s ongoing story deserve to be told, and not their victim’s?”. With MAG141/142, I feel like suddenly, Jon got utterly destroyed as a protagonist? Who cares, honestly, if he’s self-destructive or has survivor guilt? How do you justify the fact that he should still be (even partially) a (sym)pathetic character, or someone to feel for, if he goes around dooming people in such ways, even if it’s a spooky temptation/an addiction problem…? I would need the canon to tell me why and I feel… that it’s going to be hard. Because even if Jon feels bad about it, even if he was planning to get fucked over and it was only a temporary thing, he’ll still not be the main victim, and there is (presumably) no fixing for what he did, no way to alleviate what he did to the people whose statements he extorted, and unlike them, he’ll still be… our character. We’ll hear his voice, not his victims’ (after this woman’s testimony), and I don’t think that’s compatible with his protagonist status anymore.

And I know that RQ is usually very sensitive when it comes to real-life issues; the woman was treated with the soft carefulness that she deserves, and I understand perfectly that the way Martin was written this episode was meant to avoid typical accusations in such cases: he absolutely believed her and didn’t even consider that she could have been lying; he took her seriously and didn’t argue with her over the necessity of filing a complaint; he was supportive and soft; he validated her after she told her story (“O–okay. Hum. [INHALE] Right, well… [EXHALE] Firstly, I’m re– I’m really sorry that this happened.”); he expressed outrage towards Jon’s actions for this (… at first). But I have a hard time “trusting” and can’t help but be wary of what will follow in the story, and I am ill-at-ease: because crediting the woman as “Bystander” was… a surprising choice (she was a victim, she was preyed upon, it was her story, she was not… a witness or someone on the side…), because she wasn’t named (so… deprived of her identity…), and because it is likely the last of what we’ll hear from her… even though we know, with the rules of this universe, that she won’t escape this situation. And we’ll keep following Jon, and be narratively meant to get heartbroken over him, if MAG142 is any indication. I’m open to surprises (we heard Melanie’s and Daisy’s voices in ways that I hadn’t been expecting, although it was necessary and welcome; Daisy did harm people and keeps reasserting that it was her responsibility, and I currently adore her (… though the fact that we never met an innocent she would have wrecked… helps); or it’s possible that it’s the point, that Jon is currently being buried as a protagonist and that we’re supposed to lose our attachment to him) but… as I said, I’m wary, and not at ease at the moment. So I’ll see with next episodes, but it’s possible that I might take a hiatus soon-ish to let a few episodes pass and to judge from afar if I’ll feel better listening to them in one go, with the overall direction getting clearer. My first reflex last Wednesday was “I can’t listen to this anymore” and it messed me up until I was able to pinpoint what had been the thing bleeding into me and making me feel so sick, and fiction isn’t… supposed to do that to you – suddenly, it made the world unsafe, and it wasn’t horror escapism anymore for the reasons mentioned above, and I really wasn’t expecting to get slammed this hard even when expecting Terrible (fictional) Things. So, I’ll… see; you do you, I do me, I’m fine now, I can branch out if I feel that It’s Not For Me After All. Despite these grand intentions, I’d probably end up swallowing any Jon Angst/Tragedy Juice anyway, manpain-flavoured or not, so, eh.)

(Here’s for narrative hope: Daisy saw the woman and reminded Martin that she was a “detective”, so… some pieces are laid for Daisy to track down and find her? The fact that this woman wasn’t given a name feels a bit suspicious – not because she would be a false identity or an illusion, but in the way that… she was denied one. And given her situation, given that she was a victim, it’s quite harsh and un-TMA-like? So we’re probably meant to see her again, with a proper name…?)

Title for MAG143 is out: no cookie point to guess which Fear is involved, but mMMMMmm, guessing we’re going into Things (and that we might get a clue about what Robert Montauk was doing when Julia was a kid…?).

[gumnut-logic]

A Little Chaos (Part 5)

Title: A Little Chaos

Part 1a | Part 1b | Part 1c & 2 | Part 3 | Part 4a | Part 4b | Part 5

Author: Gumnut

May 2019

Fandom: Thunderbirds Are Go 2015/ Thunderbirds TOS

Rating: Teen

Summary: A little conversation in less than optimal conditions.

Word count: 2068

Spoilers & warnings: Virgil/Kayo, Scott/Em.

Timeline: Sometime after ‘Gentle Rain’

Author’s note: Yeah, I should be writing ‘The Bellini Incident’, but this was supposed to be a quick fic, but then so was Bellini. This one will not be anywhere near as long and I will be back to Bellini asap. I am now laughing at this last statement as the word count for this has now passed the 10K mark ::headdesk:: Also, the prompts below? Pretty much forgotten…though I guess they may rear their heads in the next chapter or so.

The prompt: From a series of OC prompts. Kylorr asked for 5. Have they ever cheated on anyone before? And 7. How many partners have they had? I don’t know if I’m going to answer either of them, but this is the fic that happened. I hope you enjoy it :D

Disclaimer: Mine? You’ve got to be kidding. Money? Don’t have any, don’t bother.

-o-o-o-

“Virgil?”

The engineer didn’t answer. He sat staring at his hands, thoughts obviously miles away.

She was on familiar turf. They were back at Wellington Hospital, the site of so much last Christmas. This time, however, it was not Virgil, but Kayo who was being attended. That left Virgil and Scott sitting in the waiting room.

It was obvious neither did waiting very well. Scott was busy on comms with John, the Wellington police and the GDF. She had heard shouting over the line several times from his direction. Scott answered everything calm and business-like. Em had no doubt she would have to help unwind her man later. She could see the tension in his shoulders from here.

Thunderbird Two was once again parked on the hospital’s front lawn. The rest of the Tracy family was inbound, Grandma marshalling them. Even John would be dropping in as soon as they could contain the fallout from the incident.

Kayo was in no danger. She just needed the bullet removed and the wound tidied up. She would be out of surgery soon.

At the moment, Virgil was her concern.

“Virgil?” She reached out to touch his shoulder and he jumped.

“Huh?”

Scott eyed him from across the room, his brow furrowing.

“I need to check you over.”

It was Virgil’s turn to frown. “Why?”

“Kayo hit you rather hard.”

He shifted in his seat. “I’m fine.”

“Forgive me if I never believe that statement ever again.”

His eyes shot up, narrowed slightly and his lips thinned.

She shrugged. “Can you really blame me?”

He sighed, dropping his gaze once again to his hands. “Okay.”

Squeezing his shoulder, she smiled just a little. “C’mon, it will only take a moment.”

Without a word, he rose to his feet and picked up the green dress that lay on the seat beside him. Em cursed the lack of her ‘scoot, reduced to the basic hoverchair the hospital provided. Virgil was tall next to her. Scott was a bloody skyscraper.

Speaking of Scott, her boyfriend was beside them in a matter of steps. “News?”

Em reached out and caught his hand. “No, I’m just going to check out Virgil.”

“Why?” Immediate frown, immediate concern.

She arched an eyebrow up at him. “I know you know how hard a hitter Kayo can be and Virgil took a good one to his midsection today. I just need to check on him...considering his medical history.”

“Oh.” Scott swallowed and grabbed his brother’s shoulder. “Keep me informed.”

Virgil pursed his lips. “I’m fine.”

“Sure.”

The glare Virgil shot his brother was enough to light his hair on fire.

Em dragged the younger man away from her boyfriend before the argument could start. She wrestled him into an examination cubicle. “Top half of your uniform off. I’m going to grab some equipment.” A smile to soften her tone. “Be back in a moment.” She pulled the curtain and left him to disrobe.

She was caught in thought between Scott and Virgil when she approached the nursing station, but was thrown out of her thoughts at the mention of the word ‘Tracy’. Being so low in the damn hoverchair, apparently her presence hadn’t been noticed.

“...Tracy, look at those eyes. Wouldn’t you love to have them looking at you?” The voice belonged to a young nurse holding a phone talking to an equally young workmate.

Em frowned.

“Blue or brown?”

“Oh, I don’t know. They are both bloody gorgeous.”

“And both spoken for.” An older voice broke in. “Have you been taking photos? Jenny, do you want to lose your job?”

“These are worth more than my job, ‘Melda.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“So gorgeous though.”

Slipping back into the shadows, Em fingered the comms in her collar. “John?”

“Em? What’s wrong?”

John’s voice never failed to alter her heartbeat. A combination of long memory and the music it was. “Can you find a mobile phone about five metres...south-east of me, belonging to a Jenny?”

A moment. “Located. Why?”

“She has pictures of Scott and Virgil on it. She’s intending on selling them.”

The line went quiet. Ten seconds later there was a squawk from the nurses’ station. “What the hell?”

“Situation resolved.” John’s voice betrayed no smugness, but a female voice was laughing in the background. “Eos, subtlety next time.”

“She didn’t deserve subtlety.” Em’s phone pinged quietly and she pulled it out of the hoverchair’s inside pocket. The photos appeared on the screen.

The woman was right. They were worth more than her job. A photo of them entering ER. Virgil at Kayo’s side that naked love and concern on his face that had so circled the world the last time the press had hounded them, but behind them Scott was carrying her. The expression on his face spoke of his concern for Kayo, as well, but a flick over to the next photo and his head had turned to look down at Em in his arms.

Oh god.

He was different to Virgil. The two brothers were vastly different in so many ways. But the way he was looking at her...

Her heart missed a beat.

A text flicked up on her phone. These are the only copies. Keep them safe. John.

While the nurse, metres away from her, was swearing at her phone, Em had to blink to keep the tears at bay while looking at hers.

But Virgil was waiting.

She shook herself, straightened and without a word, barged into the nurses’ station and appropriated the equipment she needed.

She took no pleasure as the nurse exclaimed to her friend that her phone was possessed, that it was posting horrible things to her social media all by itself, that it wasn’t responding, that it swore at her. She did smile, however, when she distinctly heard Eos declare through the phone’s speakers that Jenny would be assimilated and resistance was futile. The AI had obviously been in John’s Trek collection again.

The phone was dropped to the hard floor. There was a sharp crack as its screen shattered.

Oops.

The woman was still swearing as Em headed back to Virgil. She had to swallow a laugh and straighten her expression before slipping through the curtains.

Any thought of humour vanished at the sight of the emergency responder sitting on the side of the bed. His posture was slumped and worn. In the middle of his bare chest a lovely bruise about the size off his fiancée’s fist was blooming.

He straightened the moment he saw her, facade falling into place.

Em pressed her lips together just a little.

“Virgil, she is going to be okay.”

“I know.”

“You and Scott saved the both of us.”

“I know.”

She sighed. He’d put a wall up that she didn’t have the trust yet to batter down. Only Kayo or Scott could do that.

As she reached for the scanner and fiddled with the primitive hoverchair in an attempt to get it to gain at least a little height so she could examine him, he slid off the bed and crouched down to her level. “How are you?”

She blinked. “I’m fine.”

She didn’t miss the curve of his lips at her parroted response. His eyes dropped to the touchscreen she was fighting. “Let me have a look at that.” And the next minute she found herself on the bed and her bare-chested patient pulling apart the control panel of her hoverchair. A muttered expletive, a whack with a screwdriver from his kit and the ‘chair hovered smoothly to a standing height.

He straightened. “There you go. Should behave itself long enough until Gordon arrives with your backup ‘scoot.”

His offered arms were gratefully accepted and he lifted her off the bed and placed her gently in the ‘chair, assisting her with the harness.

“Virgil, I have to say that you are the first patient of mine who has ever had me as a patient in return.”

A snort and he smiled up at her. “We each have our specialties.”

She returned the smile, happy to see it. “Now let’s check under your hood.”

A pair of rolled eyes and he climbed back onto the bed. A gesture for him to lie down and he complied. She activated the bed’s holographic system and an outline of his system appeared above him. Focussed on his rib cage, her eyes tracked the healed remains of his injury on his right side, searching for any aggravation. The bruise showed up, minor sub-dermal damage obvious, but his ribcage had managed to flex without issue. His lungs were clear and healthy, heart unaffected.

A sigh of relief she hadn’t known she’d needed.

She ran some basic obs, his brown eyes tracking her actions.

“So, was I right?”

A blink. “In what way?”

“I’m fine.”

Unable to let it completely slide, Em curled her lips. “Oh, I think Kayo thinks you are pretty fine.”

He snorted and the hologram rippled. A second later his expression froze and his heartbeat increased.

She frowned. “Virgil, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Lying under examination is futile. You know that.” Not to mention that she had learnt pretty fast that the man was rather crap at it in any case.

“It is nothing.”

“It most certainly is not. What is wrong, Virgil?”

His readouts changed yet again as he...well, she could only describe it as ‘squirmed’ under her gaze.

“Virgil.”

“Em.”

She couldn’t force him to tell her anything and she didn’t want to. She shut off the scanner. “You are fine. Just take it easy.”

He sat up, but he wouldn’t look at her. Something was definitely wrong. She frowned and dropped her hand onto his knee. “You don’t have to tell me anything. Just know I’m here if you need to talk. Patient confidentiality.” She fixed him with her gaze and he smiled at her just slightly.

“Thanks, Em.”

She held his gaze just a moment longer, frowning. His eyes darted away and she knew he wouldn’t tell her in this case and she had no doubt Scott had something to do with it. An involuntary sigh.

He looked up at her. “Are you sure you’re okay?” Gentle fingers wrapped around her arm. “You’ve been through quite an experience.”

Okay, so she had her own facades. She was as bad as him. “I’m fine.”

“That talking thing is mutual, you know.”

“Thank you for saving me. Again.” It came out in all a rush.

A ghost of a smirk. “Anytime, Em, anytime. Besides, if I hadn’t, Scott would have likely killed the guy.” Virgil shuffled off the bed and started shouldering on the top half of his uniform.

She blinked, suddenly caught up in the moments before Virgil had broken through the wall and ripped the guy out of her personal space.

“Em?”

Caring brown eyes looking down at her in concern.

She put together something resembling confidence on her face.

He wasn’t fooled for a second. “You don’t have to worry. Our lawyers will put him away for a very long time.” He reached for his harness, buckling it on with practised fingers.

She shivered, remembering the slimy touch on her belly.

“Em?” And suddenly Virgil was too close. She flung herself backwards, the unfamiliar hoverchair colliding with her tray of instruments, sending several of them clattering to the floor.

His eyes widened in realisation...and horror. “Oh god, I’m so sorry, Em. Hell.” He stumbled backwards, catching the curtain of the cubicle and almost tangling himself in it.

Her hand shot up. “No! No, Virgil, no. It’s fine. I’m sorry. I know. I KNOW. You would never hurt me.” She flung the chair forward, grabbing his arm in desperation. “I’m sorry. Please come here.”

Both fear and anger flickered through those chocolate eyes and god she wished Kayo was with them. The man was massive, his sheer muscular bulk could be considered intimidating, but he had never intimidated her. And he wasn’t intimidating her now. It was just... raw memories.

Virgil’s hands flexed into fists and he refused to move closer. “I’m so sorry, Em. I should have known better. What that asshole said to you...” His knuckles went white.

She forced a grim smile. “Well, as you said, he is going away for a very long while.” A blink and a frown. “How do you know what he said to me?”

He froze, his eyes widening.

“Virgil?”

-o-o-o-

[liveattheauction]

A Story with Mutants: Chapter 1, kind of

Hey, here’s a thing I’ve been working on forever. It’s an old project that I revived recently and have been working on in my increasingly small amounts of free time. I’ve got a little more than this written but I only wanna post the first part here, mostly so that a particular friend of mine (hi, Marten!) can read it. I’d love to hear what you guys think of it! I don’t even have chapter titles. It’s very unedited.

[Chapter 1, I guess]

The roof of the First Lupei Bank stood a few stories taller than all the surrounding buildings except one, a fifty-something story modern skyscraper misplaced among the old concrete and steel blocks. Its mirrored windows cast back the grey skies with a veneer of rain. Below the streets gleamed in puddles, passersby shedding their coats at the return of the sun, the rumble of traffic muffled by the height. It’d be peaceful if not for the industrial AC unit rattling. Sheinberg shrugged off his jacket, breathing deeply. “I love it up here,” he sighed warmly as he stepped out from the stairwell. “About as private as one can get in the historical district.” “Doesn’t seem very private,” Shiloh muttered, following behind him. Sheinberg leaned against the concrete edge, narrow shoulders lifted and elbows settled on the wall. “Too much interference. The AC’s too loud, the other buildings are too short, and that big one there is a news station—twenty-four seven broadcasting, radio, satellite, everything.” “That’s… very basic.” “Well, there is more.” Sheinberg pulled a small box from his pocket. “But no fun in telling everything, is there? You smoke?” “I do, actually.” Sheinberg held out the box and Shiloh accepted a cigarette with a nod of thanks, placing it between his lips to draw his own lighter. “‘S a dying habit,” Sheinberg muttered through the filter. He cupped a hand against the wind and puffed a few times, smoke swirling against his palm. “I mean, rightly so; it’s a killer. But it’s nice to have a smoking buddy now and again. How’d you get into it?” “Old teenage habit,” Shiloh murmured. “You?” “Similar. So.” He cast Shiloh a wry, knowing grin. “Let’s talk first impressions. Tell me, were you expecting a black man?” A flicker of surprise crossed Shiloh’s face, noticeable only as a spasm among the freckles around his eyes, but it was quickly smothered by a chuckle. “I admit, I was expecting an old Jewish man.” Sheinberg laughed too, cigarette bobbing between his teeth. He slipped it between his fingers and spoke with smoke on his breath, “I get that a lot. I get that look—you hid it pretty well, you sly dog—that little blink, the head nod, the ‘oh, okay, it’s like that’ look. You know what that is?” He waited for Shiloh to shake his head. “It’s called cognitive dissonance. Old psychology concept from the fifties.” Shiloh blew smoke through his nose. “Post-war, then?” “No, man, nineteen-fifties. Which,” he said, waving his hand, “I guess is also post-war. But World War II, not three. The idea is that we have a set of preconceived notions of what the world should be, a bias of expectation. You hear you’re coming to meet Samuel Sheinberg, middle manager of a bank chain, you think old white guy in a yarmulke, yeah? You think big nose and curly hair and all those other things that you’d be called racist for voicing.” Shiloh snorted, grinning faintly. “What?” “I’m Jewish.” “Are you?” “Partly. Though my grandfather.” He waved Sheinberg on, lifting his cigarette again. “Go on.” Sheinberg shrugged. “I know you’re Irish—see, there’s the other side of it. No cognitive dissonance when you hear a name like Moil—Maloi—” “Maoilseachlainn?” “That. That’s Irish if I ever heard it. Then you walk in, freckled all to hell, pale as the dead, speaking with an accent. All you’re missing is the red hair and a flask. You are a perfect fit with my idea of your average Irish ex-pat.” He clamped the cigarette between his teeth and reached into his jacket pocket, holding it out on his arm. “Which, if you’ve come this far, you are not.” “In many ways, I’m not,” Shiloh murmured, a smile ghosting about his lips. Sheinberg pulled out a little red card and draped his jacket on the concrete edge, leaning back onto it with his elbows, and rolled the card across his fingers like a coin. “I didn’t bring up hundred-fifty year old psychology concepts for no reason,” he warned. “That moment when things aren’t exactly what you expect—that’s a definitive moment. You can learn a lot about someone by how they respond to dissonance. And it’s not just when people aren’t stereotypes, it’s anything: situations, information, even actions. What do you do when you act against your own beliefs?” “Is that rhetorical?” Shiloh asked. “No. Dead serious.” “I imagine most people don’t do that.” “But they do, every day.” He waggled his cigarette between his fingers. “Smoking, for example. At the end of the twenty-second century, between vapor alternatives and the health crisis and climate change and all that shit, smoking tobacco nearly disappeared from American soil. The last major generation of smokers died of lung cancer. It was kept alive by traditionalists and historians, nothing more. If you ask someone if they smoke, most of the time you get, ‘Don’t you know that’s bad for you?’” He took a long drag and spoke with smoke whirling on his breath, “Ever tried to quit?” “Once or twice.” “You obviously didn’t succeed. So, tell me, Shiloh: when you picked up that first cig after weeks, maybe even months, of sobriety, what did you feel? When you knew you were breaking a promise to someone important, maybe yourself? You knew it was bad for you. Still is. Why’d you still do it?” Shiloh studied his half-burnt cigarette, sheltered from the wind by his shoulders. “Several reasons, I suppose,” he said thoughtfully. “Stress, mostly. You must know my line of work.” “Yeah, and I can’t blame you for any vice. But that’s not my question.” “It’s not, is it?” He sighed and looked up as if the sky held answers. “If I’m being honest, I felt guilty. Disappointed in myself. I managed to justify it later—to myself, mostly—but at the time I just needed the indulgence.” Sheinberg nodded slowly, cigarette loose in his lips. “That’s dissonance. Your own actions in opposition to your own beliefs and all the facts supporting them. So you justify.” He took the cigarette from his mouth and gave the red card another roll across his fingers. “It’s largely situational and I get that, but you get the concept, yeah?” “I do.” “Good. You see where I’m going with this?” “I have a sneaking suspicion.” Sheinberg flicked the card across his hand, pinning it with his pinky and index finger over the two between to show off the ram’s head logo. “What do you know about the Ramheart Outpost?” “Less than you, I’m sure.” “Once again, that’s not my question.” Shiloh took a long drag, held his breath as he snuffed his cigarette on the concrete, and sighed smoke through his nose. “I know it operates as a brothel,” he said lightly, “for a number of reasons. But my interest in it is primarily as one of the largest and most secure mutant sanctuaries of the country.” Sheinberg paused. “Go on.” “What do you want to know?” Sheinberg simply waved a hand, urging him on. “The Ramheart, as I’ve most often heard it called, is located somewhere in the city of Lupei and serves as a major entry point for a global network of sanctuaries and asylums for mutants. I’ve been to several others—Cardiff, Chicago, the Mojave—but none as large or as connected.” Sheinberg waved further. “I’ve got an approximate location on it, but—” “Listen, Mawlsee—Marl—fuck—Shiloh. We just had a conversation about psychology and emotion. Don’t play me for an idiot, Shiloh; you know I’m the Ramheart’s gatekeeper and you know I don’t care about what data you’ve scrounged up from chasing us. I’m not here to judge your spying abilities. I’m here to judge you.” He dropped his cigarette without taking his eyes from Shiloh’s and smothered it with his shoe. “What do you think the Ramheart is?” Shiloh stared him down without expression—for such a vibrant face, all freckles and cheekbones and fine brows, it was amazing how well he could keep it blank—and spoke with a stiff neck, voice loose and honest, “The Ramheart is a refuge for those without refuge. A banned people whose very existence is tied to the worst forms of organized crime. It is a gateway to other mutant sanctuaries, and I suspect that’s often why it’s sought, but it is first and foremost a provider of some simulacrum of a normal life for those for whom that can never be a reality. It is, by multiple definitions, an asylum. It is also—and forgive me, this is a personal interest—an enormous operation with clients around the globe that still manages a level of secrecy unheard of by even the most successful intelligence agencies. I don’t seek the Ramheart for personal reasons.” “I know,” Sheinberg said quietly. Shiloh nodded. “You’ve given me the runaround better than some of the mutant-makers I’ve found, you know. That’s as great a compliment as I can give.” Sheinberg leaned in slightly. “That’s. Not. My. Question.” “I seek the Ramheart Outpost because one of the mutants there is relevant to my mission, and you know already that I can’t tell you more about that.” For a moment, Sheinberg was silent. The cigarette smoke still ghosted about their feet, their last wisps crawling along the quarter-inch of windless space before being caught up and lost in the updraft. A car honked below and a dull voice called back angrily. “Okay,” Sheinberg said thinly, spreading a hand on the concrete ledge and drumming his fingers. “Let’s try something else. You know anything about history?” “You’re too general.” “You’re dodging me. We’re talking about mutants, so I pretty obviously mean mutant history. What do you know about it? And don’t”—he held up a hand quickly—“don’t give me names; I could not give less of a shit about who you’ve tracked and brought down. Tell me why you had to do that in the first place.” Shiloh stared him down. The man could cut glass with those eyes. “You really don’t understand why we’re here, do you?” Shaking his head, Shiloh pulled his lighter out again and a box of cigarettes of his own. “I don’t understand what you want, that’s for sure.” Sheinberg rolled his bony shoulders out to his wrists, a single fluid motion, and steadied his stance as if readying for a debate. Unperturbed, Shiloh lit another cigarette. “World War III. It starts there and should’ve ended there. You know mutants were weapons at first, right?” “Still are,” Shiloh murmured threateningly. “Not often. They started as just beefed-up humans, you know. Little genetic enhancements to make them better killers. Then people started making them more animalistic, bigger, carnivorous, real monsters. Those were weapons, Shiloh Starts-With-An-M. We’re fuckin’ lucky they didn’t survive that long.” He watched Shiloh’s hands hide in his jacket pockets shamelessly. “The Second Geneva Convention banned the technology in war but nowhere else—common misconception is that it was banned all over then and there, but it actually took ‘til 2069 for the general ban to be signed by every country. This incredible military technology to alter genomes however the hell you so choose suddenly passed from government to private hands. That’s where the more artistic mutants came from that inspired the ones you track today. The twenty-first century anthropomorphic fantasies. Did you know, Shiloh that in the 2050s, the mutant population of the United States was almost as high as the population of African slaves before the civil war? Millions of specially-made, designer, often intelligent beings passed around like shiny new toys. Guard dogs, sexual objects, pets—ever heard of Red Norton? He was a mutant actor made specifically for a series of horror movies in the early 2040s—who existed solely as property. They never had any rights to take when they were made illegal. It was like rounding up assault rifles after the ban.” Shiloh’s expression was dead. “You know, some bars and cafés host trivia nights. You’d be a champion.” “As soon as the ban went into effect,” Sheinberg continued, cutting over the last of his words, “traffickers started scrambling for the mutants. I’m sure you know more about that than I do, Mr. Tracker. What you might not know is the schism it caused among the global trafficking networks—who would move mutants, who could keep them, who’d deal in their technology. The Ramheart was one of the first underground sanctuaries and it split pretty quickly with the rest of the trafficking network. You know the name Marise Williams?” “The cryptographer, yes.” “The same. She founded it right before she died.” Shiloh took the cigarette from his mouth. “That I didn’t know,” he admitted, pointing with it. “It’s her work that started the incredible web of secrecy that you’ve been navigating for… how long now?” “The better part of two years.” Sheinberg drew himself upright, spreading his arms. “And here you are.” “Yes.” “Looking for one mutant in particular.” “Yes.” “And not for personal reasons. I can only assume, from what I know of you, that they’re connected to one of the traffickers you hunt.” “That’s as much as I can tell you.” Sheinberg put his fists on his hips, tapping a foot. “I don’t like it. I don’t at all.” “Does that matter?” Shiloh asked, cigarette hanging forgotten in his fingers. “My intentions are not to harm the mutant, only to question it. This might be important to you but, to me, this is just another part of another investigation.” “Does that matter?” Sheinberg retorted. He rubbed his cheek and sighed. “Listen. I’m torn on you. I can tell you don’t mean harm to my organization, but you’re… I think you’re a force of nature, man. You religious?” “I am.” “Right, Jewish.” “No, Kirian.” Sheinberg grimaced politely. “The Odd Gods, huh?” “Does it bother you?” “No, but I really don’t know much about it.” Rubbing his chin, he queried, “You guys have a chaos goddess, right?” Shiloh nodded. “Alad, goddess of both order and chaos. I—consider her my patron deity, even among the pantheon,” he added hesitantly. “I consider myself an agent of her peace, balancing the natural chaos of the world.” Sheinberg stayed silent and Shiloh dropped his cigarette, smothering it with the toe of his shined leather shoe. “I don’t often talk of my religion.” “I can tell,” Sheinberg said gently. He blew his cheeks out in a sigh. “All right, Shiloh. I’ll cut you a deal.” He held out his hand, the red card pinned to his palm, and Shiloh shook it. “I’ll grant you access for one night and one night only; you go straight to the mutant you’re looking for, make your contact, and get out. Not that I think you’re one to linger. And”—he held up a finger—“if the mutant doesn’t want to go with you, you have to respect that.” Shiloh nodded. “Those are fair terms. I can’t promise that I won’t contact your network again, though.” “Contacting us is fine, just leave the poor buggers at the Ramheart alone. They’ve been through enough.” He let go of the red card, letting it flap against Shiloh’s palm, and took back his hand. “Good luck, Shiloh.” “Thank you.” Without warning or explanation Sheinberg rubbed his nose and said, “How familiar are you with the history of tobacco? Fascinating crop. A quintessential item in American trade for centuries.” With a small snort of amusement, Shiloh pocketed the card. “Do go on.” Sheinberg swung his jacket over his shoulder and led the way back to the stairwell, chatting blithely and emptily of colonial American trade policy as they reentered the building. The rooftop seemed to sigh, relieved of tension, and the AC unit rattled once when the door closed. A rooftop away, a different AC unit opened and a slim figure stepped out carefully. She straightened her shirt over the listening device and made her way inside. In another building, a less subtle eavesdropper lowered his amplifier from the open window, grumbling about audio quality. The sniper atop the skyscraper lowered his weapon in relief and the sniper trained on him half a district away finally relaxed her grip on her own gun. Contact made, mission complete; Shiloh emerged from the bank a few minutes later and caught the downtown bus on the street corner. Sheinberg watched him leave from his office window, worried truly that he’d let on to too many secrets, shown too much vulnerability, damned himself with his nerves. A scarecrow playing brave to the tornado. He rubbed his nose again—maybe he should quit smoking.