#v late in a world where i've inverted time

[thegreatobsesso]

HELLO I MISS YOU!! Tell me what Callie and Riley and everyone have been up to lately. I need my fix.

I... fffffcuking adore you. ☺️☺️☺️ I miss you too, I think about you and your OCs all the time and I mean to catch up on what you have been up to soon. I've been all over the place lately. 👻

Right now as of where I am in draft two, Callie is at Delaney, helping defeat magical racism and learning how nice it feels to be a part of a group and do good things. She's getting really close to figuring out how to actually belong somewhere and be authentic instead of playing a role she thinks people will find impressive.

Riley is somewhere else, helping the magical racists do terrible science experiments on magicians in the hopes that she can use the results to rid herself of her own magic. Meanwhile, she's also courting their enemies, the magic supremacists, to discover the key to longer life because the fucked up experiments she's doing might just kill her before she manages to discover the secrets she's looking for.

During this phase of the books they only interact twice, both times via the telephone. I'll share the first one because it's a personal favorite. :D

Adding my tag list because I never use it anymore and quite frankly, I don't know why.

@avrablake​ @adie-dee​ @dontjudgemeimawriter​ @ryorine​ @thelaughingstag​ @winterandwords​ @afoolandathief​ @asomeoneperson​ @cedar-west​ @diphthongsfordays​ @lowslore​ @poetinprose​ @cilly-the-writer​​​​​​​​ @harps-for-days

Callie POV

It wasn’t a big deal. It really, honestly wasn’t.

She dialed, and waited. One ring. Two rings. She wasn’t going to answer and hell, that was probably for the best. 

Three rings, four rings. And actually, this was fine, it was- 

“Hello?” 

Fuck, shit, fuck.

She sounded the same. Riley was on the other end of the line sounding the same, the same way she sounded in Callie’s head.

“Hi,” she managed. “It’s... Callie.” 

A pause. “Oh.” 

This was a mistake, a terrible mistake, what was she supposed to- 

“It’s been awhile. Why are you calling?” 

She swallowed the growl in the back of her throat. No need for niceties anyway, she didn’t call to chit-chat and she didn’t need to pretend otherwise, didn’t want to prolong this, so, fine. “I’m calling because I need your help,” she said. 

Silence on the other end of the line except for some distant clicking, metal on glass. “Do you?” 

Two syllables - how could someone inject so much infuriating presumption into two syllables? She could hear one of Riley's eyebrows go up, a perfect inverted V. 

"We do," she modified quickly. “The world's going to shit, and we're trying to..." 

Subvert the government? Fuck the police? How could she convey this without saying it outright? 

“Is this about SISA?” 

“Maybe,” she decided on. She couldn’t tell everything, not over the phone and not to a heartless, manipulative bitch who’d feed her own babies to the wolves. “We're trying to help, and we could use you." She bit her tongue. "Please,” she managed begrudgingly.

"Why me?" Riley asked evenly. “You call me out of the blue when I’m sure Simon Bennett could have a hundred scientists by his side in a second if he asked for them. You’re asking me. Why?” 

Ooh, she hadn’t figured it out - what a wonderful surprise. "Because it's about me," she said, a flutter of pleasure in her stomach at being out ahead for once. "And nobody knows more about how I work than you do." 

Silence, again - pornographically satisfying silence, and she wished so dearly she could see Riley's face, watch her try not to look interested. How strange, that they spent so little time together and still, Riley's micro-expressions were burned into her memory in merciless detail. Even now when she tried to picture Bennett, he came to her like a cartoon. Two-dimensional; heavy lines and exaggerated features. Riley was a living photograph. Why was that? 

“I’m actually intrigued,” she admitted, with an edge to her voice that almost made Callie believe it. “But I can’t.” 

"Why not?" 

"Because I've got a life of my own," Riley said simply. "And as helpful as you were to me in a single point in time, it doesn't revolve around you." 

Her cheeks caught fire. Tears welled up out of nowhere and she blinked furiously, gripping the phone hard enough to snap it in two. 

"Fine," she gulped. "Eat shit and die then, we’ll do it without you.” 

"Callie," Riley said, just as she was about to hang up and possibly throw the phone across the room. "How are you?" 

She misheard - must've. "What?"

"Are you okay?" 

Nothing could've pinned her to the spot quite like that simple question, with seemingly no ulterior motive to fuel it. Was she okay? 

“Y-yeah," she stammered, like a fucking idiot. "I guess so. Um. How are you?" 

A pause. "I'm alright,” Riley said. The sides of her face tingled. "Take care of yourself, Callie." 

The line went dead, but she sat there holding the phone anyway. 

One time at Bible camp, she jumped into a lake from twenty feet up without plugging her nose and she swore water shot straight up into her brain. She surfaced gagging and crying, water and snot streaming down her chin. It burned all the way through her skull, just like this. 

Yikes, Bennett sent across the bridge, even though he wouldn't have really said that word, it was just that sort of feeling, sympathetic surprise. That bad? 

She hung up the phone numbly. Fire-water, all the way up in her brain. 

what is wrong with me, she sent. She felt fucked up. She refused to qualify it any further. 

Bennett, on the other end of the bridge, was busy measuring his words with extraordinary caution. You wouldn’t be the first, he said carefully. 

She wiped at her eyes furiously. first to what. 

To... you know. Fall for somebody that’s bad for you. 

Screeching brakes. Spinning wheels. Her brain flipped off the side of the road. I HAVEN’T I DIDN’T I DON’T I’M NOT-

Okay, okay. Bennet backed away. We’ll figure this out without her, don’t worry. 

She wasn’t worried, not about that. For a hot second she wasn’t even worried about Grace anymore. She was really only worried about how utterly fucked she was and didn’t even know it until just now.

[memento-fugaces]

Winter of the Harmony Shoal Chapter 3: time to regroup

That evening, Osgood was attempting to make herself something new but such plans quickly fled as the ingredients amassed into some subversive force. Defeated, though not altogether too much annoyed, she resorted to preparing something simpler instead. She was in her apartment, a small, messy thing cramped intimately with decoration and a good distance from the Thames. It was a comfortable, if shabby, affair furnished lavishly, dimly lit, almost alive.

Once she had eaten, this wonderfully pleasant, unplanned meal she glanced toward her phone, noticing a new message; this took her by surprise, a relatively misanthropic wont having afforded an affable seclusion. Briefly, her attention diverted itself to a ramshackle stacking of books that she stared blankly at for a few minutes as her mind panicked slightly.

She theorised liberally about all manner of esoterica from work, especially the recent Harmony Shoal stuff. A flurry of speculation discarded ideas with as little reluctance as it took them up; facts were blatantly connected but reason unapparent. Truant truth was needed to explain those very strangest of circumstances that could steal away a brain leaving behind only a translucent trail, that had gripped Kate so.

On reading the text a flash flood of panic susbsumed her with worry for her friend, releasing her after its course. While Kate was struggling presently, she realised, the severity of danger would be rather heightened inspiring her own concerned desire for action. The sparse body spoke of urgency but this left her little to act on. Therefore, she could do little but linger sleepless and dispirited. Soon reaching the uneasy compromise of slumber that hardened her resolve to be of use the next day.

She woke early in an effort to be of use. Speculating the cause of this led her to make copies of most potentially useful UNIT files. She had to see Kate but the agreed time was hours yet. What could she have found? How was she? The text had been sent only shortly after they'd run into eachother so the Harmony Shoal case was a likely cause but it was best not to be too certain of any unproven hypothesis. She packed for the journey, ensuring to bring her laptop, a spare inhaler, anything even possibly useful- a first aid kit, some eccelctic paper documents, an old unused pocket diary, anything. She sat still for the eternity of a split second. Despite the early hour, she left in agaitation and grabbed a book to read in wait.

Unusually, Kate had been late if only by a few minutes or so. They sat adjacent on a plank of damp oak supported by dark legs of wrought iron. The smell of petrichor faintly coated all.

'Every night and every morn some to misery are born,' Kate stated.

'Every morn and every night some are born to sweet delight, every morn and every night some are born to sweet delight, every morn and every night some are born to endless night,' came the reply.

'Sorry about that, had to be sure it was you. The shibboleth is from a poem, you know, Blake but I know it from Agatha Christie. It's her favourite of hers.'

'You're trying to distract me or maybe even yourself from whatever you found. It's one of my favourites too.'

'Of hers or in general?'

'Both'

'I had to check because Harmony Shoal seem able to infitrate by replacing people, unnoticed. Remember that scar tissue you noticed,' she admitted.

'That's quite a lot. You're sure?'

'Absolutely. In fact, based on the fluid you found, I think it might be a biological mechanism.'

'Have you got everything you need from The Towe? We'll need some other location to return to after this.'

'You're right, sorry: I haven't been thinking straight. Someone trying to follow me here was a concern.'

Unhesitatingly, Osgood queried 'Have you got anything you need from home? It's probably best not to go back.'

'Some people were there last night so I haven't but there's nothing much important.'

'Do you have enough pills?' she quickly asked.

'I'll manage.'

Uncontented, Osgood looked through her bag to produce a packet and thrust it toward her. 'I've got some, you gave me them. If you haven't had any this morning, I have some water and biscuits so you can now.' She recieved them after a look shaded by worry.

'Thank you,' she responded to this gesture of care. 'I tried to get anything useful onto a USB stick but there wasn't enough time.'

'I've already got whatever I could find. We should go now; got anywhere in mind.'

'It's not great but there's a place near the docks. We can go more and share more information later,' she decided readily.

In a clearing of thick, unpruned trees, Kate informed her, 'Not far now. I should tell you, the enterance is a bit complicated. There was a proper way in but that was filled in decades ago. ' They approached a non-descript statue that glared with hard ivory eyes. Kate held a steady, secure gait as they walked past, while her companion looked about, curious as a herpetologist. It was not exactly the image of London. An increasingly convuluted path was enshrined by corridors of layered vegetation. Kate completed a series of motions before finally putting aside a large, rock-like door. It was still well over a few meters away but the drowning tension seemed to have fallen seveal orders. A new, ambivalent silence accompanied them down corridor after corridor until they arrived in an underwhelmingly unkempt room.

Invasive weeds tore up the acutely moulded paneling, exposing a firm, stony foundation. They viciously clawed their way up the lowest inches of the slightly irregular walls. I reeked of confined age, equally visible by the paint-stripped walls. A single remote corner was furnished, lonely as a sole mourner. Wherever they were was fortified against sound, dampening the outside world and insulated from the deepest of winter.

'It's not exactly an oasis,' Kate acknowledged, 'but it should be safe. There's no information about this emergency location in the UNIT database. As far as anyone knows, this whole place was filled in years ago.'

'It is quite dishevelled, although a somehat appealing abandonment,' she observed.

'I'm going to find out who was surrounding my house last night to get some estimate of their influence. See if you can find anything new based on what we know now.' Each adorned the room with their efforts, leaving belongings strung messily about the place.

Abruptly, Kate pronounced discovery that, 'From what I've found, it sounds like it was the Volunteer Fire Department. The organisation seems at odds with itself so infiltrating them is no great indication of power. Found anything interesting?'

Merilly they exchanged notes, ideas, thoughts freed from the danger if only by beckoning it closer, while Osgood glanced over her commonplace book. She realised over a few scrupulous reviews of the latest few pages, 'There slogan is Here to Open Your Minds.' After a brief, bleak laugh she continued, 'A bit on the nose. Though from their actions I'd say they're quite good at knowing how much to reveal. It seems anything remotely useful was removed from the file.'

'I suppose we know where not to look. Lucky then,' she smiled with a discreet pride, 'I still have access to most UNIT.' She motioned Osgood to an arrangement of numbers and letters, nearly without refrain, that formed logs. 'We should be able to look for anomalies, any changes. I'm going over everything since when the offices were shut down.

'In the meantime, we ought to look back over what we've done. See if we've missed anything.'

Osgood countered that, 'It's already getting late: just getting here took a while and we've been here ages. We should rest for now.'

Kate posited, 'It's fine. You can go to sleep and I'll just keep on for now.' Noting Osgood appealing expression she reassured, 'I'll be fine.'

'You need sleep too,' she replied with an articulation of care that Kate momentarily found as ineffable as the inevitable.

'Okay,' she conceded.

'Good night, have a good sleep,' wished both, each mutually assuring the other they would survive this. Thhe air was thick, its water content having gone minutely rancid over years of near disuse that made sleep an effort.