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umbry-fic · 3 years

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To Wish Upon a Lantern

Summary: In the midst of their journey, Lloyd and Colette visit a new town and decide to participate in their lantern festival.

Fandom: Tales of Symphonia Characters: Lloyd Irving, Colette Brunel, Original Character Relationships: Colette Brunel/Lloyd Irving Rating: G Word Count: 3266 Mirror Link: AO3 Original Post Date: 22/06/2021

Notes: Fluff fic with a little bit of angst! Written for @frayed-symphony's birthday!

~~~

“Look at these, Lloyd! They’re so pretty!” Colette exclaimed next to Lloyd. She was pointing out the tiny charms on display in the pop-up cart in the middle of the bustling marketplace. “I wonder what they are,” Colette mused.

“They kinda look like a chef’s hat to me,” Lloyd replied, leaning down to get a closer look at the charms. “You know, the one Professor Raine wore sometimes when trying to cook, just without the folded ridges? It’s even pure white in colour.”

The design resembled a cuboid with an open bottom from which a tassel protruded out, the individual strands all ramrod straight without a kink or tangle in sight. The top of the cuboid transitioned seamlessly into a pyramid-like shape, the same string that made up the tassel extending upwards out of the top of the pyramid, tied into a complicated system of knots. Trying to follow the string down its path made Lloyd’s head hurt. At the end of it all, the string formed a loop, perfect for hanging the charm up on furniture. Threaded on the string above and below the “chef’s hat” were two gems, sunlight reflecting off their polished surfaces and making them sparkle.

“I see what you’re saying.” Colette picked up one of the charms by the loop of string, pursing her lips as her fingers rubbed at the knot. It was a rather satisfying feeling. “But I don’t think a chef’s hat would be important enough to a town for it to be everywhere.”

“True.”

By everywhere, Colette truly meant everywhere. Lloyd had seen multiple variants of this charm at other stalls, some with different colours, some with and without the gems on the strings, some with even more complicated knot designs, some with words printed on the side, some without strings altogether and instead using clasps and hooks, perhaps to better attach the charm to clothing and bags. But it wasn’t just products in the marketplace. He’d seen it in murals painted on the walls of this town, and even walked past some children making a larger version.

“The details are incredible…” Lloyd muttered, feeling the material of the charm. It looked to be folded out of paper at first sight, but the texture wasn’t remotely like it. He wanted to ask the stall owner how he’d folded something so intricate and yet so small.

"Ah, young man, looking to buy one of the lantern charms?"

Speak of the devil! Lloyd nearly jumped out of his skin, gaze snapping up to find that the jovial, bearded stall owner was now right in front of him. The last Lloyd saw of him, he’d been engaged in a fervent discussion with another patron, and that had been just moments ago. How had such a large figure manoeuvred in front of him without any noise at all?!

“No, no! Just window shopping at the moment!” Lloyd quickly clarified, acutely aware of how light the sack of Gald in his pocket was.

“Lanterns? These are lanterns?” Colette interjected, head cocked and hands clasped before her chest. “I’ve never seen lanterns like these before…” When she heard the word “lantern”, she thought of fragile glass and cold metal grips, a flame burning with the faint whiff of kerosene, chasing away the foreboding darkness of winding caverns.

“Ah, I thought you might not be locals. I’ve never seen you around before.”

“Yeah, we’re just passing through. Never been to this town in Sylvarant before, so we thought why not?” Lloyd replied.

“It’s always nice to see travellers now that the Desians are gone,” the shopkeeper said with a hearty chuckle, his smile hidden by bushy black bristles. “To answer your question, young lady, these are indeed lanterns. It has been this town’s proud tradition to make these lanterns and hold an annual festival involving them, where we send them to the Goddess above. Though we’ve only been able to do so again with the Chosen's success. We’re actually holding our second one tonight!”

“A festival?” Colette squealed, clapping her hands together. If she weren’t in the middle of town and surrounded by dozens of other people who could clearly see her, Lloyd thought to himself with a smile, she certainly would have started jumping up and down on the balls of her feet like an excited child.

For that was precisely who she was allowed to be, now that she no longer had to labour under the title of Chosen. The child that had been buried for so long in favour of performing her duty could now come to the forefront. She could show her excitement over experiencing all the strange and delightful customs of each town they came across, whether it be Sylvaranti or Tethe'allan. And it was always so endearing to witness, the clear delight on her face, and it gave Lloyd even more motivation to continue this journey across the reunited world. Both to collect the Exspheres, and to let Colette experience everything this beautiful world had to offer, now that it was no longer denied from her.

“Yes. Everyone is encouraged to participate! All you need to do is purchase one of the lanterns, light it up, and release it into the sky! You can even write custom messages on the sides. Most people choose to write wishes, such that the Goddess can grant them.”

“That sounds wonderful.” Colette’s eyes were shining just as brightly as the gems on the cart. Lloyd was sure that she had built a vivid picture of the festival in her mind, what with her bright imagination honed from years of daydreaming as she sat within the cold walls of the Church of Martel, wanting desperately to escape but only able to do so in her head.

A festival sounded like a wonderful experience to him as well. All festivals were, events that exuded a magical aura as all types of people, strangers, friends, lovers and family alike, came together in one place just to celebrate and have a fun time. He hadn’t gotten to participate in that many, but he’d love to go to more.

"Lloyd, do you want to go?" Colette asked, nudging him in the side.

That was all it took for Lloyd's smile to slip into a small frown. Colette's terrible habit was rearing its ugly head again.

It had taken him a while to pick up on it, to learn to parse through what was innate to Colette’s personality and what was Chosen behaviour. But once he did, it was rather hard to ignore. The accursed mention of “Lloyd, do you want to…” had started to grate on his nerves - she’d done it with regards to the summer festival at Mizuho, and the newly revamped Altamiran theme park, and likely a thousand other times throughout all the years he’d known her that he hadn’t noticed. Asking was all fine and dandy, but only if she expressed her own desires first.

She always did this. Disguised her desires in the form of questions posed to others, too afraid to just do things for herself. She still thought she needed justification to let loose and just enjoy herself, despite her own happiness being justification enough.

Time to flip her question on its head.

"Do you want to go? To release a lantern?" he countered, eyes narrowing as he held her in a stare.

"Uh - uh, I -" Colette stuttered, fumbling at the unexpected turn of conversation, unable to look away from those intense russet eyes. "Well, we're low on Gald! And you did say you wanted to make it back to Iselia by next week, so if we stay a night -"

"That's not what I asked," he interrupted, taking hold of her hand. He didn't like being this forceful with her, but it was required. She needed to learn to ask for herself, and giving excuses was not the way. "I asked if you wanted to."

There was silence as Colette bowed her head, her hair hiding her face. It was but moments later that she raised it again, uncertainty painted across her face. "I… Would like to go... With you… And release a lantern together," she whispered haltingly, like it hurt to get the words out, shy blue eyes meeting his again. For her, it likely did, battling against her instinct to swallow the words down and the fear that there would be retribution, whether from invisible priests or the world at large.

There would be no retribution, not if he had anything to say about it. He squeezed her hand, giving her an affirming nod.

That's it. I’m so proud of you.

A small smile graced her face.

"Then it's settled!" Lloyd declared with gusto, turning back to the stall owner, who’d been watching the whole exchange in silence. “Uh, except the cost. How much is it?” He expected he’d have to haggle; they really didn’t have much Gald left. But no matter how, by hook or by crook, he would make this happen.

The stall owner burst into roaring laughter, slamming a hand on the cart. “For you two, free of charge!”

“What, really?” Lloyd blurted out, hardly able to believe his ears. Surely this was a deal that was too good to be true?

“Yes, really! Take it as payment for putting such a large smile on my face. Go down to the fields at sundown. I’ll meet the two of you there with a lantern. In return, spread the news of our festival to your friends! And if you choose to return next year, you can pay the full price.”

“Thank you so much, mister!” Colette said. “We’ll be sure to tell all our friends! I’m sure they’ll love the idea so much that they’ll all turn up next year!”

“Ha! I like the sound of that!”

Confirming the details of the meetup, Lloyd thanked the stall owner profusely before walking away hand-in-hand with Colette.

“He was very nice,” Colette muttered.

“That he was. So we shouldn’t waste the opportunity.”

Colette mumbled her agreement, that small smile still on her face, soothing Lloyd’s worry that he might have pushed her too far.

There was still the issue of lunch, though. His stomach was growling, and Colette must have been hungry from all the walking they’d done in the morning. But this time, he’d cut her some slack. He couldn’t expect change to occur immediately - it would take time, possibly years.

“Want to go get lunch at that place we saw down the road that sells dumplings? We’ve never tried it before, and Sheena said it was good.”

Receiving Colette’s enthusiastic agreement, (and spotting the relieved slump of her shoulders,) they set off, their fingers tightly locked together. And after lunch, there would be enough time to explore this town to the fullest.

~~~

Colette stood back on the grassy hill, watching the stall owner (whose name she still hadn’t learned), kneeling on the ground and carefully lighting a match. Lloyd stood slightly closer, observing with a keen eye. He was most likely trying to figure out the craftsmanship of the lantern; he’d been obsessed since he’d first seen the charms. She was more interested in the knot, and would likely be spending an afternoon at Dirk’s playing with string trying to recreate it. She didn’t think that would end very well, and a lot of untangling from Dirk and Lloyd’s end would be required, but it would be fun!

Standing too close to the stall owner ran the risk of her accidentally starting a fire, and that would have horrific consequences on plains of short grass such as these, so she was going to keep a safe distance.

As agreed, she and Lloyd had met up with the stall owner at the rolling hills behind the town, though not before exploring every nook and cranny of the town, with its curving arches and winding, narrow streets, watching the children play games with toys she had never seen before and having the honour of joining in. The stall owner had been in the process of unfolding a compact square of an unknown material, unveiling a lantern that was half her height and fitting it with something that resembled a lamp without the glass covering. (How did that fit into a small square?) After which, he’d lent them brushes whose tips were drenched in dark red ink, asking them to write whatever they wanted on the side of the lantern.

Enraptured with the idea of granting wishes, she had written the first thing that had come to mind before she lost her courage to do so. Lloyd had smiled after seeing her wish, choosing not to write another and only adding his name under hers, causing her to giggle as she tried her best not to trip and dot him in ink.

The sun had still been peeking over the hill when they’d arrived here, but in the time it had taken to finish their preparations, it had sunk out of sight, leaving behind only a harsh pink that was quickly being chased away by sparkling stars.

“It’s done!” the stall owner called out, standing up while keeping a secure grip on the side of the lantern. The fire was contained inside the lantern, causing the sides to be lit up in gentle orange light and the tiny words to stick out in harsh red. She’d noticed that quite a lot of things in this town were red. Maybe it was an auspicious colour to them?

Colette ran over to join Lloyd, accepting the lantern from the stall owner so that she was holding one side and Lloyd was holding the other, standing across from her. She could feel the heat of the flame licking at her fingers, chasing away the chill of the night. The lantern was fighting to escape her hold, the surge of hot air doing its absolute best to propel it towards the heavens, where it belonged.

“You can let go at any time,” the stall owner clarified. “Once that’s done, you can sit here and watch your lantern for as long as you want! I’ll be joining my family and giving you two some alone time now.”

“Thank you, mister!” Colette called out after the diminishing silhouette of the stall owner, until he disappeared amongst the throng of others. It seemed like the entire town and then some had turned up for the festival, populating the plains with head upon head. Somehow, upon this one hill, they were the only two present, free to soak in each other’s company.

“On the count of 3?” Lloyd offered, drawing her attention back to him. The flickering flame of the lantern cast him in the same orange light, the tips of his hair catching most of it and rendering the strands an even lighter brown, the features of his face soft while his lower half was covered in twisting shadow. A truly magical sight.

“Okay.”

“1…”

“2…” she joined in.

“3!” they cheered together, throwing the lantern into the sky and angling their heads up to watch.

The lantern rose fast into the sky, wobbling a little in its journey but remaining steadfast. The weather was good today, with no hint of a raincloud and only a gentle breeze that would pose no problems. Theirs was one of the first lanterns, joining the dozen that had already made their way into the clear sky to play by the moon, darkness having fully fallen.

Feeling a tug on her sleeve, she found that Lloyd had settled himself on the grass and was gesturing for her to join him. She did just that, the two of them sitting in silence side-by-side for a few minutes as more and more people released their lanterns.

"Sorry if I was too hard on you in the morning," Lloyd whispered, finally breaking the silence as he pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead.

"No, it was necessary," she replied, taking his hand and squeezing. "You were just trying to help me. Besides, you've more than made up for it today. And I know I need to start thinking about myself more. It's just… Hard.”

It was difficult, to push past the echoes of the priests in her mind, telling her that as Chosen she had to conduct herself with the utmost grace and not indulge in cravings. That accepting gifts from others were already pushing the line, not to mention asking for things. It wasn’t proper.

“I'm -"

"Stop right there," Lloyd interjected, pressing a finger against her lips, a slightly exasperated smile on his face. “No apologising for what isn’t your fault, remember?”

“Ah, right! I’m - Okay, I’m just going to stop talking,” Colette muttered with flushed cheeks, clapping her hand over her mouth as she let her head fall onto his shoulder. She’d gotten better, but whenever she fell back into one habit, she tended to fall into all of them at once.

At least she could stop herself now. And she wanted to shed those behaviours, not only for herself, but to stop seeing the sad frown on Lloyd’s face. He continued to blame himself for not catching on sooner, for unknowingly encouraging those habits, when it wasn’t his fault.

Lloyd chuckled, leaning his head on hers. “It’s alright. I know it’s not going to be easy, but all you need to do is take baby steps. And I’ll be here to help you.”

“I know you will.”

“Let’s just enjoy the view now, shall we?”

“Mm.”

Above them, there were a thousand pinpricks of light as the lanterns rose into the sky. So many and so dense that they seemed to outnumber the stars themselves, though she knew that was impossible. Or perhaps the lanterns were golden stars, each holding a precious wish that its owner hoped could come true with all their heart, prayed would reach the Goddess. It almost reminded her of gazing up at the grand chandelier adorned with candles that hung in the sanctum of the Church, but instead of a sight that filled her heart with melancholy, the sight before her now was a breathtaking and uplifting one, even if she knew there was no Goddess in the sky.

For surely, if this many people came together with a common dedication, a miracle could still occur to grant these wondrous wishes.

She could barely see their lantern now - it was both lost among the crowd and too high up, the words she’d written on it too far away to make out. But they were still held in her heart.

I wish that I can continue exploring this incredible world together with you.

Mayhap it was a selfish wish. It would have been more appropriate for the Chosen to wish for the good of the world. But she wasn’t the Chosen anymore. Besides, she was sure other people had made such a wish. And… If the wishes contained within all these lanterns were to come true, would the world not be a better, happier place? Would there not be a brighter tomorrow awaiting all of them?

“I’d like to come back next year,” she said, trying her best to push out the desires in her heart, to stop battling against guilt that she knew she should not need to feel. “Maybe with all of our friends?”

“That sounds like a wonderful idea.”

Maybe my wish will be different next year.

She snuggled closer into Lloyd’s warmth, enjoying the feel of his arms around her, both a comforting blanket and an impregnable shield.

I don’t think it will.

#fanfiction #tales of symphonia #colloyd #colette brunel #lloyd irving #one shot

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songfell-ut · 4 years

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Chapter 1, I suppose

...Hello! It looks like this thing is on. So. Hi.

I am posting this because I saw an Undertale comic by @lostmypotatoes on one of those dub channels, and it was such a neat and unfinished concept that I started writing an original story based on it. Then I contacted her and she was super sweet about my thievery and I was like ha ha too bad I didn’t make this a UT fic and now I wrote this too.

I don’t know any of the usual formatting or etiquette for posting fic on here because I’m old and don’t do stuff. Sorry! (I signed up here for this very purpose.) It’s...good gravy, almost 7,000 words. Anyway! Here you go, let me know if I should look into Witchfell I don’t know I just did him Underfell but there’s witches

*takes Valium*

~~~

"Make way! The High Priestess approaches!"

The monster sat up in his prison cell, focusing on a slim figure coming down the stairs. In the room's single witchlight, he could make out a few details: a black gown with a narrow skirt that flared over the stone floor, a spiked headdress, and a long, dark veil over her features. The orange pinpricks of his eyes narrowed.

The guards stood at attention as the priestess approached the cell, her head high and her hands demurely folded. "Make haste, men!" barked the captain. "Secure the creature! Tighten those bonds!"

She stopped just short of the bars as the guards made a show of pulling levers on either side of the cell, stretching the chains tighter on the monster's limbs. "How long has he been here?" she asked.

"Three days, my lady," the captain said, "but he has refused all of his meals."

The priestess looked steadily at the captive monster. "Does he have a name?"

"He calls himself 'Sans,' my lady," the captain replied.

The High Priestess' headdress tilted to one side. "You know, Captain, wood and iron bars cannot hold a boss monster," she said quietly.

The men jumped as the monster snorted—as much as a skeleton could do so. "Funny, I told 'em the same t'ing," he said, his voice rough and painfully loud in the tiny space.

The captain gripped his sword hilt with one hand. "Silence, monster!" he snapped.

"No, let him speak," said the priestess.

Sans grinned wider, baring huge, jagged teeth. Though he remained sitting, he towered over the humans on the other side of the bars, especially the young woman. "How generous of you, witch," he said mockingly. "Tell me, how may I repay your kindness? Let you take my SOUL? Harvest my magic? Or add me to yer evil little collection?"

The guards muttered to each other in dismay. "How dare you speak to her with such disrespect?" demanded their captain. "She is the High Priestess of this realm, and you will address her as such!"

"Wow, what a loyal dog. You heard 'er, I get to talk," retorted the skeleton. He glared down at the priestess, ignoring the captain's sputtering. "Now, witch. Tell me. What are ya gonna do t'me? I ain't very fond of surprises. My heart can't take it." He placed his bony palm on his chest. "Grant me this one kindness, ya magic thief."

The High Priestess did not move. "Captain. Free him."

Sans lifted the equivalent of an eyebrow as the men gasped. "High Priestess," protested the captain.

"Release the bonds," she said.

The captain swallowed. "Is this a wise—"

"Free him, now." The woman's hands dropped to her sides as the guards reluctantly pushed the levers back up. "Sans, I'd like to make you my apprentice," she told the bemused skeleton. "In return, I will give you your freedom."

Stunned silence hung in the air. "You want me to be your apprentice?" the monster repeated. He looked at her, and he threw his head back and roared with laughter.

The captain bristled, moving in front of the woman with his sword drawn, then stepping back at her murmured command. The other men winced as the monster's laughter echoed off the walls. "Stars! That is rich!" Sans slapped his thighbone. "Ya know," he said, more conversationally, "I'd be less offended if ya dragged me out an' forced me to be yer slave."

Suddenly, his grin had no humor in it. The priestess tensed as the monster reached up to grasp his collar. "Do ya think I'm stupid? Me as your apprentice, witch? Please, don't fool yerself with your own lies!" The collar shattered, crumbling to dust. He gave another laugh, eyes glowing a hellish orange. "But I guess I should thank you for the opportunity," he said savagely. "'Cause now I'm going to—"

The air around him exploded in white-hot flame as the monster's voice rose to a bellow of "KILL YOU ALL!"

Power raced through the skeleton in scintillating waves, lighting the cell as bright as a hot day. Now Sans could do what he'd dreamed of since that first human sorcerer had caught him unawares: murder everyone in his path. There were so many possibilities! Fire was fun, but usually worked too fast. He could always tear them limb from limb, but that was messy and labor-intensive. Then there was blue magic, which turned them into stupid, flailing rag dolls, easy to pick up and impossible to put d—

A twinge of suspicion interrupted his musings. Where was the screaming, or the sound of fleeing footsteps? Sans lowered his aura until he could see the room clearly, and what he saw chilled him to his very SOUL.

His attack hadn't killed anyone. It hadn't even singed them. The cell's bars had disintegrated, but now a translucent golden haze stretched from floor to ceiling, and his magic was splashing off it like raindrops off an umbrella. The guardsmen were bravely huddled by the stairs, slack-jawed but unharmed, while the High Priestess stood right where she'd been, hand raised and lips moving.

Sans was not quite so confident now. In fact, his first impulse was to run away screaming. This was the stuff a monster's nightmares were made of: he was trapped by a barrier.

Once upon a time, he'd tormented his brother with stories about a bad little skeleton who went out alone after dark, or talked to strangers, or didn't do his big brother's chores for him, and it always ended with the bad skeleton getting caught by a human. All monsters heard those bedtime stories and learned that there was no escape from barriers; not even the King was strong enough to break one, and just touching them would kill you. If you were lucky, the human would drag you off to be their slave, never to be seen again. If you weren't, they'd squeeze the magic from your body or snap your ribs open to dig your SOUL out, then leave you to die and let your dust blow away.

Panic closed over him like a shroud. He gathered all of his magic and threw himself into a shortcut out of the castle, only to strike an invisible wall and bounce right back into the cell. Shaking his head to clear it, Sans looked around and realized that the barrier had him boxed in on all sides.

Anger saved him, as it always had. In another moment, he wasn't afraid anymore; he was furious at his captors and their whole cheating, thieving, murdering, thoroughly worthless race.

And it was the worst possible moment for the priestess to open a small hole in the barrier and say, "Sans, please calm yourself. I don't want to hurt you."

She snapped the barrier shut half a second before a wickedly pointed bone thudded into it, the tip nearly touching her nose. "So be it," the young woman said tightly, and the bone evaporated as the barrier glowed brighter.

Sans knew better than to waste his energy in an all-out assault. Instead, the boss monster contemplated the force it'd take to punch through one small area around her neck or her heart. He might still be afraid, but every fiber of his being wanted that woman dead on the floor. So...

With a flick of his wrist, he summoned an array of massive, razor-sharp bones, almost too many for the cell to hold, and began firing them at blinding speed, one right after another. The priestess didn't react, but as he struck the same few inches of barrier over and over again, he saw bits of gold flake away, revealing a tiny crack.

He smirked, focusing his magic to hit harder and faster. So much for scary stories. Her people might have been glorifying her as some kind of mighty sorceress, but she was just another stupid human, witch or not. She'd raised her other hand to reinforce the spell, but more and more cracks were forming. You're boned, he thought, chuckling to himself.

Still, as he watched and waited for the golden light to shatter, he had to feel some grudging admiration. Most of the magic-wielding humans he'd killed were big, blustery men, and none of them had lasted half as long as this scrawny female. What kind of SOUL did the witch have, anyway? He'd seen just about every color there was, and figured she was stubborn enough to be purple, or maybe a patient cyan, or even orange for bravery. After all, he was throwing out everything he had, and she wasn't backing down. The skeleton squinted at her through the barrier, searching for the telltale spark of—ah, there it was. There...it...was.

For the second time, Sans looked at her and knew instantly that he was boned. Despite the ferocity of his attacks, the cracks in the barrier were starting to fill themselves in, and the air crackled with another surge of her magic. A merry little chorus of Shiiiiit shit shit shit rang in his head as he stared at her blazing-red SOUL, and it only got louder when he remembered what that color meant.

Determination.

It didn't matter that she was just a human. His intention to kill her was nothing compared to her will to live. As the bones he conjured came slower and weaker, dissolving as they hit the barrier, Sans knew with horrible certainty that he wasn't going to win.

The stories had to be true after all. Unless the priestess got careless and he could either kill her or use a shortcut, he was going to have to do whatever she wanted for as long as she said. But maybe, if he caught her off guard...

Sans let his arm drop. The last few bones clattered to the floor, and he sank to his knees, head bowed. Behind the High Priestess, the men all breathed a sigh of relief.

To her credit, the woman didn't let the spell go. She poked her head through for a better look at him, motioned to the guards to stay where they were, and knelt in front of the massive skeleton, halfway inside the barrier. "I'm not surprised that you wanted to escape. I can almost excuse you for trying," she said. Her voice was calm enough, and as far as he could tell with her veil on, her face was still expressionless.

He would have bought it if he hadn't noticed her hands clenching in her lap. "Almost?" the skeleton asked, head still lowered, eyes fixed on her.

"Almost."

He shrugged, watching her knuckles turn white. "Guess that's why yer the High Priestess, huh?"

"It is. None of my magic is stolen," she said.

"'Course not. Our power's no good in barriers. We ain't that stubborn, or that dumb," he added bitterly.

"My offer stands," she continued, as if he hadn't spoken. "Do you have any questions or conditions you'd like to propose?"

Sans glanced at her headdress. The spikes atop it dipped in and out of the golden curtain as her head drooped. She had to have expended most of her power holding him off; after several days with no food or sleep and then wasting all that effort on the barrier, he was pretty worn out himself. Too bad monsters couldn't take a human's magic, just her...

Her SOUL. It took all his self-control not to jump to his feet in excitement. Why the hell hadn't he thought of that? An ordinary monster who absorbed an ordinary human SOUL was supposed to grow incredibly powerful. What would happen if a boss monster gained all the power of a gifted and highly determined witch?

The High Priestess shook herself and sat up straighter. "Please answer me, Sans. I don't think either of us wants to go through that again."

"No," he admitted, shifting his weight back, edging toward the wall. Sure enough, she unconsciously moved closer, a few more inches into the cell. "I do have one question," he said, moving back again.

The woman frowned, scooting almost all the way out of the barrier. "What is it?"

He slowly, delicately reached down and tapped on her headdress, gentle as a light breeze. "Mind if I get a better look at ya?"

The priestess started. For the first time, she seemed uncertain. "I..." She frowned, and as she opened her mouth again, Sans lunged at her.

There was no question of her ducking behind the barrier in time. Before she even knew that he'd moved, one of the skeleton's hands had closed around her torso and lifted her as easily as a child holding a doll. The barrier vanished behind her, and Sans said casually, "Heel, or I'll stomp 'er like a grape."

The guards froze in the act of drawing their swords. The priestess started to say something, but he flexed his hand ever so slightly, and she stopped.

Sans smiled. He considered her for a moment, wondering if he should crush her anyway and squeeze her out slowly in front of the guardsmen, the way humans drained a monster's magic. It was tempting, and kind of poetic, but he decided he'd better not; he didn't want to damage her SOUL. Besides, she'd put up a hell of a fight. If anyone deserved a quick death, it was—

"Sans," she said. To his astonishment, she worked her arm out over his fingers and rested her hand on his knuckle. "Please," she murmured.

Normally, he would have laughed at a human begging him for mercy, but this didn't feel like begging. She was just looking at him calmly.

...No, the crazy bitch wasn't asking, she was telling. She was distressed, but expectant, as if she was just waiting for him to put her down and apologize!

He should've squished her or bashed her against the wall for that. But, somehow, as the veiled priestess stared into the fire of his eye sockets, the idea of breaking her didn't seem much fun anymore. Her head lowered and tipped to one side, and all of a sudden, it was like his mind – his memory – got pulled sideways.

As he stared back at her, he was no longer facing a mortal enemy. He was back in a moment he thought he'd forgotten, standing in front of his house in Snowdin. A tiny human in a striped shirt was holding his hand and smiling up at him with perfect, stupid trust, and he knew that however much he despised humanity, he could never hate this kid, any more than he could reach up and stop the sun in its orbit. Why did he have to think of it now, when he needed all the homicidal energy he could muster?

With a painful effort, Sans tore himself away from that memory, back to the present and the woman in his hand. The skeleton growled, starting under his breath and working up to a snarl that reverberated throughout the stone walls. To hell with her. To hell with all of them!

Lack of space was a definite issue, but Sans prided himself on adaptability. He extended his arm to its full length, nearly shoving her into the frightened guards, which gave him enough room to materialize a single blaster.

It was much smaller than usual, and that was fine, because it'd concentrate the last of his power into one good shot. The skull shone an incandescent red, eyes aflame and fangs glinting in its own light, literally nose-to-nose with the High Priestess. Sans let his rage and frustration rise like a tide of pure filth, distantly surprised that he could still feel some grief beneath it all, and the blaster's mouth creaked open from the pressure building in its throat.

The priestess had pulled herself upright with her free arm. The scarlet luminescence was right up against her eyes, but she screwed them shut and leaned forward, face set with determination.

In his haste to align the blast and hit all the humans at once, Sans didn't hear anything unusual; he didn't even notice when the light dimmed just a little, or that the pressure had stopped rising. But then a shock ran through him like a hand grabbing his SOUL, and he jerked out of his concentration to see – and feel – the woman stroking the blaster's nose as if it was an overexcited puppy. "It's all right," she said, so low that he barely heard her. "Please, stop. It'll be all right. I promise." And he'd be damned if the giant skull wasn't closing its mouth and leaning into her hand!

No one had actually touched one of his blasters before. They were long-distance weapons, and he used them as such, only getting close when it was fun or strategic to do so. His first reaction was horrified indignation; he might be about to vaporize her, but for crap's sake, he wasn't being inappropriate.

As she kept petting, though, she leaned in and rested her forehead on the skull's lower jaw, and the skeleton felt an alien sensation steal over him, something he didn't recognize at first. The light dimmed further; the skull's jaws drifted shut. For the first time, Sans heard a soft, rich sound—it was the woman humming to herself, or to the blaster, as if trying to soothe it.

And it was working. Sans felt as if he'd been drugged, with a sense of...peace? Was that it? Yes, it was absolute peace washing over him, relaxing his grip so that the young woman had to catch herself before she fell out of it. She might have been smiling faintly beneath the veil, but he couldn't focus enough to tell. He wondered if it was the same magic that had made him think of Kris, a distraction to save herself and kill him before he attacked again.

No...he wasn't drugged or under some kind of spell. Sans remembered feeling this way when he was a lot younger, and a couple of times during the humans' last visit to the Underground, when he and Pap discovered that at least one human was worth something. Of course, then they'd lost him, and there were no more humans worth anything.

It never failed to amaze him. They'd had less than a month together, but all these years later, he still missed the little bastard so much that it hurt.

Luckily, the pain didn't last. The woman kept humming, and Sans grew less and less angry. The blaster made a kind of purring sound and vanished; at the same time, Sans' arm fell, releasing the priestess, allowing her guards to rush in and pull her away.

The boss monster gazed at the angry humans with total detachment, scratching the back of his head as he yawned. She'd won. "You win," he mumbled.

"Are you all right, my lady?" demanded the captain, helping her sit down against the wall.

The humming had stopped. The young woman rubbed her eyes, keeping them shut. "Don't kill him, please" was all she said.

Sans closed his eyes, too. The humans were conferring in rapid whispers on what to do with him, but he didn't care anymore. It was almost a relief when they stepped back, a couple of them grunted with effort, and something crashed into his skull, knocking him out.

Over a day later, the High Priestess shut the outer door to her chambers, set a covered tray on the table, and sat down at her mirror. She checked that her eyes were clear, or at least not so puffy anymore, then picked up her veil and headdress and settled them over her head. She stared at her reflection for a full minute, as if waiting for the woman in the mirror to get up first. She sighed, and finally pushed herself to her feet.

Just outside her bedroom, she paused, running a thread of magic ahead to check each of the loose barriers she'd set around the bed. Two ripples came back, one very close by. "Good morning. Please step back," she said into the slight crack in the door.

A pause, then a soft creak of floorboards, unnervingly quiet for something – someone – his size. "Further, please," she ordered.

He made a noise she couldn't interpret. Floorboards creaked again, and the bedframe groaned under his weight. The priestess turned the doorknob, picked up the tray, and elbowed the door open.

Sans was sitting on the edge of the bed, knees on his elbows. He had opened the windows, and in the early daylight, he looked even more menacing; the light shone through his filthy shirt, shadowing the spaces between his ribs. The young woman made herself place the tray on a side table and pull up a chair with perfect unconcern, as if she couldn't feel him staring her down. "I see you're all healed. You must have slept well," she said coolly. "I know I did."

The skeleton glanced behind him at the rumpled sheets. "Uh..."

"You were alone the whole time," the priestess hastened to add. "There's a very comfortable couch in my office that I've been using."

"Yer office, huh?" Sans stretched his arms out over his head, bones clicking softly as he rolled his neck around. "Pretty nice setup y'got here. What is this, silk? Real feathers?"

She inclined her head. "I would have removed you from your cell much sooner if I'd known you were there. No one told me until Duke Archibald asked me to help select your new owner, which, no, I am not." She grimaced. "May I ask how you were caught? You're certainly capable of defending yourself."

Sans didn't answer. The young woman was thinking of what else to say when he grunted and turned to stretch back out on the bed, splaying his limbs across the huge mattress. "This's the most comfortable place I ever slept, y'know that?"

"Me, too," she said before she could stop herself.

Sans glanced up, as if wondering whether he'd seen a glimpse of personality, and she cleared her throat. "Is it the same reason you made no attempt to break out of your cell for three days?"

"Got caught tryin'a steal some grain," the skeleton mumbled. "Not a lot of food in the Underground these days. I hadn't had anythin' for a while, so I was weak as hell."

"You refused to eat anything while you were imprisoned," she pointed out.

He shrugged. "I figured it was poisoned or drugged 'r some other shit. Humans don't get their mitts on a boss monster every day, but ya can't have five sorcerers watchin' me every second. Feeding me some kinda crap like that would be the easiest thing t'do."

That didn't feel quite right, but without more evidence, the priestess decided to leave it for now. Instead, she pulled the side table closer to the bed and removed the tray's cover.

Sans twitched at the sight of steaming hotcakes, piles of cheese-sprinkled eggs, tomatoes, and crisp-crusted sausage links. The priestess cut a tomato slice into quarters with her fork, speared one and, with the ease of long practice, took hold of her veil between two fingers and lifted it long enough to get the fork to her mouth, dropping it as she put the fork down.

"Seriously? Just take the damn thing off," the skeleton remarked, sitting up.

The young woman made a show of chewing, swallowing, and lifting another tomato to her mouth. He didn't have a stomach, but if he had, she probably would have heard it growling; he was shifting around and scowling, clearly agitated. So she quickened her pace, taking a huge bite of egg, a chunk of hotcake, and a sausage, in turn eating as fast as she could.

Sans' eyes had lit to orange again, and the priestess was glad to put the fork down. "There. You see? It isn't poisoned," she said briskly. She stood and pushed the side table over to the bed. "Help yourself."

The orange faded. His skull tilted this way and that, like a wary but curious animal. "What?"

"I had breakfast over an hour ago. This is for you," she explained.

He glanced at the tray, then back to her. She waited for a full ten seconds, almost holding her breath, before she was rewarded with a rude noise. "Can I have another fork? Don't want your germs," he said.

The priestess knew when she was being tested. She picked up the fork. She went to the nightstand and the pitcher of water standing ready, and dunked the fork in it, swishing vigorously. "Here. But first," she said, holding up the dripping utensil, "I'd like to get a few things straight."

He didn't move. A moment later, she felt a tug on the fork, and instantly snapped the connection by raising another barrier. "No cheating," she reproved him.

"I'm cheating?" The skeleton banged his fist on the bedpost. "How the hell are you doin' this? I'm not dumb, lady! Ya can't just slap a barrier on somethin' that blocks every kinda magic! I can't get out of here, I can't go blue, ya did some weird crap to my poor blaster—"

"I helped you calm down. You've been asleep for twenty-six hours, by the way."

He stopped dead, but only for a second. "Yeah? Well...well, how do ya know so damn much about what I can do? If I'd known this was gonna happen, I'd'a left a long time ago!"

"And yet you didn't." The woman crossed her arms, keeping the fork pointed away from him. "I don't believe that you were too weak to remove yourself from the situation, Sans. We all have our secrets, and I don't mind that, but I need to know that you won't take drastic measures before we've completed our arrangement."

"There is no arrangement, witch," he shot back. "I'll make you a deal, okay? Forget this apprentice crap, lemme go now, and I won't kill anyone on my way out. How's that?"

She tapped the fork on the pitcher's handle. "Your people possess almost no farmland, and the area we've left you has notoriously poor soil. Did you know there are several potions, all made from common ingredients, that could double your crop yields in the space of a few years?"

Sans started. "No, and I don't care," he said, but without conviction.

"You should. There are also potions that can heal wounds, preserve foodstuffs, and send you to sleep with no ill effects, using only the tiniest bit of magic. Do you mean to tell me that monsters need none of these things?"

The skeleton looked at her warily. She could almost see him thinking. His rough speech and rougher appearance didn't fool her: he was at least as intelligent as she was, and also cared enough to want to hear more. "So," he rumbled, "I learn all this fantastic secret knowledge, and you get...?"

"Insight. Humans have been fighting monsters for centuries, and the more we know about you—"

His eyes flamed. "The easier it is to kill us? You seriously think I'm gonna—"

"The easier we can stop dying!" she snarled, her anger suddenly flaring right back at him.

The boss monster's eyes went blank with astonishment. She took a long, deep breath that did not help at all. "Believe me or not, Sans, when I say that I want to make peace for everyone's sake. I am tired of hearing every unsolved crime and evil thought blamed on monsters. I am tired of arguing with sorcerers who want to seal the entrance to the Underground and let you starve to death so that we don't have to talk about it anymore. I am tired of mediating disputes over monster ownership, as if we had any right to help ourselves to other sentient beings, and I'm sick to death knowing where our magic comes from and being unable to stop it!"

She was almost panting now, gripping the fork like a trident. Sans was staring at her like she'd grown another head. She swallowed, and lowered the fork. For want of something peaceful to do, she dipped it back into the pitcher for more swishing. "Monsters are not completely blameless," she said quietly, "but you are outnumbered by a much crueler and stronger race, and we've taken that advantage too far. It has to change, Sans, but we cannot do anything until we learn to talk to each other again."

Sans' teeth ground together. "Have you ever read a history book?" he snapped. "Ya know what happened the last time we had humans over to play?"

The priestess stared at a spot on the wall. Sans looked up in alarm as the barriers surged in and out of visibility, hissing softly. "Yes," she said, and went on, reciting from memory: "Several people were killed in an explosion caused by faulty stage effects at a farewell gala for the human delegation, most notably Prince Asriel of the monster race. Though the exact cause of this unfortunate accident remains unclear, its scope and destructive power were hallmarks of human magic, leading to accusations of sabotage and assassination from both sides. War was prevented solely by the will of Queen Toriel, who was devastated by the loss of her son and adoptive daughter, but nevertheless prevented her husband from executing the remaining humans. The delegation was permitted to leave, and in exchange, humans promised the Underground would never be sealed."

"...O...kay, then. Yeah. That's...that's pretty much it." Sans rubbed the back of his neck, scratching between the vertebrae. "Knowin' that, you still think you can teach me a bunch of stuff, turn me loose, an' make everything all better?"

"No. But I can try." On impulse, the priestess knelt, looking up at him and hoping the effect wasn't spoiled by the dirty fork. "Sans, give me one month. That's all I ask. You can have copies of any recipe you need to take back with you, and I'll show you the techniques to make them work properly. You won't have much freedom of movement, but you won't be kept in a cell, either." She glanced at the feather mattress and added, "You can keep the bed for yourself. As luxurious as it is, I feel lost in it."

He didn't laugh, but he didn't sneer at her, either. His eyes went from the fork to the bedpost, the canopy, the bookshelves lining the walls by the fireplace, and back to her face. "I need some time t' think about it," he said reluctantly. "What happens if I don't wanna?"

Her magic crackled in the air again, and she winced, trying to calm down. "I'd rather not say, but I think you know the answer. Remember, I'm not the only human who can use barriers."

He did not like that, and she couldn't blame him. She looked down at the fork in her hand. "You should eat now," she said lamely, and held it out to him, handle first, praying she had judged correctly.

The skeleton's face was impossible to read. Now that it was quiet, it reminded her too much of when he'd grabbed her in the cell. Her instincts screamed at her to pull her hand back and throw a barrier between them, but determination surged as she remembered how she'd already faced down his attempts to kill her. She was going to forge a lasting bond between their worlds and hand him a kitchen utensil like a normal person or die trying.

Slowly, Sans reached down, and she fought to keep from panicking as his massive hand approached hers. He paused...and plucked the fork from her grip with delicate courtesy, holding it up between them. "Hm. Too small. Still dirty." He tossed it back into her lap.

She stared at the fork. She stared at him. She picked up the fork, dropped it into the pitcher, and plunged her hand in after it. Out came the utensil; she turned her back to him, and with one swift motion, off came her veil. As High Priestess, she wore it for most of her waking hours, which meant she'd learned to whip it off without even disturbing her headdress, the way she'd once seen someone yank a tablecloth out from beneath a set of dishes.

And as High Priestess, if she wanted to use her sacred veil to dry a mostly-clean fork in order to please a giant monster who was intimidating her and somehow also being a complete snot, then who was going to stop her? No one, that was exactly who.

With a righteous huff, she turned back around, still polishing the bedamned fork. "Here," she said, facing him for the first time. "I hope this is satisfactory."

Sans looked at her. He didn't say anything.

The world always seemed a little too bright when she'd just had the veil on, and the light from the window was in her eyes. She rubbed them on her sleeve and tucked a strand of shoulder-length hair behind her ear. "Well?" she demanded.

Sans didn't take it. He was leaning forward, hand dangling as if he'd started to reach for it and somehow forgotten what he was doing. His sockets were blank, an odd color washing over his bony face. "Uh," he said. "It's."

The priestess didn't know that that could be a complete sentence. It probably wasn't, she thought in growing irritation. "Sans," she said carefully, "are you going to use this, or would you like to eat with your hands?"

The skeleton shook himself and turned away. "Never mind. 'm not hungry," he grumbled.

She bit back the urge to call him a colorful name or two. "Sans, this is not a joke. There is nothing wrong with your food, except that it's cold. Eat it. Please."

"I will, I will." Sans hunched his shoulders. "Just gimme a couple minutes."

She did not have the time or patience for this. "Sans. Look at this." He glanced at her, and in one motion, she stabbed a sausage and another chunk of hotcake. "Say 'ahhh,'" she ordered, and when he blankly repeated, "Ahh?" she thrust the fork into his mouth.

Sans nearly choked, demanding, "Wh' th' fuh, 'a'y?" before he swallowed it whole. The priestess was fascinated to not see anything pass his throat, though she knew he had eaten it. "What the fuck, lady?" he clarified.

"I am not 'lady,' thank you, and I know you know better words than that," she said sternly, putting the fork back on the tray. "It's not my fault if it got cold."

"I don't care how hot or cold somethin' is, lady. Ya didn't give me a chance to get my tongue out, so it's all the same to me." The boss monster answered her puzzled look by concentrating, then opening his mouth and pointing. "Thee? Tah-dah."

Good God, he suddenly did have a small, floppy red tongue. She flapped her hand at him, face burning. "All right! I believe you! Put it away!"

He did, and she was relieved to see nothing but a mouth full of giant fangs. "So," he said presently, "if I'm not supposed ta call you 'lady,' what's your name?"

The priestess blinked. No one had asked her that in a long, long time. "Well...if you don't like 'my lady,' there's always 'Your Eminence,' or my ceremonial name, Thea." It occurred to her that he was probably not going to react well to any of her suggestions, but she soldiered on: "You could just say 'High Priestess,' though that's a mouthful. At the convent, they gave each of us a different saint's name, and I was—"

Sans held up his hands. "Okay. That sounds peachy. But what. Is. Your. Actual. Damn. Name?"

She grasped her skirt so hard that her nails dug into her palms through the thick velvet folds. "My name is Frisk."

Sans' eyes were blank again. "Huh. No wonder. Welp, nice to meet you, Frisk." He raised a hand.

It was a blatant lie, but cordially given, so she attempted a smile in return. "It's nice to meet you, too, Sans."

For some reason, that seemed to alarm him. He drew back, then suddenly grabbed the tray, tipped his head back, and dumped the entire contents into his mouth. He had no cheeks, but his face somehow looked very full before he swallowed it all, dropping the tray on the floor. "There. Where's the bathroom?" he rasped.

Frisk realized her mouth was hanging open, and shut it. "It's...why do you ask? You're a skeleton."

"Right. Right." He scuffed the bones of his foot on the carpet. "Oh, look at this. Fork yes."

Sure enough, he'd found the fork. She scooped it up, setting it on the table, and out of nowhere, the priestess felt a real smile lift the corners of her mouth. "Just in tines."

The words hung in the air for a long moment. Frisk was beginning to feel stupid when Sans smacked his thighbone and gave a shout of laughter. "I'll be damned! You got the point."

"It's food for thought," she said, and grinned as he doubled over. "I'm sorry. Please fork-give me."

Just like that, she thought distantly. Yesterday – the day before? – she'd fought for her life against a boss monster who interpreted her overtures as a deadly threat, and now they were giggling in her room like drunken schoolgirls. Was this going to work after all? Was this how real peace began, with awkward silence and stupid puns? If not, Frisk could always console herself that this was the most she'd laughed in years.

Sans was not wondering the same thing. He was thinking how he'd woken up not knowing where he was and had had to figure out that he wasn't dreaming about the battle in his cell; a human witch really had trapped him and knocked him out with some kind of weird brain-magic. Once he got over the fact that he couldn't take any shortcuts and wouldn't fit through the windows, though, he had to admit things could be worse; the bed really was the most comfortable thing in the world.

Talking with the witch was not comfortable. It was bad enough when she was asking him questions about his capture and not breaking out of prison, but then she had to give him food and say things that made sense, and things that made even more sense, and then...

He'd never understood why human men made such a huge fuss over women. Monsters came in so many shapes and sizes that anything was possible; the inside really did count more than the outside, except maybe when it came to reproduction. But that was a rare occasion for monsters, who thought that humans' obsession with it was shallow and weird at best. Sans in particular had no interest in the human form unless he was trying to destroy it; they were all just skeletons with varying degrees of hair, meat and fluids in the way.

And then that infuriating woman had turned around in the sunlight, veil and stupid fork in hand, and he suddenly couldn't breathe. The overall picture was what made him feel a huge mess of feelings he didn't like or understand, but he could see every detail perfectly: her lips pursed in annoyance, the sun reflecting off that black circlet thing, chestnut hair shining and eyes half closed against the light. Her dress was still black, but today it was a looser, laced-up style, shoulders partly hidden under some kind of sheer material that ended high up her neck.

And then she had turned her head and done something with her hair, and now he couldn't think things right. All he could try to do was turn away, then eat it all in order to make her go away, and only his punning instinct had saved him from saying or doing anything else stupid.

Why did she have to like puns, too?

This was bad. It had gotten very complicated, very fast. He had to get out of here. She'd demonstrated some emotion behind her priestess-y facade; maybe he could appeal to it, persuade her to take some other monster under her wing and...wow. Speaking of wings, as she laughed, he happened to look down at her from a different angle, and she had a really nice rack. It was hard to see under such dark clothes, but they accentuated the graceful outline of neck and shoulder perfectly. Under the sheer material, her collarbone was—

"...going to do it," she was saying, wiping away tears of laughter. "I'm not all-powerful, but I have enough influence at court and with the Church to guarantee your safety." Frisk looked up at him, bright-eyed, and his SOUL did another loop-de-loop. "So, Sans. Will you stay?"

He didn't want to, it was a bad idea, and he said, "No," in his mind.

She smiled, tilting her head.

"Yeah," Sans said out loud.

#frans stopitstoptalking

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strongerwiththepack · 4 years

Text

Fab-Five-Feb: Gordon

Hope you enjoy this Gordon-centric fic as his week comes to a close. Poor Alan didn’t even get a mention in this one after getting the spotlight last week. Thanks again @gumnut-logic for this challenge. I’ve used the prompt ‘no clothes’.

“Tell dad I’m going out for the night.” Gordon said casually to John, who was in the kitchen doing work for school. He was hoping he could get away without John asking any questions. He almost succeeded as John just nodded, heavily engrossed in the book he was reading but as he opened the door to leave John seemed to snap out of it.

“Wait, where are you going?” John gave him a suspicious look.

“Just to the lake with some friends.” Gordon shrugged.

John narrowed his eyes. “Which friends?”

Gordon rolled his eyes. “Do we need to do this again John?”

“Apparently we do.” John said straightening up in his chair. “Those guys are no good for you Gordon.”

“Whatever John, you’re just jealous because they’re not friends with you.”

“They are not your friends Gordon.”

There was the toot of a horn sounding outside.

Gordon gave John a quick wave as he headed out the door. “I’ll be home by 10, okay?”

He didn’t give John the chance to respond before he was running down the driveway.

“Hey Tracy, that your weirdo brother at the window?” Todd Davidson mocked as Gordon clambered into the back of the 4-by-4.

Gordon just gave a half-hearted laugh. He knew these guys didn’t get along with John but he was never going to sit and ridicule his older brother. Although…he also wasn’t at the stage where he was ready to stick his neck out to defend John either.

He really wanted to impress these guys. They were older than him, he’d only just started to get invited along to hang out with them. Todd was a senior, like John, and most of his friends were either also seniors or juniors, Gordon was the only sophomore going tonight. Apparently there was a huge party going on at the lake just 20 minutes out of town.

Gordon had gotten friendly with Todd after the older boy had witnessed a fight Gordon had gotten himself into with another Senior – a Senior that Todd wasn’t too keen on either apparently. Gordon had taken the guy down with no more than a bruised cheek in return. He had three older brothers – he knew how to handle himself in a fight.

Speaking of his brothers, they had all been less than pleased with his behaviour, that’s why when Todd came along singing his praises he’d soaked it up. Scott was just starting his training in the air force and Virgil was away at college so they didn’t have the same influence on him as they used to. His dad had been very distracted lately and was away on business a lot. John had told him his dad had a big project in the works. Gordon hadn’t cared enough to question it further.

As for John, his closest older brother had given him quite the lecture but Gordon brushed it off at the time. John was always warning him about the guys in his year but Gordon was pretty sure John just didn’t know how to have fun. Heck, he’d definitely never seen his older brother go out to a party like this. Even Scott and Virgil had gone to their fair share of parties in their high school days. So when Gordon got invited to one himself, he jumped on the opportunity.

It about 7pm so it was already dark outside. Gordon stared out the window as they reached the lake. They drove round it for about a mile before the car drew to a stop. Gordon looked out at the darkness confused.

“I thought you said this was going to be a party?” Gordon asked looking out on to the silent waterfront. He’d expected a bonfire and loud music and he couldn’t hide his disappointment.

Todd chuckled from the front seat. “Don’t worry Tracy, we’re just leaving the car here and walking round.”

“Oh. Okay.” Gordon mused as he exited the car with the four other guys.

Todd went to the boot and pulled out a pack of beers, handing them out to everyone. He didn’t even hesitate to toss one in Gordon’s direction too.

Seeing Gordons look of unease he snorted “That’s not your first beer, right Tracy?”

“’Course not” Gordon was quick to shoot back, popping open the can. He took a sip and was hard pushed not to gag. Was it suppose to taste like that?

The guys set off down towards the water and Gordon couldn’t help but shiver a bit at the cold. This really wasn’t what he’d been expecting and he was starting to feel a bit uncomfortable.

He piqued back into the conversation as he heard one of the other guys shout at him. “Hey baby Tracy, aren’t you like a champion swimmer or something?”

He bristled a bit at the baby part but replied anyway, trying to sound impressive. “Yeah, coach said I could be on track for the Olympics if I put in the work.”

“Olympics, huh?” Todd grinned. “Give us a show then.” He said pointing towards the water.

Gordon gave a half-hearted chuckle. “Yeah right.” He snorted.

Todd groaned dramatically and put his arm around Gordons shoulder. “Aw come on water baby, don’t be a party pooper.”

Gordon frowned. “You can’t be serious. It’ll be freezing.”

Todd just grinned down at him. “We’ve got towels in the car, just take another swig of the beer and you’ll be good to go. Come on Tracy, I know you aren’t a coward.”

Gordon stared out at the water. He tried to convince himself it would be fine. So what if he got a little cold? The guys would love it. He started to strip off his clothes.

The guys all cheered around him and Gordon felt his confidence return. Might as well put on a good show.

“There you go Tracy, knew you were up for a good time.”

When he was down to just his boxers he turned and gave the guys a mock salute before jumping off the bank and into the water. It was ice cold and the breath was knocked out of him immediately. He heard the guys cheering him on from the bank though so he kicked out and started swimming. He got into a rhythm after that. 1, 2, 3, 4, breathe, 1, 2, 3, 4…

When he figured he’d gone far enough out, he started treading water and looked back to the shore with a grin on his face.

It was silent.

His face dropped and he suddenly felt very alone. It’s fine, he told himself. He’d just gone too far out. He started swimming back, feeling the cold numbing his limbs slightly. When he got back to the bank and still couldn’t hear anything, he started to panic a little.

“Guys?” he called out. “Todd?”

He pulled himself up onto the bank, shivering as a light breeze blew past. He wrapped his arms around himself and noticed with a sinking heart that his clothes were gone as well.

“Very funny guys” he shouted into the darkness. “You can come out now.”

Everything remained perfectly still. Gordon ran back up to the road. The car was gone as well. Shit.

Gordon felt tears prickle at his eyes as he started to panic. He was standing in his boxers, soaking wet on a cold night in October. His phone had been in the pocket of his jeans so he didn’t even have anything to call home with.

His breathing picked up harshly. He was going to die out here. His body already felt stiff and the shivers tore through him harshly. Think Gordon.

John! John knew where he was. He just had to find a way to stay warm until John came to look for him. He sighed as he realised it was probably barely even 8 o’clock and John wasn’t expecting him back until 10. He needed somewhere he could wait until then. He vaguely remembered passing a water sports hut on the way in. That was probably his best option right now.

He walked a solid 30 minutes before he came across the old wooden building. He was pretty sure his feet were bleeding after walking all that way barefoot on the rocky surface but he was too scared to look. And too cold to feel it.

He tried the door but, as suspected, it was locked. He peered through the window looking longingly at the wetsuits hung up on the rack. Oh how he wished he could climb into about 10 of them right now. All layered on top of each other.

He trudged over to the changing cubicles closer to the water. Thankfully they were also made of wood and were not locked. He was relieved as he shut the door behind him. In the small confines of the changing room, without the wind, it was a mild temperature. It was still cold but not the hypothermic level of cold outside had been.

He curled up on the bench and prepared to wait.

He must’ve dozed off briefly cause the next thing he woke up to was what sounded like somewhere shouting his name. He bounced to his feet only to grunt as his legs gave out underneath him and black spots appeared in front of his eyes. He kneeled on the ground breathing heavily. He was so tired.

“GORDON!”

He lifted his head as he heard a familiar voice shout his name. He almost cried in relief.

“John!” He shouted, or tried to anyway, it came out more like the pathetic whine of an injured animal.

He pushed open the door to the changing room and half crawled, half stumbled out onto the grass.

“John!” he tried again as he managed to push himself into a standing position.

There was running footsteps in his direction and he tensed slightly until a steadying hand was placed on his shoulder and John’s face filled his vision.

“Geez Gordon, you’re freezing.”

That was all it took and Gordon pushed himself into John’s arm, violent sobs wracking his small frame.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry” he cried.

John was startled momentarily but was quick to return his little brothers hug, wrapping his arms around Gordons ice cold skin.

“You’re okay.” He reassured.

John was so warm. Gordons chest was tight as he cried out all the emotions he’d kept in the past few hours. Eventually John stepped back, grabbing one of Gordon’s arms and placing it around his shoulder to help Gordon walk. They limped slowly towards what Gordon hoped was a car. His limbs feeling lethargic and his feet were stinging from his previous walk.

John helped him into the passenger side of the car before rushing around the other side to turn on the heating. John got out again and returned with a thick blanket that he threw over his little brothers shivering form. He finally settled into the drivers seat and started the engine.

John glanced over at his little brother worriedly. “You need to tell me what happened Gordon”

Gordon buried his face in the blanket, feeling tear well up in his eyes again.

“You were right okay?” Gordon said defensively. “I shouldn’t have trusted those guys.”

“Did they hurt you?” John questioned quietly. He had been imagining the worst for the past couple of hours.

“They just left me out in the cold, half-naked and soaking wet.” Gordon grumbled bitterly before whispering. “I thought I was going to die.”

John barely caught that last part but hearing the vulnerability in his usually boisterous little brother made his blood boil.

“I’m going to kill those guys.”

Gordon startled. He’d never heard John sound so angry.

“It’s my fault John, I should have listened to you.”

“I never should have let you go in the first place.” John sighed. “Those guys have caused me so much trouble over the past 4 years.”

“You couldn’t have stopped me John, I’m just glad you still came to find me.” Gordon shuddered when he thought of what could have happened.

“I will always come for you Gordon. Always.” John promised.

Gordon settled back into his seat, finally warming up. He made a mental note to listen to John more in the future. John was always right. Why did none of them ever listen to him?

#fabfivefeb #fabfivefeb2020 #thunderbirds are go #thunderbirds #Gordon Tracy #again there is no canon timeline here #also this is my longest fic in a really long time???#go me

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ofstormsandwolves · 4 years

Text

cheerleaders and fighter pilots

Teen

Wishverse

Buffy, Giles, Oz, the Master, Anyanka

Canon divergence

Read on AO3

In an alternate timeline, Giles fails to destroy Anyanka's amulet. What happens now?

Summoning Anyanka had been a foolish idea, Rupert Giles realised almost instantly. As if it wasn’t enough that he was very clearly a male and Anyanka dealt with scorned women, she also hadn’t taken too kindly to being told she had to undo her spell.

Which was how Giles had ended up pinned to the wall of his apartment by his neck, the vengeance demon squeezing hard as she slowly cut off his oxygen.

“This is the real world now,” Anyanka sneered, and Giles felt his vision narrowing. “This is the world we made.” She smirked. “Isn’t it wonderful?”

Giles struggled against the demon’s grip, but it did no good. He could feel himself fading fast, as he gasped for breath, and he knew there was nothing he could do to stop the inevitable end. But just before his vision faded entirely, he saw Anyanka’s amulet glow green. He clawed at it with a hand, and the next thing he knew...

He was falling.

The Master had Buffy in a death grip, pulling her towards him with a look of triumph. Jaw clenched, Buffy thought quickly. How did she get out of this? What should she do?

There was a thud, followed by a growl from the Master, and suddenly the death grip was gone. The Master had turned his attention elsewhere. Not wanting to let the opportunity pass her by, she lunged for her stake, having dropped it as she sparred with the master vampire. Spinning round, Buffy plunged it into the Master’s back, and watched as his body turned to dust. His skeleton seemed to hang in the air for a moment before clattering to the floor.

Lifting her gaze from the pile of bones, she glared at the boy who had been stupid enough to antagonise the Master.

“You could have gotten yourself killed,” she told him lowly.

To the boy’s credit, he simply stared back impassively.

“I didn’t need your help, you know,” Buffy added with a frown.

The boy gave a small smile at that. “I know.”

Something about the calmness of the boy threw Buffy, so instead she distracted herself with looking around the warehouse. There were bodies everywhere, as well as plenty of piles of dust, but it looked like everyone else had vacated the premises while she’d confronted the Master.

The boy was staring down at the bones. “So, uh, what exactly are we going to do with these?”

Buffy shrugged. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “They don’t normally leave bones.” She nudged the skull with her foot. “I suppose I should take them to Jeeves.”

“Giles,” the boy corrected, and a look of recognition seemed to flit across his face. “You’re the Slayer. Giles said you weren’t coming, that he couldn’t contact you.”

Buffy shifted uneasily at that. Something about the way the boy was scrutinising her made her feel uneasy. It was like he was observing her, analysing her. “Yeah, well,” she shrugged again. “I’m here now.”

“You are,” the boy agreed. “I’m Oz, by the way.”

Buffy, however, was busy looking around the room. “We’re going to need something to carry the bones in,” she said.

As she and Oz started looking around for something to use as a bag for the Master’s remains, a silence fell over them. Picking over the dead bodies, Buffy eventually found what seemed to be a dust sheet, and quickly moved back to the remains. Seeing that she had found something, Oz moved to help her with the task.

“I’m Buffy,” she said after a few moments of transferring the bones to the middle of the dust sheet so they could gather the four corners together.

Oz smiled softly at her then, and said nothing. The Master’s remains gathered, the two teens straightened up.

“My van’s outside if you want a ride,” Oz offered. “It will be quicker than walking.”

Buffy surveyed him for a moment before finally nodding. “Fine. Lead the way.”

The drive to Giles’s apartment was one filled with silence, but it wasn’t anywhere near as awkward as Buffy had expected it to be. The boy- Oz- seemed quite comfortable with the whole not-talking thing, and she couldn’t help but feel a little grateful about that.

When they finally pulled up outside the apartment block, they climbed out of the van and ascended the steps. As they reached the courtyard, however, Buffy froze, and frowned.

“What is it?” Oz asked with a small frown.

“Stay here,” she responded, shoving the Master’s bones at him and creeping across the courtyard.

The door to the Watcher’s apartment was slightly ajar, and Buffy balled her hands into fists, ready for a fight. But as she kicked the door open, she saw nothing but chaos. And a body slumped on the floor.

“Giles,” Oz breathed, and he must have followed Buffy even despite her telling him not to.

She couldn’t help but roll her eyes at that, as she stepped into the apartment. She crossed to the body, scowled at the bruises around the man’s neck, and bent down to press two fingers to his pulse point.

“He’s alive,” she stated, before looking around the room.

The remnants of a casting were evident on the wooden desk- herbs and candles and jars of things Buffy couldn’t identify.

“He tried to summon the demon,” she said as she took it in. “He tried to break the spell.”

“But we’re still here,” Oz said unnecessarily.

“Well, obviously it didn’t work,” Buffy responded, before surveying the Watcher again.

The man- Jeeves, or Giles, or whatever he was called- groaned, and for a brief moment Buffy thought he’d open his eyes. But he didn’t, and she sighed.

“Where’s the nearest hospital?” she asked Oz.

“Sunnydale General,” Oz answered promptly. “Maybe ten minutes in the van.” Then, without her needing to ask, he said: “I’ll take you.”

Giving the boy a swift nod, Buffy bent down to haul the unconscious Watcher up. Oz moved to support some of his weight, but he was about the same size as Buffy and she could already tell he wouldn’t be much help. So she was more than marginally surprised when he managed to take more of the man’s weight than she’d anticipated.

“You know,” Oz said, seeing her eyes widen slightly, “you’re not the only one with a secret identity.”

He gave an enigmatic smile then, that left Buffy wondering about him, as they slowly moved towards the door.

Sunnydale General was a large, bland building full of confused and crying teenagers. Apparently those who had escaped the Master’s warehouse had sought out medical attention for their wounds, and Oz and Buffy had to pick through clusters of baffled high school students to reach the admissions desk.

“Rupert Giles,” Oz said succinctly to the bored receptionist. “We think he was attacked. He was unconscious when we found him.”

The receptionist took one look at Giles and called for an orderly, who showed them to the bed. The bed was in a corridor, along with a dozen or so other beds, and Buffy realised that Sunnydale General apparently wasn’t equipped for a sudden rush of patients.

“I’d have thought living on a Hellmouth would mean they’d be more prepared for this sort of thing,” Buffy mused as they hauled Giles onto the bed.

Oz shrugged uncomfortably. “Usually people patch themselves up at home. It’s not usually safe to be out at night here.”

“It still isn’t,” Buffy retorted. “Just because the Master’s dealt with, doesn’t mean everything’s suddenly safe.” She glanced pointedly at the bones Oz was still carrying around in the dust sheet.

A nurse came by to check Giles over then, and Buffy wasn’t the slightest bit surprised when Oz explained that the man had had several head injuries previously.

“So he makes a habit of getting knocked out,” Buffy stated once the nurse was gone. “Figures.”

Oz eyed her carefully. “Giles said that you were supposed to be in Sunnydale, long before tonight,” he ventured carefully.

Buffy folded her arms, avoided his gaze. “So I heard.”

Sensing she didn’t want to continue the conversation, Oz turned his attention back to Giles. He didn’t like feeling so helpless, particularly when it came to Giles. He was the leader, the one in charge. The adult. There was something unsettling about him being out cold like this, even if Oz had seen it before.

He just hoped Giles woke up soon.

Giles was taken for tests, and when he was finally brought back, most of the teenagers had been kicked out and the sun was beginning to rise. Oz and Buffy sat on either side of the man’s bed, Buffy feeling a little awkward about the whole thing, and waited for him to come round.

“You said this has happened before,” Buffy said after a lengthy silence. “Does he usually take this long to come round?”

Oz blinked, and considered the best words to use. “No,” he responded eventually. “It’s never taken this long.”

Buffy eyed the man in the bed. “Well, that’s what happens to a guy who summons demons for fun.”

“It wasn’t fun,” Oz said, and Buffy wasn’t sure if she’d offended him or not. He was kind of hard to read. “He was trying to save us.”

“I was trying to save us,” she countered with a shrug. “That’s why I went after the Master. Jeeves here was summoning demons on a hunch he might be able to undo this supposed spell.”

There was a groan from the bed then, and the man in question opened his eyes briefly before closing them again.

“W-Whoever is talking,” he said in a strained, hoarse voice, “please shut up.”

Buffy snorted. “I killed your supreme vampire for you and you tell me to shut up? Well, that’s gratitude for you.”

Giles opened his eyes again, and peered at Buffy in confusion. “Buffy?” he asked. “Buffy Summers?”

“Yeah, we’ve already covered this, several hours ago,” Buffy told him, before looking to Oz. “You weren’t kidding about the head injury thing.”

Giles followed her gaze, and blinked at Oz, a delighted smile tugging at his lips. “Oz,” he greeted, “you’re alright.” He frowned. “And everyone else?”

Oz responded with an apologetic shrug. “Quite a few people escaped, but I don’t know who,” he admitted. “I lost sight of Larry during the fight. I would have checked the bodies to see if I recognised anyone, but the Master left us a leaving present and I had to help Buffy with it.”

He held up the bundled dust sheet then, and Giles frowned, moving to push himself into a sitting position.

“What’s that?” he enquired even as he winced.

“The Master’s bones,” Buffy stated. “I figured you’d know what to do with them. Usually the vampires don’t leave me a ‘going away’ present.”

A doctor entered the room then, cutting off all conversation.

“Well, Mr Giles, it looks like you had quite the night,” the doctor noted in a cheery tone. “There doesn’t seem to be anything too wrong, and nothing’s broken, but you do have some cracked ribs as well as a bruised larynx.” The doctor frowned then. “May I ask what exactly happened? Your... Friends here weren’t able to fill in all the details.”

“An intruder,” Giles rasped. “Most likely trying to steal from me.”

Buffy almost rolled her eyes at how easily the doctor accepted the explanation.

“Well, you’ll have to take it easy for a few days, and be sure to drink lots of fluids, but I see no reason to keep you here any longer. I’ll just go see about getting your discharge papers.”

It took all of about ten minutes to discharge Giles; apparently Sunnydale General had a quick turnaround regarding patients. As the three of them made their way out to Oz’s van, Buffy glanced up at the older man.

“I’m guessing the thing with the demon didn’t work out, huh?”

Giles scowled at her. “She must have escaped while I was unconscious. The spell worked fine, but she was stronger than I anticipated.”

“You’re lucky she didn’t kill you,” Buffy said as they reached the van. “Most demons don’t let their victims live.”

“I’m well aware of that,” Giles snapped, before wincing at the pain in his throat. “We’ll simply have to summon her again. I’m fairly certain the amulet around her neck is her power source- it was glowing.”

Oz had already climbed into the vehicle, and watched as Buffy and Giles climbed in. “Well, maybe we should probably wait to summon her again,” he said as he started up the engine. “Between the three of us, we might be able to take her.”

“Or next time she gets to kill two men,” Buffy frowned. “I don’t see why you’re so fixated on what this girl told you anyway. Who says this is a result of a spell? What if this is just life?” She shrugged, folding her arms across her chest. “Maybe you both need to let go of this fantasy that there’s a better world out there.”

Oz and Giles glanced at each other and said nothing.

Giles was immediately sent to relax on the sofa when they reached his apartment. Oz busied himself tidying up the debris from Anyanka’s visit, and Buffy leaned against the wall and watched.

“Buffy,” Giles said after several long moments, “why don’t you bring the Master’s remains over here? Let me take a look?”

“Sure,” she shrugged, crossing the room to dump the remains on the coffee table. “But they just look like a bunch of old bones to me.”

Giles said nothing, and instead slipped a pair of glasses on before unfolding the dust sheet. A heavy silence filled the air while he examined the bones, and Buffy quickly grew tired of watching him. If she hadn’t believed he was a Watcher already, the way he scrutinised the remains would have proved it to her. He looked fascinated, in a way that she had only ever seen on her other Watchers’ faces.

“We should bury these,” he said after several minutes. “In consecrated ground.”

“We should destroy them,” Buffy countered. “I’m not about to give some vampire a nice little funeral.”

Giles blinked, and Oz watched the scene from where he was finishing tidying up the desk. “Well, I, I understand your feelings,” the older man began slowly, “but I don’t think destroying them is necessary-”

“Isn’t it?” Buffy interrupted coolly. “And how many supreme vampires have you fought?”

Giles stuttered a little more at that, and Buffy folded her arms across her chest.

“We’re destroying them. We’re destroying them, and then I’m leaving.”

“Now hang on,” Giles protested, finding his voice even if it was a little hoarse. “What about Anyanka? We still need to break the spell!”

“You can do that without me,” Buffy dismissed. “You have Oz to stop you from being beaten to a pulp again.”

“But Anyanka deals with scorned women,” the man continued. “I’ve already tempted fate summoning her once-”

“Fine,” Buffy said loudly, cutting him off midsentence. “We destroy the bones, summon this Anyanka, and then I leave.”

Giles seemed to sense that this was the best he was going to get, so he nodded after only a brief hesitation.

Buffy looked at the bones set out on the coffee table. “Have you got a sledgehammer?”

Although he didn’t own a sledgehammer, Giles had the money for one. They all piled back into Oz’s van with the bones and drove to the nearest hardware store, before continuing on to the woods.

“I do vaguely remember something about my taking it easy,” Giles muttered as Buffy led them deeper and deeper into the woods.

“You could have waited in the van,” Buffy countered over her shoulder.

“Absolutely not,” came the rasping reply. “You are the Slayer, and I am a Watcher, and it is my duty to-”

“Yeah, yeah.” Buffy sounded extremely unimpressed. “I’ve heard it all before. A Slayer slays, a Watcher watches. You’re here to watch me pulverise some bones just so you can make sure I’ve done it. Haven’t you guys ever heard of trust?”

She came out in a clearing then, and dumped the bones onto the ground. Giles and Oz came to a stop just at the edge of the tree line, and Buffy moved to take the sledgehammer from the younger man.

They watched in silence as the Slayer got to work methodically smashing the bones into the ground. Shards of white bone jumped through the air, buried their way into the dirt, scattered across the grass. There was an angriness to the girl’s movements, and when Oz glanced towards Giles he knew that the older man had seen it too.

Buffy didn’t stop until the shards had been hammered into the ground, until every last bone was barely more than dust, and when she turned to face them, there was a furious look in her eyes. As she walked past Oz, she shoved the sledgehammer at him and he took it without thinking.

She didn’t stop walking until she reached the van.

“Just tell me what to do.”

Giles surveyed the stubborn Slayer with a slight unease. None of them had talked about Buffy’s actions in the woods, but he couldn’t help but feel the reason for her anger might have been at least in part linked to her failure to show up in Sunnydale. Still, he could tell that forcing the matter would only anger the Slayer, and he knew their current priority needed to be undoing the wish.

“I’ll do the mixing of the ingredients,” he told her carefully. “I simply need you to recite the spell. When Anyanka appears, you will need to grab her amulet and destroy it. That will reverse the spell.”

Buffy didn’t look convinced, but Giles pointedly ignored that and instead set to work mixing the ingredients. When he was ready, he nodded to Buffy.

With a sigh, she leaned over to read the words for the spell. “Anyanka, I beseech thee. In the name of all women scorned, come before me.”

Oz startled as the demon appeared in the middle of the room, and even Giles unconsciously backed away. But Buffy just arched an eyebrow at her.

“You know, I was expecting something a little scarier,” the Slayer said as she scrutinised the demon in front of her. “Oh well. Let’s just get this over with.”

She darted forward then, and aimed a blow at the demon’s head, but the demon blocked it.

“Slayer,” Anyanka greeted with a smirk. “How nice of you to join our little town.”

Buffy said nothing, and instead blocked a blow from Anyanka.

“B-Buffy,” Giles’s nervous voice came from a few feet away. “We might have a problem.”

Landing a blow to the demon’s stomach, Buffy glanced over her shoulder with a scowl. “What?”

“T-The amulet,” Giles said, wide-eyed.

“Yeah?” Buffy prompted.

Oz pointed towards the demon. “She’s not wearing it.”

The Slayer blinked, and looked back at Anyanka. There was no amulet around her neck. Anyanka laughed.

“Do you really think I didn’t know what you were planning?” the demon sneered. “I wasn’t falling for your little scheme! My amulet is safe and sound somewhere you’ll never get your hands on it.”

“Without the amulet, we, we can’t reverse the spell!” Giles informed them, sounding more than a little anxious.

“Oh, you won’t be reversing anything,” Anyanka grinned. She looked around wistfully. “I hope you enjoy your new lives. They were so much fun to watch unfold.”

And before anyone could react, Anyanka had vanished. Buffy blinked at the spot where the demon had been just a split second before. A heavy silence filled the room.

“I take it that wasn’t the plan?” Oz said at last.

“No,” Giles agreed quietly. “It wasn’t.”

Oz left a little while later, sent home by Giles to get some sleep.

“I should go,” Buffy said, standing by the front door.

“Back to your Watcher?” Giles asked, perched on the arm of the sofa.

Buffy shrugged and avoided his gaze. “Maybe. Maybe not.”

Giles frowned. “You know,” he said after a moment, wincing at the soreness of his throat, “when I was first told I was destined to be a Watcher, I was told that the most important thing for a Watcher was to be trusted and respected by their Slayer.”

Buffy watched him suspiciously then. “What are you getting at?”

“Oh, nothing,” he said, looking away across the room. “Just that I don’t think you trust your Watcher, if you’re so reluctant to return to him, and that isn’t right.”

The Slayer scoffed. “Look, I can handle myself,” she said, frustrated, “and-”

“I’m sure you can. But it isn’t right that you are stuck with a Watcher you don’t feel a connection to. A Watcher is there to train and guide the Slayer, and the Slayer must have absolute faith in them. Otherwise people get hurt.”

Buffy stepped a little closer then, arms wrapped round herself and a hint of vulnerability on her face. “My Watcher hates me,” she said after a moment. “The one before hated me too. And the one before that. They all had these perfect ideas about a Slayer, and because I didn’t fit into the mould they tried to force me. And when that didn’t work, well...” She shrugged, not meeting Giles’s gaze.

“I remember,” Giles said slowly, watching the small girl in front of him, “that Cordelia Chase knew you were meant to be here, in Sunnydale. That I was sent here to await a Slayer by the name of Buffy Summers, that I was to be your Watcher.” Buffy met his gaze hesitantly. “That there was another world, a- a better world than this, where you made it here and I did my duty.” He swallowed, dropped his eyes to his hands, unable to look at her any longer. “We might not be able to reverse the spell, to undo this nightmare entirely, but perhaps we could- could make this world a little more tolerable.”

“How?” Buffy asked, though he sensed she knew what he was hinting at.

“You have no connection to your Watcher, Buffy, perhaps because he was never meant to be your Watcher. By the time I was made aware of your not arriving in Sunnydale, I had started building a life here, and I was informed by the Council that alternative arrangements would be made for you. But what if those arrangements were doomed to fail? What if the world Cordelia came from got one specific thing right? You being in Sunnydale as the Slayer, I as your Watcher?”

“What if my presence here changed everything, you mean?” Buffy asked, and she looked vaguely ill at the thought. “If I’d arrived when you were expecting me, how much would have changed?”

“Exactly,” Giles agreed, and he couldn’t help the excitement building in him. It would be a lie to say that he hadn’t been disappointed when he had been informed of the change of plans, that he would not receive a Slayer. And to have her here, now, albeit a couple of years later than planned...

“You can’t put that on me,” Buffy said, voice quiet and angry. “You cannot hold me responsible for the way things turned out here.”

The man frowned, and suddenly realised how his words had been misinterpreted. “I- I don’t,” he hastened to assure her. “I, I merely meant that your presence here in Sunnydale might help this world find its balance. Clearly Anyanka has taken extra precautions to keep us from getting her amulet, and while we could try summoning her again, I’m quite certain she’ll avoid Sunnydale in its entirety for the foreseeable future.” He sighed. “I just wanted to offer you an alternative, to going back to a Watcher you don’t trust, or, or being on your own. You were meant to be here in Sunnydale, and so the Council can hardly protest at your staying here. I just thought you might like the option.”

Buffy frowned a little at that, apparently confused by the idea of choice. She moved across the room, and sank slowly onto the sofa, causing Giles to have to move in order to see her.

“Options,” she echoed softly, before meeting his eyes. Suddenly, she wasn’t that cold, hard Slayer who had found him at the side of the road; she was a scared, lonely teenage girl. “I haven’t had options for a long time.” She gave him a tight smile, and the action looked foreign on her face. Giles was willing to bet all his good scotch on the fact she hadn’t had a reason to smile for quite a while. “You know, when I was a kid, I was gonna be a cheerleader. Or an ice skater. My biggest concern when I started high school was getting on to the cheerleading team. It was all I cared about.” Her brow furrowed. “Then it became all vampires and demons and death.”

She lapsed into silence then, and Giles felt compelled to say something.

“When I was a child,” he responded quietly, “I wanted to be a fighter pilot, or a grocer. I was rather quite put out when I was told I’d be a Watcher instead. I think part of the reason I hated it was because I wasn’t given the luxury of choice. It was like what I wanted didn’t matter. I even ran away for a while; I dropped out of university, ran off to London. Did everything I could to avoid the call of the Watchers Council and my destiny as a Watcher. Eventually I went back, of course, but only when I felt ready.”

Buffy seemed to process this. “I don’t think I ever felt ready,” she admitted, voice barely more than a whisper and a pained tone to her words. “I even tried to quit, after my first Watcher died. They wouldn’t let me.” She glanced up at Giles, gave another smile, and somehow this one felt a little more natural. “It’s nice to know someone gets it. My Watchers have always been pretty smug with themselves for being picked. I think it’s why they hate me so much. They can’t understand why anybody wouldn’t want the job.” She thought for a moment longer. “Is the offer to stay still on the table?”

Giles smiled back then, a soft reassuring smile that made Buffy’s eyes light up just for a second. “It is,” he nodded. “I’m afraid the spare room is rather full of things right now, but I can make up the couch for you until we get it cleared out?”

Buffy nodded, though he could see she was trying not to let on how affected she was by his words. “Sounds good.”

Giles stood then, and paused briefly before turning back to her. “I know you’ll probably say no, but I’ll ask anyway. Did you want to call your Watcher?”

“No,” Buffy responded calmly. “But we should probably call the council. Make my move official, and all that.”

Blinking at that, Giles found a slow smile spread across his face. “We should?” he asked, not wanting to get his hopes up just yet.

“Yep,” Buffy said, getting to her feet. “You’re back on the clock, Watcher.” She moved past him to the kitchen. “Got any cereal?”

And as the Slayer began rooting through his cupboards for food, Giles couldn’t help but smile. This world wasn’t perfect. In fact, it had been downright horrific for the past two years. But something told Rupert Giles it was about to get a whole lot better.

#buffy fanfic #buffy summers #rupert giles #wishverse

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calligraphist-artemisia · 4 years

Text

Harry Potter and the Best Summer (1 | Rescue)

Summary: AU - canon divergence. Harry had barely been back at the Dursley's for two weeks, when an unexpected visitor arrived at the door. He quickly finds himself spirited away back to the wizarding world and learns some secrets that have long been kept from him.

A sequel to Of Family and Unexpected Friendship. Also posted on AO3 under the username Kishirokitsune.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

1 | Rescue

If Harry Potter could have only one wish come true, it would be that he would never have to return to number four Privet Drive. His time at Hogwarts had only reinforced that wish and there was a certain knowledge lurking at the back of his mind that said if he really wanted to, he could leave and spend his summers lodging at the Leaky Cauldron. However, he was stopped by his promise to Headmaster Dumbledore.

Harry sighed as quietly as he could and gave a sideways glance to the cupboard under the stairs, where his relatives had immediately locked away his trunk when he arrived home.

He'd been just lucky enough to convince them to allow Hedwig to stay in his room, provided that he keep her quiet. It was working, but barely. After two weeks of being stuck in her cage, she was beginning to give him reproachful looks and quiet hoots of displeasure.

For his part, Harry kept his head down and did his chores as he was told. The less he could provoke his relatives, the better. They seemed perfectly happy to ignore him anyway, which was far better than any of the years before he learned he was a wizard, and the most interaction he got daily was from Aunt Petunia leaving a list for him on the counter.

Most days followed a routine; make breakfast, clean the kitchen, water and weed the garden, make lunch, leave the house whenever Dudley brought his friends over so he could avoid the inevitable bullying, and make dinner. Some days there was another chore added in, like vacuuming or dusting or cleaning the windows.

It wasn't bad, all things considering.

His chores kept Harry busy and in his free time he tried to review what he could remember from classes, so that once his friends did write him with days he could (hopefully) visit them, he would have a clearer idea of what to write for his summer essays. With all of his books locked away in his trunk, it would be the only chance he'd have to complete the work given to him.

Two weeks wasn't a long time. Not really. There was no reason for him to worry about not receiving a single letter, even though they'd all promised to do so.

Two weeks.

Harry quietly began preparing lunch according to Petunia's exact specifications. He knew if he did a single thing incorrectly, he would find his “privileges” more restricted than they already were.

He was partway through when something very odd happened.

The doorbell rang.

Most people would not find that odd, but most people were not the Dursley's, where an unexpected house-guest was a very odd thing indeed.

Petunia glared at him as she bustled by on her way to the door, a not-so-subtle reminder that he was to remain quiet and not draw attention to himself. She pasted on a smile for their guests and smoothed out the front of her neat blouse, and then opened the door.

Harry slowed his movements so he could listen in, thankful there was no one else around to watch him.

“Good afternoon, my name is Andromeda Tonks and this is my cousin, Leona Black.”

Harry's heart leaped in his chest.

Leona Black was a fellow Gryffindor at Hogwarts who he befriended over Christmas break. Their parents had been friends and year-mates when they attended school, and she offered him the chance to hear stories about them. On top of that, she spent the remainder of the school year tutoring him in wizarding culture and had promised to dive deeper into that over the summer, even if she had to do it through letter.

He skillfully set aside the spatula without making a sound and crept closer to the hall, hoping to get a look at what was happening.

Leona was there, looking far different than he remembered and it took Harry an embarrassingly long moment to realize why. It was more than just her light brown hair, curled more neatly than she bothered to while at school, it was also in the way she held herself, straight-backed and head lifted high. Her muggle clothing was crisp and neat in a way that way too perfect.

The woman with her was dressed in a similar manner, but carried herself with a grace and nobility that made Harry feel like a bum in comparison. Her hair was darker than Leona's and curled in a more natural manner. For a moment he thought she might be Leona's mother, before remembering that she introduced herself as Andromeda.

Or “Andy”, as Leona commonly called her.

“We are here to pick up Harry Potter.”

The next few minutes passed in a blur to Harry. Petunia denied that he was there, of course, but none of that stopped Leona or Andromeda from finding the truth, aided in part by Harry himself, who did not stay quietly hidden in the kitchen. He wasn't sure if she made a convincing argument, or merely decided Petunia wasn't someone worth arguing with, but before he knew it, Harry was being swept toward the door by Andromeda with a steady hand on his back.

“Leona, fetch Harry's things,” she instructed.

Leona nodded once and looked to Harry for guidance.

“Hedwig's in my room. Up the stairs, second door on the left. My trunk is, er...” Harry couldn't stop his glance to the cupboard under the stairs.

There was more than just his trunk in there. No one had ever bothered to fully clean it out when he was moved to the smallest bedroom. It had only been a year since then, but he couldn't remember if he left behind anything to show that he had once called the tiny space his room.

In one fluid motion, Andromeda withdrew her wand and flicked it toward the cupboard.

Petunia hissed angrily and pressed herself up against the wall, her eyes fixated on the slender piece of wood. She said nothing, but her glare promised retribution the next time Harry stepped foot into the house alone.

The cupboard door creaked open and Harry tried to move forward and get his trunk before much more of the room could be revealed, but the older witch summoned it towards them herself, bumping the door wide open in the process.

There, pinned to the wall on an old scrap of paper and written in crayon, were the words “Harry's Room”.

Andromeda narrowed her eyes and pressed her lips into a thin line. She continued to float the trunk a few inches from the ground, and in a very calm voice said: “Leona.”

“I'll get Hedwig,” she responded immediately, turning to the stairs and racing up them. She returned quickly, crooning to the snowy owl with promises of freedom. She didn't look at Petunia as she brushed past the woman.

Harry wasn't sure if he managed to say goodbye to his Aunt or not as he was hurried from the house, but he didn't glance back either. His trunk was still floating, though it was close enough that anyone not paying close attention would assume he was carrying it.

There was a shiny black car – obviously new and expensive – sitting at the end of the drive, and Harry eyed it curiously as they approached. He assumed they would keep going, but instead Andromeda led them right up to it. His trunk was soon loaded into the back and Hedwig released to stretch her wings, and then they were off, with Harry in the backseat along with Leona.

“I got worried when you didn't respond to any of my letters,” she explained. “When Fred and George said you hadn't written Ron either, I knew I had to do something, so I asked Andy for advice and she agreed to come with me.”

“You sent letters? I never got any,” Harry said.

Leona frowned. “I sent three of them, and I know Ron sent one, so that's at least four missing letters. According to him, Hermione has sent you one as well. So what happened to them? Any ideas, Andy?”

“It sounds as though someone has been tampering with Mr. Potter's mail,” Andromeda responded. She glanced at him using the rear-view mirror, her brown eyes scanning his slight form. “It will all be looked into.”

Harry got the feeling she meant more than just his mail. He looked to Leona instead, wondering which of his many questions he should ask first. (Should he ask them? Would she mind? Those musings Harry tried to brush away, though the sense of unease lingered. The Dursley's never liked questions.)

“I got a little worried when I didn't hear from you after the first one,” Leona said to one of his unasked questions. “You do have a knack for trouble, after all. Mum convinced me that you might be busy and that two days is hardly cause for alarm, but she did let me send a second letter. Once I didn't get a response to that one, I mentioned what was happening to Fred and George. Ron overheard and said you hadn't written him, but Hermione had and she was having similar trouble. I figured there must be something wrong, but it wasn't until the third one that mum and Andy were willing to believe me.”

“We always believed that you thought something was wrong, but there are better ways to handle problems than rushing headlong into a situation when you don't know all of the facts,” Andromeda said, in a tone that indicated she'd said that many times before.

Leona made a face.

“Extra lessons tomorrow morning. Early. Mr. Potter may join us.”

Leona sputtered, her expression one of distress. “But it's the start of vacation and we've only just gotten Harry away from those awful muggles!”

Andromeda's voice was firm and without amusement when she spoke again. “Then I should think that Mr. Potter would like the opportunity to immerse himself in wizarding culture and tradition. As it's clear from what little I've heard from you about the circumstances of his placement, there is a great deal he needs to learn, and very little time to teach him. There will be time for fun, but at the moment we have more pressing matters to attend to.”

Leona slumped back against her seat, which seemed to mark the end of their disagreement.

Harry soon found himself distracted with the view out the window, as the car they were in squeezed through impossibly small spaces. He thought at first that it was the other vehicles warping to let them pass through, but on closer inspection realized that they were the ones being pulled and squeezed as they moved easily through traffic.

They drove for another ten minutes before Andromeda made a turn off down a dead-end street, at the end of which was a tall brick wall – likely the back side of a shop. When they didn't slow down, Harry began to get nervous.

He closed his eyes, bracing himself for impact, but all that happened was the car bouncing slightly and then he could hear the crunch of gravel beneath the tires. Harry opened his eyes again to find that they were no longer in town.

When he twisted around to look behind him, there was only a gray brick fence and impressive iron-wrought gate barring the path to the main road.

“It's pretty cool, right?” Leona asked, noticing his look of awe. “There are specialized runes and charms on the car that let it pass through magical space. It was only invented in the past few years as a way to travel without causing motion sickness. Of course, not everyone has embraced it, since it relies on muggle engineering and it's slower than apparating or taking a portkey, but you don't have to down an anti-nausea potion each time you use it, so that benefit outweighs the extra time. And also, disappearing in front of muggles is generally considered breaking the Statute of Secrecy, but they won't pay any attention to a car.”

“It's brilliant,” Harry said, though he had no idea what apparation was. He resolved to ask Hermione about other forms of magical transport once he had the chance. She was bound to know, but on the off-chance that she didn't, it would give her something new and interesting to research.

Of course, he could also ask Leona or Andromeda, who were both right there with him and clearly happy to explain anything he was having trouble understanding. It was only out of habit that Hermione was the first one he thought of.

His attention was drawn elsewhere as he got his first look at where they were going. It was a truly magnificent Victorian manor with a octagonal tower positioned on the front right side of the building. It looked to be around two stories tall; three, counting the tower. The outside was done in dark stone and had wooden embellishments for added interest.

The landscaping around the manor was immaculate, but not in the too-perfect way of Privet Drive. There was no symmetry, for one, and it seemed like every plant had been chosen for a specific reason that went beyond uniformity. Aside from a few groupings, none of them appeared to be the same type of tree or bush, and the colors of the flowers ranged across the rainbow from red to blue. The fact that his Aunt and Uncle would hate it made Harry love it even more.

“Welcome to Oakstone Manor,” Leona said proudly.

Andromeda pulled the car into a stone carport next to the house and once they were parked, Leona led the way up to the front door.

“Remember our plans, Leona,” Andromeda said.

“Of course,” Leona responded with a short nod. She looked down at Harry, whose confusion was clear in his expression. “Andy set up an appointment at Gringotts for the reading of your parents will. She's been looking into a few things ever since I sent that letter to mum over Yule, but it's the most important one.”

“We will explain things once you are settled in, Mr. Potter,” Andromeda said kindly.

Harry felt a little too reminded of Professor McGonagall right before she was about to give a lecture every time Andromeda referred to him as Mr. Potter and quickly asked that she just call him Harry instead.

“Then you may call me Andy,” she said. “My child prefers to go by our surname, Tonks. You will likely meet them this evening once they return from Auror training.”

Andromeda walked ahead of them to open the door, giving Leona a split second to whisper a rather unusual word to Harry. He assumed Nymphadora was Andy's child and could almost understand why they wanted to change their name. (He didn't fully understand the use of “they”. Nymphadora sounded like a girls name, so shouldn't that be “she”?)

Harry had so many questions that he didn't know where to start, so he stayed quiet as he followed them inside, his eyes wide at the sight of the grand staircase leading up to the second floor. They bustled him along to the right, past a parlor room decorated in soft blues and grays, and then through a set of doors leading to the kitchen, where a tiny creature in dark gray was busy using magic to prepare a light lunch of sandwiches and fruit.

The creature strongly reminded Harry of a hairless cat, though it was bipedal and its ears were much larger.

He looked to Leona in silent questioning.

“Harry, this is Cici, one of the manor's house-elves,” Leona introduced. “Cici, come meet Harry! He'll be staying with us for the rest of summer.”

Cici turned with a delighted squeak, her eyes large and almost bulbous in shape. She dropped into a low bow. “Cici is being pleased to meet Harry!”

Once she was facing him, Harry could see the navy blue sash attached to the front of the house-elf's uniform, stretching from one shoulder down to the opposite hip. At the very top was a crest, which he supposed belonged to House Black.

“Nice to meet you,” Harry replied.

Cici beamed. “Cici has prepared lunch for everyone to enjoy! If Harry wants anything else to eat, just ask Cici!”

“I, um, I will. Thank you,” Harry said, fighting off his confusion at her enthusiasm. He cast a wide-eyed look at Leona, who wasn't at all phased by the house-elf. But then again, why would she be?

Cici snapped her fingers and the plates of food floated to the long table in the center of the room.

“Eat, Harry,” Andromeda suggested in a tone that left little room for disagreement. She smiled as Harry obediently sat down in the nearest chair and reached for a sandwich. “Cici, would you take Harry's things to his new room? I was thinking that the blue room on the east wing would be best for him.”

“Cici will be going right away, Miss Andy!”

Harry jumped as a loud pop! snapped through the air right as Cici vanished. “How did she do that?”

“Magic, of course.” Leona grinned at him as she sat down and selected a sandwich of her own, also adding several large strawberries to her plate. “Remember earlier when I was telling you about different forms of magical transport? That was apparation.”

“And... and you said Cici is a house-elf?”

Andromeda joined them at the table, but stayed silent as Leona explained.

“They're sort of like live-in servants. They bind themselves to the magic of a family or House and it makes their own magic even stronger. Of course, some people take advantage of that and use it as an excuse to be cruel to them – to command obedience even when it means hurting them. It's...” Leona paused to get her thoughts in order. “House Black used to be that way. After the war, when Andy took over as Regent for the House, she started to make changes and reformed House Black from the ground up.”

“It has been a long process and not nearly as simple as Leona makes it sound,” Andromeda said gently. “Family magics are delicate and often tightly woven. It has taken no small amount of power and patience to get as far as I have, but it has all been worth it to lay the foundation for Leona to build upon once she comes of age.”

“Anyway, our house-elves all have the option to accept payment and can use it for any extra things they like. We provide all of the housing, food, and medicine for them, as well as access to the family magics. And their clothing, of course. While working they wear the uniform of our House, but outside of that it's up to them.”

Leona spoke with such pride of the changes that had been made, but Harry couldn't help but feel like she was leaving so much out. If House Black had only recently begun to offer payment to their house-elves, then did that mean it wasn't something other Houses did? But then that would make house-elves...

“They're slaves?” he asked in a quiet voice.

Leona flinched.

“They have been treated as such for many generations,” Andromeda said in an even tone. “For long enough that house-elves themselves see it as the only way, though that in no way makes it right. We are trying to do better, Harry. In time, we hope to see others willingly follow until the day comes we can approve legislature that will prevent the mistreatment of house-elves.”

Andromeda filled her own plate with food. “Enough of this talk for now. There is much we need to get done and the day is already halfway through. Milla!”

Harry jumped as a new house-elf appeared, similar in appearance to the first but decidedly older. Like Cici, they wore all gray except for the navy blue sash from shoulder-to-hip.

“How may Milla be helping?” they asked.

“Could you let Remy and Aquarius know that we have returned and lunch has been prepared? I'm afraid I sent Cici off with new instructions before she could do so,” Andromeda said.

Milla quietly agreed and then popped away, leaving the three of them alone in the kitchen. They ate in silence for several minutes and then footsteps on the wooden floors sounded the arrival of someone else.

Or two someones, as it were.

A tiny girl with wild dark curls was the first to enter, giving little pause when she spotted Harry sitting at the table next to Leona. She smiled sweetly as she made her way over, her pale blue skirt swishing around her ankles, and then sat down directly across from Harry.

Behind her was an older woman whose hair was similar in color to Leona's – a light brown that has slight waves – though there was a visible streak of gray in the front. Something in her expression broke when she saw Harry and before he could wonder if there was something wrong, she opened her mouth to greet him.

“I haven't seen you since you were a baby, Harry. It's good to have you here,” she said.

She could only be Leona's mother – Remy Lupin-Black – who had been best friends with his parents while they were at Hogwarts. He'd been exchanging letters with her since Christmas, though his were mostly thanking her for the stories she told him about his parents and a little bit about his life at school. He should have recognized her from the photographs Leona showed him, but she had only been a teenager in those.

“It's nice to finally meet you – er, again,” Harry said, feeling awkward.

Remy took a seat across from Leona and next to Andromeda, her movements a little stiff. Maybe she was just as nervous to meet Harry? The thought seemed silly, but after all of her well-written letters maybe he wasn't off the mark.

“Leo says she's been teaching you about culture and stuff,” Aquarius spoke up, breaking the silence that had fallen over the room. “Did you really not know about it before Hogwarts?”

“Well, no. I grew up with muggles – my mum's sister,” Harry explained.

“Petunia?” Remy sounded alarmed, her amber eyes wide. “But he said – you were meant to be someplace safe and he put you with Petunia?”

“Remus,” Andromeda said sharply. She waited for the other woman to calm down before continuing with: “That is part of the reason why we will be going to Gringotts before anything else. Harry is overdue for his inheritance test and after that we should be able to request for the unsealing of the Potters' Will. We will get to the bottom of why you were sent to live with those horrible muggles instead of being placed with the magical guardian chosen by your parents.”

Harry wondered if speaking up in defense of his aunt and uncle would be the right thing to do, but decided he didn't care. They were horrible muggles.

“Lily wanted to do a few things the muggle way, so you should have gone to your godparents, but...” Remy trailed off, her voice full of pain. “Alice Longbottom was named your godmother. She and Lily were close after Hogwarts. James picked your godfather.”

“Sirius,” Harry said, remembering what Leona told him when they first met. “Wait, Longbottom? Like Neville Longbottom?” His head reeled at the thought of growing up with Neville as a brother. It would have been far better than Dudley, that was for sure. Or he could have even grown up with Leona and Aquarius as his sisters!

He should have grown up in the magical world, knowing about his parents and the world he would come to know and love. So who had placed him with the Dusleys? And why?

Harry doubted he would be able to eat much until he learned the truth.

#harry potter #harry potter fanfiction #harry potter au #original characters #exploring the Culture and Traditions of the Magical World #Harry has a more realistic curiosity about his family #HP and the Traditions of the Magical World

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panticwritten · 5 years

Note

Unbind Me? (for whoever you want)

OKAY I FINALLY DID IT!! Sorry it took so long, and thank you so much for sending this!

This takes place August 2017. There’s not a lot of context here, but tbh it would take more than 1500 words to give anywhere near enough context to make some things in this make sense.

Content warnings: Unreality, implied memory loss, implied suicidal ideation.

—//—

I know Connor will have a great big I told you so waiting for me when we get back. I told you, he’ll say, that you can’t just ignore trauma. There’ll be a whole thing, and everyone is gonna agree with him even though no one else deals with their bullshit either.

“What’ll you do with him when we get back?” Jarie tugs at the rope between the two of us. She walks a step behind me, but I still feel the pointed look she aims at Jordan.

I tighten my grip on his wrist. Some might say it’s unnecessary, considering he’s also tied to me. I don’t trust him not to use the memories to wiggle away. Not for the reasons the Master thinks, but because of one trait I know he shares with Connor.

He doesn’t think he deserves forgiveness for crimes he never even committed.

“Figure out what’s really going on.”

“We know!” she snaps. “Do you think I’ve been running around with someone else in my head for fun?”

Guilt throbs from Jordan. He doesn’t say anything, still, and I wonder why. I wonder why he doesn’t defend himself, why he doesn’t tell her the truth. Doesn’t tell me the truth. He obviously thinks I think he did this if his insistence he stay out here means anything.

The lonely boy trapped in the memories, stuck in a hole in the darkness and surrounded by both my nightmares and his own. Jarie led me right to him, only a trace of what really controlled her left in her head by the time I tracked them both down.

Still. There’s something else.

Something, something, something doesn’t taste right around here.

“It’s just like you to stop with the easy answer,” I mutter around the buttery feeling in my mouth. “It’s all horses to you.”

A bolt of confusion lances through her irritation, through her anger. She doesn’t have to ask her question. Not here, not in a place as personal as the memories.

“I’m on a zebra hunt.”

Really, it’s so familiar. I’ve felt this before. The quality of those remnants in Jarie’s head, the vague taste of late nights and this feeling. It’s right on the tip of my tongue. It’s there, and whatever it is makes me much more nervous than the idea that Connor’s missing half might be secretly evil.

“Oh, great.”

The blank slate of the Memories shifts. A baby blue wall slams down in front of us, the floor now a ratty green carpet. The single window only shows inky darkness, no sign of what really would have been outside my room in…

What year would this have been?

I ignore both Jarie’s demand for an explanation and Jordan’s nervous protest when I drop his hand and twist around to assess the room.

Pictures up on the walls, a camping mat instead of a bed. Most of the furniture against the one wall, but that desk… next to the door…

“2013? No, no.” I snap around again, only limited by the rope still tight around my waist. Laptop on the dresser, the old one, the one I kept stealing from the living room. “2012. That summer, the good one.”

Jarie immediately stops her complaining. “That summer? What are we doing in 2012?”

“I was thinking, trying to remember.” I tilt my head and look out the window. Sharp, shifting red and blue. An easy assumption, but it wasn’t a real-life thing. No sirens, nothing out of the ordinary in the real world. “I’m so close, what is that taste?”

“What taste?” Jarie demands. “You’ve been weird since we picked him up.”

“Ugh, shut up!” I groan. “There’s a taste, like—like—“

I stop because we’re not alone in the room anymore. Based on how close Jarie shuffles to me, I’d say she feels it too. The memory itself isn’t tampered with, it’s normal even with the red and the blue that I only really saw through someone else’s eyes.

The lights! That red and blue wasn’t even here, I was trying to do something at—and that taste! It’s like—

“You would expect memories to be different, wouldn’t you?” a voice, a familiar voice, muses. I don’t need to look to see those eyes, for the growl of a smile to sink into my skin and root me to the floor. “But, then, you never go-ot the o-opportunity to really feel it, did you?”

Blank, blank, my brain turns to nothing but faint static and false clarity.

Jarie lunges toward the voice, still behind me. The rope keeps her from actually attacking. That’s good. Even a memory of Tchaikovsky could ruin us if we let it.

Jordan, on the other hand, stumbles in the opposite direction, away from the threat. He ends up where I can see him, red eyes wide and scared and anything but an enemy. He focuses on me, a plea.

It takes the purr of a laugh from behind me to really shake me out of it. It rubs the situation wrong, a thorn in the fabric. It’s just a memory, but this doesn’t fit.

I turn, too stiff, too mechanical. This fear, nothing more than the remnants of a horror movie. The big, bad monster stands in the middle of my old room and I know he can’t do a single thing to hurt me.

The victorious, smug glint is right. The line of the shoulders, the hungry touch in the air. The confidence. All of that’s right. The chuckle fits what I’m being told.

I narrow my eyes. That’s not a memory. That’s something else, and it’s lying to me.

“Jarie.” I flex my hand and curl my fingers around the newly-arrived map back home. She doesn’t answer with more than a frustrated agreement in the air. Good. “I’ll be right behind you.”

“Don’t be so sure.” The specter shifts on its heels, as if it’s going to take a step forward. It laughs again when Jarie skitters back to stand just barely behind me. “Does your brava-ado hide the sa-ame cowardice?”

Jarie growls at my side and snatches the map from me. It takes less than a thought to reconfigure the ropes. I don’t even have to look away from the boogieman. From the fake.

The door slams shut out of sight, Jarie and Jordan both gone.

This is so familiar, why don’t I remember? That affect to its voice, I know I’ve heard it before!

“Tchaikovsky wasn’t here for this.” Might as well start with what I know for sure. Wary, tired, but at least I can keep a lie of control here. “Who are you, really?”

“I tho-ought you knew everything in your Cube.” It sneers and loses the characteristic poise of the face it wears. It does nothing to dispel the tension in the air. “You certainly believed so o-on this day, my fa-avorite interloper.”

Ah.

I shift, and in a blink I have it backed against a wall. I didn’t expect it to back up on its own, though it certainly makes this easier. White hot sparks fizz over the hand I raise toward the throat it stole from a man I’d love nothing more than to wipe from the Cube’s history.

“You,” I growl, my voice strange under the force of electricity I hold. “Don’t belong here.”

It breathes out a nervous laugh, and it really did choose the wrong face if it didn’t want me to be tempted to crush it like the worm it’s masquerading as. It shouldn’t be here, I haven’t even talked to Brennan in at least a year! It can’t be here!

“If you ever ca-ame to visit, you’d know I’ve been here for nearly five years.” It presses back against the wall, its voice strained and seething. “But then, you a-alwa-ays neglect to fo-ollow up o-on your little ga-ames, don’t you?”

It flinches when I raise my hand and a spark lands on its neck. Tchaikovsky’s milky skin fades there, just for a second, into the scratched plastic that it was hiding.

“You disappeared.” I shift just a little bit closer, close enough that I can really see through the illusion. Just a broken mannequin, full of a thing that doesn’t belong anywhere near my head. “I was thirteen. Why would I even think to look for you?”

“I stole ha-alf a-a summer from you!”

Now that I can see both its illusion and the blankness of its true face, it’s both less intimidating and more disconcerting. So close, though, I see something else. Something that speaks volumes more than anything it could say to me.

I step back, though I don’t take the sparks with me. They hang in the air, a simple enough threat, just beside its throat. It doesn’t relax. In fact, that same something only twists and shakes the air around those sparks.

“AA.” I dip into the voice I try to avoid. The voice of a leader, I suppose, or a commander as Jay’s described it. The voice of someone who expects their orders to be followed. I hate it, though it does get the attentiveness from AA that I’m looking for. “Why reveal yourself now?”

It doesn’t answer. I wait longer than I probably should, and I know what I have to do. I’m gonna get hell when I get back. I hate this slimy little monster, but I can’t feel that and see it in the air and still bring everyone the blood they’re going to want.

I’ll already be getting a trial for Jordan. I may as well get one for the thing that I’d be willing to bet is really behind all of this. Especially when I’m almost ninety percent sure it lured me out here just to kill it.

#writing #my writing #paraportal #prompt game #unbind me #AA #the original #jordan #the master #and there's AA's introduction #sort of #its technically been in a few things already ;)

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razieltwelve · 6 years

Text

Infiltration (Final War)

“You seem troubled, my lady.”

Jaina was shaken out of her musings by the question. They had been sailing for days now, and they were all feeling the strain. After what had happened in Lordaeron, it was for the best that they had left. Yet none of them could quite understand how everything had gone so horribly wrong.

Arthas… he was a good man. Had been a good man. And yet he had become the very evil they had sworn to destroy. Countless thousands were already dead at the hands of his Scourge, and she had even heard whispers of a vast undead army marching on Silvermoon. If the high elves fell as well…

“It isn’t your fault, you know.”

Jaine’s eyes widened as she turned her full attention to the woman speaking to her. Her brows furrowed. She wasn’t wholly familiar with all of her ship’s crew, but she had never seen this woman before. She was tall with blonde hair that seemed to be ever so slightly red in the sun. Her eyes were somewhere between blue and green, and there was a small smile on her face, as though the whole situation amused her.

“What are you talking about?” Jaina murmured.

The woman made her way down to the deck via the rigging with ease. “The prince, my lady.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Jaina replied stiffly.

The woman shrugged. “Fair enough, but I’d have to be blind not to notice. The thing is… he was a grown man. I don’t know exactly what happened in the far north, but he made his choices. The only one to blame for what he’s become is… him. Oh, maybe things were tough, or maybe something went wrong, but he still had a choice.”

Jaina’s magic stirred. There was an undercurrent of cruelty in the woman’s words despite how reasonable they sounded. She knew they were true, at least intellectually. Arthas was a grown man. His choices were his own, and yet…

“My father has a saying,” the woman continued. “Don’t worry about the ones you can’t save. It hurts, but there’s nothing you can do for them. Worry about the ones you can save.” She gestured at the ship and the others not far away. “You can save a lot of people, my lady. Save your strength - and your worry - for them instead of the fool who forced you all to flee.”

X X X

Kahle found Jaine Proudmoore fascinating. The sorceress was incredibly naive in some ways, yet she could sense an inner streak of ruthlessness just waiting to be awakened. Victor would probably be aggravated at her poking and prodding at one of the key figures in this whole debacle, but Kahle was having far too much fun.

She blamed her ancestors.

She was descended from Jihl and Fujin from the Age of Heroes. More recently, however, her bloodline featured luminaries like Sarah Kerrigan and Jim Raynor. As an infiltration specialist, there were precious few in the Grand Empire Alliance who could claim to be her equal.

Her convoluted bloodline had given her immense psychic powers. It was trivially easy for her to enter the minds of others, and she could layer illusion after illusion with ease. More to the point, her eyes could project a sort of ‘psychic harpoon’ that let her dig her hooks into her targets for even greater effectiveness.

The little mishap with the portal into Azeroth had been unfortunate, but she had swiftly found a way onto this ship. Since then, she had been leaching the details of this world out of the minds of the others as they slept, building a truly in-depth picture of how Azeroth operated. She had also delved into the dreams of those around her to see if any of them needed to be eliminated or if there were ways to nudge them into the directions she wanted.

Jaina’s dreams had been a swirl of horror, shame, and regret. Oh, the sorceress carried so much baggage that it was a miracle she could even put up the front of a calm, level-headed ruler. It spoke volumes as to her ability that she had managed to do so for so long. In the end, though, she would break, and Kahle could not let that happen.

Besides, they were headed to Kalimdor, and her AI, Infiltrator, had detected signals from it that matched those belonging to Cinnamon. The last thing she needed was for someone so important to end up anywhere near the Dia-Farron without being mentally stable.

X X X

“Still brooding, I see.”

Jaina scowled as Callie, the woman from before, landed on the deck beside her. Every day since they’d first spoken, the other woman had taken to speaking to her. Her words always drifted on the very edge of insolence, but there was no denying the wisdom in them. It made her wonder what sort of life she’d led to have developed such a perspective.

“There is much to brood over,” Jaina said at last.

“Oh? Worried about what happens when we get wherever we’re going?” Callie waved at some of the other sailors. She seemed to be well liked, and Jaine had heard that quite a few of the others had taken to seeking her out for advice.

“Perhaps,” Jaina conceded. It was, in a way, refreshing to speak to someone who was not awed by her rank or accomplishments. “We are going to be landing in an unknown land with only the forces and resources at our disposal. There are many things that could go wrong.”

“There are,” Callie agreed. “But you should keep things simple.” She grinned. “When I used to go camping with my father, he told me to keep it simple: food, water, shelter, defence. Those are the four thing you need to worry about. You need food. You need water. You need shelter. And you need some way to defend yourselves and the other things.”

“That sounds simple enough,” Jaina replied. “But it has to be more complicated than that.”

“Of course, it is,” Callie said. “Which is why you need to send out scouting parties. You have soldiers and sailors under your command, and you’ve got mages too. Don’t commit to a location until you have at least some idea it can meet those four needs. An island in a strategic location would be good. You could defend it easily, and provided it isn’t too far from land or is large enough, you could find food and water. As for shelter, well, you’ll need to build things. Timber and stone are essential.”

“You seem awfully knowledgeable about this,” Jaina drawled. “For a sailor.”

“I have a friend who likes to build things,” Callie replied. “She has taught me a lot.”

X X X

Cinnamon breathed a sigh of satisfaction as she watched her base continue to expand. She’d brought along some Eranthem too, and the industrious insect-like creatures had been busy expanding her base and its capabilities. Not far away, Shayna was still gawping at everything like a fish out of water.

“Don’t look so shocked,” Cinnamon said. “And keep talking about the Burning Legion. I might have to start choosing tech paths soon, and I’d like to avoid any mistakes.”

The Eranthem and the Imperial Zerg had already established vast extractors that delved deep into the earth for metals, minerals, gases, and anything else that could be of use. More of them had built up processing centres to turn wood, stone, and anything else they could get their hands on into more useful substances. They had even built a pipeline of sorts to the ocean, and they had a refinery hard at work splitting the water into oxygen and hydrogen for further use, not to mention filtering it for rarer materials.

All in all, it was going quite well.

In fact, her first batch of flyers were due to hatch right about… now.

“By Elune!” Shayna cried. “What is that?”

Cinnamon followed her gaze. The creature soaring through the air above them had two pairs of wings along with a sleek, aerodynamic body. There were several openings in its body from which blade-like parasites could be seen.

“That? That’s a Mutablade. Basically, it flies super fast and shoots parasites at stuff I don’t like.” Cinnamon paused and cackled malevolently. “The parasites burrow into their target and then explode in a huge cloud of acid. It’s great. They’ll melt your average flying demon into goo in about two or three seconds. Oh, and they can shoot heaps of those way faster than you can imagine.”

X X X

Jaina was awakened from her slumber by a sudden lurch.

“We’re under attack!”

She was up on her feet in an instant, throwing on her clothes, and rushing onto the deck. It was night, but a spell swiftly illuminated the area - and the foe they faced. It was a massive sea serpent.

“To arms!” someone shouted. “Damn you, this is why I told you to keep your weapons handy!”

The massive creature lunged, and Jaina jerked out of the way just in time. Part of the deck splintered, and there was wild cursing as an assortment of attacks clattered down onto the creature only to bounce off its thick scales.

Jaina summoned her magic, and fire blossomed to life. The serpent hissed and reeled back before the assault. Jaina swiftly seized the opportunity to summon a pair of water elementals, the magical creatures putting themselves between the serpent and the crew.

“There are more of them attacking the other ships!” the captain roared over the din of waves and battle. “But this one is the leader! If we can drive him off, I’d wager the others will flee as well.”

“Then we drive him off.” Jaina’s eyes narrowed, and the elementals surged forward. The serpent met them head one, its massive bulk smashing through them with terrifying ease. She gathered her magic for another spell, only for the sea serpent to go reeling back as a harpoon caught it squarely in one eye.

And still holding onto that harpoon was Callie. The blonde woman swung her body around the weapon, driving it deeper into the creature’s eye, before flipping off it and sliding down some of the rigging. It was a casual display of agility that Jaina was sure no one else in the crew could have matched.

Still, the blow had earned her an opening. Magical power gathered, and there was a flash of light as Jaina’s spell ripped the sea serpent’s skull apart. The creature toppled back, blood spewing, and sank beneath the waves. Elsewhere, the other sea serpents quailed at the sight before following their fallen leader back into the safety of the ocean.

“Not bad,” Callie said. “My lady.”

“I could say the same.” Jaina frowned. “And you say you’re just a sailor.”

“That’s what I am for now. I’ve been other things before.” Callie smiled thinly. “You have to be flexible to survive.”

Jaina could certainly appreciate that sentiment. “See to the wounded,” she ordered. “And let us hope there are not too many of them.”

X X X

Author’s Notes

Things are tricky for our heroes. Sort of. While Victor has to keep the high elves alive (and hopefully get them to listen to him), Kahle has to help Jaina establish some sort of stronghold in Kalimdor without revealing too much. And Cinnamon? She’s busy playing SimCity except with Imperial Zerg.

#final war #fanfiction

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real-fakedoors · 6 years

Text

under leaves so green - CHPT 9 - Miraculous Ladybug

After the Dupain-Cheng family purchases a flower shop around the block from the Agreste mansion, Chat Noir frequents the spot in search of company from the manager-but-not-really Marinette. Beneath the mask, Adrien starts to struggle with how cute she looks in that green apron. (AKA: the not-really flower shop AU where basically everything is the same, but Marinette is extra stressed by her job and Adrien tries to be supportive)

Crossposted on AO3 and FF.net

Chapter 9: The Hummingbird Flower

In which, Adrien and Marinette are both very excited for their date, and Chat Noir decides he can't wait until tomorrow to see her.

We apologize: your regularly scheduled Marichat programming has been interrupted by a surprise guest appearance.

Marinette had never enjoyed her work so completely.

Sure, it was hard and laborious as ever, but she could practically feel the happiness seeping into her pores with the light of the sun. Every breath came easy, every customer seemed pleasant, each order was seamless, and all of her plants smiled brightly back at her. Her brash Banks’ roses were a magnet of attention, lustrous rubies beneath a cloudless sky. Subtly even seemed a quiet grace in the form of her painter’s paradise of hydrangeas or by her terracotta beheld boxwoods. Within, Marinette’s heart was a hummingbird, and the greenhouse seeped with the lush overgrowth of peaceful fullness.

It felt like she had forgotten how to frown.

Her phone had been buzzing all day, and Adrien’s name was a frequent one that came across the screen. In fairness, he hadn’t been the one to text her originally; their group text was blowing up with Alya’s planning, only to be derailed almost immediately by Nino and Adrien. As it happened, Marinette didn’t a bit. Heck, her phone could fall into a bag of topsoil and be crushed by the delivery truck, and she was certain her mood still would not be hampered.

With respect to the conversation, Marinette wasn’t able to contribute much. She was constantly busy with the demands of her job, but she appreciated that her friends didn’t fault her for her radio silence. It was simple and nice, to peek at the screen occasionally when a customer headed out the door or between restocking the shelves. Alya had been the one to initiate the four-way chat today by sending a picture of the Louve from the street - why she was around that part of town, Marinette hadn’t a clue - and pushing the La Nuit des musées idea onto all of them, but since then the conversation had degraded to mostly dumb humor and well-meaning goading between the boys.

Alya was by no means absent, though. She and Nino poked plenty of fun at the both of them for their date plans tomorrow night. Adrien had been quick to try to shut it down (for what he said was Marinette’s sake, to not make her feel uncomfortable) but they were persistent. Still, through dodging plentiful innuendos and frequent sarcasm, Marinette thought Adrien seemed rather excited to talk about it.

Proud, even.

That thought sent her running towards the back with rose-tinted cheeks more times than she was willing to admit.

The reporter-to-be eventually looped them back to a proper topic, about spending that Saturday night at the La Nuit des musées. It was an annual event in Paris that only happened one night of the year where all of the big museums remained open from dusk ‘til dawn. There was a modest upfront charge for a wristband that allowed unlimited access to all of the participating venues. Any of the Paris museums worth their salt were included on the list, so it would have felt foolish if she were to not go: the Louvre, Musée d'Orsay, the Centre Pompidou, the Arts and Metiers Museum, the Decorative Arts Museum, and the Palais de la Découverte were all possibilities.

Marinette was excited by the prospect of attending, although that would be with a post-date Adrien... so the possibilities for what that night might turn into was like dividing by zero. At least until Tuesday passed, Marinette could whip between gooseflesh and stomach cramps at the possibilities for Saturday night quicker than she could sew a seam.

Between watering planters and wrapping bouquets, Marinette noticed an uncharacteristically serious text from Adrien directed towards a tag-team of Alya and Nino insisting he give them a firm answer on La Nuit.

Adrien (1:56 PM):

Um, idk if I can. I want to, but Nathalie says there’s something on my schedule I don’t think I can get out of.

And now that it was on her mind, she did recall Adrien saying he wasn’t going to be available on Saturday. It explained why he kept getting off-topic, probably trying to avoid disappointing everyone. Marinette couldn’t blame him for that, even if she was saddened to think on it. She would probably still attend if Alya and Nino wanted to, since it was a one-night-opportunity, but she would definitely skip out on the reception and deal with the minor annoyance of third-wheeling.

After another thirty minutes, Marinette ate her lunch in the back office while going over her next purchase order. Tikki played the part of sympathetic audience.

“Ugh, these prices… How’s a girl supposed to eat?” She said, taking an entirely ironic bit from the lunch Maman had prepared for her. It was some sort of curried potatoes and rice creation.

Tikki frowned and settled into her shoulder, nibbling on her favorite variety of macron.

“Well, at least the need to order plenty means you’re doing good business, right?”

Marinette sighed and retrieved the “company” checkbook (it was just her parents, linked to the business account with their bank) and wrote out a figure with so many 0’s she actually had to double-check to make sure she hadn’t made an error.

“Yeah, I suppose… Maybe it’s a seasonal thing, but all of this?” Marinette pointed down at the catalog, finger tracing plastic planters and floral wire. “It’s annoying that they would inflate the price of necessities because they know we need them.”

Tikki giggled and adjusted her weight on Marinette’s shoulder. “Maybe Hawkmoth akumatized the factory workers. If there’s no flowers left in the city, what will draw ladybugs to Paris?”

The girl shook her head and chuckled. “Why didn’t I see it before? The answer was so obvious, Tikki!”

They shared a laugh and Marinette took another bite of her food, sealing the envelope and writing down the purchasing figure in the books. Hopefully this was the just the height of seasonal pricing, because they were barely breaking even with these sort of margins.

Just as she finished her food and took a long drink from a water bottle, the bell at the front chimed. Marinette could only check the messages on her phone and couldn’t get much utility from the device otherwise during business hours, so she opted to leave it with Tikki who could pass the time watching videos.

Marinette wiped her hands quickly on her apron and walked through the front of the store. A young gentleman, well-dressed and a few years her senior, had walked in looking very nervous. He eyed an assortment of bouquets wearily, and Marinette had to suppress the urge to laugh.

Mo would get a kick out of this.

If a man came to the store alone, Mo had warned her of three things.

“When M&M is at its end, when I go, you’ll need to be wary on your own! ...Yes, Marinette, I just rhymed, you can stop laughing now. I am but a poet who doesn’t even know it!”

Even in present day, Marinette rolled her eyes. Typical Mo.

“Young men - and nay, even some young women - will need your help with these purchases. They know nothing of the language of flowers, and they’ll be so blindsided by romance they won’t have the forethought to study up before coming to the store. If they are not purchasing for an apology or a date, then they may have a lustful eye for the unsuspecting female clerk, working the store alone. Don’t be afraid to use those muscles of yours to kick some sense into them, if you have to.”

Mo said he had an eye for that type, which Marinette frankly found to be a little ridiculous, but he would always insist on “helping” those clients so they might not make some sort of unwanted advance on her. It was actually very sweet how protective the old man had been, but she usually though he had a tendency for the dramatic.

Grinning, the bluenette strode across the counter and called his attention. “Bonjour. Can I help you?”

His face was conventionally handsome, a strong jaw with some dark five o’clock shadow that made him look a bit more mature. Glasses and brown eyes, darting and anxious, looked up at Marinette’s greeting.

“Oh, bonjour, Mlle. Um... actually, yeah, if you don’t mind. I’m not sure...” The customer turned his attention back towards the wide variety of bouquets Marinette had prepared, and she felt a little smug at having just finished restocking. It was a bit impressive to look at, especially for someone like this.

Marinette nodded and placed a hand at her hip, joining his study of the display. “Rather you did something wrong, or you’re aiming for a date. Right?”

There was a pause, and the man laughed in relief. “Wow, you’re good. Yeah, I… I’m trying to ‘impress’ someone.”

Marinette nodded, tapping her chin and keeping her eyes forward. That narrowed the possible list of appropriate bouquets, although it depended on what type of impression he was hoping to make.

“Well, if it’s a date,” Marinette mused, taking a step towards a cacophony of crimson, scarlet and ruby red buds that were easy to admire. “You might consider something classic. Roses are popular, of course, but…”

She gestured to another, softer and slightly fuller arrangement. “If you want something a little different, Hummingbird flowers are always a reliable, pretty pick.”

Marinette brushed the star shaped petals of the palest pink with her fingers, a delicate bunch accented by Baby’s Breath and White Diamond Limonium.

Roses were cheap to grow and they could sell them at a high mark-up, just by way of the demand. Fiscally, it probably would have made better sense to stick to upselling the former recommendation, but Marinette just will herself to make a sale based off money alone. There was soul within each stem, and some blossoms simply needed additional advertisement for people to appreciate their personalities.

“Hummingbirds?” The man croaked, and Marinette just nodded patiently.

“No, Hummingbird flowers. They’re technically called bouvardia. They’re simple, reall-- ”

The bell at the door interrupted her, so she quickly called a greeting before continuing.

“Bonjour! Just a moment, please! Sorry, but yes - bouvardia are really simple to care for, and they will keep for weeks. Just pop them in any vase and change the water every few days. They’re supposed to represent enthusiasm, and they have a…”

Her voice fizzled out, because a ringing in her ears didn’t stop. The bell was going off continuously, and it had picked up a rhythm.

Marinette turned to face the door, having caught a child playing with the bell to elicit such a sound before, but it turned out the chime was coming from someone much less predictable than a child.

“C-Chat Noir! Bonjour,” Marinette bowed her head, surprised to see him, and the customer turned with wide eyes.

Clasping his hands together, the young man bounced on his toes. “Wow! I-it’s… you! I’m a huge fan!”

The black cat, always one for a show, performed a theatrical bow while his tail swished around the middle aisle. “Ah, it’s always a pleasure to meet a fan! And in the most charming spot in all of Paris, no less.”

The gentleman beside Marinette practically floated over to Chat, and he vigorously took the heroes hand and shook. “I hate to ask - I’m sure you get this all the time, but could I get a selfie with you? My boyfriend wouldn’t believe me if I didn’t show him a photo!”

“Of course,” Chat accepted the man’s phone and they leaned in for a picture. “I actually happen to photograph rather well.”

Just after they snapped the shot, Chat caught Marinette’s eye, and the smug blond had the nerve to wink. Out of reflex, her head fell back on her shoulders, and she had to keep herself from hissing at him in annoyance.

“Yes, hello, Chat Noir. If you’re here for a purchase, I’d be happy to help you once I’m finished with this gentleman.”

“W-What?” The man clutched his phone to his chest, hugging the device like it was a lifeline. “No, please! Chat Noir, you go first. My thing isn’t important, it can wait!”

Chat Noir shook his head and smiled. As he opened his mouth to speak, however, the bell to the door rang again and Marinette thought seriously about throwing her hands up and quitting.

She fixed her face into a smile, certain that it was not convincing, and faced the door. “Bonjo-- …?”

There was no one there. Had the person stepped in and left immediately? It… had had happened before, though it struck her as odd.

Whatever the case, she could not complain. Chat’s presence alone certain to bring a tide of business crashing down Courtier St., so she needed to wrap things up.

Marinette stepped firmly towards the center of the store and gestured to young man who had begun texting furiously into his phone. “I’m sorry, sir, but I insist. Chat Noir is a hero of Paris, but in this store, he’s also a customer. You were here first, and I’ll assist him once we’ve made a choice for you.”

Behind the young man’s glasses, he blinked repeatedly and looked between the hero and Marinette like she had just started speaking Yiddish. It wasn’t until Chat nodded him to go that she was able to finish the sale, and thankfully, it had been quick thereafter. He seemed so starstruck that Marinette didn’t even have the chance to finish her explanation of Hummingbird flowers before he hastily accepted and passed her a shiny credit card.

“Wow, who would’ve thought? I’m here for flowers and bam! Chat Noir. This is such an amazing day!” He whispered across the counter to Marinette, who just smiled politely and passed him his receipt and requested a signature.

It really shouldn’t have struck her as a a surprise, as Chat Noir came frequently, but Marinette had gotten used to seeing him in the evening after the past week. Him coming here during the day while she drowned in work seemed comparatively frustrating, but Marinette kept her voice kind all the way until the man left the store (only after he stopped to shake Chat Noir’s hand two more times, of course).

Even so, Marinette had nothing but positivity to offer today, grinning at the alley cat who had folded his hands neatly behind his back.

“Hi, Marinette.” Chat said once they were alone, and she raised a brow at him. The cat must’ve hit his head or was actively hiding something, because the look he was giving her was filled with unusual admiration.

“Hello, minou,” Marinette smiled as she returned to the counter. Chat respectfully remained on the other side, though he did walk rather close behind her.

Sticking her tongue out, Marinette broke through his intense stare when they both laughed. “What brings you by today?”

“Ah, right meow? I was simply in the neighborhood and thought you might want some company of the kitten variety.” He smiled and wiggled his eyebrows, and Marinette just slapped a palm into her face.

With a good-humored sigh, she picked up some papers and began to make a few notes. “I’m so flattered, Chat, you have no idea. How could I ever thank you?”

“Oh I’ve got a few ideas, Puur-incess. Especially now that I know you sneak boys into your room.” His voice was riddled with suggestiveness, but it was clearly sarcastic. Marinette just shook her head and giggled.

Chat seemed to notice her exuberance and commented, “Well, isn’t your cat-titude just meow-valous today? Even my puns seem ineffective!”

Marinette just exhaled brightly and met his gaze. “Yes, as a matter of fact, I happen to be in a very great mood.”

“Oh? Do tell!” The black-suited hero leaned his elbows on the counter, coming closer in interest.

Her face flushed, but she did not look away. “Well, that friend I was telling you about… They came back, and…”

She stopped mid-sentence, interrupted yet again by the ever-present bell that called her attention, and Chat straightened when she glanced over his shoulder.

There was no one there.

“Again?” Marinette pursed her lips in annoyance, walking around the counter and coming to the door.

Chat stayed a pace behind her, watching her examination of the doorknob. “Is something wrong?”

“I think there’s something broken… with the… um…”

Marinette’s voice trailed off, but not, for once, due to lack of the right words or a sputtering confidence. Instead, her attention had been caught by some unusual activity beyond the glass walls. Instead of a typical flow of passing couples, groups of friends, or parents and their children, the predictable midday ambiance of Paris had been unsettled.

“Something’s happening,” Marinette whispered, voice suddenly urgent. Chat scowled and moved right up to the window, standing so close she could feel the smooth exterior of his suit as he looked into the road.

Indeed, people were no longer passing along peacefully, a steady tide of leisure down the sidewalks. No, the current had picked up, and a wind was blowing ever East, loud and panicked. People were screaming, and running, and clutching their loved ones.

Chat clenched his jaw. “An akuma.”

Marinette tried for a playful smirk. “I suppose it was inevitable, wasn’t it?”

He pursed his lips, and the witty joke that Marinette expected didn’t come. Instead, Chat Noir turned to her and put a hand on each of her shoulders.

“Go hide, Princess.” The sharpness of his tone surprised her. “Please.”

“Umm…” she felt his hands squeeze her slightly. “O-okay, Chat Noir. Be careful.”

The promise of her safety must have been enough to undo whatever had rattled him, because his smile turned huge and he stepped away, bowing low.

“But of course, I’m paw-sitive things will be just f-el-ine.”

Marinette rolled her eyes while the cat hopped away, the only force of nature moving against the clamor of people fleeing the source of danger.

Wistful, Marinette watched him go, worried again. Was he okay?

“Marinette!” Tikki chimed, flying a few inches in front of her. At what point her kwami had come to the front of the store, the girl had no idea. “Aren’t we going?”

“O-oh, right!” She nodded seriously. “Let me go out the back…”

As quickly as she could manage, Marinette locked the front door and ran through the exit on the southern side of the building. Thankfully, everyone in this part of town had already fled or found refuge indoors, so it seemed safe enough to transform.

Marinette met eyes with her kwami, and the two shared a fierce nod. “Tikki, spots on!”

In a flash, a strength flowered from her core as red spandex fit to her like a second skin. Clarity and focus settled in her mind with ease, and with a contented sigh, Ladybug stepped out into the courtyard.

“Alright, let’s do this!” Ladybug said, mostly to get herself to get in the right headspace for a fight. It’s been weeks, and taking to the rooftops with her yo-yo in hand felt invigorating.

Back-tracking slightly so no one might see her depart directly from the flower shop, she ultimately headed towards the center of town. Ladybug made quick work of a few miles when the magical device in her outstretched hand began to buzz.

Finding a building to stop upon, Ladybug flipped open the screen, listening for disturbances or ambushes all the while.

“Chat Noir,” Ladybug nodded severely in greeting into the screen. The black cat grinned sheepishly, and she had to stop herself from laughing.

“Do I even want to know why you’re soaking wet?”

“Well, you see Bugaboo, it all started this morning when I -- “

“Mon chaton,” Ladybug said pointedly, raising her eyebrows at him. He shook himself off slightly like a drenched animal, and his hair seemed puffier as a result.

He kept his grin just as wide. “I’m afraid things are a bit fishy down by City Hall.”

“Fishy?”

Chat shrugged. “You’ll see. I’ll keep ‘em distracted for you, Bugaboo.” He sang her nickname and blew her a kiss.

Ladybug merely shook her head, flipping the screen closed. “That cat, sometimes…”

Setting a course towards her partner’s location, the heroine moved as a flash of red along the Parisian skyline. The roads were quiet in their vacancy, and it was always one of the worst parts of battling an akuma. People abandoned the streets and sucked the life from the city itself; it sounded of death and reminded her of absence, neither of which were conditions she yearned after.

Once City Hall was in sight, Ladybug quickly came to understand Chat’s meaning. The nearer she moved to the scene, the more that awful, odorous waves reeking of fish wafted to meet her. Even as a civilian, Ladybug was not the biggest fan of seafood, and this wasn’t the smell of a roasted salmon or freshly prepared sushi. It smelled like of salt and seawater, musky and dark and totally unpleasant. Vaguely, she recalled someone telling her once that olfactory experiences are more poignant than any other sensory memory; Ladybug could only hope that was hyperbolic, because this smell would surely haunt her forever.

“What the…” Ladybug muttered, covering her mouth and nose, trying in vain trying to block some of the oceanic air from making her dizzy. At the cusp of a large building looking over the city square, she looked down into the streets to find a torrent of… money? Coins, bills, and currency of every kind spilled into the streets, so high it covered some smaller buildings entirely. It was like a flood of cash sprang from City Hall and was rushing down the streets, a broken dam that began to submerge the city beneath the weight of wealth.

Baffled, Ladybug wondered aloud (through a compressed, nasally voice). “What kind of akuma is this?”

“Beats me,” answered a familiar call. She turned and spotted Chat Noir, retracting his baton and finding his footing. By the looks of it, he must have just vaulted to the top of the building himself.

“You weren’t kidding when you said it was fishy, mon chaton… ugh, this is terrible.” Ladybug replied, scowling and scanning the world below in vain, searching for some source of the chaos.

“Really?” He seemed amused. “Maybe it’s the whole, cat-like-instincts thing, but I think it’s actually rather nice.”

“Bleh,” Ladybug stuck her tongue out, and her partner snickered at her expense.

Stretching his arms, Chat moved to the buildings’ edge and crouched down. The streets were still filling with money, a sea of metal and paper growing taller in the center of the square and spreading further down each side street.

“Looks like we don’t have anytime to waste, unless we want to be sleeping with the fishies,” he commented, almost sounding annoyed. Ladybug sighed, and they met eyes. She gave the cat an approving smile.

“Well, kitty, this seems like your specialty. It looks like it’s all centralized around City Hall, so we best start there.” Chat’s ears perked, and Ladybug’s grinned widened. “Shall we go akuma fishing?”

Chat stood and spun in a fluid movement, facing her after a full rotation and bowing. “It would be a pleasure, Bugaboo.”

Leading the way, Ladybug swung her yo-yo far and aimed high, not particularly interested in falling into the flood of currency - the smell seemed to come from the rising tides, and frankly, she was glad to have nothing to do with it. The catching wind while she leapt closer to the building actually helped to wick some of the odor from the air surrounding her face, but when she landed deftly on the roof of the building, it grew even worse. The gentle thud of Chat Noir landed beside her, and his voice was immediately alarmed.

“L-Ladybug! Are you okay?” He gripped her shoulders. “Why are you crying?”

She groaned and patted his hold, using the knuckles of her other hand to brush away the sudden tears.

“I’m just fine, thank you for the concern Chat. It’s the smell, my eyes are just watering. Ugh.” Setting her jaw, she tried to indicate finality with her tone, and thankfully Chat Noir drew back.

“Hmm,” Chat tapped his chin and walked to study some of the skylight windows. “If you don’t think you’ll be able to breathe, don’t be afraid to fall back, okay? Maybe we can draw the akuma out away from the, uh,” he paused, looking over the side of the building at the growing pile of cash. “Ocean?”

Ladybug huffed and squared her shoulders. “You might be right, but let’s see if we can’t figure out what’s going on first.” She had to blink through some latent wetness while investigating the glass beside Chat Noir.

“It doesn’t look like there’s - oh, well,” Chat was about to state the obvious - that there wasn’t anyone inside - but his claim would have become immediately false. The door to the mayor’s office burst open, and so far as they could see, all of the inner sanctums of the building remained entirely vacant of money.

Stepping out from the office and cackling wildly, a larger-than-life man stepped through the doorway (just barely fitting) and dragged a large net behind him. In some weird way, Ladybug was reminded of Santa Claus, but only if the jolly man of Christmas carols had jaundice and turned mad.

The man sported a bright, almost insultingly yellow, coat with matching hat and boots that covered almost his entire body. A few inches between the bottom of the coat and the top of the boots exposed gray tattered clothes beneath, and even the man’s face was largely obscured by a bushy grey-white beard. Striking against the his drab appearance, his eyes were gruesome - one, large and blown from glass, matched by a scar from lid to cheek, and the other was gray as an overcast sky. What little of his face was visible and not disfigured appeared papery and tough, and he must have been getting up there in age.

Thrown over his shoulder, adding to the illusion of a deranged Kristopher Kringle, the man gripped a net at least double his size. Large and black woven wire crossed over itself into what must have been some sort of fisherman’s net; it was the only part of his get-up that seemed a clear candidate for the akuma to hide.

Ladybug grimaced when she realized the net was not empty.

“He’s got the mayor,” Chat commented, almost as casually as if he were remarking on the weather. With a glance over the streets, Ladybug noted the rising rate of the strange paper and metal sea, and snapped her fingers.

“Ah. The treasury is in this building. That’s probably where the money is coming from, and I think it’s below ground.”

Chat nodded, already understanding her meaning.

“I’ll stop the flood,” he offered.

She smiled. “And I’ll try to get the net away from ol’ greybeard.”

With a quick nod, she watched Chat dive from the building into the “water” with surprising grace. The sound of his body hitting a conglomerate of metal, however, did not sound at all pleasant.

“It probably doesn’t tread like water,” Ladybug yelled down to him through cupped hands. She giggled as Chat massaged his backside, more crawling than swimming towards the bit of the entrance that was still visible.

He called back to her. “That would have been helpful about 10 seconds ago!”

Allowing herself a little laugh, the red heroine readjusted her shoulders and faced the window again. The akumatized victim was shouting something nonsensical to the mayor, who was quivering under the net. She needed to act quickly before things escalated into some sort of hostage situation.

The windows on the roof did not have any visible locking mechanisms, so Ladybug shrugged and kicked through the glass, leaping to the marble tiles effortlessly.

“Let him go!” She demanded as the yellow-coated man turned to face her, and much to her surprise, he dragged the mayor’s weight with his turn.

The moment of recognition came too slow, though, and Mayor Bourgeois slammed into her and knocked her back into a pillar.

“Ladybug!” He cried, seemingly uninjured though he had just been used as a weapon.

Groaning, she blinked a few times and tried to ignore the several tender spots where rock had met her back muscles, and took another, more prepared stance across the hall outside the mayor’s office.

A different approach, she held her yo-yo at the ready. “What do you want?”

“Fair trade in the state of France!” He shouted automatically, adjusting the net at his shoulder. “And I, the Pêcheur, ain’t going to let some bug get in the way of what the hardworkin’ people of France deserve!”

Ladybug dropped and rolled away from the swing of the net she knew was coming, the threat evident behind his words. Not a moment too soon, as a loud crunching sound left a crater against the wall where she had just been standing. Maybe the net wasn’t hiding the akuma after all? It seemed really careless to swing around the object she needed to destroy so recklessly.

“The people of France don’t want violence, Fisherman, I can assure you that.” Ladybug replied calmly, standing and gripping her yo-yo. If not the net, than what?

The hat? Maybe… It still didn’t feel right, though.

“Oh I don’t know,” he said, cackling and swinging the mayor like a ragdoll. Ladybug winced, glad whatever magic kept Mayor Bourgeois in the net equally seemed to stop him from getting hurt. Still, he was a civilian, so she needed to get him out of here as quickly as possible. With a hasty scan of her surroundings, Ladybug noticed an elevator at one end of the hall.

“The people of France welcomed a revolution filled with violence, or did you forget, Little Miss?”

Backpedaling down the length of the corridor, Ladybug tried to keep Pêcheur far enough away that he would have to release his net to swing it at her, but near enough that he kept in pursuit. Just a little further…

“That’s true, but times have changed, Fisherman!” Ladybug took a threatening posture with her weapon in one hand, her other hand seeking the elevator button. “You can’t expect the people of Paris to--”

She stopped when the lift behind her dinged lightly, and she reared back with her yo-yo ready to send it spiraling around his ankles. In retaliation, Pêcheur roared furiously and whipped his net around, swinging it at her with barbaric force.

Perfect.

Like pretending to throw a dog a bone, she kept a close hold on her yo-yo, leaping over the net as it swept at her. Instead, she flung the trusty weapon at the man’s forearm that had a hold on the mayor. With a cry of pain, he dropped the net just in front of the elevator, and gravity did the rest.

She fell to the earth just inches in front of Mayor Bourgeois and quickly dragged him backwards before the elevator closed.

An angry wallop could be heard against the metal doors, but she had been just fast enough to complete the getaway. Immediately, Ladybug began to unravel a whimpering Mayor Bourgeois.

“Mayor! Are you alright?”

He was shaking, but appeared unharmed. “Y-yes, Ladybug. Thank you! I feel t-terrible about this…”

Ladybug noted a pleasant beep above their heads; they entered on the third floor, and she had her sights on the basement.

“Do you know what happened? Who is Pêcheur?”

Mayor Bourgeois made a face. “Well, he’s a fisherman.”

“... Yes, thank you, Mayor. And?” It was difficult to keep the irritation from her voice as she lifted the last bit of net above his head.

Another beep.

One more floor.

“He came to my office with a proposed bill to reduce the state tariffs on exporting fish, but that is something politically way above my head. I’m just a mayor! When I refused to bring his concern to my compatriots at the Assemblée nationale, he screamed about earning his livelihood at sea and stormed from my office.” The man completed his explanation as Ladybug helped him stand. Once he was steady, she reared an arm high in the air and used her foot as a counterbalance, tearing the net wide.

No butterflies here.

As if on cue, the final ding sounded in time with Ladybug’s sigh and the doors opened.

The horrible, repugnant scent of dead fish flared in her throat, and the mayor covered his mouth to stop from throwing up. A small influx of money spilled around their ankles, but it wasn’t surging as it once had.

“Why, there you are Bugaboo,” Chat called nonchalantly straight across from them, using his bodyweight to keep a large bank-style safe closed. It was clearly giving under the stress of compounding currency within, but his barricade had stayed the madness temporarily.

He shifted when a particularly horrendous metal creaking sound went off behind him. It was clear the door was going to give soon.

“I hate to be a burden, but purr-haps you could lend this poor cat a hand?”

Ladybug helped the mayor wade through the mess to the stairs, and thankfully Chat had mostly cleared a path on his way inside. “Mayor, find any room to hide it. It’s too dangerous in the streets with all of this in the way,” she gestured at the mess at their feet. He quickly nodded and thanked her again before sputtering and slipping his way up the stairs.

In a flash, Ladybug flew across the remainder of the room and, with their combined strength, managed to better stabilize the door.

“Okay, minou, got any ideas? Where’s the money even coming from?”

“Actually, I wanted to talk to you about that,” he said, the strain clear in his voice. “It doesn’t seem to be coming from anywhere. It’s just seeping through the ceiling in there. Like rain, almost.”

“Rain?” Ladybug glanced down. “And you were wet earlier, weren’t you?”

Chat scowled. “It wasn’t my fault, I was helping someone in a car that got turned over and some people running by were soaking wet.”

She frowned, brow drawn together as she looked at her feet. “Maybe this isn’t just like water. Maybe it is water, Chat. That explains why its able to sort of swish and move on its own, and there’s no way he could have an endless supply --”

The cat yelped as the door started to give a bit, and he hastily replied. “Yes, sure, great - your logic is amazing and you’re amazing, blah blah, but maybe we should get out of here?”

“Ugh,” Ladybug groaned, exerting even more force as the door started to buckle. “We need a plan first. If one of us lets go, the metal won’t hold.”

Ears perked, Chat Noir turned to her with a grin. “Wait a meow-ment! I have an idea! Just hold the door for one second, and um..well, actually...” His smile flickered and faded.

“Well?!” Ladybug shook her head, eyes bulging. “What are you waiting for? What is it!?”

“Umm, you’ll have to, uh, spread your… legs” he muttered. Frankly, she didn’t care about boundaries and all that - Chat clearly was not understanding the urgency of the situation.

“Okay! Okay, sure, just do whatever you have to!”

Chat frowned at her for a moment, as if surprised she trusted him so completely, but his focus came back with another groan of the metal.

His tone was hard. “Okay, hold the door.”

Under her breath, Ladybug muttered a quick retort through grit teeth. “Yeah, like I have much of a choice.”

Chat Noir moved directly in front of her, crouched down and drew his weight back. “Cataclysm!”

He aimed a hand, miasmatic and deadly, at the spot where the metal barrier met the ground, just between her feet, and the floor began to quake.

With his other arm, Chat wrapped a deft hand around her waist and extended his baton forward into the metal, just as the hinges began to snap, and drove them back into the elevator.

He smashed the button closed the moment they were inside. The door dented under the crushing weight of coins, but they were unscathed.

Ladybug heaved for air, crisp and sharp against her windpipe as they stood in the strangely quiet elevator. Beside her, Chat rubbed the back of his neck anxiously.

“S-Sorry, that was close.” He glanced at their feet, noticing some netting caught in the small collection of coins and paper below. “I take it the akuma wasn’t in the net?”

Still breathless from exertion, she merely shook her head and glanced up at Chat. The moment they met eyes, his ring beeped twice.

“Ah…” he pressed his lips together and eyed his right hand in annoyance. “Well, any ideas?”

“I think…” she began, looking at the ceiling. “I think the guy isn’t going to leave the building. At some point, he’ll demand our miraculous, and we’re already here. More importantly, he said he wants to change the laws, I guess.”

Chat Noir snorted and ran a hand down his face. “They have like, petitions for that, right? Did getting akumatized seem like the most logical solution?”

His ring beeped again.

Ladybug was only half-listening, and she lifted herself up using the wall to support her weight, pushing through the latch in the ceiling. He didn’t need directions to know they were going up, the long way.

Once situated in the dark vertical tunnel, she squinted upwards and addressed Chat’s earlier question. “Yes, but, this man felt wronged, or cheated from what I gathered. He called himself the Pêcheur. The Mayor refused to help him… and he was talking about ‘the hardworking French people’. The smell, the ‘ocean’ of money, his outfit...”

A little more quietly, Chat reached the same conclusion she had earlier. “Ahh… A fisherman who wanted to improve wages or something to that effect, wronged by the Bourgeois. Literally, probably.”

She nodded, to which Chat added, “But what is he hoping to do?”

Another beep.

Ladybug just shook her head as she unsheathed her yo-yo, spinning it before grappling to the floor she had last seen him. “I have no idea, but we’ve got to stop it before things get more out of control. Your ‘second basement’ bought us some time, but Paris is going to flood if we don’t do something.

“It’s almost like the city is under-funded, am I right, Bugaboo?”

Chat had his baton ready, but Ladybug lifted a hand to stop him.

“You should stay here, you’re about to detransform. I’ll go after Pêcheur, and you recharge. Okay?”

She could tell, even in the low-light, his ears drooped slightly. The hard truth came in the form of his final beep, warning them of only sixty more seconds until he would revert to civilian form.

“I’ve got some food on me, so I’ll be able to catch up with you soon.” Chat offered, and Ladybug gave him a quick two-fingered salute.

“Bug out for now, mon chaton.”

The sound of hastily typing thumbs and a gorging kwami were the only things to break the silence for several minutes.

It was a little unnerving, sitting cross-legged at the bottom of a dark elevator shaft, waiting patiently for time to catch up to need. It was some sort of poetic pseudo-marketplace dealing in minutes and cheese, patience and fortune. Still, the quiet was peaceful, but it stirred a fear in his stomach.

Was Ladybug okay?

And another, newer worry found dominion beside that familiar fear.

Was Marinette okay?

Digitally speaking, things had spiraled out of control. Providing live updates to the Ladyblog, Alya was wading the sea (and probably earning herself some serious bruises along the way) while Nino had texted the group in clear panic, trying to get her to move inside or at least seek higher ground.

Marinette had not messaged any of them, which was disconcerting.

Adrien pulled up the blog in spite of himself, knowing his compliance was sort of encouraging Alya’s dangerous behavior, but it was an undeniably useful source of information when away from the throes of the fight.

The livestream was turning from selfie mode to photoview, and he cringed at the quick glimpse of Alya sauntering waist-deep towards the center of the city.

“Alright Ladybloggers, looks like there’s a change of scenery going on. Ladybug just appeared outside the building, and by the looks of it, no Chat Noir in sight.”

Scowling, Adrien and Plagg met eyes.

“The man calling himself Pêcheur,” Alya continued, oblivious to mutual annoyance of her audience in the elevator shaft. “Seems to be able to manipulate money, and he’s using the change to -- whoooaa,” Alya wavered and nearly dropped her camera, and the broadcast jostled disorientingly.

“We are in deep water now, folks, and that’s not a Chat Noir signature pun,” she shouted, and true to her word, the semi-calm mountains of cash had turned back to a freshet of angry ocean, literal water pouring into the city streets and sweeping Alya out and away with the deluge. His “second basement” must have bottomed out.

Adrien’s heart went out to Nino; at least Marinette had enough sense to stay inside.

“Okay folks, we need to seek higher ground. We couldn’t get close enough to hear the akuma’s threats, but there’s no denying one thing: he can control the water, and it can change to… well, change, apparently, by his whim. Stay safe everyone!”

She stopped the livestream, and Adrien couldn’t decide if it was appropriate to laugh or sigh. The girl was about as brave as Ladybug herself, but without the supersuit. In another life, she would have made a great superhero.

“Alright kid,” Plagg chewed his last piece of camambert and swallowed. “I’m ready when you are!”

Adrien stood quickly, his gaze fierce.

“Plagg, claws out!”

As easily as breathing, black leather encased his right arm and branched to his left, down his torso and hugging his body. Running a hand across his hair, familiar ears fit to his blond tresses and Chat Noir shook the familiar resurgence of power through his muscles.

“Round two.” He declared quietly, readying his baton to vault through the building, after Ladybug and the akuma.

Chat managed to trace after without issue, following the sounds of battle raging above his head. A clear hole had shattered a glass window, and the jagged edges offered droplets of water near the middle of the hallway. Unable to cling against their own gravity, the droplets turned to metal with a tiny shing each time another drop loosened and hit the marble floors.

Hmm. So LB and Alya were right. He turns water to money.

“But where is he even getting the water?” Chat wondered aloud, glaring at the ceiling.

A rush of red flew backwards across his line of sight, propelled by a gush of liquid that sounded hard and metallic upon impact.

He watched the Fisherman saunter forward, after what had clearly been an injured Ladybug. Chat waited just until the man crossed over the opening before vaulting himself on the roof.

“Hey now!” Chat taunted, twirling his baton upon landing. “Don’t you know that fish keep their money at the riverbank, Mounseir Pêcheur?”

Grinning, he paused to leap away from a second crashing wave of bills, rolling and landing on one knee. “C’mon, if you’re a Fisherman, surely you can catch me?”

Another rush of money snapped in his direction from over the side of the building, near enough that Chat felt the light tickle of passing air besides his ear.

The more Chat baited, the more the man fumed and rage, and the blond hero rather enjoyed watching the Fisherman’s face turn red beneath his yellow suit. It was clear, unbridled fury, and it was turning him reckless.

“Why are so crabby, anyways?” Chat mewled in time with the rising tides, the sound rapturous as metal smashed into concrete and plaster walls. Coins rained from above with the jostling movements, flying upwards only to smack against the top of his head. Chat hissed, more in annoyance than in pain.

Still, the Fisherman looked too ensorcelled to do much else than storm senselessly after the black cat. Not a single intelligible word passed through the man’s cracked lips, and of course, Chat Noir was never one to pass up a joke.

“What, cat got your tongue?”

In a furious roar, Pêcheur raised his arms high in the air and the sea moved with him, punching a hole straight through the roof with brute force.

Chat barely managed to backflip away from the assault, but it seemed Pêcheur had been hoping for that. He had driven Chat rather close to the edge of City Hall’s rooftop, and the hero barely managed to stay upright, thanking Plagg for his enhanced reflexes. Below, choppy tides and dangerous currents called up to him in a manmade monsoon.

“Heh, well, looks like you, uh, caught me?” Chat shrugged, and blessed be, Ladybug had regained her wits and he watched as the string of her yo-yo snaked around the Fisherman’s ankle just as he reared up for another attack.

A fierce shout garnered Chat’s attention while the man went sprawling.

“The akuma are the papers in his coat! It’s in his front pocket!”

Nimbly, Chat prowled forward and rolled the man over with his foot, ducking down to follow Ladybug’s directive. As he did, a massive shadow cast along the roof at his back, winking the sun out of existence. His ears were pitched to two sounds: one, of rustling paper and rising winds, and the other, a voice.

“Chat Noir! Look out!”

He had only time to cover his face before much more than just the sun was eclipsed - his whole body was smashed by waves of pain. Every muscle twisted and flared against sharp edges of coins and paper, crushing him beneath sheer weight alone. It was like getting smacked by a metal mallet, over every inch of his body, all at once.

“Lucky Charm!”

Oh thank god, Chat thought through grit teeth. It was disorienting, a rush of sensations that were fueled mostly by discomfort, shoving and dragging by invisible hands. The force of the hit had knocked him clean off the roof, and it was clear that the man was trying to drown him in a sea of greed.

A much different, sudden flare of pain made Chat wince, but this was neither a compression of coin or the twisting of substance pelting into his body again and again. It wasn’t the same light paper cuts that marked his cheeks and nose. This was tight and sharp, like someone was trying to pop his shoulder out of place.

Before he knew what was up from down, Chat Noir was airborne again.

He blinked several times, even more confused by his surroundings. The first thing he noticed was he had been freed of his alloy-bound tomb. The world was inverted, the fringe that usually rested along his face hanging down and away from his forehead, brushing into his sort-of-but-not-really cat ears. A definitely upside down and cute red heroine frowned at him- or was she grinning? - and raised an eyebrow in bemused appraisal.

“Hello, mon chaton,” teased Ladybug. “Can I borrow your baton?”

“Oh I suppose, it’s not like I’m using it, given that I’m just hanging around,” he grinned, though not without clenching his jaw through some of the latent soreness from his earlier battery. Chat reached for the trusted tool at his lower back and offered it to her.

Ladybug rolled her eyes and accepted his baton, only to let him go and crumple on the roof of what he figured to be a tall neighboring building. She had rigged some sort of pulley to bring him out of the crushing sea with her yo-yo and a large antenna. In her other hand, she held a comically huge polka-dot cutout of the mayor.

By now, the “water” had completely covered most of the square, and City Hall was immersed.

“Hmm, and where did our fishy friend go?” Chat asked as he rubbed the strain from his arms and shoulders.

Beside him, Ladybug pursed her lips while tieing one end of his baton and her yo-yo together, keeping the disc of her weapon dangling from the end. “He’s under the, uh, money somewhere. But I thought we might go back to our original plan.”

Chat watched her movements with interest, and Ladybug tested out his baton, extending it slowly.

“Oh? And what’s that?”

She smiled widely. “I thought we could try akuma fishing.”

And with no problem at all, she cast out their weapons into a makeshift fishing pole, far into the square with the cut-out of the mayor secured to one end. Her yo-yo stuck out above the choppy waves, a red sinker in the middle of a brown, silver and bronze mess of wealth.

Several seconds passed of silence, and Chat eventually offered, “Just like that?”

“Yep. Now we wait,” Ladybug offered simply, and Chat frowned when her earrings beeped.

“You sure about this?” He crossed his arms nervously, eyes scanning a jingling ocean.

That caused her to laugh, and it was a bubbly, infectious sound. Chat smiled.

“Of course, mon chaton. My lucky charm has never failed us before.”

“Well,” he shuffled his feet before deciding to sit down onto the roof beside her, boots almost grazing the top of the bristling body of money below. “I guess that’s true. This was a strange akuma, LB.”

After a pause, Ladybug replied. “Yes. It definitely was. I feel bad for the old man, he really seemed to just want a better life for himself and other fishermen.”

Another beep.

“I don’t think anyone can fault him that,” Chat responded, and they both fell quiet and watched the chaos start to calm. He must be close and spotted the bait.

Ladybug was going to change back in just another few minutes, and still the akuma hadn’t appeared. Even if they did manage to defeat it in time, it was sort of a shame. It had been awhile since he’d seen his partner, and Chat admittedly missed her company. Ladybug was one of his best friends, and… well, given the nature of their relationship, he felt like he should tell her about his recent interest in someone else. It’s not like it mattered really, but he loved Ladybug in the sort of way you would only with someone you’ve nearly died for, and who has nearly died for you.

With the recent luck he’s had as Adrien, Chat felt it was the sort of good news he could share with her and that she might want to know about. Even if he wouldn’t be able to refer to Marinette by name, it was something so new and pure that made him happy it was almost like lying to not talk about her. A lie of omission, almost.

Again, Ladybug’s earrings beeped, and Chat fidgeted uncomfortably. “So… how are you?”

She blinked down at him, brow drawn together. “What?”

Rubbing his neck, Chat clarified. “Well, you know, it’s been a little while and…”

A horrible grinding sound caused them both to jump, and Chat sprang to his feet while Ladybug returned her focus forward. The baton was starting to bend under a sudden weight, and a swishing release of Ladybug’s “line” began zipping loudly over the water.

“This is it!” She said, but the sudden intensity of Pêcheur’s grip at the other end was starting to pull her over the building’s edge. Without a second thought, Chat situated himself behind her and wrapped his arms around the baton as well, using their combined strength and weight to doubleback against the line, and he cringed at the sound of beeping just beneath his head.

“Ladybug! You only two minutes left!” He managed, grinding his molars.

“It’s okay. I’ve got this,” she spoke confidently, and quick tug his baton began to retract in, dragging the akuma’s weight along with it.

Of course, just as Ladybug said, the rest was simple. Pêcheur’s body had gotten tied up in the wire of her yo-yo, unable to escape though he thrashed like a fish just caught from the ocean. Quicker than they ever had before, Chat leapt up, snatched the akuma and threw it down to his partner, and she quickly ripped the papers to shreds.

Ladybug bid the luminescent, glowing akuma farewell, and stayed only long enough to offer Chat her fist.

“Pound it!” She smiled before, in perfect Ladybug fashion, bugging out in the other direction.

Sighing contently, he watched her go from the rooftops, looking down into the center of Paris with satisfaction. Another successful battle, and Chat watched as the people began to return to their wares, ducking out from buildings hesitantly.

With some gentle reassurances, Chat helped escort the akumatized victim to the medical professionals, and he caught the tailend of a conversation between the man and Mayor Bourgeois.

“I really do apologize, Monseiur Naser. I’ll at least see if I can take it to my colleagues, but I do not know how much power I will have.”

“T-thank you, Mayor. I appreciate you even trying to make a change.”

Chat sighed and removed himself as politely as possible from the crowds, trying to disengage from the probes about Ladybug’s whereabouts or his take on the recent dry spell of akumas. Of course, he did his best to answer vaguely but kindly, and thanks to Ladybug’s power any of the pain or soreness from his body had been wicked away.

Paris had been defended, but that didn’t mean he felt his job was done. Chat still had someone waiting for him, halfway across town, but what had been intended as a short break between shooting for the new Gabriel ad had been totally sucked up in the attack. Once again, responsibility got in the way of seeing Marinette, and it had only been so fleeting. Chat did not want to jeopardize the recent headway he had made with his relationship with his father, so he was resigned to return to his civilian life.

Chat Noir took to the sky and his feet only touched the tops of buildings long enough to propel him into the air again, preferring the open wind to the chains of gravity that would return him to himself soon.

Carefully, he slipped into an alley behind the studio he was expected in and spoke three familiar words.

“Plagg, claws in.”

Adrien held his palms out carefully, and his black kwami settled himself comfortably against his chosen’s fingers. Unfortunately, Adrien had only brought cheese enough for one detransformation, and Plagg knew as much.

Grumbling, the kwami curled in on himself, much like the creature that gave Chat Noir his namesake. “If ya can gets me something with some cheese in it, I’ll forgive you... this time.”

Adrien smiled. “There’s a snack table in the back. It’s not camembert, but I’m pretty sure they have some cheeses.”

At that, Plagg mustered enough energy to float into the front pocket of Adrien’s jacket, urging him on towards the dressing rooms.

Adrien stopped in the middle of the hallway, spotting some floral arrangement with a flower he actually recognized. It was part of one of the “sets” for the shoot, he assumed, as it was complex and larger than life. This had been the first time he had been able to utilize Marinette’s lessons in all things floral outside of the shop, and the recognition caused his heart to skip a beat.

He wasn’t sure what came over him, and Plagg certainly did not understand why Adrien felt the urge to stop in the middle of his Holy Grail quest with cheese at the helm, but in a quick motion the blond had his phone in his hands and was snapping a picture of the flowers.

Adrien (3:01 PM):

I’m at a shoot today. I saw these and I thought of you. :)

The only disappointing thing was that he knew it wasn’t a Dupain-Cheng product - those were easy to spot. With each delivery he had seen Marinette prepare, rather as Chat Noir or as Adrien, he always noticed the tag she would attached to the outside somewhere with care; a handwritten note thanking each customer for their business.

“I’m dying, Adrien,” Plagg called dramatically, turning over inside his jacket. “I’ll never be able to help you fight another akuma again, or sneak into your girlfriend’s room late at night.”

Hastily, the teen shoved his phone back in his jeans and made a beeline for the snack table, shoving enough cheese into his jacket to satiate a fully grown human.

Adrien took off his coat in the dressing room and left Plagg to his disturbing feasting rituals, staying only long enough to grab his phone and take it out to the set with him.

Marinette (3:08 PM):

What a coincidence!! I just sold some of those earlier today! They’re (bouvardia) Hummingbird flowers. Sorta like those latanas you sold the other day. :D

Marinette (3:08 PM)

Although Mme. Kleinstein probably would’ve bought anything from you with those freakin puns.

He grinned, walking down the hall. Adrien wasted no time writing back, stopping just shy of the shooting area so he could finish his message.

Adrien (3:09 PM):

That was the best sale the store has ever made and you know it! I gtg, we’re about to start again - but I thought they were pretty and knew you would appreciate them.

“Aye! There you are!” The photographer called, snapping her fingers aggressively halfway across the room.

“S-Sorry,” Adrien stammered as he slipped his phone into his jeans, but the woman simply glared suspiciously before turning her attention back to fixing her camera.

Around the studio, clusters of people moved around in preparation. Set designers, wardrobe, make-up, photographers and aids, Nathalie, magazine editors and people with clipboards all fluttered about, busying themselves with this-or-that. You wouldn’t even know the whole city hadn’t been under siege not twenty minutes ago.

Adrien hadn’t much time to think about it before he was swept up in the din, being shuffled back into his next outfit and having hands poking and prodding around his body. It felt annoyingly like the sensation of getting smashed by a tidal wave of change, just a little less sharp.

Still, he was thankful that most of his shots today were ones requiring happy poses. With recent events, that posture came naturally and his smile felt less forced. The photographers commented on his unusually but refreshingly chipper attitude, and he could only blush when Nathalie mentioned off-handedly that he had a date tomorrow night.

It was true, and it’s not like he was ashamed of it.

Between shots, different people would whisper to him about it, and he tried to just brush it off with the same answer.

“I’m excited! Just a little nervous.”

For whatever reason, it turned out that had been the wrong thing for Adrien to say. Several of the adults took his honesty as an opportunity to grant him all sorts of unsolicited advice and to offer tips from their wide experiences dating.

Adrien knew most of these people moderately well - business acquaintances, he would probably label them. Some were comfortable enough to be on a first-name basis, but it wasn’t without an arm’s-length of familiarity between them, so discussing something so personal with people like this was… strange, definitely. But more than that, it was nice. Everyone was clearly excited for him, asking all sorts of questions about Marinette and their plans, how they met and how he asked her out. The photographer, Lila, audibly “aww’d” when he told her about her employment as (practical) sole proprietor of the flower shop.

By the time the next break came, an hour had passed and Adrien felt like he had just finished having the most bizzare group therapy session imaginable. Between the overwhelming positivity of the people around the studio and their decidedly bizarre interest in his love life, he strode to his dressing room to check on Plagg when another model spotted him.

“Oh, hi, Macey.” Adrien stopped and nodded politely. She was a brunette with a dark complexion, taller than his father probably, and he knew she was about five years older than he was. They had done dozens of shoots together for the Gabriel line, and she tended to treat him like a younger brother. While Macey wasn’t quite a friend, she was at least always polite and easy to talk to.

“So A,” she said, hand at her hip. “Tell me about Marinette.”

A rush of blood flooded his cheeks, and the woman laughed. She gestured for them to continue down the hall, which gave him a chance to clear his throat.

“Well, she’s in my class at school - I’m not sure how much you heard out there…?”

She brushed him off. “I want to hear it all again. From the top.”

The explanation felt practically rehearsed after talking to so many people about Marinette recently, so it only took a few minutes to re-explain his friendship and admiration for the dark-haired miracle in his life.

They were standing outside Adrien’s dressing room by the time Adrien finished.

“So you like her. Marinette.”

“Um,” Adrien blinked. Had she even been listening? Wasn’t that much obvious? “Yes. A-a lot, actually.”

“As in, maybe-one-day-a-serious-relationship?”

He nodded firmly, omitting the comment that popped into his head about the possibility they might already be in a relationship if not for his own obliviousness.

Lowering her voice, Macey glanced down the hall.

“Well, then, I’m really happy for you, A. Really.” She smiled, as Adrien was clearly confused. “But take it from me - be careful with the press, especially early on. I lost a lot of good guys to the stress brought on by the paparazzi.”

Ah. Right. That… actually made a lot of sense.

“I guess I didn’t really think about that, I’m just so used to it...” He admitted, tapping his chin.

Macey closed her eyes and nodded, satirically serious. “The burden of fame, my friend. I know it’ll be fine, but I couldn’t not say something. It really sucks if a story gets out of hand, you know?”

Adrien thanked her, and Macey left him to his room. As he entered, he found Plagg snoozing beneath his jacket, so Adrien looked around for his cellphone.

Crap.

He left it in his jeans, which were still over in wardrobe.

Sighing, he sat at the mirror and considered Macey’s advice. It was reminiscent of a rumor that had gotten out about him and Marinette once, and in retrospect, it was funny to think about it now. Someone had taken a photo of them at the park beside her house, under rather embarrassing circumstances if he recalled correctly, and the photo went viral with claims of a secret relationship. At the time, Marinette had taken the gossip in stride and insisted it wasn’t an issue, and like most tabloid fodder, it died out rather quickly since no one in the Agreste circle acknowledged the photos.

A photo or two was innocent enough, so they had no problem dismissing the public speculation surrounding their friendship. But now? If he and Marinette continued to spend more time together (a thought which made him grin in spite of himself), the winds would likely stir the rumor mill all over again.

The irony of all of this was not lost on him.

Adrien had grown up under the constant scrutiny associated with fame, bulbs flashing and shouts commandeering his attention just walking down the sidewalk. The press knew no boundaries, demanding answers on anything and everything ranging from French politics, to the disappearance of his mother, to his take on Chat Noir and Ladybug. Incidentally, when he first wore his miraculous, admiring fans had already been second nature at that point.

Would Marinette be okay with the publicity?

…Maybe?

She was sort of shy, but fierce when she wanted to be. It’s not like you had to be an extrovert to deal with photographers - look at his father, for example.

Still, Adrien didn’t want to upset her or make her uncomfortable. Especially as he’s gotten older and come to, um, understand romance in a more adult context, he could imagine plenty of horrible headlines that could really start them off on unfortunate footing. It’s not like footing was something something Marinette was exactly known for...

“Plagg - I got a question for you.” Adrien pondered, glancing over at the clock. They’ll need him again in another five minutes.

“Adrien, I swear to the stars,” his kwami mumbled. “If Paris isn’t on fire, I’ll cataclysm you.”

The teen smirked, though took a few steps back for good measure. “Can you even do that?”

“Do you really want to find out?” Plagg replied darkly, but lifted his head and met his stare with a half-lidded glare.

“Nope.” Adrien help up his hands. “Actually, I think I just figured out my answer. Go back to sleep, grumpy.”

His kwami did not need telling twice, and his head lowered beneath Adrien’s jacket again. Tiny snores came almost immediately.

Rolling his eyes, Adrien headed out the door and made his way back to the front of the studio. Despite Plagg’s bad attitude, he actually had answered Adrien’s question. All he had to do was ask for the kwami’s attention, and Plagg’s reaction was answer enough to know how the conversation would go.

Why not just do the same thing with Marinette? Not everything had to be a riddle or require a complicated plan. Adrien respected her too much to make assumptions on what she might feel.

By the time he was in front of the camera again, Adrien’s mood was bright again. Some of the set workers still occasionally whispered questions to him about Marinette, which made him blush more than once (each time, the photographer or makeup artist would yell in annoyance. Red cheeks were good for a winter ad, not one with floral backdrops). Aside from those interruptions, the remainder of the shoot passed without issue.

They were all dismissed just a bit few minutes after six, but by the time Adrien had finished changing and washing his face, he wasn’t in the car until quarter-til seven. Sinking comfortably into the seat, he finally sought out his phone. He had fifteen texts from the group chat, and from a separate, private conversation.

Marinette (3:11 PM):

Thanks for sharing, that was really sweet. And np - good luck!

You would think he would be tired of smiling after a photoshoot, but then, he was also lucky enough to have something to look forward to afterwards.

Thinking through a response, Adrien studied the streets as the car rolled by. Vermillion streaks of maroon velvet had begun to explode across the sky, rippling outwards against a swirling miasma of night that began to overtake Paris. Softening, the day was mending beneath the horizon as night came to reign again. It was both dark and luminous, all at once, reminding him of Marinette’s hair as it bounced down the sidewalk.

No, wait.

That was just her, walking home.

“Oh!” He blurted, shooting upright.

Nathalie jumped, and she turned to him sharply. “What is it? Are you alright?”

Adrien blushed, still staring at the window. They were stopped at a light, so Marinette just floated off towards the bakery, towards her home.

“Umm…” He glanced at Nathalie, who was staring at him with hard eyes, and his bodyguard, who was completely not reacting at all.

“Y-yes, I’m fine! It’s just, Marinette is right outside. Could we offer her a ride home?”

The two in the front met eyes, his father’s secretary pursing her lips, and they both glanced at the time on the dash.

“...Pull over,” Nathalie commanded, and the driver did just that at the first chance.

Adrien hastily thanked them and practically flung himself onto the sidewalk, running to catch up with her.

“Marinette! Mari!” Adrien called, speeding past a few alarmed pedestrians. Perhaps she had been examining her cellphone from within her purse, because her pigtails shot up at the call of her name, and she turned around.

“H-hey!” He greeted, stopping and panting in front of her from the sudden sprint. Marinette blinked, nonplussed, and shook her head.

“Adrien? What are you…?” She clasped her bag shut, but smiled as she spoke his name.

He tried to smile back, still slightly bent forward from his exertion. “I was just driving home from the photoshoot… we were stopped at the light,” he jerked over his thumb in the general direction of the car, and Marinette peered over his shoulder. “And I saw you walking. Did you just get out of work?”

Marinette covered her mouth to laugh lightly, and nodded. “Yes, and earlier than I hoped. That akuma scared away a lot of my customers.”

“Oh. Sure.” He rubbed his hands together anxiously, not sure what to say to that.

Silence came thereafter, but it wasn’t awkward. Marinette was just radiant, both physically and by way of her presence alone. She seemed to diffuse happiness into the air itself, and Adrien drank it all in.

It was almost too much when her cheeks turned pink.

Adrien cleared his throat and gestured behind him. “Did you want a ride home? We could take you.”

Marinette’s mouth fell open slightly, surprised. “O-oh, really? I would… I would love that, actually, if you’re sure it’s no trouble.”

He laughed and started to guide them back to the car. “Nah, it’s fine. You’re the only one who attracts trouble, after all.”

Adrien leaned down and grabbed the door, opening it for her. Marinette scrunched her nose, always acting sort of flustered when he would try to behave chivalrously.

Quietly, before stepping in, her blue eyes sparkled. “Should I start calling you trouble, then?”

Marinette closed the door for herself, smiling proudly at what was probably his stunned expression. He was still working through the joke by the time she was buckled in, and he had to scramble around street-side to get in, blushing and grinning at her all the while.

Beside the goofy glimpses they shared on the way back to the bakery, sticking their tongues out or winking dramatically, trying to fight the urge to laugh, the actual conversation remained perfectly cordial. Marinette asked Nathalie how she was doing, and apologized for her mother’s insistence the other day (Adrien guessed she heard it all second-hand from Sabine and Tom once she got home), and she and Adrien spoke about their days.

Well, besides the whole turning into Chat Noir and protecting Paris for almost two hours. He decided to leave that part out.

Towards the end of the ride, Marinette began to bounce lightly against the lush seats, brightening as she retrieved her cell phone. “Your text was really nice, b-by the way. I love Bouvardia, they’re the flower of enthusiasm!”

“I’m glad,” Adrien responded with a smile “I like how enthusiastic you get when you talk about all flowers, so this is like, enthusiasm about enthusiasm.”

“Meta-enthusiasm,” Marinette closed her eyes and nodded solemnly, peeking through a lid and catching his eye. They both grinned and snickered quietly.

“Yeah,” he said with a small, contented sigh as he gazed at the streets. They were very near to her house now. “I always think of you when I see flowers anymore. I hope that’s not weird,”

he tagged on the last part hastily, hoping she didn’t see the color fill his cheeks.

“The shop is like, one of my favorite places in the city.”

Marinette’s smile reached her eyes, and she too was looking out the window. The lights of street lamps that hit her face in a sort of constant flutter. It made her look almost angelic.

“Mine, too,” she commented, voice soft.

They pulled to a stop just outside of the bakery, and he could see Tom inside with a broom, sweeping the front of the store.

“Well…” Marinette said, rubbing her hands on her jeans. She looked nervous, which only made her even more adorable.

Adrien turned to her and tried for some confidence, very aware of the adults in the car and her father fifteen feet away in the building. “I’ll see you tomorrow, after you get off of work?”

Ducking her head, Marinette nodded vigoriously and started to get out the door. She paused halfway through and looked back inside the car.

“Thank you, Adrien, for taking me home. And thank you, Mme. Sancouer and, um, Adrien’s driver.”

“You’re welcome,” Nathalie said, keeping her eyes forward.

Adrien scooted down the seat slightly, leaning towards her. If only he could tell her how beautiful she looked right now, hair framing her face and eyes wide, turned up in kindness.

“Can I... call you again tonight?” He managed shyly.

Adrien lost a bit of his will power when she beamed at him, causing her freckles dancing under the light of the moon. He reached for her hand resting on the open door and, as gently as he could, kissed her knuckles. Glancing up, Adrien hoped the action spoke the word he was too embarrassed to say aloud.

Please?

Her own gaze looked only surprised, but if he didn’t know better, her skin had darkened from the gesture. A tiny bit smug, Adrien thought she looked much less offended than when Monseiur Delcair kissed her hand a week ago.

“I- I, yes. Yes.” She nodded and gave his fingers a light squeeze before pulling away. “I would like you very much. I-I mean, I would like that very much! I’m, I’ll… uh, see you!” Quickly, she waved and tagged on a squeaky “‘Bye!”

The door closed firmly and he watched her scurry up to the door, nearly colliding with the frame on her way inside.

Night proper had settled across Paris, dark and enigmatic, yet the city of love had never seemed so bright. Adrien felt like he was dreaming already, and he when he arrived home after mercifully little questioning from Nathalie, he had never wanted to sleep so readily. The next day, he would take Marinette on their first date, and the hours could not pass fast enough.

#miraculous fanfic #miraculous ladybug #miraculers #miraculous #tales of ladybug and cat noir #ladybug and chat noir #adrien agreste #marinette dupen-chang #marinette dupain-cheng #chat noir x marinette #adrien x marinette #adrinette #adrienette #flowershop au #flowers #language of flowers #ao3fic #ao3feed #fanfic

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firethatgrewsolow · 6 years

Text

Swiss Time - Chapter Seven

**Sorry for the delay! And thank you @ladygrange for everything you do for me! Hope you guys like it. <3**

Robert peered through the hotel window, the snow-capped mountains that had seemed so foreign to him when they arrived now a familiar comfort. Their week was almost up, culminating in the show in a couple of days. The time had flown by, and he realized that he was reluctant to leave. A little, anyway. He’d not seen Natalie since their castle adventure and subsequent dinner two nights before, and he found himself growing restless, even missing her a bit. His gaze shifted to the streets below, dotted with shoppers and late lunch goers scurrying about. A swirl of dark hair captured his attention, and he sat up, narrowing his eyes, only to fall back into the armchair as the woman turned around. Definitely not Nat. She was due to move over the weekend and would probably miss the gig, and that bothered him more than he cared to admit. He wanted to sing for her, see her light up as he knew she would. He smiled, his mind returning to the impromptu performance on the way back from Chillon. Christ, how stoned had he been? But it didn’t matter. Her laugh was all he’d wanted to hear. Bloody hell, what are you doing? The click of the door behind him dispensed with the reverie, and he glanced toward it as Jimmy shuffled in.

“So, did you and Natalie enjoy Chillon? You didn’t mention going.”

Robert took in the guitarist’s mildly perturbed demeanor. “I haven’t seen you since. Where were you yesterday?”

Ignoring the question, Jimmy plowed on. “Did you tour the torture chamber? It’s supposed to be quite remarkable.”

“Nah, we, uh, didn’t make it there.”

“What a shame. I’d heard it was not to be missed.” Jimmy tapped his finger gently against his chin. “Hmm, I wonder if she’d consider going again.”

“Not likely.” Robert chuckled, kicking his feet up onto the ottoman. “I think once might have been enough. She knows a lot about it, though. Said she was going to write an article for a magazine.”

“So, our little Natalie Grace is a writer, then? I had no idea. She is full of surprises.”

“Well, she’s shy about it, but she must be pretty good. It’s for a children’s magazine, but a popular one.” Robert cleared his throat, patting down his jacket for cigarettes. “You know, um, she’s probably not coming to the gig.”

“Why is that?”

“School stuff.” Spying Bonzo’s pack on the coffee table, he snatched it up. “I’ve been trying to think up ways to convince her to stay. When we were at dinner . . .”

“Dinner, too?” Jimmy asked, cocking his head. “My, my, aren’t we getting chummy.”

“Well, seeing as how she was free for the evening since you didn’t have a date with her after all . . .” Robert trailed off, pointedly raising a brow.

Jimmy stared back in silence, finally breaking out into a grin. “Couldn’t resist.” He reclined onto the sofa. “ So, you have a thing for our girl, eh?”

“I could say the same for you. Jesus Christ, Jim, she’s a kid.”

“Of course, I’m only joking. You were talking about convincing her to stay?”

“Yeah.” Robert nibbled his lip, treading carefully. “I was thinking that she could, well, maybe she could write about us. Like an interview and a piece about the gig.”

“You mean a review of the show?” Jimmy scoffed with a terse laugh. “That’s absurd.”

Robert shrugged his shoulders. “Why? What could it hurt?”

“What would she bloody know about any of it?”

“She’s pretty smart.” The singer pulled out a cigarette, rolling it between his thumb and forefinger. “And it might be nice to have her around.”

Jimmy glanced to the window as a patter of rain hit the glass. “She is nice to have around, I’ll give you that,” he murmured, the thread of something blooming in his mind.

“I’m sure she’d be complimentary,” Robert added, subtly emphasizing the word.

Complimentary. Jimmy pursed his lips, wheels in motion. It wasn’t an entirely unpromising scenario. In fact, it was somewhat intriguing. A young, likely very malleable writer with a strong connection to a major music promoter. Nobody would have to know that she was barely fifteen, nobody that mattered, anyway, and it would be a welcome change from the stodgy old fucks they always sent out to the gigs. A friendly word in the local paper certainly wouldn’t do them any harm, and who knew where it could lead. She wouldn’t be fifteen forever. But that was down the road. For now, at the very least, he would have a bit of fun with it. “You know, I think you’re right. That’s not a bad idea. It’s actually a rather good one.”

Robert blinked, surprised by his friend’s acquiescence. “So, should I ask her to do it?”

“Not directly,” Jimmy replied, shaking his head. “Let me take care of it.”

“They want me to do what?” Nat set down her teacup with a clatter, pushing her breakfast away. “I’ve never done an interview. I wouldn’t even know where to begin.”

“Oh, it can’t be too hard,” Susan chided, waving her hand dismissively. “Besides it’s the local paper. You don’t have to be Hemingway.”

“Whose idea was this?” Nat cut her eyes at her conspicuously quiet aunt. “Well? Whose?”

Susan hesitated, drumming her fingers on the dining room table. “The paper’s editor, from what I understand.”

“Really? So, I’m a fifteen year old nobody that’s hardly written anything, and somehow, mysteriously, I’m interviewing one of the biggest bands in the world?”

“Well, Christian is friends with . . .”

“Oh, no.” Natalie grimaced, running a hand through her hair. “You pulled some weird strings, didn’t you? Susan, I don’t want to be that girl in school. Half the kids will probably be going, and if they see this dumb interview, they’ll know that . . .”

“You’re a wonderful writer?” Sue finished, dropping a sugar cube into her tea. “That’s what they’ll know. As long as you don’t ask tough questions and give them a good review, you’re golden.”

“Review? Of what? I haven’t even listened to their full albums.”

Susan smiled coyly, stirring her steaming concoction. “The show, darling. Although, you should probably brush up on the records, too.”

Natalie’s jaw dropped. “You want me to review the show?”

“Not me . . . them,” Sue purred, taking a sip of her tea.

“Them? Oh, my God. The editor had nothing to do with this. I knew there was something funny about all of it.” Nat skimmed her thumb along the rim of her cup. “Who is them? Robert?” Her aunt looked artfully away. “Wait, it’s Jimmy, isn’t it?”

Susan abandoned her tea, making her way to the bar. “At the end of the day, does it matter, Natalie? Good lord, you’re impossible to please. Maybe they just want to do something nice for you to help you out. A burgeoning writer and all that business. And what if it was Robert? I assumed you had a nice time with him. You have no idea how hard it was to sneak away without you seeing me at lunch the other day.”

“Sneak away? What are you . . .” Nat’s jaw dropped again as it dawned on her. “You saw him come up to me. There was no meeting with the architect.” She frowned at her aunt’s giddy grin. “What are you, some kind of twisted matchmaker? I’m only fourteen . . .”

“Fifteen, you just said so yourself,” Susan chimed, wagging a finger in the air. “Jesus, Nattie, I’m not trying to get you two together in that way. At least, not yet.” She smirked, exchanging her teacup for a thin, crystal flute. “Listen, it’s a fantastic opportunity. They’re notoriously crafty with the press. They rarely grant interviews, and they wanted you specifically.” She held up her glass with a glimmer in her eye. “And when the kids from school see you’ve interviewed the band, you’ll be an absolute queen on the campus.”

Queen on the campus? Jesus Christ. “But what about moving into the dorm?”

“We’ll figure something out.” Hands on hips, Sue expelled a weary breath. “You cannot possibly be trying to worm out of this.”

Nat sensed there was more to it than just a random act of kindness. Altruism didn’t suit the band. Surely an ulterior motive was involved, but she couldn’t for the life of her figure out what it would be. She slunk back into her chair, resigned to her fate. Sue’s right. What does it matter? There were definitely worse things than spending time with four handsome, talented musicians. And funny and sweet and silly . . . She clenched her fists, crushing the thought.

“So, that’s a yes, I presume?” Susan beamed triumphantly. “Perfect! Their albums are in your room, along with a brand new record player. Courtesy of Christian, of course. I also pulled some clippings from my personal collection. I like to keep an archive on the bands that I . . . particularly admire.” Sue popped open a bottle of Champagne, pouring a long, fizzy stream. “And don’t worry, love,” she cooed, peeking at her wristwatch. “You’re not meeting with them for another five hours. You’ve got all the time in the world.”

* * *

Natalie tapped her pen on the pages in front of her, exasperated beyond belief. The interview was an unmitigated disaster. Bonzo and Jonesy hadn’t even shown up, and getting answers out of Jimmy was like pulling teeth. She’d spent every spare minute preparing, even gotten a tiny bit excited, and apparently, it was all for naught. He didn’t want to talk about anything personal, and she’d been shunned when she asked about life on the road. Everything seemed off limits. What was the point, she mused dejectedly. Hadn’t they been the ones who wanted to do it to begin with? And in hostile territory, no less. Her gaze roved over the guitarist’s candle laden suite, landing on a trio of half-melted pillars situated on the coffee table. A small book lay beside them, tattered and torn, and she squinted in an effort to read the title. His clipped cough brought her gaze back to his. A reprimand for being curious, she determined as she scanned his blank visage. Prickly didn’t seem to do him justice. Maybe leave off the ly. Hell, he’s probably enjoying this. How in the world was she going to put any of it together? She ran through the options one more time. Influences, go back to influences. “So, um, what inspires you? Are all of you into the same kind of music?”

Sighing dramatically, Jimmy rolled his eyes. “Oh, God, not that again.”

Nat cracked, finished with the cat and mouse game. “Dammit, this was your idea!” She threw down her pen. “What do you want me to ask you, then? I’ve heard a couple of things about a shark.”

“Natalie, dear, you do cut to the chase,” Jimmy hummed, amused at the rise he’d finally elicited.

“Let’s just say that I’ve done my homework.” She crossed her arms, her gaze flickering back to the book on the table. “Would you rather tell me about your interest in, uh, more spiritual matters?”

“Ooh, I see you have done your homework,” Jimmy replied smoothly. “In that case, why don’t you tell me?”

Recognizing Natalie’s stormy scowl, Robert hurriedly intervened. “Come on, Jim, just answer the questions. We asked for this, remember?”

“Ah, fair enough,” Jimmy conceded reluctantly. “Pity it has to be so one sided.” With another heavy sigh, he resettled into the sofa. “Well, I’d say we all have different influences, to some degree. There’s a melding here and there, but I think that’s what makes us able keep it fresh and interesting.”

Encouraged, Natalie leaned forward. “There’s quite a lot of blues in your records so far.”

“Oh, yes, that’s the root of it, I suppose.” Jimmy glanced to his bandmate, who was clearly champing at the bit to have a word. “What say you, Robert?”

“What we’ve tried to do is to sort of reinterpret some of the stuff from America . . . Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf. It’s endless, really. All those sounds, we kind of spin it round and round until we take it somewhere else.”

“Right, the expansion of it. That’s important.” Jimmy crossed his legs. “I want to create, well, we want to create something that’s dynamic and keep pushing boundaries.” He paused for a moment, searching for the right words. “Something heavy that strikes you, and just when you’ve reached the edge, it softens. Or vise versa.”

“Light and shade,” Natalie offered, grateful that he'd begun to open up.

Jimmy exchanged a look with Robert. “Exactly.” He turned back to her with a devilish smile. “Sort of like making love.”

Natalie swiftly dropped her head, praying that the lighting was dim enough to hide the blush she felt racing onto her cheeks. Her saving grace was Peter, who lumbered into the room.

“Let’s go, lads, interview’s over. Ahmet just got back, and they’re ready.”

More than a little relieved, Nat closed her notebook and capped her pen. “Thanks for taking the time.” Even though it was mostly a waste of it. She shoved them both into her satchel as Robert bounded up to her.

“Would you like to come and watch? We’re just gonna run through some stuff, sort of a sound check. It won’t last long.” He held out his arm, his dimple deepening. “I’ll take a request, if you like.”

Her lips curved at the prospect. What did she have to lose? “Sure. Lead the way.”

Arm in arm, they plodded out of the room and into the hall. As they reached the elevator, Robert peered behind him for the others, but they were still in the suite. He punched the button, secretly hoping it would make haste so he could have her to himself for a few minutes. His wish granted, the car arrived almost immediately, and he hustled on, selecting his destination as quickly as he could. He caught a glimpse of Peter and Jimmy in the distance as the doors slid blessedly shut. Mission accomplished, they were alone. “You, uh, seem to know a lot more about us than I thought. Very impressive.”

“I did some research,” Nat replied, basking in the warmth of his sideways smile. “Aunt Sue is a pretty good resource. Keeps tabs on certain groups that she finds . . . stimulating.”

“I bet she’s got quite a file.” They shared a muted laugh. “I take it you’ve listened to the albums?”

“Um, yeah, that would be part of my research.”

“Right. Of course.” Robert quietly cleared his throat. “So, ah, what’s your favorite song?”

Natalie pursed her lips as their eyes met. “Moby Dick, I think.”

“The one about the whale, huh?” Robert teased, the corner of his mouth curling up.

“The one with no vocals,” she shot back with a smirk.

“Ouch, that hurt.” Robert clamped his hand over his heart, and they shared another laugh. “You know, you did a good job back there with Jimmy.”

Natalie snorted, shaking her head. “You must be kidding. I hardly got anything out of him.”

“You got more than most, believe it or not.” A ping in the car signaled that they’d reached the first floor. “Pagey likes you. I can tell.”

“Good God, what does he do to the people he doesn’t like?”

Robert snickered as the elevator doors surged open. “Nothing. That’s what.”

They navigated through the lobby and into the casino, winding around the masses and entering a cavernous room toward the back of it. Natalie slowly canvassed the drafty space, examining the ancient looking wooden planks that made up the ceiling. They were cracked and peeling, in need of a facelift. Hell, a full renovation, really. “It’s like a matchbox in here.” She meandered to the wide glass windows overlooking the pool, which was empty, save for a fully clothed woman reading a book. “Are you guys all set up?”

The floor squeaked underneath Robert’s feet as he padded to the front of the stage, inspecting the equipment. “Yeah, looks like everything’s here.” He gave her a wide grin. “So, what would you like to hear?”

“I don’t know.” Natalie surveyed the scene, nodding at Jonesy and Bonzo as they passed by. “This is kind of a lot.”

“If you’re going to be a music journalist, you might want to get used to it.”

Natalie jumped at Jimmy’s words right behind her. Shit! Where had he come from? Probably just thin air. She spun around, her brow wrinkling. “A music journalist? Who said that? I write articles about castles and history, not . . .”

“This is history, history in the making, darling, and you’re in the center of it all. It’s fate. Can’t you see that? You’d be a fool not to take advantage of your position.”

Nat studied the guitarist warily, at that point quite sure that there was more to the situation than met the eye. As she pondered her response, he turned on his heel, making his way to the stage. A group of men in suits were taking their seats beside the platform as pops of bass and the rattle of drums shook the rafters. Grabbing the microphone, Robert sidled up next to Jimmy, and the four musicians engaged in a few seconds of hushed deliberation.

“As it appears that our little Natalie can’t make up her mind what to request, I think, ah, I think we’ve got something to dedicate to her, yeah?”

The opening strains of Chuck Berry’s “Nadine” filled the room, and Natalie giggled as Robert substituted her name instead. It was a rowdy, lighthearted rendition, and she was reminded of his silly serenade two nights before. How anyone could classify him a some Rock God or sex symbol was beyond her. He was simply too goofy for the label. At the end of the song, they launched right into a poppy Elvis tune, and then another that she remembered as a child. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught shifting shadows at the door to the theater. She watched Robert nod to the large man that was serving as a guard of sorts, and people began to file in. She pored over their faces, some giddy, some disbelieving, all transfixed as the Elvis number morphed into Buffalo Springfield, which somehow seamlessly transformed into a rollicking “Good Golly Miss Molly.” It was evident that the boys were completely attuned to each other. It was tight, but still lively and fun. They were obviously a great band, but as she followed Robert’s bouncing figure across the stage, she couldn’t help but wonder what all the fuss was about.

Robert beamed, flushed from the applause and cheers of the burgeoning audience. He glided his eyes over the crowd, delighting in their delight at the unexpected show. “We’d like to do one more. It’s from the first LP, and it’s something I hope you’ll like.” His gaze landed on Natalie at the foot of the stage. “Particularly one of you.”

Nat could feel the stares of those around her, and she grinned as he winked at her, his gravelly voice cutting through the din.

“I can’t . . . quit you, baby . . .”

In an instant, her grin vanished. This was different than the other songs. Very. Her body shook from the ear shattering boom of Bonzo’s drums and the thunderous bass and guitar that accompanied it.

“Woman, I think I’m gonna put you down . . . for a little while . . .”

Robert’s wail made her mouth fall open as a wall of sound like she’d never heard before roared around her. Bluesy and seductive, it enveloped her, heart and soul, and for a moment, she forgot to breathe. He was nothing like the silly serenader on the trail. This side of him was new, completely alien to her. She swallowed as a wave of heat rippled through her, a current of electricity the likes of which she didn’t know existed. As her wide eyes locked on his knowing ones, she finally remembered to breathe. Jimmy was right. History was in the making. And she fully intended to take a piece of it for herself.

#Robert Plant fanfic #Robert Plant fan fiction #Led Zeppelin fanfic #Led Zeppelin fan fiction #Jimmy Page fanfic #Jimmy Page fan fiction

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hallowedmuses · 4 years

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𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐭: 𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞.

SUMMARY: With little to go on regarding Daisy’s kidnapping, Deke brings together a ragtag team of agents to help him search for Daisy. Clues in the camera footage lead the team to unlock Natasha’s memories of a pervious mission gone wrong that proves useful in locating Daisy Johnson in there here and now. TRIGGERS: Manipulated memories, brain washing, violence mentions WRITTEN WITH: @oflokismischief , @ofdcniels , @oflemcns , @ronniestvns, @daisyljohnson (mentions of)

DEKE: So Daisy was a badass. Not just a badass, but the badass. But just because she was a badass, didn't mean she was invulnerable. Maybe not as vulnerable as the average Joe, but Daisy had her vulnerabilities nonetheless. He knew firsthand, having been in her body when he was. Having been in her body and gotten her kidnapped, that is. Now, having returned to their own bodies, kidnapped she remained while he roamed free. A shitty deal for her he'd wager. His memory wasn't 100% on all that had occurred, but he'd tried to gather what he could. Including the best agents and biggest badasses he knew (or had previously known of) all together to rescue the director of shield. "So Daisy... kind of super kidnapped right now. Kind of my fault." Super his fault. "So how do we do this-- the whole rescue thing." He was used to being kidnapped, not on the opposite side of the spectrum as the rescuer.

NATASHA: She ran her fingers through her hair as she glanced at the team Deke had collected. She'd spent the morning questioning the kid and didn't get much. The list of people who had a vendetta against Daisy Johnson was long. Any number of people could've taken her. Deke didn't seem to know much about the people that had taken him while he occupied Daisy's body but he was able to give Natasha his last known location before the kidnapping and a rough timestamp of when the kidnapping might've occurred. "I pulled CCTV footage from various cameras around the location where Deke was taken when he was Daisy," she explained to the team. "We need to start cataloging it. Any faces that you see in the footage we need to identify because they could be potential witnesses. Pull license plates, even partials can be useful. Tattoos, piercings, birthmarks, presence of a limp, any apparent injuries...they can all lead us to witnesses or to the perpetrators themselves. It's gonna be a long day so be prepared to be here a while."

DANIEL: When Daniel had found out Daisy was missing, no... taken, he was furious and stormed into Mack's office practically demanding to be a part of the rescue effort. If i hadn't stayed in the other timeline I could have been with her... helped prevent this... he sighed quietly from his place against the wall, arms crossed over his chest as he studied the screens. This was something he could do, look over photos- footage and mark anything important, he'd done it for years and it gave him something to focus on other than Daisy being tortured again. He turned his gaze away from the screens and over to the woman, Natasha, as he stepped closer to the group "Just point me where you want me ma'am. I'm not leaving until Daisy is back."

Loki: Was one of the first people to notice her disappearance, Daisy and him had schedule a couple meetings that she didn't attend. Being called to this little joint recuse mission was something he demanded to be a part of. He looked to Nat knowing she'd be ideal to lead this mission after having plenty of a experience. The Footage would be key in understanding who planned this attack any little thing could go unnoticed when it came to watching things. "I agree the CCTV footage would be our best route to figure out just who we are dealing with, with all of us cataloging what we noticed I'm sure it will be quite easy to piece together the necessary information that we can run against the SHIELD Database." He mused agreeing with Nat before turning towards the somewhat new face he hadn't seen since that time in the dinner. "Good to know Mr. Sousa, It might be a little fast paced for you watching live CCTV but if you require any assistance I am quite good at muiltasking"

Jemma was concerned. No one had any idea yet on who had taken Daisy and it had been at least a few hours. She looked around at everyone who was in the room unsure of what to think about them. She knew Daisy trusted these people but some gave her slight weariness. She stood to the side of Deke listening as everyone spoke, finding that she agreed with the decision. "Have you already starting watching the footage?" She asked as her gaze settled on Natasha.

RONNIE: “Sorry I’m late.” Veronica apologized, sliding in to a chair next to Loki. She pulled out her laptop, listening to the conversation as she typed with great passion. When heard from Deke about Daisy’s kidnapping she felt the need to help in some way. While she wasn’t close to daisy per say, she cared about her a great deal, hoping the two might become good friends someday. “I’ll get started on those background checks while Daniel reviews the footage. Surely there’s got to be some kind of lead there. My A.I. JUSTINE run background the checks as we pull suspects. We won’t rest till we find her.” She agreed. “Have we got any leads so far?”

DEKE: Being surrounded by these super spies and all around badasses was harrowing to say the least. It reminded him of his own mortality (his own uselessness... ) He tried to give them all he could, but his memory was limiting to say the least. It seemed Black Widow (Natasha) had already done more for the investigation than he'd even touched. She reminded him of Daisy as she spoke, so serious and so authoritative. Ma'am. As fun as it would be to make fun of the man out of time (much like himself) it was hardly the situation for such thing. "Me too." He sputtered a bit, struggling to keep up with all going on. "I could help look over the footage or anything you need me on-- I'll help." Help in any sort of way he could, he would give it his all. Maybe it wouldn't be enough, but if nothing else Deke was confident in his scientific mind. He could help that way at least.

NATASHA: "I've only had the opportunity to do a cursory overview of the footage. There's a lot of it. Six adjacent stores have CCTV, but Deke was able to narrow down the time frame to a two hour block window at least," she replied. She knew the kid was nervous. Truth be told, it wasn't entirely his fault. Daisy had a lot of enemies being the Director of SHIELD. Someone must've known she wasn't herself and taken the opportunity to grab her knowing whoever was in her body wouldn't see it coming. Natasha entered her credentials into the system and pulled up footage from six different CCTV cameras, all timestamped within the same time frame. She then shared the camera views with everyone in the room. "Deke, you're with me. We'll start combing through footage on Camera A and B. Loki and Daniel you can take C and D. And Veronica and Jemma you can take E and F. If any of the traces you run get a match, please let the team know."

Natasha watched as everyone broke out into their teams to survey the footage found. “Alright, lemon boy,” Yeah, she knew about the lemons. She did her homework on Deke Shaw. “I’ll take Camera A and you take Camera B.” Natasha pulled out two legal pads and a few pens to hand over to him. She pushed play on her footage and watched it go one loop around at 2x the speed. In the far right corner of the screen, see saw Daisy’s form appear. The footage wasn’t incredibly clear, but she knew Daisy well enough so, she slowed the footage down. Sure enough, a few minutes in, she saw a van pull up. The license plate was obscure from this angle, but she hoped maybe one of the other cameras would pick it up. As the men stepped out of the vehicle, Natasha slowed down the footage more and more. She zoomed into their faces but the faces were obscured by a mask and helmets. The helmet itself seemed familiar in a way. She wasn’t sure why, but she had a feeling she’d seen something like this before. She took a screenshot of the video, trying to get as clear a picture of the masks and helmets as she could, so that she could run a search for gangs that may use similar paraphernalia. It didn’t take long to get the results back. No match.

“This is weird,” she replied as she played back the footage in slow motion to Deke. She was sure she’d seen these helmets before. They were so distinct. “Do you recognize any of them?” she asked him. She could feel the beginnings of a throbbing headache developing. She wasn’t sure if it was the stress of the situation. Natasha was normally calm and collected on missions no matter who’s life was on the line purely because their life depended on her being calm and in control. But, right now, she could feel pressure building up in her temples. It was an odd sensation. One she hadn’t felt since...since deprogramming. It was the feeling of blocked memories. Her mind was grasping at old ghosts she couldn’t reach. Where the hell had she seen these helmets before? Why wasn’t it coming back to her?

DANIEL: He nodded at the direction before moving towards Loki "Sir. I assume the basic functionality is the same as what's used on the Zephyr? It's been a few years but I'm a quick study." Daniel sat in front of one of the stations trying to keep himself focused. He'd made promises to Daisy, and staying in the alternate timeline made him break them. He didn't want to stay, but someone had to... they couldn't just leave the chronicoms to run amok there after all. "I can review Camera D if you want to take C." he suggested after pulling himself out of his thoughts. Part of him was hoping that there wouldn't be anything useful on his camera, but he also wanted to see her... even if it was a grainy image.

After they decided on who would review which camera Daniel started scrolling through the footage, albeit a bit of a slow start as he figured out the way the device worked. It was much more advanced than what he'd been using for the past few years, even with working with Stark and Pym technology, the eighties could only do so much. He had to admit, looking for clues and suspects was easier when he could pause and rewind the footage this would have made for shorter nights at the ssr, that's for sure he chuckled quietly at the thought. As he scrolled he glanced over at the other male "How has she been? Apart from getting kidnapped I mean." he chuckled, eyes turning back to the screen "I'm not really sure what exactly I'm trying to ask. She hasn't been running into too many brick walls has she?"

Loki: he couldn't help but smirk at Daniel's response he was definitely going to take a liking to this new man out of time if he kept it up with the sass. "Ooh I love when you call me sir, but I'm merely offering assistance, It's been awhile since you've use equipment, don't worry boy scot I want her back just as bad as you do" he whispered the last part as he took to camera C before quickly running through a basic run through of how to work the buttons in his favor. He needed to find Daisy and stop this torture's he'd failed her once before back when they were an item he swore he'd never do so again.

It was always tiring reviewing camera feeds but anything little thing could've been capture that needed to be addressed so he watched the video waving his hand to have his pen magically catalog the women's movements before looking at the other it was almost adorable the way his worry leaked through as he put together sentence to come out and ask how she was doing. "Daisy as I'm sure you know is a very strong girl who if given a direction would just run full barrel. She had a little incident back with a breech of her trust, in the form of a hydra spy, nothing bad was leaked in term of information but safe to say her circle of friends have greatly stepped up and provide a protective circle around her." He mused knowing there was plenty more but most of it should be Daisy's story to tell all he could do was ensure this Daniel was true to his word. If he ever hurt Daisy like scarlet had no one would be able to stop the pain he'd bring down upon them. "So all this interest, Do you have intentions towards Miss Johnson?" he smirked.

JEMMA: Once the recordings were divided out gave a reassuring smile to Deke. "This isn't your fault. We will find her." She then watched him go off with Natasha before turning her attention to Veronica. Another person she didn't know but she supposed that if the woman was here then she wanted Daisy back just like the rest of them. "Shall we get started." She went to sit down to start looking through the footage.

RONNIE: Veronica listened intently, all the while she continued to stare at her laptop, aside from the occasional nod or glance towards the others as teams were assigned with a basic strategy set into place. “Sounds good, best of luck with your footage everyone, we’ll find her.” Veronica added, a look of determination on her eyes. “We shall, the quicker we get through all this, the quicker we find her.. I really hope she’s okay.” Veronica sighed, a worried look coming over her. “Oh! I’m Veronica by the way, Veronica Wayne. I don’t believe we’ve met.” She extended her hand to her new footage partner.

DEKE: It was intimidating, working with these top agents. Which was almost funny because he felt normal working with Daisy, May, Mack, other top agents. Maybe it'd been that he'd met them on his ground, in his world. Or maybe he just knew them so well that he couldn't bring himself to be scared. Well except maybe of May when she got the kind of pissed that made ever instinct scream RUN. "On it." He wasn't much of a good shot, nor was he particularly brave but at least he was smart. Deke was confident in that much. At least this was something he could actually help with, to which he was grateful. "Thanks Nana." He said, grateful for her confidence in his innocence that he himself sorely lacked.

Lemon boy. Despite himself, despite the situation, Deke couldn't help but feel a lightness at the fact Daisy had actually given such mention of him that Natasha knew his affinity for lemons. Or at least, he presumed Daisy had mentioned it. He tracked through his footage, eager to find Daisy's face (himself, technically, but her face), he looked for familiar looking surroundings as well. Maybe he could stir some memories of where he'd, as Daisy, been taken. Natasha inclined him towards her screen and- "Yeah. Those are the asshats." Though it felt almost rhetorical to say when it was quite obviously them. He wished he had more information to offer, but he'd given as much as he could remember already. Anything else was just wasting time and repeating things.

NATASHA: She sighed deeply, her features taking on a troubled sort of look. “The head pieces,” she replied as she tapped on the screen to magnify it. “I’ve seen them before but the database search is coming back with no results.” Where had she seen it before? Was it the Red Room? She thought she’d unlocked most of her memories from that time. Whatever this was, the feeling of the memory was more recent than her time with the Red Room. Natasha’s expressions grew more stormy. If these memories that she was struggling to grasp onto occurred after she’d already been taken in by SHIELD that meant someone inside of SHIELD had programmed them away. Was she surprised? No. Not everyone in the agency had good intentions. Even after she’d exposed HYDRA’s infiltration of the agency with Steve at the triskelion and even after the agency went through a period of reformation, there were still people within the vast organization that couldn’t be trusted.

Could she trust everyone here? Her eyes glanced around the room. Deke seemed genuine in his concern for Daisy. He came to Natasha directly when he returned to his body. If he wanted to harm Daisy, he wouldn’t have done that. Then there was Daniel Sousa, he was a living legend within the agency, but had time and his absence from the team changed him? Natasha eyed him momentarily and gauged that she could trust him. His concern held a genuine nature - it was hard to fake the kind of concern that his eyes shone whenever Daisy’s name was mentioned. Then there was Loki. Most would doubt the God of Mischief and his alliances, but not Natasha. They’d been through too much together for him to have been playing her this whole time. Jemma, too, had been a long time colleague and proven her worth time and again. Veronica was new to Natasha. She was family to both Bruce and Tony - they’d both vouched for her and from what Natasha could tell she was willing to step up to the plate even though she did not know Daisy as well as the others. Natasha decided that she could trust everyone on this team.

“Loki,” she leaned back in her chair to get a better look at him. “When Daisy and I were out drinking once, she’d mentioned how you helped her retrieve some memories that were taken from her. I think...” Natasha glanced at her screen and then back at Loki. “I think I’ve seen these helmets before but the memory isn’t clear. And I fucking hate the memory machine,” she frowned and made a face. It was painful and while she didn’t mind the pain, she’d very much rather take the alternative option. “You up for some mind spelunking?”

DANIEL couldn't help the chuckle that escaped him at loki's comment, the humor reminding him of howard before he met maria "i appreciate the help loki. even with working with stark and pym tech for a few years this is still miles ahead of what we had then." he gave him a smile, nodding before turning back to the footage. daniel wasn't sure exactly what was important so he was noting down license plates for cars that showed up more than once while listening to loki "that's daisy for sure, full of fight." he smiled slightly, shaking his head "i'm sad to hear that happened but i'm glad her friends had her back." his grip on the pencil he was using tightened as he watched the van pull up and grab daisy... deke? no, deke in daisy's body... god, he'd been right in thinking that the further forward in time the worse/weirder things got. he looked away from the screen, pausing the footage, to look at loki again "mack beat you to this conversation, but yes. i do have intentions towards daisy."

Loki: rather liked Daniel if things were so darier he could see himself getting to know the other merely to ensure he had the best intentions for their Daisy. "You've quickly turned into quite the tech bug, I have to admit its pretty simply looking at footage, once you get over the amazment of the fact that yes we can record people" He mused looking through the footage as the other nodding his head "She is, sometimes even more so then she has the strength to give, she needs someone to catch her when she falls, not many people are like that in this world. So willing to give everything for those they care about, its easy to betray their trust, something I will never allow happen Mr. Sousa " he replied rather pointily before nodding his head 'We will always be there for Daisy, regardless of how hard she tries to push away, I love her dearly" He mused before looking at the other smirking "Well then, Try to speed up that Courting? we aren't in the 20's anymore and I'm almost positive she likes you." He mused before turning his attention to Natasha as she spoke.

"Yes I did, its quite a process one that takes a very hands on approach to things. I did it for Daisy to help her recover using a tiny bit of information using it as a trail to follow." He explained looking at her screen taking slight notice of the helmets, it'd been awhile since he'd been inside of Daisy's head but he could feel something about the imagine that seem familiar like Nat had said. "My way is a lot less painful, but it gives me access to your mind, whatever we uncover I'll see as well and sometimes it can give you a headache with the rush of information. I'll see and feel everything you'll go through so it's best we ensure no one else tries to interfere or touch either of us." He mused looking at her "Always down if you are Nat."

Jemma gave Veronica a slight smile. "I'm Jemma. Glad you're here." She replied as she sat down next to the woman. Her focus then turned to the videos that they were looking at. She wasn't quite sure what she was looking for but she picked out every detail out that she could about the car. Even though she was focused on her side she picked up the ending of the convo between Natasha and Loki. Her gaze turned towards them both. "Will that help?"

Veronica nodded, returning the smile towards Jemma. “Me too.” She agreed, her eyes following the footage. She was glad Deke had come knocking on her door, asking her to assist him with this delicate matter. She couldn’t explain it, but she felt something pulling her to daisy, like she was meant to help rescue the girl, and Veronica never was one to say no when a person was in need. aside from Wayne enterprises, Stark Tech produced the most advanced tracking equipment. Ronnie was the VP of one and one the board of the other so naturally it made sense he’d come to her for help. “Actually, that might be hold them key to finding daisy. I think we should we try it, if your sure your up for it Natasha.” Veronica perked up, both intrigued and excited to see what Natasha’s memories could offer in their search.

DEKE: He watched Natasha, the Black Widow, as she began to figure things out. He wasn't fully following, there was so (too much) he didn't know of. But, one thing he did know for sure, was that everyone here was someone who cared for Daisy. Who had her best intentions at heart and who only wished for her safety. That was all he needed to know. He'd keep watch, see where he could possibly offer his expertise. Though identifying those who had taken him (her, Daisy, technically) he didn't feel all too useful. "They used knock-out gas," It was shown in the video, so perhaps saying it was rhetorical. "So they have had a ton of info on Daisy, right?" There was still a long list of enemies, that didn't cut it down. It was clear this was something planned from the very start. He just wished he could offer something new, something helpful.

He stayed back as the other's went on. Natasha speaking to Loki. It was good that they had a lead, that they could have Loki go into Natasha's mind and uncover more info. Though, he did feel a pang of sympathy for Natasha and Loki both. From what he had remembered from his conversation with Daisy, mind stuff wasn't the greatest. And from the sound of it, it wasn't going to be pleasant for Loki either. Especially not for Natasha. He admired that they could do it without hesitation for Daisy, though he wished the situation hadn't occurred at all. At Loki's mention of no one interfering or touching either of them, Deke made sure to distance himself as far as he could while remaining in hearing range. He knew he had some clumsy tendencies, and he didn't want to risk screwing it up. Grimacing, he said. "Good luck guys." A pause. "Not that you need it because your both badasses and you could for sure do it and know what your doing but uh-" Yeah, he should just stop talking now. "Good luck." He repeated, lamely.

NATASHA: She sighed as she looked at the screen which was paused on the men with the intricate helmets. A design like this that generated absolutely no leads in any of the systems she had access to? It was beyond fishy. Someone was trying to hide something. Not only had they erased whatever it was that they were trying to hide from the computer systems, they'd also erased it from her memory. She was beyond furious. What else had been taken from her memories? What else might've been implanted? She hated this. She thought she'd been done with this phase in her life but here she was again trying to answer the age old question: what part of me do I own and what part of me is someone elses programing? "I was hoping my next surprise trip would be Greece, but I guess a trip down memory lane works just as well," she replied with an easy sort of calmness as she looked up a Loki. "Never mind the skeletons then."

The method might've been new to her, but she knew the drill by now. She grabbed a few of the wireless heart rate monitor straps and secured them around her chest. Despite the stress of the situation, her heart rate remained steady with no signs of elevation. "Alright, gang," she looked at the team. "Guess that leaves you guys on make sure I don't end up in a coma filled with my worst memories duty. When I get out of this, someone remind me to demand a raise," she winked before taking a seat across from Loki. "This ought to be fun. I'm assuming it works like the memory machine? Focus on what I've forgotten and you'll bippity boppity boo your way through my mind like a tour guide?"

Loki: Had little issue using his powers to help find Daisy, this brand of magic took a lot out of him but if there was a chance at getting Daisy back by unlocking Natasha's Memories it was something he had to try. He looked at the other chuckling softly "They must enough to know not to take her conscious even if Deke was in her body he could've taken them down by mistake." He mused looking at the other this process would be hard on them both but this information proved that it was a hit by someone who know just what Daisy was capable of. "After this I'll take you to Greece personally, tell Clint we are on recon mission." He teased looking at her "I've got you" He whispered only for her to hear.

He watched her get everything ready moving to take off his suit jacket knowing that he'd have to be pretty comfortable before moving to place his hands on either side of Nat's head. "Yes focus completely on that memory, and anything about it feelings, smells i need you to try and paint me a picture from there I'll find the cord to pull and we'll unlock this door. It's extremely important that no one touches me if something happens, if I break the connection I could loose Natasha" He addressed everyone in the room before looking at the other ensuring she was ready before closing his eyes as his hands glowed green waiting for Natasha to start remembering.

Jemma: She realized pretty quickly that although she would've been helpful with any medical issues that might surface, the process they were doing involved things that might've been beyond her knowledge, at least for now. Magic was just science that they didn't understand yet after all, and while this would have been a prime opportunity to observe such magic and try to understand it better, she received a message that made her unable to stay. Fitz needed her help with Alya back at home. She would've felt guilty for not helping as much as she could with finding a way to save Daisy, but in this situation, her help wasn't really necessary until they knew what was in Natasha's memories anyways.

She walked over towards Agent Sousa. "I know this must all be very hard on you, arriving here in the middle of this," she said, keeping her voice quiet, so as not to break the concentration between Loki and Natasha. "I have to see to my daughter, but I'm sure we'll find Daisy soon. She's strong, and I imagine that reconnecting with you will make all of this a little more bearable for her. She'll be delighted to see you. Take care, Agent Sousa." She moved towards the door closer to where Deke was. "Fitz and Alya need me, but just call me and let me know what happens, please?" she asked him. "You did a good job organizing all of this, but don't let it get into your head that this is your fault, okay? Daisy will need everyone clear-headed for this, but I know you'll help them figure things out." She gave him a quick hug. "You'll do great. I'll see you later," she said before departing out the door, closing it quietly behind her.

RONNIE: Watching Jemma exit, Ronnie turned back towards Natasha and Loki, nodding silently as she stood up, going to man the door to ensure no one interrupted them. While she knew she couldn’t be of any real assistance, she still chose to stay and offer moral support to Deke if nothing else. Plus, she was intrigued to see how Loki memory surfing with Natasha would go. “I hope you don’t mind, but I’m recording this, strictly for the archives.” She pulled up the holo pad on her watch, setting the camera to record. “Hey, relax..” She looked at Deke, resting her free hand on his arm. “Natasha and Loki have been through this before, they’ll find something to help us get to Daisy.” She offered him a smile of assurance before turning back to watch.

NATASHA: "I'm not picky. If we can't go to Greece, I'll take Asgard." She was probably going to need to get nice and drunk after this. Knowing the fact that your mind and memory were manipulated was never an easy pill to swallow. She nodded when Loki said he had her. "I trust you," she replied as she made herself comfortable for what was sure to be an uncomfortable experience. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, concentrating on the memory of the intricate headpieces. She could feel Loki's hands above her almost guiding her mind from memory to memory. It was like doors opening and closing in her head until her mind latched onto one particular memory.

The Kingdom of Latveria. She was here on some kind of mission. What was it again? Something off books, no doubt but not for herself. She remembered. Fury believed that Latveria and their prime minister Lucia von Bardas were supporting terrorism by equipping B-List super villains with high-tech equipment. So, he gathered a team that included both Natasha and Daisy and they broke into Castle Doom. Natasha could see it now almost as if she was relieving it. They were fighting their way through to get to Lucia, and then Daisy...Natasha gasped and gripped the seat of her chair as Loki pushed the memory further. He heart rate ticked slightly higher than usual. She could see Daisy with this glazed look in her eyes that Natasha now recognized as one associated with brainwashing. Daisy wasn’t in control, someone else was. She watched as her friend quaked the country and wrecked into near oblivion, presumably killing Lucia in the process.

When the dust settled, they turned on Fury. They were all rightfully angry at him for tricking them into being a part of this, but he didn’t want to face his own shame. Instead, he wiped both the records and the minds of all those involved, herself included. She never wanted to be a part of this and neither did Daisy. It looked like their involvement in it was now coming back to bite them in the ass. As the memory faded, Natasha felt herself resurface. The room came back into focus and she found herself staring up at Loki’s face. “Lucia von Bardas,” she replied as she sat up. “I need someone to pull up her last known whereabouts now.”

DANIEL: he didn't want to hover, it wasn't really his place seeing as daniel didn't really know natasha or loki, but they were important to daisy which, by proxy, made them important to him... so he wanted to hover and make sure everyone was okay. delving into someone's memories, in his extremely limited experience was not an easy task, but if daisy trusted loki to look in her head then daniel would trust that he had the knowledge to do it again. he forced himself to stay by the computer he'd been using earlier hoping he'd be able to look up anything helpful if the two discovered anything. daniel hoped what little he'd been shown on the zephyr combined with working with stark and pym for a few year and what he'd been shown so far would be enough for him to help. right now, being so out of his element, he felt a little useless but he wasn't going anywhere until daisy was back safe. hearing the name, daniel started typing "i have to say, this is a lot easier than going through files in some basement." he chuckled before opening the file that was pulled up. "ok, lucia von bardas. former prime minister of latveria... looks like she attacked shield hq and was focused on attacking some heroes. she was captured but broke out and stole a hellicarrier to make her escape." daniel looked over to natasha "i assume you and daisy were part of the group she was attacking."

Loki: chuckled softly at how jovial Natasha was being if anything it was good she was in a joking mood it helped to allow him access to her mind. "Fine by me, I'll have them waiting on you hand and foot like the princess you are" he mused nodding his head as they began his mind reading, he'd give her the lead it was always less painful that way when the one's who's mind he invaded lead them through the rooms that seem more familiar. It was only when her memory tried to fight back did he have to push throw following the thread, who ever messed with Natasha's mind had done a piss poor job of it, he was able to unravel plenty missing spots from the memory of the latveria. The Brainwashing he wasn't surprised to find out it was Fury who done this to Nat, he never felt such rage until he learned just what this man thought he could do with his power. Once they'd learned what they needed he started bringing Nat out of her memories and back to the surface feeling weaker then he had in awhile as he let his hands drop away breaking their connection as he turned to look at daniel to ensure he got the information before making a glass of water appear in front of Nat "Drink it all before you return to kicking ass and taking names okay?" he replied a shared moment between them.

NATASHA: She must've sat up too quickly because she was seeing stars. Being back in the here and now was jarring, but she tried to focus on what Daniel was saying. She nodded as he read through the details of the Lucia's last known whereabouts. Natasha remembered the attack on SHIELD HQ, but she wasn't in charge of the interrogation of Lucia nor was she there when the woman escaped. She now realized Fury had kept her out of that on purpose. He didn't want her to remember their infiltration of Latveria. Natasha felt Lok thrust a drink into her hands. She reluctantly chugged it before taking a seat at one of the computers. She pulled up the file Daniel was looking at and found the serial number for the Hellicarrier. If it was active, she could find it. She had enough of a clearance level to access the satellite feeds triangulate its coordinates. "There." She pointed on the map. "You'll find her there. We need a team ready for search and rescue efforts." She swiveled back in the chair to look at them. "Who's in and who's staying here to monitor this thing in case they decide to take it for a test flight." /

DANIEL: he stood from the computer, looking at both loki and natasha. there was a snowball's chance in hell that he'd be sitting this out, daniel was going in and was gonna help pull daisy out even if he lost his other leg in the process. "where ever daisy is that's where i'm going to be. i know you don't know me but i've got your back, whatever it takes." while daniel had no idea what he'd be walking into, even if he had 500 miles, he was going to help get daisy back. "mack can vouch for me and i'm happy to go through whatever tests you'd like."

Loki: He keeps his eyes on Natasha to ensure there wasn't any side effects to his mind reading so far she seemed alright which he was quite grateful for given how much he'd come to care about the other. He left her be when she downed the water without issue before following her to the monitor to look over the file Daniel had pulled it, it was exactly like the men from Nat's memories so he knew they'd finally figured it out. He couldn't help but smirk looking at the other "It's been quite awhile since I've bathed in the blood of my enemies, I think I might try my hand at Field work" he mused looking around at the other, if anything they could handle the extraction without issues. "I will vouch for the fossil who hasn't wanted to see history come alive before." he smirked teasing the other.

DEKE: When Sousa mentioned Mack as a someone to vouch for him, Deke gave a look. "I could vouch for you too," He'd been there too, he'd seen the badass-ry Daniel was capable of. He remembered him carrying Daisy into the ship, remaining by her side all that time, all the googly eyes between them both. However he deflated at the realization perhaps his vouch meant nothing at all, Sousa was probably still pissed at him too so- "He is very badass on the badass scale. Killed lots of Chronicom." Maybe it went different in the other versions reality, but Deke remembered vividly the badassary of Sousa, Daisy, and Mack together after they rescued him and Nana. So, regardless of hos much it was worth, he put his vouch out there.

Deke knew he wasn't all too much good in a fight. Sure he was scrappy, he SURVIVED from being scrappy in his own timeline. But this timeline had a very different set of rules, and he wasn't nearly so as attuned to it. Regardless of that, like hell he was going to sit back and do nothing. "You'll need a science person in case you run into something science-y." Bullshit, and these very smart secret agents and god-like beings probably knew it too. "I could science." While survival in this world consisted of things he wasn't used to, it was also full of new things he never had access to. Things he could put together, take apart, and make into other things. If there was one thing Deke was confident about himself it was his ability to make something out of nothing. That was his life in a nutshell back in the light house. Now he had actual things to make stuff from. Maybe they didn't need him, but he would insist to come either way. Hopefully, he'd be of use. Worst come to worst, at least they'd have a human shield if they needed one. "Actually it's more of engineering, but I'm pretty sure that's under the science scope." He added, a bit sheepish.

RONNIE: “Oh, you bet your asses I’m in.” Veronica was the last to speak up, but her voice was full of willful determination none the less. This wasn’t her first trek into the unknown to help rescue a fellow agent, friend, of person of importance. She was agile, as well as tech smart, and could certainly hold her own in a fight. She felt she could be a good assistance in helping to rescue Daisy due to her multitude of skills, and she felt like she owed it to her boss to help save her. Looking around, she saw several friends and a few acquaintances whom she was sure would become friends by the end of this. . “No offense to Deke, but I think I should handle the Scientific part of all this since that’s more of my department, and you, my friend, can on the engineering aspects of all this.” Ronnie kindly suggested as she stepped forward to look at region Natasha was pointing at meant not malice towards him with her words. “Shall we suit up now, or later? I’m ready when you are.”

NATASHA: She'd made plenty of time for herself to do research on each member of the team whom she hadn't had the pleasure of working with before (what else was she supposed to do with her time when she couldn't sleep?). This included Daniel. She knew what he was capable of but it was, dare she say, cute seeing this many people vouch for him. "I believe you, blue shirt," she nodded and patted him on the shoulder. Loki and Veronica both seemed ready to throw down, but Deke was more reserved. She understood some agents weren't necessarily field agents. That didn't make them useless. Natasha was a field agent but she was also a handler. Her job was to assess the attributes of each one of her agents and determine where their skills best fit. "Actually, I'll need someone to be the eyes and ears. Ronnie, will you run communications for us? I'll need you to hack into the surveillance system of Lucia's helicarrier and tell me what's coming." She didn't like turning corners and being surprised by what she was met with so coms was the best assistance to avoid that. "Deke, I'm going to need you in medical bay. I don't know what kind of condition Daisy will be in once we get to her. I'll need you to have the Hyperbaric Chamber up and ready." She turned to address Loki next. "I'm going to need you to wake Clint up from his beauty sleep. It's time to work for a living. I'll go get the plane ready. Everyone meet me back here in 20 minutes so we can get started."

#discord chat

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