#I also think we should’ve seen more of michael and what happened with him | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

burntotears · 2 years

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Title: The Texan Job W/C: 14,609 Summary: Deep Sky won't help collect the alien tech on just the mere chance that it might have been built by Nora, so the gang comes together to perform a heist in the middle of a mansion full of party guests. What could go wrong? A/N: Part 4 of Marriage Ain’t Easy TW: a passing reference to suicide, homophobic language and slur

[ AO3 Link or read under the cut ]

THE PLAN

“So let’s consider the options,” Kyle said, leaning back in the chair opposite of Alex’s desk and taking a sip of his coffee.

“Okay,” Alex looked up from the photos they had splayed out on his desk. They were of the ‘Truman tech’ they’d seen inside of Álvarez’s alien gallery. Still unconfirmed, of course, but for now it was easier to give it a codename and roll with it than to beat around the bush.

“The Lockhart machine had the piece of glass inside that had the information Patricia got from Theo, right? They basically downloaded it from his brain to pass it on to Dallas.”

“Correct,” Alex’s word was clipped, a little annoyed at recalling this information again. They’d gone over it a hundred times.

Kyle didn’t take offense. “But Jones also used it to put some form of call out. So obviously it has multiple functions. It works more like a computer than a phone. So shouldn’t we be able to put in other quote-unquote ‘disks’ and read them from the machine?”

Alex sat back, folding his hands together. “In theory, sure. I don’t know that Nora was really thinking of it that way when she built it, though. The point was to get that specific information to Dallas so there was a way to deal with Jones. I don’t think she was worried about smuggling anything else out after that.”

“Not then, sure.” Kyle made a move to put his feet up on Alex’s desk and aborted halfway through when he saw the look on Alex’s face. Alex kept his office tidy when he wasn’t in the middle of a project–old military habits die hard–and he wasn’t in the mood to clean scuff marks off the wood. “But if those pieces really are Truman tech, then they could be modifications for the original machine to allow that possibility. Once she was stuck in Caulfield, I highly doubt she expected to see Michael again–that was kind of dumb luck that it happened in the end. Knowing how resourceful she was, she very well could’ve been coming up with a way to get her own messages heard.”

“I dunno, maybe,” Alex rubbed his forehead with his forefinger and thumb. “That’s a far fucking leap to make on two complete unknowns. We don’t know if the pieces were made by her and we don’t know if they interface with the Lockhart machine. Which is not a great case to bring to the board for approval.”

“You really think they’d say no?” Kyle looked skeptical.

Eduardo wasn’t a bad guy and if it were up to just him, he would probably let Alex and Kyle chase rainbows to their hearts’ content. But Deep Sky was still an organization at its core and it had to get results if it was meant to keep functioning. “I think it will look as if I’m trying to use company resources to crusade for my husband on a case that is flimsy at best. Which is reason enough not to file; the last thing I need is for them to stop approving my assignments because they think I’m in it for my own benefit.”

“So I can do it,” Kyle said easily.

Alex offered him a sad smile. “You’re my best friend, Kyle. They’ll know you’re doing it for me.”

“So we’re just going to give up? Doesn’t sound like us.” He gave Alex an impish grin. They’d officially corrupted him if he was now advocating to get involved rather than being dragged into it by sheer necessity (usually of the medical variety).

There was no way Alex could leave it alone and they both knew it. Unfortunately, the solution was also going to bring its own set of complications. “No, we’re not giving up. But keeping him to task is going to be a fucking nightmare.”

Kyle snorted. “Should’ve thought of that before you married him.”

—

Alex wasn’t sure how Michael was going to take this. It had only been a few weeks since their Álvarez op, but he hadn’t told (or showed) him what they’d discovered there. His reasoning seemed sound in the beginning, but now that they were going to need help in obtaining the pieces, he wasn’t sure if that argument held much water. He wasn’t even certain how to broach the subject of what was there, let alone explain that he’d lied about having visual evidence of it all.

He had to thank small mercies that they didn’t have the bondprint active right now because Michael would smell the anxiety on him before he even got home from work. He would already be able to tell that Alex was wrestling with something while they ate dinner as it was. Except Alex noticed that Michael seemed to be acting a little strangely too.

“I need to show you something, but what’s going on with you?” Alex asked when it felt like the air in the room was stifling.

Michael looked at his plate for a bit longer before meeting his gaze. “So uh, I got accepted into the Engineering program at NMSU.”

“What?” Alex felt like he was missing part of a conversation they should have had, but he definitely would remember if they’d talked about this before. “When did you even – why didn’t you say anything?”

“I just… I didn’t know if I would get in and I didn’t want to bring it up if it wasn’t going to happen.” He looked sheepish as he spoke.

“Michael, that’s ridiculous. Of course you would get in. But I didn’t know you wanted to go. You never mentioned it.” Alex reached over to take the other man’s hand in his own. “Congratulations. I’m happy for you.” Alex was happy for him. Before Michael’s world was blown up by Jesse Manes and then Noah, Michael had plans to go to college. He deserved this. Something was itching at the back of Alex’s mind, though, and he couldn’t quite pinpoint the source.

Michael squeezed his hand and smiled. “I felt kind of weird about saying something. I’m in my thirties trying to start undergrad. I don’t know.”

"You're smarter than half the people there already. There's no reason to be embarrassed by some teenagers fresh out of diapers."

Michael laughed. "I took your virginity when we were those teenagers fresh out of diapers."

"Ew gross," Alex’s face scrunched up in disgust and he snatched his hand away while Michael laughed even harder. “Don’t ever say those words in the same sentence again.”

“It was your imagery, sweetheart.”

Alex got up to take their dirty plates to the kitchen, taking longer than was strictly necessary. He was definitely stalling. “What do you need to show me?” Michael asked from behind him and Alex sighed, nodding his head toward the coffee table where his laptop bag was sitting.

Once they both sat down, Alex tugged the bag toward himself and unzipped it, pulling the file folder out. “These are photos of the other tech that Álvarez has in his gallery.” He pointedly didn’t look over at Michael.

“What do you mean? I thought you said the recordings were scrambled?”

“They weren't,” Alex replied flatly. Equivocating would get them nowhere. If he was going to come clean, he needed to be completely honest now. “I didn't want to show them to you.”

“What's going on Alex?” Michael sounded worried, a little guarded, but he wasn’t angry yet.

“Kyle and I think that this tech could be related to the Lockhart machine.” Alex didn't set the folder down on the table. He had a white knuckle grip on it, grounding himself by staring at the discoloration of his fingers while he prepared for what came next.

“Related how?”

“The pieces could have been built by your mother.” Alex took a deep breath and waited. It didn’t take long.

“What the fuck, Alex?” Michael yelled as he shoved off the sofa and away from his husband, standing a few feet away now. Alex stared ahead, unable to meet his eye. “You weren't going to tell me?”

“No, I wasn’t.” God, why had he decided brutal honesty was the right idea here? It made him sound apathetic, but he wasn’t going to lie about his motivations. “We have nothing to base that theory on but our own assumptions, Michael.” Alex finally looked up at his husband. “And telling you was just going to agitate you when we’re literally making guesses about this right now.”

Michael threw his hands up, clearly feeling the very thing Alex had wanted to avoid. Though he knew it was directed at him and not the situation. “Then why the hell are you telling me?”

“Because there's no way for us to verify if it's Truman tech–”

“Truman tech?”

“It's just what Kyle and I started referring to it as. The Lockhart machine was built by Nora, hence Truman tech.” There was a complicated mixture of emotions that rippled across Michael’s face, but he didn’t say anything. “Anyway, Deep Sky isn't going to sanction us to go back on the hunch that my husband's mother might have built it.”

“Personal conflict of interest?” Michael scoffed derisively.

“Exactly. But there’s no way we can leave it there if there’s even the smallest possibility that Nora built it.” Of that his conviction was clear. He’d spent some time going back and forth, not just with himself but with Kyle, and the decision wasn’t really much of a decision at all. Alex was always going to retrieve that tech one way or another. “Which means we're going to have to get it ourselves.”

“I cannot believe this.” Michael was justifiably furious. Alex had told him that stealing anything from Álvarez was specifically off limits when he’d suggested the very same thing three weeks ago. “So now you do want to steal it.”

“It’s our only viable option,” Alex agreed flatly.

“And you want me to go with you.” Another thing that Alex had told Michael couldn’t happen because of his temperament.

“It’s our only viable option,” Alex repeated, with only a slight change in cadence.

“Well don’t make it sound like the eleventh-hour, Manes.” Michael sneered. Even so, he ran a hand through his messy curls and sat back down next to Alex.

Alex barely noticed the name considering the current conversation. He was in his tactical-Manes persona, after all. “You do have a tendency not to abide by mission directives. Or any directives, really.”

He saw Michael’s mouth tick up at the corner and rolled his eyes. He finally handed the folder over for his husband to pursue and waited patiently. Even though he knew Michael was still upset, he could see the immediate anger seeping from him, replaced with a determination to focus on a new target.

“So you got a plan?” Michael asked after a while.

Alex cleared his throat. “Part of one. Still working on the details. You’re not the only alien I would need help from.”

Michael glanced over at him. “Who?”

“We still haven’t gone on that double date,” Alex said a little smugly.

His husband’s only response was a groan of protest.

—

“How exciting! A real heist!”

Michael glared at his sister. “This is serious, Isobel.”

“I didn’t realize that being pleasant meant I couldn’t be serious at the same time, Michael,” she snapped back. “This is why Alex didn’t tell you. You’re incapable of rationality when it comes to Nora.”

Alex’s head shot up at the mention of him. This was definitely not what they needed to be talking about right now. Or ever.

“You’re getting into the middle of my marriage now?” Michael’s tone was icy and he took a few steps toward her.

Isobel wasn’t fazed. She’d been dealing with Michael all her life, after all. “I hardly need to. You do that well enough on your own.”

“Okay!” Alex cut in loudly, knowing this was going off the rails in a bad way. “This has nothing to do with the mission, so let’s just keep our personal lives out of the planning, shall we?” He looked sternly back and forth between the two siblings who took their sweet time in backing down.

Michael had been extra snippy with all of them and Alex knew it was his own fault more than anything. He shouldn’t have kept the information from his husband, but if he’d told him earlier, then there would be no planning phase and Michael could be dead from some half-cocked scheme he put together trying to get the tech by himself.

“Here’s what we know so far,” Alex plowed ahead, giving them no time to pick up any loose threads of their previous argument. “Álvarez is hosting an exclusive gathering at his mansion for gallery viewing. Only select clientele invited, of course, considering most of what he owns is illegal. Kyle and I are a known quantity, however, so Kyle was able to snag us invites.”

“Good job, baby,” Isobel patted Kyle on the chest and he preened a little from the praise.

“Yes, we’re all very proud of Valenti,” Michael rolled his eyes and Isobel shot him an annoyed look.

Jesus, this was like herding cats. Alex cleared his throat. “So that means we will be there legitimately and have access to the main gallery space, which makes half the job a whole lot easier. Unfortunately the alien gallery is connected to the main gallery, meaning we will have to slip inside while other people are there and he has two locks coded directly to him that we’ll have to bypass. I don’t know if he plans to show anyone that space during the party, but I’m leaning toward no. It would be better for us not to rely on him to get in anyway.”

Isobel's eyes were curious. “You don’t want to influence him to get in?”

“I’d rather not. If we could avoid him altogether, it’d be ideal. I’m already going to have to go in to deactivate the alarms on the pedestals, so I think it’s safer to spoof the lock mechanisms on the door through the computer system.” It wasn’t the best way to go about it, but the less they interacted with Álvarez, the better.

“What about some sort of alert for tampering with the system?” Michael asked.

“You’re going to have to help me sever some connections in the physical hardware at the same time that I spoof it–that should kill any alarms that would otherwise be triggered. It’ll be the same situation for the pressure plates on the pedestals.” Alex pointed at the columns he and Kyle had gotten pictures of that held up the artifacts in Álvarez’s alien gallery. It was a pretty simple system as far as museums went and normally they could just swap the weight out, but it wasn’t worth the trouble when they could cut the connections and be done with it.

“And how are you meant to get in without anyone seeing you?” Kyle asked.

“It’s funny you should ask that,” Alex grinned and his friend’s face deflated immediately. “You’re going to distract the party goers while Isobel influences any guards away from the area which lets Michael and I sneak in.”

“Distract them with what?”

“I have faith you’ll figure something out.”

Alex looked down his list of to-do items and addressed the next thing he had written down. “We can’t use any kind of radios to stay in contact–Álvarez has all frequencies locked down for his own people from what we gathered when our audio recordings were useless. Isobel and Michael can talk to each other and I guess Isobel could get into mine or Kyle’s heads if need be.” An idea occurred to him and he glanced at Michael. “We could use the bondprint again.”

Michael’s eyes widened and he was chewing on the idea, but Isobel furrowed her brows. “How would that help?”

“I’m almost positive we can communicate telepathically through it,” Alex said nonchalantly, as if that was something he and Michael had actually accomplished already. They’d used the print again, but they hadn’t managed anything that advanced. Still, something told him that they were easily capable of it.

“What the hell makes you think that?” Kyle asked, baffled.

Michael chuckled. “Because it’s Alex.” Truthfully, he’d expected Michael to think he was insane when he mentioned it as a possibility, but his husband didn’t think it was far-fetched at all. Michael gave him a curt nod. “Probably a good idea.”

The downside was if something went sideways during the op, their emotions were going to be looping and making it a little chaotic for them. Though maybe his calm could help Michael focus and stay on point, too.

“No, not a good idea,” Isobel snapped. “Lest we forget the last time you tried rooting around in the bond all willy nilly not knowing what you were doing, Michael. Alex, how could you even suggest such a thing?” Isobel’s wrath turned on him as well and he couldn’t help but cow a little. She’d been (disapprovingly) supervising when they tested it again to keep them safe. So far no disasters had occurred and Michael was successful in opening and closing the connection without issue now. Alex could manage it sometimes too, but it was more difficult on his end for some reason.

“Obviously we’d practice beforehand,” Alex tried.

“And what happens if one or both of you gets screwy somehow and you’re out of commission for the actual heist? We lose our window and then what?” Isobel had her hands on her hips, staring them both down like a bird of prey.

“Iz,” Michael was surprised by her anger. “My telepathy is great. There is no reason that it would screw me up.”

“But you don’t know if Alex’s mind could handle it,” she barked.

“He has no trouble in a mindscape. This is far less invasive,” Michael said slowly and Alex could almost see the wheels turning in his head as he tried to parse what was bothering Isobel. “Why are you so against this?”

“You have no idea what it was like to walk into your house and find you like that, Michael!” Isobel shrieked and stalked out the back door onto the patio, Alex frowning behind her. Kyle began to follow her but he grabbed his arm to stop him and looked at Michael expectantly. His husband blew out a long breath and stood, going out the door and closing it behind him.

“I didn’t realize it was still upsetting her,” Kyle said quietly. “She hasn’t said anything about it since it happened.”

Alex shook his head. “I should’ve thought of that. It makes sense after Max died and especially now with him on Oasis. Michael’s all she has left here.” Isobel had scolded them, sure, but it had mostly been brushed aside with her insistence to oversee their practice.

“I think Max put too much pressure on her when he left. ‘Time for you to protect the family.’ Kind of fucked up, if you ask me.” Kyle watched the patio even though they couldn’t hear what the siblings were saying to each other.

“Oh it was definitely fucked up. His whole exit was egregious, most specifically the timing.” Alex couldn’t help but glare at an unseen person in his mind. Regardless of how ‘fine’ Michael and Isobel said they were, Alex could see the cracks. Some of them might never heal, even if Max did return some day.

Kyle’s eyes widened at the rancor he could hear in Alex’s voice. They hadn’t discussed this before, probably because both of their significant others said they didn’t resent Max for his departure. “Are you pissed at Max?”

“I don’t agree with the decision he made.” It was Max’s prerogative to leave and help Oasis and it was Alex’s prerogative to disagree with the actions he’d taken. He would absolutely criticize the way the man had left his siblings behind.

“Does Michael?”

“He says he’s at peace with it. He understands why Max had to go.”

“Gotta say,” Kyle eyed Alex in bewilderment, “I would’ve expected those roles to be reversed.”

“I live to confuse you,” Alex said sarcastically and Kyle flipped him off just as the other two came back in from the patio. The humans looked up at them apprehensively.

“I’m sorry, Alex,” Isobel said first.

“What, no, you don’t need to apologize to me.”

“I do.” She sat down on the coffee table near him and took Alex’s hands in her own. He was still acclimating to Isobel’s affection toward him. He’d always thought that she hated him for what he’d put Michael through–and maybe she had in the past, but she’d seemingly moved past it. She had nothing but kind words and affectionate ribbing for him nowadays.

“I know that you and Michael didn’t purposely screw up when you started working with the bond. I realize that it’s my own fear of something happening to Michael now that Max is gone that’s making me overreact–”

Alex shook his head, curling his fingers around hers and squeezing. “Isobel, you did not overreact. I cannot imagine what it would have been like for me if I found him in that state.”

She smiled warmly at him. “Even so, I overcompensated by hovering over you two like your mother while you kept trying, dictating every little thing you did. And–” she glanced down at their hands, hesitating for a moment, before looking him in the face again, “I blamed you for talking him into trying it in the first place.”

“Isobel, what the fuck?” Michael yelled as Alex froze in place. Normally he was better at confrontation than this, but Isobel’s words were one of his own thoughts actualized. Kyle looked a little pale in the chair beside them. Whatever Michael and Isobel had spoken about outside, it had not included this if Michael’s reaction was anything to go by.

Michael moved as if to push Isobel away from him and Alex’s brain kicked back into gear. He held up a hand to keep Michael at bay. “Michael, it’s fine.” He squeezed Isobel’s fingers again to let her know he wasn’t upset with her.

“No it’s not.”

“She’s entitled to her feelings, no matter how unreasonable they might seem to you,” Alex said quietly and god did that hit close to home right then. He couldn’t help but glance over at Kyle who understood exactly what Alex was thinking.

Michael opened his mouth to respond, but Alex glared at him and was surprised that his husband bit his tongue.

“I know that Michael makes his own decisions and that he’s been trying to figure out how to heal for a while now. I suppose that your involvement with the bondprint gave me another place to direct culpability other than him. Since, y’know, he’s the one I’m scared of losing now that Max is gone.” Even though she was talking about Michael, she was still looking directly at Alex, her eyes a little glassy.

Alex understood. Fuck, he felt like he was on the road to Albuquerque again, his insides fracturing when Michael told him Max was leaving. He could nearly sense everything Isobel was feeling as she said it to him. He sniffed, only now realizing that he was tearing up too. “It might sound cliché, but I understand exactly how you feel.”

“Oh gosh, that’s not what I wanted for you at all,” Isobel started crying harder and leaned in to hug him. He held her tightly. “But it does help, in a strange way,” she said near his ear. Misery loves company. Maybe later when there was less to do, he and Isobel could talk a little more about this.

“What the hell is happening right now?” Michael was bewildered.

“Shut up, Michael. I’m hugging my brother,” Isobel said over Alex’s shoulder, “because I love him.”

“Yeah, so do I. I married him.” The answer came easily, even though he still sounded confused.

“He’s my best friend, I love him too.” Kyle chimed in.

Alex pulled out of the hug. “Now this is just getting weird.”

—

“Getting in seems to be the easy part. How the hell are we getting out?” Kyle looked over the blueprints Alex had procured of Álvarez’s mansion which they had spread out over Michael and Alex’s dining table.

“The only way I can see us being able to extract the tech without it being obvious is working down through the ductwork here.” Alex pointed at the ventilation duct stemming out of the second gallery room toward the downstairs.

Michael raised his eyebrows. “Neither of us is going to fit in there.”

“No, we won’t. You’re going to have to lower it through with your telekinesis. Kyle and Isobel will be at the bottom to retrieve it.” Alex glanced over at him to gauge his reaction because he knew what he was asking.

Isobel balked. “Alex, that’s impossible. How could he lower it through without being able to see it? It would either get banged on the walls or he’d drop it and it gets crushed at the bottom. Destroying it defeats the purpose of stealing it in the first place.” Michael’s face remained unreadable as she spoke.

“We can bring rope and lower it that way,” Kyle tried.

“No,” Michael shook his head. “I can do it.”

“Michael, the energy you would need alone would be outrageous. You’ll have already disabled the locks on the door and the pressure plates.” Isobel looked sympathetic, but her tone was no nonsense all the same. “There’s no way acetone would get you through that, much less the practicality of something you’ve never done before.”

“The bondprint,” Alex said.

“What about it?”

“You can get energy from me through it.”

“No way. I’m not doing that,” Michael shut it down immediately, which Alex had expected.

To his surprise, Isobel agreed with him. "That's not a terrible idea." He smiled at her and she returned the gesture.

"Yes, it is." It was Kyle now, which Alex hadn't expected. He probably should have, though, because Kyle was always going to see things through the lens of a doctor.

"I'm not stupid. It’s not like I would let him put me on my ass." Though he would need to practice more at closing the bond on his end.

“Oh okay. And what happens when things go south and we have to run out of there, Alex? You think after all that time on your prosthesis and with only half the energy you had before that you’ll be just fine to leave?” Kyle was in frank doctor mode now.

“Hey, fuck you, Kyle!” Alex spat back with a pointed finger at the other man, his blood boiling instantaneously. This was top of the list of things that fiercely pissed Alex off. “Don’t doctor-talk to me like I’m a goddamn invalid. I think I know my limitations a little fucking better than you do since I’m the one missing the fucking leg!”

Kyle shook his head derisively. “You know goddamn well that’s not what I was saying, Alex. Don’t pull your sanctimonious war-hero bullshit on me!”

“Kyle!” Isobel gasped, but Alex was… honestly impressed. Kyle had never called him out before and certainly not for something regarding his disability. They all knew Alex had a tendency to overextend his mobility to his own detriment. Michael was the most vocal with Alex about it, but with him and Kyle working together so much now, it seemed like Kyle was getting fed up.

His anger cooled and he held a hand up to Isobel, letting her know it was okay. Michael’s shoulders eased as well. “I get the concern. We will figure out exactly what he needs and test it to make sure I can handle it afterward, okay?”

“Yeah, fine,” Kyle agreed, his own annoyance leveled. “I will be there to evaluate though.”

“Yes, Doc.” Alex clapped him on the shoulder. “I can’t believe you said that to me.”

“It felt pretty good, actually,” Kyle laughed. “You’re a pain in the ass.”

Isobel patted them both on the back and pushed her way between them at the edge of the table. “So assuming that works out, I’m guessing your plan is for me to get all the guards looking the other way as we walk our way out the front door?” She turned her head to Alex.

“If it’s doable? I don’t know the energy conversion for your powers very well.”

“If we’re talking a short nudge to look away just long enough for us to slip by, it wouldn’t be difficult. But it depends on how many guards we are going to run into.”

Alex figured as much. “That isn’t something we’ll know ahead of time, unfortunately. We can tell you how many we saw when we were there, but with so many guests, there’s bound to be a multitude more.” He also had no way of knowing where they would be posted during the party. He could canvas the mansion ahead of time, but he didn’t expect the guards to be at the same positions during a large event. “I’ll see if I can come up with an algorithm to plot the best route out depending on where and how many guards we’re dealing with once we’re onsite.”

That left one more loose end that he could think of. He turned to Kyle. “I know you’re going to hate this, but I need you to bring some backup in case we need to drop people if something goes wrong.”

Kyle blanched. “Seriously? Your dad had a stroke!”

“Nothing that strong, Jesus. They just need to be unconscious or paralyzed long enough for us to get the hell out of there. No comas, dude.” He preferred no deaths, if they could help it.

“I’ll see what I can do,” Kyle sighed.

“It’s going to be all the two of us have. There’s no way I can bring a gun inside. I could wrestle one from a guard, but I would rather not have to engage with them loudly. We have to expect the worst, though.” Alex checked over the table. “I think that covers the basics. Let’s get started.”

—

After Kyle and Isobel had left the house, Alex could feel Michael’s annoyance with him slip back into place like he was putting on a hat. It was fair, but they didn’t have a whole lot of time to dwell on these things. Alex sat down on the couch with his crutches nearby to start the process of removing his prosthesis while Michael was clearing things off the table.

“If you have more you want to say to me, we should get it out in the open,” Alex said matter of factly.

Michael snorted, but he didn’t turn around. “It’s not a business transaction, Alex.”

“It’s not, but we have a lot of shit we need to get done between now and then, which means we need to be on the same page.”

Michael pulled a chair from the table and sat backwards on it, arms folded on top of the backrest, facing Alex where he was on the sofa. “So if Deep Sky had approved getting the tech, would you have told me at all?”

“Before we had any sort of verification if it was legitimate? No, I wouldn’t have,” Alex said truthfully. He set his leg and liner aside and started to pin up the pant leg on his sweats.

“Right, because I’m ‘too irrational’ when it comes to my mother.” Michael’s tone was flat.

“Isobel said that, not me,” Alex corrected. “The reason I didn’t want to tell you is because I didn’t want to get your hopes up.” He paused for a second, remembering their conversation from earlier. “Sort of like how you decided not to tell me you were applying to school–or even mention you were interested in going at all.”

“Now hang on,” Michael started, caught out. “That’s completely different.”

“Oh, is it? Because you weren’t sparing your own feelings on the matter. Hell Guerin, I don’t even know how this is going to work. Are you moving to Las Cruces for four fucking years? Am I supposed to be moving there? It feels a little like something we should’ve discussed before you start classes in, oh,” he glanced at a non-existent watch on his wrist, “two months from now, is it?” When Michael had first told him, he’d been so shocked that the realities hadn’t fully set in for him. Now that they had, he was pissed.

Michael, for his part, looked apologetic. “Okay, you’re right. I should’ve told you. If you don’t want me to go–”

“I did not say that. Don’t you put that shit on me,” Alex snapped. “I’m pissed that you hid this from me and I have no idea what the hell is happening when you start school.”

Michael got up from the chair and moved toward Alex; he sat on the coffee table directly across from him, legs spread on either side of Alex’s own and put his hands on his husband’s thighs. “My classes will be online until the last couple of years when I have to do labs in person. We’ll figure out what we wanna do then, but for right now I’ll be going to school at the table right over there.” He tilted his head toward the dining table.

Alex took a deep breath and felt the tension in his chest ease immensely. He probably should’ve thought of online classes, but his brain was too wired to scream ‘change, change, change’ and the worst case scenario had popped up. “Shit, I’m an idiot.”

“No you aren’t. Completely valid concerns that I probably should have thought to address immediately when I told you.” Alex reached down and tangled his hands with Michael’s in his lap.

“Michael, there’s still a chance after we do this that this tech isn’t from your mother. We could be making a huge effort for nothing. Someone could have imitated the Lockhart machine, tried to build their own–”

“Yeah, I know. And you’re probably right to have held off telling me. Even now I’m champing at the bit to run in there without any plan whatsoever. So you weren’t wrong and neither was Isobel, really.” He squeezed Alex’s hands, looking a little lost in his thoughts. “Just the thought of having anything that she created fills me with fire, y’know? I want to get anything I can.”

“That’s why I am doing this. But I would hate to see your heart get crushed if it isn’t what we thought.” Alex reached up and brushed his fingers over his husband’s cheek.

Michael turned his face into Alex’s hand and kissed his palm.“Thanks, but I think I need to learn to be a bit more mature about these things. It’ll be a disappointment, but it shouldn’t be a crushing blow to my sanity. The upside is that regardless of how risky it all is, we’ll be training more and get new skills out of it.”

Speaking of which, after he and Kyle had started to argue about Alex’s energy levels, Michael’s objection to it had fallen to the wayside. “Are you going to take my energy through the bond?”

Michael laughed a little sourly. “Somehow I feel like if I didn’t, you’d find a way to force it through anyway.” Alex hadn’t considered that as an option, but if it could be taken, couldn’t it be given, and by force if necessary? “Great, I just gave you the idea, didn’t I?”

“I didn’t think of it as an option before, but you might be onto something.”

“You have to practice closing the bond on your end so that you can stop me. I won’t know how much to take.” Michael fixed him with a steady look. “And Valenti was right. You need to make sure you don’t overextend what you can actually do without.”

“Hmm, ‘Valenti was right’. Three words I never thought I’d hear you say.”

Michael took Alex’s chin between his thumb and forefinger. “See, I know you’re trying to deflect with humor, but I’m serious here, Alex.”

Since when did Michael and Kyle have a united front? That wasn’t a double team he ever expected to see. “I got it. I’ll be responsible, I promise.”

THE HEIST

Fighting Isobel Evans for creative control of his wardrobe for the party was a losing battle. Alex tried explaining about functionality for the mission, usability for the tablet he needed to hide, even mentioned his prosthesis, but she had a rebuttal for everything. Eventually he just conceded because she assured him it would be exactly what he needed.

When his and Michael’s suits arrived two nights before the party, he had to acknowledge that she’d been right. “Don’t tell her that. She’ll wipe out your entire wardrobe,” Michael said with a laugh.

Maybe he wouldn’t mind going shopping with Isobel sometime. He honestly never expected to become close with her, but they spent more time around each other now that she and Kyle were dating. After Max left, Liz threw most of her energy into work so he hardly ever saw her. It had always been her coping mechanism, but he had to admit that he was contributing to the distance too thanks to his recent antipathy for Max. He still texted with Rosa on occasion and Maria was in and out of his life these days too. She split most of her time between working on her astral projection and the Pony, no longer as involved in the day-to-day alien adventures.

“I dunno about that,” Alex said. “I think I have a pretty decent style.” He’d been over the top in high school and too buttoned up during his first few years of enlistment under DADT. It was a year or so after when he finally found a happy medium between those two worlds that felt authentic. Weirdly, the suit Isobel had picked out felt perfect to him. She just had a way of understanding people.

“Definitely,” Michael agreed as he proceeded to unbutton Alex’s shirt for him.

He rolled his eyes. “Naked isn’t a part of my clothing style.”

“I disagree,” Michael murmured, sliding the fabric off his shoulders. “You want it on your chest?”

Alex nodded. “I think it feels stronger there. That might just be psychological, but if it helps, then might as well.”

“You’re the boss,” Michael said, which Alex opened his mouth to refute, but his husband already planted his hand in the center of his chest and tugged him forward with the other arm around his waist, kissing him openly.

It was a little awkward with Michael’s hand pressed between them, but he was distracted by the man’s mouth against his. Alex slid his fingers into Michael’s curls and cupped his neck, noting the slight tingle against the skin of his chest as he slipped his tongue into Michael’s mouth. The moment the bond connected they were both gasping and clutching each other tighter. They didn’t kiss for much longer; Alex pulled back and rested his forehead on Michael’s shoulder.

“You always feel fucking phenomenal inside me,” Michael murmured near his ear, making Alex snicker even though he knew Michael hadn’t meant it sexually. His love-amusement dripped steadily over through their bond.

Fuck you, Alex heard in his head and it only made him laugh more.

“Not everything’s about sex, Guerin,” Michael lamented, pulling out of the cocoon of their hug. Alex missed the contact immediately, but it wasn’t as gut-wrenching as it had been the first time they’d used the print. Once they’d figured out how to open and close the bond, the desperation for physical contact settled on an even keel between the two of them rather than yanking so hard on Michael. Sometimes Alex missed the codependence they shared those first few days, but he also knew it was heinously unhealthy and unsustainable for their sanity.

Says the man who called it a ‘fuckprint’, Alex shot back and Michael’s smirk was luminous. God, he made cocksure the sexiest thing in the whole goddamn world. Michael’s eyebrows lifted toward the ceiling when Alex’s desire made itself known; Alex glared at him and slammed the bond shut like a door in the face, causing Michael to chuckle.

“No one can say we aren’t prepared,” Michael drawled. Alex hoped he was right. He still felt a little wobbly about closing the bond. It was a constant pull to be near his husband whenever they were connected that made it difficult to shut him out. Something like this, as just a joke, was easy enough to accomplish, but their practice runs hadn’t been the most successful. Whatever he could feel that Michael needed, Alex wanted to give of himself, regardless of what it did to his own body or psyche. His promise to Kyle about not letting it put him on the ass had only been upheld twice so far in their dry runs. To say Kyle was irritated with him was the understatement of the year.

Alex packed the rest of his things in his laptop bag and zipped it closed. "You ready to head out? Isobel and Kyle said they would leave in a couple of hours. Kyle has a few things to finish at the office."

That gave Michael pause. "Are you two sure they aren't going to figure out what you're up to?"

"After the fact, yeah, they'll put it together. But being indispensable to the organization does come with a few perks. Asking for forgiveness and not permission, for one thing.” Out of anyone who had ever worked for Deep Sky, Alex and Kyle had the most firsthand experience with Oasians. They were the only ones with clearance from said aliens to interface in all aspects, so that had made them critically influential within the company since their tenure began. It had also gained them more freedoms, though they still weren’t designated as more than high level field agents–with their own offices due to unprecedented circumstances. “But I’ve taken precautions. I know how to hide from them.”

Michael narrowed his eyes. “You don’t always use your powers for good.”

Alex never told Michael what he’d seen when he was hallucinating with the Lockhart machine. Considering Nora made it, Alex assumed that everyone saw her and that she spoke specifically to each person’s fears, but there was that nagging at the back of his brain that made him wonder if it had been different for him because of his relationship with her son. Was it his own fears she was speaking to, or did she not approve of Alex for Michael? Shit, he hadn’t thought about this in a while and it made his stomach twist.

“Let’s go.”

—

Alex set up their make-shift command center in the common area that connected the two hotel rooms in the suite they’d rented. It made things easier than trying to shuffle back and forth between two rooms and also looked less suspicious for the foot traffic.

“Were you able to find anything on Álvarez outsourcing for security?” Isobel asked, sitting down next to Alex on the sofa and offering him a warm cup of tea. He accepted it gratefully, along with the lack of harassment over his excessively paranoid setup in the room. The silent trip alarm for every possible entrance into the suite that sent notifications to his phone was a superfluous touch, even for him.

“No. I can’t track down all the accounts he’s got set up. He already closed the one that we wired the transaction to from Deep Sky, so he’s moving money around a lot.” He gave her an apologetic look. “I wish I could be more precise for you.”

Isobel waved him off with a flip of her hand. “Nothing to apologize for. I’ll have acetone on hand and Kyle has the ketamine on standby so if worse comes to worse, we’ll just put them to sleep for a while.” Alex didn’t want to know how Kyle had gotten ahold of ketamine–he knew from experience that it was heavily regulated because the Air Force had given him infusions while his stump was healing. They’d practically had the vials handcuffed to the doctors. With a hospital full of soldiers suffering from PTSD–many of whom might already be dying–self-administering your own death sentence could be an appealing prospect.

“Yeah, let’s just triple check that we have the dosages right on that before we go stabbing needles into anyone,” Alex said wryly.

Isobel patted his hand that was curled around the mug. “You know he’ll be careful. He couldn’t live with himself if he made that sort of mistake.”

“I know. I’m just nervous.”

“It’s as good a plan as we could possibly conceive, Alex,” she assured him.

“It’s not really the plan itself that concerns me,” he admitted, setting down the tea and mussing his hair, “it’s the crushing disappointment if this was all for nothing. Wasting everyone’s time, putting you guys in danger, and for what?”

“For hope, you idiot,” Isobel chided and shoulder checked him. “I don’t know why you and Michael think that hope is such a dangerous commodity.”

“Because when it doesn’t work out–”

“Anything in life can fail, Alex,” Isobel said, cutting him off. “You’re no Atlas; you can’t shoulder the burden of tribulations for everyone. We all need to have our own hope, even if grief is at the other end of it. Otherwise we wouldn’t be living our lives at all.”

Alex blew out a heavy breath and let her words wriggle into the corners of his mind that he kept cordoned off with remnants of Manes mortar. It wasn’t just wanting to protect those he cared about, but those ingrained exigencies to control every aspect of life he could touch. An overcompensation for a life of having someone else dictate who he was supposed to be–and a realization that he’d joined the military because the command structure was a well-worn groove in his psyche he could slot back into with ease.

He must have remained quiet for some time, because Isobel touched his shoulder and apologized. “Did I overstep?”

Alex shook his head. “I think you just said something that I needed to hear.”

—

Isobel was resplendent in her form fitting floor-length red dress that had a long sleeve on one arm and no sleeve on the other and one slit cut up to her thigh. Alex whistled appreciatively at her when she stepped into the common room, to which she smiled and Kyle told him to back off. The three men had well cut suits, all slightly different in style and color, complete with hidden pockets inside for smuggling necessities. “Here we go.”

They spent the first thirty minutes or so at the mansion meandering about the gallery and down the open halls, taking stock of security placements and relaying the information back to Alex. He had to excuse himself to a bathroom stall to input it into his tablet.

It looks like taking the side exit is going to be our play, he told Michael once his algorithm had finished calculating the best route. He traced along it with his finger as he spoke. Tell Isobel it’s seven guards–two at each set of doors when you leave east from the utility room. Outside door has one more guard, then two at the back entrance to the parking lot.

He felt a twinge of worry drift back to him. Fuck, that’s a lot.

It’s the best option to allow for shorter travel time. We can manually disable if we need to.

Michael was annoyed by something he’d said, but he didn’t explain what. Alex put the tablet back inside his suit jacket and returned to the gallery space where Isobel offered him a wink when he walked past on his way toward Michael. He slid his arm through his husband’s and pretended to look at the art with him.

“Iz and Valenti ran into Álvarez,” Michael murmured when he tilted his head toward Alex.

Alex only stiffened slightly. “It go okay?”

“Iz can make anyone fall in love with her,” was Michael’s response and Alex had to agree.

Give her the go ahead, Alex sent, taking one deep breath to prepare himself. He only hoped their preparation had been enough to make this successful against any unforeseen circumstances.

They remained at their corner of the room, moving slightly as if they were checking out another piece when the sound of glass breaking and a shocked scream filled the gallery. Alex frowned, glancing toward the noise like the other patrons.

“Oh god! What’s happening to him?” a woman was shrieking over a man who was clearly seizing on the floor. “Someone help him!”

“I’m a doctor!” Kyle said, rushing toward the man, while Isobel covered her mouth in concern. Out of the corner of his eye, Alex saw the guards posted at the alien gallery entrance begin walking toward the scene that was unfolding, so he and Michael started to inch in the opposite direction.

Alex was pulling his tablet out when he heard one of the guards speak behind him, his heart falling into his stomach. “Give the doctor some room, everyone.” Alex’s breath wooshed and he closed his eyes for a moment before directing his attention to the tablet.

He had prepared the code he needed to add to the security system ahead of time, it just needed to be put in place and executed in sync with Michael severing the wires inside the physical device. Once it was pasted in the correct position, he looked at Michael, who nodded that he was ready.

“Oh god, he’s going to die!” the woman lamented loudly behind them.

“Ma’am, please step back and let me examine him,” Kyle responded in a firm tone.

Three… two… one… go. Alex hit execute just as Michael’s brow creased in concentration and the glowing handprint scanner turned off completely without any fanfare. Anticlimactic, but effective.

Alex prepared the code for the eye scanner, while the woman behind them wailed indiscriminately. When they were both ready, he counted them down again and the eye scanner went black just like the handprint scanner. The door won’t get a signal to disengage so you’ll have to pop it open.

Michael gave a curt nod and there was a small snick as the door gaped open. Alex stuck his fingers through and pulled it just enough to slip inside, Michael following. He heard, “So he’ll be okay?” from the other side of the door just before it shut again.

Alex lifted his arm and started a timer on his watch for fifteen minutes. “Southwest corner first.”

There were six pieces of Truman tech they were going to remove, all placed on separate pedestals. Alex’s original plan was to disengage the alarms all at once, but he was worried about the internal wiring system. They could be spidering out from one central line, but had no schematics that would give a proper choke point to cut at. It was deemed too risky, so they were cutting at each pedestal instead. It would take longer, but there was less chance of failure.

As they moved to the southwest pedestal, Alex could practically feel the drag of Michael’s eyes over the two pieces of alien glass that they had not allotted time to retrieve. “No, Michael.”

“Alex…”

He prepared the code for the piece in front of them and looked at his husband expectantly. “Are you ready?”

To his credit, Michael refocused on their task and nodded. “Three… two… one… go.” Alex pressed execute and Michael severed the wiring to the pressure plate. There were no visual cues here to know that their work was done, which was a little disconcerting.

“Did it work?” Michael asked, his worry slipping into Alex’s chest.

“We did it correctly,” Alex said in lieu of a real answer. “South,” he designated the next pedestal, preparing his next code snippet and moving to the corresponding piece of tech. They repeated the same process for the south and southeast pedestals before Alex checked his timer. Ten minutes left.

“Northeast. Are Isobel and Kyle in place?” It was almost like a dance: grab the code snippet, stand in front of a pedestal, count Michael down, execute the code, side-step, grab the code snippet, stand in front of a pedestal…

“Yes, they’re ready.”

Alex hummed to show he’d heard. “Three… two… one… go. North.” Once they had finished north and northwest, Alex shoved his tablet back into his jacket pocket. This was the real moment of truth. If they picked up this tech and the alarm went off, they were officially fighting their way out of here and he didn’t like their odds.

He held his breath and slowly lifted the piece off the plate. The plate was still depressed as if the weight was never removed. Relieved, he gathered two more while Michael got the other three. “Acetone?” he asked when they’d gathered the pieces in front of the vent.

“Yeah,” Michael agreed and pulled a bottle from his pocket, downing half the contents. He pulled the vent off the opening with his telekinesis and sent it to Alex who set it aside.

“Two at a time? I think three is risking hitting the walls of the duct,” Alex said when he glanced inside the vent opening.

Michael stuck his head in to gauge the size better. When he backed out he nodded his agreement and rapped his knuckles on the inside of the ductwork once. They heard an answering knock moments later. “Ready.”

Alex moved back a bit to give him room and watched as his husband lifted two of the pieces at the same time, carefully directing them through the vent hole and downward until they were no longer visible. His eyebrows furrowed in concentration and Alex found himself holding his breath and standing stock still, afraid to do anything that might distract him.

Moments later Michael’s face softened and he took in a heaving breath, tottering backward a little. Alex was there quickly, hand at the center of his back to keep him steady as a knock sounded in the duct again. “Are you alright?”

“Peachy,” Michael drawled, already sounding tired.

“Can you do the next one or do you need some energy now?” He was tempted to tell Michael to take it now anyway, but he trusted him to be responsible with this.

“I got it. Can you stay here though?”

“Of course.” Alex kept his hand splayed on Michael's back for support, his husband shooting him a grateful look before rapping his knuckles in the duct to indicate the next transfer was beginning. He carefully lifted two more pieces of tech with his mind, easing them down and out of sight through the ductwork and into the waiting fabric net Isobel and Kyle had fashioned below.

When he released his hold on them he stumbled again so Alex wrapped his arm around his waist, placing his chest against Michael’s back. Alex took the other man’s hand in his own. “Take it,” he said.

“Alex, I–”

“Now, Guerin.” His tone must have done it, because Alex could feel that strange tug beneath his skin start almost immediately. He wasn’t sure he’d ever get used to it and he didn’t want to make a habit of it, but he was glad the possibility was there if they needed it. It was just like he’d imagined it would feel if a vampire was draining his blood–like the life was being sucked right out of him. No, he definitely would never get used to it. Once he felt Michael’s frame straighten more and his own body slackening, he snapped the bond shut (thankfully without incident).

“Thanks,” Michael said with real gratitude that Alex didn’t need a bond to feel. He knocked into the air duct again while Alex leaned against the wall nearby, watching him repeat the same process for the last time. He felt winded, but he’d be fine to get out. Alex heard the last echoing knock come through the ductwork when Kyle and Isobel had received the last two pieces and Michael relaxed, pulling out his bottle of acetone and draining the rest of the contents. Two minutes left on the clock, Alex saw when he checked his watch. They were cutting it close.

“Isobel says the guards are at the other end of the gallery still, but they haven’t seen Álvar–”

The door slammed open behind them, startling them both so badly that the bond reopened without any conscious effort. It could’ve been caused by a deluge of adrenaline or just an automatic preservation instinct they couldn’t control. Regardless, there was a flood of fear looping between them that wasn’t going to improve their situation.

Alex wasn’t surprised to see Álvarez walk through the door flanked by two guards–they must have been from another area of the mansion and were untouched by Isobel. The guards stopped at the door once it closed while Álvarez moved closer to them.

He made a tutting noise when he looked at them and shook his head. “I knew there was something suspicious about Dr. Valenti’s very loud proclamations of assistance for Mr. Doyle’s condition. Even more when the man just miraculously stopped convulsing after a few minutes. But I thought, ‘what reason would a doctor have to cause someone to seize, only to stop it not long after’? A distraction, of course!” He clapped his hands together as if he was having a good time recounting the story.

Alex took a deep breath and stuffed down his fear. He needed to keep them both composed if they had any chance of making it out of here with no bullet holes. Do not speak to him, Alex warned Michael, his face impassive as he stared ahead at Álvarez.

“It only took a cursory glance at the cameras to notice the two of you were missing.” Álvarez stepped through the room, merely wandering around as if perusing his own gallery rather than confronting two thieves. His suit was perfectly in place, white with a gray pinstripe, the top two buttons undone on his undershirt and yet somehow he still looked professional. He knew how to carry himself with the authority that made people want to fall in line–Alex only now realized that the man was former military. He hadn’t found any reference to that in the research he’d done, which meant his record was scrubbed. Why?

What is it? Michael had noticed the uptick in Alex’s heartbeat.

He was military, but he has no record.

Michael stiffened slightly. We know what that usually means.

Fuck. The implications were too much to even consider right now. They had to get out alive before he even entertained the idea.

“I had high hopes for you, Captain Manes, despite your… proclivities.” He wrinkled his nose as he looked at Michael. “The Air Force has its limitations, as your father discovered, so when I found out you joined Deep Sky after your brother killed Jesse, I thought surely his plan is to infiltrate and use their resources to gain information otherwise unavailable through the military. A way to carry on the legacy that his misguided brother cut short.”

Alex… They had to be in a parallel world if it was Michael trying to temper Alex’s fury right now.

Alex balled his fist, his fingernails digging half-moons into the flesh of his palm. I know. He’d be giving the literal meaning to biting his tongue soon if this kept on much longer.

Álvarez continued meandering around the room as he spoke. He hadn’t spared a single glance for the empty pedestals, which made Alex uneasy about their validity. “After meeting you the first time, I can’t say I was convinced. You’re petulant, that much is obvious, but you still have a backbone at the very least. Malleable enough, in the right circumstances.”

Malleable? For what his father had been doing in Project Shepard? Was this really the man who was in charge, or was he just another rung on the ladder?

“Knowing that Deep Sky has the Lockhart machine, I was expecting you to contact me after you saw the other tech in my gallery.” He gave an exaggerated weary sigh. “My own folly was not connecting the dots fast enough between the purchase Deep Sky made and the missing tech from the facility that was raided months ago.”

Fuck fuckity fuck.

“But I don’t think Deep Sky is sanctioning raids,” Álvarez said slowly, turning his head to look at Alex. “So then why did they want that piece of tech in particular instead of, say, this alien glass?” He waved toward the other pedestals. “It was innocuous, as far as alien technology goes. Unless someone already had another part of the puzzle to interface with it…

“Once I realized it was you, Captain Manes, interfering with Project Shepard… well you can imagine my disappointment. How your father would be rolling over in his grave.”

Alex wanted to laugh because that was exactly what he hoped for–his father’s perpetual torment in hell while he watched Alex dismantle his life’s work. He hoped his father got dizzy from all the rolling the man did in his grave.

“But then I discovered that you don’t care about that. You have no love for your father, your family legacy, no love for anything of worth.” At this he sneered toward Michael, before fixing his eyes on Alex again. There was anger rising in both of them, but Alex was trying to tamp it down. There were still armed guards standing by the door.

“You see, you were never fit to wear the uniform and certainly did not earn the title the Air Force threw at you. You have only reinforced the fact that a faggot doesn’t understand the meaning of honor, is incapable of conducting himself with dignity, and has–” They didn’t hear whatever else Álvarez planned to say, because Michael descended on him faster than Alex had ever seen him move before.

“No, Michael, stop!” Alex reached out for him too late.

Michael’s fist collided with Álvarez’s nose so hard that Alex heard something snap and the force knocked the man back a few steps. The guards moved toward them immediately and Michael used his telekinesis to throw them back into the wall so forcefully that their heads made contact and they were knocked unconscious on impact, sliding down like ragdolls.

Michael’s next attempt at a punch was blocked by Álvarez’s forearm and the man pushed his husband away. “Oh, Jesse suspected but I thought he was just blinded by his disgust for you, Alex. I should have known your depravity ran so much deeper. You wouldn’t be satisfied with the average trailer trash, no your scatological nature craves an equal in vulgari–”

“Shut up!” The words hit Alex harder than he wanted to admit. Usually he could handle the taunting, but there was something about the way Álvarez was talking about Alex and Michael together that caused Alex to lose the last shred of control he’d been holding onto. His hands were balled into fists, his face tight in outrage, and he closed his eyes as he screamed the words.

Álvarez shut up. He shut up because his body flew back and slammed against the wall, knocking the wind out of him. Even though Michael was overexerting his powers, Alex couldn't help feeling pleased that he’d thrown the man.

Except now Alex’s brain felt fuzzy, his knees were wobbling, the room was spinning, and he was definitely falling to the floor. “Alex!” Michael caught him before he managed to knock himself out by hitting his head on the ground.

Álvarez was stirring, finally regaining his breath as Michael eased Alex down. “Give me a second.” Alex was only dimly aware of what he was doing–most likely jabbing a syringe filled with ketamine into the man’s neck before he could regroup. Álvarez slumped back down a few seconds later and Michael was next to Alex again.

“What did you do?” Michael asked, concern-confusion seeping through all of Alex’s pores.

“What are you talking about?”

“You need to take some of my energy.” Alex could only assume that Michael’s outburst had overtaxed him through the bond somehow. Whatever caused it, they needed to leave and Alex couldn’t function like this, so he did what Michael suggested.

He grasped Michael’s hand tightly and concentrated on pulling back his ability to stand and think and escape this hellscape. His head was mostly clear when he felt the flow abruptly stop and Michael fell back from his crouch onto his ass. He pulled out another bottle of acetone and drained it completely. It didn’t make him look much better than before. “Shit, you don’t look good,” Alex noted.

“Neither do you,” Michael teased.

“Kyle and Isobel,” Alex said abruptly and turned over onto his hands and knees to push himself into a standing position.

“They’re still in the utility room freaking out.” Michael gestured over to Álvarez. “What are we gonna do with him?”

“Nothing. He’ll wake up eventually. We need to go.” Alex started toward the door.

“Alex, you can’t be serious. He’s obviously involved in Project Shepard. We can’t just leave him here!” Michael’s scared-desperation cut into Alex a little, but they didn’t have time to deal with it right now. “He’ll come after us!”

“They always do, Michael.” Jesus, why was that so common that Alex felt unaffected when he said it? “We will deal with it, but we have to leave. Now.”

“Fuck!” Michael yanked at his curls, but Alex felt him cooperating. Alex got the door opened enough to peek out into the gallery hall. It was deserted; Álvarez must have sent the party goers to the dining hall so he could march Michael and Alex out without upsetting the guests.

Just as he stepped out of the door, an alarm blared to life overhead. There was no way Álvarez would have activated a motion alarm when he expected to leave the room again, so what had tripped it? Michael appeared next to him in the doorway holding a piece of alien glass in each hand.

“Fucking Christ, Guerin!” Alex didn’t bother keeping his voice down–the klaxon was loud but his anger was louder. Guards would be headed to their location now, so they didn’t have time to do anything but run. Alex grabbed one piece from Michael so he had a free hand, then they headed to the stairwell exit of the gallery hall which exited right next to the utility room downstairs.

Unfortunately Alex wasn’t at his best and there was no way he could move down the stairs quickly. “Need to bar the door somehow.”

Michael waved him on. “Get going, I’ll handle it.” His husband was already searching the nearby landing for something useful, so Alex started his slow descent down the staircase. His stump was already protesting every movement, but he pushed forward anyway, gritting his teeth against the bright spots of pain and ignoring the obnoxious voice of Kyle in his head telling him ‘I told you so’. Alex was halfway down when Michael caught up with him. “I wedged a broom handle in there, but it’s not going to hold for very long.”

Alex didn’t have the space in his head to make it down the stairs and answer Michael at the same time, so he didn’t say anything. He did raise his hand against any protest before returning both hands to the railing. Michael didn’t argue; he jogged down ahead and opened the lower door, looking back and forth down the hall and giving the all clear. “I’ll go get Isobel and Valenti,” and he was gone. Alex finally let some tears escape even though it didn’t relieve any of the pain. It at least felt a tiny bit cathartic in the coffin of the stairwell.

He’d reached the first floor landing just as all three returned to the door.

“I’d ask what the hell is going on, but I don’t think we have the time,” Kyle said sardonically. Alex followed them to the first set of double doors while his stump screamed in agony.

“Definitely not. Isobel are you ready?” Alex ignored the worried look she raked over him.

“Yes, I think so. It will need to be a short time for each or I won’t make it.”

“Just have them face away from us as we pass and then release them completely facing the other way. Hopefully we’ll be out of line of sight by the time they turn around again. If not… we’ll handle it another way.” Fuck, Alex was in no condition to handle anything and it showed. He was going to slow their movements by half and make Isobel have to influence them twice as long.

Kyle shook his head. “I’ll be the asshole–you’re going to slow us down and there’s no way she can influence them long enough.”

“Christ, I know,” Alex groused, rubbing his forehead as he tried to reformulate a plan. “Isobel, can you manage to get the two at the parking lot to leave and we will–”

The double doors crashed open and they were greeted with a group of four guards at once; Alex assumed they were the two groups they were meant to pass in the hallway first. “Drop the art.”

“Guerin, guns. Don’t kill anyone.” Alex said and held a hand out expectantly.

The guards looked at him like he was a moron just as all their guns flew out of their hands, one pistol landing in Alex’s hand and one in Michael’s. The rest went sliding across the floor behind them. Alex shot three of the guards in the left shin in succession, each dropping to the floor on impact. Michael shot the last one in the thigh.

“Can you guys carry this glass too?” Alex and Michael handed over the pieces of glass. “Let’s move.” They had to pick their way through the groaning guards but at least the hallway was a straight shot to the exit now, so long as they could make it before more guards showed up behind them.

Alex tried to pull all his focus into his hands wrapped around the gun and not the excruciating pain that radiated up his thigh and into his hip. He was mostly unsuccessful at that. It felt like he was stuck in one of those nightmares where no matter how far you walked, the exit just kept moving away from you. His head was beginning to ache along with his lower body in a redoubling effort of torture.

They did reach the single door eventually, Michael going out first and clocking the butt of his gun against the temple of the guard right outside. They filed out as quickly as Alex could manage.

“I can go ahead, drop the guards, and pull the car to the sidewalk,” Michael suggested.

“No,” Alex shut down. “We stay together. We’re not taking any chances.”

“He’s right, Michael,” Isobel said in that tone that allowed no arguments.

His husband didn’t respond, but he didn’t make any moves, either. They remained quiet after that, moving as a unit toward the back entrance of the parking area. When the guards came into view, both facing away from the group, Alex shook his head at Michael. Hold until I say.

Michael nodded and the other two looked sideways at them, concern on their faces when they kept moving forward and neither of them were shooting. As they approached, Alex heard the sound of a video playing–both men were engrossed in whatever they were watching on the screen of the phone. Alex held a hand up for Kyle and Isobel to stop and mimed to Michael as they crept up behind them. They lifted their guns and dropped them down hard against each man’s head in unison, the phone clattering to the ground as they crumpled forward.

Alex bade the couple follow and they kept moving into the parking lot. He was momentarily disoriented when he couldn’t find his Explorer until he remembered they had rented a vehicle because he wasn’t stupid enough to drive his own car to this op. He felt stupid from pain right now, though. Michael wordlessly dug the keys from Alex’s pocket and unlocked the rental, waving Alex to the passenger seat, which he wasn’t going to argue. Once the tech was safely secured and everyone was inside, Michael started driving them out.

“Don’t speed once you leave the driveway,” Alex informed him, his head heavy against the window. He was legitimately going to pass out from the pain. “Close the bond.”

“Alex, you’re practically unconscious!” Michael glanced over, his desperate-concern eating into Alex’s chest.

“And you need to stay focused on driving.” There were a few more moments of worry before it shut down and Alex’s world went blissfully dark.

THE DEBRIEF

When Alex regained consciousness he was in the bed at the hotel with an IV in his arm. How the hell they managed to get him all the way here while he was dead weight, he had no idea, but he was grateful nonetheless. His grunt came out like a question because he didn’t feel the pain from his stump anymore.

Michael sat down next to him on the bed and brushed his hair away from his forehead.

“How long was I out?” he croaked and then cleared his throat. Michael grabbed him some water which he accepted, leaning up a little to drink a third of the contents before his mouth felt normal again.

Michael took the water back when Alex was finished. “Couple hours. Kyle gave you a little bit of ketamine for the pain.”

Alex groaned and dropped his head onto the pillow. “Kyle, that shit can give me hallucinations without proper anesthesia, you fuckwit!” he yelled at the ceiling.

“It’s either the possibility of hallucinations or debilitating pain, jackass!” Kyle called back with zero sympathy.

“His bedside manner really sucks,” Alex pouted, causing Michael to grin at him. Alex held up a hand to Michael’s face, brushing his thumb along his cheekbone. “How are you doing?”

“Better than you. Jesus, Alex.”

“I know,” he sighed, scrubbing a hand over his face.

“You really, really don’t.” Michael’s eyes were bright and wide, staring at Alex like he’d never met him before.

Alex’s concern heightened instantly. “Did something happen? Is everyone alright? Did they fi–” He made a weak attempt to sit up, but Michael eased him back down with a hand on his chest.

“No, everyone is fine. It’s not that. When you can get out of bed, we’ll go over everything. You should get some more rest.” His voice was soft but firm.

Alex’s first instinct was to argue that he was ready now, but after the fiasco at the mansion, it would be absurdly irresponsible of him. His body needed the rest, even if he was missing context for something. “Okay.”

Michael feigned shock and Alex rolled his eyes, getting comfortable again. His husband gave him a kiss on the forehead before he left the room.

—

When Alex woke up next he could hear Isobel and Michael in the common room.

“Michael, that’s impossible.”

The IV was out of his arm and his crutches were leaning against the table by the bed.

“Iz, I’m not an idiot. I know what I saw.” Michael sounded exasperated, like he was tired of reiterating this.

Alex pushed himself upright on the bed, one foot on the floor, and rubbed the sleep from his eyes before reaching for the crutches.

“I know you like to think that you and Alex have this cosmic connection, but even the two of you can’t defy reality.” It was obvious she was attempting to be conciliatory, but was finding it difficult to indulge him.

Alex got the crutches under his arms and made his way into the other room. “Who’s defying reality now?”

“Alex, hi. You look a lot better,” Isobel smiled far too wide at him.

“I know you were talking about me. What is it?” He levered himself over to the sofa next to Michael and sat down, looking between the two of them.

“Michael’s under the impression that you… used his powers when Álvarez found the two of you in the alien gallery.” Isobel spoke slowly and concisely like she was trying to soften the blow of bad news.

Alex scoffed. “What? That’s impossible.” He turned to Michael, expecting some sort of smirk or laugh but his husband’s face remained serious. “Michael?”

Michael put his hands on Alex’s thigh, his voice even and eyes soft. “When Álvarez kept saying all that homophobic bullshit and you screamed at him to stop… you threw him against the wall, Alex.”

“No I didn’t, that was you.”

“I didn’t do anything. Why do you think you collapsed right after?” Michael moved his thumb back and forth on Alex’s thigh as he tried to parse the scene in his head.

“B-because you had already used so much energy, you overextended…” he said, sounding uncertain even to his own ears. At the time, Alex assumed that Michael had unintentionally pulled energy from him to throw Álvarez.

Michael shook his head slowly, squeezing his thigh. “Alex, I gave you energy afterward because you needed it. I was fine.”

Alex’s forehead wrinkled in confusion. “That’s–that’s not possible…”

Isobel held a hand over her mouth, eyes wide as she absorbed the significance of this conversation.

“How would I be able to do something like that and not even know?” Alex asked skeptically. The pod squad all had control over their powers; they used them intentionally and knew that it was happening when they did.

“When we were younger,” Michael started slowly, “we had trouble controlling our powers when we got angry or scared. Alex, when Álvarez was talking, you were… enraged. I could feel you through the bond, you just… you lost total control of yourself. I have never seen you do that before.”

“Oh my god, Michael,” Isobel gasped. “He really did use them.”

Alex’s jaw was hanging limp, his mind trying to process something that shouldn't be possible. “Holy shit,” he whispered and a few moments later, a little louder, “Holy shit.” Michael was right about him losing control from the enmity that Álvarez had stirred inside him. He always tried to keep a tight lid on that part of himself, to not stoop to their level because he knew they were inherently fanatical, but god the way he had spoken about Michael and their relationship–it had broken through the vestiges of Alex’s composure.

Kyle appeared from the other bedroom, drying his hair with a towel, joining in the conversation like he’d been there the whole time. “Wait, so that’s why your leg was in such bad shape? I thought you gave him too much energy in your usual self-sacrificing schtick.”

Alex flipped him off, sufficiently pulled from his meandrous thoughts. “I did it the same way as we practiced.”

“You hardly managed it when we practiced,” Kyle pointed out unhelpfully.

“I liked it better when you wouldn’t challenge me because you were afraid of offending me,” Alex deadpanned, startling a laugh out of Michael next to him.

“Sorry, bestie, that catharsis has already come and gone.” Kyle clapped him on the shoulder before sitting down on the arm of the chair Isobel was in. “So does this mean you’ll have alien DNA now like Rosa and Maria?” Kyle didn’t sound excited to add a new alien-human hybrid to his collection of peculiar patients.

“I don’t see why. If anything it would be analogous to a conduit of sorts. Powers come from him, flow through the bond and out through me.” Alex said it as if it made perfect sense when it absolutely did not. None of this made any sense.

“I’d agree with that if it wasn’t for the energy consumption,” Isobel intoned thoughtfully. “Michael said he was fine and it was only you that had collapsed. If the energy had come from Michael then it would have left him weak.”

Alex put his head in his hands and felt Michael squeeze his thigh. This was preposterous. He couldn’t just be telekinetic through the bond. He was human, he didn’t have any of the necessary biology that made it possible. There was no way–

“We’ve been using telepathy, Alex. Both ways.” Michael’s words were careful, like he was afraid to spook the horse. He was right, though Alex hadn’t thought about it that way until now. When he spoke to Michael through the bond, it didn’t feel like he was using telepathy himself. He had thought of it as an extension of Michael working through him. But had it been the opposite the whole time–Michael giving Alex the capability to work through him?

Shit. The bondprint was a fucking powerprint, too.

—

The only way to take his mind off the fact that he could apparently use alien powers if he was connected to Michael was to focus on the mission. The extremely, horrifically, shamefully botched mission. Owed partially to the fact that Álvarez had them figured out from the get-go, but also because Michael had gone off-script. Again.

On the one hand, they did get the tech. On the other hand, they created a new enemy. Alex wasn’t sure if that was a balanced trade.

“I understand that Álvarez got suspicious of the distraction,” Kyle said while they were gathered in the common room later, “but you said that he and the guards were unconscious when you left the gallery. So what set off the alarms?”

Alex raised his eyebrows and turned to Michael. “What did set the alarm off, Michael?” he mocked.

“Look, we didn’t have the time to disengage them and there was no way I was going to leave them there with that bastard.” Michael didn’t look apologetic. “You heard the things he said, Alex.”

Of course he would never forget the things that man had said. They were burned into his mind inside the corner where his memories with Jesse Manes festered. It almost felt like they were one and the same. “It wasn’t part of the mission, Michael.”

“Neither was Álvarez finding us in there!” Michael replied, agitated.

“And we adapted to that situation and overcame the obstacle.” Not as well off as they should have been, but still on the positive end of things. “We had a clear path to leave the way we had originally intended to and you introduced new variables that put us all in danger.”

“Alex, that’s not fair. The whole point of these raids is to dismantle Project Shepard, to remove alien tech from–”

“This wasn’t a raid. This was a clear-cut heist, planned for an explicit set of items during a very distinct time frame.” Alex spoke in monotone weariness. “This was a plan that you agreed to adhere to in advance for the safety and success of the mission and its participants.”

Michael stood up, throwing his hands in the air. “This isn’t a fucking military platoon, Alex! I’m not a goddamn soldier who’s going to take orders from you!”

“Michael–” Isobel tried.

“They were never orders, Michael. We had an agreement and you broke it.”

Michael scoffed even though he looked uncertain now. “No–no I didn’t.”

“We had just found out that Álvarez was involved with Project Shepard, was extremely dangerous, and you were revealed as an alien to him,” Alex’s words were calm and level, but he was glad that the bond was closed because he was having trouble keeping his irritation in check. “The both of us were physically compromised, myself to an inordinate degree, and you were aware that lifting the glass would set off alarms and make our escape riskier than it already was.”

Michael was flagging with each word Alex said, eventually sitting down onto the couch again.

“Someone could have died,” Alex finished.

“Alex, I think that’s a little extreme,” Isobel interjected.

“No,” Michael said, looking down at his hands for a few moments before he glanced at Isobel and then to Alex. “He’s right. He could barely walk and I was so depleted I couldn’t even help him. I’m the reason we had to move so fast.” He looked at Kyle then. “Is his leg going to be okay?”

“Uh, yeah. The inflammation should go down in a day or so.” Kyle looked directly at Alex when he continued, “He just has to stay off the prostheses. I will break into your house and steal them all if it becomes necessary.”

“Jesus,” Alex muttered, rolling his eyes. “I won’t use one, Kyle. Calm down.”

“I’m sorry, Alex,” Michael said, looking over at him like he was afraid his husband wouldn’t accept him.

“I know you are. I know it’ll happen again. And I love you anyway.” He could never be mad at Michael for his big heart, but he didn’t know how much longer they would keep getting lucky when shit went sideways.

“They’re so sweet,” Isobel cooed to Kyle, holding his hand.

“Yeah, it’s pretty insufferable,” he replied with a genuine smile.

Michael threw a couch pillow at his face just as he kissed Alex softly.

—

“So you think Álvarez is the head of Project Shepard?” Kyle sounded dubious.

“I don’t know if he’s at the top, but I do know that he was above my dad,” Alex leaned back into the cushions of the couch. “He was in the military, but there’s no record of his career anywhere.”

“I still don’t understand how you discovered he was former military.” Michael tilted his head at Alex’s sigh. He snagged his husband by the ankle and turned him 90-degrees on the sofa so that his knees were draped over Michael’s lap. A pillow was floated behind Alex’s back to stop him from lying uncomfortably against the armrest.

Alex’s glare softened when Michael started kneading at the back of his calf. “The way he carries himself; he expects people to listen to him. He was an officer.”

“Is that so, Captain?” Michael had an impish grin as he glanced sideways, his curls falling over his forehead.

Alex ignored the jab. “He knew that I was involved in the raid we did, but I couldn’t really tell from the way he was talking if he thought I was working alone or not.”

Michael was frowning. “He said that Deep Sky isn’t sanctioning any raids. They knew about the raid, didn’t they?”

“Eduardo knows. He’s the only one that Kyle and I tell about them because strictly speaking, they aren’t sanctioned by the organization.” Alex looked at Kyle, an uncomfortable pit starting to open in his stomach.

“But Álvarez knew that Deep Sky was footing the bill for the piece we purchased from him. And he knows that they have the Lockhart machine, but not about us participating in the raids…” Kyle’s eyes were growing wide. “You don’t think–”

“Goddammit.” Alex rubbed his temples. This was just what they didn’t need. “Project Shepard has a mole in Deep Sky.”

#malex #malex fic #roswell new mexico #rnm fic #alex manes #michael guerin #(mine)#(my fic)#(malex)#(rnm)#marriage!verse #tw: homophobic language #tw: mention of suicide

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himynameisobed · 11 months

Text

mid-may.

i've been having a pleasant string of almost-summer days that make me grateful. last saturday, amber and i went to cirque du soleil and had what seemed to be a life-changing and eye-opening experience - at least in the immediate aftermath, when we talked about leaving our boring, everyday lives to join the circus. (my toxic trait is believing that i can develop the capabilities necessary to be a cirque du soleil performance if i wanted to, even now, in my close to middle age) the human body is an absolute marvel. we saw mesmerizing contortionists, a man stacking chairs to an unbelievable height while also performing acrobatics, a man whose feet were strapped to one long stilt, who was launched into the air and did several flips before landing in perfect balance - it was insane and thrilling and now i truly believe every one should see one of these performances at least once in their life. after the circus, we went to my friend beth's 30th birthday party and it was cute. i'm trying to live more of an alcohol-free life, but it's difficult when i say i'll only drink on special occasions and every occasion seems special. got a bit tipsy, played with a dog, stood outside smoking a cigarette and talking about the upcoming movie, "killers of the flower moon." and when a friend of mine gets tipsy too, sometimes we get closer than we probably should. easy affection, a strange pull, some yearning for a deeper intimacy that might not be wholly appropriate given the context of everything. or maybe just a little bit of a harmless flirtation. the next day is sunday and i'm too hungover to go to church. i meet my sister at my parents' house later though, and we head to bang bang to stand in line for 20 minutes and get ice cream. we walked all the way there, which was impressive, but maybe a bit unnecessary. i'd invited conor out for ice cream, but he flipped it over on me and instead invited me over to a little party he and his friends were having at Tommy and Ronan's place. i wanted to go just to properly meet one of their friends, Shane, who had just immigrated to Toronto a couple of days before and has maybe the coolest natural hair colour i've ever seen. my sister and i get to their party, which is happening on the shared patio space on their building, so there's a bunch of random people there, and we find everyone talking to a group of australian girls. i play it cool with shane, pretending to be just noticing him, and strike up a nice conversation. he seems sweet, and a bit shy and sensitive, but also like he can have a good time. a nice addition to the group, in any case, but i guess they've all been friends forever. later we go to stackt market, and shane confides in me that he thinks it's overrated and he's bored, so i suggest going to crews. to my delight, he seems excited about the idea, but conor and i had been texting renee and she said she was at karaoke, so we went to meet her there instead. it might've been the wrong move since we ended up having to get a separate room anyway and barely seeing renee, and crews honestly probably would've been more fun, but it is what it is. shane leaves early saying he's tired. he leaves without letting most people know, and i feel bad he didn't have more fun, but there's always next time. the next day i meet my david, amber, and michael (+ michael's wife) at the beach. it's a nice day out and we walk along the board walk for a stretch before heading to a barbecue restaurant for lunch. my friend liam, his friend william and william's room mate meet us there. i feel kind of bad because i think liam thought we were going to have an actual beach day - a day of casual drinks on the shore, playing beach volleyball or some other sport - but really we just wanted to be outside in the nice weather and go get food. i think i accuse him of misunderstanding what i said when i invited him, but really i should've just apologized. in any case, he said he'd be ready for next time - that he would get some sort of ball himself and we'd all be able to play. he lives in the beaches but apparently rarely goes to the beach, but next time we'll make a day of it. our waitress at the restaurant is unnecessarily rude, making mistakes and accusing us of them and refusing to answer questions in any helpful way. it's honestly astounding, and i make a loud remark about how she needs to learn how to just do her fucking job that i hope she hears while she's walking downstairs. at one point she'd brought us what she says is a pork sandwich, which none of us ordered. she goes, "well, it's someone's, i wrote it down," and we say none of us ordered it so she goes back to the kitchen and comes back saying it's a brisket sandwich. our friend asks to confirm if it's pork or beef (since he can't eat pork), and she dismissively says something along the lines of, "i can't tell just by looking at it." so we ask her to go to the kitchen and check. and it was on her way back to the kitchen that i make a loud remark, and honestly after that she was quite a bit nicer to us so i think it worked. it's crazy how service can truly make or break a dining experience. we were 9 customers who were just trying to have a good time and enjoy the long weekend, and it seemed like this waitress with a stank ass attitude was making it her personal mission to ruin everything. to be honest, i think she was also a little bit racist or ignorant. maybe she was just a basic white blonde girl whose spent all her life in the beaches ever only with other white people, so she has no grasp of any possible experience beyond that. two of the people we were with were from cameroon and were asking her very reasonable questions that she was treating as stupid. i want her to try going to cameroon and ordering in french off of a menu that she doesn't understand. she literally had no patience or empathy, but i'm hoping she's just young and will grow out of that. after lunch, we walked along the beach some more and when we parted ways, i went home and took a nap until 9pm. all in all, it was a nice weekend with nice weather, and now i'm going to go back to trying to finally finish my portfolio.

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witchlyboo · 3 years

Text

Definitely, maybe.

Part five: The one who belongs to someone else.

Introduction. Part one. Part two. Part three. Part four.

Paring: Latina!reader x Logan Lerman x Tom Holland x Ben Hardy x Timothee Chalamet x Pedro Pascal x Michael B. Jordan

Warnings: Swearing, angst, misspellings, some Spanish, me learning how to write properly, and NY stuff that I've learned from movies that we all agree to pretend are real.

Word count: 6.4 k

a/n: You been asking for smut, I know, I know, I just wanted to introduce you to all the boys first, and we're getting there, just one more ahead. Also, I'm working on a masterlist because we are getting too many parts already.

All body types and skin tones friendly. You can also enjoy it as a no Hispanic reader. Constructive feedback and misspellings correction is always welcome.

Red and blue lights flash the driving mirror.

—No, no, no, por favor que no sea a mi—You beg to the sky looking at the patrol that is asking you to park, or someone else, there's a lot of cars in this part of the city, there's a big chance is the panic who's controlling your senses.—Dios, mi abuela fue a la iglesia cada domingo de su vida y nunca te pidió nada, please let me have some of her divina recompensa.—But that's not how it works, you end up parking with just a few seconds to think what to say. There's a perfect explication of why you are driving a car that is not yours in the middle of the night and smelling like a minibar.

Then this ridiculous thought comes to your mind, you look expensive, you've never seen the daughter of a senator but you must be close to it, it would make you less of a feminist if you just use your attributes? Ugh, you feel sick just to think about it but don't have enough money to pay a fine, and the constant paranoia of being chased all the time as an immigrant will only get stronger.

You pull down your dress a little so your neckline can do its job but you regret it immediately, and you're pretty sure you look more like an expensive prostitute who stole the car of his lover than some influential men's daughter.

—License and registration.—You hear him say when he approaches your window. You don't like this but you have to play the dumb tourist, the pretty foreign girl that is too stupid to be dangerous, with the look you have tonight it shouldn't be hard. But damn you hate cops, any uniformed man that works for the government is your eternal enemy, and you don't know how long you could keep the nice dumb Latina game before spit on his face.

—There's something wrong, officer? ...You?!—Your sexy and fake high voice is ruined when you see the face of the man who stopped you. This night couldn't get worse.

—Wait, what happened with the party?—Evan interrupts you while you finish some notes for work, little remainders for later when you don't have an eleven years old kid running around you, he's not usually this energic and you have to blame yourself for that, you're describing a life of excess and eccentric fun, something you let behind so many years ago that your own son doesn't know even a bit of it.

—Ugh, a nightmare doesn't worth telling.—You remember vaguely most of it but what keeps fresh in your mind is bad enough to don't want to bring it back.

—But if Timothée is my dad I have to know the important things, including the bad stuff.—Sounds perfectly reasonable and that's what makes you groan at him. Sometimes you feel blessed that your kid is better than you in any possible way, and sometimes you want to kill his brain with video games and reality shows like the rest of the parents.

—Ok, cool, but I'll keep all the +18 content for myself, so this part of the story might be blurry for you.—It kinda is for you anyway.

You should’ve known this night was cursed, you had a feeling because a) your earring fell off at the same time Timothée texted you to give you the party address and say he can't pick you up. And b) he won’t pick you up. Your mother would say that’s reason enough to not go, a real gentleman wouldn’t make you go to an unknown place in the middle of the night on your own in a city like this. But you decide to ignore it because you are a modern woman and because it’s worth it. It better be.

The outfit must be something special. You always take your time to choose what to wear, even if just another regular day, and since this isn't the case you thought about it for hours, that made your mind busy enough to not thinking about Tom and the whole love confession. He texted you saying he'll come for you to go to class together on Monday, which is completely impractical because he's way closer than you but is progress and you're going to take it.

You wanted to ask for Sheep's opinion but you thought she might not care, has been a few days since she started acting strange like she's bothered just to see you breathe. You want to blame his boyfriend to take all her time and attention from you but is probably just her new job, she got a small role in a Netflix show, and even when you're so happy for her, that's the event that has changed her into someone completely different. But you give her time, stress can do bad things to people.

The winner is the exact copy you made of the black and white striped dress Cameron Diaz wore in "The Mask" beautiful, classy, and sexy enough without being too scandalous, not that you have any problem with that, but this isn't the occasion, you don't want to feel like you're being too much or too little, just enough, it's supposed to be easy, right? you were born for this. Just adding some big shiny earrings you got on a thrift shop that look like real diamonds and you're ready, not that you own any to compare. Red lipstick, dark eyes, and a messy bun to get that disinterested pitch every look needs.

Getting there wasn't a problem, you were in the rich part of the city, everyone know who, where and what just to brag about it. The excitement is growing with every second, you check your makeup like thirty times in the elevator and send texts to your mom just to let her know where you are, and because you have to share that moment with someone and you are limited of friends these days.

Timothée opens the door with red eyes, drunk, high, or somewhere in between, you know then you were right about the bad feeling. He jumps on you to kiss you and no matter how much you try to explain the delicacy of your lipstick, he does it anyway, leaving a taste of alcohol and shrimps in your mouth. Taking you by the waist he walks you to a group of people you don't know while you're trying harder to fix the red color of your mouth without a mirror.

—Here is the companion I bought, look at her, that's how five grand per hour look like.—They laughed but you were too disoriented to process all the things he said, it was supposed to be a joke? if it is, why isn't he correcting? Instead, his hand goes straight to your ass and presses it to get you closer to him.

—I'm actually an intern in the costume designer department of the new version of "Sense and Sensibility".—You wanted to mention your recent promotion to hairstylist and makeup artist but that might be too pretentious. Anyway, they don't seem to care what you are or not, in fact, they don't even see you, all eyes are on Timothée

—Oh, well, is easy to forget when you're paying them—All laughs again. Who is this person? Who are all these people, actually? You recognize some influencers, a few cast members but there's no sign of the director, other main actors, not even his co-star. You feel like an extra in a movie where someone will be killed in a luxury party, hopefully not you. You take his hand from your body and clear your throat.—I'm just joking my love, she looks stunning, isn't she? I’ll get you a drink.

He leaves and the group of people surrounding you suddenly dissipated like boiling water, you were on your own again and despite some judgmental gazes is like you’re not there, you’re sure you could just take your dress off and throw it to someone’s face and unless Tim says something about it, no one would care. You’re there as his companion, an ornament, and that’s not enough to earn their attention because it’s too obvious you’re the one in turn.

You walk to the only window no one is smoking and check your phone, you know, the thing you do when you pretend you have important issues to attend, but no, you end reading some old messages, pictures, texting your mom of how much fun you’re having at the party, and somehow you check your filed Facebook messages to find Logan’s name. You cover the screen so fast you hurt your nail, his name is enough to make you tremble like a Chihuahua, you haven’t talked to him since that night, you know from his sister he lives in the house he bought for you two and he’s having the happiest life without you. You want to believe that because that means you took the right decision but deep inside… no, you can’t be that person, you want him to be happier than ever.

You find the guts to open the message, and you read as slowly as is humanly possible. “My angel, I hope this finds you in perfect health…” Dios, just Logan could start a message like that, your smile is almost too big to fit in your face so you bit your nail to cover it a little. “I recently found one of the human body drawings you made for me to study, you’ll be happy to know…”

—That’s a fucking long-ass message.—Tim appears behind you and takes your phone from your hand, spilling some of his drink on your dress in the process. Apparently, he's been there long enough to read part of the message.

—Give it back.—You command in the most severe voice you have, your magical moment got ruined and you remember the hole of hell you are.

—"My angel, I hope this finds you in perfect health. I recently found one of the human body drawings you made for me to study, you must know I still use them now and then"—Timothée starts reading the message, and even when no one is close enough to hear it and you don’t really care about this people’s opinion, that’s not for anyone to read, that’s one of the few parts of your life you treasure the most and you’re not ready to get over it.—You little slut, are you cheating on me with a med student?

—Give it to me.—You repeat trying to take the phone from his hand but he’s faster and walks away putting it out of your reach.

—"I meticulously preserve them, I certainly know any piece of art made by you will be priceless in the near future"—You don’t want to hear it coming from his drunk mocking voice, so you try to ignore what he’s saying and put more effort on chasing the phone.—Should I had kept the jeans where you left the wet spot on? I didn’t know you were an artist, my love.

—Timothée, por el amor de Dios.—Now you're trying to climb him, it wouldn't be that hard to take him down, he's skinny and you're fierce. That's what you thought but he's not moving even with you are on top of his shoulder and his opposite long arm keeps the phone away from you.

—Who is this guy and why is he talking to my girl like this?—You see the olive eyes getting darker and the tone of his voice went deeper than you thought he could do. You desist from taking the phone, you know the bullies love the attention, maybe that's exactly what he wants and give it to him just makes it worse.

—I'm not your girl.—You claim fixing up your dress having enough of games, and you have no reason to keep worrying about losing your job, the filming is done, and apparently your relationship with him too. You don't care about any of that anymore, just want to read Logan's text.

Even behind all the alcohol and the eyes injected in blood thanks for who knows what kind of drug, you can see the disappointment and anger, but it's not a broken heart, Is the hissy fit of a child that loses his balloon and now everyone will pay for it, especially you.

—Are you sure about that?—You can see him swallow hard, almost looking vulnerable, but his voice is defiant and threatening to prove you wrong. He just has to stretch out his arm to reach the open window with your phone in hand, his intentions are clear and the only thing you can do is raise your hands as a reflex.—You were mine the moment you put a foot on my trailer, and I don't fucking share my stuff.—Before you can say a word he drops the phone from the fourth floor.

You know is senseless but you find yourself running out of the party and going to search the device, using it also as an excuse to get away from that place. This is the first time someone makes you feel meaningless, you know the famous' world is cold and lacking in empathy but this is ridiculous, they're a bunch of parasites fed by attention and power. By Timothée.

The screen is crashed and the rest of it is probably beyond repair, not that you're surprised, its life is longer than you've been in the country and you admit you should have replaced it much earlier but you're not the kind to throw away things that still work. However, is not the phone you are worried about, not as much as what it contains.

—That was obsolete anyway, I'll get you a better one.—You didn't know he was following you, his voice interrupts your self-wailing. He sounds calmer and a little embarrassed, but not enough to say sorry, you don't think he's capable of saying it.

You shake your head and start to walk away without a word, you don't want anything from him, not materially, at least.

—Don't make a scandal out of it, it's just a phone!—He yells erasing any trace of regret in his voice. He doesn't see the reaction he expected and that's when he runs after you and with a hand on your upper arm pulls you back, you gasped for the sudden bluntness.—That annoying habit you have of leaving when I'm talking to you.

You push him away with all the strength you have, which resulted in him almost falling on the ground.

—I don't care about the stupid phone!—You finally break, but sadly is not as satisfactory as you thought it would be.—You are mean, vain, arrogant and the worst part is that you enjoy being this despicable human because you have absolutely no consequences to it. Everyone around you just accepts it and I feel so sorry for you because the only possible way for you to fill the void inside is to be surrounded by that crowd of mules licking your steps—To your surprise, he has nothing to say, he's just standing there with no facial expression, whatever he feels is easily covered by his years of experience acting, even drunk.—I can't give you that and it's obvious they don't want me either. What am I even doing here?—You ask yourself thinking where would be the best way of getting a cab, is a rich zone, must be easy.

—Everything is better when you're around—His voice is thin and fragile, you have to process what he said three times in your head to understand his words. You're not willing to look at him yet.—You're not like the others.

—Pure bullshit. You love to repeat that misogynist discourse of girls being in a certain way because is easier than be responsible for the people you choose to be—You were hugging yourself the whole time, is a cold night, but not enough to be bothersome, you enjoy Fall weather—You got me for a moment, I give you that, you fooled me but I'm too tired of guessing what version of you is real—When you return your gaze at him, he doesn't try to hide the guilt anymore, but there's still haughtiness in there.—Now, if you don't mind Mr. Chalamet, I need to get a cab.

—No, you came with me, you leave with me.—There's no trace of alcohol in his voice anymore, a good scolding is enough to put you sober, you know that thanks to your mom. Oh god, you're becoming her.

—You didn't bring me here, gigantic head—You look at him and put your hand in front of him with the palm up. He stares at it for several seconds before put his own on it—Not that!—You shake it and start looking inside his jeans pockets until you feel the metal of his key car.—You can't drive and I have to get home. You'll find it in the studio tomorrow.

That's how you ended with a car way more luxurious than you expected, driving so slowly and carefully that the police stopped you. What a night, but at this point, you couldn't care less about anything that is not that message, is been months and you can't get over it, over him. Not even Ben moans, Tom's comforting arms, or fight with a movie star at 3:00 am. is enough to get him out of your mind.

—So is true, you don't wear anything that hasn't appeared in a movie, huh?—Michael B. Jordan is leaning on the car window with a mocking smile and a sparkle of satisfaction that you would love to punch but his uniform keeps you in line, where you come from police is not equal to justice, most of the times is oppression.

—You know where it's from?—That was kind of comforting, no one at the party noticed. Not that you care.

—Is The Mask, not some Adam Hitchcock's blurb.—He smiles and even when you really don't like him, it's nice to be with a familiar face, you are really tired of running away, scaping for problems that are a result of your null capacity to deal with emotions. Ugh, what a word.

—Is Alfred Hitchcock, actually.—You didn't want to sound priggish, but you correct him with no time to stop yourself, an old habit.

—You got me, smarty, you know more than movies than me. Where did you get this car?—You feel really nervous even when you got this legally, you have your documents and license on time and he's being nice enough to not want to run away in a car that you technically borrowed for yourself.

—It's not mine.—No shit, Sherlock.

—No shit, Sherlock, I was asking where did you steal it.—You wanted to laugh but there's something with the uniform that just doesn't allow you to be yourself.—Are you drunk?

—No, no, fuck, no, it's just, I don't feel comfortable with cops—He raises his eyebrows but that is his only reaction.—Listen, is my boss' car, I'm doing the favor to take it to the studio, and I'm really nervous because is fucking expensive, he's an asshole, I haven't drive un almost a year because you people only use cars if you're rich or your work and lives depend on it. I'm starving.—The last part came out of nowhere, you haven't eaten anything in almost 13 hours, maybe that's the actual reason why you are that moody.

He doesn't answer right away, takes his time to look at you, what makes you blush, he's really close, closer than he's ever been. Does he smell like green apples? Not the actual apples, the artificial smell they had given to them.

—Get out of the car.—Oh no, is he arresting you? Is he finally taking revenge for every time you make fun of his Hawaiian-type shirts? You know you have too much karma accumulated and a cop making you pay for it when you don’t believe in their sense of justice is kinda poetic, and evil.

You don’t want to discuss with someone with a taser, gun, pepper spray, or who knows what else. So you take your bag, the key car, and get off defeated.

—My turn is almost over, I’ll take you to eat something, c’mon.—He walks back to his patrol and you stay still for a few seconds still processing his words, you must look totally devastated for him to offer that. How you see it you have two options, go with him and spend an awkward hour with a person you don’t like or risk getting a fine, Tim can pay it, it’s not a big deal but you don’t want to owe him even the minimal thing.

You get in the car holding on to your bag to feel calmer, this is the first time you’re fully alone with him since you found him half-naked in your kitchen. Those defined abs may never leave your brain.

—Are you cold?—He interrupts your thoughts with his question, you didn’t notice you were shaking. He looks for something under his seat and gives you an NYPD hoodie, you hold it doubting your next move, is not like you don’t appreciate the gesture but it’d be easier to take if it doesn’t get that words printed—Is clean.—He says chuckling when he sees the way you’re looking at it.

—Is not that, just, you know, fuck the police, defund the NYPD, demilitarize the pigs and that stuff.—You say putting on the hoodie anyway, is a cold night and you won't help the institution wearing their propaganda.

—Yeah, I get it, but you can't change the system just from within.—You decide is not the right moment to have a political conversation so you shrug your shoulders and discreetly smell the hoodie, a mix of cologne, green apples, and cheap soap, you know is cheap because you buy the exact same, do its job.

—I'm in the mood for pizza.—You say casually, making a deal to yourself to try to be his friend, he is a small part of your life anyway.—Domino's is open at this time of the night?

—Tell me you're not consuming that shit, dear Lord, you been here for how long, two years? I can't believe your idea of a good pizza is Domino's. Stella hasn't taught you anything?—You're surprised by the level of condescension with a pizza and you mirror his smile, suddenly feeling embarrassed. Your school program includes people from all around the world so you don't have that much experience with actual new yorkers. Logan is rich, so he doesn't really count.

—What's wrong with Domino's? I don't buy much street food, is cheaper to buy things on the food market. Besides, all pizza is good.—The mention of Sheep makes you a little tense, so you don't say anything about it, is not a conversation to have with him.

—Don't blaspheme in the patrol, I just washed it—You laugh, finally, after a terrible weekend. You can see why she likes him, there is something about his voice, smile, and his eyes that feel... calm, like watching Friends after a marathon of Lord of the Rings.—There are rules to survive this city, and I'm surprised you have made it this far without a proper guide.

—Chill out Mr. Miyagi, I'm not from the jungle, and I've learned a lot by myself.—He gives you a lopsided grin as a request, and you put your fingers up ready to enlist your acquired knowledge.—Walk fast, like you're about to be stabbed, something that actually happened to me, with an umbrella—He nods and laughs being related to it.—Number two, no small talk, no one cares, even if they ask. Number three, if you look a stranger in the eye, especially a homeless person, you have essentially invited them to approach you.

—Number four, we never eat from Domino's, Papa John's, Pizza hut, or any other chain restaurant, only trucks and local places are allowed.—You roll your eyes but you get the point, is just, again, you're not much into street food, it doesn't taste like home and the only way to eat food like that is preparing it yourself.

—Fine, fuck capitalism, let's support local places—You make an obvious fake enthusiastic tone but he nods proudly.—Number five, you don't need a car to live here, not even know how to drive. I would have successfully avoided this police brutality if I had followed that rule.

—For someone who is about to eat for free, you whine too much.—He parks the car and gives you a sign to go with him. You see him go to a pizza truck and order, you realize at the moment how ridiculous you look, so before chasing him you let your hair down, take your huge earrings off, and roll up the skirt of your dress until your mid-thighs letting the hoodie cover the rest, and clean the red lipstick with a Kleenex from your bag. Now you look more like a college person and not a rich girl who just got seized.

—Here you go.—He says giving you a slice as big as your head, looks oily and spreading cheese everywhere. Perfect.

—Is it vegan?—You ask receiving the food with an obnoxious face. His kind grind turned into a dread expression and you give him your second laugh of the day.—I'm kidding.

You are about to give it a bite when you see passing next to you a huge rat with the exact same slice as yours in its mouth, running into the dark of the night happy to have obtained the food for its family. They use to scare you when you just moved out but now they're like any other pigeon in the sky.

—Rule... whatever, a rat with a slice of pizza is a symbol for good luck, congratulations.—He pets your head awkwardly, not sure if you're ok with the physical contact, which, surprisingly, you are.

—I see rats with bagels all the time.—Pizza and bagels, that's the main culinary wonders of the city, you like it, not much to object but is hard not to compare it with your home's food.

—Is easy to confuse a rough diamond with a simple rock.—You both eat in silence, enjoying the mixed sounds of the city and all the different smells, the whole situation feels like one of those lofi music videos. You remember thinking about moments like this before getting the scholarship, what would it be like to feel normal in the city of your dreams.

—How do you know that much about movies?—He asks after a few minutes when you take a break to drink something, that pizza is not easy to take.

—When I was a kid a spent much time on my own, so my dad bought me a used DVD reproducer, and at the corner of my neighborhood was this movie store where you could buy 5 pirate movies for one dollar. They were blurred, with a terrible sound, and most of the time with the wrong movie inside but they helped me to not feel lonely. Eventually, the store closed but I've watched everything in it by then—He gives you a warm smile, you never told that story to anyone, not because is too intimate to share, but because no one asked, it doesn't sound like a question with a complex answer.—Anyway, I watched Marie Antoinette when I was like eight, and I decided at that moment that however is done I wanted to be part of that magic.

—You hear all kind of people chasing dreams in this city but is hard to find someone who actually deserves it.—You blush and you cover it with your hair but the smile on your voice is impossible to hide.

—Is that a compliment? You must really want me to like you to date Sheep.—You laugh but you can see his face tense, so you can guess your friend has been busy breaking everyone’s hearts.

—She hasn’t returned my calls in three days so I don’t think there’s much you can do—You nod, all this time you thought he was the reason she is ignoring you but apparently you are both in the same boat.—But yeah, I don’t know what I was thinking, what I should have said is, Marie Antoinette at eight? I can see where all the damage started.

You gasp and throw your napkin at his head, he easily catches it without even looking at it and laughs; that was unexpectedly attractive.

—Why a cop?—You ask, not sure where that question came from, maybe you authentically want to know more about him, he just bought you food, and honestly, that's the easiest way to win your trust.

—I wanted to be an actor when I was a child. This is the city of opportunities so you may think that if you want to chase the big wonder, this is the perfect place to do it. But I grow up surrounded by these people giving their entire lives to get something just given to one in a million so I decided is not worth it. For many years I wondered what I wanted to do with my life and the answer was really clear, my dad was a cop, a good one, or that’s what people say. I don’t remember much because he died when I was seven—Conversations about death are not your strength, everything can turn out uncomfortable if you choose the wrong words.—It might not be that glamorous but if my father died for it, it surely worth it.

—For the good ones.—You raise your almost empty can of Coke and he does the same with a grin that warms the cold weather of the night.

—For the good ones.

The next two hours passed like minutes talking about anything and everything. It just felt right to talk freely with him, you didn’t feel judged for your awkward family moments or your random thoughts, not even once because he told you his too. At some point of the night he borrowed you his gym sweatpants, any of you could just suggest going home but that was off the table, end that peace just for weather reasons would have been a tragedy.

—I read Timothée Chalamet is a dick. Is that true?—The mention of his name remains you of your life and everything that comes with it, including the middle semester project that you must dedicate your entire day, one that is about to start.—What, you can’t talk about it?

—He is a complete dick with no sense of privacy or human decency—And when he interrupts a deep kiss to look at your eyes, smile, and caress your chin, you feel like a character of his Victorian movies. But he didn’t ask that.—But the next week he’ll be no longer my problem.

—That’s why we have rule twenty-three, don’t ask for a picture of a celebrity unless they are local—You have heard about it before but you haven’t got the opportunity to decide if you like that rule because the only celebrities you have seen are from work and that club’s party opening.—That means you’ll be free to go to the Stephen Kings’ movie projection there will be for Halloween.

You don’t know if that was a proposition, a suggestion, or just a simple recommendation, and whatever it is, you noticed he was nervous to ask. Is it wrong? It feels wrong like you were betraying your friend accepting to hang out with his boyfriend without her consent. But he didn’t ask you to go with him so is safe to answer.

—Yeah, I guess—You get a moment, four seconds top, where you shared innocent, curious, and tenting gazes like three graders in the playground. And that’s the further you will allow yourself to go.—We better leave, if the sunlight touch me I’ll turn into dust.

You get off the car hood and go to the side door, but this time he opens it for you. You give him a “seriously?” Look, receiving a little push in your arm as a response.

↬☀︎︎

A distant voice asks you to wake up, softly whispers that turn into caresses on your cheek, your eyes feel so heavy, even when you are well aware of your environment your eyelids keep closed.

—Good morning, Princess—This is the first time Tom calls you that way, the change from silly nicknames to Princess is enough to get you out of hibernation. He is squatting beside your bed, his smile is the promise of a better day, and chasing that idea you give him one small back.—Your mom has been texting me desperately all day, she said you're not answering her calls and is worried.

—Fuck, my phone broke last night, can I call her from yours?—That’s an oversimplification but in the search for a better story, that's what you decide to believe and tell. Tom nods and gives it to you, he looks happy, beyond that, this is the first time you see that subtle blush on his cheeks and the eyes sparkling. You sit on the bed next to his body looking for your mom's number, slowly he moves between your legs, you have shorts and an oversized Back To The Future t-shirt, you got took the time to prepare yourself to bed last night and keep Michael’s clothes inside your closet to wash them, like The Tell-Tale Heart, a little innocent secret who feels dirty somehow

The conversations with your mom are always long, nostalgic and the tears are hard to hold for both parts; after a long life sharing almost every day with her, her absence never feels smaller. But this time is different, Tom is exploring the bare skin under your knee with his warm hands, asking for permission with curious eyes, and when you don’t object to the touch the British boy keeps his exploring mission cautiously, giving special attention to see your eyes in case something change. Is time to hang up when he gives a long and loving kiss to your knee, the less erotic kiss you could think of but so intimate to bristle your skin.

—Not nice to touch someone's daughter when is talking to her mom.—The protest of your voice loses strength at every word, he heard that and just straight his back to reach your face, the gap is almost extinct.

—We're okay, she likes me.—He assures holding your hips and pulling you a bit to him. Tom looks very comfortable with the new closeness authorization, you like it but are not very sure about it yet, most of you still think of him as your best friend.

—Did she tell you that? Are you talking with my mom behind my back?—You laugh when he does, almost like nothing changed.

—She adores me, I swear, I'm invited to Christmas, you know?—You're not surprised, she invites everyone, Logan was too but the first time he got family plans and didn't make it to the second.

—You should go, maybe we can do...—His lips touch yours in a peak at the middle phrase and makes you forget what you were about to say.—Man, the audacity to interrupt...—Then he kisses you again, deeply, using his tongue to taste your inner lip and his hands holding your shirt in fists. That's a twist of events.

—Is that ok?—You hear a weak whisper coming out of his voice but you got so mesmerized on his lips that decided to ignore it and kiss him back instead. He responds to your touch and starts to lean over you to make you lay on the bed.

Jesucristo bendito, is this happening? like, actually happening? you must look like trash, you barely took all the makeup from the night before and didn't take a shower, you start to get so worried about smells, feelings, and what that'll mean to your already too much-spoiled friendship.

However, the time of doubts is done when Sheep starts yelling in the living room, you both reacted running to the sound and looking for your blonde friend. Michael is there but doesn't look like the same as a few hours ago, is annoyed and tired for the lack of sleep, a look that doesn't match him at all.—What did you do?—You ask him fast assuming she's mad for something he did.

—Just in time, the star of the movie, I was wondering how much it will take you to be the protagonist of this.—That is Sheep's voice talking about you and what must be your heart breaking from her words.

—Excuse me?—You wish your tone would be less savage but you can't help respond the same way she did.

—Logan wasn't enough, then you got the drummer, fucking Timothée Chalamet, Tom and now my boyfriend. I'm so glad I didn't leave you alone with my dad or I'd be calling you mom now.—You have no words to that, Michael doesn't even dare to look at you, he must have told her something she misunderstood, but Sheep, or well, Stella is saying things she actually thinks and keep to herself. Tom walks in front of you whispering things to her to calm her down but she is not looking at him, you didn't tell her anything about Tom either so he's taking responsibility this time.—Go ahead and fuck the whole city, Michael if that please you but you're crossing the line with Tom and you know that, you're going to ruin him as you ruin every man that enters in your life.—She has a very you moment having the last word of the dispute and getting out of the apartment with Michael going after her but not putting much effort in it.

✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧

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#ben hardy imagine #michael b jordan fc #tom holland x reader #timothee chalamet fanfiction #pedro pascal #logan lerman fc #definitely maybe #fluff #angst #timothee chalamet #Tom Holland #Ben Hardy

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pastelwitchling · 3 years

Text

Michael tells Alex about the Dictator.

Michael was leaning forward on his knees, staring at the flames of the bonfire. He was slowly losing his mind, he knew it, but that didn’t make him pick up his phone and call Max for guidance or Isobel to apologize. He didn’t call Maria to ask if she was having any visions about his future, or Valenti to look him over for a burn mark he might’ve miraculously missed.

Mr. Jones had told him all he’d needed to know, and now the rest of the world felt muffled, like there was cotton in his ears. He didn’t want to talk to his siblings, he didn’t want his friends’ advice or insight. He didn’t think he could ever move away from this bonfire again, watching the flames taunt him. Because they knew they couldn’t hurt him, and that it was torturing him.

When a car drove up to the junkyard, Michael was flooded with memories of another late-night visitor. He looked up, traitorous hope climbing his throat before he could help it. When he saw Isobel behind the wheel, his heart sagged back to the bottom of his stomach, and he returned to staring at the fire.

It was frightening how, even after a year apart, just the thought of the airman cut through his haze like a knife.

Isobel stepped out of her car and stood across the bonfire, her arms crossed. She sighed. “I think you should talk to Alex.”

Michael’s eyes flickered upward. Isobel looked shaken, and the brotherly part of him wanted to be protective and concerned, but the bigger part couldn’t muster the will.

He offered a small, humorless smirk, the only kind he could manage, and held his still untouched beer bottle to his lips. “Pardon?”

Isobel wasn’t having it. She came to stand in front of Michael, blocking his view of the flames. “You’re not okay,” she said simply.

“Would you be?” he answered without looking at her, the cruelty evident in his tone.

“I don’t know why you’re listening to Jones of all people,” she tried. “You’re the one who said we shouldn’t –”

“Is,” Michael cut her off, shutting his eyes. “Not now, okay?”

Isobel said nothing for a moment, then huffed. She grabbed the chair nearest Michael, pulled it closer, and sat down, facing him. “You need to talk to Alex, Michael. You’ve . . . you’ve never listened to anybody like you listen to him, and he’s smart. He’ll tell you what I already know, and . . .” she shook her head. “Maybe you’ll believe him.”

Michael said nothing. He said nothing as Isobel sighed, kissed his temple, and told him she’d come by again in the morning. He said nothing as she got in her car with a final plea for him to go see Alex. He said nothing as she drove away.

He said nothing because he couldn’t admit that he’d been terrified of this beyond anything else. Facing Alex again, after everything he’d done. But he wanted it. He wanted to see Alex so badly, and though he knew it might only push him further over the edge until he felt nothing at all, he also knew he would be worse off not seeing Alex at all.

When Michael dared ask himself what he wanted, the answer was clear; he didn’t want to see or talk to anybody, but he could manage just enough strength to talk to Alex. Only to Alex.

On his way to Alex’s house, he thought of all the ways he could explain what he was doing there, where to begin in what he’d discovered. But it looked like Alex had somehow known he was coming because he didn’t give him the luxury of working out a script in his head. Instead, Michael found him in his front garden, kneeling in the mud and pulling at weeds. He had one hand on the dirt beside a few roses, as if careful not to accidentally hurt them.

Michael pulled his truck to a stop, watching the ends of Alex’s hair stick to his skin with sweat, the way his brows pinched in concentration, but his hands worked gently. A lump formed in Michael’s throat. He thought about the things he’d said to Alex almost two years ago, and the way he’d made him feel.

“I don’t think we’re good for each other, Alex.”

“I like Maria, okay?”

“I’m saying no.”

Michael shut his eyes tight. What right did he have to talk to Alex now? He clenched his jaw and swallowed thickly. He started to turn the steering wheel when Alex glanced up and their eyes caught through the windshield.

Alex straightened and raised a hand in startled greeting. Michael hesitated. He should’ve driven away, escaped as quickly as possible, but he hadn’t seen Alex in a year, and only barely glimpsed him at the bus stop when he’d come back before he quickly turned away, unable to stand the sight of him and Forrest together. And he missed him. He missed him like he didn’t think he could ever miss anybody.

Seeing him now had Michael itching to be closer, to touch. Before he could tell himself it was a bad idea, he parked his truck. Alex pushed himself to his feet as Michael stepped out.

“Hey –” Michael started and stopped as Alex breathlessly pulled him in for a one-armed hug.

“Hi,” Alex said and started to pull away, but Michael kept a hand on his back, keeping him close for a few more seconds. He turned his face into his hair, breathing him in. He was so warm and felt so good, his soft strands tickling Michael’s cheek.

When Alex finally stepped back, Michael saw that he looked tired, but was smiling, his cheeks dusted pink. “I was going to come see you tonight.”

“Y-You were?”

“Yeah,” Alex dusted the mud off the hem of his shirt, but Michael’s hand was still on his waist. “We haven’t talked since I got back. I missed you.”

Michael let his hand fall and allowed himself to stay close. Just for another few minutes, before Alex found out the truth about him and pushed him away in disgust.

He forced a chuckle. “I’m flattered, Private.”

As Alex searched Michael’s face, his eyes narrowed, and his smile slowly dimmed. “What’s wrong?”

Michael’s brows furrowed and he was about to shake his head, to say nothing was wrong, then Alex pursed his lips and said, “That bad, huh?”

He tried for another chuckle, but it got caught in his throat and sounded weak to his own ears. “Alex, I don’t –”

But Alex was already dusting the dirt off his hands. Michael briefly noted the strange new ring on his finger. At his confused look, Alex smiled, “I’ll put some coffee on.”

Ten minutes later found Michael in Alex’s living room, two steaming cups of coffee on the table in front of them. Michael sat on Alex’s couch, while Alex took the bench in front of his keyboard. He had changed into his sweats and an Air Force t-shirt, and Michael kept alternating between fear of what he would say, studying every freckle on Alex’s face and neck, and ogling his strong arms. He was always toned, but it was evident he’d spent the last year working out.

“You look good,” he thoughtlessly blurted.

“And you’re stalling,” Alex said, blushing.

“I’m not,” Michael truthfully said. “You look really good.”

“Guerin,” Alex leaned in. “What happened?”

Michael met Alex’s eyes and felt his own burn, the plagues of his mind coming at him at once with the genuine care in Alex’s eyes. He wondered how many minutes he would have before that kindness turned to cruel satisfaction.

“Karma,” he said. “I . . .” he looked down at his lap, his fingers playing. “I think I know who my dad is.”

Alex’s eyes widened slightly before his captain’s training kicked in, and he schooled his expression to one of indifference. “Okay. Who?”

Michael shook his head. He whispered, “A monster.”

At the confused furrow of Alex’s brows, Michael launched into the story of everything Jones had told them. He thought it’d be impossible to speak at all, but Alex held his gaze and it gave him a strength he didn’t think would last outside these walls.

By the time he was done, he was pacing the length of the living room, and Alex watched calmly from where he sat.

“This guy might’ve chased my mom and Louise off our planet in the first place,” Michael raged, his heart racing. “My mom – my mom, Alex – made Max in a lab so she could use him.” A rough chuckle escaped his lips. “And all the crap I gave you because of Jesse –”

“Guerin,” Alex said gently. “Sit down. Please.”

Michael clenched his fists, and sat down. He shook his head, staring at his cold cup of coffee. “What do I do now?”

Alex raised a brow. “What do you mean?”

Michael looked up at him. “Alex,” he reminded him, “my dad’s a villain.”

“So is mine,” Alex sighed, taking their mugs to the sink. “It happens.”

Michael stared, and stood to follow. “Do you not get –”

“I get that this is freaking you out,” Alex said simply, and turned to face him. He leaned against the sink. “I get that you’re angry.”

“Angry?” he scoffed. “I’m a monster’s son!”

Alex raised a cool brow. “So?”

“So my parents are supposed to be heroes!” he slammed his fist against the wall, and all the furniture jumped a good foot before falling back down.

Alex looked unaffected, but when he spoke, his voice was soft. “I know.”

“My mom used Max! My dad destroyed everything!”

“I know.”

“Fire,” he breathed, “fire doesn’t hurt me, Alex.” He shook his head. “It feels wrong.”

Alex took Michael’s face in his hands. “It’s not.”

Michael opened his mouth on a silent sentence, whatever he was going to say next lost as Alex brushed his cheek with his thumb.

“I . . .”

Alex gently pulled Michael in against him, hugging his shoulders. Against the crook of his neck, he whispered, “I’m sorry your family’s more human than you wanted them to be.”

Michael shuddered. He tried to push Alex away, to get angry, but in his embrace all he could feel was the desperate need to be closer. He ended up grabbing Alex’s hips, his fingers curled tightly in the material of his shirt.

“Why don’t you hate me?” he demanded. “Yell at me, laugh, tell me I deserve this!”

Alex held him tighter and shook his head.

“Why not?” he urged through grit teeth, his eyes burning. “I do deserve it, Alex. I made you feel like crap because of your dad. I . . . I left you alone –”

“Shh,” Alex said softly, raking a gentle hand through Michael’s curls.

“Hate me,” he begged. “Please, get mad at me.”

“Am I monster,” Alex asked, and Michael stilled, “because of my dad?”

Michael was already shaking his head. “You’re my hero, Alex,” he said without missing a beat. “But –”

“And you’re mine,” Alex whispered, his lips brushing the bare skin of Michael’s shoulder where his shirt was pulled back. It made it very hard for Michael to think.

He opened his mouth to argue, to say something, but before he realized his vision had gone blurry, big fat tears were falling down his cheeks and onto Alex’s shirt. Alex held him even tighter.

“We’ll figure it out,” Alex said lightly, as if this was no big deal. As if he had no doubt in his mind the kind of person Michael was, the hero he was. “Everything’s fine, Guerin. I promise everything’s fine.”

Michael’s hands slowly came up Alex’s back, his fingers clawing through his shirt and into his skin, holding him back even tighter.

“I missed you, Alex,” Michael breathed, and buried his face in the crook of Alex’s neck. “I missed you so much.”

Alex chuckled softly. “I’m flattered.”

#alex manes #michael guerin #malex #malex fic #malex fanfic #malex fanfiction #roswell new mexico #roswell nm #malex angst #malex fluff #tyler blackburn #michael vlamis

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heartcal · 3 years

Text

“who do you believe?”; l.h. (pt. ii)

oh my GOD it’s here, it took longer than expected but she’s finally here! after the eye strain i got a sty so that threw me in for a loop, but the good news is my eyes are better! and i’m fully vaccinated too! please get the vaccine if you are able to :^) enjoy!

a/n: (formatting again lol) there’s a part where there’s supposed to be texts (in italics) so it may be a bit weird to read (hopefully not) (sorry for these parantheses) please let me know if there’s anything off!

pairing: luke hemmings x reader

summary: having known luke for years, it was bound to happen eventually. the crush you developed happened before you could stop it, and you did your best to keep it a secret. you told no one, did your best not to show it, so what do you do when his girlfriend finds out?

warnings: swearing (as usual),

genre: angst, fluff, basically friends (to brief enemies but not really) to lovers?

wc: 5,201 (they’re getting longer, huh)

taglist: @1sosrvd1267 + @wowitsel (side note: i don’t have a current taglist, this is just for this fic!)

part one | my masterlist!

You skipped the after-party that night. You couldn’t bear standing in the same room as Luke and Rachel, so you booked a ride and left as soon as the car pulled up.

Had you stayed for the party, you would have crumbled under the looks of pity thrown at you by those who would have heard about what happened. The knowing looks that something bad had happened between two people everyone on the crew knew were best friends would have been uncomfortable.

The ride home is uncomfortably silent, but you were thankful the driver wasn’t the talkative type. The soft jazz playing on the radio wasn’t calming but it did distract you from the pain and embarrassment you felt from the argument.

Once the car had pulled up to your place, you bid a silent farewell to the driver and slid out.

You just wanted to get inside, take a shower, shut your phone for the night, and sleep until you physically can’t get any more sleep.

You’re not too surprised Luke stood up for his girlfriend. He does love her—he’s shown that with friends and with fans. But the way he glared at you, defended her without trying to find out what exactly went down…he had never looked at you like that.

You’ve seen that look before; it wasn’t something you were used to but it was the look he would give paparazzi when they would harass you, the guys, and his friends. The glare carried such strength that it would make people back off. And so when it was directed towards you, it struck you hard.

Having done what you wanted to do once you entered the house, you lay in bed with wet eyes staring at the ceiling. Your phone was face down on your nightstand, completely out of reach to the point one slight touch could knock it off.

Maybe you were the one at fault. Maybe you should’ve told the truth about your feelings to Rachel or Luke before this all happened. It could have prevented the fallout and you would be with the guys and the crew celebrating a successful show.

But what good would that have done? Had you told someone, anyone, that you liked Luke more than a best friend should, would that have caused the same problem but presented differently? Or would something come from it? Maybe nothing would have happened.

A sigh escapes your lips as you turn your back away from the nightstand, facing the empty half of the bed and before your mind drifts to more pitiful thoughts, you close your eyes.

You didn’t dream that night. It’s as if you blinked, with the night flying by faster than you had wanted and anticipated.

The sunlight beamed down on you from above your headboard. It was late morning and it was time to face the harsh reality of the day.

There is no doubt you have lost Luke as your best friend.

Wiping the sleep and crust from your eyes, you sit up and vacantly glance around the room. The box where you keep gifts from Luke is illuminated by the sunlight, and with the vacant stare you stand to walk towards it.

You hesitate to open it; it’ll bring back memories of good times and with the events of the previous night, you do not think you can handle the rush of emotions.

It’s then when you realize your phone was off, and though you don’t want to do anything social today and would rather stay home with your favorite snacks and shows, you know you have to let your friends know how you’re doing.

You stall by washing your face and brushing your teeth, albeit slower than usual. You know that once you turn your phone on, the onslaught of questions and missed calls are going to take possibly an hour to clear up.

Sure enough, as you turn your phone on, the missed messages come in, barely giving your notification tone a break and the missed calls and voicemails were coming in fast. You can feel the heat from the battery on your palm, and for the sake of the phone you switch the sound off and turn on Do Not Disturb to prevent any new calls from coming through.

The messages you saw were from the crew, asking where you went and if you were okay. Others were from the boys minus Luke, and looking through the missed calls, there was nothing from Luke.

You’re not surprised, but the pain was still simmering within and seeing no messages or missed calls from him was adding to it.

You responded to the crew’s messages first, since many of them sent one or two messages asking simple questions: “Are you okay,” “Where did you go,” and “Did you get home safe?”

Then you responded to the boys’, Michael’s first since he had the least amount of messages.

hey, you didn’t have to leave. we could’ve talked some sense into him when he calmed down (11:37pm)

did u get home okay? we know you didn’t drive here yourself. (11:58pm)

please let us know you made it home. let us know you’re okay (12:10am)

hope you made it home and that you’re safe and okay. thank u for ur work today. please text me when you see these. goodnight (12:49am)

You typed your reply to him, letting him know that you were okay and got home safe.

Calum’s messages were similar, asking the same questions but some were repeated to emphasize his worry. In response, you answered his questions like Michael’s.

But even before you can open Ashton’s messages, seeing double digits next to your conversation with him, rapid knocks on your front door grab your attention.

With a groan you stand and grab your robe from the hook on the door, wrapping it tightly around your body as you open the door and groggily walk to the front door.

It was a stupid idea, as you weren’t ready to face anyone yet Ashton stands in front of you. He’s well-rested, a stark contrast to you as you were sure your eyes were still puffy and bloodshot, along with an occasional sniffle from your nose.

His eyes travel from your face, down to your feet, and back up to your eyes. He can immediately tell you had a terrible night.

“You weren’t answering anyone last night,” he begins, tilting his head as he narrows his eyes, “we were worried about you after you left.”

“Yeah,” you sighed, “I just—I didn’t feel like talking to anyone.”

“You could’ve let one of us know that you were shutting off.”

You nodded with a frown, “I could have, yeah,” your eyes dart around behind him to avoid his worrisome eyes before asking him if he wanted to come in.

He doesn’t hesitate and steps in once you move aside, opening the door wider to give him enough room. He notes your bag in a heap on the floor a few inches away from the couch, and how your shoes were far apart, with one upside down, as if you flung them off.

“How are you holding up now?”

You shrug, still avoiding his eyes because you know if you make eye contact, you’ll break down and you won’t have control over the onslaught of emotions.

“Be honest,” his voice is soft, wanting to make you feel comfortable enough to open up.

You stare at the ground, biting the skin of your lower lip nervously. This is why you did not want to talk to anyone face-to-face. Talking to them over the phone, preferably through text, allowed you to lie to the other person (and if applicable, to yourself). But talking to someone in person, and to someone who can see through your lies, you were bound to break down and become vulnerable.

You inhale, taking careful steps to the couch and gently sitting down with a sigh. Ashton follows you, sitting next to you but giving you space to not overwhelm you.

“What happened last night—,” you lean back with your arms folded over your chest, “—was something that I feared. When I realized I liked Luke, I was so worried about him finding out and what the outcome would be. I knew from the beginning that things would never be the same if he found out, and I was afraid of the change that would come from it.”

Ashton listens intently, his eyes displaying sincerity as he listens to you list off your worries. What he saw last night bothered him to no end, and had he not exerted most of his energy during the show, he would not have slept at all and would have stayed up all night in a constant state of worry.

“So, now that Rachel knows, and no doubt Luke has caught on, I don’t know what to do. I responded to everyone’s texts before you arrived, and Luke sent nothing—not even a phone call.”

Ashton nods, swallowing before speaking, “Well, after you left, things went down that may be the reason why he hasn’t tried contacting you.”

Your head turns to face him, eyebrows furrowed as confusion embeds itself across the rest of your features.

Ashton readjusts himself, getting comfortable in his seat as he gathers the right words.

“Something happened after I left?” You ask as you shift in your seat to face him.

“Michael wanted to go after you, to at least offer you a ride back, but Calum went back to tell Luke that it was bullshit what happened. So, Michael went back to make sure they wouldn’t fight or anything. I also pointed out that he was a dick; choosing you over her when he’s known you the longest didn’t sit right with us. But he got defensive and kept wanting to leave but Rachel convinced him it was alright, so they stayed for the party. But the party was bad—the crew felt the tension and the vibes were down—,” he chuckles at the word choice, getting a small laugh out of you as well, “—it brought everyone out of the energetic and ecstatic mood we were in before the confrontation. We all kinda did our own thing during the party but we noticed things were tense between Luke and Rachel. And when the party ended, shit hit the fan.”

“What happened?”

Ashton sighs, “To make the long story short, they got into an argument when we were leaving the venue after Michael brought up your name. He said something like, ‘I hope they got home safe,’ and that you weren’t answering your phone at all. Calum and I pointed out, again, how rude Luke was to you and Luke kept defending himself. Rachel dropped an insult and something shifted. Basically, they’re done and the guys and I can finally fucking breathe.”

“Wait—,” you stand with bulging eyes, “—wait, are you saying they broke up?”

Ashton hums as he watches you mindlessly walk around your living room.

The guys have been waiting for their break-up. It’s not something they were open about, as to avoid any conflict with their best friend, but it was almost an unspoken agreement: Rachel was not liked.

As for you, it’s not like you were wishing for their break-up. You wanted Luke to be happy, and if he was happy in that relationship, then so be it. But you were not a fan of it. Yeah, you liked her in the beginning but when she started disregarding you as if you did something to offend her, you lost most of your respect for her. Now, with this news of their break-up, you don’t know what to do.

Are you happy? You don’t exactly feel happy about it, but there is some relief.

“So,” you sit back down on the couch slowly, “what am I supposed to do with this information?”

“Not sure,” Ashton shrugs, “but I recommend talking to Luke.”

You shake your head fervently, “No. I don’t feel like talking to anyone.”

“But you’re talking to me,” Ashton has a smirk, but you know there’s no malice behind his joke.

“You showed up unannounced, Ash,” you smile, “I was responding to everyone who sent messages and voicemails. I don’t feel like talking to anyone else in person.”

He holds his hands up in defense, “Fair enough, but don’t be a stranger.”

He gives you a quick hug, whispering something similar to ‘don’t shut Luke out’ before he pulls away and walks out.

Ashton’s words stuck with you for the next week. You felt comfortable enough a few days after the fact to contact the boys, eventually meeting up with Ashton and Calum for lunch and third-wheeling Michael and his fiancée. The only person out of your friend group and co-workers you have not contacted was Luke. He hasn’t contacted you either, but you do not think much about it as you’re still trying to figure things out. If he were to contact you, how do you talk about what happened?

You want to know why he was able to choose his then-girlfriend over you, but at the same time you don’t want to know the answer. You know that one day, and though it hurts, you will not be his number one. With the way he behaved that night, it felt like that dreadful moment came to earlier than expected, that he found his number one and you immediately became his second go-to person.

So it did surprise you when you were out with an old friend to receive a text from Luke.

Can we talk about what happened? (2:23pm)

You only stare blankly at the text, not even moving to type a response. You were in such a good mood, and not even this text would change it. Instead, you lock your phone and place it back in your pocket, noting to leave it alone until your day out comes to an end.

And when it does, you see that more texts from Luke had arrived, the final being sent an hour before the outing ended.

I know you’re mad, I understand that and I don’t blame you but please talk to me (2:31pm)

You’re reading these, please say something (2:33pm)

There are some things that I need to clear up with you, I want to apologize for what happened that night but I want to do it face to face. Please respond. (3:57pm)

Whenever you’re ready, I’ll be waiting. Sorry if I’m bombarding you with these texts, I just don’t want to lose you over something that I realize now should not have happened. Respond when you want to, I’ll be here. (5:49pm)

You could only let out a small chuckle at the persistent requests to talk, and you don’t deny the small—minuscule, honestly—flutter in your stomach. You don’t waste any time responding.

Sorry, I was busy. We can meet somewhere to talk. (7:08pm)

He responds about five minutes later, agreeing to meet at a small café the two of you love tomorrow afternoon.

The rest of the night for you is spent thinking of ways to carry yourself, being completely confident, and accepting the fact that you love your best friend. Pep talks in the shower and mirror to calm any arising nerves, revising the topics you want to talk about in your head so you keep the confidence.

As for Luke, he was struggling to gather all his thoughts. In the beginning, he thoroughly enjoyed the fact that you and Rachel got along. He liked seeing his best friend and girlfriend become friends like that. He didn’t notice the shift, however, and he wishes he did before things got out of hand.

When he defended Rachel, without finding out the story from all sides, he thought he was doing what was right. To him, friendships and relationships have the same base, but romantic relationships with a partner have a different structure than friendships do, and he was starting to see cracks in his friendship before he saw it in his relationship.

When he confronted Rachel after she insulted you, he started to see someone he never saw. He remembered the times Rachel ignored you, sometimes playing it off as if she never heard you. He remembered how she would make plans with everyone and exclude you, but he always played it off as an accident (even if he knew it wasn’t). He remembered all these times he noticed a change in mood when the two of you were in the same room, and he couldn’t believe he turned a blind eye to all of it.

It hurt him to break-up with Rachel—he won’t deny that because he did love her. It’s not that he saw the rest of his life with her as they weren’t at that mark in the relationship.

But, when he did picture his future, he always saw you. He always thought it was just as a friend, someone who was just joined at the hip. Yet, he was quick to throw that away for someone he rarely saw when he pictured the future.

Which is why, the next day, as he sits at a booth near the window of the café, he carefully goes over what he wants to say. He doesn’t want to ruin the chance to fix things between the two of you. If it goes awry, not only does he lose you, but his friendships with the band and the team will take a hit since they all love you.

The bell above the door rings making his head turn to watch you walk in. Your eyes danced around the café before they fell on him.

He couldn’t help the smile the formed on his lips, a small breath of relief escaping as he watches you walk towards him. The smile doesn’t stay long though, because as you sit down with a stoic expression, the reality hits him.

“I got your usual,” he’s shy and timid, pushing the mug toward you as he eyes the liquid nearly spills the edge.

You mumble a ‘thanks,’ grabbing the mug and taking a small sip. It falls silent as the two of you wonder who should start first.

Luke makes the move first. He sighs, sitting up straight and wiping his palms on his pants.

He’s nervous. When the guys started touring, visiting new cities and countries, he would always be nervous and constantly wiped his hands on his thighs, sitting up straight and even straighter if he wasn’t slouching. It’s an old habit, but something you remember fondly as he had grown out of it. Or so you thought.

“I want to start with I’m sorry,” he begins, making eye contact but fails to hold it. His eyes instead drift to his drink, “I know what I did was wrong, and I put you in a spot that hurt you and disregarded you. At the moment, I thought I was doing the right thing because she was my girlfriend, but then—” he gulps, “when she insulted you, it struck a nerve and, not to sound cliché or anything, it felt like it opened my eyes. I saw someone I didn’t see when I first met them.”

You don’t respond, just nodding your head to let him know you’re listening.

He licks his lips before continuing, “When the guys brought up how you left on your own, I was feeling nervous and they started reminding me how much of a dick I was to you. I didn’t want to admit it myself, but now, I was such an ass. I’m just—I’m so sorry for what happened.”

“Luke,” you sigh, shifting in your seat, “I’m not saying I forgive you but I accept your apology. It hurt me so much that a friend, someone I’ve known for years was just so quick to turn their back and take someone else’s side. I know she was your girlfriend, but I wish you didn’t do what you did.”

“If I could go back and fix it, I would.”

You only nod again, trying to think about other things that need to be talked about. The one topic you hope to avoid is the possibility of him knowing your feelings—something you do not want to discuss, at least not yet.

“Did she say anything to you?”

The question leaves your mouth before you register it, and the widening of your eyes catches Luke off guard.

“What?”

“Nothing,” you mutter, grabbing your mug and taking a long sip.

“She didn’t tell me what started the problems between you two, if that’s what you mean,” Luke smiles a bit, watching you nervously play with the mug’s handle after the sip. It fades when your eyes move up to meet his, “I don’t know what happened between the two of you, but it isn’t important anymore. She’s out of the picture, and I don’t want to lose you.”

The silence returns, but unlike the previous bout, it’s a calming silence. It isn’t uncomfortable, rather the air is easier to breathe and the tension isn’t unsettling.

“Where do we go from here?” Luke asks, nervously wringing his fingers.

“I don’t want to lose you as a friend, Luke,” you offer a smile, “but it’s going to take some time to ‘heal,’ if you will.”

Luke smiles again, this time a bigger grin. He nods, leaning back in his seat, “Let me know what I can do to make things better. I’ll do it if I get to keep you.”

Over the next few months, your friendship with Luke was rekindled. The guys were at ease now that Rachel was gone and you seemingly had taken her place, even though you were friends. The awkward glances they would give when Rachel was in the same room were now playful rolls of the eyes over a dumb joke or pranks. You didn’t miss out on any outings you wanted to go to, now that everyone invited would check in with each other the night before. Things went back to the way they were before Rachel.

There was a change in your friendship, however. It wasn’t something you noticed right away, but it was something you thought about at night just a few weeks ago. Luke paid more attention to you, not that he didn’t pay attention before, but this was a noticeable change where he still looks at you even after you finished talking, and would only look away from you when you caught him. He would always cover his mouth with his index and middle finger, but you saw a small smile behind them. You played it off as friendly teasing, but it tugs on your heartstrings.

Another noticeable change is the hugs. Duration-wise, they were relatively the same. However the touch lingered; if he wrapped his arms around your shoulders, an arm would stay around your shoulder, meanwhile if they were around your waist, his hand would stay on the small of your back. You played it off as a friend being protective, but yet again, it did nothing to stop your growing love.

Tonight was the first night of their tour. The boys were up to their usual pre-show antics, as well as the nervous habits; Michael fixing his hair and deciding whether to go with a beanie or a hat, or neither, Ashton was warming up with his pre-show playlist, Calum testing his bass, and Luke was relatively fine.

Sure, he was nervous because it isn’t a crowd of 500, close to 20,000, but he was calm compared to the last time he performed. He didn’t have any worries to talk about, his vocal warm-ups were smooth, and getting dressed up was a breeze. He shared chuckles with you as you both watched the others move around with tense expressions (all with no malice, of course).

“You sure you’re not on edge?” you nudge Luke with your arm as he leans forward on the couch your sitting on to fix his shoe.

“Nope,” he sits up, leaning back in his seat.

“Really?” you inquire again, doubt laced in your tone with a hint of teasing.

“Yeah,” he chuckles, “if anything I’m excited about tonight.”

You hum, crossing your arms as you watch Ashton walk over.

“Ten minutes left,” he nods at Luke before walking to Michael to tell him the same thing.

You give Luke a look, wanting to get him to admit he is nervous, but all you get is a smirk and a shrug. He stands, patting your shoulder left before walking away to put in his in-ears.

You won’t deny you still don’t have feelings for him. Throughout the past few months, you were able to pinpoint the reasons why you fell for him. The small acts, the obscure things he would remember about you—especially the ones you don’t remember yourself—with the attention he would give you. It was staring you in the face, but you chose to deny all the signals to give yourself the satisfaction of thinking it was just a phase. But now you know why you love him.

Two minutes until showtime, Ashton finishes his speech and the crew is taking their places. The band stands at the opening, waiting for their cue to head out.

As you watched them hype themselves up, you noticed Luke looking around nervously. Of course.

“Nervous?”

His head whips toward you, and you can see it in his eyes.

“A little,” he mumbles, but you don’t hear it over the crowd’s excited screams.

“You got this,” you grab his shoulders to make him look you in the eyes, “like Ash said, you guys worked your asses off for this album. The fans loved it, your shows are all sold out, and you have thousands out there waiting to see you kill it.”

He’s silent, blue eyes staring into yours as they bounce from one eye to the other.

“I love you,” he blurts, loud enough just for you to hear.

You freeze, the grip on his shoulder loosens but remain.

He notices, “She did tell me something that night, and whether or not it’s true, I-I love you.”

“Sixty seconds!” a stage recites in the earpieces.

The boys turn to look at both of you, curious eyes turn into surprise as they watch your expression.

“I don’t know how long, I don’t know when, and I don’t know what it was, but I know for sure.”

Your eyes glance at Ashton briefly, not missing the knowing smile he gives you before you look back into Luke’s eyes.

“I…love you, too,” you respond, gripping his shoulders while your eyes drop down to his shiny shoes.

He doesn’t hear you over the cheers and screams, but reading your lips he knows the answer.

Luke smiles, grabbing the back of your head and kissing your forehead.

He leans down to your ear, “I expect to hear you say it when I come back.”

With flashing lights scattering across the stage, the boys run out to the stage, big smiles gracing their faces for multiple reasons with adrenaline pumping through their veins. From backstage, you watch the show you a smile, feeling high from the brief but fulfilling confession.

It’s two hours later when the show ends. Your heart is pounding as you watch the crew celebrate the successful first show.

Luke pulls you away from the crowd, into the hallway and away from the noise.

“So it was true, what Rachel said?” Luke begins, his hand still holding yours as a shy smile forms.

“What did she say?”

He exhales air through his nose in a laugh, “She said you were in love with me, and that you were trying to break us up.”

You scoff, shaking your head as you look at your intertwined fingers. He squeezes your hand to get your attention.

“I doubt that last part, but the first part I’m hoping is true in a sense.”

Your eyes meet his, adoration swimming in them bringing a smile to your face, “There may be a strong crush I have on you,” you tease, “and it may or may not have turned into love.”

He laughs, letting go of your hand to wrap you in a hug. His head dips down, his forehead on your shoulder as he breathes in your scent. He moves slightly, whispering in your ear, “Say it.”

Your head rested against his chest, hearing his heart beat rapidly and rhythmically.

“I love you,” you whisper.

You feel him smile against your shoulder before he pulls away, his arms resting on your hips as he smiles down at you.

“If you’d like,” he begins, his tone timid now, “that place you like in Seattle has a new dish. It’s our next stop…” he drifts off, hoping you’d catch on to him asking you out.

You do, laughing at how he remembered yet another thing you seem to have forgotten. It was a themed restaurant that had some of the best food you’ve ever eaten, and for days you wouldn’t stop talking about it. But you never went back to it, even during breaks, but somehow he seemed to remember.

“Yes, Luke.”

You know the shock will hit you later that night, that finally the person you’ve fallen for, who happens to be your best friend, admitted his feelings to you. But you’re happy, Luke’s happy, and with the boys’ and crew’s reaction to the two of you walking back to the area where they’re celebrating, the happiness is infectious.

On the road in the tour bus, Ashton passes you as you respond to emails.

“Thanks for not shutting him out,” he says, drinking a small bottle of water from the fridge.

“Did you know?”

He shrugs, avoiding your eyes as he finishes the bottle and tosses it in the recycling bag. “Maybe,” he walks towards the back where the beds are, “maybe not.”

You shake your head, “You did.”

“Didn’t want to spoil it,” he gives you a quick hug before retreating to bed.

Luke walks out of the bathroom shortly after, taking his spot next to you.

“Go to bed,” you slightly shift your shoulder as he lays his head on it, “you need the rest.”

“No,” he mumbles, sleep lacing his tone, “feels like a dream. Don’t wanna wake up.”

You chuckle at his nonsense, finishing off the last email before shutting the laptop and placing it on the counter next to you. You adjust yourself on the couch to have Luke lay down with you. He readjusts himself so he doesn’t crush you, wrapping his arm around your waist and placing his head on your chest.

“I wish I had known before all the drama,” he mumbles again, eyes closed, “I want you in my life, always.”

He drifts off to sleep with that, a faint smile on his lips.

You know what made you fall in love with your best friend. You accept it now, and you’re at peace knowing the feeling is mutual.

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zeppelin-and-unicorns · 3 years

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"Don't do that" + Hyde and Donna friendship! Also you don't have to follow this prompt but I imagined Donna catching Hyde before he cheats on Jackie with the nurse and he tells her and she stops him :)

Donna was walking back to her house when she saw an enraged Hyde leaving through the backdoor. He looked more pissed than she'd ever seen him.

"Hyde, what's with the long face?" Donna asked when they crossed paths.

"Why don't you ask Kelso and Jackie?" He spat at her, walking away from the house. Donna followed him "I was so fucking stupid, should've known better than to date her, she makes guys stupid"

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Jackie and I are done," Hyde said "That's what I'm talking about. Now stop following me because I need to go do something"

Donna ran and placed herself in front of Hyde, preventing him to walk any further.

"Don't do that" Donna said firmly, making Hyde finally look her in the eye "If you do what you're thinking about, then you and Jackie will be over for good"

"She's been messing around with Kelso behind my back this whole time, we're already over for good" Hyde argued. He turned around to leave, but Donna forcefully grabbed his arm.

"Think about it, Hyde," Donna said "For once, put your stupid rage aside and actually think about how stupid this whole thing is. Kelso has been trying to break you and Jackie up since he found out about you guys. Jackie could've gotten back together with him multiple times, but she didn't because she loves you. Not him, you."

"Yeah, she really looked like she loved me when she was stroking Kelso's hair on your couch," Hyde said bitterly "Let me go, Donna"

"Not if you're going to do something you'll regret later!"

"Let me go, Donna!"

"No!" She said as she dragged him through her backyard "You're not going to do anything, not until you actually know what happened, you dillhole!"

"Donna, I'm gonna hurt you"

"Shut up, Hyde," Donna said, opening the backdoor again and pushing him inside the kitchen "Come here"

"Donna, man, don't make me..."

"Look, Hyde, Jackie would never sleep with Kelso again. She told me that many times" Donna said "You have no idea how many nights I've spent awake because Jackie can't shut up about how much she loves you and how she wants to spend the rest of her life with you. If she's cheating on you with Kelso of all people, then Red is running for the Nobel Peace Prize"

"I've seen them, Donna. Now just let me go, man, please"

"No. You're going to see them again, and this time, you're sticking around to see what's really happening. Jackie makes you happy, Hyde, and I'm not going to let you ruin that. Now shut up or they'll see us" She whispered and grabbed his arm again, gently opening the door to the living room.

They could now clearly see the sight of Kelso and Jackie, and it made Hyde sick. He tensed up, but he knew any attempt to leave with Donna by his side would be futile.

Kelso still had his head on Jackie's shoulders, but his hands were resting on his lap. Jackie was gently stroking his hair and mumbling some words to him, but Hyde didn't bother listening.

Then he saw Kelso moving his hand to rest on top of Jackie's breast, and the rage took over him again. He was about to turn around to leave, but Donna blocked the exit and forced him to watch everything.

"Michael, what the hell are you doing?!" Jackie slapped Kelso's hand, and pushed him away as far from her as she could "I'm with Steven, don't touch me!"

"I need to see if I'm gay or not!" Kelso argued, and Jackie threw a pillow at him

"Michael, you're not gay just because Fez had a weird sex dream about you!" Jackie yelled, throwing another pillow at him

"Don't yell at me, I'm sad!"

"Fez had what?!" Donna asked, not being able to contain her laughter and announcing her and Hyde's presence to the group.

"Nothing!"

"Oh, shut up, Michael! Fez had a dream where Michael was a nurse, and he was giving him a sponge bath, and they had sex!" Jackie said, still looking pissed at Kelso "We had that talk before, Michael! Don't ever touch me like that again!"

"I just figured, you were already comforting me, so..." Kelso tried to explain, but Jackie slapped the back of his head.

"So you assumed I would sleep with you even though I'm dating your best friend? God, you're a moron!" Jackie yelled and went to stand by Donna and Hyde "This is what I get for being nice! I should've listened to my mom! Michael, the next time you're sad, you're crying on Eric's bony shoulders!"

"But... It'll bruise my beautiful face, Jackie!" Kelso argued, and Hyde finally woke up from his stupor and took a threatening step in Kelso's direction.

"Oh, I would run if I were you, Kelso" Donna said with an amused smile, and Kelso dry-swallowed.

"You're dead!" Hyde said, and Kelso opened the front door and started running. He was about to run after Kelso, when he felt a gentle touch on his arm.

"Steven, you can kill Michael later," Jackie said, wrapping her arm around his waist and resting her head on his chest "I'm sorry I didn't listen to you, Michael is a pig and I'll never be alone with him again"

Hyde glanced at Donna before looking down at Jackie, his shoulders slumping at the weight of his guilt.

He jumped to conclusions, Jackie wasn't cheating on him with Kelso, and if Donna hadn't shown up...

Hyde doesn't want to think about what would happen.

He wrapped his arms around her and buried his face in her hair, breathing in the scent of her strawberry shampoo.

"I love you" He whispered in her ear, pressing a kiss to her temple afterward. He looked at her shocked face and couldn't help but smile a little "Don't say anything right now, wait till I get rid of Donna"

She nodded, and he planted a chaste kiss to her lips before letting her go and walking towards Donna, who was still standing near the kitchen door and had a shit-eating grin on her face.

"Shut up," Hyde said with a small smile "Thanks, man. Really"

"That's what friends are for," Donna said, "You need to think more and do less, Hyde. You could've really screwed up the best thing that ever happened to you"

He sighed "I know that, man. Thank you"

"I'm going," She said, looking at him, the grin still plastered on her face "I need to tell Eric about Fez's dream. You two -- don't defile my couch, my dad and I watch movies there"

"Sure thing, Pinciotti. Thanks again, man"

Donna just waved at them before leaving Jackie and Hyde alone in the room. Jackie was sitting on the couch, with a stunned look on her face, and Hyde sat next to her.

"You really meant it?" She asked, her eyes glassy

He smiled at her and cradled her face in his hands "Yeah man, I meant it. I love you"

"I love you too" She smiled back, and glued her lips on his.

Hyde buried his fingers on her hair and let out a happy sigh. He and Jackie are going to need to talk later -- about his trust issues, about Kelso, about everything. But right now... Right now Hyde could only thank the universe for making Donna show up when she did.

Well, that got very sappy in the end. I can't help myself.

That was a GREAT prompt by the way, so thank you for suggesting it! I hope you liked the ficlet!

#ask #prompt game 2.0 #ficlet #jackie and hyde #jackie x hyde #zenmasters #donna pinciotti #steven hyde #jackie burkhart

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ingravinoveritas · 3 years

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I can't with how Michael is honest to god smelling David, he's quite literally breathing him in, I'm... you're in public, good sir

One of the things I liked about Michael immediately and that made me become a fan is his entirely lack of subtlety and how, when he’s really into someone, he can’t help but show his feelings. There are a few people he’s dated where I’ve seen him do something similar to what he’s doing with David--getting so close them, aligning his body and energy toward them--and, as you mentioned, breathing them in. And it’s incredible, and it’s powerful to witness. (It’s also why it’s very obvious when he isn’t into someone that way, because his body language is totally different.)

Quite simply put, it’s that feeling that, when Michael is genuinely, fully into someone, he doesn’t care if he’s in public, and he won’t hold back. I feel like we kept seeing that again and again on the GO press tour, and all I can think of is what we will be treated to this time around, especially given how Michael and David have grown even closer over the course of the pandemic. Two years ago, we had Michael staring at David’s lips, Michael scenting David, Michael calling David his lover, David saying he should’ve married Michael, Michael saying he’s the mother of David’s baby, and just an incredible amount of longing looks and flirting all around in countless interviews and on the red carpet. So what will happen this time? Behind the scenes selfies during filming? Holding hands (or more) at the premieres?

Or maybe it won’t even be something overt. Michael and David tend to be very good at saying and conveying what they feel without saying a word, so perhaps all we’ll need to look at is their eyes. I’m reminded of the last scene in the second series of Staged. We get that lovely moment of Michael standing outside David’s car window with David’s overjoyed expression and Michael barely containing himself. But what I think is so telling is when they put their masks on and David rolls down the window, because all we see is their eyes:

This gif doesn’t do it complete justice, but when you watch this moment, it’s like everything and everyone else fades away, and it’s only Michael and David. David’s eyes are the warmest I’ve ever seen them, and both his and Michael’s eyes crinkle at the corners as they look at each other, and it’s just gorgeous.

So there are any number of possibilities for what could happen when GO 2 is being filmed/when it comes out, and the one thing we know for sure that being public isn’t going to stop Michael from showing us exactly how he feels about David. Lovely...

#anonymous #reply post #michael sheen #welsh seduction machine #david tennant #soft scottish hipster gigolo #good omens #michael is about as subtle as a drunken llama on roller skates #david is definitely more subtle than michael #but he knows how to speak volumes without saying a word #can't wait to watch #amazing #ineffable lovers #good omens rpf #discourse #gif by me

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mittensmorgul · 3 years

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As Above, So Below

I’m still trying to pinpoint exactly why the focus on “heaven is fixed and actually a paradise now!” is just so deeply unsatisfying to me. And I think I need to preface this with a bit of backstory about me, because I think that gives the rest of this essay some relevant context.

I know this isn’t relevant to my main point here, but this is a metatextual and thematically identical example of the exact thing I’m gonna lay out, because context is always helpful. So please forgive this seemingly irrelevant detour, because I promise it will be relevant by the end.

(plus, would it really be an Essay By Mittens™ without at least one baffling tangent? no, it would not!)

Tangent time!

I think everyone that follows me knows how skeptical I was... or should I say how WARY I was of the way Eileen was returned to the narrative this season. We were warned in the PREVIOUS EPISODE how much Chuck was attempting to interfere in their lives. I was accused of some very nasty things, of hating the ship, or hating the character of Eileen, or of hating Sam and not wanting them to be happy. No amount of pointing at obvious warning signs in the text, no amount of yelling about Sam’s God Wound or the absolute klaxon warning that the wound had become “quiet” and his Chuck-O-Vision Nightmares had apparently stopped seemed to matter. I was declared “wrong” and told to shut up.

And then 15.09 happened, and basically everything I’d been wary of was shown to be what actually happened, but there were still unresolved issues. Eileen doubted her own feelings and walked away. She doubted what was actually real. And at the time, I said many times that I would be thrilled to see those issues resolved by the end of the season, and for her to truly know that what she’d felt growing between her and Sam was real. And by the end of the season, despite my personal horror at her previous situation (and having that personal horror compounded by the fandom literally gaslighting me and attempting to bully me into ignoring this basic actual plot detail of this specific growth process which... in the context of what my personal objection was to accepting her return at face value in the first place having been personal trauma associated with gaslighting and manipulation...) by the time 15.18 aired, I was 100% convinced that Sam and Eileen had fully chosen each other, and felt the traumatic pain Sam suffered during that text conversation with her during the snap. She NEEDED to come back, because she had been set up to be part of Sam’s Win. They were clearly each other’s future.

The show literally put in all the work to make even *me* feel this to be True and Right and Good. And then after that point we never even hear Eileen’s name again. We never were told that she was even returned at the end of 15.19. Sam, who had been so entirely devastated by her disappearance in the previous episode that he couldn’t even process it was apparently hit with an amnesia hammer and just... never even thought about her again through a long greyscale life with a blurry baby Dean factory vaguely in the background of a single scene of his life. I can’t credit or justify how after an entire year invested in making us all truly care about Sam and Eileen and the happiness they found in each other if only the cosmos would allow them to choose each other in the end would just... erase all of that in the series finale.

Which brings me to the second tangent, which is specifically about *me,* and how I feel about the cosmic order in the television show Supernatural. Because I feel a lot about it. Probably more than most people ever did. And this is also important to understanding the main underlying point I need to make here.

Something I’ve been most looking forward to, for YEARS, about Supernatural eventually ending someday was writing a book, or a thesis, or even just organizing and compiling all my observations into a cohesive narrative specifically about the cosmology of the Supernatural universe. I’ve been cobbling together my observations and realizations about the nature of heaven, hell, purgatory, the empty, the alternate universes we’ve seen, and yes, even the cosmic function of the mundane level of the story as told by events that transpired on Earth. So of everyone watching this dumb show for the last 15 years, I don’t actually know anyone who cared more that I did about finding a satisfactory resolution and transformation of every plane of existence-- the mortal world AND the “afterlife realms” we’ve experienced on this show. And in the wake of the finale, I feel cheated out of that. Because in the end, it wasn’t about the triumph of free will and a flip of the script, it was just more of the same.

And now that I have those two preliminaries out of the way, I’ll finally get to the point. :’D

(hooray, it didn’t even take 1k words to get there for once!)

The “main stage” of Supernatural has always been Earth. It’s always been “Humanity.” At the very start, we meet two men whose lives had always been dictated to them by higher powers. At first, that “higher power” was their father who raised them in his vengeance mission, who trained them to hunt the supernatural. It was the inciting incident of the entire series, after all, their realization that forces outside of their control had irrevocably altered the course of their lives. It had forever torn down what they’d trusted in family, in personal safety, and would become something they couldn’t outrun or fight back against for long before another wave of cosmic discord would settle over them once more.

We watched this story play out in ever increasing spheres of cosmic significance, until Gabriel laid it out on the table for them in the simplest possible terms (in 5.08).

GABRIEL: You do not know my family. What you guys call the apocalypse, I used to call Sunday dinner. That's why there's no stopping this, because this isn't about a war. It's about two brothers that loved each other and betrayed each other. You'd think you'd be able to relate. SAM: What are you talking about? GABRIEL: You sorry sons of bitches. Why do you think you two are the vessels? Think about it. Michael, the big brother, loyal to an absent father, and Lucifer, the little brother, rebellious of Daddy's plan. You were born to this, boys. It's your destiny! It was always you! As it is in heaven, so it must be on earth. One brother has to kill the other. DEAN: What the hell are you saying? GABRIEL: Why do you think I've always taken such an interest in you? Because from the moment Dad flipped on the lights around here, we knew it was all gonna end with you. Always. A long pause. SAM and DEAN look down, then at each other. DEAN: No. That's not gonna happen. GABRIEL: I'm sorry. But it is. GABRIEL sighs. GABRIEL: Guys. I wish this were a TV show. Easy answers, endings wrapped up in a bow...but this is real, and it's gonna end bloody for all of us. That's just how it's gotta be. ***

And isn’t that all even 1000x more painfully ironic that it all still happened even 10 years later? It was always going to end with them. And lol, “I wish this were a TV show” because if it was then it wouldn’t have to end bloody.

But this… was a Major Acknowledgement that the meta level of this story was consistent, and was telling us something important. It demonstrated that the Cosmic Structure Itself was the cause for Sam and Dean’s “destiny” in this story. But that’s not what the point of this story has ever been.

Nobody (including me, who is literally obsessed with this aspect of the story) has ever invested themselves in the narrative of Supernatural because they cared about the fate of the cosmic order over and above the fate of the characters who had committed to overthrowing it all, to “tearing up the pages” and writing their own destinies. I mean, we became invested because Sam, Dean, and Cas as characters took us by the hand and invited us to come along with them as they battled against fate for the good of EARTH and HUMANITY.

And certainly, Heaven being a horrific sort of eternal replay of the “highlights” of individual souls greatest hits, where free will didn’t apply as everyone was just boxed away into their individual holodecks to serve as some sort of giant Heaven Battery powering the furtherance of this narrative, this “cosmic order” that had become so powerful it dictated the events and manipulated the lives of people who still existed in the ostensible realm of free will and human life on Earth… that couldn’t stand in the end. But what the narrative (and people I’ve seen attempting to justify the finale as narratively sensible) seems to have forgotten was that all of that was Chuck’s construct to begin with. That without Chuck holding his kingdom in Heaven together, the walls of all those soul cubicles ceased to even be relevant.

After spending their entire lives to this point constantly fighting their way to the absolute pinnacle of the As Above, So Below narrative and pulling the plug on the original creator himself, Humanity should’ve triumphed. And I’d argue that it DID, through Jack restoring the missing essential “humanity” to the divine condition. And, silly me, I thought they’d achieved the promise of “paradise” heralded by Jack’s birth at last, and truly “flipped the entire script of the narrative.”

Ever since they thwarted the original apocalypse, I had hope that they would continue to achieve the same result right up the ladder. Metatron trying to fill the role of Chuck Junior hit his own narrative wall in TFW, while Dean’s battle with the Mark of Cain, and Cain telling him he was “living my life in reverse” and would succumb to destiny by killing his loved ones in the “reverse order” to Cain’s own path to downfall cemented this for me. Dean not only failed to kill any of his loved ones (you didn’t kill your own brother. why?), he SAVED them. He didn’t fulfil the prophecy in reverse, he subverted it. He UNMADE it.

Perhaps I was thinking on too grand a scale, that the ultimate inversion wouldn’t be “God is overthrown and replaced by more of the same,” but “God is overthrown and the entire order of the universe is restructured from the bottom up rather than the top down.

I’d hoped against hope that the conclusion of the narrative would be “As below, so above,” with the fundamental power of human love becoming the new foundation of the cosmic order. It never even occurred to me that “taking back the narrative to rewrite it for ourselves” was not the ultimate goal of Team Free Will, or the ultimate expression of their biggest win.

This whole “well heaven really needed to be rebuilt, there was still work to be done!” seems… irrelevant to me if they’d truly won free of the cosmic narrative. The entire structure of the universe-- including Heaven and Hell-- should’ve defaulted to the paradise state that Jack was literally born to bring to fruition. Wasn’t that the point of his entire role in the story, ultimately?

And if that wasn’t the case in the end, why did we never learn the fate of Hell? Was it just… irrelevant and unchanged after this? Or just… abandoned as a concept entirely? It’s just strange to me to put such a focus on heaven being the sole sphere of import in the end that it undercuts the essential humanity of the narrative for me.

The story itself had kept Heaven on a back burner for years, only occasionally mentioning that the structure of the place was falling further and further into disrepair with a dwindling force of angels struggling to keep the walls in place at all, that it seems like it could’ve been an afterthought at the end of the series rather than a focus so large it required the death of both main characters to make sure we all understood that Heaven Had Changed Now. Because TFW had never been fighting to make Heaven right. They’d been fighting to save the world itself, for humanity to all have a chance to live their lives as their own.

And we didn’t need to see that in the final hope they might get their own lives on Earth to explore. In the end, the fundamental narrative that Life On Earth was dictated by the cosmic structure of creation was never fully subverted. And for me, that’s the main reason I just… can’t accept the finale. It wasn’t a victory of free will and humanity, in the end it was just more of the same.

I appreciate the attempts to take the essential bones of the story we did get and apply a different polish to the surface of the skeleton, but to me it still feels like we’re looking at completely different beasts in the end. Like… to me this was as jarring a revelation as those drawing of modern animals reimagined as dinosaurs entirely based on their skeletons. Like, all along the narrative told me I was looking at a swan. They told me this skeleton they’re building out from is definitely a swan, without a doubt. I know what a swan looks like-- a graceful feather-covered bird with magnificent wings. I trusted that in the end it would be at least remotely swan-looking. And then the finale ended up looking like this

and I just don’t even know where everything went so wrong. Or maybe all along I just assumed they actually knew what a swan looked like, but weren’t sure they could actually pull it off and settled for whatever the heck this is instead. Either way, I’m actually kinda grateful to the finale for being so entirely disappointing on every level, because otherwise I probably would’ve tried to adopt the monstrosity of it anyway. And I’m really, really glad I don’t have to.

#spn 15.20 #spn cosmology #heaven hell purgatory and the empty #and this is why no amount of narrative defense of the finale is capable of making me feel any better about it #i admit i thought too big... but it was all right there in the narrative to see #oh well at least all i have to do to hold on to my grandest notion of the universe is throw out the finale :'D

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seventeenwrites · 3 years

Text

Catharsis - Chapter Two

-> Group: The Boyz

-> Type: Short Series

-> Member(s) of Interest: Sunwoo

-> Word Count: ~2.9k

-> Genre: angst, fluff, apocalypse au

-> Warnings: alien apocalypse, guns/weapons, blood, violence, death, cursing, female MC

-> Playlist: Hold You in My Arms by Ray LaMontagne; All Right Now by Angel Olsen; Saccharine by Atta Boy; Love & Hate by Michael Kiwanuka

-> a/n: Hey guys! Here's chapter two! Again, I want to emphasize that my goal with this series is to portray a kind of love which transcends any kind of labels we’ve assigned to love (romantic, platonic, familial, etc.). It may seem a bit hard-and-fast, but I think that is a reflection of the world around these characters. When you don’t know if you will live to see another day, when you are surrounded by death and tragedy, you live and you love without regrets, or at least you try your damnedest to.

Catharsis.

And then, fortunately, my eyes opened. Now, this wasn’t fortunate because I was alive, but rather because of the way I was alive. The fire that had separated Sunwoo and I the night before had died, but the coals were still glowing, so that they could easily be re-ignited. Just beyond the pit lay Sunwoo, still sleeping. One of his shoes had been thrown six feet away in the middle of the night, and his left arm was almost completely smothering his face.

Before I had time to laugh at him, a voice interrupted me.

“Oh, Ari! I’m assuming Sunny filled you in last night.” I whipped my head in the direction of the voice, to find the same man who had yelled at us the night before. Jacob, right? When not puffy-faced and half-asleep, he was much better-looking. He wasn’t smiling, but his eyes popped out and his cheekbones were raised nonetheless, in a way that reminded me of my mother's face in her youth. Next to Jacob was another man, who I could immediately tell was the leader of whatever this place was. His nose high on his face and his brow heavy, he was reminiscent of a Renaissance sculpture, elegantly beautiful, yet intimidatingly powerful. He was also impressively clean; everything from his ears to his nail beds were devoid of even a single smudge of dirt.

“Oh. Uh, yeah. I think so,” I said, sitting up and wrapping the blanket around myself, suddenly self-conscious of my dirty T-shirt and basketball shorts.

“Good. Sangyeon and I are gonna go collect more firewood. There’s berries and nuts in those if you get hungry.” Jacob pointed to a collection of miscellaneous containers by the centermost tent. Wooden crates, mason jars, old metal lunch boxes decorated with superheroes and princesses, even a piggy bank. Resourceful. Smart, I thought to myself. I turned back to the two men, to find that Jacob had already started walking away. Sangyeon still stood before me and assessed me for a few seconds, slightly nodding his head and furrowing his brow.

“We’ll be back,” he said before slinging a backpack over one shoulder and following Jacob out of the camp. I didn’t blame him. If I was running a camp and one of my members suddenly showed up with a random girl, I would be suspicious, too.

As the day got brighter, more of the members woke up and came to greet me, and I got to know more about who these people were and how this place worked. There was Kevin, who came out of the same tent as Jacob, and who was a self-proclaimed genius chef, but judging by the defined musculature on his small figure, he was useful for more than his culinary skills. In the next tent there was Changmin and Chanhee, who seemed to be attached at the hip; they were both lean, perfect for long-distance running. The next tent housed Eric and Haknyeon, who were both robust and muscular, obvious fighters. The last tent was home to Juyeon, Younghoon, and Hyunjae, who entered last and were all visibly athletic, with their long and sturdy physiques. I had finally figured it out. This place was a powerhouse. No Echo would be a match for these boys.

“Always tardy, huh, sleepyheads?” Changmin jested towards the last three to join our circle around the dead fire.

“SHHH!” Eric suddenly play-whispered, “You’ll wake the baby.” He pointed towards Sunwoo’s still-sleeping figure.

“Eric, you’re literally younger than him,” Kevin laughed while trying to catch berries in his mouth, and failing. Hilariously.

“By like eight months!” Eric shouted, a slight pout donning his face.

“That’s pretty significant, if you ask me.” We all looked down at Sunwoo, whose arm was still covering his eyes, but whose mouth was visibly quivering to maintain a laugh. He peeked out beneath his arm to see what Eric’s response would be, but Haknyeon was already holding Eric back.

“Okay, babies. Let’s calm down. Jacob and Sangyeon will be back soon and I’m sure they’ll have food.” Juyeon hushed-- his voice had a way of calming the boys down that could only have been achieved through years of trust and reliability. His voice and the mention of food seemed to lull the pretend conflict, and pretty soon, side conversations enveloped the entire group. I sat and watched Sunwoo. He was chatting with Kevin who was right next to him, and he was laughing at something, his head thrown back. I found myself smiling. Two smiles in 24 hours. That’s gotta be a record.

Sunwoo’s eyes met mine and I felt my heart leap. He excused himself from his conversation and walked over to sit next to me, placing his hand on top of mine. Again, I noted just how soft his hands were. And warm too, compared to the frigid morning air. As if feeling his warmth made me colder, a shiver traveled down my spine.

“Cold?” Sunwoo asked. I nodded in reply. “Let me in there, then,” he said, pointing at my blanket. I opened it and he stuck himself into my arms, grabbing them to close on top of him. He was warm. Physically, but he also warmed me from the inside, like drinking a cup of hot cocoa after playing in the snow, or getting a hug from your mom after your first piano recital. He felt like home.

-------

When Jacob and Sangyeon came back, they were dragging a deer behind them, backpacks chock full of firewood. The boys all scrambled up excitedly; I could only make out random interjections and complaints about hunger from the younger ones.

“You’ll finally get to see me in action, Ari,” Kevin quipped, gathering random tools and ingredients to cook the deer with.

Sangyeon walked up to Sunwoo and I, placing his bag by his feet and looking me up and down, just like he had before he left. Still suspicious of me, I guess. He turned his eyes to the boy next to me, looking him up and down as well, and started, “Go get some water from the stream, will you?”

“Sangyeon, come on! It’s been three weeks already, surely I can do something else?”

“Sunny, I’m sorry, but your legs obviously just not healed yet.”

Sunwoo looked as though he was going to protest again, but Jacob cut in before he could: “Doctor’s orders, bud. I’ll take a look at it again later today.”

Shoulders slumped, Sunwoo dramatically sighed and grabbed my hand, dragging me along with him.

“I’ve been on water duty for three weeks, now. I mean, I understand. They care about me; they want me to be safe, and the path to the stream is clear and short-- almost impossible to get hurt. But like, come on. Three weeks of getting water. I’m sick of this damn path!” He joked, swatting a vine out of his way.

“What happened to your leg, anyway?” I asked. “If you don’t mind sharing,” I quickly added, suddenly afraid that it was too personal.

Sunwoo stopped in his tracks, looking at the ground. I could see the wheels turning in his head, as if he was trying to figure out how much of himself to reveal to me. He sighed and let go of my hand, turning to face me. His eyebrows were furrowed as he looked at me, the morning sunlight shining only on the right half of his face.

“It was about two months ago. A few of us were out looking for clothes and other essentials. We figured we’d go about ten miles east and get to the city that used to be there, hit all of the convenience stores and shopping malls. But we strayed too far from camp, and we got lost on our way back. By sundown we were in the middle of the woods with no shelter, no food, nothing.

“We were ambushed in the middle of the night. Those bastards were wearing our own faces. We couldn’t tell who was real and who was an Echo. Hyunjae did this to me,” he said, referencing his injured ankle, “Pushed me into a big tree trunk. I forgive him, obviously. It was crazy, and he was trying to protect himself. That same night…” he trailed off.

I could tell that he was about to cry, since he was starting to choke on his words, “That same night, I-- I killed one of our guys. Didn’t know it was him until it was too late, until he was already bleeding red. I shot him. He was flailing around all crazy-like with his knife. I didn’t know if he was him or an Echo, so I shot him. I should've-- I should’ve shot his foot, or his hand, to see his blood. But I didn’t. I got him right underneath the heart. Missed it by a hair. So I held him as he went. For thirteen minutes, I held him. I looked him in the eyes as the life left ‘em and I held his hands as they went limp. That poor fucking bastard, I’m so sorry to him.”

Sunwoo was crying. It was a cry I had never seen or heard from a human before. It was absolutely, heart-wrenchingly tragic, and the only thing I could do for him was hold him. I didn’t tell him that it wasn’t his fault, because he knew that already. I didn’t tell him that he was still a good person, because he knew that already. I didn’t tell him that I loved him, because he knew that, too.

I didn’t tell him that his member was in a better place, because we both knew it wasn’t true.

-------

When we got to the stream, we were holding hands again. Sunwoo was still wiping tears off of his face with his free hand, but he was smiling again.

“Whaddya say, Ari? Care for a little dip before we head back?” Sunwoo teased, rocking his shoulders as if to say I’m joking, but if you’re down, then I’m really fucking down.

“Fine, kid,” I chortled, “but only because that water looks deliciously crisp right now.”

I turned away to place all of the water buckets on the ground, and when I turned back, Sunwoo was standing a yard or two away, facing the water. He reached down and took his shirt off in a swift and seamless motion, one which seemed to me only men were capable of performing. The sunlight kissed his skin, illuminating its smooth and tanned surface. The shadows of his shoulder blades danced across his back as he attempted to balance on a stepping stone. The gentle slope of his neck blended seamlessly into the crease of his spine which traveled all the way down his back, like a book that I never wanted to stop reading. His arms, outstretched in a balancing act, were lean, yet capable and sturdy shooting arms, slightly different in size as a reflection of his right-handedness.

He turned around to look at me, a wide smile on his face. His eyes were still bloodshot and puffy from crying, and his face still splotchy, but his smile-- his smile was brighter than the light of any sun. I didn’t think I had ever seen anyone or anything so beautiful in my life. I smiled back at him, and I felt my own eyes start to well up with tears.

“Come on, Ari! This stream isn’t gonna skinny-dip itself!” Forgiving his slightly awkward--yet adorable--phrasing, I accepted his challenge, jumping in with him.

As our heads both emerged, we held hands under the water, my thumb rubbing the soft skin of his. He leaned in and placed a kiss on the top of my ear, before settling his face into the crook of my neck. And then, again, we felt like nothing more than an extension of the earth below our feet and the sky above our heads.

Catharsis.

-------

Sunwoo and I arrived back at camp and we were met with ten horrified faces. To be fair, we looked an absolute mess. Our clothes were sopping wet, hanging off of our bodies like rags. As our feet had been too wet to put our shoes back on, we walked back barefoot, as evidenced by the dirt, mud, and scratches littering our ankles and calves. Our hair, like something out of a horror movie, dangling in front of our faces in stringy and curly sections.

“Sunny! What the heck, dude?” Jacob cried, staring in shock at Sunwoo’s now dirty and tattered bandage on his ankle. Sunwoo half-smiled, scratching the back of his neck.

“Sorry, Cobie. You should’ve seen the stream today! It was so beautiful; we just had to swim in it!” He replied, a slight pout on his lips.

Chanhee was sitting at the fire a few feet away, a sly smile engulfing his face. “Oh sure,” he teased, “Swimming. I bet that’s all you two were doing.” He puckered his lips and wrapped his arms around himself, a type of mockery I hadn’t seen since high school. I couldn’t help but giggle at him, even if he was jumping to conclusions, and incorrect ones, at that.

Sunwoo and I hadn’t kissed. We didn’t need to, and maybe we never would. We only needed to hold each other. And frankly, that’s all I wanted to do for the rest of my days.

As Jacob unwrapped the bandage from Sunwoo’s ankle, his smile faltered for a second before he replaced it. I knew that look. I grabbed his wrist to stop him.

“What is it?” Jacob looked at me, contemplating, then turned to Sunwoo and sighed. He resumed his faux angry persona from earlier, resembling a loving parent.

“This is why I told you to be careful, Sunny! The wound must have reopened at some point, and you got it dirty when you were out there. It should be fine if we wash it and dress it with herbs, but you’re gonna have to stay off of it for longer-- and no more playing in dirt, for Christ’s sake, Sunny.” Sunwoo looked like a child getting scolded for tracking dirt into the house, but I could see the twinkle of mischief still ever-bright in his innocent eyes.

Sangyeon walked over to us, still as reserved and stoic as ever. He looked me over as he always did, eyes filled with suspicion and piqued interest. He turned to Jacob, who I had figured out was something of a second-in-command.

“We’ve received word of a pack about a mile west. We should head out now, while it’s still bright out,” he turned to look at Sunwoo, still talking to Jacob“This is sort of an all-hands-on-deck situation. Is he okay to shoot?”

Sunwoo replied for Jacob by standing up, still young and eager to prove himself, “I’m fine, I promise! I’m not in pain, and my ankle won’t affect my shooting if I’m sniping. Sir.” Sangyeon looked Sunwoo up and down, slightly nodding his head, then reached out to pat him on the shoulder.

“Don’t get hurt again, buddy. We can’t lose anyone else.” That was the first time I had seen Sangyeon let his guard down, and I even saw a tear slip out of the corner of his left eye. Sunwoo bit his lip in an attempt to suppress the tears he had already let go that morning. Sangyeon was quick to wipe it and resume his cold air, though, and he turned to look at me, unsure of what to do with me.

“What do you mean you received word? And why are you seeking out Echoes? Shouldn’t we be, like, hiding from them?” I asked.

Sangyeon stared at me again. “I hear you’re good with a knife.”

“Not good. Excellent.”

He nodded and walked off, leaving my questions unanswered, to which I looked at Sunwoo in disbelief.

A slight smile spread across Sunwoo’s face and he started walking towards one of the smaller tents, expecting me to follow him. When I walked in, I saw more radios than I had ever seen in my life. Old ones that couldn’t have been less than 60 years old, the ones that were built into flashlights, walkie talkies, even old car radios.

“Kid, what the hell is this?” I asked, dumbfounded.

“This, Ari, is anything that can send or receive signals through the next hundred miles. Over the year and a half we’ve been here, we’ve found all of them.”

“B--But why?”

“So we can get them before they get us. There are lots of us out there, we send word to each other if we see or hear of Echoes that we can’t get ourselves.”

The wheels in my head were turning so quickly, and I still couldn’t understand it.

“So-- So you guys actually… hunt Echoes? You don’t just run from them?”

“That’s right. And we’re gonna keep hunting them. Until every one of those bastards is six feet under.”

It all finally made sense. How organized and resourceful they all were. How skilled they all were at fighting. The hierarchy and positions they all assumed, with Sangyeon at the top. This wasn’t a camp.

It was a machine. An Echo-hunting machine.

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