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You will not freeze to death if you take the appropriate measures, Parker. It's only obvious. Well, you can happily stay inside like a hibernating bear, and I will be outside, anchoring my show as I usually do, seeing as I'm not afraid of the impossible.

A little snow? Your definition and my definition of a little is a lot different. Responsibilities can’t freeze to death either, but I sure can. I think I’ll happily stay where I am.

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You're letting a little snow stop you from going out? Hah! Come on, Parker, live a little, won't you? Responsibilities don't wait for the weather to clear up.

With this blizzard going on I suppose I have to resort back to this website if I want to keep communications with others going. It’s been awhile though, how is everyone?

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IRIS WEST’S INFINITE PLAYLIST ► TRACK 009; GOODNESS GRACIOUS BY ELLIE GOULDING

i lost a signal and put you away swore upon my sun i'd save you for a rainy day loosened the noose then let go of the rope i know it's never coming back it has to go

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Iris simply laughed at Lois's answer, shaking her head slightly at her friend's adventures. She could only imagine the sheer dedication that drove Lois into dangerous situation -- well, perhaps not imagine any longer, but more so empathize nowadays. She caught the menu thrown at her swiftly, opening it and eyeing the words, but not truly comprehending what she was reading. After a moment, the inevitable question came, to which Iris replied with a small sigh and her gaze meeting Lois's. "I took the wrong train," she said honestly, looking back down at her menu. "Well, this place certainly has no variety," she deadpanned, closing the book. "It's bland. The only good thing about it is it serves breakfast all day."

Once Iris was sitting across from Lois, she smiled brightly at her, knowing she already put the puzzle pieces together. This was only once encounter they had together while Lois was dressed in a disguise. The list was longer than she’d like to admit. “Norwegian.” Grabbing the menus that were stashed behind the condiments rack, she tossed one towards Iris. They might as well eat while they were here. Her eyes scanned the lists of choices, narrowing for a minute as she realized something. Lois dropped the menu to the table, her eyes locked onto Iris as she sat back against the booth, arms crossed. “Iris,” she started, voice curious, innocently so. “How did you end up in Gotham City?” Already, Lois knew the answer, but she decided to let Iris tell her, seeing if she would or if she’d try to squirm her way out of it.

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Merry Christmas, everyone. Apart from the long day of work, I'm definitely stuffed. That was my gift this year -- a table full of fattening food I had no trouble and/or shame eating. 

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It was unfortunate, how often this happened as Lois Lane's friend. One could only learn never to ask questions when it came to her -- and simply follow directions. So when Lois prompted to Iris to follow her, she did as she was told, keeping her distance and warily glancing around the silent city's streets -- as always, she felt as if the buildings were glaring at her, wind whispering to get the fuck out, but Iris ignored them just as well as she had the last time, following her friend to a diner somewhere in the corner of a busier street, ducking in and sliding in the furthest booth across from Lois. She placed both her hands on the table, entwined, and offered Lois a smile. "I suppose you're working," she stated, tilting her head, waiting for assent. "What are you -- Russian? Norwegian? Polish?"

Lois’ heart automatically slowed when she saw Iris’ face, relieved that it wasn’t someone who caught onto her disguise. Someone who wanted to kill her and then make it as she never existed — wiped clean from the world. “What—no, I’m not—” A shadow a few blocks away cut her off and struck a sense of fear in her once again. It made her realize just how this exchange could look if she was in fact being tailed by anyone keeping tabs on her. Talking to one of the most well-known news reporters. “Keep your distance. Follow me.” Lois whispered. Without another word or explanation, she turned on her heel and started walking as normal. Her breathing was a little unsteady. Once she turned a corner and caught sight of a small diner, she made her way across the street, and ducked inside. There was an empty booth in a far corner that she made her way to, taking her wig off as she sat on one side and waited for Iris to join her.

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She wasn't sure what she was expecting -- maybe, who knew, Peter limp against her, awkwardly patting at her back and pretending this wasn't happening. What she hadn't at all expected, however, was his arms to wrap around her comfortably, rubbing gently at her back, and his voice whispering reassurances to her. She held on tighter and laughed once, shaking her head in his shoulder, muttering against the fabric there so that her voice was muffled. "I'm so sorry you have to be the one to put up with me," she told him honestly. "I know you just do it because of Barry, but I don't -- I don't think I've ever thanked you for it," she finished quietly. "So, thank you, Parker."

Peter’s hand fell from her wrist once he saw she had turned around. The sniffle had him worried, after all Peter didn’t know what to do when it came to crying girls… Now a crying Barry he had down pat at this point, but anyone else and he was at a loss as to what to do. As Iris’ arms wrapped around him he stiffened slightly before looking down at the top of her head. Peter recalled what his aunt did when he was a child and would wake up crying for his mother though and he went with that. That had always made him feel safe and cared for after all. So he wrapped his arms around her and drew her in closer to him. “Hey, it’s okay. You’re going to be okay.” He whispered softly to her as he rubbed her back gently.

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Sometimes, when Iris needed to escape, she went to Star City, lay down in the city's center and watched the stars. Sometimes, however, Iris decided to take the train rather than her car, and sometimes, she took the wrong trains -- especially if this "sometime" was a time when she was emotionally altered and pathetically alone. Gotham City was the last place she wanted to be, but she held Green Arrow's phone near her securely, knowing full well that she could dial if she found herself in any trouble -- then again, she wasn't sure she would. Wasn't sure she'd pick up if it rang, either: it was strange, the hesitance but the simultaneous reassurance carried with the phone, and she walked aimlessly down the streets of Gotham as she stroked at it idly in her pocket, wondering if she should have simply hopped on the next train and gotten out of there right away. Maybe it was her newfound sense of danger, or her obvious death wish, but she opted for walking the streets, and was stopped immediately when someone turned to her and began calling her out. She blinked, looked at the woman before her, before the woman's eyes flashed in recognition. Iris, still not entirely sure of what was happening, blinked at her, walking towards and trying to recognize as well. Five feet away, she instantly managed to -- bone structure, eyes, posture -- and her eyes widened in surprised. "Lois?" she called out hesitantly. "I believe I should be asking you the same question," she pointed out, gesturing towards her hardly-tamed outfit. "You look -- are you doing prostitute work, Lois? Is this a money thing?" she attempted.

Gotham City was utterly eerie during the night. It was almost pitch black save for broken street lamps that lit the way and shadows always seemed to be looming within the depths of darkness. Lois, dressed head to toe in her newest disguise, was making her way to the nearest subway station as quickly as she could. While she wasn’t scared to be roaming the streets of Gotham — she could take care of herself, always could — after coming from one of Gotham’s most notorious Mafia families, she couldn’t help but be a little on edge. Even though she knew without a doubt that they didn’t recognize her — she played her part without flaw, she could never be too sure. So when she start noticing someone walking behind her, she tensed up. What if they were on to her? Not making an rash decisions or moves, she waited until she was in a better spot — or as better as you could get in Gotham City — and turned around to call the guy or girl out that was following her. Still keeping up her appearance as Nikolina Bjornsen. “Look, I don’t take kindly to being fol—oh.” Lois stopped mid-sentence, realizing that the person she thought had been tailing her wasn’t such at all. In fact it was someone she recognized. “What are you doing down here?” asked Lois, still a bit flustered and tense, her fake, but very believable, Norwegian accent still heavily lacing her voice.

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Iris heard Peter call her name, but there were two reasons why she couldn't let herself turn: one, she really had to get to her parents' house, and two: she needed a hug. A very, very long hug. A Barry hug, more specifically --  but Barry was working, now, as she was supposed to be doing, and she couldn't ask him to give up his work for her. So she needed to go far, far away, before -- and then Peter was taking her wrist, and she froze, unsure of what to do. Peter seemed just as unsure, however, and when Iris turned to look at him, she sniffled like a child would, and without thinking, wrapped her arms around him, burying her face in his shoulder.

Peter tried to give her space, continuing to stand where he was while she talked to whoever it was she needed to. As she approached him though he could see that if she wasn’t sad before she certainly was now. Peter muttered out a simple you’re welcome which she probably didn’t hear, seeing as she was already moving away from him. He watched her go for a second, an internal battle raging in him. “Shit,” he muttered to himself before running after her. Peter called out her name, hoping she would stop. Once he was close enough though he latched on to her wrist and pulled her to a halt. “Iris,” he hadn’t thought this out fully apparently seeing as he had nothing more to say to her now that he had stopped her.

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"Never heard of it," she quipped, taking the phone after Peter unlocked it and offering him a gratuitous smile. "Thanks," she said, before taking a couple of good steps away from him and dialing her father. The phone call was quiet, short, and heartbreaking all the same -- come over for dinner and we'll tell you everything -- and she knew, God, she knew then. She'd discovered the truth. Maybe, this time, her prying nature wasn't exactly her best trait. Maybe, this time, she should have left things as they were. She hung up and walked towards Peter, trying and failing to hold back her emotions. "Ah," she cleared her throat, avoided Peter's eyes. "Here -- thanks." She shoved the phone back in his hands. "I'm gonna go, thanks again, bye," she mentioned, disoriented, turning and walking.

"Yeah Sad. You know that emotion that sometimes people feel when something bad happens?" He sighed, knowing that even with speaking in such a snarky tone would go unnoticed by her. She was just ignoring him at this point, asking him things that she wouldn’t even really listen to. "Sure," Peter sighed taking his phone and quickly unlocking it and handing it back to her. He didn’t believe her for a second, but Peter didn’t put up a fight for right now. She would just keep dancing around the topic and Peter didn’t have the patience for that.

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"Sad?" she muttered disinterestedly, pretending to try and figure Peter's phone out. She turned it over in her hand time and time again, before letting her head snap up and roll her eyes at his repeating question. Of course Peter would blatantly ignore her own question to ask his own -- that's how it worked with Peter Parker and his lack of social grace, she supposed. "I'm positive," she beamed, then handed Peter his phone. "Care to unlock this for me? Contrary to popular belief, I don't know how to do everything," she joked weakly.

The quick change of not only whatever Iris had been feeling before, but her facial expressions as well honestly scared Peter for a moment. He was reminded of all those studies with the people who where feeling sad and as soon as a pen was in their mouth they were happy again. “You just- before you seemed sad?” Peter was starting to doubt how he thought she was feeling. If it weren’t for her words seeming so rushed together he would have believed the whole act. Choosing to ignore her question for him, he turned the conversation back to her. “You’re sure your fine?”

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Taken aback by the face that turned to greet her, Iris took a step back, panicking for all of five seconds before regaining her composure and plastering a wide grin on her face. "Parker!" she clasped her hands together, immediately hiding her previous expression for her sake and his. It was a natural thing to her, after all -- she did work as a news anchor; the face she let people see on their television screens was always a different one from what was normal. She took the phone from him, waving him off. "Of course I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be fine? I was just an idiot and left my phone back at the studio," she explained swiftly. "What are you doing in Central City?" she asked, prolonging the inevitable phone call.

The way the light was hitting the tree in front of him, the way the suns rays were filtering through in fragmented little segments made Peter pause. There was a slight feeling of regret at letting Iris borrow his camera, he knew she needed it for something important but  this would have been a beautiful shot. Peter was just about to move on when he felt the tap on his shoulder. He recognized the voice, “Didn’t you just borrow my camera-” Peter’s words were cut off when he took in how Iris looked. “Iris?” He handed over his phone easily, “Are you okay?”

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This -- what she'd just uncovered, for once, was a truth Iris thought she was better off not knowing. She needed -- what she needed, truly, was to call her parents, allow them a chance to explain, to contain the memories that were threatening to seep through now, taunt her in plain daylight rather than in her dreams. What she didn't have, of course, was her phone: she'd left it back in her dressing room before she took this walk, and, swallowing thickly, she made her way to the first stranger she could spot, finding it difficult to feel ashamed with a heavy heart. "I'm sorry," she spoke, tapping the person on the shoulder lightly. "Do you think I could borrow your phone for, ah, five minutes?"

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TASK: #001 - SEVEN DEADLY SINS (GREED)

GENERAL NOTES: N/A.

She's in Mexico, this time around.

It's where she picks up a smoking habit -- many poor workers living in squalor offer her some so eagerly that at one point, she buys them simply to appease them, but she opens them later and she tries one and she likes it, the feeling of the smoke wrapping around her mouth, building upon her lungs an guiding it out, feeling it wreck her and control her yet empower her -- just for a couple of months, nothing too serious.

("That's a nasty habit," her father will say upon return. She'll throw away the cigarettes and never look at them again.)

But for now, she's smoking, ignoring the large sign inside the cafe that reads "NO SE FUMA" -- pretending she's so American she doesn't know what it means. She's frowning at her laptop, typing furiously away at it, pens and pencils and her camera sitting beside it, hair disarray and bags under her eyes (which would soon become a signature look, unbeknownst to her), attire the same one she's been wearing for two days straight, and the only thing that's in her stomach is coffee, black and bitter.

She's waiting for someone; but Iris has never been the most patient person, so she's waiting and working. She's unsure of whether or not the man will come through, but there's hope, slowly brewing underneath her skin, tugging at the back of her mind, trying to settle her worries. There's hope, she sees, that she might get what she want -- Mexico's been a bust so far, but today, today it might be different. Today, things might change.

He walks in, black hat, black shirt and rotting jeans, brown eyes searching the diner and he spots her the minute Iris spots him -- he walks over, sits across from her without a word. "Señorita West?"

Her spanish is rusty, but "si" is hardly a difficult answer.

The man nods once, reaches into his pocket. "The camera," he says, accent heavy and out-of-practice. "Put it away."

Iris glances at her camera, rolls her eyes. "I'm not filming this," Iris assures him. "I'd be a fool to."

The man looks at her. "You'd be a fool not to put it away."

Resigned, Iris does as she's asked, shoving the camera and the rest of its gears inside her bag, not once looking away from the man before her, afraid he'll disappear the minute she looks away, afraid he's simply a figment of her imagination, an illusion created by the hope that's so egged her on these past two weeks. She finishes zipping the bag, then holds her hands up. "There." She says sternly. "What do you have for me?"

The man cocks his head to the left, stares at Iris intently. He seems to be debating internally -- he seems curious, which makes Iris's stomach churn, her skin crawl, her spine weaken. The man's gaze, though seemingly warm and brown, is nothing but ice, and it's bearing her soul, taking what she knows and what she feels and shaping it to its liking. Iris is doing her best not to cave in on herself, not to give up and crumble, when the man speaks. 

"Before I give you what you want," he says, looking towards the kitchen's open window. "You must know that if I tell you -- if I tell you, señorita West, you will have -- how is it that you say?" he looks back at her for a moment, as if Iris will have the answer when she's no idea where the man is going with this. "Jeopardize. Jeopardized these honest men's jobs -- they will most likely lose their life's work, their -- income. These men, and the men across the street," his index finger slowly points in said direction. "And their wives and their children will suffer because you want a story so very badly."

Iris simply blinks at him. 

"I'm only a messenger," he leans towards her, voice quiet, breath smelling of faint tobacco. Iris idly grabs at her smoke. "But I do feel compelled to tell you many, many lives could be ruined by this." His stare is calculating, judgmental. "Would you still like to know?"

And Iris knows she shouldn't, but there's Mexico, and the hardships of Mexico and how hard, how so very hard it's been to find something trustworthy and worth her time, so she doesn't think -- she puts aside her parents' instilled values and her morals and she says, "Yes."

The man's expression flashes with something reminiscent of disappointment, but he leans back, looks resigned. "Bueno," his voice is slower, quieter. He reaches into the bag Iris hadn't noticed he'd been carrying before, pulls out a stack of papers, neatly filed and color coated, bound together by a thin red rubber band. He places them on the table, slides them to Iris, effectively pushing her laptop out of the way. "Here you are, then." He stands, says nothing else as Iris stares at the folders with bile in her throat. She's taken off guard when her cigarette is taken from her lips, looks up in surprise and offense.

The man smirks at her, points at the sign. "No smoking," he says, throwing the cigarette on the ground and putting it out with his heel. He leaves it there, a memory of what's just taken place, and leaves as quickly as he'd arrived.

Iris takes a second, then packs everything up, including the folders she'd just received. 

She writes the story, she sends it off. The men lose their jobs, the diner closes.

But she's got people now -- the respect of many of the working elite in Mexico, and she's got contacts here shining out of places things shouldn't shine. She's good; Mexico's no longer a bust.

But she feels compromised, when she sees her waiter of two days holding his child in his arms, whispering spanish sweets into his ears and stroking his hair gently. He's holding back his tears and he's being strong, for this tiny child that so very much fears what's to come. She feels dirty -- she feels greedy.

She's smoking inside a restaurant, typing up an e-mail. A "NO SE FUMA" sign is hanging up here, as well, but she ignores it again. Sends off an e-mail to her father, says she's going home soon. She feels as if she's seen enough, done enough.

She throws a sizable amount of pesos on the table and stands, grabbing her things. On the way out, there's a large trash can -- and she looks at it for a moment, looks at her bag, then pulls out the camera she'd compromised everything for and throws it away.

She takes a drag of her cigarette, and walks away.

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IRIS WEST’S INFINITE PLAYLIST ► TRACK 008; THE WAY YOU LOOK TONIGHT BY FRANK SINATRA

someday when i'm awfully low and the world is cold i will feel a glow just thinking of you and the way you look tonight