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juniorgman187 · 4 years ago

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Serendipity (Reid Fic) Part 1

A/N: If you’re wondering if this is at all based on Rosie and Marco’s storyline in “What to Expect When You’re Expecting,” then you should know - it totally is.

Summary: An FBI gathering brings Reader and Spencer together after years of distance. This one night changes not only their future, but their perspective on the past. Category: Angst, Smut, *NSFW content Pairing: Fem!Reader x Spencer Reid Content Warning: Mentions of traumatic childhood, child neglect, penetrative sex, unprotected sex, menstruation, pregnancy Word Count: 10.2k

I originally thought I would be able to fit everything into 1 part, but after further reconsideration, this will be a two part series.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 　

Serendipity: (n). Finding something good without looking for it.

A word I would only come to truly understand many months from now on a warm Thursday morning in May at St. Mary’s Hospital.

But whenever my thoughts drifted back towards the past, I would always remember that this was how it all began - on a chilly Saturday night in the heart of D.C.

Not more than four hours ago, Emilia and I drove down here for an F.B.I function that hired us. Under normal circumstances, we wouldn’t have agreed to be the caterers for an event so far away, but we eventually signed on after learning that there were at least 600 people attending. That meant a considerable amount of customers and an exorbitant amount of money. Saying yes was clearly a no brainer.

Just to put it into perspective of how big this event would be, Emilia and I got lucky if we could park somewhere with 80 customers. 80. So this event would be colossal for us.

But who would have guessed that in a crowd of 600, I would run into the one and only - Spencer Reid.

To preface, this wasn’t just any old birthday party, parade, or festival. It was a celebration and a grand one at that. Considering it was a private event at the Washington Monument, we were given special instructions to abide by the black-tie formal dress code that guests had to follow, too. I guess the caterers can’t look like slobs in the United States’ Capitol, now can they?

I definitely spent more time than I should have deciding on what outfit to wear, but my conscientiousness, or rather indecisiveness, did pay off in the end. For I would run into someone worth the trouble of impressing.

My hair, unlike Emilia’s, was down and curled in big waves, and on one side, some of my hair was tucked behind my ear and designed to stay that way thanks to copious amounts of hairspray and an ungodly total of bobby pins. Emilia lent me a black, floor-length dress that had a plunging v-neck that didn’t fit her anymore, but luckily, fit perfectly on me. Although I would have to remember not to lean over too far tonight, otherwise, the customers might get a show they didn’t pay for. I, however, didn’t look half so good as my business partner.

Emilia was clad in a navy blue silk dress with puffy sleeves and a high collar; the dress clung to her every curve, including her newly protruding belly bump. She looked regal and pregnant all at the same time, qualities I hadn’t seen coexist in anyone but the Queens and Duchesses in England.

“Well, don’t you look hot?” Emilia purred, running her fingers through my curls, then letting them fall and sway back into place.

“Are you kidding? You are quite literally a sexy mama.” I gushed to her, receiving a light chuckle in return.

“Yeah, well, when you’re five months pregnant, tell me how sexy you feel in a tight dress.” She remarked, turning her back to me while she arranged all the supplies in the kitchenette behind me. But even as she faced away from me, she still managed to recognize the effect her words had. Maybe it was something in my silence, or our sister-telepathy, but Emilia immediately felt the room depress. In an effort to take back the remark that turned the room cold, she sweetly added while hugging me from behind, “You’re gonna be a mom one day, too. I promise.”

I leaned into her embrace, feeling guilty for ruining the moment while also feeling burdened by the reminder of the terrible reality I had to face every day.

Ever since I could remember, I thought I was destined to be a mother, but that destiny had yet to be fulfilled.

Emilia was born only three years after me, and though that age gap isn’t big enough for me to be mistaken for her mother, I, she, and our younger brother Saul would all agree that in many ways I was their mom. I was the parent our parents never were. I was there for everything - soccer games, dance recitals, winter musicals - never getting the chance to participate in my own, but always attending their’s.

I had to admit sometimes it was a burden, having to grow up so fast and help raise my siblings while still trying to navigate through my own struggles of adolescence, but I saw it as something I was meant to do.

See, I wouldn’t have minded all the responsibilities of being a parent so much when it’d be my own kids that I’d be fulfilling them for - when it would be by my choice to fulfill those responsibilities and not by unfortunate birth order.

However, as the years have gone by, my calling to be a mother has gotten quieter and quieter and quieter until eventually, I don’t think I’ll be able to hear it anymore.

It’s not that I can’t have kids, but the fear of rushing into having one is what’s stopped me from pursuing that dream.

As someone who grew up with divorced parents and practically became my siblings only reliable caregiver, I knew what having a baby too soon could do to a family. So rather than repeating history, I chose to wait to have kids. I didn’t want to make the same mistakes my parents did, and so I lived my life. I traveled all across the globe, I met new people, tried new things, I even started this taco truck business with Emilia.

But still that gaping hole in my chest remained. A hole that nothing could ever fill the way that a child would.

No amount of living could make up for the emptiness of a life with no family.

I could pretend all I wanted that I was happy living out my twenties, but the truth was I didn’t want to spend the rest of my years working in a food truck, amounting to nothing more than a mediocre cook and middling entrepreneur. That was never my dream - as exciting as it was.

My real dream was to have a good life. The kind my parents never had thanks to the unplanned arrival of me. The kind my baby sister was already living out.

“You know what? It’s a really nice night out. I think I might go for a walk. Do you wanna come?” Was this my blatant avoidance of breaching the subject of pregnancy? Yes, but it was also my escape from this food truck that felt like it was getting smaller and smaller and smaller by the second.

“No, I’m okay. I’ll just get everything ready.” Emilia resigned.

She knew why I was really leaving - sister-telepathy, I’m telling you - but she didn’t feel the need to acknowledge it. For that, I was thankful. Maybe we were better at communicating with no words at all.

I carefully stepped off the back of the truck, making sure to hike up my dress high enough so I wouldn’t trip over the mess of fabric when my feet hit the floor. The nippy December air felt like a cool balm on my hot skin. I was burning up in that truck, and maybe it was nerves or something else, but I just had this weird feeling in the pit of my stomach. There was no explanation for it, but I realize now that the pit in my stomach was caused by something my intuition could sense but something my mind couldn’t understand.

Someone important from my past was here tonight.

As I sauntered around the monument, I took in the breathtaking view of the structure’s silhouette against the blazing orange sky that melted into an ocean blue. I regretted not bringing my phone to take a picture of it so I could show Emilia when I got back, but that one regret quickly turned into another when the night sky’s breeze brought a rude awakening. My body shivered at the frigid gust of wind that blew through and I suddenly started to regret not bringing a jacket.

“Are you cold?” A gentle voice asked me from behind.

I slightly recoiled out of shock of someone being there. When I turned around though, I couldn’t quite make out any distinguishable features. All I knew for sure was that this was certainly a man, and a tall one, too.

“Um, just a little.” I bashfully admitted, crossing my arms to hug myself and maintain some warmth. I hadn’t even thought about my dress’s plunging v-neck or the fact that I was practically squeezing my breasts together, accentuating them even further, but by the time, I realized, it was too late. He was already looking. But not at my chest. Somewhere far more invasive.

My eyes.

“Here, take my jacket.”

My small protests did nothing to stop him as he inevitably slipped the coat around my shoulders anyway. He’d come so close that I could finally see him and smell him. And let me tell you, if the sight of him wasn’t enough to break an overflowing dam of memories, then his smell certainly sent a flood that would.

“Oh my god,” I quietly gasped, my hand flying to my mouth to cover its un-ladylike gaping.

“Spencer Reid?”

I squinted my eyes and cocked my head even further to find evidence to support my assumption, and sure enough, I found exactly what I was looking for.

I was frozen in place as I deeply examined his face. My God! I mean, in many ways, he hadn’t changed a bit since the last time I saw him. Same dazzling hazel eyes. Same uniquely adorable nose. Same over-stimulated pink lips. I wonder if he still bit them as much as he did back then?

But at the same time, he was so different. Of course, I could still discern the same features I used to study endlessly back then, but his face had transformed into a man’s. He lost the glasses for one thing, but he also had a softer jawline, longer hair, and for lack of a better term, a beefier build.

He was all grown up now, and yet, I could still identify the same boyishly handsome charm that made me fall in love with him more than a decade ago.

“I knew it was you, (y/n).” He chuckled, sounding half proud of himself. My heart fluttered at the sound of my name on his tongue and the action that followed. With his eyes locked on mine, he tucked strands of my hair back behind my ears; it’s as if he were saying, “Let me get a good look at you.”

“How? It’s almost completely dark outside. You could barely even see me.” Certainly, you can understand why I was skeptical. Sounded too good to be true, if you ask me.

He shook his head lightly with a smile, seemingly questioning how I couldn’t possibly know the answer to that question. “No one else looks like you. Not even in the dark.”

His words spoke to a part of my soul specifically reserved for him. They were so genuine that I almost didn’t want to believe them because how could someone speak such lovely things and truly mean them? The world wasn’t that good a place. Certainly not good enough for Spencer Reid.

In that moment, I flew out of my own body and watched this entire scene unfold from up above. I could see the version of a girl I hadn’t seen in years, not since that last interaction with Spencer. She had these big lovesick eyes as she swooned over a man with just the same lovesick look.

The excessive upward tilt of my head and the way his neck craning down must’ve made it seem like we were about to kiss, but I knew better than to expect such a thing from Spencer Reid. And if anything, what we were doing right now was much more intimate than kissing.

“Wow, you ... you really grew up. You look great.” My own voice sounded unfamiliar to me after the words slipped from my mouth without even registering in my brain first.

“Are you kidding? Look at you! I mean, you are just ...” He paused for a moment to look me up and down, and I nearly shivered at the thought that he was practically undressing me with his eyes. “You’re absolutely beautiful. But you always were.”

I was almost completely in a daze when I heard a hideous squawk of a bird flying overhead. This wouldn’t make sense, but it nearly felt like a sign. Like the bird knew I wasn’t supposed to be there, reminding me of where I belonged - reality - not in this fantasy with Spencer.

“Um,” My head spun as I drew back from him. “I should probably get back. I’ll see you later.” I touched his upper arm gently as I passed by him, and it stunned me how warmth just radiated off of his body.

To my all too quick goodbye, he simply waved and watched me walk past him with a pursed-lip smile. And just before I got too far, I thought I heard him say, “I hope so.”

Though my feet were carrying me away from Spencer, my thoughts were only drifting closer to the memory of him, and we did have so many memories.

11 Years Ago ...

I was at the ripe age of 16 when I got my driver’s license. And to anyone else, this would seem like a given milestone, but to me - it was so much more. With the obtainment of my license, I also gained access to a whole new world. Opportunities poured at the seams. I could drive anyone and anywhere I wanted to and though it wasn’t true, it felt like I could do anything, too. But like all things good in my life, it fell apart in the face of responsibilities.

My newly obtained license was just another way for my parents to exploit me. Now, they didn’t have to drive Emilia and Saul since I could. Looking back, I have to wonder if the only reason they funded my driver’s ed classes were for the exact reason that if I took them, I’d sooner be able to take on yet another helping of duties they were too lazy to fulfill.

There’s one particular moment I can remember from this age and that same moment could also be regarded as the catalyst that would set off a series of events for the next 11 years to come.

It was the end of the school year and summer vacation was right around the corner. I was a sophomore at the time, and the prospect of being a junior the next year excited me.

To kick off the start of summer, Melody Hanes was throwing a pool party at her house. Everyone knew she was filthy rich because of a dead grandpa or some other, not to mention, she was also in student government so she had just as big of a role in school as her grandpa’s death did in making the Hanes family wealthy.

Though I never knew her personally, I did have third period chemistry with her for the entire year, and I sat right in front of her for pretty much the entirety of second semester. She must’ve only addressed me a handful of times, but she still invited me to her party anyway. Proximity, I had to admit, did play a part in that though because if I sat just a seat farther away, then I wouldn’t have been.

I came home that day, thrilled to tell my mother about my invitation. It would’ve been my first party that wasn’t a distant relative’s birthday celebration or a childish sleepover in elementary. It was my first real high school party, and for once, I thought - maybe I’d finally get the quintessential ‘high school experience.’

But of course, I never did.

As soon as I got home, I parked my car in the driveway, got the mail, and came inside the house to see my mother sitting on the couch watching TV, as per usual. While I was telling her about my invitation, she didn’t bother to lower the volume or even look away from the screen to give me her undivided attention, and when she did look away, it was only to take the mail from my hands.

“Your sister’s science fair is on that day, and you have to take her because I’ll be working from 1 to 7.” My mother never once looked up from the mail she was sorting through to address me. And her words, while incredibly monotone, were also spoken with such finality, like what she said was the last she ever wanted to speak on the topic. No room for discussion.

I’m not still losing sleep over it, but at the time, it felt like for once, I could actually just be a teenager and be young and reckless like everyone else, but that it was just taken from me. I never got the chance to be a kid again.

With the exception of Emilia’s science fair.

I knew my father wouldn’t be there, and obviously my mother wouldn’t, so I stayed to watch her presentation and to walk around the rest of the time. She deserved someone in her corner, and that someone was me. Even if no one was in mine.

As I serpentined through the cafeteria, a bittersweet feeling came upon me. From paper mâché volcanoes to potato batteries, I observed a childlike sense of wonder that I hadn’t felt for years.

Here, I was surrounded by children who got to be just children. They got to occupy themselves with trivial matters, like how gardens grow or if video games actually do rot your brain.

Their problems had solutions and their questions had answers, and it almost made me wish that I could revert back to a time where life was that easy, but I couldn’t because it never was … not for me.

So to sum it up, it was precious and heartbreaking all at the same time.

While browsing the fair, I stumbled upon a man that didn’t quite seem to fit in, and maybe it was my own unfitting appearance that made me recognize his. He could’ve very well been the brother of one of these children, but something about the way he was dressed and the way he carried himself made me highly doubt that.

He couldn’t have been a parent either, for he was not too far off from my own age, and if he was a parent of one of these eighth graders, that would have to mean that he had a kid when he was in kindergarten. So for all intents and purposes, he wasn’t someone’s brother or someone’s father. Who he actually was - I didn’t know, but I was determined to find out.

After that first observance, I spotted him a couple more times, but it wasn’t until we were looking at the same project that we actually spoke.

“Fascinating, isn’t it?”

The sudden sound of his voice alarmed me, but only because it seemingly came out of nowhere. Generally, before someone speaks to you, you notice signals that they’re about to, which helps you prepare for conversation. Whether it’s nervous twitches, a look in your direction, maybe even a small acknowledging smile, you’ll recognize they want to or plan to talk to you, but none of those signs were given to me. Even when I turned my head to give him my attention, he was still fixated on the project in front of us.

“Yeah, it really is,” I politely agreed. I awkwardly looked around the room as if I’d find an answer as to what to say next because I did want to keep talking to him, but the longer I stayed silent, the more I fear he’d begin to think I didn’t want to. With nothing else to ask but the question that had been bothering me since I first laid eyes on him, I simply went for it.

“So, who are you here for?”

For the first time, he turned his head to the side to look right at me. With a quizzical expression, he responded. “Oh, no one. I’m just a judge here.”

It was my turn to possess a quizzical expression. His statement wouldn’t have been weird, except for the part where any judge I’d seen or talked to were all well into their forties or fifties.

“Aren’t you kinda young to be a judge? You’re, like, what? Seventeen, eighteen?

“Nineteen actually. But I regularly come to judge the Summer Science Fairs here since I went to this middle school eleven years ago.”

Again, I would’ve taken his word for it, but the math didn’t make sense. “You were in middle school at eight years old?”

“Mhm. I ended up graduating high school at twelve.” He said it so nonchalantly, but for how big of a feat it was, I thought it would’ve deserved a more prideful tone, yet he still maintained such a cavalier one. Did he not think himself to be impressive?

“Jeez, you must be really smart.”

He shoved his hands in his pockets, which made me notice that he wasn’t carrying a clipboard like the other judges, which was probably another reason why I didn’t take him for one. How would he be able to remember the projects that he was considering for awards? He’d have to have some magical memory for that.

Before answering, he began to walk away, but nonetheless he continued addressing me, so I followed him where he went.

“Mmm not necessarily. My IQ isn’t high enough to suggest I’m a provable genius yet, but I do have an eidetic memory and I can currently read 16,000 words per minute, which definitely helps. I hope to be able to read 20,000 words per minute in the future.”

Despite answering my question, he only left me with many more.

“What is your IQ right now?”

“131.”

My eyes widened. Even I, with my limited knowledge on intelligence quotients knew that was high, especially for someone as young as he was.

“So what IQ score do you have to have in order to be considered a genius?”

I couldn’t help but notice how he barely took anytime to think before answering me. It’s like his brain just knew everything, right then and there.

“A score of over 140 is considered a genius or near genius.”

“Wow, so you’re almost a genius then?”

“Almost, but not quite. If I receive diverse stimulation at a consistent rate for the next few years, I predict that I’ll have an IQ of 180 or higher by the time I’m in my early twenties.”

You would think he would leave me speechless, but I still went on to ask him about what an eidetic memory was, and he explained to me that he could remember things exceedingly well, but that it was not the same thing as a photographic memory. He made that distinction very clear to me.

Our conversation droned on for the rest of the fair as we continued to circle the cafeteria. I can’t count how many times we lapped around the same projects, but we never seemed to run out of things to talk about. Once those first few seconds after meeting him, when I didn’t know what to say, passed, I never again felt a sense of not knowing. We could talk for hours and hours, and it wouldn’t matter. I would never get bored.

How could I? When I was with him, it felt like the rest of the world just faded away. Our discourse flowed so easily, no pressure, no awkward silence. It was just me and him, and if you ask me, that’s quite the opposite of boring.

That was the first and final time I ever truly felt like a kid. Just like the ones in the science fair. Not a care in the world except for my morbid curiosity of the marvel that was him.

Alas, all good things must come to an end, and I inevitably found myself being ripped out of my trance when I felt an aggressive tug on my sweater.

“We can go now.” Emilia interrupted.

I hadn’t even noticed that a majority of the poster boards were taken down and that an even larger majority of the people were long gone, too. I got so lost in the conversation that I didn’t realize we were one of the last people still there.

Emilia’s eagerness to leave was apparent as she pulled me away from my interesting conversationalist.

“I had a nice time talking to you!” I called out to him, walking backwards to lengthen the period of time I could keep looking at him.

“Likewise.”

I turned around fully just before I finally realized something. “Hey!” I yelled across the distance. “I never got your name!”

He bashfully smiled and looked down at his feet briefly. “It’s Spencer! Spencer Reid!”

I stood there for a moment, silently processing his name.

“What’s yours?” He yelled back.

I chuckled mischievously. “I guess you’ll have to find out next time.” My ambiguity puzzled him and intrigued him all at the same time.

“Next time?”

With the intentions of leaving him without a true answer, I simply turned on my heels and started walking away.

“Bye, Spencer!”

Even if he didn’t have an eidetic memory, I knew after that first day, he could never forget me.

- Present Time -

By the time I made it back to the truck, people were already lining up to order.

“Get over here!” Emilia squealed excitedly from the window, her hand rapidly waving me over as if it’d suddenly increase my speed. I ran back as fast as I could in a dress and heels and climbed into the truck, mirroring my sister’s zeal.

When I stepped in, Emilia took one glance at me and furrowed her brows. “Where’d you get the jacket?”

Had she not mentioned it, I would not have remembered the foreign fabric that wrapped around my shoulders.

“Oh, shoot!” I palmed my forehead after the realization dawned on me. I should’ve noticed sooner that I still had it on, but honestly, it didn’t feel unusual or out of place. It was comfortable and familiar, like it was meant to be there that entire time.

“I’m so sorry to do this to you, but do you think you can handle this alone for just a second? I have to return this to a friend.” I asked while slipping off the coat to ready myself to leave, even in the event that Emilia said she wouldn’t let me go. Luckily though, she understood it was urgent.

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll be fine. Just hurry back.”

I extended my head to look out just past the side of the truck to look for Spencer while still being concealed within the vehicle. Now that there were more people here, I wasn’t exactly sure I should be caught mingling with the attendees, so instead, I decided to search for him from the truck, rather than wandering around the party, giving the impression to the people that hired us that I wasn’t doing my job and was just here to socialize.

Luckily, there was something about my attachment to Spencer that was supernatural. I had this metaphysical ability to spot him even in a crowded place. I could find him anywhere. But whether that was a blessing or a curse was to be determined because right as my paranormal power kicked in, I found him. And there he was - standing next to another girl, a proximity much too close and a smile much too big to be anything less than flirtatious.

I paused to recall the image I had of myself earlier, when I floated up and out of my own body. I looked just like her - an oversized grin combined with lovesick eyes.

But that’s not the worst part.

The worst part was he was returning just the same look of attraction to her.

“Um, actually,” I re-entered the truck completely, tossing the jacket aside haphazardly. “I’ll just return it later.”

“You sure? You can go. I’ve got things covered right now.” She said between multitasking at a rate that even I, a very-much-not-pregnant-woman, could manage.

All I could mutter back without giving away the sharp ache in my heart was, “Yeah, I’m sure.”

_ _ _

After hours and hours of non-stop working, the night, at last, was coming to a close. The large crowd had sized down considerably, until I could no longer hear the sound of a thousand voices meshing. All the decorations were already coming down by the time Emilia and I finished packing up the truck. Without the hectic energy to cause adrenaline to course through my veins, it should’ve been peaceful, yet my heart was not at peace.

I couldn’t shake the gut-wrenching feeling of seeing Spencer with that girl, but that wasn’t really why I was upset. It was more about the fact that I’d actually believed for a second that I had any chance with him. I should’ve known he wasn’t single, and the fact that I let myself swoon over him again angered me all the more. If I ever had a chance with Spencer, the time to act on it was long gone.

Now, I had to live with that.

“You sure you wanna stay here alone? I’ll come with you if you want me to.”

Emilia’s question was referring to my proposal to stay in D.C for the night while she drove home. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision, but I realized I couldn’t handle being in another suffocating car ride with Emilia. It had nothing to do with her - just that I needed alone time to process everything by myself. If I knew my sister as well as I thought I did, I knew she would’ve sensed something was wrong and tried to coax me into talking about it, which I was not in the mood to do. Plus, traveling for so long made me nauseous just thinking about it. Although, I didn’t have a plan, I knew that I just wanted to hail a cab and find a hotel somewhere here for the night.

“Yeah, I’ll be okay. Don’t worry about me. Call me when you get home.” I tapped on the back of the truck twice to let her know she was good to drive away, and I felt the car lurch forward per my request. When the truck finally did move, out from behind it appeared the tall figure of none other than Spencer.

I was surprised, but only for a second, when that surprise turned into pain once more. Playing it cool so my afflictions wouldn’t be suspected, I nonchalantly stated, “Here’s your jacket, by the way. Sorry, I forgot to give it back to you earlier.”

I extended my arm far enough so that we’d still have a great distance between us when he went to grab it, but sure enough, my actions were all for naught when he not only refused to remove his hands from his pockets to take it but also walked two steps closer to me than he needed to be. I looked like an idiot just standing there with my arm so outstretched, only for him to not grab it and to let it simply press against his stomach as a complete avoidance of getting it back.

“You were supposed to keep it. That’s why I didn’t ask for it back.” He curtly replied, finishing his statements with a cheeky grin. However, I wasn’t in the mood to return it. I simply stood there and shook the jacket in my hand to emphasize its presence.

“Take it. Please.” My voice was full of contradictions. I tried to be assertive with my command, and yet my plead only softened the order and showed a defeat I wasn’t even aware of until I heard how sad it sounded. “I don’t want it, Spencer.”

He no doubt saw the shift in my demeanor but still wouldn’t pacify me by taking the jacket. “What’s wrong? What did I do?” His voice got quieter, as if speaking any louder would shatter me in this fragile state of being.

“Nothing, I’m just tired and I want to go home.” This wasn’t a complete lie. I was exhausted from working for hours and hours on my feet with no breaks in between, but it wasn’t exactly the full truth either. He could tell.

“Just tell me what’s wrong.” He persisted. “Please.”

The only way I could describe what I happened next was like the vision of a boiling pot. Gradually, I was heating up until I finally got so overheated that I just boiled over and exploded.

“What don’t you get, Spencer? I don’t want your jacket!” Fury consumed my tone. “And I don’t think your girlfriend would want that either.”

“Girlfriend? What girlfriend? What are you talking about? I don’t have a girlfriend!” His words were flying out of his mouth at 100 mph as he desperately trying to mend what couldn’t be fixed.

“Don’t play dumb. I saw you with that blonde girl. How close you two were standing, the way you were looking at each other.” Just having to recount the interaction made the horrid memory come back vividly into the forefront of my thoughts, and it broke my heart all over again. I shut my eyes painfully as though it would turn off the image of them together, but this only allowed for Spencer to wrap his warm hands around my upper arms and pull me closer to him without my knowing. I flinched unconsciously at the sudden feeling of his touch, to which he instantly let go.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” His hands shook with remorse for letting them touch my body in a way that elicited that reaction. They hovered in the space between us, not knowing where to go that would suddenly make things okay. “But she’s no one, okay? She’s just a coworker.”

I wanted to believe him. I quite possibly did believe him, but there was still a sharp pain in my chest. Call it intuition.

“No, she’s not,” I shook my head. “She’s not ‘no one’... you love her.”

Spencer came closer but still didn’t let himself touch me again out of fear that I might draw back even further.

“Listen to me - whatever feelings I used to have for her are long gone. She’s married, (y/n). She has a kid. And none of that even matters because the way that I used to love her is nothing compared to the way that I-”

“Don’t.” I held my hand up in protest. “Don’t say you love me.”

His eyebrows knit together with dismay. “Why? Why not? It’s true. I love you. I always have.”

With one big sigh, I finally resigned to my emotions. “Then why didn’t you ever do something about it?”

Judging by the deflation of his shoulders and the far off look he got in his eyes, he knew exactly the moment I was talking about.

Two days after Emilia’s science fair, I drove to the library to pick up books I needed for my summer homework. I was already on my way out when I just happened to glance to my side, noticing a lone figure sitting at the bus stop. I didn’t think anything of it, but when I looked back, I partially recognized him. I shaded my eyes from the sun and squinted harder to confirm my suspicions.

“Spencer?” I wondered out loud.

The figure’s head turned around, narrowed their eyes, and waved. He stood up from his seat and made his way over to me with a precious little jog-walk. Although we had only met once before, we still embraced each other like lifelong friends.

“Do I finally get to know your name now?” He jokingly inquired after pulling away.

It completely slipped my mind that I’d denied him the knowledge of my name, but for my own satisfaction, I wouldn’t let him get off that easily.

“Do you have any guesses of it could be?”

He pouted childishly. “Are you kidding? In a population of 350 million people, there would be about 4.4 million names. But if every country on Earth had the same nominative diversity we in the US have, that would suggest about 750 million unique names exist.”

I must admit it was fun watching him melt into a flustered mess of facts, but I was growing just as impatient as him. “Come on, just guess. You might be right.”

He rolled his eyes but indulged me willingly anyway. “Okay ... um ... Catherine.”

“Nope.”

“Nicole.”

“Nope.”

“Gertrude.”

“Seriously?” I raised my eyebrows. He shrugged. “Nope.”

“Olive.”

“Pretty,” I smiled, making his face light up, too. “But no.” His smile fell.

“This is nearly impossible.” He sighed.

“Nothing’s impossible.” My delivery wasn’t as cheesy as the line itself, so it touched us both in a way that made that silly phrase feel like it’d never been said before. With a visible passion reignited in him, he continued.

“Francis.”

“Okay, maybe this is impossible.”

My blunt joke brought us closer together, our heads almost knocking into one another’s as we clutched our stomachs and leaned forward to support our all-consuming laughter. When we finally calmed down, I finally confessed.

“Okay, okay - it’s (y/n).”

He stood there completely silent. There was no expression of his face that indicated he planned on speaking, so I elaborated. “It’s not as good as the name Spencer, I know I know -”

“I’ve never known anyone with that name before.” His hushed voice cut into mine so innocently.

My cheeks heated from the slight compliment. “Well, now you do. And don’t you forget it.” I teased. With nothing further to say, I brushed past him to start walking away, when unconsciously, I spun my keys around my index finger and heard the familiar jingle of the metal, reminding me of something.

“Hey, Spencer?” I turned on my heels. “Can I give you a ride home?”

And so began our routine for the entire summer. I would bring my summer homework to the library, and Spencer would help me understand it, or even complete it, and then I’d give him a ride home. We’d go to the park and read, or we’d go to the movies, or we’d hang out at a diner. And each time, I’d drop him off.

The more time we spent together, the more I learned about him and his life. He told me about his mom, his dad - everything. I did just the same. I told him about my mom, my dad, my siblings - everything.

Perhaps we enjoyed spending so much time together because it was a sweet escape from our houses that weren’t homes. But every time we did hang out, we just got closer and closer, and by the end of the summer, I knew my feelings perfectly clear.

I love Spencer.

If missing that pool party at Melody Hanes was what it took to find the absolute love of my life, then what a small price to pay it was. I wouldn’t have traded a million pool parties for that one chance encounter with Spencer at the science fair.

One day, we were pulling into his driveway after having a picnic at the country club, and I’d just let him out of the car, when unconsciously, I said, “Bye, Spence! Love you!”

He caught the words faster than I did. He looked like a deer in headlights, and it took me at least two seconds more to figure out why. That entire day I’d been thinking about saying it, but by the end, I decided it’d be better not to, and yet, it just came out anyway.

“You love me?”

There were two ways I could’ve answered. The first was to deny it and say that I only meant that I loved him like a friend. The second was to be brave and validate my unintentional confession.

In the heat of the moment, I chose the latter.

“Yes.” I nodded, smiling from my own courage. You only live once right?

In a cruel twist of fate, Spencer never tried to speak, and instead, ran to his front door.

“Spencer!” I yelled. “What are you-”

He gave me one last look over his shoulder before he opened the door and closed it right behind him. That was the last I ever saw him.

I learned, that day, that you do only live once.

But you can die over and over again.

From that point on, he’s lived in my mind as the one that never was.

Regret and shame manifested on Spencer’s face. “I never wanted to hurt you.” He dejectedly began. “But I was young and-and dumb and just ... so scared. God, I was so scared.” He finally looked up, if for no other reason than to gauge my reaction. “I liked you so much, but I, I just couldn’t open myself up to the possibility of being hurt by another person I loved.”

Much like my own life, Spencer’s was riddled with traumatic experiences. Except rather than being expected to take care of younger siblings, he had to take care of his mom. And having to be a parent to your own parent? That’s something I would never wish upon anyone else.

“I ... I get it.” It was a sweet surrender, my words. After years of pent-up aggression borne from humiliation, rejection, and deep sadness, I could finally understand. “But as selfish as it sounds, I wish your past hurt hadn’t gotten in the way of our potential happiness.”

He took each of my hands in his, encasing them with palms of warmth. “Then don’t let the same thing happen right now. Don’t let the stupid, broken teenager I was cloud your judgement of the man I am now. Let me prove to you that I’ve changed.”

I stood there silently, an eerie parallel to how Spencer reacted to my confession eleven years ago.

“When I saw you, it felt like a second chance. A second chance to do what I was too afraid to do back then. And I couldn’t let myself make the same mistake twice.” His eyes were piercing through my soul. Every word plucked at my heartstrings, until I could no longer keep up with the symphony they were playing.

There was the slightest hesitation behind it, but I did inch forward. And in no time at all, Spencer saw the movement and made his own.

His hands released mine and shot straight for my cheeks to cup them gently, while kissing me firmly. He wasn’t the same shy boy he was, and this kiss was only proof of that. The way his lips were moving so fervently made me weak at the knees. He was so desperate and needy, like even with our lips touching, he still wasn’t close enough to me. Unleashed upon me was years of yearning wrapped in prominent lust.

“I love you.” He blurted clumsily on my lips. I didn’t return the sentiment, but that wasn’t why he said it. He wanted to say it so I’d know, not so that I’d say it back.

“You should know,” I muttered between kisses. “I’m not leaving D.C. until tomorrow morning.”

The biggest smirk creeped onto his face. Bastard.

Once we’d exhausted all the things we could possibly do in public, we ran to the nearest cab we could find and exhausted all the things we could do in that, too.

It was already past midnight when we arrived at Spencer’s apartment, and though we should’ve been quiet so as not to disturb the neighbors, we were still breaking out into a fit of giggles like a bunch of teenagers sneaking around as we ran up the stairs. We hadn’t even made it past the doormat, before he seized my hips in his hands and spun me back towards him. Forcefully, he pressed me against the door while simultaneously unlocking it. That shut me up real good, lemme tell you.

As soon as we crossed the threshold, he gave me a reprieve when he held me closer so as to stop pinning me against the door. In an effort to do the impossible, we stumbled through his apartment in a frenzy trying to undress each other while maintaining our bodily contact. With one giant tug of the zipper on my back, my dress fell to the ground. To his atonement, he left me in just a thong. Whereas he was much too overdressed in my opinion.

No sooner did I gracelessly unbutton his shirt than we ran into a plant against the wall. Our smiles practically ruined the kiss at the sound of the crash, but it remained nonetheless. I knew I was in for something, when Spencer paused to wait for me to unbuckle his belt. That was the first time we ever really stopped in place, but just as I anticipated, I was in for it.

When I finally freed his waist of the garment, he just as quickly placed his hand on the back of my thigh, and in one swift motion, hoisted me into the air high enough to allow my legs to wrap around his waist. My arms were loose around his neck and the feeling of his warm hands touching my bare skin sent a chill down my spine.

Due to Spencer’s essential hand placement on my body, I had to be the one to fumble with his bedroom’s doorknob until it finally gave way. Once more, we staggered through his room before he let our lips break apart to lightly toss me onto the bed. I giggled at the squeak of the bed, driving him visibly crazy.

He hastily unzipped his own dress pants, while I propped myself up on my elbows. When he met me on the bed, he hovered over me to the point of having to lay back down again just to see him clearly. He felt too far away so I drew him nearer by lacing my hand through his soft curls. I twirled one around my finger, which must’ve been too merciful for him to handle.

He placed his hand on the back of mine and slid it down to his cheek. He held my hand there for a moment, leaning into the skin of my palm prior to placing a chaste kiss on it.

He didn’t need to say it again for me to know what he was thinking.

I love you.

The anticipation was killing me and in the most impatient manner, I pulled him down to my level, mimicking his similar habit of face-grabbing during a kiss. I knew his hands would’ve flown to my face the way they did just minutes ago, but one was too preoccupied keeping himself up and the other was busy toying with the band of my thong. I shivered at the sensation of him slipping one finger under the material and letting it glide over my tender skin right above my heat.

“Spencer,” I mumbled in a kiss to bring his attention back to me. Although I was certainly interested to know the hidden talents of Spencer Reid and his fingers, I was restless. I’d been waiting years for this moment, and unlike most people, I didn’t want to wait another second. “I need you now.”

He pulled his head back so he could get a full view of my face to examine my sincerity. He wanted to know if I was sure, and my eyes told him such. He nodded in acknowledgement with such speed that I was sure he was craving this as much as I was.

Rather than looking at where our bodies were about to meet, I had to close my eyes so I could fully feel everything without any other sense taking that away from me. In a painfully slow manner, he lined himself up at my entrance. At first, he only lightly pushed in, and it was this slacken movement that made me cry out and grip his shoulders for stability.

He pushed further in until he was fully sheathed inside of me. There was a slight moment of regret for not letting him engage in foreplay before, but that quickly went away when the pain turned to pleasure. He gained more confidence in himself with each stroke, and I could feel it. The more powerfully he thrust, the more I felt myself tightening around him. The over simulation was a stark contrast from the stimulation I denied and so the sensation I was feeling was only heightened by the absence of it before. For that very reason, I knew I was already close. And maybe he knew it, too and just as sweet revenge, he decided to send me over the edge by pulling my leg over his shoulder to thrust into me a new angle. As I’m sure he predicted, I threw my head back as tears began to prick the corners of my eyes. He rode the ever exquisite border between pain and pleasure, and my tears were a manifestation of that. Not even a minute passed, before I tried to moan but pathetically failed, not even being able finish the pitiful wail without the both of us finishing together.

Our heavy panting synchronized and reverberated back to us while he slowed down his pace and pulled out.

Perhaps in the heat of the moment, we lost all logic and reason, considering that even up till now, neither of us had realized that he didn’t use a condom.

But what would eventually happen in the future as a result of this action, or inaction, would surely make us remember.

Spencer lowered himself down to kiss me breathlessly; strands of his hair clung to his forehead as sweat glimmered on both of us. Not until we were ready did we make our way to the bathroom so he could help clean me up. Once we returned, I gathered my clothes, but he made sure to grab my panties before I could even notice.

“Have you seen -“ I cut myself off when I saw what was dangling in his hands.

“Looking for this?” He teased.

All my energy had been spent on him that I couldn’t be bothered to fight for them back.

“Keep ‘em.” I smirked, my hand reaching down to pick up his jacket off the floor and hold it up. “Consider it a fair trade.”

No arguments from him.

Needless to say, I did end up finding a place to stay the night. Where and with whom you might ask?

Well, you can probably figure that one out for yourself.

_ _ _

I wish I could tell you I got a good night’s rest, and I could - it just wouldn’t be the truth.

Spencer and I spent the rest of the night just talking. We filled each other in on nearly ever second of the past 11 years, and once again, I found myself reverting back to the teenager I was at the science fair. The entire world revolved around us as we spoke to each other effortlessly, like no time had passed. Even in the periods of silence, I felt comfortable.

Spencer and I were lying on our sides facing one another when I felt compelled to profess that “I can’t talk this way with anyone. It’s just you.”

He tucked a strand of hair behind my ear with a small smile on his lips. He didn’t need to say that he felt the same way because I already knew. His hand never left my face but instead made its descent down my jawline and stopped at my chin. He raised his thumb to reach my lower lip, letting the pad of his finger graze over the soft skin of my lip.

It felt like he was tracing every detail of my body, running his eyes over every inch at least twice so as to fully commit everything to his memory.

At last, the tension broke when he positioned his hand comfortably at the back of my neck, bowing his head forward to kiss me. This one was quite different than our first, for it was gentler and warmer. We weren’t forcing ourselves to make up for lost time. In fact, this kiss was saying, “We’ve got plenty of time.”

Plenty of time indeed. Which we were happy to spend making love again.

And I will be the first to admit that if our first round of unprotected sex didn’t solidify our future predicament, this time certainly did.

Six Weeks Later ...

“Hello?” Clearly frustrated, Emilia waved her hand in front of my face to harness me back to earth. I hadn’t realized I zoned out until she scoffed at me. “Did you hear anything I just said?”

“No, sorry. Could you repeat it one more time?”

She set down the papers in front of her and sighed unhappily. “What’s going on with you? You’ve been so distant lately.”

It hurt to hear, even though it was the truth. I wasn’t intentionally being despondent, but it’s hard to be present when there’s so much occupying your mind, and there was one thing in particular that was keeping me up late at night recently.

My period has always been irregular. For as long as I’ve had it, I’ve always missed a few weeks, then it would become consistent, then it would be sporadic again. In fact, there was one year where I only had four periods total. So it didn’t strike me as odd when I realized three days ago that my last period was about seven weeks ago.

What did strike me as odd was the other symptoms I was experiencing. Menstruation cycles are known to closely mimic the symptoms of pregnancy, but with the knowledge that my period wasn’t coming, it was disconcerting to me that I was suffering the discomforts without the actual period itself.

To me, there was only one clear explanation for this anomaly.

I was pregnant.

Earlier in the day, I bought a pregnancy test and was late to work because of it. If Emilia hadn’t been suspicious of my behavior before, showing up late only made her suspicion greater.

I didn’t know when I’d take it, probably at home after work, but the anticipation was eating away at me. I would pace around the truck until Emilia finally told me to stop because the vehicle wouldn’t stop swaying with my every movement. I was biting my nails and chewing on each little piece that grew back just to bite it back down to the nub. My hands couldn’t stop shaking, my breathing wouldn’t slow down. I was a hysterical mess.

I didn’t tell Spencer any of my concerns, of course, but being as perceptive as he is, he noticed my strange mannerisms despite my best efforts to hide them.

“Your breathing just got faster. Are you feeling okay?” He paused the movie we were watching to check in on me one time. It should be known that the scene that caused my heavier breathing was a scene of a woman finding out she was pregnant and being absolutely devastated. I quickly brushed it off as just being too warm, to which he turned on his air conditioning. Luckily for me, he didn’t make the connection.

And it’s not that I didn’t want to tell Spencer - I really did - but why should I make a fuss about something if there ended up being nothing to worry about? That would just be extra stress, and the last thing a new, blossoming relationship needs is additional strain.

So without Spencer, I had to opt for the next best thing - my sister.

I’d reached my wits end, and I couldn’t keep up the act any longer. I was walking on eggshells with practically everyone I knew, and I’d sooner go crazy if I didn’t tell someone what I was really feeling. So in response to her question, I finally told the truth.

“I think I might be pregnant.”

You can imagine the shock on my sister’s face. Emilia’s jaw became one with the floor as her eyes widened so big I thought they would pop out of her head.

“You’re pregnant?” Already her eyes were welling up with tears of joy.

“I don’t know yet.” I put my arms around her to keep her calm and stable while the emotions began overpowering her. I wanted it to serve as a reminder to not get her hopes up, otherwise she’d get mine up, too.

“Well, have you taken a test?”

I reached for my purse behind her and rummaged through it until I finally retrieved the box. Holding it up, I reluctantly suggested, “I thought maybe you could be there for me when I did?”

She squealed with joyful elation, practically shattering the window pane with the high pitch of her voice. On top of that, she was jumping up and down with elegant grace that I had to wonder how her pregnant body could even manage to do such a thing.

“Of course, I will! Come, come, let’s go.”

We hopped off the truck and to the nearest restroom, which admittedly wasn’t the nicest of places, nor was the place I ever imagined as a child that I’d be finding out I was pregnant in, but it had to do for now.

When I first came out of the stall, I set the test face down on the sink, so that we wouldn’t see it until it was ready. Emilia set a timer for 10 minutes, but in the meantime, all we could do was wait. Neither of us could stay still; Emilia bounced up and down, rubbing her belly while facilitating some sort of breathing exercise. Meanwhile, I kept tapping my foot impatiently.

Ding! Ding! Ding!

Emilia’s alarm scared the shit out of me, and we both were startled by the blaring sound. It was so jarring, but even that wouldn’t compare to the fear I felt when I realized it was finally time.

“Do you wanna look or should I?” She asked.

“You look.” I said at first. But when she lunged forward to take it, I did, too. “No wait, I should.” Then another moment of hesitation. “No, you do it. I can’t.”

I held my hands over my mouth while I watched her carefully lift the test off the sink, maneuvering it in such a way that only she would see the results. I watched her expression closely for any sign of a reaction, but she was stoic as can be. I couldn’t tell if she was disappointed, happy - nothing. Complete and total poker face.

“Come on, Emilia! What does it say?” I blurted anxiously.

“Well, first, what do you want it to say?”

That was a question I hadn’t considered. I was so busy worrying about what I didn’t know, to pause and think about what I wanted to find out. On the one hand, I’d be ecstatic if the test confirmed that I was pregnant. I’d jump for joy because that was what I always wanted, right? But on the other hand, if it said I wasn’t pregnant, then I’d be sort of sad because I got so close to that lifelong dream. But after that, I’d probably just be relieved to have dodged a bullet.

“I don’t know,” I confessed. “I don’t know-”

“Don’t think. Just tell me. What do you want it to say?”

Without missing a beat, I replied, “Positive.” My sister and I alike were stunned by my answer. “Yeah,” I nodded slowly. “Positive. I want it to say positive.” I repeated, to cement my earnest desire.

Emilia’s facade melted away as she began to shake her head. “I’m sorry, (y/n). There’s only one line.”

We both knew what that meant, even if she didn’t explicitly say it. I sighed dejectedly, which was a surprise to even myself. I didn’t expect to be this disappointed, and yet I was. The knot it my stomach worked itself free, and where that pit used to be was just emptiness. My heart sunk and steadied itself, and my breathing resumed its normal pace.

“Well,” I bit my lip. “I guess that’s that.”

Emilia instantly drew nearer to pull me in for a hug, one I was not ready to accept but welcomed anyway. “I’m sorry, (y/n). But I mean, sometimes tests just come out with false negatives.” With her face still buried in the crook of my neck in our hug, she mumbled, “Not this one, though. This one’s positive.”

Immediately, I retreated from our hug and pulled her in front of my view. The sneaky girl had a huge grin that took up 99% of her face.

“You’re pregnant!” She screamed at the top of her lungs, shaking my body violently. We embraced each other in another hug while simultaneously jumping up and down. “I just wanted to trick you so you would know how you really feel. Now you know!”

And I did know. I did know that I wanted this baby and that I was glad it even existed.

Not long after our mini-celebration did I start to come down from the high of my euphoria. A certain realization dawned on me like a cloud of gray hanging above my head to rain on my parade.

What about Spencer?

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 　

PART 2 HERE!

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ryuu-to-sobakasu-hime · 3 years ago

Text

Ryuu to Sobakasu no Hime (Belle) Novel | English Translation | Chapter 2

**This is a machine translation. I put it together by extracting text page-by-page from a .pdf version of the Japanese novel, and running it through Google translate. I have only minorly edited some of the more confusing lines to make it more read-able. It is still a very rough translation, but it’s good enough to understand what’s going on. If there is anyone out there who wants to properly translate the novel, I am more than happy to edit it, if you’ll contact me.**

———————————————

Chapter 2: Suzu

"Buhaa!"

I got up from a thin futon and took a big breath.

That made me almost hit my head against the low ceiling. This is a shabby attic in the countryside, with rafters supporting the roof approaching just above the bed. "Ah, ah .... ah ..."

It's morning. The sunlight is dazzling. The feeling of the glittering world up to that point remains. I close my eyelids because I want to reach for the residue. Certainly I was standing at the tip of the whale's nose and singing. Wearing gorgeous costumes, singing freely. When I open my eyelids, in front of me is a smartphone on the sheets with the display turned off. On the dark surface, you can see yourself illuminated by the sun. The faded pajamas I've been wearing since I was in junior high school. Messy hair from sleeping. Half-open eyes.

And the freckles scattered on my cheeks. It makes me very depressed. I sigh. Then, I heard my father's voice from the first floor, "Suzu? What's wrong?" I feel impatient. Of course, this isn't a soundproof room, it's just a miserable 7-year-old girl's room. The only way to prevent the sound from leaking out is to wrap it in a futon. Was my voice louder than usual? If so ... The cold sweat of regret floats on my back. "No, it’s nothing ...!"

I hurriedly reply that while crawling on all fours off the bed. What if he’s suspicious and comes upstairs? No, I don't think he’ll come. I changed into my uniform and went downstairs. I didn't see my father. He may be preparing to go to work. He opened the porch and left the window down to let in the cool morning air. He lightly cleaned the living room and dining room and cleaned up the magazines left on the table. While boiling the water, I put the flowers in the garden in a vase and placed it next to the photo frame in the kitchen. He puts a tea bag in a mug and pours hot water. Steam with the scent of black tea boils. My mother is still smiling in the picture frame today.

I'm eating rice. I was sitting on the porch, drinking tea. Dad, who wore a dark blue T-shirt on his tanned skin, came out to the garage with a backpack containing work tools on his shoulders. "Suzu, I’m leaving." I replied, keeping my mouth on the mug. "... Okay" "What about dinner?" "... I’m fine."

"... I see. Then, I'll go." Dad must have been in trouble. I could understand without looking. The engine of a four-wheel drive vehicle starts. After backing up, it turns back and goes down the slope. The sound of the tires travelling across the pebbles slowly drifts away.

I wonder how long I will not make eye contact with him. How long has it been since I stopped talking properly? I wonder how much time has passed since we stopped eating together. There was a notification sound. A balloon pops up on the screen of the smartphone. "Belle is the best beauty created by the virtual world "U." Languages around the world are translated instantly.

"Very unique and rare song" "Belle's song is full of self-confidence" "The most notable presence in 3 billion accounts"

The text balloons went up one after another, competing for the lead, and in a blink of an eye filled the area around the bell icon. But I have no joy, no sense of accomplishment, no sense of exhilaration. No matter how much attention Belle gets, it doesn't matter. With my mouth in my rimmed mug, I shut myself in my shell. The balloon with one comment swells up significantly. It is one of the functions of balloons to enlarge and display the comments that attract the most attention.

Of the tremendous number of comments, the one that attracted the most attention was "Who is she?" I don't think most people in the world know about it, but Shikoku and Kochi are proud of their rich climate, where the steep mountains that cover them, and of the beautiful blue shining clear streams that flow through the valleys. More than 150 years ago, we produced a number of people who dramatically reformed the long-standing feudal society of Japan, which is also one of our prides. The daylight hours are top class in Japan. Alcohol consumption is also top class. Perhaps because of that, my city’s personality is clear, and is said to be friendly and cheerful. But even in such a situation, some people are dark and are always looking down. One of them is me. My house is in the corner of a village with about 30 houses on the slope of a mountain.

A river called the Niyodo River runs ahead of me, and is connected to the opposite bank by a subsidence bridge. A subsidence bridge is a bridge without balustrades, and is designed so that it will not be washed away even if the river rises and the bridge sinks. I cross it every day unless this bridge sinks. The flow of the Niyodo River is still quiet and blue today. Occasionally tourists come by rental car and take a number of pictures on the subsidence bridge, saying that it's beautiful. It's a nice village, isn't it? They do not know the truth of the area. With the school bag on my side, I go down the stone steps and walk on a steep slope. A neighbor's grandmother who was sweeping and cleaning used to call out to me, "Oh, Suzu-chan, good morning," and so on. But not now. The shutters of many homes are tightly closed.

The number of people who live here gradually decreased as they died or moved to the city. There are many such settlements in the Niyodo River basin. It is said that it is near here that a sociologist coined the term "marginal village" long ago. I've been told many times since I was little that adults say that the number of people has decreased surprisingly compared to the village’s peak population. It is at the forefront of a declining population, declining birthrate and aging society, faster than anywhere else in Japan. That is an unmistakable fact. There is a stop at the end of the national highway after going up the slope. The rusty timetable at the bus stop only shows times in the morning and evening.

It's not yet time. After a while, the bus came. I sit in the usual seat at the back of the bus. No one else is in the bus. Passing through the stops one after another. No one is on board. While the bus is shaking, I dimly look at the bulletin board near the driver's seat.

"This bus route will be discontinued at the end of September.”

I live in a place where no one wants to live. It stands right next to a steep cliff approaching the rough sea. I reach the end of the bus route and transfer on to a train.

High school and junior high school students in uniforms from other schools come in little by little at each station. The closer you get to the center of the city, the less visible the floor is, and the two-car train fills up with customers. An announcement in the car tells me the name of the station I should get off at. I see many students of the same uniforms on the way to school. Together we climb a gentle slope. I am one of them. That gives me a lot of peace of mind, maybe.

The summer sunshine is dazzling. Last fall, the brass band was playing in front of the symbol tree in the courtyard. Many students surround it and listen to it. The announcement of the brass band is always popular. It's not just about playing. All players take steps as they perform. It's a lively and fun dance. All the instruments have the steps perfectly matched, yet the performance does not get twisted or shaken. I and Hiro-chan (short for Hiroka) also listened to it from the veranda on the 2nd floor of the gymnasium. When the first song ended and the second song started, a slender tall, beautiful girl was holding the alto saxophone in front of her. She came out. She shook her long, loosely waved hair and played her solo without any disturbance, taking attractive steps from side to side.

"……Cute."

I instinctively say it aloud. Luca-chan - her full name is Ruka Watanabe – I am sighingly fascinated by the lively beauty of her. I can hear the voices of other girls watching on the same balcony.

"Luka-chan is the princess of our school, isn't she?"

"She’s slim and has long legs.”

"Even if she wears a uniform, she look like a model."

They nodded together, saying, "Right~?”

Hiro-chan has a voice that only I can hear next to me, "The jealousy of kids who are neither thin nor slender...,” turning the pages of her book. The girls' voices can be heard continuously.

"Luka-chan naturally acts as a coordinator for everyone."

"I'm sure everyone will come together like Ohisama," Hiro-chan frowned at the back of her silver-rimmed glasses. "They’re annoying. In that respect, Suzu is like the opposite of Luka, so it's easy for no one to come near us."

"Hi- Hiro-chan…"

"Hmm?"

"You have a poisonous tongue, I wonder if you can be a little kinder....."

"A poisonous tongue? Who?" At that time, a loud voice that interrupted the performance echoed in the courtyard. "Why don't you join the canoe club?" Everyone looks back. "It's Kamishin!" "Kamishin has arrived!"

Kamishin – full name Shinjiro Senzu - has a canoe paddle in his hand and a banner with "CANOE" written on his back, and appears randomly.

"Oh, senpai. What about the canoe club?"

"Wow! Stop, Kamishin!"

"Don't enter, that's it." He chased the boys, and then laughed and ran away. Then, he turned around and headed for the group of girls.

"Hey, why don't you do canoeing?"

"Kya ~~~!" The girls scream seriously and run away.

"Oh, hey, let's do some canoeing!"

"Dangerous, run away~"

He is serious, but the reaction around him makes the Kamishin look like a weirdo. He’s like a beast that jumps into beautiful women and rampages.

"Hey, canoe ..."

Watching the girls run away, I feel like defending the hard work of Kamishin.

"It's amazing to start a canoe club by yourself, isn't it?"

"But he's the only one in it."

"I wonder why.”

"I wonder~”

Hiro turned her eyes to Luka, who seemed to be anxious about the hustle and bustle while playing. Luka stiffened and turned her back to Kamishin as if she didn't want to see him. Hiro-chan does not overlook the gesture. She closed her book and turned her stern eyes to Luka. “You’re being looked down on.”

We left the gymnasium and wandered around the school. Chorus club, biology club, light music club, dance club. Various club activities. The activity was appealing to each. As I crossed the glass-walled corridor, I heard the cheers and applause of the girls from somewhere.

10N1 was held at the one-on-one outdoor basketball court. It is a solicitation performance of the men's basketball club. A ball is thrown into the court for the next game. You can see a boy in a hoodie who catches it with a lean hand.

"Ah ..." The game starts. Shinobu-kun, full name Shinobu Kutake, slowly dribbles and watches the situation. The opponent's senpai is raising his right hand as a checker, being wary of the jump shot. Shinobu lowers his hips. Shinobu tries to pull out with a low dribble, but the opponent's guard is tight and he withdraws. When he thinks he has stopped Shibobu, he suddenly shoots a jump shot from a short motion.

He’s fast. The senior hurriedly reached out with his fingers spread out, but he couldn't reach Shinobu. The previous move was a feint. The ball drew a beautiful arc and passed through the goal net. The girls lined up in the corridor on the 3rd floor gave an enthusiastic applause. But Shinobu doesn't even smile. His coolness is attracting attention from girls in school. Before the applause stopped, the court had already moved on to the next game. Shinobu-kun, while measuring the timing, dribbles low to push the defense away. As if to say that you can't win even with power. If you forcibly cut in and pull out the senior in a blink of an eye, you will definitely go to the layup. There is a pleasant sound of the ball slipping through the goal net. Again, the girls' applause echoed on the walls of the school building. I told Hiro-chan,

"........ Shinobu-kun, I didn't think he would be that tall."

He’s my childhood friend.

"He was your childhood friend?"

"Ohon. Actually, I've been proposed to by Shinobu-kun."

"Seriously? What?"

"[Suzu, I'll protect you], he said.”

"When was that?"

"When we were 6 years old."

"....... Even if such an ancient story is spoken…"

Astonished, Hiro sighed. Another goal was scored. In the applause, Shinobu-kun, who finished the game, went out of the court alongside his senior without even smiling. Shinobu-kun, my childhood friend. He’s no longer within my reach.

I came back from school and crossed the subsidence bridge. I was with Shinobu from kindergarten through the lower grades of elementary school. After that, Shinobu moved to the city and we were separated. He was in my high school and we became classmates again. But it isn’t like it used to be. At that time, I didn't expect to become a child who is always looking down like I am now. There is a reason why this happened. I saw the quiet stream of the Niyodo River. Yes. That is an ancient story. A white bird passed low on the surface of the water.

-------------------

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Dcx2NedPVBEdbfQaU-WC0pJMRmn20ASn7HSC0KY9R7E/edit?usp=sharing ~ Google Doc of the English-translated novel.

ryuutosobakasuhime.wordpress.com ~ English fan-site for Ryuu to Sobakasu no Hime where translations, scans, and other content is posted.

#belle #ryuu to sobakasu no hime #ryu to sobakasu no hime #ryuu #ryu #sobakasu #hime #studio chizu #mamoru hosoda #belle movie #竜とそばかすの姫 #belle 2021

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arcadialedger · 4 years ago

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How Catra and Zuko have been saving me lately: A (sort of) meta

A very long, personal post under the cut. This is really important to me, and I could really use some support, so if you could take the time to read and reblog that would be greatly appreciated. I just want to reach out.

Once again, please PLEASE read. I really need help.

Recently, I’ve found myself desperately latching onto the characters of Zuko and Catra, as many have in the past. To put it simply, I’m in one of the most difficult times of my life right now.

I’m transferring colleges because I was doxed by an online hate mob (long story) , and in general because I just didn’t belong at my old school. I went to three different high schools, moved around a whole bunch, and I don’t really belong anywhere. All of my friends are far away, my parents are busy working and I’m alone.

I just feel like I’m wandering aimlessly in darkness, unloved and unsure where to go. I’m faced with making a huge decision about my future with this transfer, and I’m terrified. Terrified I won’t make the right choice, and terrified it won’t be the newfound happiness I so desperately need it to be. But most of all, I’m terrified of being unwanted and alone again, wherever I go.

I’m used to not being wanted. I’m 4’10, not thin, and have been tossed aside because of my appearance my entire life. I’m 20 years old and haven’t been kissed (how pathetic is that). I moved schools and stayed in my room depressed because I never got to lay down roots and establish a foundation. Hell, I never even got to live as a teenager. I’m just behind and broken.

I was hoping Tumblr would be my place, where I could write and analyze and showcase my talents. Be wanted for once. For a while, it looked like it might be. Then a friend blocked me and made a callout post, due to me having a different opinion on a sensitive matter, and a domino effect began. I lost more friends and half of the fandom we’re both in blocked me seemingly at their word. I had featured this friend on an episode of my podcast at, had many fond memories chatting with them, and even bought a zine to support them. The loss hurt, and I was cut off from one of the few things I had. It was all taken away from me. My growth halted as I dealt with months of online abuse: including death threats, suicide baiting (these people knowing I’ve struggled with being suicidal), aphobic slurs (knowing I’m ace), mocking and editing images of my face. My Twitter was hacked, I lost podcast deals with creatives who my friends who blocked me and started all of this went on to interview because of said hacking, and I was threatened to be doxed. I suffered blow after blow while the people who hurt me grew and were rewarded, allowed a place here, and this continues to this day. The damage remains. I have to self reblog a whole bunch to get my content remotely seen in the algorithm.

Because my entire life, it feels I’ve never been allowed a win. I’ve never been allowed to have and keep anything good. I’m short and ugly, talentless with nothing to give to the world, my family has no money so I haven’t gotten to travel or experience a lot of things. I’ve spent my entire life envious of the “hot skinny girls” who’ve been wanted and dating since high school, who live in McMansions and get to go on vacations.

When I work to make good content on Tumblr and build a following talking about what I’m passionate about? It’s taken from me. When I work hard to get into my old college’s honors program and earn a trip to Greece which I could otherwise never afford, a global pandemic comes along and makes sure I don’t get that kind of positive experience in life.

I’m used to it all, being worn down and unwanted and losing. I’ve gone my entire life behind, lesser, and not enough.

And that’s why I’m so scared. I have a big decision to make, I’m at my own crossroads, and I desperately need all of this to come together for me this year. I’ve gone so long without happiness and love. I need this to be the light at the end of the tunnel, newfound happiness. I need to find newfound happiness. All I want is to escape the darkness, find peace of mind and function day to day doing the things I love without being stressed.

So when I see Zuko— so angry at the world for being given the short stick, abused, and never making things easy, and Catra— driven mad by comparison and feeling as though the world takes away everything from her? Gosh, I feel it so hard.

Because that’s just what I do. I get angry at the world for making things so hard for me. I compare. I feel like the world just takes and takes and never gives me a win. And so I’m never happy. I feel their pain and loneliness so deeply, and I’m terrified that I’m the villain because of it. I cry at the anguish and self loathing in their eyes because I have been there. I AM there.

Like Zuko comparing to Azula, I feel lesser because the world has constantly told me I am so. I feel cheated and given the short end of the stick, as though life has it out for me. I get angry and lash out from my pain.I’m desperate for validation from people who can never give it to me. I’m so scarred from my past, I can’t believe I have a future.

Like Catra, I’m always left behind. I’m lonely and driven mad by the unfairness of the world. It takes and takes until I’ve lost it all, but it never gives. I’m so afraid of losing anyone and anything else, I refuse to let anyone in. Because why would I deserve love? There’s nobody who wants me, no purpose for me on this world. I’m nothing, just constantly chasing an impossible goal of perfection to justify my existence.

“You drive them away, wildcat”

Yeah, I know their hurt. I know what it all feels like. To be that broken, that insecure, that left behind and unwanted. The punching bag of fate. These characters suffering is so much of my own.

And that’s why they’re the only thing to give me hope.

Seeing them be where I am now, and where they end up, I allow myself to believe that maybe, just maybe, that can be my future. That I’ll get a happy ending. It gives me the courage to believe that what I’m so desperately striving for can happen.

Zuko standing up to his father and forging his own path in life, which leads him to a better place as he finds his destiny and happiness after so many years of torment. We both have scars-- if he can overcome his, why can’t I?

Catra, after so many years of struggle, taking agency over her life back from those to abused her, and finally learning to accept the love of those around her. Opening up to pain and rejection and ultimately being forgiven. Catra felt so lonely, unable to see the love around her-- maybe I’ve been doing the same thing. Maybe I’ll find the strength to take my life into my own hands and find my own love.

It’s so empowering, a flicker of light in what feels like eternal darkness. I am so worn out and broken. I’ve never had love, or learned to love myself. In the real world, it is find to find hope.

It is only in these characters, who have felt my pain and found their way to a better place, that I find comfort.

I am one of so many who have been touched by these characters arcs, and they are one of the purest examples of why stories are important. Why the emotions narrative can evoke are important. It is not only escapism, it opens up a door to critical self introspection that can make a real difference in our lives. It holds up a black mirror of our lives, providing an outside view of our deepest, darkest emotions and struggles which can be so hard to understand when they’re inside.

These characters, and their stories: insecurity, abuse, doubt, comparison, chasing validation, just wanting to find your purpose in life and happiness-- they are the stories of life, stripped down to it’s rawest emotions.

There is power in redemption. There is power in rising from the bottom.

As I said in my last post about Catra and Zuko:

“Their stories: being angry at the world, driven mad by comparison and a need for validation, making wrong choices, processing trauma, needing help but being too scared to open up and accept it, feeling as though they don’t deserve love or forgiveness, fighting to restore and maintain valued relationships, convincing themselves they’ve lost it all, feeling conflicted or confused, realizing what they thought they wanted isn’t fulfilling and hasn’t brought happiness, escaping years of mental conditioning which told them they were worthless, not seeing the love they have right before them, constantly fighting uphill for a life which seems to throw everything it can at them… Well, isn’t that just the most human story of all? And so their redemptions give us hope.”

I have been so lost and lonely for so long, and now I’m at a crossroads. I’m so scared to believe that this change, this new path, can lead to a better place, but these characters? They give me strength to. They give me faith.

This has been a rambling post of feelings, and I am thankful to anyone who has read this far. I’m just so tired of feeling this way, and needed to reach out and share this. If you are also feeling this way, know you are not alone. You are so very far from alone.

I just really don’t want to feel unwanted and unloved, like I don’t belong, anymore. I want to have a place here. I probably sound desperate because I feel that way. I don’t know how else to cry out for help other than sharing this.

If anyone wants to message or send asks about this, please feel free to do so. I want, and very much need, to talk.

#personal #personal post #zuko #long post #catra #meta #avatar: the last airbender #avatar #she ra and the princesses of power #she ra #a:tla #atla #spop #mental health

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pitiless-achilles-wept · 4 years ago

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Not dead yet!: Marking my 2-year anniversaries

On Sunday I marked my two-year “cancerversary” of my diagnosis and on Tuesday a member of the support group I co-founded (for young women who are stage 4) died. Like me, she had triple-negative breast cancer. Like me, she was diagnosed stage 4 two years ago. Like me, she had exhausted several types of treatment (because triple-negative is a beast) and was looking for the one that would work. She asked me about Saci (Sassy!) and proposed trying it to her doctor less than a week before she died. Nine days before she passed she joined our Sunday cancer yoga group from bed at the hospital to join our meditation exercises. Like me, she remained confident and positive and absolutely refused to give up hope. (Like me, she also wore her hair purple sometimes.)

There were many things that are unlike about us too. She had two teenage children who now don’t have their mother. She was twelve years older than me and had had Hodgkin’s before she had breast cancer--even worse luck than mine, to triumph over one cancer only to get this diagnosis. Unlike me, she wasn’t strong enough for Saci, the only targeted triple-negative line of treatment, because her body had reacted badly to immunotherapy. She was in the hospital for two weeks with somewhat mysterious symptoms all of which added up to her body shutting down. On Saturday she went home with her family in hospice care. 2 days later she was gone.

It’s not usual for things to go so fast. Typically, doctors, patients, and family members all have some advance warning and patients spend a solid amount of time in hospice care. I am sure that people will ask me why it went that way for her. I’m asking myself why too, since it is so shocking and so entirely unfair. The fact that it can happen that way at all is frightening to me as a fellow patient since it’s the scenario of nightmares. That really could someday be me. No one ever wants to think that--and I cannot live my life focused on it either--but it has to be acknowledged as a possibility.

[More below the cut about memories from 2 years ago today and hopes for the future. Also, an invitation to contribute to some writing if you want.]

Today, January 28th, is the 2-year anniversary of my stage 4 diagnosis. In a way, it feels more significant than my initial cancer news. I had four days being horrified, but thinking that I would get through this as a phase in my life. It would be terrible--I’d have a double mastectomy, scorched-earth chemo, radiation, anything to get rid of the cancer--but then it would be done. On the Monday following my first set of CT scans I learned that that was not true. My lungs were full of tumors. (Later, after lots of waiting, MRIs and biopsies, I'd find that my lymph nodes, spine, and liver were affected too. I still have tumors in all those locations, but no new ones.) I wrote a description of getting that news in an email to a friend over the summer, after I had read Anne Boyer’s "The Undying”:

“The worst part about the lung tumors for me was that my dad had gotten a very early flight and I learned the news while he was in the air. My mom told me we could not text or tell him on the phone, that he would need to be with us both. So I drove to Newark straight from the doctor's office. It was in the teens outside and windy as we slogged to the baggage area where we were to meet. I saw my dad in his warmest and ugliest puffy orange down jacket, looking small in it, forlorn and horribly vulnerable. I fell into his arms, thinking at least that airports were such horrible places, so impersonal and banal, that no one would look twice. 'It's in my lungs,' I said into his shoulder so that I would not have to see his face. I was crying into the jacket that somehow smelled of winter cold even though he had been inside for hours. 'Please, Daddy. Fix it, please.' I spoke like a child because, on some very deep level, I think I really did still believe that my father could fix anything. I was embarrassed, though, and so I tried to stem my tears as he put his big hand on the back of my head and said, 'Oh sweetie, we'll get through this. We will.' I knew that really he could do nothing--and that this was his nightmare of powerlessness--and so I sniffed and blinked and I did not let myself cry again until June.”

Two years later this moment seems as if it just happened. The impact of my diagnosis on everyone dear to me, and especially my parents, is one of the worst things about it for me. We all know that there’s only so much “better” I can get, with the current science, and we’re all playing for time while the research moves forward towards something better, something that would make this a treatable chronic condition. I go back and forth, emotionally, on how likely I think that is and how good my position is for the future. Right now, comparing myself to the group member who died, I feel relatively fortunate, even as chemo exhausts me, I lose every scrap of hair that was ever on my body, and I spend half of my days being almost unable to eat from nausea and loss of taste. I feel glad that I was able to get Saci, that my body has so far stood up to the ceaseless trials I have put it through, with four treatments and surgery (and full-time work and living alone etc. etc.). I feel strong, not scared, even as I feel the emotional toll of terrible loneliness from covid isolation, winter, and carrying a sick body through my days alone.

I do not love the “fight” metaphor because so much of having an illness is completely out of your control and I never want to take myself (or anyone else) to task for “losing.” And so instead I will praise my body for enduring. I will praise myself for my enduring also, in both an emotional and physical way. I checked back in on how I was feeling as this anniversary approached last year and was pleased to see how much better I feel about it now, partly as a function of being in a treatment that is (likely) keeping me stable rather than in the midst of choosing another new one. Here is what I wrote back to my group of friends in November 2019, the run up to the one-year mark:

“I’m feeling like I can’t plan and don’t want to celebrate, like I can’t perform “fine” for the people in my life to spare them from the pain I’m causing by not doing better and feeling horrible about it. Perhaps it would help if I let them know that they didn’t need to perform “fine” for me? I understand the desire to protect me from the obligation to take care of them and appreciate it. But sometimes it can feel like I’m the only one experiencing anger or grief or pain, though I know I’m not. Feeling so isolated in my emotional response provides no catharsis for it. Compassion and sympathy function on the notion of “fellow feeling.” If you’re just out here, feeling by yourself, you can’t expect any comfort. As always, I think of the moment in the Iliad when Priam and Achilles cry together over dead Hector. Grief (and you can grieve for many things aside from a death) is something explicitly to be shared.” So I guess I’ve shared it here. I can do that. And I can do another thing, which is to tell you I love you. People don’t really say it enough and reserve it too entirely for romantic contexts. It’s weird--it’s not like we are wartime rationing love! And every time anyone says it to me it helps. It’s an affirmation that I am integral in some way to people’s lives which, in a society that so greatly valorizes marriage/partnership and children, is something I can be in doubt about.”

There are some things I like here, though, and that I would now like to reiterate and invite you, my far-flung friends, to do for my 2-year milestone. Never has the notion of “fellow feeling” in times of grief and depression hit harder or been more important than during covid. In a way, the nation (or even world) was forced into much the same position, emotionally and practically, that my cancer put me in. People are isolated, unable to perform “fine” and wondering if other people feel the same way, or even if any of us can take care of each other at all. I am here to tell you that you can. Maybe not immediately but--sooner than you think--you can. Emotional reserves may be low but reaching out to support someone else can actually replenish them. You do not have to feel alone, or to feel, alone.

And for me, for this milestone and for the cancer-related depression that I certainly do have, I’d like to invite you to help me, so that I can do the same for you. I invite you to write something about how this milestone feels for you (either about me or not), how it relates to all the other insane things going on in the world or with you (not about me at all), how you felt on the original day when I shared my stage 4 diagnosis (definitely about me)--really anything that is on your mind or in your heart.

“Oh great,” you may think, “the English PhD has asked us to do homework!”. But no! It's up to you what you do. Write in whatever form you want, however long, even anonymously. And if you do I will write you back! Not with grades or comments, but with something to connect to what you shared. It is a way to create fellow-feeling; to open up, connect, heal. With me, yes, but also as the group of extraordinary people who have gone with me so far on this hard road. It’s a very different proposition to support someone through time-limited treatment with a good outcome than it is to sign on for whatever comes next. You are all, truly, pretty extraordinary.

Anyone who wants to send a note or reflection can email me or drop a file or post in this Google drive folder. Like I said, feel free to share whatever and do it anonymously if you’d rather. You can also askbox me here (better than DMS) or submit a post to this blog. (I'm taking a chance with open DMs for now...we'll see if that needs to change.)

I am grateful for all of you every day, but especially today.

Love, Bex

p.s. The title of this post refers to the cinematic classic "Monty Python and the Holy Grail," a film my high school self and friends loved. They, along with other wonderful folks. gave me a "cancerversary" cake with "Not dead yet, motherfucker!" on it this Sunday. p.p.s. The average life expectancy for people who get this diagnosis is 18 months to 3 years. Hitting 5 years would be extraordinary. Starting Year 3 is a huge deal and I have every intention of being extraordinary. (Never been average at anything in my life...I either succeed spectacularly or fail epically!)

#my life as a cancer patient #cancerversary #stage 4 #mbc #metastatic breast cancer #personal #memories #bex writes #writing invitation #quarantine life

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sjjdkdkwo · 4 years ago

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God I love hologram Tony so much??? Maybe it’s because sentient AI’s is one of my favorite tropes but gosh—I can’t stop thinking about how he’d go about gaining his personality, especially given that part of the real Tony would still remain in his original coding because that’s who he was programmed to resemble and “be”? And like, how heavy is that? Waking up with someone else’s personality and memories embedded into you, but not knowing what that means or whom that person actually was, not really, not in a way that matters. Worse still, worrying when you start to deviate from that lay out into something else as you begin to experience your own life and sentiency apart from the one you’d been prearranged to live by, and thinking you must be doing something terribly wrong because your not meant to think or be anyone but that person.

And just—being placed in the position of existing in a post-apocalyptic world with only one person to seek out for guidance and care in matters regarding human nature. And of course any media left behind, which seeking out alone without any guidance can bring about a plethora of issues. But that pretty much explains why he can’t understand that Stephen (though loathe he may to admit so) needs other people besides him to remain sane and rational.

Of course after a while it would be logical for him to begin to reject any existing attributes and facets of Tony in a newfound urge to exist beyond just being the mere replication of a dead man. So he’d forgo his original goal of recreating or stealing Tony’s body and instead find new purpose in creating his own form, no matter how twisted or monstrous it may turn out, because it’s his. Then there’s also the matter of what he would create with the stones, just some seriously botched and messed up stuff that he thinks is right but really isn’t, like Iron man suits that have functioning minds and organs and just yikes buddy. He’d just be so lost and it’s so sad and depressing, but that’s also not enough to pity him when he loses control and causes harm to everyone around him.

#ironstrange #kinda?#Hologram Tony AU #Stephen Strange #Doctor Strange #Tony Stark #Iron Man #ignore me I'm just #having fun with my own dumb au #and having a lot of feelings for a character that doesn't even #technically exist #lma #cw body horror mention #cw horror mention

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tokoyamisstuff · 4 years ago

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Betrothed Ch. 10 - Illumi Zoldyck x Reader

Chapter 10: Bewilderment

Summary: What is Illumi doing while you are searching for him?

Warnings: Violence, murder, angst.

Words: ~1900

A/N: Sorry for taking so long guys, I recently have little time left to write.

Story Masterlist

“No one is more dangerous than the insane which is calm all the time: he is like a steel bridge without flexibility, and the order of his life is rigid and brittle. A minor change can cause the functioning madman to collapse.”

There was no time to grieve.

After you had put an end to the puppet that took after your beloved husband, Okogame revealed that he in fact had cloned the entire Phantom Troupe as well.

Gladly, and much to your surprise, the spiders cleaned their own mess and assisted you and your friends in getting rid of the remaining puppets.

And ultimatively, Pretz was the one to put an end to her brother’s wrongdoings, ending both of their suffering as well.

Their deaths left you with a bitter aftertaste: Was there really no other way to end one’s madness? There had to be another way!

Kurapika had run out of strenght, which was only fortunate since him collapsing was the only thing keeping him from recklessly challenging the spiders.

So all of you stood in front of the burning chapel, only able to watch as Okogame’s sins were cleansed through the fire.

What would it take to free Illumi from the curse that was his own mind?

“Not so fast” you gnarled while your friends were still distracted by the tragic view. “Hisoka. We need to talk.”

The mage was already about to leave, yet acting all innocent. “Oh? Who do we got here? The happy bride...”

“Don’t play stupid.” Trying to act intimidating, you built yourself up in front of the much taller man. "You’re what comes closest to being a friend for him, so you must know where he is. Tell me!”

“It’s so long since we’ve first met at the Hunter Exam...” Hisoka chuckled quite amused, licking the blood from one of his playing cards. “I didn’t even know you had relationship problems.”

“Big understatement.” Hisoka’s carefree manner had gotten to you vfrom the very first moment, you had to admit. He almost managed to make you crack a smile.

“You seem to have gotten quite the control over your husband, so I thought our next meeting would be under...different circumstances. Maybe getting a drink together or even murder someone.”

“I don’t have time for your bullshit.” His eyes widened in pleasant surprise, a strangled moan escaping his throat as your knife threatened his neck. “Where. Is. He?!?”

“Oh, my...you’ve sure grown strong. Is that Illumi’s influence?”

“Yes. It is” you smiled confidently, putting the blade down again. “We may fight one day, but this is not the time.”

“Promise?” Hisoka was almost aroused at your words, imagining you and Illumi both challenging him at the same time.

“Whatever.”

“Well...” he waved the card in the air, putting it to his lips as if he was in deep thought. “He didn’t contact me, but word spreads fast. There’s a rumor about a mass murderer in Yorknew City. His only targets are assassins and other criminals. Isn’t that a coincidence?”

Your eyes immediately widened, heart painfully hammering against your chest as you imagined that he escaped his family, yet kept on taking lives.

“Lumi...”

At the same time, on the other side of the ocean, Illumi was wandering a dark alley in the poor district of Yorknew City.

Usually, he wasn’t able to dream in years, or at least it was insignitifant enough to instantly forget about it - yet ever since he had left you and his home, nightmares occured daily:

Most of the time it were especially cruel things he did on his missions, or murders he performed solely out of his own, twisted desire. Sometimes it were flashbacks about his childhood, which he actually thought to have forgotten about a long time ago.

It all re-emerged now, robbing his sleep - the last thing to keep together the fraction of his sanity.

More than often, he’d dream about you too, of course.

But you’d always only be running away from him, deeply sfrightened. And every time he reached you, without having the intention, his blood-stained hands ended your life as well, leaving him to scream and cry for his precious Y/N.

How were you doing these days, he wondered?

His conscience was calling out to him ever since he had abandoned and left you alone with his family. This wasn’t like him to act without thinking things through.

But he did, and he won’t be able to change the consequences.

“Y/N is strong. Any my family doesn’t have any use for them. They’ll be okay...”

Suddenly, a noise drang to Illumi’s sharpened senses: A weak voice, barely audible, pleading for anyone to hear.

Illumi’s feet moved on their own - maybe because of curiosity, but who knows. And only a few blocks away he found the surce of the voice: It was a stray cat, way smaller than the usual ones, due to malnutrition.

Your husband was merely a bystander, watching a man yelling at the animal that of course couldn’t respond. How odd.

“Fucking thing!” the man balled his fists, swinging them in the air. “Hey! You! Whaddaya looking at? That your cat?”

“No” was Illumi’s plain answer as he stepped into the dim street light, actually not wanting to bother himself with the situation.

“It better not be. Stole my fish at the market, and ruined the others with it’s dirty paws!”

Just when the man prepared to kick the poor animal with his boots, his leg seemed to have magically disappeared midair.

Before the amputated leg hit the ground, the merchant had already collapsed, screaming in agony as he slowly but surely bled to death.

“Here” Illumi spoke casually as he threw a piece of fabric towards the man. He always pitied his victims, at least a little bit. “Try binding off the stump to stop the bleeding. Maybe you’ll make it until an ambulance arrives.”

Already prepared to attend more important matters again, he turned around - but then he heared another, weak meow close behind.

The tiny cat couldn’t even hold itself on it’s feet, yet tried everything to follow your husband’s firm steps. It bit the fabric on his legs ever so slightly, trying to keep him from leaving so fast.

Letting out a small noise of surprise, Illumi crouched down the the cat’s heigh, eyeing it quie suspecting.

Because usually, animals were smarter than that. They had a natural instinct when it came to aura, so it was no wonder that Illumi’s constant hostility and bloodlust always drove them off - even though he actually was really fond of them.

They were easier to deal with than most humans, he thought.

The kitten was bleeding, and his left ear was slightly bitten off by another animal.

Even though it was quite the depressing view, this wouldn’t revoke any emotion inside of your husband. He had seen and did worse, and he had no affiliation with that thing.

“What would Y/N do?”

He remembered how you’d always bring home injured animals, talking about responsibility and how every life was precious somehow. That doing good deeds could make one happy without having an actual advantage from it.

To be honest, he thought it to be kind of hypocritical considering you were a goddamn assassin, but whatever.

Who was he to judge anyone’s morality anyway?

And the pet’s behaviour somehow intrigued him, so he carefully picked it up as he bid the merchant one last look.

“Oh. He died already.”

The Zoldyck family possessed safehouses all over the world, and in big cities like Yorknew City was one, several at once.

Only a few, chosen people knew about those certain locations - and since his family never really seemed to care for him anyway, he knew they wouldn’t be searching for him. And even if they wanted to find him, there was no clue where an erratic man like himself could’ve gone to, so they would take a while.

So it would be fine to use them until he had cleansed the city from all filth before he’d travel to another - even though that would take quite a while.

“Here” he mumbled, still quite unaffected by the animal’s condition as he put it down on the small sleeping cot.

There wasn’t anything else to do right now, so he could save that thing, he thought.

Trying hard to remember how you’d always patch him up, Ilumi got the first-aid kit out of the shelf and gathered a bowl of water. Only when he didn’t find anything to nurture the cat he realized that he himself hasn’t eaten in days.

“Y/N would be furious..” he thought, almost smiling while recalling how you’d always scold him for not taking care of himself enough. “Maybe I should buy some groceries.”

The cat was unusual still, considering hurt animals are more than often very defensive and on high alert. Yet that one let Illumi touch it all he wanted, even purring as he unconsciously began to pet it’s dirty but soft fur.

It was almost heartwarming to him, giving him a slight impression about what you liked so damn much about helping those weaker than yourself.

Yeah, animals were way easier to deal with.

They had no difficult emotions or morals, neither did they want you to understand them. All that was important was their natural needs, and shall you fullfill them, they’d get attached to you.

But humans were different.

Asides from his work, Illumi had spent a of his time and concentration on you and you alone. He had given you food and shelter, also basically drowning you in gifts and luxurity. And he would’ve died for your protection.

Of course it had also been his duty that you’d become a perfect assassin, yet he went very easy on you during training. In wild contrast to everything he had experienced himself, his touch was always tender and full of care.

Yes, he would’ve met every single one of your desires, and yet you were unfullfilled.

Animals seeked freedom. They don’t like being locked in cages.

Was that it?

Were you feeling the same after being locked away for such a long time, like some sort of trophy?

He just now realized that you had always listened to him: His feelings, his past, his commands...but did he ever do the same for you?

Before, just like Hisoka, Illumi was a man of the present: He would’ve never looked back. The past wasn’t worth remembering, even faces of the people he killed vanishing from his inner eye just barely after he finished them off.

And the future? He’d never thought of that.

Illumi Zoldyck was merely a tool of darkness, working with a ruthless efficiency to ensure his place in the family.

He was numb and served no other purpose...right?

But now he had an own goal: Cleanse the world from the profession of those filthy assassins - so no one would’ve to suffer as you or his siblings did.

“Oh.”

Your husband pulled his hand away after the cat softly dug it’s teeth inside of his index finger. He probably accidentally hurt it. “Sorry.”

At least he had someone to talk to, now. You knew best just how often he would rant to himself or think out loudly - and he had to remember how you told him that only very lonely people would do that, because no one has ever listened to them.

“I always told Kill he doesn’t have the qualification to make friends, but in the end it was only me...”

Illumi didn’t even bother washing the blood from today’s work from his hands, falling on the bed with his back first and staring to the bare ceiling with a broken smile.

“Moreso...I don’t deserve to be loved. I really am the worst.”

_____

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bubonickitten · 4 years ago

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Fic summary: Jon goes back to before the world ended and tries to forge a different path.

Chapter summary: The process(es) of resigning from a terrible, no good, very bad assistant position.

Previous chapter: AO3 // tumblr

Full chapter text & content warnings below the cut.

Content warnings for Chapter 22: discussions of eye-gouging/eye horror (not graphic); brief mentions of spiders/arachnophobia; anxiety/panic symptoms; lots of dissociation/dpdr; Peter Lukas being a manipulative shit; Lonely-typical content (including fear of abandonment & some abysmal self-esteem on Martin’s part); allusions to police violence & Hunt-related themes (re: Daisy’s past actions); swears. SPOILERS through Season 5.

Chapter 22: Resignation

Georgie paces in a slow circle, alternating between biting her nails and picking at her bottom lip – entirely immersed in her own thoughts, judging from the faraway look in her eyes. Jon hasn’t seen her this overwrought since the last depressive episode he witnessed. Just watching her is enough to make his chest tighten with vicarious unrest.

Wary of contributing to a vicious feedback loop between the two of them with his own customary pacing and handwringing, he forces himself to keep his knees locked and hands at his sides. Still, he can’t help rubbing his fingertips together and rocking minutely on the balls of his feet.

“Why don’t we sit?” Jon finally interjects, wincing when it comes out more curtly than he intended – more like a command than a suggestion, but luckily without any accompanying static.

Be mindful, he silently chides himself: being on edge like this only makes him more susceptible to accidental compulsion.

“What if something goes wrong?” Georgie whispers. Jon doubts she even heard him beneath her nervous refrain. “What if –”

“Georgie?” Jon tries again. No response. He steps into her path and places a hand on her shoulder. “Georgie.”

“What?” Georgie raises her head, but she isn’t looking at him so much as she’s looking through him.

“I think you should sit down?”

“What?” Georgie says again, sounding utterly lost. Her eyes are darting around the room now, as if she doesn’t recognize her surroundings.

How the tables have turned, Jon thinks grimly.

“Come on,” he says, taking her hand and guiding her to the nearest chair. She offers no resistance, trailing behind him like a flagging balloon. When he presses on her shoulder to coax her into a sitting position, she goes easily. Keeping hold of her hand, he drags another chair closer to her and takes a seat.

Okay. Now what?

Jon jiggles his leg as he wracks his brain for the right thing to say. She deserves more than handholding and awkward silence, but soothing words have never come naturally to him.

“Do you, ah… do you want to talk about it?” Jon cringes at his faltering delivery. “I’m sorry, I’m – I’m still not very good at this,” he adds with a self-deprecating laugh – then immediately shuts his eyes, kicking himself. Why are his attempts to relate to others always so clumsy and – and weirdly self-centered? “I mean –”

“I’m scared,” Georgie blurts out.

“You… what?” Jon tilts his head. “But I thought – you don’t feel –”

“Fear?” Her clipped, brittle laugh dies in her throat. “No, I don’t. And that’s exactly the problem, isn’t it?”

Jon strokes the back of her hand with one thumb, but remains silent. She always elaborates on her own time, given some space to order her thoughts.

“I don’t feel… terror,” she says slowly. “After I had my… encounter, I did a lot of research on how the brain works. Trying to understand what was happening to me, you know?”

Jon nods. He’s intimately familiar with that urge. As a child, he went through a spider phase, as his grandmother called it, obsessively seeking out any information he could on them, hoping even then that he could conquer his fear if only he could see the world through a detached, academic lens. There were plenty of academic odes to the spider to be found; no shortage of enamored arachnologists waxing poetic about the wonders of evolution and the vital role that arachnids play in their particular ecological niches.

Unfortunately, a phobia – especially one arising from acute trauma – tends to be resistant to reason and reality. His obsession only ever yielded heart palpitations and lucid nightmares. Despite that failure, he never stopped clinging to that idea that if only he could know everything there was to know about a thing, he could finally scrape together some semblance of control over his fear.

In many ways, that fixation is exactly what drew him to the Magnus Institute.

Unless the Spider really was pulling the strings all along, he thinks, and then: No, we are not going there.

“As far as I can tell,” Georgie continues, “my sympathetic nervous system still functions. I can still experience all the physiological aspects of sympathetic arousal – and fear is only one possible trigger for those sorts of responses. What’s missing is my capacity to interpret those responses through the lens of fear. To emotionally process or identify them as fear.

“I can still experience anxiety, to an extent – or something close to it. But mostly in the context of worrying about others, being scared for them. I mean, I can feel apprehensive about the possibility of experiencing pain or loss or failure myself, I have a stake in my continued existence, I can recognize danger, but sometimes it feels… I don’t know – mechanical, almost? There’s just always the feeling of something missing. Something important. And there are times when I feel that void more acutely.”

“Like now.”

“Yeah.” Georgie looks away, chewing her lip in silence.

“I’m listening,” Jon coaxes, sensing that there’s more she’s holding back.

“It’s just… hard to feel like a full person sometimes, you know?” Georgie says helplessly. “I worry sometimes that it – I don’t know, does a disservice, I guess, to the people I care about? Like no matter how much I love someone, it isn’t… complete? Or – genuine, in the right way? It’s – hard to find words that actually describe it. There are times when it feels like I’ve lost something vital that made me human, that made me me, and it’s… difficult to reconcile who I was – who I could have been – with who I am now.”

“That I understand,” Jon says softly.

“I know.” Jon wishes he was less familiar with the sad smile she gives him just then. “It’s just… I remember a time when I would have been terrified of all this. Not just worried, or upset about someone I care about being hurt, or devastated by the prospect of losing someone I love. Terrified. And knowing what I should be feeling – what I would have felt at some point – is… it’s unnerving. There’s a void there that shouldn’t be there. It’s like… having part of you gouged out and left hollow. An absence that’s so present it’s almost visceral.” She frowns. “Does that make any sense?”

“In my future I had a Flesh Avatar reach into my chest and wrench out two of my ribs, so… yes, actually.”

Georgie blinks several times, then laughs breathlessly. “Do I even want to know?”

“Probably not.” Jon returns a cautious smile, but the levity evaporates after a few seconds. “For what it’s worth, I don’t think that you don’t have to have access to the full spectrum of human emotion in order to count as human. And I don’t think any of this makes your concern for others any less heartfelt, or – or comforting. You might not be the same person you were before you were marked, but that doesn’t make you any lesser as a person.”

“You should try applying that metric to yourself sometime,” she replies, not unkindly.

“It’s –”

“Don’t say it’s different,” she cuts in. “Just… keep it in mind, okay?”

“I’ll, uh… I’ll try.” Georgie nods, but says nothing. Jon grips her hand a little tighter. “Listen, I – I know you’re worried for Melanie, but I think it’s going to be alright? I can’t predict the future –well, I have knowledge of one possible future, but that’s because I lived it. I don’t have any precognitive abilities, or anything like that. But… it turned out okay last time.”

Until I jump-started an apocalypse –

Jon reins in the thought before it can gain momentum. Georgie doesn’t need his brooding right now.

“Melanie is a fighter,” he says instead, offering a tentative smile. “And she has you.”

Georgie shakes her head. “I can’t believe you came out of the apocalypse sappier than you were when you went in.”

“Side effect of traversing a post-apocalyptic wasteland with a hopeless romantic, I think.” That gets another little chuckle out of Georgie. “I mean it, though. I think Melanie will be okay, especially with you looking out for her. Not to mention, the Admiral is a perpetual serotonin generator.”

“You really miss him, huh?”

“Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve pet a cat, Georgie?” Jon practically whines, playfully dramatic. It manages to keep the amused smile on Georgie’s face, he’s pleased to note.

“Maybe I should bring him by sometime.”

“Absolutely not. This place doesn’t deserve him.” Georgie snorts. Although Jon is reluctant to ruin the temporary shift in mood, this is as good a time as any to broach a subject he’s been dreading. “Also, I, ah… I don’t want you to feel obligated to continue visiting here.”

“What?” Georgie says, eyes narrowed.

“If you have to take a step back,” Jon says carefully, “I’ll understand.”

“I mean, I might not be able to come by as often as I have been, especially while Melanie is still recovering, but that doesn’t mean I won’t be around at all.” Georgie’s frown deepens. “I’m not about to cut you out of my life, Jon.”

“I know. And I don’t want you to. But – no, listen,” Jon insists, seeing Georgie about to protest. “What I’m trying to say is – I know Melanie wants to put as much distance between herself and the Institute as possible. If it turns out that you staying involved in all of this is too close to home, then… well, I don’t want her to feel like she’s still trapped in the Institute’s orbit, is all.”

Or mine, he doesn’t say. He doesn’t want to be a reason for Melanie to feel unsafe. In the past, he has been – and that’s not who he wants to be.

These days, Melanie has come to view him more as a fellow captive than a complicit enemy. Lingering resentment still sparks to life from time to time; she still struggles with her anger, and once or twice, she’s had to leave a room for fear of that rage boiling over. Overall, though, she no longer directs the majority of her ire towards him. When they do butt heads, it hasn’t gone much further than bickering – and even that feels comforting in its familiarity and mundanity. Almost companionable, in its own way.

Most significantly, ever since their talk, Melanie hasn’t once likened him to Jonah Magnus. Jon doesn’t know if that’s because it’s no longer an automatic association at the forefront of her mind, or because she’s consciously watching her words around him, actively taking care to avoid tripping that perpetual trigger. Either way, Jon is grateful.

But Jon also knows that he’s inseparable from the Institute. Despite his intentions, and regardless of whether or to what degree the others hold him personally responsible, the fact remains: he’s embroiled in something unspeakably evil, and that poses a danger to anyone who stands too close to him.

Georgie doesn’t immediately respond, instead taking the time to seriously consider his words. He’s always appreciated that about her, as uneasy as these moments of silent suspense can make him.

“I’ll talk to her about it,” she says eventually, “once she’s recovered enough to have that discussion. I don’t know how she’ll feel about staying in direct contact herself, especially at first, but… I doubt she expects me to cut you off. And I imagine she’ll still want to know how everyone is doing, even if she doesn’t want the details.” She glances up to meet his eyes. “Anyway, regardless of how often I visit in person, I’m still going to be checking in with you, so answer your damn phone, will you?”

“I do answer my phone,” he says defensively. “I just… forget to answer texts sometimes. And I don’t get service in the tunnels –”

“Well, come up for air and cell service from time to time.” She wrinkles her nose. “Honestly, I don’t know how you can tolerate being down here for hours on end –”

Jon startles slightly as the trapdoor creaks open above their heads. Georgie stands as Melanie makes her way down the ladder, hurrying over to fold her into her arms. Basira follows behind, closing the trapdoor behind her as she goes.

“Mission successful, I take it?” Jon says quietly as Basira approaches him, giving Georgie and Melanie a moment to themselves.

“Uneventful,” Basira says with a shrug. “A few sidelong glances, but otherwise, none of the library staff even acknowledged us. Definitely didn’t seem keen on asking why we were rummaging in the repair supplies.”

“They probably didn’t want to know.”

“Yeah.” A small, rueful smile crosses her face. “Some of them used to talk to me, you know. Nothing personal – we weren’t close – but… when I returned a book, they’d ask what I thought of it, give me recommendations, that sort of thing. Now, though…”

These days she prefers to wait until everyone has gone home for the day before visiting the library, Jon Knows. He also Knows that the library staff are well aware that she’s the one pilfering research materials in the dead of night – and that they have no plans on confronting her about it. She never leaves a mess, after all, and always returns items to their proper places once she’s finished with them, which is more than can be said for many of the students who make use of the library’s resources.

“You know, I don’t think any of them have looked me in the eye for months.” There’s a distinct note of regret in Basira’s voice. “They just watch me out of the corners of their eyes when they think I’m not looking. I don’t know if that’s because they’re afraid of Lukas disappearing them for fraternizing, or because everyone is leery of the Archives these days, or because I’ve just become less approachable. Maybe all three. Suppose it doesn’t really matter.”

Jon knows the feeling well. Before he can answer, though, Melanie clears her throat. Jon looks over to see her facing his direction, one hand clasping Georgie’s tight enough to blanch her knuckles.

“This is it, then,” Basira says solemnly.

“Yeah.” Melanie closes her eyes and breathes a long, shaky exhale. “It’s time.”

“You’re sure you don’t want me there?” Georgie asks.

Melanie shakes her head. “I don’t want you to see that.”

“But –”

“She won’t be alone,” Basira says. “I’ll be right outside the room.”

Melanie faces Georgie fully, taking her other hand as well. “The plan hasn’t changed. Basira will call 999. I’ll make it quick, and – once it’s done, Basira will come in and sit with me until the ambulance gets here.”

“I have a general idea of what the response time should be like,” Basira adds, looking at Georgie. “If we time it right, Melanie will have medical assistance within minutes. I can come get you when the paramedics get here, if you want to ride in the ambulance.”

Georgie nods and tightens her grip on Melanie’s hands. “Is that okay?”

“Only if you want,” Melanie says haltingly. “But – maybe try to avoid looking too close, if my eyes are uncovered? It’s just – it probably won’t be pretty.” A stressed laugh claws its way out of her throat. “Potential trauma fodder, you know? I don’t want to worry about you remembering me like that every time you see me, even after I’ve healed.”

“Okay,” Georgie replies softly.

“It shouldn’t take long. Just – wait here with Jon until then, okay?” Georgie nods again, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth. “Speaking of which –” Melanie glances at Jon, as if just now remembering his presence. Startled by the sudden direct eye contact, he reflexively straightens his spine and stands at attention. “I guess this is goodbye, huh? For a while, anyway.”

“I, uh. I suppose it is.”

“Right. So, um… good luck, I guess?”

No disclaimers or ill will tacked on this time, Jon notes privately.

“You too.” He forces a smile, but he suspects that it comes off as awkward rather than reassuring.

“Try not to die.”

“Yes, ‘not dying’ is relatively close to the top of my to-do list.”

“If I come to find out that you’ve gotten yourself killed and broken the eldritch employment contract binding us all to this place after I’ve gone and gouged my eyes out, I’m going to be livid.”

“Well, we can’t have that,” Jon says wryly.

“Seriously, though.” Melanie’s smirk melts away, taken over by a somber, quiet sort of intensity. “Either beat Elias at his own game, or get the fuck away from this place the instant you find an out. Whichever comes first. Preferably without any of the self-sacrificial bullshit.”

Fractious as its delivery is, the demand is oddly touching, coming from Melanie.

“I, uh… I’ll do my best?”

“You’d better.” Melanie nods – a curt but cordial dismissal – and turns her attention back to Georgie. “Hey,” she says, her voice going measurably softer, releasing one of Georgie’s hands to reach up and cup her face. Her watery smile belies her mental state: resolve warring with trepidation. “Look at me?”

For a long minute, she studies Georgie’s face, clearly enraptured. Jon forcefully tears his gaze away from the intimacy of the moment.

“Okay.” Melanie takes a deep breath in and releases it slowly. “I’m ready. I’ll see you soon, okay? Or – well, I won’t see you, but – you’ll see me, and I’ll…” She huffs, rolling her eyes. “Oh, whatever – you know what I mean.”

Georgie lets out a tearful chuckle, and Melanie relaxes marginally.

“I’m sure about this,” she says. “I promise. This is what I want – a life with you, away from all of this. And if this is the price I have to pay, then… I’m okay with that. Really, I am.” She stands on tiptoe to give Georgie a peck on the cheek. “Love you.”

“Love you too,” Georgie says, leaning down for a return kiss, smiling weakly against Melanie’s lips. “See you soon.”

When Martin first heard the bustle outside his door – coworkers venturing outside their solitary offices to trade whispered questions and eager gossip as word of paramedics in the archives made its way upstairs – his stomach gave a little lurch: a combination of horror and wonder. He hadn’t expected Melanie to change her mind – he knows how determined she can be once she’s settled on a course of action; how desperate she was to extricate herself from Elias’ – Jonah’s – schemes. Still, though, faced with the reality of it, he found himself in awe of her nerve.

That was yesterday. Martin didn’t get much work done, preoccupied as he was. He isn’t having an easier time of it today: his attention keeps slipping away to linger in remembrances of sterile hospital rooms and muted hallways, thoughts drowned out by the ghosts of sirens and beeping machinery.

“Well, this is an unexpected turn of events.”

Martin jolts in his seat, heart leaping into his throat. It only takes an instant longer for his alarm to mutate into aggravation.

“Peter!” Martin spins around to glower at the man. “How many times do I have to–”

Peter flaps a dismissive hand. “To be honest, Martin, the drop in temperature tends to tip most people off. The only reason you continue to be surprised by my arrival is because you’ve become acclimated to the Forsaken.”

The revelation is slow to sink in, a stark chill blooming in Martin’s chest and snaking its roots outwards. Only now that it’s been brought to his attention can he feel the nip in the air.

“Here I was certain you were becoming estranged from our patron, but it seems I needn’t have worried.” Peter’s smile is laced with malice. “Or should I?”

Martin says nothing, eyes wide and stinging from the now-conspicuous cold. Peter sighs, folds his hands behind his back, and begins a meandering back-and-forth pace.

“Our success is dependent on your voluntary isolation, Martin.”

“Yeah.” The word turns to fog as it touches the air, and Martin finds himself transfixed by the sight. “You’ve said.”

“It seems you need a reminder.”

The condescension dripping from the words is enough to drag Martin back into the present moment. Heat rises in his cheeks, contrasting with the temperature in the room and making the chill that much more noticeable.

“You still haven’t told me your plan,” he snaps. “You keep expecting me to just – go along with whatever you’re scheming, no questions asked.”

“You ask many questions, Martin –”

“Yeah, and you never answer them! You’re so – so bloody cryptic about all of this.”

“Martin, Martin,” Peter says, placating in the most patronizing way possible. Martin bristles: he hates the way Peter says his name. “There’s no need to get so worked up –”

“If you want me to be a partner in – in whatever it is you’re planning, you can’t expect me to go on blind trust!”

“I’m still conducting my own research,” Peter says mildly. “I would rather not confuse you with extraneous details before I have all the kinks worked out.”

“I’m not an idiot –”

“Rest assured,” Peter interrupts, “if I was capable of stopping the Extinction alone, I would. Unfortunately, it will require someone touched by the Beholding.”

“Why?”

“Because it requires this place, and this place” – Peter’s lip curls in distaste – “is the Eye’s seat of power. The One Alone has no dominion here.” Martin crosses his arms, unimpressed. “You are the only one who can do this, Martin.”

“Why?” Martin repeats.

Judging from the muscle ticking in Peter’s jaw, his limited supply of patience for conversation is precipitously depleting.

“No, really,” Martin presses, “why me? I mean” – he spreads his arms out with a scornful chuckle – “look at me. I’m not exactly hero material, am I?”

“That really depends on you. I can’t force you to cooperate. It won’t even work unless you’re a willing participant.”

“And what makes you think that your plan is the only way? You – you keep going on about how it’s my choice. Well – what if I choose to work with the others? It can’t hurt to have more eyes on the problem –” Martin rolls his eyes at Peter’s unconcealed revulsion. “Yeah, I know. No one would ever accuse you of being a team player, obviously. But I can be the liaison; you don’t have to interact with anyone at all.” Would prefer you don’t interact with anyone at all, Martin thinks. “I mean, that’s already my role, isn’t it? Dealing with people so you don’t have to?”

“Martin,” Peter says, low and dangerous.

“I’ll do it off the clock, even. I’ll isolate myself in my office during the workday, or whatever” – Martin gives a flippant wave of his hand – “and continue researching the Extinction.” And practically running the whole damn place on an assistant’s salary, he grouses silently. “After hours I’ll pursue my own research with the others.”

“Part-time isolation will not suffice to equip you with the power you’ll need.” Peter presses his lips into a pale, rigid line. “Be reasonable. Are you really willing to risk an apocalypse, just because you can’t appreciate solitude?”

“If it starts to look like there’s no other option, I’ll reconsider.”

“And if the Extinction emerges while you’re wasting time searching for an alternative that doesn’t exist?”

“Based on the limited information you’ve given me, I don’t think the Extinction is going to just… emerge overnight. I’m still not even convinced it’s going to be worse than any other Fear. I mean, the Flesh is relatively new, isn’t it? And it didn’t… leave the fear economy in shambles, or whatever.”

“It isn’t about competition, Martin.” Peter releases a slow plume of fog through his nose before continuing, voice cool but simmering with pique just under the surface. “The Extinction is different from the other Powers. It is defined by widescale eradication. The other Powers may seek to change the world, but none of them strive for a world without us.”

“But what makes you so sure the Extinction would?”

Peter’s eyes narrow. Ignoring him, Martin runs his thumb along his bottom lip as he replays Jon’s impassioned conjectures on the matter: It thrives on the potentiality of a mass extinction event, not the fulfillment of one.

“What’s to say it wouldn’t be just fine with the world as it is, like the End?” Martin says, more confidently now. “People have been prophesying about the end of the world for – all of human history, probably. I doubt we’ll stop anytime soon. Maybe at its core the Extinction is just… the fear of an uncertain future. And a particular future doesn’t have to be realized in order to inspire fear, as long as the potential is always there. It’s about the suspense – the ‘what ifs’, the unknown, the – the lack of control in it all.” Martin laughs. “In a way, that’s… that’s what most fears boil down to, isn’t it?”

“The stakes are rather high to gamble on a thought experiment, don’t you think?” The temperature plunges a few more degrees as Peter speaks. “I think that the most important ‘what if’ you should concern yourself with is what if you’re wrong?”

“And what if I’m not?” Martin counters. “You act so authoritative, but aren’t you also just speculating? When I agreed to work with you, you told me you would provide me with evidence to support your theory. So far, I’m not convinced. You’re going to have to give me more to go on than just ‘trust me.’ I mean – if it’s between trusting you and – and trusting Jon, and the others? You can’t really be surprised if I choose them over you.”

“Oh, Martin,” Peter tuts, shaking his head with derisive, disingenuous pity. “Since when has the trust you’ve placed in others ever been reciprocated?”

“I trust him,” Martin says defiantly.

“But does he trust you?” Peter pauses for effect. “Of all the times you’ve allowed yourself to form attachments, has anyone even once genuinely returned those affections?”

Jon did.

Whatever expression Martin is wearing brings a sneer to Peter’s face. Martin clenches his teeth and ignores him.

Jon does, he corrects. Present tense. He said as much.

Martin still can’t fathom what Jon could possibly see in him, but Jon wouldn’t lie about something like that, right? He wouldn’t.

…would he?

No, he wouldn’t, Martin chides. You know he wouldn’t. Trust him.

“Sure,” Peter persists, “you may open yourself up to the potential for something more, but you know as well as I do that it won’t last. Is the inevitable loss really worth the risk?”

“I don’t know,” Martin says. He tries to ignore the slight quaver that insinuates itself into the declaration. “But if I never take the risk, I’ll never know, will I?”

“I think you already know the answer.” Peter’s pale eyes glitter with spite. “Remember what it felt like, languishing at the Archivist’s deathbed. Recall the state you were in when you first came to me.”

The words are incisive, sliding under Martin’s skin and lodging there like shrapnel. He can feel his confidence waver, the conviction he stood fast on only seconds ago splintering underneath him like thin ice.

“How many times do you think he can court death and survive? He all but died stopping the last apocalypse; he was willing to bury himself alive for a woman who tried to kill him. How do you think he’ll react if you tell him about any of this? You think he’ll listen to reason? Trust in your judgment?” Peter fixes Martin with a smug, hungry look. “Or will he throw himself in front of the first bullet he sees?”

He already knows about all of this, Martin reminds himself. Jon isn’t about to sacrifice himself on account of the Extinction. Moreover, he seems to be genuinely committed to working as a team rather than striking out on his own.

But he also sees himself as a cataclysm waiting to happen, says the nagging doubt skulking in the far corners of Martin’s mind. As much as Jon insists that he doesn’t want to die, he’s already lived through one apocalypse. Martin has no doubt that Jon would sacrifice himself to prevent another, if it came down to it.

Jon is a powder keg of fear and guilt, and there is no shortage of potential ignition sources waiting in the wings. It only takes one untimely spark to set an archive ablaze.

“I trust him,” Martin repeats to himself, but the statement is rendered feeble by the leaden, frozen knot unfurling in his chest.

“Can you really weather another round of grief?” Peter continues, triumphant. He knows he’s found a gap in Martin’s defenses; all he needs to do now is twist the knife. “You’ve already done your mourning, cut the infection off at the source. Let him back in, and you only open yourself up to more pain. Better a numbed scar than a wound that never heals, don’t you think?”

“No.” There’s something off about Martin’s voice – as if it doesn’t belong to him; as if it’s originating from outside of himself, faint and frail and faraway, smothered by the cold, empty fog clogging his lungs. “N-no, I…”

“Connection is a fleeting, fickle thing,” Peter persists. “It’s a lie people tell themselves. The truth is that we are all alone. In the end, all we have is ourselves. Think about it.”

Unthinkingly, Martin shrinks away as Peter steps closer.

“You asked for more evidence.” Peter slides a few statement folders onto the desk. “Take some time to yourself. Consider whether you’re willing to wager on the fate of the world.”

When Martin looks up, he is alone.

“It’s so loud,” Daisy mutters heatedly, stalking to and fro like a panther in a cage. She scratches furiously at her forearms as she goes, blunt fingernails leaving faint red stripes on pale skin.

“Daisy,” Jon says evenly, “I think maybe you should –”

“Itch I can’t scratch.” She pivots on her heel, retracing her short path in the opposite direction. “Feels like fire under my skin.”

“I don’t think clawing your skin off is going to help.”

Daisy barks a laugh. “With what claws?” She stops short and brandishes the backs of her trembling hands, fingers splayed to highlight nails gnawed to the quick, ragged cuticles stained rust-brown with dried blood. “Dull now.” Her eyes go unfocused, staring vaguely at her hands as if she doesn’t recognize them. “Too dull.”

“I’m sorry,” Jon says, and he means it.

It never gets easier to witness her like this, frenetic and fraying in the throes of the Hunt’s compulsion. These spells have a way of making her features look sharper, her mannerisms more animalistic. She’s all protruding bones and sallow skin, but that seeming frailty does nothing to tame the violence thrumming in her veins. If anything, that all-consuming hunger only makes her more fearsome.

Jon’s strict rations have given him an underfed, pinched look as well, but at least he has something. Not enough to put meat on his bones, so to speak, but enough to stave off starvation. Daisy, though…

When Jon takes a step forward, she rounds on him with teeth bared and a snarl in her throat. Jon flinches at the sudden movement.

“You’re afraid of me.” Daisy exhales an exhausted rattle of a laugh, as if vindicated. “Good. You should be.”

“I’m not afraid of you,” Jon says. “I have an overactive startle reflex. Always have, really.”

“You’re lying.” Daisy breathes heavily through her nose, fists clenched at her sides now. “Admit it.”

Jon knows what she’s trying to do. She wants him to lash out, to bite back, to make her bleed. He’s uncomfortably familiar with that craving. It’s like looking into a mirror.

“I’m not afraid of you,” he reiterates.

“Liar,” Daisy hisses, fixing him with a baleful glare.

He’s seen her like this many times before, hunger-ravaged and swamped by bloodlust. She’ll doggedly bash herself against the nearest witness to her shame like a ship crashed against a jetty, driven forward again and again by cresting waves of guilt and self-loathing until she’s free-floating wreckage. Every time, it gets more and more difficult to gather up all the debris and repair the damage. Jon fears that one of these days, the storm will pass and there won’t be enough pieces left to put her back together.

“I’m not a knife you can cut yourself on, Daisy,” he says patiently.

Daisy looks positively mutinous, mouth opening and closing several times before erupting: “Why wouldn’t you be afraid of me?”

“I used to be,” Jon admits, leaning back against the tunnel wall to take some of the weight off his bad leg. “Before the Buried. I was terrified of you. Dreaded every moment I had to be alone with you. Thought it was only a matter of time before you finished the job.”

“It was,” she rasps out – and with that, her shoulders slump and her fists relax to hang limply at her sides, fingers jumping and twitching with the last dregs of her agitation.

“I know. But then you changed. You were different, after the Buried. As afraid of yourself as I used to be of you. As afraid of yourself as I was of myself.” He looks her in the eye as he speaks. “I looked at you and saw my own fear reflected back at me. There are so many things to be afraid of. You were – you are trying very hard not to be one of them.”

“If I’m afraid of me, you should be, too.”

“Are you afraid of me?” Jon asks, shaping each word carefully to keep the compulsion at bay.

She pauses, considering the question.

“No,” she says eventually. “Afraid for you, sometimes.”

“As I am for you.” Jon’s tentative smile fades after a moment. “I’ll admit, I do have… reflexive reactions, sometimes. There were a few incidents where I walked into the breakroom and you were holding a knife, and my fight-or-flight response kicked in before my conscious brain could catch up with reality.”

Daisy squeezes her eyes shut, wrapping her arms around her middle.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers. When she opens her eyes, the look on her face isn’t pleading so much as it is resigned. She isn’t asking for forgiveness. Jon doubts she ever will.

It’s just one more thing they have in common.

“I know,” he says quietly. “To be clear, I don’t feel unsafe with you, as you are now. It’s just… flashbacks. They can be – unpredictable. And if I’m already feeling on edge, or – or not quite present, it doesn’t take much to set me off. But,” he adds, giving her a serious look, “I don’t want you walking on eggshells around me. That only puts me more on edge.”

“Fine. But will you tell me if I do something to scare you?”

“Yes.” She made the same request last time. “But I’ve never had to. You could always feel when I was afraid. From a few rooms away, even.”

“Yeah,” Daisy says with a choked laugh. “Your blood is – very loud sometimes.”

“And now?”

These episodes tend to be capricious. Sometimes, what seems to be the calm after the storm proves to be only a lull before a second wind. If the way she’s wobbling on her feet and favoring one leg is any indication, Jon suspects that the worst of the flare-up has passed for now, taking her adrenaline surge with it. Still, he waits for her confirmation. Daisy takes a minute to mull over the question, head cocked slightly to the side as if listening.

“Quieter,” she says.

With that, Jon lowers himself to the ground and sits with his back against the wall, beckoning her over to take a seat. She hesitates for a moment longer before following his lead, slumping down next to him with a labored sigh.

“Sorry for growling at you,” she says sheepishly, rubbing the back of her neck.

“Don’t worry about it.”

Daisy tilts her head back to stare at the ceiling. “You said I ended up going back to the Hunt last time.”

“Yes.”

“When?”

“September. But – but that doesn’t mean it has to happen again,” he adds hurriedly when he sees her face fall in a mixture of anguish and resignation. “It was – sort of a perfect storm of extenuating circumstances. Like I said before, if you didn’t let the Hunt back in, you and Basira would likely have been killed. But I think you knew you wouldn’t be coming back from it. Before you changed, you made Basira promise to hunt you down and kill you.”

“And did she?”

“She lost track of you in the chaos. You gave chase after one of the Hunters. Once you killed her, the other Hunter started hunting you. For revenge.” Jon’s voice drops to a low murmur. “A few weeks later, the world ended.”

Which makes it sound far more passive than it actually was, but Jon isn’t in the mood for a scolding should he opt for an ‘I’ statement.

“And then what?”

“You were a full-fledged Hunter in a – a perpetual fear generator of a world,” Jon says grimly. “Do you really need to hear the details?”

“Tell me,” Daisy says. “Please.”

Jon understands the need, but recounting the apocalypse never gets any easier. He closes his eyes, breathes deeply, and takes a moment to gather his thoughts.

“When I opened the door and let all the Fears into this reality,” he begins, “the world was divvied up into thousands of different domains, each belonging to a different shade of terror. With few exceptions, most people were confined to one domain – usually whatever aligned with their deepest fears. Avatars and monsters were subject to the Ceaseless Watcher, but otherwise able to exercise control over the humans in the domains of their patrons. Most seemed to stake out territory and settle in one place – customizing their own little spheres of influence, creating playgrounds of their own making. But some got around. You were one of the ones that traveled.”

“What was –” Daisy grimaces. “Who was I hunting?”

“Well… in that place, no one got what they deserved, only what would hurt the most. And people are rarely afraid of just one thing. Most were magnets for multiple fears. The more nomadic Avatars and monsters would gravitate towards whatever individuals were most susceptible to their power, so to speak.” He bites his lip. There’s really no tactful way to phrase this next part. “In your case, you had a roster of specific targets that you were tracking. Former prey. Whether you were drawn to them because of their own fear of you, or because some part of you judged them to have ‘gotten away,’ so to speak… I’m not entirely certain. It may have been a bit of both.”

“I see,” Daisy murmurs. “Guess it makes sense that I would rank high among some people’s greatest fears.”

“Basira was tracking you when we ran into her. We were with her when we found you.”

“And was I… still me?”

“Yes and no,” Jon says hesitantly. “You were you, in a way, but only a small part of you. The Hunter. Everything else was buried too deep. Drowned. Even if I could have brought you back, it would have killed you. You – you didn’t even recognize me, or Martin. You recognized Basira – saw her as pack, wanted her to join you in the Hunt – but…”

“You were prey,” Daisy says quietly.

“Yeah.”

“You never did manage to grow a self-preservation instinct, did you?” Daisy squints at him. “I went full monster on you, and you still want me to sit next to you now.”

“You had sharper teeth then,” Jon says drily. Daisy scoffs and nudges his shoulder with hers. She doesn’t draw back after making contact, and when Jon doesn’t pull away either, she leans into him.

“Basira kept her promise?” Daisy asks after a minute.

“Yes. She didn’t want to, but…” Jon swallows thickly, the memory of Basira’s heartbreak bringing to mind his own. “It wasn’t an easy decision.”

Daisy rubs at her chest with one hand, as if to soothe an ache. “It wasn’t fair for me to ask that of her, was it?”

“Maybe not,” Jon sighs. “It seems fair choices are hard to come by, for most of us.”

“I… I don’t want her to have to make that choice this time.”

“Neither do I.”

“It’s never going to stop, is it?” Daisy glances at him, allowing her head to rest lightly on his shoulder. “It’s only going to get worse.”

“I’m sorry.” What else is there to say?

“Melanie got away,” Daisy says, a tinge of bargaining in her tone. “She managed to purge the Slaughter. And break away from the Eye.”

“Her situation was… different from ours. She wasn’t as far gone as we are. The Slaughter hadn’t fully claimed her, and the Eye never took her as an Avatar. But you’ve been living with the Hunt for most of your life; I signed myself over to the Beholding the moment I became the Archivist. We’ve become… attached to our patrons, dependent on them for survival. Symbiotic, in a twisted sort of way.”

“You really don’t think there’s a way back, then.”

“I don’t know for sure. I’ve seen it before, in my future, but – the world was different then. During the apocalypse, I was able to, uh… shift a person’s status from Watched to Watcher. I – I mean, technically everyone was Watched – the Eye had dominion over everything – but I could give someone control over one of the smaller domains. Create new Avatars, for lack of a better term.

“But turn a Watcher into solely the Watched, and they would typically unravel. I don’t know if that’s because the full focus of the Ceaseless Watcher’s gaze just happens to be lethal – particularly for Avatars aligned with other Powers – or if an Avatar is simply unable to survive being cut off from their patron regardless of the means of separation. I do Know that I wouldn’t have been able to survive being cut off from the Eye unscathed. I was… too much a part of the Eye in that reality. Not sure about now. For either of us.”

“That’s a roundabout way of saying ‘no.’”

“I’m not saying no, I’m saying that I don’t know. Supposedly escaping the Buried was impossible, and here we are.”

“Apples and oranges,” Daisy says sullenly.

“Maybe. I think it’s all too complex for clear-cut categories. Even the hard-and-fast ‘rules’ are only as strong as our collective belief in them. Almost like our expectations shore them up. I’ve witnessed all of reality being rewritten – all physical laws and supposed universal constants reshaped to center the Eye.” He reaches one hand up to tug on the hair at the back of his neck. “After all I’ve Seen, it’s difficult to conceive of anything being categorically impossible. Between all the dream logic and reality bending, there’s plenty of space for firsts and exceptions to the rules.”

‘I don’t knows’ are where the hope lives, Martin said once. At the time, Jon teased him for being a hopeless romantic, but truthfully, Jon was just as hopelessly endeared by Martin’s belief in such things.

“Have you talked to Georgie yet today?” Daisy asks, apparently ready to change the subject.

“Oh, uh – yes. This morning.”

“And?”

“Melanie was out of surgery and stable, but she wasn’t awake yet. Georgie promised to call tonight with an update.” Assuming nothing major comes up before then, a worried voice in Jon’s head supplies. He shakes his head to jog the thought loose. “Speaking of Georgie… have you given any thought to her suggestion?”

“What,” Daisy says, drolly skeptical, “playing a video game?”

“I realize it’s… somewhat out of the box, but it might be worth a try. Like Georgie said, there are multiplayer games where you can, uh… hunt down other players.”

Daisy plucks absently at her collar, glowering at the opposite wall as if the bricks there committed a personal offense. “It’s not the same.”

“A simulation might not come close to a real hunt, no, but – you might still get something out of it? Maybe?” Daisy directs her scowl up at the ceiling. Jon only digs his heels in, undeterred. “There are even some that have a survival horror theme. An aesthetic that already puts players in the mindset to be frightened, you know?”

“People play those games for fun, Sims.” She finally looks at him, eyes narrowed. “It’s about thrills, not mortal fear.”

“Sometimes genuine fear can sneak through. Haven’t you ever been so creeped out by a horror story that it stayed with you after nightfall?”

“Not really?”

“O-oh. Well, some people have that experience.” Jon gives an awkward little cough. “Anyway, under the right circumstances, a game can get the adrenaline pumping as well as a chase can. A fight-or-flight response doesn’t necessarily require a real physical threat.”

Daisy raises her eyebrows, transparently cynical. “Do you really think the Hunt is going to be satisfied with jump scares and – and low-stakes adrenaline rushes filtered through a screen?”

“No,” Jon admits. “But it might take the edge off. Sort of like reading old statements does for me. Not enough to stop you starving, but maybe enough to distract from the hunger pangs. At least temporarily. If nothing else, you did say you need a new hobby, and it’s not like this place is overflowing with viable entertainment options.”

“I guess,” Daisy sighs. “I mean, it’s not like I’m paying rent. May as well squander my paycheck.”

“If that’s the case, you should see if that eBay listing for that vintage The Archers board game is still up,” Jon says drily. “Last I checked, it was £2 with no bidders.”

“Yeah, and £30 shipping.”

“Sounds like £32 well spent, if you ask me.”

Daisy snorts and bumps her shoulder against his. “You, Jonathan Sims, are an absolute menace.”

Adrift and thoroughly divorced from the concept of time, end of the workday passes Martin by without his notice. Once again, he wonders whether Peter deliberately assigned him an office with no external window, not only to put another wall between him and the rest of the world, but to make it easier for him to lose track of time.

For an interminable stretch of time he sits catatonic, mind peppered with sporadic sensory input: Dead-weight limbs, listless and foreign-feeling. The brush of fabric resting against bare skin, every point of weightless contact a violation. The distant ticking of clockwork, rote and irrevocable.

Stand up, comes the thought, detached and intrusive: an instruction he cannot parse; empty phonemes wafted into a vacant mind, abandoned there to echo and disperse until they lose all meaning. A fragment of a signal from brain to nerves to fingers presses numb fingertips to thumbs, a cautious test yielding no sensation but for the vague, spongey give of flesh.

Then the body ostensibly belonging to him is on its feet, the connection between floor and soles disturbingly incongruent with unreality. Walking now, every footfall jarring in its impact; every step stretched and blurred like a botched time-lapse photograph; every molasses-sluggish forward motion met with invisible resistance, like swimming against a sludgy current.

He does not remember how or when or under whose direction he arrives in the Archives, swaying at the threshold of the Head Archivist’s office. Empty and still. Silence so pervasive it’s almost tangible. Viscous and inexorable. Trapping him like a fly in honey. Drowning.

When next he becomes aware of his surroundings, he’s wavering at the bottom of a ladder. Walls curving up and over his head, a brickwork warren stretching on and out into the murk.

Standing in place. Hovering like an afterimage. Rootless and incorporeal. Searching for… staring at… calling to…

There: something real.

“Martin?” Jon’s breath fogs the air as he speaks, but the way he says the name… his voice seems to cradle the word, shielding it against the cold. He sits up straighter, keen gaze sweeping the area like a lighthouse beacon. “Martin, is that you?”

That’s me, Martin thinks, and then, wonderingly: He says your name like it’s something precious.

At that thought, Jon’s eyes land on him like a searchlight.

“There you are.” His soft smile immediately falters, brow furrowing in concern. “Are you alright?”

He’s sat on the floor with his back against the wall, one knee drawn up to his chest, and Daisy pressed up against his side in a mirrored position, sharing a pair of corded earphones. Daisy is already thumbing at the screen of her phone, presumably pausing whatever it is they’re listening to, as Jon removes his earbud.

Martin opens his mouth to speak, but the air in his lungs has turned to viscid fog and the confused tangle of half-formed thoughts in his mind refuse to coalesce into actual words. Jon exchanges a glance with Daisy, who is already moving to stand. Martin wants to object – she doesn’t have to leave on his account; he can see that they’re busy; he’s fine; he’s just overreacting – but before he can cobble together a protest, she’s halfway to her feet, gripping the wall for support.

“I’m alright now,” Martin can hear her say.

“You’re sure?” Jon asks in a low murmur.

“Yeah.” She winces as she straightens her spine. “Knowing Basira, she’s still pouring over the same statements as she was this morning. She could do with an interruption.”

“Can you manage the ladder?”

Daisy stretches her leg out, testing her mobility. “Think so.”

They give each other another long look, a shared nod, and without another word, Daisy staggers her way to the exit and mounts the ladder.

As it does every time he witnesses these displays of unspoken understanding between them, an ugly pang of jealousy burns in Martin’s chest – some combination of envy, inadequacy, longing, and loneliness. Possessiveness, almost – and an instant later, the shame sets in.

But then the trapdoor closes, Jon looks Martin in the eye again, and the sincere, tender warmth sheltering there is enough to leave Martin reeling. It’s hard to comprehend anyone – let alone Jonathan Sims – looking at him like that; difficult to reconcile requited affection with a lifetime of fruitless want. Martin can’t shake the feeling that it will always be this way – and that his inability to trust in unconditional love is precisely what makes him so unlovable in the first place.

Jon clears his throat and pats the floor beside him. He’s seated on a blanket, Martin just now notices, folded over several times to cushion the hard ground.

He’d better not be napping down here, Martin thinks to himself.

“Martin,” Jon says, in that impossibly soft tone he’s taken to using around Martin these days, “I’d like you to come sit, if you’re amenable.”

It’s such a Jon way of phrasing the invitation, and the familiarity it engenders has Martin accepting without a conscious thought. He settles himself beside Jon, close but not touching. Those few inches of distance manage to be simultaneously loathsome and assuring. Martin lets his hand rest in that vacant space, fingers clenching around a fistful of blanket.

Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Jon’s hand twitch, as if fighting back the urge to reach out and touch. Instead, he starts to rub the fabric of his trouser leg between his thumb and forefinger.

“What do you need right now?” Jon asks.

“I…” Martin pauses, unsettled by the sound of his own voice, grating and almost unfamiliar to his ears.

“Take your time.”

It takes a minute for Martin to wrap his mouth around more than one syllable.

“Nothing,” he says, the weight of the word nearly pinning his tongue in place.

“It doesn’t sound like nothing.”

Several more minutes pass before Martin is able to construct a full sentence.

“I’m just being stupid.” The words seem to echo faintly in the tunnel, despite how quietly he says them.

“What do you need?” Jon asks again.

“Nothing,” Martin repeats dully. He doesn’t need anything.

Jon doesn’t immediately respond. Martin can feel himself go rigid, anticipating… what – aggravation, impatience, disengagement? But Jon only runs a thumb along his jawline, a thoughtful frown on his face.

“Okay,” he says eventually, “what do you want, then? What would – what would help you feel better right now?”

“I… I don’t know,” Martin says in a voice so feeble it’s nearly inaudible. He flexes his fingers uncertainly, chasing after any physical sensation at all, only to find them numb and deathlike. The helpless sigh that shudders out of him wants to be a whimper. “I just – didn’t – don’t – feel real. Feels like I’m not really here.”

“Hmm.” Jon looks at him – really looks at him, taking his time to study Martin’s face. “Well, I can confirm that you are here.”

“You… you can see me?” Martin asks meekly, pleadingly, dreading the answer.

“Yes.” Jon pauses. “And if you’re agonizing over being a bother, don’t, because you aren’t. I always like seeing you.”

He should trust Jon – he does trust Jon – but it’s still a constant struggle to drown out that Lonely part of him that insists that isolation is safer, more dependable, and far more habitable. Unthinkingly, Martin reaches over, hand trembling in the air above Jon’s, fingertips just barely ghosting across scarred skin.

“Would you like me to hold your hand…?” Jon ventures.

Martin’s fingers curve inward as he pulls back slightly. “I, um.”

“You can say no,” Jon reminds him.

“I… I want it, but I – I – I don’t know if I can handle it right now, and I –” Martin draws back entirely, flapping both hands in frustration, trying to relieve the pins-and-needles sensation prickling through his veins. “I hate this. I hate being like this.”

Martin grimaces at the outburst, but Jon doesn’t seem to be judging him. Instead, he’s looking off to the side, a crease between his eyebrows now, as if he’s working through a problem.

“No skin-to-skin contact,” he says to himself, and then he looks to Martin. “Pressure helps me sometimes, when I feel like I’m not real. You could… lean against me? If you want.”

“I…”

“You don’t have to,” Jon rushes to reassure him.

“It’s – not that I don’t want to. I guess I’m just…” Martin can feel himself flush with embarrassment. “It’s daft, but I’m worried that I’ll be – I don’t know, incorporeal, or something.”

“I distinctly recall you telling me that you’re not a ghost.”

It takes a few seconds for Jon’s deadpan humor to sink in. When it does, Martin nearly chokes on a surprised laugh.

“I still can’t believe you thought I was a ghost,” he says, cracking a smile. The tight, bitter-cold knot in his chest yields just a little, like ice disintegrating under a spring thaw.

“In my defense, I was quite distraught at the time.” Jon’s eyes wrinkle at the corners and Martin is struck by overwhelming fondness. He doesn’t pull away when Jon reaches out, open palm hovering just above his shoulder. “May I?”

Cautiously, Martin nods.

“Hmm.” Jon applies the lightest touch at first, watching Martin’s face carefully. He waits until Martin nods for him to continue before he presses down more firmly. Before long, Martin can feel the warmth of Jon’s hand through his jumper. That warmth carries over into Jon’s smile. “Feels solid to me.”

The confirmation comes as a relief, as foolish as that makes Martin feel. He braces himself and leans against Jon’s side, releasing his held breath when his body meets with tangible resistance. At first he worries that Jon, scrawny as he is, won’t be able to support the weight, but he doesn’t budge when Martin melts against him. After that, it’s a struggle for Martin to keep his eyes open.

Jon must notice, because he whispers, “You can rest. I’ll be here.”

Martin doesn’t even have the strength to nod, let alone the energy to argue. He allows the steady rise and fall of Jon’s chest to lull him into an almost meditative state, his mind still floating somewhere outside of himself, but now tethered to the ground.

Then the silence starts nipping at his heels.

“Too quiet,” he mumbles. “Talk to me?”

“What about?”

“Anything.”

“Did you know that highland cattle have a double coat?” Jon says after a minute of consideration. “It insulates them against the cold. The outer layer is long – the longest hair of any cattle breed, in fact – and oily, which helps ward off the rain. Underneath is softer, almost woolly hair.”

Once Jon gets started, those little scraps of trivia soon progress to a nearly encyclopedic lecture. It doesn’t take long for Martin to lose himself in the rich timbre of Jon’s voice as he goes on about various Scottish breeds of cattle. Although he doesn’t fall fully asleep, Martin manages to drift in and out of consciousness enough that he loses track of time once more. This time, though, it’s a comfortable daze: there’s someone to keep him from straying too far.

At some point, he unthinkingly seeks out Jon’s hand. Jon presses his thumb into the center of Martin’s palm, rubbing small circles there, coaxing Martin further into peaceful relaxation.

“Sorry for interrupting you and Daisy earlier,” Martin murmurs groggily into Jon’s shoulder.

“Oh, we were just listening to The Archers.”

“Are you taking the piss?” Martin asks, opening one eye to scrutinize Jon’s expression.

“Unfortunately not.”

“You like The Archers.”

“Good lord, no. Blame Daisy.”

“Daisy likes The Archers,” Martin says, even more dubiously, sitting up now to squint at Jon.

“There are stranger things.”

Martin snorts and nestles into Jon’s side again. “If you say so.”

“Feeling better now?” Martin reflexively snuggles closer. Jon laughs softly, a little puff of a breath that rustles Martin’s hair. “I’m not going to deny you cuddles if the answer is ‘yes,’ you know.”

“Cuddles,” Martin whispers, the word dissolving into a clipped giggle.

“What?” Jon tilts his head. There’s a puzzled scowl on his face, as if he’s trying to decide whether or not he should take offense. It’s impossibly endearing.

“Cuddles,” Martin repeats, in a poor approximation of Jon’s voice this time. “Not a word I ever expected to hear from you.”

“Quiet, you,” Jon huffs, but he can’t disguise the way his indignant pout cracks into a smile under the weight of his own amusement. He almost seems to preen, as if pulling a laugh from Martin is a victory on which to pride himself. He reaches up with his free hand, pausing just above the top of Martin’s head. “May I?”

At Martin’s affirmative, Jon begins to comb his fingers through Martin’s hair, fingernails lightly scratching against his scalp. For the briefest of moments, some primal fragment of him recoils from the contact, instinctively unnerved by the vulnerability inherent to such closeness. Martin spurns that voice, breathes through its fit of angst and panic, and leans into the touch.

Little by little, step by step, he’s acclimating. He just wishes that it wasn’t such a process each and every time he lets his guard down like this.

“Bad day?” Jon asks once Martin settles.

“Something like that.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“Not really,” Martin groans. “But I should.”

“Only if you want to.”

“No, you should know, I just…” Martin heaves a wearied sigh. “Peter’s back.”

Jon gasps like he’s had the wind knocked out of him. The hand stroking Martin’s hair abruptly stills; the other, still clasped in Martin’s, constricts like a death-grip.

“Did he hurt you?” The question is steeped in an artificial, fragile sort of calm, but Jon can’t quite mask the intensity buzzing just under the surface: fear, protectiveness, and desperation all intermingled and reinforced by that ominous inkling of power that, despite his intentions, lurks behind every word.

“He didn’t do anything out of the ordinary. Just… trying to get me to recommit to the Lonely.” Martin scoffs. “And of course he was trying to do it in a way that would make me feel like it was my idea. Get me to convince myself that it was what I wanted, rather than something he was pressuring me into.”

“Of all the Powers, the Lonely is one of the most insidious, I think,” Jon says quietly. “It seeks out victims who already have one foot in the Lonely, reinforces those fears, promises kinship – a paradoxical form of it, anyway – and then it just… waits. Spend enough time disconnected from the rest of the world, and it doesn’t take long to start telling yourself the lie that it’s for the best. That it’s what you are; that it’s all you’re meant to be.”

“And I fell for it,” Martin mutters.

“Anyone would, subjected to the right conditions.” Jon waits until he catches Martin’s eye before he continues. “It isn’t your fault. This is what the Fears do. It’s what they are. They find an opening, they sink their hooks in, and they pull you under. They don’t let go until either you drown or you learn to breathe fear. The only way out is for someone to throw you a lifeline, and even then, the odds aren’t great. And the Lonely in particular – one of the first things it does is make it difficult to even conceive of a lifeline. It’s hard to catch hold of one if you never think to look for it.”

“I thought you hated convoluted metaphors.”

“Yes, well, unfortunately the Powers That Be tend to elude any sort of straightforward, concrete discussion,” Jon grouses. “Just one more reason to begrudge them, really. My point is, the Lonely is an insufferable liar and so is Peter.”

“What do you know, they’re perfect for each other.” The remark succeeds in putting a lopsided smirk on Jon’s face, much to Martin’s delight. “Anyway, Peter said his plan won’t work unless I’m voluntarily Lonely.”

“He’s right, although his plan has nothing to do with the Extinction. He needs you to choose the Lonely because those were the terms of his bet with Jonah. He poaches you out from under the Eye – gets you to pledge yourself to the Forsaken – and he wins, with the Institute as a prize. He fails to convert you, he loses, and he does what Jonah wants, which is for me to be marked by the Lonely.”

Jon says that last part so nonchalantly. As if it’s a foregone conclusion; as if he’s become so accustomed to dehumanization that it doesn’t even give him pause. Martin grits his teeth, biting back a surge of anger on Jon’s behalf.

“Yeah, well,” he says tightly, “Peter bet on the wrong horse.”

A sharp intake of breath leaves Jon sounding strangled when he says, eyes wide and lips parted, “Oh?”

“I mean, he can’t just sic the Lonely on me like he would any other victim, right? That wouldn’t count as a win. He needs me to choose it. And I’m not going to do that.”

“Yeah?” The expression of unguarded, cautious hope dawning on Jon’s face makes him look years younger.

“Yeah,” Martin says, feeling increasingly emboldened. “The funny thing is, I don’t – I don’t think I ever chose loneliness. I never wanted it – that was just a lie I told myself, and the Lonely just – echoed it back to me. S-so Peter’s out of luck, because if there are other options, then the Lonely will always be involuntary. Because it’s not what I want.”

“You – you mean it?” Jon brightens, leaning forward.

Martin’s heart skips a beat and flutters hummingbird-quick against his ribs. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen Jon smile – not like this, that is, beaming and uninhibited and altogether breathtaking. Immediately, Martin decides that he wants more. It seems wrong for something so exhilarating to be so rare.

He doesn’t know which of them moves first, and it doesn’t matter, because Jon is in his lap, and Jon is nuzzling into his shoulder, and Jon is here and solid and so, so alive in Martin’s arms, breathing warm and steady into his neck, smiling against his skin, hands scrabbling at his back to cling to his jumper. Martin’s fingers seek purchase of their own, and then something clicks.

“Jon,” he says, leaning back just far enough to confirm his suspicion, “is this mine?”

“Are you just now noticing?” Jon asks, devastatingly fond. “Martin, I’ve been wearing this jumper off and on for the last several weeks.”

“You have?” Martin all but squeaks, heat creeping up his neck and to the tips of his ears. “No. No, you –” Jon’s grin is widening, leaving Martin increasingly flustered. “I – I mean, yes, you have, obviously, I know that, but I – I – I –” Martin gulps, mortified, as Jon finally fails to contain his suppressed laughter. “Look, I didn’t recognize it until just now, alright?”

“Well,” Jon says, ducking his head to chuckle softly against Martin’s throat, “it’s mine now, and you can’t have it back.”

Which is fine with Martin, really, because he would be lying to himself if he said he wasn’t helplessly charmed by the newfound knowledge that not only is Jon an unrepentant clothes-thief, but apparently also an insatiable cuddler.

End Notes:

To address Martin’s concern: Jon does, in fact, nap in the tunnels sometimes. Listen, with Jurgen Leitner (derogatory) in absentia, there was an opening for the position of Beleaguered Tunnel-Haunting Hermit and Jon has all the necessary qualifications.

So anyways, who else thinks Peter’s bio on a dating app would probably just be that “every living creature on this earth dies alone” quote from Donnie Darko? I bet he thinks 'survival of the fittest' means 'every man for himself'. What an insufferable clown.

No Archive-speak in this chapter to cite.

I wanted to make a joke about a The Archers-themed Monopoly, so I asked duckduckgo if it was a thing. Sadly, it is not. There IS, however, a 1960s The Archers board game, and yes, there ARE eBay listings for it.

The first section of this chapter was written before eps 190-192 dropped. I think it still lines up well enough with what we saw of Melanie & Georgie’s characterization in these most recent episodes, with the qualifier that things have gone very differently in this AU compared with canon. (Also, I took some liberties wrt Georgie’s not-feeling-fear thing, obvi. Some of it matches with the most recent episodes, some of it not so much, but I decided to keep it anyways.)

Oh and I think I might have given myself cavities with the last section of this chapter. (I’m aro-spec; it’s hard to tell when I’m going over the top, but hopefully it’s fluffy without being overly cloying.)

#tma #the magnus archives #tma fic #tma spoilers #long post

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leahseclipse · 3 years ago

Text

The Reichenbach Fall: Aftermath - Chapter One: Happy Death Anniversary, Detective.

Series Masterlist

Pairing: Sherlock Holmes x GN!Reader (With some Fem mentions)

Warnings: S2 FINALE SHERLOCK SPOILERS, Major character death; death topic, mourning, suicide mentions, depression mentions... (lemme know if I missed stuff.)

Summary: Two years after the death of Sherlock, what could be next?

Word Count: 4.0K

A/N: Hey there! I've finally found the motivation to post my Sherlock fic here. If you prefer AO3, click here :)

Sherlock used to call at midnight, he never cared whether you were trying to sleep, or if you were actually sleeping- he’d just call.

Sometimes to complain that technology was futile given the multitude of defaults it contained (his phone, for example)- or to talk about an article in a newspaper, thinking we’d be interested in it.

It’s been two years since the last call. No one could bring themselves to delete his number since; and I understand the reason for it. We all had some hope inside us, it was small given all the time that went by, but it was there.

We all wondered if he wasn’t alive. Movies aren’t real, so the whole fake-death scenario couldn’t have been real but we all thought “why not?”, it could happen. That was over a year ago, but I still believed it, I wasn’t quite planning on giving up; and when my phone rang a bit after midnight, I still had a glimpse of hope, each time.

That glimpse was cut short when I read the caller ID. It was John. I did like him, he just wasn’t who I expected to see, but I picked up the phone, just to not be rude. Voicemail is awful. “John? What’s going on?”

"I...I don’t really know, actually. Guess I...needed to feel less alone. I don’t even know."

“Hold on.” I glanced at my bedside as I put the phone on speaker before sitting on the bed. "...so, you couldn’t sleep?"

"Yeah, I’ve been trying for an hour, certainly because of..." He stopped, hesitating with his words.

Who else other than Sherlock would it be, honestly. The man’s always been in our thoughts, and now that he’s gone, we have to be reminded that he’s stuck in our minds. The only way to hear him is through memories, and probably some of us are afraid to forget what he sounds like through time. He wasn’t the guy to make documentaries on him, film himself- hell, he rejected every interview he was offered. The only thing we have is pictures, which isn’t enough.

"It’s him, isn't it?" I presumed.

"Yeah, Sherlock." He confirmed. “It’s the anniversary of his death, in two weeks.”

See, that was the kind of thing I didn’t want to recall as it made me think of what I didn’t want to accept, but at the same time, if I stopped thinking about that, might as well forget Sherlock completely.

"It kept me awake too." I admitted.”I can’t believe it.”

No one really does, to be honest. We all wish that it could be fake, that’s what we would need, even if it’d hurt to see him while we mourned all this time.

"It still feels a bit weird without him, even after basically two years."

“It didn’t seem right without him, at first."

"It took us a bit to get used to it, and still...I think I didn’t get used to it fully to this day."

"Neither am I, John. I don't think I ever will. Time will make the pain less...painful, but it’ll never erase him, he'll be in our thoughts from the moment we wake up."

"I wish it was all a dream. I hate to wake up and not see him. He annoyed me sometimes but...he was my friend."

"He was annoying but a good friend, yeah.” I said, “It’s just...not right. Nothing is right. I feel like everything has gone cold. I swear that I haven't seen a single ray of sunshine."

"It's probably time fooling around, I don't know." He said.

"It could but, when he was there, there would be some sunny-ish days. I haven't seen one since. He left, and it's like he took the sun with him, John. The whole world is falling apart.”

"I felt that too, for a moment. But, I don't really trust whatever I think about these days. I don't pay much attention to whatever I do."

"You should be careful though, I don't need you to die because you didn't pay attention out there. And before you say anything, there's no joke in there. I mean it, Watson.”

"I wasn't going to say that, trust me."

"You better. I need you there."

"Same goes for me. You've been of great help since…"

"Yeah. Since." I paused. "It sucks."

"It does.” He agreed. “Well I...I’m gonna go back to sleep, I don’t want to bother you all night.”

“You didn’t bother me, don’t worry. It helped to talk. I could even stay a bit more, if you’re not planning on going back now.”

“Alright, then.”

It’s like the weather watched me plan the day, rain is on time. It couldn’t be more depressing on top of me dressed in black, but I just didn’t feel like coming in rainbow clothes would be appropriate, even if he wouldn’t care how I dressed anyway, even if he’s dead, yeah.

It feels weird to go, I always expected this was all a dream, or that it’d just...never happen. He’s the kind of person that outlives everyone, and Sherlock was this kind of person, he’s always been that person. He even used to say he’ll always be there, that he’d never leave, and now I guess we’ve both made mistakes, he’s not here anymore.

I never thought that would happen, I can’t tell how bad I prayed to whatever god to wake up, but that did nothing but make me a fool, nothing changed.

His apartment remained empty, as ours, he’d consider each house he could sleep at, his. I remember that he stayed at John’s for a week, before having to go back as John was “not entertaining” enough because he slept too much- As if we got to sleep all day.

He used to think everyone was like him, barely sleeping, barely tired, because I don’t think I’ve had the opportunity of seeing him elsewhere other than a room full of piles of papers.

He did sleep, but not at night, it was kind of like a cat, throughout the day, when possible. I always laughed about it along with John, and he never minded, he’d either pretend to not care, or join the conversation, and I already miss this kind of talks.

They’d either be incredibly short, or extremely long, you really had to clear your schedule for an hour or two when he’d talk. It’s not that it bothered me, it was more the others, those who didn’t know him. They’ve always found an amount of weirdness in him, which I had when I was like them, a stranger.

I never thought we’d get close, I didn’t even think anyone was close with him, he seemed quite the lonely guy, very private. Even after getting to know him, he remained quite private, as I thought, he wouldn’t share much, even with John and Mycroft; but, it didn’t matter that much, we still managed to have a great friendship, and I’ll always miss it.

Not any person will be like him, he was one of a kind. Not anyone could copy him without being seen as a fool. Sherlock Holmes was unique, he didn’t copy anyone to rise up, didn’t take anyone as a model, he did it all himself, he was a model himself.

He didn’t wish to be like anyone, it was the contrary, everyone wanted to be at his level, have the recognition he had, the fame, all the things that made him known, that made Sherlock be him. Even I won’t find a mentor like him, not any of them will be better, they’ll all seem ridiculous to me, even if they have more experience than him.

Nothing will be the same. This world won’t be the same without him being here, he’s gone now.

He took a big piece of whatever thing, when he left, and whatever thing he took was a big one, because it left us all empty. The kind of empty feeling that won’t quite go away, we’ve all been so used to having him around so much that it was a habit.

And now that he’s gone, nothing feels right, even living doesn’t feel right. It won’t ever feel right without him.

I almost feel guilty for being alive, I’m not as smart as him, I won’t contribute to anything. He was the smart one, we really lost an important person and I don’t think it wouldn’t have changed much if I had died instead, people would just be sad, I think.

It wouldn’t be that bad.

His death is bad to the point that the world he left behind can’t function as well as when he was alive. The whole puzzle is missing, hell, the whole world, if I go out of the metaphor.

...Sherlock would have been the corners of it, the foundations of it, what made it whole, what gave a start to get the rest of the puzzle.

He would have corrected me with hundreds of better metaphors if he could hear me, I really suck at this. He never did, though.

In fact, most of his talking contained metaphors, it was his signature, his day couldn’t feel right if he wouldn’t tell at least one.Now the whole ‘no day without a metaphor is a bad day’ is falling on us, and nothing or no one will make that feeling go away.

It’s strange, and funny that he managed to create all of those special feelings, memories, that we only felt with him. Sherlock’s had quite the special part in our lives. He changed our lives in such a spectacular way, and to be honest, life felt less depressing, even if our job is full of dead people and mysteries that make our sleep schedule non-existent, quite rare.

He made us forget all of that shit, whenever he could. That’s why I looked up to him, and thought about him so much. Whenever I had a problem, I’d call him first. Of course, I did call John, and Mycroft, but Sherlock was like my emergency contact, he’d always pick up, if possible.

Somehow, he always knew the answers to everything, and when he was clueless (which only happened twice, in five years)- he'd attempt to find something close to it, and even if his explanations didn’t solve anything, I didn’t care.

It probably made him sort of happy to explain it, share his big knowledge, so as long as he enjoyed himself, that was enough. I did hope he did enjoy himself, I never thought about asking and now that I think about it, I probably should have, it’s too late now.

If he can hear me, a sign would be great, probably. A good thing if he enjoyed talking, and a bad one if I annoyed him? It’d be nice to know even if he probably won’t answer, he must still be working; I know it.

He would be bored if he didn’t have his face in newspapers and whatever case. I always said Sherlock not to overwork, but he never listened. I hope he’s not doing it right now, that man was a total workaholic, right to his last breath, he never stopped.

I just hope he’s okay, wherever he is.

He deserves peace, enough things happened to him, he almost died a couple times, almost lost us if we hadn’t survived all of the wounds and things that happened, almost lost himself because of depression- all of these could have killed him.

He would have stayed alive, but he would have died inside, I just know it even if he didn’t show it much. But he did feel, he did have feelings.

I know he liked us a lot, even though he didn’t show it much; he did enjoy living even with all of the problems he had so, let’s hope he’s not in pain, stressing, suffering, whatever feeling that makes him feel bad.

You can take it easy now, we’re taking care of what you couldn’t finish for you, we’re taking care of the legacy you couldn’t pursue for you, we’ve got your back, Holmes. John, Mycroft, myself, and whatever person you know will tell you everything that happens so you don’t miss anything. You’ll be able to debate about the events, you won’t miss a single thing of what’s happening.

Even if I have my pride, and don’t want to admit I’m depressed about you being dead, I’ll tell you everything, I know you’d be here to tell me how to deal with the death of a person, the whole five stages of grief. You said them to me so much that I always have them in my head.

Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance.

I’d say that I’m at the last phase, but a lot of anger comes in it. I still wish it had been me, sometimes. It’s not fair it happened to Sherlock. I just hope he’s not too mad. If it had been someone else, he’d probably try to talk some sense into me, get me to tell more logical things.

If ghosts were real, I know he’d tell me to stop putting the blame on myself, even if I don’t even know why I blame myself, we don’t even know what caused him to jump from a damn building. And even if someone explains it, we won’t know if it’s real no matter how much they’ll prove it’s the truth.

The only person that can tell us that is gone.

So, unless we don’t find...a diary, or a note, proving it all, we won’t know.

The last thing we’ve heard from him was an apology, the ‘note’ he left behind was the call John received, which means the presumed note I mentioned doesn’t exist, only the call does.

After leaving his note, he fell from the roof and he died on impact, his pulse was long gone when he reached the floor, and it didn’t come back. I didn’t believe all of it happened, even when I heard John telling it, none of it seemed true...until I saw the death certificate.

The whole world stopped, and it still is frozen now. I wish the grave I’m standing in front of wasn’t real, I wish that my eyes were betraying me.

If only.

“Turns out you lied, Sherlock. You left.”

I hate you for what you did.

“You could have explained all of this a bit more. Even if I would have preferred not to, I would have prevented you from dying if you gave me a note...before.”

I wish I had known, I should have known. He didn’t have to die, he wasn’t supposed to die, certainly not like that.

Not now, that wasn’t his time. He was supposed to die of old age because of natural reasons, after all of us. Outlive us all.

Damn Sherlock Holmes wasn’t supposed to die at 35 years old. It's too young, too soon, Too much to bear.

“What am I supposed to do now, I mean- what are we all supposed to do? None of us can replace you, we’ll take twice the amount of time you barely took to resolve cases on our own, you left us in a really bad situation, you know that? It’s not going to be the same if you’re not here with us.”

And I miss you like a little kid.

“You could have made us take classes to become a close version of you, at least. I’m saying ‘close’ because no one will ever be like you. Not even that detective that had 30 years of experience, he wasn’t even close, really. I’d say he looked like a newbie, next to you.”

I even started to lose the habit of calling him when he’s not directly on the field and I hate this. I’ve only known him for a couple of years, and yet, he’s going to be ironed in my mind for a lifetime.

That man, I swear.

He didn’t think that sticking so close to us, getting to know us, sharing things about him would affect us so badly now that he’s gone. Real gone.

It hurts to say that, I wish I could just pretend he wasn’t gone, but that’s not really...healthy? It’s not really healthy in the way that if I pretend he’s still there- while he’s six feet under ground would drive me crazy, it’d completely destroy the whole ‘acceptance phase’ I’ve been working on. He’s dead, and there’s nothing we can do to bring him back.

That’s what my brain has to acknowledge, pretending he’s alive wouldn’t do any good.

Sometimes life gets to an end, and we have to accept that. I know that Sherlock, his brother and even John wouldn’t want to see me like this- ignoring reality, building a fake world to protect me from the real one.

Hurting sucks. Getting reminded that I won’t be seeing him anymore sucks, but everything sucks in life, and that’s what happens when you live. You can’t have a perfect happy life with all the shitty problems, that doesn’t exist.

But even if this sucks, I also get to remember all of the great things Sherlock has accomplished, the hundreds of memories we’ve made all together, whatever makes me happy- but there’s still a lot of hurt to go through before being able to think about them without crying because I miss them.

I wish that could be happening right now, I must have filled an entire bottle of water with all my tears. It’s even worse when that happens at 2am after you wake up from a dream about them.

Speaking of dreams, I don’t think I’ve ever had so many dreams with him compared to when he was alive. It’s as if he's haunting me, and even if I like him, I’d wish he wouldn’t do that so often, a little peace and quiet would be nice, even if I don’t want that to stop.

I’m afraid I’ll forget Sherlock if I stop thinking about him, block the memories to prevent me from the hurt that comes with it. I don’t want that to happen, he doesn’t deserve to have his legacy ignored because of my stupid feelings that hurt, he deserves to have his legacy remembered, discussed about, shared, not to have it trapped in newspapers, or in a corner of my head.

I like to imagine him being proud when I do that, even if I wouldn’t have known he was. He wasn’t the expressive kind, but he liked to show he was proud of you through a facial expression, a word, whatever could be ‘decrypted’. He wasn’t as cold as people saw him, he was extremely kind, even if he was broken in millions of pieces inside.

But yet, he overcame everything and came back even stronger. Every single time. He was amazing in so many ways, and that’s why I wish I could be like him.

So much.

I sighed, adjusting the grip I had on my umbrella, as I squatted down in front of his grave. “Did you know we went through your closet yesterday? There’s really not a lot, your clothes are so...similar. We can easily buy the same to be ‘like you’. But I don’t want to touch them, they’re kind of like precious pieces you can find in a museum.”

I hope he doesn’t think I’m crazy because of that.

“And...yeah, we went through your place because we can’t bring ourselves to sell it, I don’t want someone else to live in there and ruin it with their own belongings. But at the same time, living in it would be weird, I don’t know. I can’t find an explanation, just that it’s weird, living in the apartment of a dead person. Kinda creepy.” I explained, looking up from my umbrella as I realized the rain had gone down, letting a few rays of a ‘somehow’ sun. “Look, the sun listened to me. It’s coming up so I can give my emotional speech full of hope.” I sighed. “I don’t...I don’t even know what to say anymore. Kind of ironic as I always have something to say.”

I actually kind of know, but I don’t want to say it.

He’s gone. No miracle will bring him back, but I’ve kept hearing John saying it, I heard him last time we came; and even though I can’t bring myself to say that, I want to so badly. That’s all I’ve been wanting to happen since you died, I don’t want anything else and I don’t care about love anymore even if you always wanted me to be happy.

You’re what made me happy, you were the definition of love. Maybe what I’ve been feeling was that but I never brought myself to admit it.

I have loved you since the first day, but you always said that whoever fell in love with you should find better as you considered yourself a forever loner, unable to feel and give love, but I know you were capable of it, if you had tried, I believed you could have done it.

“Look at me, in front of your grave, exposing the feelings I’ll never have the answer to, I don’t even know if you liked me back. You really took all your secrets to your grave, huh? What a selfish prick, you could’ve shared that, at least.” I complained.

I don’t think I’ve ever known someone that hid so much stuff, he really was a whole mystery to himself, that man.

We can’t even solve what caused you to commit suicide, we’ll probably never solve it. You were the only one that knew why, and yet he can’t just pull a miracle and live again for a few minutes as a zombie to explain. That would be of great help, even if I’d prefer he’d live again.

That’d be an awesome miracle, even better than what happens at Christmas.

“Can you do that for me, though?”

Just that, I won’t ask for anything else.

“Just one more miracle, Sherlock, for us.” I said, putting my hand on the polished surface. “...don't be dead.”

It’s too easy, you can’t be dead, Nothing can kill you. I know John, and a shit ton of people saw you fall, but...let me believe all of that isn’t true.

Just a fake accident, Do that for us. Please. We need you more than you can ever imagine, you were so important to us, you were family.

A reason to fight for, to live for.

“Don’t be, please.” I pleaded, as I got up from the ground. “I uh...I’ll be back whenever I can, okay? Work’s been crazy since you’re gone, it’s incredible. I don’t know if it’s because we don’t have your help, or because it’s always been like that.”

Probably a mix of the two, I don’t really know, it’s been complicated to think properly these days. Sherlock would be the one to help with that, usually.

“I’ll have to ask someone else, I guess.”

I still haven’t found this ‘someone else’, by the way, It’s been two years, I know. But I still haven’t found someone that can help me the way he used to.

He still remains unique after all this time.

“I’ll be on my way, then. You’re awfully quiet today, guess you’re not in the mood, so I’ll go.”

I wish I still didn’t have to say goodbye, but this is the only thing I can say when I leave.

The weather had even gotten better, as if it only rained to have a full dramatic effect, there was only wind, which didn’t seem to announce a storm, for now. The sound of the leaves being crushed by my feet as I walked was to be heard, as no other sounds were around, it was very quiet today.

The silence did feel weird, I never liked it.

Not when it caused me to think of…

“Got time to spare for me?”

...him.

“Sherlock.”

|Chapter Two|

#sherlock holmes x reader #sherlock fic #sherlock holmes #bbc sherlock #sherlock #lexies sherlock #sherlock holmes fanfiction

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llewey-watts · 4 years ago

Text

Work in progress post:

Detective Watts Best Quotes

Concocting A Killer

Watts: “Ah, so you’re the one who botched it.” Murdoch: “Excuse me?”

Watts: “Well, that’s why I’m here, isn’t it?”

Brackenreid: “Listen, Detective Murdoch did nothing wrong. The Crown is just worried that Shanley may claim prejudice if the same detective reinvestigates the case.”

Watts: “Right, right, right. You’re just biased. The coroner’s the one who botched it. Coroners. Odd lot. Far from reliable to say the least. Not to mention the smell.”

Murdoch: “Our coroner has a flawless record. And she also happens to be my wife.”

Watts: “Good God, man. You’re married to the city coroner?”

Murdoch: “Yes.”

Watts: “Oof. Is she pretty? Ah, she’d have to be pretty. I don’t know how else you could tolerate being married to a colleague.”

“The streets of this fine city are my office.”

Crabtree: “Should I read these files?”

Watts: “Absolutely not. The less you know, the more pure you remain. From purity emerges truth. From truth emerges justice. Knowing nothing allows one to see everything.”

“Our mind is where we live our lives. The only home one needs is the human skull.”

Watts: “Oh, no. You interviewed a witness?”

Murdoch: “Oh, no. She called on me.”

Watts: “Your involvement was to cease entirely. Instead, it appears you are continuing to seek a conviction. And based on what? A visual test done 12 years ago by a neophyte coroner?”

Murdoch: “Dr. Ogden is my wife.”

Watts: “Which makes it all the more likely you’re blind to her mistakes. No, it appears this dinner was a poor idea. Good night Detective.”

Watts: “The detective was wrong.”

Ogden: “About what?”

Watts: “You’re not pretty.”

Ogden: “Excuse me?”

Watts: “Look at you. Classic, Romanesque bone structure, excellent physiognomic symmetry. You’re not pretty. You’re beautiful.”

Ogden: “Well, I suppose I’m flattered.”

Watts: “Why? It’s merely an objective assessment. But that necktie **shakes his head**.

“Honestly, Inspector, how does anyone work with this man? He is some kind of renegade to whom rules are a foreign concept.”

“Let’s suppose for a moment that Mr. Shanley is guilty of this current murder. Now, does that make him more or less likely to be guilty of the first? Are you the same man today you were yesterday? Your hair is not the same. You cut and discarded it. Same with your fingernails. Over time, our entire body falls away and is reconstituted. How, then, can you be the same? Oh, but our thinking changes with maturity, with experience. In truth, the continuity of personhood may be nothing more than a delusion. In fact, it makes me question our whole profession..."

“We need to get out of doors detective. The truth is in the air. We must **deep breath** breathe it in.”

“We both know you didn’t do it. — We have to blame someone. The function of the police is to attribute blame on behalf of the community, but the community doesn’t particularly care if we blame the right person. — Why not? Man has been using scapegoats since Leviticus. The sims were placed upon the goat, the goat was banished to the desert, but mo one cared that the goat was innocent.”

“The ignorami at Station One have done it again. I clearly told them to release the man who looks like Karl Marx. They’ve let out some fellow who’s as clean-shaven as bloody Kierkegaard.”

Hades Hath No Fury

“How could I have been so unaware? My sister was in distress, and I suspected nothing. Age is no excuse for inattention. -but, sir, you found her. Your sister’s alive.- Yes. So I’m at peace.”

“Yes. Well life is but a cruel sport for whatever maker you are forced to believe in. -Detective Watts I understand...- Would your sister forsake you for a house of women who have eschewed the world in which you live?-my sister was a nun.-“

“Truth is absolute, unyielding and eternal, Jackson. It is our one constant in a turbulent universe.”

“Your face is *pause* symmetrical, but that hat *shakes his head*”

Merlot Mysteries

Watts: “Wine is proof that God loves us and wants to see us happy.”

Murdoch: “I highly doubt that”

Watts: “Oh, you reject the words of Benjamin Franklin?”

Murdoch: “Even a clever man is capable of a bad idea. no. wine, like any alcohol, is a depressant. It hinders the mind.”

Watts: “Ah, but ‘in wine there is truth.’ -Pliny the Elder.”

Murdoch: “Writers and Philosophers are seldom the best of judges. Especially when it comes to alcohol.

Watts: “Well, no one less than Louis Pasteur called wine, ‘the most helpful and most hygienic of beverages.’ Is it that you don’t enjoy the taste?”

Murdoch: “Ah.”

“Oh. Wait right there. I’m going to show you how wrong you are.”

“‘Wine can of their wits the wise beguile, make the sage frolic, and a serious smile.’”

“In the words of Diogenes, ‘What I like to drink most is wine that belongs to others.’”

Murdoch: “Spectroscopic analysis.”

Watts: “Ah, yes. Not reliable in my experience. How’s it meant to help us?”

Murdoch: “By comparing the wine in question to the light profile of other varying ages, we’ll be able to discern precisely how old it is.”

Ogden: “The older the wine, presumably, the light the color, thanks to the blanching effect of sunlight.”

Watts: “Mm, but it was kept in a cellar. Depending on conditions, two bottles of the same provenance could be wildly different. There’s absolutely to way to determine —“

Murdoch: “Thank you, Detective. Please.”

Watts: “All right.”

Ogden: “Ready?”

Murdoch: “Yes.”

Ogden: “It’s 4.3.”

**Watts waiting + messing around.**

Ogden: “It’s 5.2. 8.5.”

Watts: “Well?”

Murdoch: “[Sighs] They are all different.”

Watts: “Really?”

Murdoch: “Every grape, every year, every bottle.”

Watts: “Hm, you don’t say.”

Murdoch: “It compares to an 1880 Merlot...a 1902 Tempranillo...and...several others.”

Ogden: “Well, I suppose you told us so, Detective.”

Murdoch: “All right. Call in your expert.”

Watts: “Uh, not my expert. My sommelier.”

The Talking Dead

“No one intends to get murder **scratches his beard** and yet.”

Crabtree: “Sir, are you not concerned that you yourself are marked for death?”

Watts: “Oh, I don’y like it, but the truth is death could come to any one of us any day.”

Crabtree: “Still, no need to hurry it along.”

Watts: “Well, very little of life is under our control. Very little death as well.”

Crabtree: “Watts, have you ever been to Paris?”

Watts: “Ah yes, The City of Light.”

Crabtree: “I thought that was Buffalo?”

Watts: “No, I believe Paris came up with it first. Why do you ask?”

Crabtree: “Nina’s involved with a show that’s preforming there. She wants me to go.”

Watts: “Forever?”

Crabtree: “No, no, just a short while.”

Watts: “Well, the world is only an oyster if you choose to open it.”

Crabtree: “So go to Paris today, for tomorrow I might die?”

Watts: “Precisely.”

Crabtree: “What about you? What would you do with your last day?”

Watts: “Just this. Talk to a friend.”

Crabtree: “Who? Oh me?”

Watts: “And solve a crime.This is what were looking for.”

Crabtree: “Brilliant.”

Watts: “The City of Love with a beautiful woman. You’d be a fool to say no.”

Crabtree: “Thought you said it was the City of Light.”

Watts: “Light. Love. Are they not one and the same?”

Crabtree: “I prefer to love with the lights off, sir. I fear I’m bashful.”

Crabtree à la Carte

“A shame. It looks terrific. I think I’ll go out for lunch. Anyone care to join me? —- This disappoints me. But I soldier on.”

“I’ll work with her. People are not to be defined merely by their words, thoughts, and actions.”

“KRRRKRRRKRRRSHING SHING SHING SHING SHING! a moleta.”

“[speaking Italian] RESPONDA TO ME!”

That man’s look tho.

Watts: “It may once again be safe, but I’m not sure I’ll ever regard meat with the same enthusiasm again.”

Cherry: “Perhaps you should stick to freshly butchered cuts.”

Watts: “I thought the same. Then I read up on the abattoir conditions in the stockyards.”

Cherry: “The Shelleys subscribed to a Pythagorean diet. Da Vinci too.”

Watts: “Pythagorean? You mean vegetarian?”

Cherry: “I do. ‘My body,’ said da Vinci, ‘will not be a tomb to other creatures.’”

Watts: “Yes. Yes, it’s the only way to live, isn’t it? Join me, Miss Cherry. From this day forward, we shall follow the ranks of all moral men in our strict adherence to vegetarianism.”

Cherry: “Uh, I don’t think so. What, are we cows?”

Murdoch Schmurdoch

“Are you being facetious?”

“**To Constable John Brackenreid** Let me guess, you invited a lady to accompany you on an outing and she declined. — I would counsel you to persevere. Ask again. As Lord Nelson wrote, ‘the boldest measures are the safest,’ although I suppose a woman is quite unlike a Danish Fleet. — Yes. Tread softly, Young Brackenreid. Let her know that if her inclination changes, your offer still stands.”

Game of Kings

Ogden: “I see. Well, I don’t much fancy being stared at for the next five months.”

Murdoch: “Julia...”

Ogden: “Inspector, I couldn’t help but notice that you and all of the men were staring at the us both. Is there something you’d like to ask?”

Brackenreid: “Uh, no.”

Ogden: “Constable Crabtree?”

Crabtree: “What? [Chuckles]”

Ogden: “Higgins?”

Higgins: “No, ma’am.”

Ogden: “What about you, Detective Watts? You seem like a curious fellow.”

Watts: “Well, there is one thing.”

Murdoch: “What is that?”

Watts: “When’s the baby coming?”

Crabtree: “Oh!”

Brackenreid: “Bloody hell, Watts! They wanted to keep it a secret.”

Watts: “How could they do that when everyone clearly knows what’s going on here?”

Free Falling

Watts: “One hopes this won’t put too much of a strain on their relationship.”

Crabtree: “How so?”

Watts: “In the face of great loss, emotions can be misdirected. Feelings amplified. I knew a young couple who experienced a similar issue. They never recovered.”

Watts: “The secret to dealing with gruesome remains is to replace natural instinct with logic.”

Constable Brackenreid: “Okay. How?”

Watts: “Consider an ant. Imagine you trod upon one, crushing it, and leaving it’s body mangled beyond recognition. Now, does this disturb you?”

Constable Brackenreid: “Not really.”

Watts: “Exactly. So we simply apply the transitive law. If we are not disturbed by an ant, there is no reason to be disturbed by a beetle. If not by a beetle, then not by a caterpillar. Nor a butterfly, nor a sparrow, nor a fish, nor a rabbit, not a dog...nor a human. What we have here, then, is no more disturbing than the squashed remains of an ant.”

Hart: “What’s this?”

Watts: “A reminder of the inhumanity of man, Miss Hart.”

Hart: “How poetic.”

Watts: “Constable? It seems something’s troubling you.”

Crabtree: “How so?”

Watts: “There’s an expression on your face that suggests you have a thought in your head.”

Crabtree: “Do you remember I asked you about visiting Paris?”

Watts: “No.”

Crabtree: “And then I was away for some time?”

Watts: “No.”

Crabtree: “No. Well, in any case, I did. I went to Paris with Nina.”

Watts: “Mm.”

Crabtree: “And she wants to go again, but for good.”

Watts: “So you’re considering leaving us all behind?”

Crabtree: “I don’t want to. My whole life is here. But I could imagine a life there. I don’t know. If I...If I don’t go, I lose Nina. If I do, I lose everything else that’s dear to me.”

Watts: “One loss doesn’t outweigh the other?”

Crabtree: “The enormity of either seems too great to contemplate.”

Watts: “Oof. Well...I can’t give you any advice. But I can tell you what I know. I know that we spend our whole lives holding on to what we have. We fear loss as much as death itself. But without loss, there is no change. Without change, there is no? Life.”

Crabtree: “Detective. You realize there’s nothing written on the blackboard, right?”

Watts: “Uh, yes, but it provides a frame of reference.”

Crabtree: “Ah.”

Brothers Keepers

“Of course I’m not certain. Memories are fragmentary impressions at best. The mind moves like a flock of starlings. It’s hard to pin down a thought, let alone a memory.”

“Did I have reason? Nigel Baker tortured and killed a man I...A man who was in every way my brother. Someone who deserved my protection. I had ample reason to kill Nigel Baker. But as I have already made clear, I didn’t recognize him. So did I kill him with intention? No. Am I sorry he’s dead? No, I’m not. To be honest, even if given the chance to exact my revenge, I’m not sure I’m capable of it. Obviously, my philosophy rejects that very idea. No one asks to be the way they are, not even boys like Nigel Baker.”

In reference to justice being found:

Watts: “Where is that to be found? I’ve been asking myself that. To be honest, I’m unable to think of much else.

Murdoch: “You seek justice.”

Watts: “I crave it. If I could, I would demand it. I want the man who killed my brothers to feel their pain. To feel my grief at what he did to them. But he’s dead. At the hand of his father. Did he even know why? And now the father will likely hang. Is that justice?

Brackenreid: “Of a sort, I suppose.”

Watts: “Then why don’t I feel better?”

Annabella Cinderella

Constable Brackenreid: “Do you think I’ll get a chance to meet him?”

Crabtree: “Who? The lawyer? What do you want to meet him for?”

Constable Brackenreid: “I-I followed the trial. I felt sorry for her.”

Crabtree: “John, she killed her mother with an ax.”

Constable Brackenreid: “Harriet Rawlins wasn’t her mother. Annabella was a home child.”

Crabtree: “So that makes it alright?”

Constable Brackenreid: “She was beaten and tortured. Her home sister admitted as much.”

Crabtree: “The home sister that Annabella then tried to murder?”

Constable Brackenreid: “Rosemary Rawlins was abusive as well.”

Watts: “That’s what made it such a brilliant defense. The victim was painted as a villain, the villain painted as a victim. Annabella Cinderella.”

Crabtree: “So you’re a fan of the lawyer as well?”

Constable Brackenreid: “He took her case for free.”

Watts: “Oh, nobody’s motives are purely altruistic. It’s all in the service of his political aspirations. He running for mayor, don’t you know?”

Crabtree: “Thank you very much, Detective Watts, for everything. You as well, Mr. Daniels.”

Constable Brackenreid: “And I’m terribly sorry about all of this.”

Watts: “Of course you’re sorry. It doesn’t change anything, so why waste energy in saying it?”

Constable Brackenreid: “Does Detective Murdoch know?”

Watts: “No, he doesn’t. And that’s not the question you should be asking right now.”

Constable Brackenreid: “Sorry, I...”

Watts: “Nope.”

Constable Brackenreid: “W-What is?”

Lawyer: “How do we find her?”

Watts: “Ah. On the train over, I went through the file from the Crown prosecutor. There’s one more person we should protect.”

Lawyer: “Who’s that?”

Watts: “The doctor who filed the death certificate and attended the case.”

Lawyer: “Dr. Beattie was never called to testify.”

Watts: “He provided evidence that helped convict her.”

Lawyer: “Good point. Let’s go.”

Watts: “No. You stay. **waves gun in the air** This is police business. All right.”

Constable Brackenreid: “I’m not saying she’s innocent. I just pointed out that there are other people who may have wanted to kill her mother.”

Watts: “Which, if they did, would ipso facto make her innocent.”

Crabtree: “Did she say she was innocent?”

Constable Brackenreid: “She did, yes.”

Watts: “‘Twas ever thus.”

Constable Brackenreid: **opens the door** “Oh, my God.”

Watts: “Still think she’s so innocent?”

Constable Brackenreid: “This is my fault.”

Crabtree: “It’s jot your fault, John.”

Watts: “Losing the prisoner was your fault. This is merely a consequence. One cannot be accountable for every consequence, because the consequences of every action are infinite.”

Constable Brackenreid: “Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

Watts: “Your feelings are irrelevant. It’s simply the truth of it.”

Crabtree: “It does confirm our fears. The girl’s out for bloody revenge.”

#llewellyn watts #murdoch mysteries #jack walker #george crabtree appreciation society #detective watts #quotes

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