#Jack made a lot of mistakes but Gabe was probably the worst one

[dimigex]

Aftermath - R76

This is a snippet that came from a prompt that @cinlat sent me. This image from @robotsinlace inspired the look as well. 

AO3 / Fanfiction

Acrid smoke filled the sky, making it difficult to breathe. Coughing, Jack fought to pull air into his lungs. When he couldn't, panic suffocated him further. Training ticked away the back of his mind, trying to calm the fear so that he could assess the situation. Each inhale stabbed through his chest like a knife. When he gasped in a shallow, insufficient amount of air, some part of him recognized that he could, in fact, breathe. It was too little, not enough to expand his chest fully. Collapsed lung, his mind suggested distantly.

Jack couldn't focus on the soft voice through the coughing fit that gripped him. Head lolling to one side, he spit blood and grit from his lips. When it passed, the man struggled toward a sitting position and ignored the waves of nausea that rolled through his stomach. Frothy bile gagged him, and something warm glued his shirt to his side. Jack reached toward the heat, and his fingers came away stained crimson. If he'd had enough breath to spare, he would have cursed.

Blue sky peeked through the columns of black and grey smoke overhead. Jack couldn't make sense of his surroundings no matter how much he tried. Alarms blared nearby. He should probably do something about that. Reaching for his hip, Jack's fingers brushing an empty holster. He frowned, wondering where his sidearm had gone. A vague memory of drawing the weapon pressed to the forefront of his mind.

Jack had been standing in his office, reaching for the gun when-when what? How had he gotten outside? Pain lanced through Jack's temple when he tried to force images to surface. His blurred vision focused on the rubble beside him, recognizing the frame of his information wall, glass shattered and broken scenes flickering fitfully in the gloom. Dizzying recollection flooded through him; he was lying in the remains of his office. Jack peered through the rapidly darkening smoke and realized that it wasn't just his office. It looked like the wreckage of the entire Swiss headquarters.

Smoke swirled to Jack's left, coalescing into deeper shadow. A ghost stepped through the broken bits of building, gliding closer. Only the crunch of glass beneath boots warned Jack that it wasn't some apparition coming to punish him for his sins. The figure paused, and a pale mask swiveled toward Jack's prone form. Flames danced across the ivory surface, before disappearing in soulless black eyes. As the form took on the shape of familiarity, fear and fury soured in the pit of Jack's stomach. The emotion escaped his lips in a low growl.

"There you are," a disembodied voice taunted, arrogance dripping from every word. The man leaped over a fragment of the command table. "I didn't think you'd die that easily."

"Sorry to disappoint," Jack answered. He poured every ounce of sarcasm and anger into the words, but they rasped out barely above a whisper.

Though Jack didn't know what the man looked like behind the mask, he was certain that he smirked at the comment. The shadow towered over Jack without fear or remorse. A boot came to rest on the center of Jack's chest. His pain doubled, tripled, until blackness ate the edges of his vision. Even the shallow breaths that he'd managed earlier seemed beyond his body's power now.

Jack sagged against the masonry where he'd been thrown during the explosion. Explosion? A fragmented memory of searing heat and weightlessness threatened to swallow him, but he pushed it away. Jack ran his tongue over his lips, hoping to impart enough moisture to curse the man who had taunted him for years. "Reaper," he spat the name like venom. The terrorist had dogged Jack's every movement, striking when least expected. He'd nearly dragged the organization to its knees, nearly. "You can kill me, but it won't kill Overwatch. They will find you-"

"Care to wager on that?" Reaper raised one gun to rest on his shoulder. Jack stared at the inky coating, wondering why it looked so familiar, but he couldn't place it. The second nestled against Jack's chest, muzzle over his heart. "Not that it matters, you won't be around to see it either way."

"Overwatch is bigger than me," Jack wheezed, ignoring the dizziness that triplicated Reaper above him. The man's images swayed, meshed together, then broke apart again. Even if Jack had access to a weapon, he wouldn't know which to shoot.

Reaper laughed, a sound that set chills racing down Jack's spine, and holstered one of his weapons. The other remained steadfast on Jack's chest. There was no getting out of this one; it was really over. Reaper scoffed under his breath. "You still don't understand do you? Overwatch will burn. Too bad you won't be around to see it, Boyscout."

Reality cracked, splintering down the center. The breath in Jack's lungs froze as pieces fell into place with deafening clarity. Suddenly, he understood why Reaper's stance looked so familiar, why the way he walked recalled a tingle on the tip of Jack's tongue. He saw it in the spread of the man's shoulders, the arrogant saunter, and the way he handled the weapon. How had he not noticed until now?

Nausea squeezed Jack's stomach until he wanted to bring up every meal that he'd ever eaten. He wrapped a hand around the leg that pressed him to the ground and levered himself closer to the man he'd once trusted. Blood coated his tongue, making it difficult to speak, but he had to know. "Why, Gabe?"

The weapon nearly crushed Jack's chest when Gabe leaned into it, using his free hand to remove the bloodless mask that covered his once familiar face. The man tossed it aside like an afterthought and leaned closer. "It was you or me." Reaper's jaw clenched, then his finger moved to the trigger. "It has to end this way; choose your last words carefully, Strike Commander."

Jack swallowed around the betrayal that threatened to choke him. Without the mask, he couldn't reconcile his one time lover with the notorious Reaper. He'd known Gabe for the better part of thirty years, allowing him closer than anyone else. Jack had been a miserable, homesick farm boy until Gabe took him under his wing. They'd lived through the hell of SEP together, surviving inexplicable odds a dozen times over. Then, Overwatch. And, Jack didn't need to close his eyes to remember the sweaty nights spent wrapped around each other. He saw it all in Gabe's face.

Maybe this fight was as inevitable as Gabe thought. Every decision that Jack had made over the years pushed them toward this point. He'd distanced himself from Gabe after Blackwatch fell from grace. Would it have made a difference if Jack opened up more? Could he have changed the outcome?

Swallowing blood with his regrets, Jack lifted his head. He searched the wild brown eyes above for a sliver of the man that he knew. There was nothing left. I did that, he realized. Now that it had slipped through his fingers, Jack ached for the time he'd wasted. He could curse Gabe for everything that happened, or focus on the parts he wanted to remember.

Hope swelled in Jack's chest, the warmth temporarily smothering his pain. Maybe it wasn't too late to change things; he knew what he needed to say. Jack forced himself to smile despite the blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. "I love yo-"

Pain obliterated Jack's world and darkness swallowed him.

[multsicorn]

multsicorn’s infinite fic playlist

some friends in a chat were talking about comfort fic!  so I have Made A List.  Ten of my very favorite fics to reread when I need a boost, in ten different fandoms.  In no order.  And with no particular theme, that I can tell.  They’re probably all more-or-less mostly self-contained enough to work even if you don’t know the canon?  Certainly the Hockey RPF fic is (cause I don’t know anything about the canon there!), and who doesn’t know HP, etc....

.... four are about fucked-up families, (cause I find that cathartic, and people dealing with it comforting), two are polyfic, (because more relationships interacting to me means ~more love~), three are really mostly about the ~feel~ of the universe, (the fun mundanity of a not-quite-mundane canon universe! or of a perfectly balanced space au), and then the last one is... about how to know if you’re in love on one side of it, and about how to get over it on the other (because how does one romance).

the ones about fucked-up families:

When The Lights Go Out, Will You Take Me With You? by narceus (Glee, Kurt/Blaine, m, ~11k).  I love the way that it punches out my heart and then puts it back together?  Lmao, that’s very personal.  But I love the way that - what can I say.  This isn’t a fic about romance, it’s a fic about family - well.  How sometimes your family is your boyfriend, and your mutual friends, how sometimes ‘family’ is something you have to leave, and real family is something you build.  ‘This is exactly what it’s like,’ and it’s wish-fulfillment, and, yes, somehow it’s both of those things.

You can run away with me any time you want.

Come Marching Home by ossapher (American Revolution RPF/Hamilton, Hamilton/Laurens, t, ~9k).  Fraught relationships with family members who think they love you but they really really don’t are my jam, and the way that this fic deals with a younger still-dependent sibling who’s caught in the middle between John and his horrible father is especially my jam.  Also, fics that transform a complicated set of characters/relationships/etc. from canon to a completely other setting thoughtfully, which this fic ‘verse has a lot of fun with.

John Laurens attempts to reconcile with his U.S. Senator dad after years of minimal contact. It's family, though, so nothing goes as planned.

Theft of Assets, Destruction of Property by Helenish (Harry Potter, Draco/Neville, e, ~23k).  I love the way that Draco here builds a life up out of nothing.  It’s very cozy from one angle, full of cooking and baking and making a house a home, but it also goes hard on the way that abused children will internalize their situation as the expected baseline of life, which I appreciate very much.

Surely it is a mistake to allow a single youthful indiscretion to cloud an already promising career.

A Month of Sundays by Kelfin (Hockey RPF, Erik Johnson/Gabriel Landeskog, m, ~69k).  I love the push-pull of a relationship that naturally slides very quickly into something very close and intimate, that keeps being pulled back from that by Erik’s internalized homophobia.  I love the way the story negotiates the very real knock-on effects of that on Gabe, his maybe-maybe-not partner, and the way the Erik negotiates ‘I love my family... but they don’t love me.’

Unlike some guys, who freak out when things get even a little bit gay, Erik is fine with this stuff. Erik's not even fazed when Gabe's attempts at flirting with him start to get semi-public, a fact that, by his own judgment, makes him at least five to seven times more tolerant than your average forward-thinking American.

the polyfics:

Everything That You Can Keep by Dira Sudis (dsudis) (Vorkosigan Saga, Aral/Jole, backgroundy Aral/Cordelia, e, ~30k).  I love this story’s negotiation of not just polyamory (and I love negotiation of polyamory stories - how two people in one relationship share feelings about yet another person, and figure things out? yes, please), but specifically of all the added complications that come out in the highly hierarchical, secretive, and loyalty-based Vor society.  When even asking about asking is a matter of trust, requested and given?  That goes straight to my id.

The impossible takes a little more time, a lot of negotiation.

Love: The Package Deal by jjtaylor (Bandom, Frank/Gerard/Lindsey/Jamia, m, ~30k).  I love the way that the different relationships are layered over and relate to each other - that’s one of the big things I like about polyfic - and the way that the amnesia smashes them together by bringing a past relationship to the present, while making the present one abstract and back to square one.  I love how the amnesia in fact smashes together all the highs and lows of eventful years’ worth of Gerard’s life: artistic success, problems with drugs and addiction... they’re all right there waiting for you.

Gerard gets a special kind of amnesia. Frank gets to reexamine his idea of acceptable relationship structures. Lots of people fail to communicate effectively, but they all sure remember how to kiss.

the cozy weirdness of the universe:

it's a new craze by attheborder (Good Omens, Aziraphale/Crowley, t, ~6k).  The development of the relationship strikes a nice balance between angst and sweetness, but what I really come back to this fic for is the fictional advice podcast!  That Aziraphale and Crowley start together, which it’s about, and the way that they sprinkle their up-close experience of history into their discussion on it - and then the way that the fandom latches onto and tries to make sense of that.  It is just, purely, A DELIGHT.

CROWLEY: I try not to make a habit of gratitude, but I must give our appreciation to everyone out there who’s been listening and subscribing to The Ineffable Plan. AZIRAPHALE: Ooh, yes, we’ve become quite popular, haven’t we? CROWLEY: Yeah, just hit number eight on the advice charts … No advertising at all. AZIRAPHALE: Mm. How … miraculous. CROWLEY: … Aziraphale. You did not.

***

Crowley and Aziraphale are very possibly the people least qualified, on the entire planet, to start up an advice podcast.

But what else is there to do when the world isn’t ending anytime soon, you’re technically on indefinite sabbatical from your lifelong careers, and you need a plausible excuse to spend more time with your best friend who you’re definitely not, absolutely not, maybe just a little, actually maybe overwhelmingly in love with?

A Resolution of Territory by arboretum (Hikaru no Go, Hikaru/Akira, e, ~10k).  I just love imagining spending my life playing Go, okay!  This fic is wonderfully immersive in a weird-but-good everyday reality, of spending your whole life immersed in a game that just fascinates you, alongside your friends - and your boyfriend, too, which is to say, the one person who shares your fascination in the most direct and deepest and mutually obsessive way.  Eventually he’s your boyfriend, of course.

The point is, life is hectic, but it's good.

The Vastness of Space by shysweetthing (Yuri on Ice, Victor/Yuuri, e, ~17k).  I love the way that the space setting here gives scope for best-friends-and-partners, for cute and amusing low-stakes shenanigans and then cleverly solved higher-stakes adventure.  I love how sweet Victor and Yuuri are in caring for each other in dire circumstances, and why they both see each other as beyond their reach in the context of this imagined world.

As chief communications officer on board the Interstellar Alliance Fleet’s Star Ship Victory, Yuuri doesn’t have to think about who he actually is on his home planet. He just has to listen to his captain, do his job, and…not fall in love with his best friend, the ship’s science officer, Victor Nikiforov.

Well. Two out of three’s not bad.

Then his mother calls with the worst possible news: She, the Empress of New Nihon, has arranged Yuuri’s marriage. There’s only one thing Yuuri can do: Fake a boyfriend, and fake one fast. Who better/worse to play that role than the friend he wishes was more? What can go wrong? It’s not like Yuuri can fall more in love...

the how does romance (with my beloved controversial otp):

if you change your mind by leetlebird (Check, Please!, Jack/Parse, e, ~35k).  I love the way this story shows Jack trying to work out what love means for him, anyway, and Kent learning to deal with and work around feelings that he thinks for most of the story are unrequited.  And the cozy jury-rigged domesticity of especially the final chapters/scenes.

Beneath the table, Jack’s hand squeezes around Kent’s knee. And -- Kent forgets. For just a few seconds, he forgets that they can’t be together, that Jack doesn’t want him in that way, that he’s trying to move on.

“We’re friends, right?” Jack says.

“Yeah, Zimms,” he says. “We’re friends.”

Or: Kent and Jack are friends, then friends-with-benefits, then maybe something more. Kent isn’t sure.

[hopevalley]

S6E2: Phone Rings & Heartstrings (Episode Write-Up)

You can also read this on my site here.

And here we are at the beginning of another new season! How do you feel? Like it’s been forever? Like it’s been little more than the blink of an eye? I know for me it’s a combination of both. It’s crazy to think a year has passed since S5! But we’ve made it to the next chapter of When Calls the Heart! I wonder what this season will have in store for us?

Plotlines for this episode:

Motherhood

Laura & College

The Telephone Comes to Hope Valley

Rosemary Plays Cupid

Jesse and Clara

The Saloon Closes

Not related to the episode exactly, but I noticed they didn’t reference Jack’s death directly in the “last time” clip. For a second, I thought they weren’t even going to let him have a speaking line, but they gave him half of a sentence. Also unrelated, the new part of the intro is great! I just wonder why they didn’t take the time to do new character bits for the characters, while they were at it. Some of these are pretty outdated.

So here we are at:

Plot #1: Motherhood!

I’ll admit that I was dreading this part a little bit. It’s hard to say where the line is between “teacher” and “mother.” I was afraid one might eclipse the other (and you know which one would be doing the eclipsing, because this is Hallmark). That said, I think overall they did a pretty good job of including the baby without making him this big overwhelming part of the actual story.

So, we find out that Jack Junior is four months old, making it almost May 1916.

The general ‘plot’ here is as follows: Elizabeth has to go back to work and finds it difficult. Molly, Rosemary, Florence, and Clara have agreed to take turns watching the baby, but it bothers Elizabeth that little Jack won’t have a more concrete schedule; she’d rather have a more stable arrangement.

This isn’t a very long or detailed plot, but it works. Everyone I know who had to go back to work bawled their eyes out when they had to drop their babies off at daycare. I know I would! Elizabeth finding it hard to balance being a mother and a teacher makes sense, but the best part about this is that she doesn’t consider quitting teaching for even a second.

First, I think it’s fair to say she needs the money, but second…she loves it! How can she balance Jack with teaching in a way that feels satisfying? That tells her that her child is getting the best arrangement she can afford while also allowing her to work to provide both the necessities and fun things?

Elizabeth’s slight clinginess isn’t really a shock or a surprise to me. It’s natural. She spent four months doing whatever she wanted with her life and her baby, and to have to hand him over to someone else every day for hours and hours… Well, it wouldn’t feel good.

I think the best part of this plot was that, like I said earlier, it wasn’t overdone. Nothing about it felt overdramatic or unnecessary.

And it wrapped up neatly with the next plot on the list:

Plot #2: Laura & College

Laura is out of school, now. In my opinion, it’s definitely that time. She’s gotta be about 15 or 16 by this point, and that’s when education ended for the majority of people. And it’s nice to get to see that transition, because with characters like Gabe, we just didn’t get it.

Free from the constraints of having to be in the classroom, Laura’s taken a job to help out her dad: working part-time at the mercantile. She loves to read, and devours the books Elizabeth loans her, but she’s given up on the idea of college. It costs too much money, and her dad needs her help.

Elizabeth, determined to find a way to make it work, writes to an acquaintance of hers who is an administrator of a preparatory school in Hamilton. She includes Laura’s grades and a recommendation letter.

Laura is accepted as a corresponding (or correspondence) student! It’ll let her study at home and send in her work (or maybe let her do it under Elizabeth’s supervision), so she’s still free to work and help her dad around the farm.

Unfortunately that leaves her little time to do her schoolwork…

So Elizabeth offers a solution that will benefit them both: Laura can be Jack Junior’s nanny! Then she’ll have a little downtime to work on her schoolwork, and it’ll pay more because it’ll be full-time.

Laura accepts the deal!

Again, this plot wasn’t huge or convoluted; it wasn’t dramatic. It was nice! And I loved how the general ‘motherhood concerns’ plot tied into this one. It didn’t need to be heavily intertwined at all. They just needed to connect. Which they did, and quite well.

That said, I don’t know if I’d trust a 15/16-year-old girl with no real babysitting experience to be full-time nanny of my baby! In that way, the solution is…maybe just a pinch too convenient? Wilma was established as being poor, and with a school-age child, maybe she would have been a better choice.

But I can’t deny that there’s a lot of room for future drama with this, too. Laura will have the opportunity to grow as a student and as a nanny! Maybe she’ll make mistakes. Maybe she’ll almost regret accepting it. Maybe… Well, it just leaves things open for some good future potential!

Plot #3: The Telephone Comes to Hope Valley

This plot isn’t really a very big deal, mostly because they skipped through all of the potential drama that would have happened when Abigail had to get people to actually bring the telephone to town. I guess at least Henry mentions that it couldn’t have been easy—and, on the plus side, too, it seems that any of the drama Abigail went through to get the phone there? Was kept from everyone else.

So… the telephone is coming to Hope Valley! There will be a line in the mercantile, the mayor’s office, the jail, and Lee’s office. As Henry says, that’s a good start!

The drama here is all good-natured. Ned tells the company he can definitely figure out the wiring, but uh…he can’t. 

He really can’t. He has no idea what he’s looking at, and the directions are confusing…so the big reveal for their four o’clock call is an awkward silent mess. Embarrassing, but also funny in a mostly good-natured sort of way.

The telephone company sends Fiona Miller to straighten things out, which she does, and not without a little sass (or uh, flashin’ a li’l ankle)! She’s easy to like. I hope she sticks around past the second episode, personally, but I can’t quite figure out if she’s meant to be a longstanding cast member or just one of those “couple of episode” characters. It’s easy to imagine it going either way.

Anyway, she fixes things right on up, the phone rings, and Abigail answers it.

Again, another…rather calm plot. It’s giving us a nice set-up for future plotlines by giving the cast access to a telephone. So who knows how things might go? It could be interesting.

That said, the one thing about this plot that I didn’t care for? Bill’s role as a curmudgeon. Was that really necessary? S1 through S4 Bill was a little tactless/thoughtless sometimes, and not emotionally open, but S5 and S6 Bill have been almost unbearably awful. I’ll talk more about this later, but the slight role he played here in this particular plot doesn’t even make sense for his character. He lived in the city for the majority of his life.

I’ll forgive this particular folly if the writers take it in an interesting direction—like Bill being phone-shy (because, for example, he relies a lot on body language/facial expression to have a conversation and gets super awkward on the phone, so he prefers wires due to it giving him the ability to think through what he needs to say and write it down to send). Otherwise it just comes off as more of the same with regards to the figgy pudding plot in the Christmas film: he’s just there to laugh at.

I’m worried that that’ll be the new norm, though. Incoming horrible joke: Bill shouting loudly into the telephone like he’s never used one before. (UGH. Just typing that gave me hives.)

Plot #4: Rosemary Plays Cupid

Now this plot was fun. It was also quiet, kind of muted, not really long, and definitely not meaty. But it served its purpose well. It also gave us some seriously awkward stuff to cringe over that wasn’t Bill’s character. Thank goodness!

So the gist of it is pretty simple: Rosemary decides that Faith and Carson have good teamworking skills, so she ambus—I mean, uh…sets them up! At her house, for dinner! Where everything ends up being awkward and weird, and all Faith and Carson talk about are…beans.

That’s right.

Beans.

Faith eats lots of beans because she can’t cook worth anything, and Carson…does not consume beans. Because they make him gassy. Great dinner conversation!  

Afterward, Faith and Carson start to bond a little over how awkward the dinner was (I mean, nothing brings a couple together like complaining about being set up, right?), but Carson gets carried away and says, “Doesn’t she realize how ridiculous that would be?”

Carson was probably trying to make things not-awkward, but all he did was make things…extremely awkward. The worst part (or best part, if we’re talking about the great acting these two did) was how Faith’s face the entire time is kind of like, “Oh crap, I can imagine it…and it’s not bad at all” and Carson drops that “ridiculous” line right on top of it, hurting Faith’s feelings and making everything between them vaguely awful.

Which we didn’t get too much of in this episode. They literally run into each other in the clinic and it’s awkward, but Carson just seems confused about it, and Faith is the one being avoidant.

Rosemary thinks her entire plan was a disaster, but…

Well, we know she got the ball rolling. ;)

Plot #5: Jesse and Clara

I love Jesse and Clara, and here they get a nice, simple little plotline that feels like it’s getting solved in a reasonable amount of time. They’re also both very cute the whole time.

Jesse purchases some land, which comes as a (pleasant) surprise to Clara. He takes her around pointing out where he’d like different buildings to go, and uses the pronoun ‘our’ to describe the barn. When Clara brings it up (“Our barn?”) Jesse responds in the affirmative (“Of course…our barn.”).

Unfortunately Clara thinks this is the beginning of a marriage proposal, but…it’s not. Jesse says it’ll happen eventually, but he wants to be more stable. Clara accepts this, but…it bothers her, so she talks to Abigail about it. Abigail’s advice is mostly to just…talk to Jesse about it, so Clara makes the effort, and Jesse pretty much just repeats himself: he wants to be in a better financial state.

Clara isn’t persuaded by this, because Jesse has a good job already, and gets kind of short/snippy with him. Jesse ends up coming forward and confessing that when he was younger he stole from a general store with some friends and he’s still paying the man back (the parts that his friends got away with).

All is forgiven when he admits that he wants to start with a clean slate: the real reason he hasn’t proposed yet. He doesn’t want something like that marring the beginning of their marriage together. He wants to prove that he’s a better man by making things right where he should, first.

All in all, a pretty good plot. Reasonable. Clara’s disappointment in not getting a proposal was more than understandable. They’ve been courting a long time, so I don’t blame her for thinking it had finally arrived only for it to just be generalized talk.

That said, this could have definitely been a bigger plot? So I’m surprised they left it as just this little thing. Him sending away $10/month could come across as a lot of things if anyone saw him doing it. But props to keeping this storyline simple! The only thing I think I would change is…maybe having Jesse talk to someone else in town he trusts (could have been just about anyone; if Dottie were around I’d probably suggest her, but Lee or Bill would be a good choice, too) to get the incentive to confess the truth to Clara. Even just a small scene where he looks thoughtful, maybe talks to himself a little in that ‘do I tell her’ ‘do I not’ way and then decisively puts down his tools and walks toward town would have gone a long way into making it seem like he was telling her for more reasons than because she’s being snippy and short with him.

Overall, though, a sweet and enjoyable plot. Jesse calling Clara m’dear was so cute it nearly killed me instantly.

Plot #6: The Saloon Closes

This was the meatiest plot of the episode by far, and with good reason: Tom Trevoy’s mother took ill (in a long-term sense), so he and his wife moved to Union City, but he keeps traveling back to Hope Valley to oversee his saloon, but the commute is awful and he isn’t with his family as much as he’d like, so…he decides to sell.

It’s an incredibly profitable business—or at least it has the potential to be, being the only saloon in town, as Henry mentions to Lee—so the fact that it’s going up for sale is a Pretty Big Deal.

Or at least, it is to Bill and Henry.

The short of it is that they both have half the funds ($4,500) and try to get Lee to cough up the other half for a partnership. Lee tells both of them he’ll have to discuss it with Rosemary first. Rosemary (more or less) talks both men into making this venture about her, because of course doing so will get them her approval (even though it’s clear neither of them really want to do these things for her). In the end, she and Lee are split about who they should choose. Rosemary thinks Bill is the safer investment; Lee would like to trust Henry. They disagree so thoroughly that they decide together to not partner with either of them, which leaves Bill and Henry to, uh, partner with one another. They hate the idea but end up talking about it. Unfortunately, they get their money together too late; Tom sells the bar for $1,000 over asking price to an out of town buyer.

How did the out of town buyer even find out about it in less than two days? Who knows.

Suspension of disbelief? Sure, okay. I can buy it easily enough.

Anyway, overall this plot is pretty good. Bill and Henry both make great points about one another: Bill might do the books for the café (we’ve seen him doing this), but he doesn’t oversee daily operations; he’s more or less a silent partner. Henry is definitely a businessman, but he’s had past issues with honesty and, uh, money.

They’re both risks for very different reasons.

But also, they don’t like each other, so it makes sense that they’d make these kinds of digs at each other in order to try and get the upper hand.

I think my favorite part about this plot was at the end when they were working together to try and buy the saloon. I wish we could have gotten that conversation on-screen, though; it would have been great. I’m sure it was mostly about the fact that the investment is pretty sound, they almost can’t lose with it, and do they really want to wait and let someone else buy it? At least if they own it, they can control what happens/how the space is used/et cetera.

Henry and Bill disagree on most things, but neither of them is stupid.

Henry doesn’t know enough about that type of business to be of much use actually doing the physical work involved in keeping it up and running, but he could be great at striking deals and keeping track of profits/loss. Bill knows enough about balancing books to see if Henry’s up to no good, but he’s also a very hands-on kind of guy, so I feel like he could do all right with the ground level kinds of things.

Still, I feel like a partnership between them would go belly-up pretty fast. They just don’t get along in other capacities enough to…make it work long-term, I think.

It’s definitely for the best that someone else bought it up.

But hey, for a second we were able to see Bill and Henry getting along!

Miscellaneous Thoughts:

Molly…had a hair appointment…in…Benson Hills… What? These women are not rich. That was a bad line. Literally anything else could have sufficed. She went to Benson Hills to get a pretty fabric she couldn’t get in town, for example. Or she went there to drop off donations for a church drive. There are so many other things they could have picked that wouldn’t seem ridiculous (not to mention unbelievably shallow in this time period).

Tom…HAS A WIFE???? We’re probably meant to think she’s been around from the beginning, but now it makes me sad she wasn’t around… The saloon owner’s wife could have been a really fun role for somebody to play!

Now, I promised I’d get back to it, so here we go: Bill was easily the worst part about this episode, and the sad thing is, like I’ve said before, he’s my favorite (regular) character! I don’t know why they decided to suddenly swerve Bill into old grumpy-gus curmudgeon territory, but so far there’s been no reason for it; it makes him hard to like and undoes all the character development he went through in the first four seasons. I don’t want to spit out a 3,000-word essay rant about why I hate this, but I figure it deserves a serious mention here, too. I hope this series isn’t going in the direction of making Bill the go-to laugh-at character. That isn’t good humor writing. It’s cheap and lazy. Please don’t let me down, writers.

Also, can I just say how cringey the weird “charming” parts were with Bill in them? You know what I’m talking about. These parts. UGH. They were terrible and weird. I’m not sure what was going on there; it almost feels like bad stage direction. Bill hasn’t done that since Season 2, and even then it was part of a persona he eventually ended up shedding (along with his job as a Mountie). Why bring it back now? It, too, undoes character development. I’ll be keeping a close eye on this.

There were so many random children…I’ve never seen before. I just wanted to point it out.

Why does only Abigail get the ‘modern’ looking telephone?

Baby Jack was cuter in this episode than in most of the stills, and Elizabeth’s nightgown was lovely.

Florence’s expressions aimed at Elizabeth for not leaving fast enough? Priceless. I mean, that’s a good spot of humor there. Nobody is mocking Elizabeth for having feelings, but we can have a good little chuckle at it.

Lee getting busted pretending to take a phone call was so cringey but mostly in a decent way? I don’t think Bill is so tactless he wouldn’t realize what Lee was doing (see my rant about Bill above) but it’s a situation we can all probably relate to a little bit. Nobody likes getting busted for practicing! A better way of doing this scene would be for Bill to look concerned, or amused? Like, “Who are you talking to?” or, “Talking to yourself?” to start out, with no condescension in his tone of voice. But…that’s just me.

Overall Thoughts:

This was a good first regular episode to the season. It definitely gives me hope about the episodes to come! Bring on the good content!

[ravenhoodoo]

A truth you need to believe (1/?)

 Part 1 of my 5 times Reaper doubted the ingrate In other words, the fic where Talon brainwashes Mccree and Reaper is just trying to get his mission done. 

The boy was too young

That was Reaper’s first, second and third thought as he waited for the signal to pounce. The mission as a whole had been flaming pile of shit. The official mission brief had been to hunt down and eliminate Talon defectors. In the end it had been more of a slaughter, scientists who didn’t know who they were working for until it was too late, green agents who had second thoughts, in short dumbasses you didn’t need a top mercenary to kill. Still, attempting to thread the needle between actively sabotaging Talon’s plans and staying alive and an active agent to do so wasn’t easy. The last two losses against Overwatch had apparently made Talon suspicious. Thus the bullshit mission, with easy kills and a bullshit handler that Reaper was desperate to shake the yoke of. Reaper wasn’t going to cry over some civilians who’d made bad decisions. He’d made that mistake before. But...the boy was too young

Said mistake approached from the left, ridiculous spurs jangling despite the need for stealth. He said nothing and Reaper knew without looking that his face was adorned with that same empty grin he’d had since Talon did...something to him. They hadn’t shared the details. Just told Reaper he was getting a new partner and “Oh, I know he was Overwatch and you hate them but you better play nice because he’s our asset now.” It would have been better if they’d given him the widowmaker treatment, made him something entirely different to his former self. But no, the mannerisms, the cadence of speech, the memories, it was all Jesse Mccree. Just with all his heart, everything that really made him him, surgically removed. Reaper tried to keep the two separate in his head. There was Jesse, once his-, once very important to him that Talon had destroyed, taken just like everything else in his life. Then there was the ingrate, a pale imitation to the real thing. Even if both shared an enjoyment of the cowboy motif.

In his periphery, he could see the ingrate tilt his head towards the kid. Maybe if he didn’t acknowledge him he’d go away. (He wouldn’t, neither Jesse or the ingrate could abide being ignored). The boy’s mother came from the door below, frantically looking about before going to scrub the soot and dust from the boy’s face. The same soot covered her face, broken only by the growing tear tracks. There had been an explosion at the compound they’d being staying at, the Talon rebels. (Reaper knew. He’d been ordered to set the explosion.) There was a hushed conversation before the mother grabbed the kid and hurried them towards the other exit to the alley. She looked hunted. Probably because she was.

“Might I ask why they’re not dead yet?” the ingrate asked, tone deceptively casual. He’d been sent to monitor the mission, to monitor Reaper. A Talon asset infinitely more trustworthy than a Talon mercenary, particularly one that had failed such as Reaper had. Reaper wouldn’t let it bother him. Or at least wouldn’t show it. Showing weakness to the ingrate was just asking for trouble down the line.

Back when Jesse first came in from the Deadlock’s he had a few bad habits. One being his way of finding a person’s weakness, any crack they had left unguarded, and wedging a lever into it. Back then it was a self preservation technique, a way of getting the upper hand. These days it screamed of an underlying viciousness that Jesse never had.

“They must be the wrong targets, I was never briefed on a kid being part of Talon.”

“Mmm, nope,” the ingrate said popping the P, “says it right here: Laurel Sanders, age 35 years old, Benjamin Sanders, age 14 years old. Mission Parameters: no survivors. Clear as crystal Gabe.” The smirk is clear in his voice. He’d made the mistake of taking issue with the name once to the ingrate and he hadn’t let it go since. Reaper still doesn’t turn to look at him. Doesn’t like looking at the facsimile of a smile more than he had to. The mother and child had reached the end of the alleyway. He could let them go.

“You should probably chase them before they get away Darlin’.”

He could smuggle them out of the city, he could- he could fail and his plans to take Talon down could die with him. And Talon needed to die. For all that they’d done, for Zurich, Jack and Je-. Decision made, Reaper leapt from the roof and followed the trail left by the two as they attempted to leave the city. He found them easily enough. They were tired and Reaper was well fed this mission. Wraithing through the gaps of two buildings he rematerialised with a shotgun to each of the escapees’ heads. It should have been the last thing they felt but- he still hesitated.

The boy is too young. There has to be another way.

“Do you have an escape plan,” Reaper asked hurriedly. Even now he knew the ingrate would be tracking him, making sure he could report back to his Talon masters. Luckily as a wraith Reaper could travel much faster. They could  get away if they had a good enough escape plan. A good enough reason he could use to justify losing them.

“Yes we- please don’t kill him, he’s not a part of this,” the mother pleaded, new tracks streaming down her face. He lowered his guns almost involuntarily. Too damn young

He could-

A loud crack sounded in the air and Reaper could do nothing as the two fell almost simultaneously. A neat bullet hole above the unseeing eyes of the boy and Reaper knew even before he crouched to turn the mother over that he would see the same in her forehead. He’d forgotten. The ingrate didn’t travel fast but was still a sniper with a simple revolver. And Reaper had led him right to them.

From his position on the ground, he leant over to close the boy’s eyes. He considered a quick prayer then quickly considered against it. Prayers from monsters were seldom helpful. The sound of those damn spurs was quick to bring him back to himself.

“They were mine to kill ingrate.” He won’t turn around. Can’t. Deadeye, Jesse had called it when he was young and full of life. He didn’t know how true the future would make that name.

“You had your chance. Besides this mission has been awfully long and I’ve been awfully bored. Couldn’t let you have all the fun.”

He doesn’t know what he’s feeling right now. There is blood on his hands and while he’s seen a lot of blood, caused a lot; there is an emptiness that looms at being the cause of this. The worst thing is that the thought that he keeps coming back to, isn’t one of the boy, of his mother, of lost innocent lives. It’s that Jesse wouldn’t have done this but whatever Talon did to his head…

Fuck Jesse, I’m sorry.

He makes the mistake of looking back, of looking the ingrate in the eye. The empty stare is more penetrating than usual. He wonders what the ingrate is looking for. Is it what Reaper is constantly looking for in him? If so, they’ll both be disappointed. Gabriel Reyes died in the fire and Reaper is just his wraith, born of the desperate need for revenge. And Jesse...Jesse never would have done this.

Reaper held still under his gaze, determined not to give anything away. A thousand excuses came to mind as they waited in the stillness. He could claim to be toying with them. Or seeking information to hunt any who would have helped them. Talon appreciated a sadistic streak in their agents. They’d probably believe him. The ingrate, who still had Jesse’s mind even if not his heart, well… There was a reason Talon assigned him. Reaper just hoped it wasn’t because they knew the weakness spending time with the ingrate brought out in him.

He opened his mouth to justify, to explain, then abruptly shut it again. Saying nothing was a lot less incriminating. Let the ingrate search, he’d get nothing from him. Maybe they could just avoid the whole conversation. It’s not like Reaper had anything worth saying to him. Of course the ingrate never could let anything go.

“Tell me, that boy, were you thinking of rescuing him? Setting him on the right path? You in the market for a new protege darlin’?”, the ingrate said. He leaned against the wall casually like he hadn’t just shot a mother and her child in cold blood. His eyes were still searching, their intensity in stark contrast to the lazy grin on his face. Reaper said nothing. There was nothing good that could come from this conversation.

“Aww, still so silent. You don’t love me anymore Gabe? I don’t know why you’re so angry, you pretty much put me on the path I walk today,” he paused, putting his index to his chin, “It’s okay boss, I’m sure you can mentor the next kid. Talon would love some new cold blooded killers. You train us so well. Boy howdy, and I thought I had blood on my hands after Deadlock.”

Reaper knew he was just trying to get a rise out of him. Knew that the better option would be to stay silent, to walk away. He never could stop himself from rising to the bait. “I should have shot you-”

“When? In Deadlock Gorge or a couple of weeks ago? I mean either bullet would have been a mercy. God I remember young me, so naive, ready to believe he was gonna work for the good guys. He was adorable. I mean that’s why you kept him right? There is nothing quite like giving someone hope just to take it away,” he paused in exaggerated thought, “Oh! Was that what you were doing! Giving the targets hope just to crush it. I mean I know you like to play with your food but that’s next level. Shame the mission parameters were so clear cut. I mean I love a good psychological torture session as much as the next person but the targets had to die or I’d have had to kill you. Maybe next time though! Hell, maybe I can play the gallant hero next time!”

Another thing the ingrate and Jesse had in common. Once they got on a roll they were hard to stop. Not that Reaper had tried. It was hard to keep the two apart in his head. That what the ingrate said now is not what Jesse had believed. Was it?

He chose instead to focus on the more absurd part of what the ingrate had just said. “You think you could have killed me? I taught you everything you know.”

“Not everything. Always underestimating me boss. You should watch that. Could be a health hazard.”

“What are you-”

“How many times have I surprised you at this point? Pretty sure I’ve lost count. I mean, remember that time at Dorado? You were so worried,” he paused to laugh before continuing, “Then there was Munich. I mean even out of mission I could always get you. God knows you didn’t expect me leaving you. Did you think I loved you too much?”

Never let him see you flinch. Don’t react. It’s not him. He knows he hasn’t quite succeeded by the victorious glint in the ingrate’s eyes. Blood in the water.

“It must burn you to wonder. Did he still love me before talon did this? Did he give a damn? Did he ever love me at all?  I mean you were my superior, bit of a power imbalance there. Maybe I just fucked you for the mission perks.”

“I gave you everything!” Reaper could feel himself rapidly losing control of the situation. If he ever had it. The ingrate knew it too. “Mmm, maybe that's why I left. You had nothing left to give. Is that why you threw in with Talon? Did you ask them to do this to me? Make sure you were my last person? Tear my emotions out cause if I couldn’t love you, I shouldn’t be able to love anyone?”

Reyes couldn’t help the flinch this time. Couldn’t help the instinctive response as if it was his Jesse in front of him. His Jesse that thought-

“I didn’t know. I swear I didn’t know.”

He knew he'd made a mistake before the words had fully slipped from his mouth. He was playing into the ingrates game. Never show weakness. Never show him which wounds to salt. It’s not him. It’s never him.

Mccree settled back, pleased as punch. He seemed willing to leave it there now he'd exposed a weakness he could use later. Whatever emotion he’d rustled up had already disappeared from his face. A facade. In contrast Reyes felt like he’d been in a gunfight. Like the ingrate had hit an exposed nerve. Probably because he had.

“Good to know Gabe, good to know,” the ingrate said, gently patting Reyes’ shoulder as he brushed past. Reyes stood still, holding himself together until the ingrate was out of sight. He collapsed against the wall, alone with the two bodies left forgotten on the floor. There was still an hour to extraction. Enough time to hide the bodies and pull himself together. The kid and his mother looked at peace at least. Their ends had been quick.

As he went to leave, Reyes realised he’d never quite gotten the ingrate to explain how he thought he’d kill him. He shuddered. In a fair fight he’d win but Mccree had never fought fair.

---------

Debrief wasn’t the clusterfuck Reaper expected. At least not in the way he expected. Debrief with Talon typically involved reporting back to two nameless agents, not too high but not too low in the organisation. High enough up to be able to control agents. Low enough in the pecking order to be useless to Reaper’s needs. He needed Talon to trust him. Reaper berated himself once more. Being seen hesitating to kill two targets wasn’t exactly a great way to gain access.

The nameless agents spoke to the ingrate first. “Report.”

“Mission complete, no survivors.” Reaper waited for the ingrate to comment on his hesitation, to tell the agents exactly how he’d fucked up. The ingrate remained silent, his face impassive. Reaper felt more than saw the confusion on the two agent’s face.

“You fired your gun, Deadeye. Twice. Shot targets Laurel Sanders and Benjamin Sanders on Crestor st, time 2300 hours. Your orders were to observe.”

Reaper noticed the slightest flinch from the ingrate’s form. It was barely noted in the turbulence in his mind. How did they know?

“I got bored, the mission was practically over. Was just cleaning up stragglers, sir,” the ingrate said with disdain.

Reaper and Deadeye had been the only assigned agents to the mission and neither had written a report. Unless they…

“You had all the targets tracked. You knew their every move.”

“Of course, they were Talon,” one agent said whilst turning to face Reaper. The other continued to stare at the ingrate, both faces perfectly blank, as if both were waiting to see who would crack first.

Reaper was angry now. He knew the mission was a farce but hadn’t quite realised the extent of it. Talon could have killed those rebels anytime they wanted. They could have-

“I don’t like to have my time wasted,” Reaper said, mind only half with the conversation. If Reaper had let those two go, if he’d helped guide them to safety…

“Neither do we Reaper. After all, we’re making quite an investment in you. Good to know it won’t be wasted.” The agent turned back towards the ingrate, that matter apparently dealt with. “You will of course need to be punished for disobeying direct orders.”

“Of course, sir.” There was no surprise on Mccree’s face. Reyes mouth was open to- he didn’t even know; defend Mccree? explain his actions? A quick side glare stopped him in his tracks and his mouth abruptly closed again. Explanations would just get them both in more trouble. Talon appreciated a level of sadism in their agents, Mccree wouldn’t be punished too harshly. He wouldn’t.

After debrief was over, Mccree left with the two agents, his usual empty smirk adorning his face. He turned to tip his hat to Reyes before walking away.

In the week before he saw Mccree again, bruised but otherwise okay, one thought consumed his mind. Would his Jesse have killed those two innocents in order to save his skin?