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masonscig · 2 years ago

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alone in the universe

pairing | mason x sofía

word count | 3k

warnings | swearing, suggestive language, mentions of grief

author’s note | thank you to my mutuals for dragging me back to m wayhaven hell <3 read a certain special and it got me thinking about jealous m, then about how great bff!m is and how i wish aspects of that were in their romantic route. and then about how a blast from the past can make you mourn the person you thought you were going to be – and mason. just lots and lots of mason thoughts. parts of this were inspired by alone in the universe by tei shi <3

read on ao3

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mason

“You’re jealous,” Felix grins, rocking back and forth on his heels excitedly.

“Definitely not.”

“Well why else would you be asking why she’s in a good mood? You upset it’s not because of you?” He’s teasing now, eyes gleaming mischievously like the glimmer of a coin.

“Whatever.” He doesn’t need this.

Mason shoves off of the arm of the couch, heads towards the hallway to sulk in the safety of his bedroom.

“Wait – hey –”

He hears the scuffling of sneakers before he stops, lolling his head back apathetically to meet Felix’s eye.

“I’ll tell you, but you have to promise that you won’t be weird.”

“When have I ever been weird?” Mason scoffs, lifting his lip in a warning sneer.

“Literally all the time. Every day. You’re being weird right now –”

He makes a show of sighing loudly to shut Felix up.

“Okay, okay – listen – it’s juicy –” Felix holds his hands up, savoring the brief moment that he has Mason hanging onto every word rather than tuning him out.

“She went to a wedding this weekend for some friends from school, right? Guess who the best man was. Guess. I bet you can’t guess.”

“I guess I won’t smother you in your sleep if you hurry this shit up,” Mason threatens, finally spinning to face him completely.

“Duly noted,” Felix laughs, clearly aware of the power he holds and elated by the fact.

Felix steps closer, voice lowering to a whisper. He’ll always up the theatrics every chance it presents itself.

“The best man… was her ex!”

He delivers the blow like the punchline to a ghost story whispered around a campfire. For what it’s worth, Mason is definitely spooked.

“Bobby?” Did that slimy little fuck actually manage to manipulate her? He’s not buying it.

“Not him,” Felix bites back a laugh. “You don’t know him.”

Huffing out a forced stream of air, Mason shakes his head. “Be straight with me or I’m leaving.”

Visibly deflating, he scuffs the toe of his shoe against the floor. “You’re no fun.”

“All I know is that he was her first boyfriend but they broke up when they were teenagers. And that he got her a charm bracelet for her thirteenth birthday that she still has. And that he’s a surgeon now. And he’s really hot. And he’s really successful. And –”

“Yeah, yeah I get the picture.”

So that explains it. Why she left for the weekend and came back a new person.

Practically floated through the warehouse Monday morning, all wide smiles and relaxed shoulders. Sofía’s demeanor was familiar, but not in that setting.

At her place, curtains drawn, with a sheen of sweat on her back that glistens in the sun. An easygoing attitude like the glow of a clear sky after a particularly heavy downpour.

His suspicions were correct. She got laid.

––––

It’s not like he cares. He’s glad she got laid, that she explored her options.

I mean, Unit Bravo won’t be in Wayhaven forever. It’s good to know she’s getting satisfaction elsewhere.

Mason is relieved, really. He was a bit worried she’d cling.

The discovery that she reconnected with an ex (one Mason didn’t know she even had) is one that he absolutely hasn’t thought about all day. Never crossed his mind. Not even once.

Even as she sits right across from him, smiling softly at her phone screen as she taps away, completely oblivious that he’s watching her.

“Sofía?” Nate asks gently.

“Oh – sorry – can you repeat that?” She asks, embarrassed, shoving her phone in her coat pocket.

“No worries,” Nate reassures with a warm smile. “Just a question about routine patrol tonight – which one of us would you like to ride along?”

Briefly, her eyes meet Mason’s.

“Well that answers that.” Felix hops up from the sofa. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ve got Animal Crossing villagers waiting for me.”

Sofía waves to him before turning to face Mason, demeanor friendly with a hint of nervousness that almost goes undetected (unless you’re Mason and you know what to look for).

“Meet me at my place so I can change?”

“What, you need help with that, sweetheart?”

She playfully squeezes his arm, and the nervousness is gone. “How selfless of you to offer.”

“I try.”

––––

Her stupid car is on its last legs, but she insists on fixing it. It’s at the mechanic shop down the road from the station – Thank fuck for Agency issued SUV’s.

Fiddling with the bluetooth options on the touch screen, she settles on instrumentals that easily fade into white noise. Huh.

“Do you want me to turn it down?”

“S’fine,” he murmurs from the passenger’s seat.

A beat passes that stretches out like a rubber band, pulled tight till it’s bordering on tense. He still hasn’t figured out a way to coax her into opening up about her ex, so he keeps his mouth shut.

“You know, I’ve never told anyone, but I made a playlist for each of you in case we’re trapped in the car alone together,” Sofía says, and the elastic atmosphere snaps right back in place.

He half-hums, half-grunts in reply.

“Felix’s would probably incapacitate you.” She drums her fingers on the wheel in a steady cadence, still slower than her thumping heart.

“You gonna use it on me when I’m too much to handle?”

“You’re always a handful,” she laughs this time, mouth curling into a genuine toothy grin.

Before long, they’re parked downtown, ambling through the dark while the last shop owners are closing up and heading out for the night.

She waves and greets them as they pass, and he doesn’t. He steals glances down at her short form, surprised at how… weightless she seems.

Sofía hates patrolling. She said so herself – the biggest perk of her job was not having to patrol anymore. But tonight, she’s content.

They’ve looped twice when she gets a call. She fumbles with the phone before answering breathlessly.

“Hello?” Her eyes flit over to Mason. “Yes, sorry, I’m working late. Oh, you too?” Laughter bubbles out of her, the sound silky smooth.

He bristles.

“Oh, that’s sweet, but… I can’t.” She says, stopping in the middle of the pavement.

Mason balances his hip against the nearest wall, curiosity piqued as he watches her pace slowly.

“This job is pretty demanding, honestly. The wedding was a bit of a fluke. I don’t go out of town often.”

He asked her on a date?

“Yes, yeah. Mhmm. I’m so glad you understand,” Sofía smiles again this time, but it’s strained. “I hope the rest of your shift goes well. Thanks for inviting me, really. I appreciate it. Yeah, of course. See you around. Have a lovely night. Bye-bye.”

She deflates as soon as she ends the call, plopping down onto a closeby bench.

“You good?”

“All good.” She doesn’t say much else, just shoves her phone into her coat pocket and steps away, continuing patrol like nothing happened.

In the absence of sound, the moment is pliant. This time, though, he’s aware of how he can mold it – how the tense stretch can work in his favor.

“You don’t sound too sure of that, sweetheart.” In a flash he’s by her side, slowing to match her short-legged gait.

A shake of her head and her bangs sway with the movement. Long lashes point downward, then up, framing irises softened by vulnerability. Plush lips pull to one side, then roll together, an obvious tell that she’s filtering herself in real time.

“Boy problems?” Mason asks with a teasing smirk.

With the upturn of her full lips, it snaps back again.

“Well… this isn’t a part of your job, Mason. Adam might consider talking about our personal lives on the clock ‘breaking protocol’.” She air quotes the words with a roll of her eyes.

He shrugs. “I can handle it.”

“Do you really want to know?” She asks, and he tips his chin twice in a brief nod. She settles onto the next bench on their path, and he follows, splaying out next to her.

Swallowing hard, she continues. “I went to a wedding for some friends from high school, and I ran into someone that used to be very special to me.”

Sofía uncrosses her legs and crosses them again, squirming at his sudden focus.

“So it is a boy problem.”

“Oh, it didn’t end badly,” she waves her hands. “We were just busy kids with their priorities straight. It’s hard to balance love and homework, you know.”

Mason snickers. “Sorry, sweetheart, can’t tell you the last time I did a math problem.”

“Unless it’s a ‘me + you = fun in bed’ situation, right?” She raises a brow.

Their banter’s quite like a paddle ball, developing quickly since they first met – missing the mark a frustrating amount of times, but now it’s easy, second nature.

“Don’t suggest something you won’t follow up on.”

A quick stare down and she’s shifting again, thighs squeezing tight so he knows he’s won this round.

“We wanted to do big things, and dating kind of got in the way of that. It was the right thing to do, but… I don’t know.” She pauses. “Sometimes I think about what it’d be like if we stayed together, as bizarre as that sounds, so seeing him was… weird.”

“Weird bad?”

“Weird good.”

He doesn’t really know what to say to that. He’s not great with words on any given day, but especially not with the nagging pang of annoyance that pricks at his side.

“He was really sweet and really, really happy to see me,” Sofía muses. “He looked the same, I think. Same eyes, but with deeper wrinkles when he smiled. Facial hair that he thought he could never grow. And… a sense of purpose. I could just feel the confidence radiating off of him.”

“Like… you, kind of.” She steals a glance at him.

His brows pull together. “Sure.”

“I mean, you’re… you. You know who you are, and what you want – what you like and don’t like �� you can be a bit standoffish, yeah, but it’s because of your self-assurance that you act that way.” Despite the boldness of her tone, she looks like she’ll fold in on herself if he disagrees.

Most of that’s true.

“Seems like you’ve been watching me pretty closely, detective.”

“Oh… I think I might’ve said too much.” She chuckles nervously.

“Nah, keep going. Maybe without the psychoanalysis this time.”

She blows out a stream of air. “After the ceremony, at the reception, we caught up over drinks, and… Mason, are you sure you’re comfortable with me telling you this?”

“It doesn’t bother me.” It did. Just a little bit.

She nods. “He was so… well-mannered. And complimentary. And kindhearted. And easygoing.”

So… the opposite of himself.

“He was pretty much a self-actualized version of the quiet lanky book nerd I grew up with. He’s such a wonderful guy.”

Mason watches her, and cocks his head to the side, a silent gesture of deduction.

“Hmm? What is it?”

“Just tryin’ to figure out where the story is going.”

“What do you mean?”

He lifts a brow, a suggestive smirk tugging at his lips.

“I – Mason –”

“Hey, you asked.”

“Well…” She trails off bashfully.

“Holy shit, you did get laid,” he howls, shoulders shaking at her blatant embarrassment.

Any hint of jealousy leaves his body the moment he realizes he can tease her even more for fucking someone else that’s not him. This is the pot of gold he was searching for.

“You didn’t even let me answer!”

“It’s all in the face, sweetheart. You didn’t have to tell me.”

“I didn’t – we didn’t… we just…” she murmurs the last few words, but thanks to his razor sharp hearing, he catches it.

“... kissed and fooled around a little bit.”

“He’s a very lucky guy.”

She smiles at that, pursing her lips to try to force it away, but he pockets it before it disappears.

“It was good. Different. I dunno. I stepped out of myself for a moment and let impulse take over.”

“S’not really a bad thing.” He likes it when she’s impulsive.

“Not bad, but… it’s not me.”

He senses a wall coming up, so he switches the subject.

“Why were you so upset after the call? Thought you liked him.”

“I do… it’s just… I think it dawned on me that we’re in two different worlds, so no matter how hard I tried, it would never work, even if I wanted it to.”

Even if she wanted it to.

“This whole thing is a bit bittersweet, if I’m being honest. He’s a surgeon, I’m… not. And I thought I’d be closer to where he is rather than where I am right now.”

“You wanna cut people open? Never pegged you as a sadist.”

She visibly relaxes, and rotates towards him, elbow perched on the back of the bench. Her hand is so close to brushing his own, that he could touch her if he stretched far enough, but he doesn’t.

“He kept telling me how proud of me he was, but I didn’t get why at all. He’s the hero.”

Taking the leap, he reaches out, covering her hand with his own.

“If he knew the real bullshit you dealt with on a daily basis, he’d be calling you the hero, sweetheart,” he chuckles, brushing a thumb across her knuckles.

Supernaturals that want her dead, and the crushing weight of that knowledge. Mason’s sure that guy would’ve cracked under that kind of pressure.

“I wouldn’t expect him to,” she sighs, softened eyes pointed where their hands meet. “If I were a doctor, I could at the very least help people while they’re alive but… I’m dealing with victims – my job starts when someone’s already in harm’s way.

“I want someone to tell me what’s wrong and be able to fix it. I want to prevent grief and suffering.”

“You’re wrong. You help humans,” he shrugs when she looks at him pointedly. “May not feel like it, but you do.”

“Thanks. Really.”

“No need to thank me. Wouldn’t say it if I didn’t mean it.”

They sit there for a bit, consoled by the quiet, until Sofía raises from her seat, and wordlessly ambles farther down the street.

The absence of her warmth on his skin is felt as soon as she’s gone.

Their pace is slow, walking down one side of the street then the other, their hazy reflections in the glass the only other beings here past sundown. It’s a gorgeous night – the stars are out, and he’s with her, but something is off.

Something seems to weigh on her still, like that wasn’t the end of it.

“C’mon, give it up. There’s somethin’ else on your mind.”

“No, no, I’m good. I promise,” she lies.

He steps in front of her, cutting her off, but not before she nearly slams into him – braces her hands against his chest to stop from falling.

“You’re lying.”

“No, I’m not –”

“That heartbeat doesn’t help your case at all. Stick to what you’re good at, detective,” he smirks down at her, acutely aware of how their proximity never fails to kickstart her heart.

He tugs at the rope pull even harder by leaning in till their noses nearly touch – he’s satisfied when he hears her breath catch, then he knows the ole faithful engine is rumbling on its own.

“So, do you want to kill time some other way?” He murmurs, tongue darting out to wet his lips. “Or are you gonna tell me the truth?”

Lips parted, she stutters out what he can only assume is an agreement. To seal the deal, he kisses the corner of her mouth just to torture her. He’ll never get enough of that.

“It’ll sound silly,” she says when she comes back to earth, still a breath away.

He laughs. “And?”

Rolling her shoulders back as if to brace herself, Sofía confides in him.

“A lot of people count on me, but… sometimes that can get lonely. At least my mom and dad had each other in this. I don’t have anyone.”

Her eyes flicker upward, but she doesn’t say anything else.

The look on her face almost makes Mason regret the recently departed envy that gripped him tight. There’s an easy way to make up for it, but he’s not used to this… speaking-from-the-heart thing.

He can manage a couple words, he thinks, so he tries.

“You’ve got us.”

“Of course –”

He takes it one step further. “You’ve got me.”

––––

sofía

Her pulse thumps so loudly in her ears that she’s not sure she’s heard him right.

In a world where things aren’t as they seem, Mason’s been the hardest for her to figure out – an anomaly of sorts.

You’ve got me.

And here she was, still wondering if he liked her at all, or if everything he said tonight was purely out of obligation.

She fishes the last of her resolve from deep down in her chest and closes the gap first. Her world shrinks to the moment his lips touch hers, and she commits every bit of it to memory.

The chilled wind against her flushed cheeks, the feeling of his henley under her palms. The sensation of their lips working together, and the way he hums when she slides her hands up his wrinkled shirt, resting at his neck, skin warm beneath her hands.

The taste of him, the smell of him, the feel of him.

The moment she cracked a portion of the Mason puzzle by not trying to figure him out. By letting him take the reins instead – by letting him tell her exactly where her piece fit.

Fleetingly, she thinks about the wedding, the afterparty, the drinks, the kiss. The nervousness of rediscovery, the comfort of familiarity. What could’ve been.

But what she has in front of her is so much more. The vigor of passion, the thrill of challenge. The fierceness of his steadfast loyalty. What can be.

She hopes someone will hold him the way Mason holds her.

––––

#the wayhaven chronicles #twc #twc mason #twc detective #twc fanfic #my fic #mason x sofía #detective sofía olmos #[alyssa edwards' voice] back back back back back again

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