#like we’ve all made the ‘ my ao3 history is between me and my fbi agent’ at least once

[vicontheinternet]

Not they got to ao3 too

[takadasaiko]

Love Me Twice: Chapter Ten

FFN II AO3

Summary: Liz re-introduces Tom to her team and Red and Cooper discuss where it's all heading.

Chapter Ten

When Liz had said that her team was a good resource for intel and backup, Jacob had assumed that had meant for her. He could take leads that she passed along and run them down in ways that a federal agent couldn't. He hadn't expected her to walk him into where she worked to speak to her team directly. At a federal black site. Below ground level with limited escape options. None of this was setting well, but she brushed off every argument that he made.

"They know you."

Jacob bristled at that even as he followed her into the lift that would take them down to what she called the War Room. "But I don't know them."

"You don't remember them. There's a difference." The doors squealed closed and she turned towards him. "I'm not going to let anybody hurt you."

"You know my line of work isn't exactly legal," he pointed out.

"They're not going to arrest you either. They know about St Regis."

Jacob turned to stare at her. "You told them?" he demanded.

"I think Reddington did? It just sort of became common knowledge in our circle after you got out and after… well once you and I figured things out."

The doors opened and Jacob fought the urge to run. What good would it do? He was stuck in a black site with a bunch of federal agents that knew he was a covert operative. Despite Liz's optimism, he had no idea how this could end well.

One of those agents looked up from his desk, eyes focused on Liz and started for them, talking the whole way. "Agent Keen! What's the news you couldn't share over… the… Holy crap. Tom?"

"Hey, Aram. Surprise," Liz offered with a struggling smile.

The other agent - Aram - stood there gaping. "How? When? Why didn't you…. you know what. It doesn't matter." Without warning he stepped forward and wrapped his arms around Jacob's neck. "You're alive."

Jacob jerked backward at the sudden contact, stiff and ready for a fight. It took a moment for his mind to process that Aram had hugged him. Why a fed was hugging him, he had no idea. All he knew was that he had no interest feeling any more contained than he already was in this place.

"He doesn't remember," Liz explained as Aram startled back, pulling his attention around.

"Doesn't remember… what?"

Liz pursed her lips together thoughtfully, gaze shifting towards the main part of the room. "Let's talk in Cooper's office."

It was surreal as Liz made introductions that her team didn't need. While he only recognized them from the file Tremblay had given him, they knew him. What's more, Aram wasn't the only one that seemed happy to see him. Cooper - an assistant director of the FBI - greeted him with a warm handshake and a promise to both of them to help get to the bottom of all of this. Ressler - one of Liz's partners and the one that had been with her the longest - was more awkward, but managed a quiet "welcome back." The only one without much to say was Park, but as far as Jacob had seen she'd joined the Task Force after his supposed death. She looked as confused by the whole interaction as he felt.

"Have you told Reddington?" Cooper asked, and there was something layered beneath the face value of the question.

"No," Liz murmured, "and for now, I'd like to keep this between us."

"I thought you trusted him," Park popped off.

"It's complicated. He and…. the woman I believed was my mother are locked in some sort of war, and until we find out why, I think my circle of trust extends to the people in this room."

Ressler turned to look at her. "Believed to be? What did I miss?"

"Tom's… employer hired him to protect me and he ran a DNA test on her. It was secure. She matched to Katarina Rostova, but there was no parental match with me."

A quiet settled over the group as they digested the new information before Cooper's gaze landed on Jacob. "The person that hired you must have known who you are."

Jacob pulled in a breath, steadying himself to open up to the feds. "Looks that way. All I have is an alias: Brigitte Tremblay. She's gone dark, though, soon as Liz and I ran across each other. She hadn't returned any of the calls."

"I can trace the number," Aram offered. "Might give us something."

"It's a place to start," Cooper agreed. "Aram, work with Tom to get any information he has that might get us a lead on Brigitte Tremblay. If she's slipped up in any way, I want you to use it to ID her. Ressler, Park, catch Keen up on what we uncovered on The Collector."

Jacob watched as Liz perked up at that. The name obviously meant something to her. "You found something with him?"

Park flashed her a grin. "More than something. It's good."

"Let's go." Liz started out the door, but paused, turning towards Jacob. He must have looked like a deer in the headlights for the way her expression softened and she reached out, her touch against his arm gentle. "I trust them. You can too. I promise."

"I've never known cops to have my back," he confessed softly. "Especially feds."

"Well this fed saved your life a few years ago and you still owe him a favour," Ressler chuckled, halfway out the door. "Don't think I'm not calling it in sooner or later now that you're back."

Liz smiled and let her hand drop. It brushed Jacob's and he felt a shiver pass through him. His fingers started to close, holding her hand there, but in the last second he stopped. She didn't, though, and her fingers closed around his, giving a reassuring squeeze and held his gaze.

"I trust you," he whispered and her lips quirked up.

"Don't let Aram get sidetracked with Doctor Who." One more quick squeeze and she was gone, following her partners out the door and down the stairs.

Jacob turned to Aram. "Like the British scifi show?"

"We totally marathoned the Fourth Doctor one time when we were waiting on some intel to come in a few years ago. There was the one where K-9…" He grinned sheepishly past Jacob at his boss. "Right… We can, uh, cover that some time when we're not trying to find the mystery woman that knows where you've been the last two and a half years. Of course. Just, uh… follow me. We'll get started."

Jacob nodded numbly, not bothering to correct him. He knew where he'd been the last two and a half years. It was the previous ten he was worried about.

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

"Before we get started," Park said as she paused at her work station, turning to look directly at Liz, "did you know? Because last I heard your husband had been brutally stabbed to death in a home invasion that turned out to be Federal Marshall after some secret of Reddington's. Didn't Cooper ID him?"

Liz did her best to push down the instinctive desire to go on the defensive at Park's tone. "I found out the night before last. He's been… trying to come to terms with the fact that he was married… had a family and a life that he doesn't even remember."

"Sounds rough."

"It has been. And yes, Cooper ID'd him."

"Not just that, but we all saw him flatline," Ressler pointed out. "Hell of an accomplishment to fake all of that."

"It is, but we've seen doubles before. Sinclair manages it pretty convincingly. Tom told me about a Russian-based program he came across during his time with Halcyon that surgically altered people to look like their targets. It does happen."

She didn't like the look Ressler gave her, almost like he thought she was stretching it.

"Yeah, but who would have those kinds of connections and resources to put it together so fast?" Park asked, shaking her head.

That, Liz had an answer to. One that had been battering around inside her mind since she saw Tom hanging in Katarina Rostova's warehouse, but she hadn't dared to admit out loud yet. "Scottie Hargrave."

Ressler blinked at that. "Tom's mom? Why would she?"

Liz risked a glance over to make sure Tom was distracted with Aram. "She has means and motive."

Ressler didn't look convinced. "Motive for faking his death?"

"If she thought it kept him safe, yeah. I could see it. She thrives on control and there was something…. strangely resolved when she took Agnes a coupe of years ago. She said she'd already mourned him once. I didn't… catch it then, but it was weird."

"That's screwed up," Park managed and Ressler snorted.

"Welcome to the Keen family drama."

Liz shook her head, unable to deny the statement. "Tell me what you guys found on the Collector."

Park lit up at that. "Michael Kowlaski was actually Viktor Petrov. While his paperwork says that he was American-born to Polish immigrants, the identity for Michael Kowlaski was farmed. All the paperwork, the credit history, everything was manufactured."

"Like a shelf company for a person," Liz murmured and Park nodded.

"Exactly like that."

"How did we get to the name Petrov?"

"Aram worked through the night going through photos linked to the Kowlaski ID," Ressler explained. "Cooper recognized one and was able to confirm that it was actually Victor Petrov, a KGB officer known for his intelligence work. Everything started to fall into place."

Liz leaned back against Park's desk. "Okay, so we've got the who and the why -"

"You mentioned that in the debrief," Park said. "The Sikorsky Archive. Petrov's last words. Do you know what it means?"

"All I know is what I've been told. It's a blackmail file that the woman that posed as my mother says she's being blamed for stealing and that she thinks Reddington knows who really has it."

"So another dead end?"

"No… maybe not. I had a PI follow Ilya Koslov -"

"Not Reddington, by the way," Ressler offered and Liz tried to ignore Park's confused look.

"- and she found that Koslov was obsessed with the Archive."

"So he's our next best lead?" Park asked, shaking the confusion from her expression.

"Seems to be." Liz closed her eyes, working through the pieces of the puzzle that made up this case. It was huge. Expansive. Pieces looked like they'd fit and then were part of a completely different puzzle altogether. This, though… she thought they were onto something with this. "The Collector always has two demands: a new secret to carry on and a favour. I know we recovered a jumpdrive on him. Has Aram cracked that yet?"

Ressler shook his head. "He's still working on it, but I think that's what had him here all night. His program's cracked pieces."

"It's German… Something about Bonn, but other than that, we don't know yet," Park agreed.

Liz risked another glance over to Aram and Tom, the tech genius looking like he was in the middle of a long-winded explanation of something that probably could have been said a fraction of the words he was using. Tom, to his credit, was patiently nodding along that he was following. The two had always gotten along well, so it was good to see that even with his missing memories Tom was able and willing to listen through.

"Then I say we focus on Ilya," Liz finally said.

Ressler quirked a ginger eyebrow. "Hasn't he gone into hiding?"

"We'll find him," Liz answered confidently. "We have to."

Park shifted where she was. "If Rostova isn't your mother and Reddington isn't… whatever the latest thing you thought he was… why?"

Liz pursed her lips, working through each word as she let them fall. "Because Reddington used us to get to here. He used us to get to The Collector to kill him. He tried to steer me away from this woman, but he never gave me a clear reason why. He uses us, and just once, I'd like to have more pieces of the puzzle than he does."

There was a moment of silence between the three partners before Ressler nodded. "Okay. Let's find Koslov."

"Uh, guys?" Aram called over. "Mr Cooper just called down. Mr Reddington is supposed to be coming by with intel on The Collector. I know you said…"

"Guess that's my queue to leave," Tom said and his gaze shifted around to Liz. "How about this: give me a lead to track down on this Koslov guy and I'll start in on the groundwork."

"Tom…"

He gave her a small, lopsided smile. "I promise I'll come back. Here, gimme your phone?" He reached a hand out and she held it out to him. He punched in a number. "Saved just above the pizza delivery guy."

Liz found herself echoing the smile. "Good. Let's get you out of here."

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

They walked a thin line with Reddington. That wasn't new, and for the most part Cooper had reconciled himself to it. There was give and take. He gave them terrible people that needed to be taken off the streets and that they wouldn't have had access to without him. In return, he took what he wanted. Sometimes it was a piece of information or access, and then sometimes the price was higher. Sometimes he used them in ways that Cooper found very difficult to see as anything but a betrayal to the very woman that Reddington had surrendered himself for. His actions had forced her into more compromising positions, put people she loved at risk, and consistently left her in the dark on issues that directly affected her without even a hope that he'd reveal the answers to her someday.

Despite all Reddington had done - and for every veiled motive, every secret he had kept about Elizabeth's past, he had quite literally saved her life and career time and time again - Cooper couldn't blame Elizabeth for not wanting to offer up the fact that Tom was alive. Reddington's secrets had, they had thought, cost her husband his life two and a half years before. He was alive, but far from whole, and her wish to protect him from the chaos that Reddington brought into her life was understandable. It was the reason that Cooper had given them a good headstart before calling Reddington into the Post Office.

Reddington didn't like being summoned, that much was clear. He helped them at his leisure and on his terms, despite the fact that, theoretically, he worked for them, but that afternoon Cooper had no patience for his antics. He'd used them to lure a Blacklister out and, when Cooper had refused to hand him over blindly, Reddington had had him shot down in the street.

It was nearly time for Cooper to pack it up and call it a night when Reddington finally strolled into the Post Office with a reminder that he's not at the FBI's beck and call, even though his immunity agreement did have some wording that leaned heavily in that direction. He continued on and on, casually taking a seat across from Cooper with his hat in his hand and Dembe lingering at the door. Cooper lost track of exactly what the point of the story was, but it had something to do with a woman from Beijing that he'd met while smuggling political refugees out of the country. By the time the story wound down, Cooper had already had to send Charlene an apologetic text and a promise to pick up dinner of her choosing on his way home.

"I'm sorry, Harold, was there a reason you called me in when I should be at Marcel's having the most exquisite Lobster Timbale that I've ever tasted?"

"Victor Petrov," Cooper said simply, not bothering to point out that if Reddington had come when he'd called that he could have been out long before his reservations.

"Ah," their often complicated CI managed. "You've put a name to the legend."

"I'm not going to waste both our times asking you exactly what you thought you'd keep Elizabeth from finding out about her mother," he stated firmly, "but I do need to know what Petrov was trying to move through Mr Krause. Aram's working on the encryption, but so far we've only gotten pieces. You said that Petrov was connected to the Cabal."

"He was," Reddington answered, his voice serious now.

"I'm not a fool. We may have decimated their stronghold in the United States, but my guess is that they have a further reach. You handed us this Blacklister and so far, without details of what was being transferred, we've gotten nothing from it other than a dead former KGB operative and another dead end." He paused, taking a risk. "Does Bonn mean anything to you?"

"Is that Krause's final destination?"

"We believe so."

Reddington tilted his head to the side and Cooper straightened his spine. He was already asking for less than they'd been promised on this. Finally, the other man relented. "I already suspected that Petrov had re-aligned himself with his old allies in the Cabal. If he's orchestrating deliveries to Bonn, then it's not just a smaller faction he's trying to reach out to."

"How many factions are you aware of?"

Reddington sighed, and for a moment Cooper thought he was going to try to slip around this. Apparently it wasn't worth the effort. "Originally? Many, but there were key players housed in the United States, Russia, China, and two in Germany: one for the East and another for the West."

"So Petrov was trying to make contact with one of the factions in Germany?"

"There's only one left. With the fall of communism in Germany, the Cabal lost its foothold in Berlin. Bonn is all that's left, but Harold -" he caught Cooper's gaze and held it, and in that moment his voice was deadly serious - "if this is more than an attempt to make contact, if the faction in Bonn is using someone like Petrov to move information Stateside, this is bigger than either of us could have assumed."

"Perhaps you shouldn't have killed the man with the answers then."

"What's done is done. Aram mustcrack that encryption and he must do so quickly."

"Or what?"

"If we wait to find out, it will already be too late."

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

TBC

Notes: ** insert dramatic music here **  

I feel bad for poor Tom right now. Everybody in this story knows more than him and he's just not okay with that.

Next Time: When Tom's search for Ilya continues to run into dead ends, Liz takes matters into her own hands.

[poeticsandaliens]

Laws of Motion

I wrote this a year or so ago on AO3 but never posted it on Tumblr (Update: apparently I had already posted it; I just forgot). I was going through old NCIS tags, rekindling my outrage at CBS because apparently that’s what I do when I can’t sleep at night. I remembered I had this up—it’s my personal headcanon. NCIS canon ends after season 3 back when it made sense. 

Not long ago, it occurred to me that Stella Gibson was the type of character Jenny Shepard could have been if the writers hadn’t... y’know... fucked up. This mysterious, casually badass woman who could kill you with words. They were similar...

my neurons fire weirdly, I think, because this is the result. Jenny Shepard and Stella Gibson would make one hell of a power couple, and I can’t help but think they’d be compelling.

AO3 Link: http://archiveofourown.org/works/10017227

The bench was an unseemly shade of grey, its boards chipped and legs rusted. Weeds poked through the sidewalk at its feet, and various young couples had inscribed their love into its wood. But after sundown, it was reborn, glowing beneath the street lamps and moonlight that varnished nightly.

Jenny had grown accustomed to the omnipresent bench, had in her mind marked the seat as her own. It aged with her—day to day, it remained unchanging, but as she acquired wrinkles and smile lines the bench acquired chips and splinters. So every night she worked late, drove to the grocery store on her way home and sometimes the liquor store, and across the street from men in polyester suits purchasing daily Merlot, the bench slept.

Today, though, the old bench presented an entirely new scene. The October wind nipping at her neck had kept couples off their evening strolls, and she’d left work considerably later. The moon cast a cold glow overhead, like a refrigerator light bulb on its last breaths, and DC had turned to a black and white photograph. The only colors in sight were neon street signs, the buzzing red letters marking the theater, the late night coffeehouse, the liquor store she’d just stepped out of.

Suddenly, Jenny felt old—not physically; no, she felt as though she’d been thrown back in time, to a darker city on a grittier day. She felt less crisp; her sharp haircut felt out of place. October always brought with it the taint of old noir. Something about the cold, windy nights allowed history to encroach on present DC. Jenny didn’t object to it, as long as it went away in time of the holidays.

The centerpiece of the scene was a petite woman in a trenchcoat, her breath turning to fog beneath the streetlight, a violin nestled in the crook of her neck. She was sharp-faced, severe in the misaligned way Jenny was not. Her blonde hair was loose over her shoulders, her face freckled and weathered. She was perfectly crooked, as if mid-October had manifested in a human body. She played a haunting tune in a minor key.

Jenny stalked across the empty street, her head cocked curiously. “Evening, Stella," she said with a wan smile. "I didn't know you played."

Stella put down her violin. “No rest for the wicked,” she quipped with a rolling British lilt.

“Very Sherlock Holmes of you."

Stella’s eyes drifted to the hotel a block away. “I didn’t want to disturb my neighbors.”

Jenny sat down on the old bench, and it creaked dangerously. “It’s been awhile,” she said softly.

“Yes,” said Stella, “I suppose it has.”

~

“You seem lost. First time in London?” A young blonde dropped onto the stool next to her. “I’ll have a Scotch,” she called to the bartender.

Jenny shook her head. “No. Just tired.” She didn’t talk to strangers, not normally.

The woman held out her hand. “DCI Stella Gibson.”

“Special Agent Jennifer Shepard,” she replied, arching her eyebrow. She had never felt underdressed before this moment, staring at DCI Gibson’s silk blouse and five inch heels. Buttoned up, hair pinned tightly to the back of her head, Jenny felt distinctly uncomfortable. She felt like she was lying—she was certainly not the perfect professional pin-up she portrayed herself to be in front of her superiors. But that was the price of ambition in DC. It was a small price to pay.

“FBI?” Stella asked, tucking an icy blonde curl behind her ear.

Jenny shook her head, taking a sip of her beer. “NCIS.”

A small noise of surprise escaped Stella’s lips. NCIS didn’t likely turn up in a London pub every night.

~

“I was surprised to hear your name when the FBI said they’d brought in a consultant in the Lacy Brown case,” Jenny confessed.

“Unfortunately…” Stella hummed, trailing into silence. Her voice dropped darkly. “Your country isn’t very good at catching sexual predators.”

Jenny snorted. “No shit.” Then her expression grew solemn as the implications of Stella’s words sank in. “No, we're not,” she mused. “I wish that could change.”

Stella cocked her head. “Then change it. You’re the director of NCIS now.” She paused. “First female director of an armed federal agency. That’s quite something, Jennifer.”

~

“We’ve never had a female director,” admitted Jenny with a grim chuckle. She took a swig of her beer. “Men see female ambition as an affront to their masculinity. It’s a shame, but I guess it leaves the title to me one day.”

Stella cocked her eyebrow. “Going to claw your way through the ranks of misogyny and militarism?”

Jenny nodded staunchly. “Yep. Prove them all wrong.”

“What to do then?”

She shrugged. “Shift our outlook on national security. Advocate for all the women in government jobs who don’t get their due. I’ve got the kinds of ideas that only work if implemented in a high place.”

~

Jenny sighed wistfully. “It’s something,” she said, “but it’s not all I hoped. I have to demand the kind of formal respect from my agents that my predecessors didn’t. Don’t get me wrong; I’m trying to change the system, but I didn’t expect so much condescension on the political end.”

Stella pursed her lips. “I felt the same condescension when I was promoted to Detective Superintendent. I know that most of my female colleagues have felt the same. It breeds isolation, anxiety, overwhelming pressure.”

Jenny was no stranger to those demons, all burdens she’d born since college. Perhaps even longer, if she willed herself to remember.

“Is that why you brought the violin?” she asked, eyeing the sleek, russet violin on Stella’s lap.

The detective shook her head. She looked older in the moonlight, her profile more defined. Like she was slowly, constantly falling from grace and was happy of it. Jenny would be happy of it too. Grace was overrated.

~

“Come back to my flat, Special Agent Jennifer Shepard.”

The offer was forward, tempting, and hardly a surprise. Stella Gibson sat with her legs spread in dark slacks and her elbows in her lap. She smelled of mahogany, roses, and hard liquor; her voice carried a swagger. There was a confidence about her demeanor that Jenny found quite irresistible. She’d always been drawn to the strong, taciturn John Wayne types, the weathered cowboy types who sought justice and spoke everything deliberately. But a man didn’t always understand the fine distinctions between strength and hyper-masculinity, handsome chivalry and condescending chauvinism. Stella Gibson saw the line clear as day.

Jenny glanced at her watch. She didn’t have to report until 8:00 the next morning.

“Come to my hotel room?” she suggested with a curve of her cherry red lips.

Stella cocked her head, and in the dim light, Jenny noticed freckles adorning her aquiline nose and angular cheeks. They fit, somehow.

“All right, Jennifer.” Stella waved the bartender over and paid her tab. “Lead on.”

~

“What were you playing?” Jenny asked. “On the violin, I mean.”

Stella shrugged. “I haven’t the slightest clue. I learned it as a child.”

“It sounds melancholy.”

“So does every piece on the violin.” Stella smiled thinly, her eyes pale in the moonlight.

~

“You have owl’s eyes,” A cold blue-grey, round and wise and curious. Jenny could hold her liquor with eloquence, but it came at the expense of thinking before she spoke.

“Do I?” Stella murmured, and Jenny couldn’t tell whether she was flattered or taken aback.

~

Stella put the violin aside and leaned her elbows on her knees. Jenny ran her fingers through newly cropped copper hair. Sharply dressed, still but for the wind, they became statues to the rare passerby. Their hair and sleeves ruffled discreetly, their eyes drifted about, but their bodies clung to the bench as if they were drowning, and the bench’s rotting wood was the life raft the city had thrown to them.

The moon vanished behind a blanket of thickening clouds that roiled and danced within themselves. Jenny had always been fond of cloudy nights. “When you said we should see each other again, this wasn’t what I expected,” she said, pulling her coat tighter over her shoulders.

“Well I didn’t expect to see you again,” replied Stella softly. “I didn’t expect I would want to see you again. But you rather intrigued me.”

“I’d ask if it was the sex or the wit, but I’m not certain I want to know the answer.”

“Well,” Stella chuckled, “it was very good sex.”

~

She pulled apart the buttons on Stella’s blouse, careful not to rip the thin material. They were alike in their tastes for lingerie—their personal elegance, for no satisfaction but their own. Stella’s lips captured hers; Stella’s tongue grazed her teeth. She reached for the clasp on the detective’s elaborate bra and pulled it off.

Jenny rested her hands on Stella’s hips, still in slacks, and broke the kiss for air. Her bare back pressed against the wall of her hotel room, and she could hear, far below her, swing playing from a shop on the street. Not the usual, energetic swing, but the slow, sultry blues.

She’d once been told that she had the voice of a jazz singer. It wasn’t true; Jenny couldn’t sing to save her life. But in this moment, a throaty moan escaping her lips, she understood the remark. She and Stella Gibson, they spoke with a common thread, a roughness that only came with trials and vices. Stella’s fingers found the edge of her skirt, and a shiver danced up her spine as they slipped inside. She bumped against the detective’s nose, clumsily searching for her lips, eventually giving up and kissing her way to the hollow of Stella’s collarbone.

Stella’s hands pushed up her skirt, tugged her to the queen bed, with few formalities found their way to her aching center. The muffled swing music rippled in and out of her hearing, as if she were miles beneath the ocean surface. As if mermaids were femme fatales with record players and pistols and police titles.

~

“I wish we’d kept in better touch,” Jenny admitted, as a nearly empty restaurant across the street played Billboard’s Top 100. She liked Stella’s music better.

Stella closed her owl's eyes. “It’s nice to have someone scaling the mountain with you.”

“You’re quite a remarkable person, Detective-Superintendent Gibson.”

“As are you, Director Shepard.”

Jenny gathered her purse. “I should go,” she said flatly. She stood, as if to leave, then froze in place as Stella reached for her violin and bow. “Will you be here later?”

“I might play one more song. Clears the mind.”

“Come back with me.” Jenny turned around, catching Stella’s eye as she tuned the delicate instrument in her lap. Her lips spread inadvertently into a playful smirk. “Come away with me, Stella Gibson,” she teased as if the slight tremble in her voice was entirely undetectable. She was completely sober this time, and the words on her lips didn’t slip so easily as they had in London, years before. Stella’s eyes, she mused, would always startle her, as would the genuine admiration she had for this stern, mysterious detective perched on her rotting bench in October.

Stella returned the smile like Peter Pan’s shadow and rose to her feet. “Perhaps my hotel room? It’s closer.”

[hipchub]

top ten fics 💝💖💕

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history and vampires? sign me the fuck up! there’s four parts to this incredible fic and they’re all around 150k to 200k each (idk how the author does it tbh). i now listen to rue des cascades on a daily so thank u for that

3. with a whimper / @kitundercover / 132k— dystopian au. louis has been alone for too long to remember how not to be, and harry has too much to worry about to deal with a scrawny, wild, stranger.

this fic is so so thought out and so incredible wow. throughout the whole thing i kept thinking “wow is this from something? it’s so great it has to be based off something right??” and it.. isn’t….. a m a z i n g 

4. the galaxy’s edge / @the-cheshire-pussy-cat / 113k— in which louis is a bounty hunter with a messed up past. harry is a prince who just wants to prove himself. niall and zayn have too many things to figure out together. and liam just wants to take care of his family. things never quite go as they are planned during a simple rescue job.

aliens and royalty? lord help m,e yes this fic was soo good and i have a strong urge to reread it

5. the king of spades / @hazmesentir / 109k— undercover metropolitan police officer dc louis tomlinson has worked his way up the ranks of a prominent london crime family without raising suspicion, but when he finds himself pitted against a rising crime boss with a police background and a favoured employee by the name of harry styles, everything starts to unravel. finding himself in the middle of an escalating war between two bosses whose bad blood runs deep into a violent past, louis has to be even more careful where he steps in case his big secret catches up to him – and if it does, he knows he won’t survive it. not to mention he’s falling for someone he can’t have – whose earnestness and honesty is a bright spot in a dark world – he can’t sleep because his nightmares haunt him and he’s in way over his head, but it’s just a game, always just a game, and if louis plays his cards right he might just make it out alive.

6. landslide / @aimmyarrowshigh & @spibsy / 143k— the year is 1976. In november, jimmy carter will take control of the white house. americans are meeting laverne & shirley at their apartment in milwaukee. hotel california diverges from the reign of kool & the gang. and the fbi is still reeling from the repercussions of watergate, the tragedy at wounded knee, operation family secrets, and the strategic terrors of the anti-cult movement. that’s what special agent harry styles has been told is the basis of his mission to an abandoned farmhouse in rural new hampshire. with his hair grown out long and his shirt untucked, he’s going undercover to do reconnaissance on suspected cult leader louis tomlinson, who has led a group of people out into the middle of nowhere, leaving no record of the life he’d had before. all harry knows is what the agency gave him: tomlinson’s name and instructions to figure out what he’s doing with the eleven people he brought with him. in the year that harry spends undercover and under louis tomlinson’s wing, he learns more than he ever expected.

7. who painted the moon black / @throughthedark / 95k— hunger games au where louis tomlinson is district six’s victor from the 69th hunger games and harry styles is district seven’s victor from the 72nd hunger games.

8. black with autumn rain / @whimsicule / 93k— harry is a journalist, louis has lots of secrets and the moors aren’t exactly the ideal place to rekindle a lost romance.

this fic ruined me and i now have an extremely strong desire to visit the north york moors 

9. fading / @tothemoonmydear  / 202k— louis knows about beauty; the combination of qualities that pleases the aesthetic senses. he creates that combination every day in the garments he designs while studying fashion at uni. the cut of the design, the color of the fabric, the intricacy of the stitching; it all comes together to create something beautiful. when the science student with the long legs and dimpled smile agrees to model for him, louis decides he’s found beauty personified. harry just thinks louis needs someone to show him how beautiful he is.

i love depressing fics and this one was beautiful ):

10. and down the long and silent street / @whimsicule  / 86k— wherein louis and harry are on the opposite ends of the social ladder, but their paths still cross on the filthy streets louis calls his home. the odds are staked against them from the beginning, and even more when louis’ past finally catches up with him.

(this is set in the 1800s and i’m such a slut for old fics so!)

-ˏˋ BONUS ˎˊ-11. love is a rebellious bird / @100percentsassy & @gloria-andrews / 134k— au in which the boys still make music. louis is the concertmaster of the london symphony orchestra, harry is the new! and exciting! interim conductor/ex-cello prodigy who “has made Mozart cool again” according to esquire magazine (louis hates him immediately, which is definitely why he internet stalked him in his dark bedroom late at night that one time), and niall is the best. zayn and liam are around too. don’t hum bolero.

this was one of the first few fics i read on ao3 and is the fic that overall shifted me from wattpad to ao3 in 2014 (thank god) “don’t hum bolero” will forever be engraved into my brain

-ˏˋ CAPTIVE PRINCE BONUS ˎˊ- 12. the veretian flytrap / @just-another-day / 175k— the court treated it like a joke. his uncle told him it was a weakness. laurent chose to listen to what auguste had said it could be: an advantage.

this is the second captive prince fic i read and it rly murdered me! it’s a canon divergence au so it’s extremely similar to the books and i love it

you can find more of my fic recs here!

[emospritelet]

Outsiders Prompts: 49

A fic based entirely on prompts from this post.

49: “It sounds like you’re trying to convince yourself” (which is one I’ve done before, but that’s okay)

AO3 link

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3] [Part 4] [Part 5] [Part 6] [Part 7] [Part 8] [Part 9][Part 10] [Part 11] [Part 12] [Part 13] [Part 14] [Part 15] [Part 16] [Part 17] [Part 18] [Part 19] [Part 20] [Part 21] [Part 22] [Part 23] [Part 24] [Part 25] [Part 26] [Part 27] [Part 28] [Part 29] [Part 30] [Part 31] [Part 32]

Gold sat quietly in Agent Humbert’s car, his hands folded in his lap as they made their way up North Street to the low, sprawling building that made up the FBI’s offices.  A large cactus appeared to stand sentinel by the sign, and Gold eyed it as he walked behind Agent Fa, his leg a little stiff.  They hadn’t arrested him, but their involvement meant that they had found the complex.  And the bodies.

Once inside, he was taken to a small, windowless room and offered some water, which he accepted.  There was a small pile of files on the table, but they remained closed, and he couldn’t see what was written on them.  Agent Humbert took some brief details from him, and asked for his explanation of what had happened leading up to Belle being shot.  Gold gave him the same story that he had given the police, dividing his attention between the two agents.  Humbert nodded along as he took notes, but Fa sat staring at him, her dark eyes narrowed.  He got the impression she didn’t believe a word he was saying.

“We found the man that attacked you,” she said, when he was done.

“Have you arrested him?” asked Gold.

“Wouldn’t be much use,” she said flatly.  “He’s dead.  One shot to the skull.”

“Oh.”  Gold looked down at his glass of water, turning it around on the table top with his fingertips.  “Well, I can’t say I’m surprised.  Violence begets violence.”

“Indeed it does,” said Humbert, watching him closely.

“Perhaps there was a disagreement with his miscreant partner,” added Gold.  “I’ll shed no tears for him.”

“His miscreant partner’s dead too,” said Fa.  “Along with a dozen others.  And the boss of an organised crime network that we’ve had on our radar for some time.  Could never make anything stick.  Somehow, there was always a problem with the evidence.”

“Really?”  Gold shrugged.  “Well, it sounds as though Belle and I had a lucky escape, if those were the men that attacked us.”

“Yeah, here’s the thing,” said Fa dryly.  “These guys aren’t known for attacking tourists at gunpoint.  They’re more the drug and human trafficking breed of villain.”

Gold pulled a face.  “Well, I guess we were in the wrong place at the wrong time.  Perhaps they were desperate.”

“You say your wife’s name is Belle?” said Humbert.  “What was her maiden name?”

“French,” said Gold.

“You got some I.D. for her?”

“Not on me, no,” he said coolly.  “Are you suggesting my wife is in some way to blame for the attack on her?”

“Oh, not at all,” said Fa.  “It’s just that the mob boss we mentioned was Maurice Marchland.  Apparently he had a daughter named Belle.  Would be around her age.”

Gold smiled briefly.  “What a coincidence.”

“I guess, if the daughter of a crime lord wanted to get away from that life and make a fresh start, she’d take a lot of secrets with her,” she added.  “Secrets worth killing her over, maybe?”

“Are you looking for me to hypothesise with you about this man’s feelings towards his daughter?” he asked, lifting a hand and spreading his fingers, and Fa shrugged.

“We’re just talking.”

“Seems to me you’re speculating.”

“I have a bunch of dead bodies and no explanation, it’s what I do.”

Her eyes glittered, heavy with suspicion, and he met her gaze with a tiny smile, a fingertip running slowly around the rim of his glass.

“Belle has never hurt a living soul in her life,” he said.  “She’s an innocent victim of a brutal attack.  If the men that are responsible for her being in the hospital are now dead, I won’t lose any sleep over it.  And if those same men were involved in organised crime, I would have thought you’d be delighted that they are no longer a problem.”

“We don’t like loose ends,” said Humbert and Gold shrugged.

“Then I’m very sorry,” he said.  “But I fail to see what this has to do with me.”

“Kinda young for you, isn’t she?” said Fa, and he raised an eyebrow.

“That sounds terribly judgemental, Agent, if you don’t mind my saying so.  Some women prefer a little experience.  I assure you that she’s satisfied with her choice in every way.”

He let his smile grow lascivious, and her jaw clenched.

“What do you do, Mr Gold?” asked Humbert.  “What’s your line of business?”

“Property management,” he said easily.  “I own a number of properties in Storybrooke, a small town in Maine.  I also run an antiques shop.”

“Maine, you say?” said Humbert, raising an eyebrow.  “Interesting.”

Fa opened up one of the files and pulled out two photographs, slapping them on the table in front of him.  Gold eyed them calmly.  He recognised Jones and Nott immediately, both gazing at the camera with smug expressions, two men who knew that whatever they had been arrested for, they wouldn’t suffer for it.  He wondered exactly how high in the FBI Marchland had reached.

“You know these two men?” she asked, and Gold shook his head.

“No, and by the look of them I wouldn’t want to.”

“They work for Marchland as hitmen,” she said.  “Two men whom we suspect have a history of being used to assassinate Marchland’s rivals and anyone he thinks has betrayed him.”

“Well, they sound lovely,” he said dryly.  “What exactly do they have to do with me?”

“They were seen in Maine earlier this month,” she said.  “Why would they be there, so far from Phoenix, do you think?”

“How should I know?”  Gold looked at her steadily.  “Perhaps they like lobster.”

“They didn’t return, as far as we know,” said Humbert, ignoring Fa’s hiss of irritation.  “Unusual for two hitmen to lay low for this long.  I’d expected to find them at the compound.”

“Then perhaps they’re the ones that did the shooting,” suggested Gold.

“Or maybe they never left Maine,” said Fa.  “Maybe they found their target, and she had someone protecting her.”

Gold showed his teeth.

“Well, that again would be speculation, wouldn’t it?”

“Look,” said Fa, leaning on the table.  “We’re on your side here.”

“Really?”  Gold raised an eyebrow.  “What side would that be?”

“We understand if you couldn’t let anyone threaten your wife,” she said.  “Desperate people can do desperate things to protect their family.”

Gold’s smile widened, and he sat back a little, his eyes fixed on hers.

“I’m not sure what you’re suggesting, dearie,” he said mildly.  “But I am simply a shop owner.  A landlord.  A purveyor of hard to find objects.”

“Is that all?” she said.  “Because it sounds like you’re trying to convince yourself.”

“Well, I have a business card here, somewhere,” he said, patting his pockets.

“That won’t be necessary,” she said dryly.

“You have a permit to carry, right Mr Gold?” said Humbert, and Gold took a sip of water.

“The way you ask that question makes me think you’re already well aware of that,” he said.  “And therefore you know that any weapons I own are held perfectly legally.”

“So if we were to test any of those weapons, would we find that they’ve been fired recently?”

“I like to practice,” he said, the corner of his mouth pulling upwards.

A sharp tap at the door made them look around, and a short man in a suit bent to whisper in Fa’s ear.  She flicked her eyes at Gold, then nodded.

“If you could just wait here, Mr Gold,” she said.  “Something’s come up.”

“Well, I’d rather like to get back to my wife, if it’s all the same to you,” he remarked, and she nodded.

“This should only take fifteen minutes or so,” she said.

“Very well,” he said carelessly, and she and Humbert pushed back their chairs, scooping up the files and taking them out.

Gold waited, running through the events at the complex in his mind.  The only snag that he could see was the security system.  Belle had hacked into it to hide his presence when he entered, and so there should be no evidence on tape for the first kills he had made.  However, he had no idea how long Jefferson’s device had continued to work after she had been captured.  It was entirely possible that they had footage of the minor gun battle outside, and of Belle being shot.  Which would blow holes in his story a mile wide.  He took another sip of water, his face a picture of calm.  He had been in tougher situations than this.

Fa was almost triumphant when she and Humbert entered the room again, a laptop open in her hands.

“You should find this interesting, Mr Gold,” she said, setting it on the table.  “We certainly did.  Of course it makes you out to be a liar, but I suspected as much.  Always good to get the evidence though, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Perhaps,” said Gold evenly.  “Although you did just tell me that your people find it difficult to make evidence stick.  I wouldn’t get too excited if I were you.”

She shot him a look, but clicked some buttons on the keyboard.

“We managed to get into Marchland’s security system,” she said.  “For some reason it was looping at the start, but later on there’s this.”

She stood back, and Gold watched impassively as the footage showed he and Belle leaving the house, and the moment he had fired on two of Maurice’s men.  It showed Belle getting shot, and him striding across and killing her shooter with one shot to the skull before tending to Belle and bundling her into the car.  Fa paused the footage, and turned to Gold with a satisfied look on her face.

“A shopkeeper, huh?” she said with derision, and he shrugged.

“Opening hours are eight-thirty until six,” he said.  “Parking validation with every purchase.  You should stop by some time, if you’re ever in Maine.”

“We just saw you kill three men in cold blood,” said Humbert.  “That’s enough to get you put away for life, Mr Gold.  I doubt you’ll be seeing Maine for some time.”

“Unless, of course, you help us,” added Fa.  “You must have been part of Marchland’s circle to get so close to him.  We need to know his dealings.  Who he talked to, his contacts, his network.  Who he has on the payroll.”

“Ah.”  He raised a brow.  “You mean which of your FBI colleagues is being paid to make evidence disappear?  I suspect the answer is well beyond your pay grade, Agent Fa.”

“Maybe,” she agreed.  “But we’re trying to put an end to it.  Marchland wasn’t the only criminal with his people in the Bureau.”

“And exactly how long do you think I’d live if it were known I’d released that information to you following my arrest?” asked Gold dryly.  “I take it you are going to arrest me?”

“We can protect you,” she insisted.  “But only if you help us.”

He smiled thinly.

“I need to make a phone call,” he said.  “I need flowers for my wife.”

“That’s your priority right now?” demanded Humbert, and he shrugged.

“Well, we’re newlyweds,” he said.  “And I’m a romantic at heart.”

“Go ahead,” said Fa suspiciously.  “But we’re staying here.”

Gold fished out his phone, and the two agents sat still, watching him.  He shrugged, dialling a number, and put the phone to his ear as it rang.  There was a click on the line as it connected.

“Game of Thorns,” said a cool female voice.  The accent was distinctly English.  The voice wasn’t one he recognised, but that didn’t mean anything.  The greeting was correct.

“It’s been some time since I placed an order with you,” he said.  “I’d like a large bunch of purple gladioli bound with gold ribbon.”

There was a pause at the other end of the line.

“Where would you like those delivered, sir?” asked the woman.

“Phoenix,” said Gold.  “Do you need the address?”

“Thank you, we have your details on our system,” she said.  “I’ll get your order processed as soon as possible.”

“Thank you,” he drawled, and put the phone down on the table.  He flashed Humbert and Fa a grin.  “May I have a coffee?  I need to think over what you’ve said.”