#since hes a file on your computer.. you could probably reprogram his file

[pebbleyoufindonthestreet]

Oh, looks like your copy of Undertale had an extra attachment.. It looks like you’ve got a sans on your computer now..?

He’s fun to have! Just uh.. don’t forget you’ve got company now, alright?

Luckily, communication isn’t a problem!

.. Whoops.

(Don’t worry though, he likes you!)

Should I draw him in your walls next? <3333

[yourmcu]

Birthday

Pairings: The Avengers x  reader

Summary:

It’s your birthday and the team gets creative on how to surprise you, putting their acting skills to the test.

Word count: 2,350

A/n: just a little something because,, well,, it’s my birthday *runs away* also it’s cheesy, hopefully it makes sense lmao

Warnings: uhhh brief mention of explosion? mostly fluff

The Avengers wanted to get creative for your birthday this year. For the few years they've known you they picked up on things about you. One, you paid no mind to your birthday at all and just considered it a normal day like the rest of the 365, Tony took note that you hated parties, at least the really big ones, something that involved only the team would be good.

Okay, you sound like a party pooper, but that isn't the case; it's not a crime to just... not want to have a grand celebration, right? And people singing the 'happy birthday' song to you too while you just sit there in silence. It's awkward, you once told Natasha. It’s also awkward and hard for you to receive presents even though that’s what birthdays are all about, you’re still getting used to it since you knew someone like Tony Stark.

Well, the team think you're an amazing friend and they all treat you like family. They're so glad they met someone like you.

You're immediately called to the conference room on that day. Only to find the team arguing and pointing fingers at one another.

You kinda just slot in, sitting on the chair you usually sit on whenever there's a meeting or mission briefing. Glancing around, you try and find out what they're fighting about.

Security. Suits. Brief mention of Ultron. Rhodey busying himself with phones, probably making a lot of calls. Natasha and Clint talking among themselves, only raising their voice whenever they're included in the conversation which mainly consisted of Tony and Steve arguing.

"Suit up, get the jet ready." Steve dismisses but before he could walk out himself you raise your hand.

"Hey, sorry, I just woke up," you say sheepishly but coolly at the same time. "What happened, is everyone supposed to go? Can I read the file?" Because if this is an Avengers-level threat that required everyone, you'd want to know all about it.

His sharp and expression softens slightly when he looks at you. "No file, I'm afraid. Some of the compound's security protocols have been compromised, someone hacked in." He proceeds to tell you how they particularly had interest in Bruce and Tony's lab so the other rooms were untouched.

Apparently, they took blueprints and materials, maybe a handful of Tony's suits.

But if you think about it, those two carelessly letting the security to their lab loose? Highly unlikely...

You push the thought to the back of your mind and nod when Steve tells you to get ready. Stark tech can be dangerous in the wrong hands, after all. Let alone the Iron Man suits.

Fortunately, those things have trackers. Leaving you to wonder again why those idiots don't even try and take them off so they won't tracked?

Sat on the floor of the jet while everyone was strangely quiet but once again you didn't pay any mind, you sharpen a few of your knives. Natasha sat on a stool near you, idly picking her nails. An hour into the flight you furrow your brows and look around.

"Are you guys okay?"

"Yes," Tony states quickly and a matter-of-factly. They all share glances before he continued. "It's the tension. Sorry. My fault."

"It's not your fault, Tony," Bruce starts.

"I'm sorry, to whom were those stolen suits again?" Steve speaks up as well and you could tell it's gonna be a full blown argument again.

"Now hold on just a second-" Tony faces the super soldier to counter.

You merely blink, not expecting a simple question to turn out like this. Clint just glances from the pilot's seat and Natasha almost cracks a smile by the look of your face. If only you knew it was all fake, all planned. But what does she know? You're a spy too, maybe you've figured out what they're up to and decided to play along.

Sad to say you're still oblivious. Maybe the fact that you only slept three hours last night is one case. You wanted nothing more than your bed right now.

Heck, not one of them wished you a happy birthday but you didn't notice at all.

Tuning out their bickering you sit down next to Natasha who's the only one not in the argument.

"I haven't seen Wanda all day," you say and she turns her head to face you. "Or Sam, or Bucky."

"Probably not back from their mission." Natasha answers promptly.

You frown at that. "Steve made this sound like an Avengers-level threat, and it is, shouldn't they be here?"

You don't wait for a response, opening up a globe-shaped hologram that shows where the jet, represented by a blinking dot. Your eyes slightly widen when you see the target location which is one of the places you've been dying to visit your whole life.

Maybe it's just a coincidence. You definitely didn't expect to visit it for the first time on a mission though.

Natasha clears her throat. "Hey, have you read the book I gave you?" She subtly closes the globe up when she catches your attention.

You shake your head bashfully. "You know I'm a slow reader. Give me two months then I'll come back to you." You laugh. Natasha smiles and tells you to take your time. "Have you read the book I gave you?"

"I loved it."

"I knew you would!" You say excitedly and the next few moments you discuss about the specific book. She's just glad you didn't ask any further questions about the location.

--

All of you split up once you reach the base but Rhodey and Bruce stay in the jet as backup. The place reminded you so much of the old Avengers tower, only with darker themes. You're paired with Clint who you follow to the side of the building, with surprisingly no cautiousness. He just... ran in, entrance deserted of guards.

You all had a digital, tech checklist to see what was stolen including all the suit names. So far you've searched two drawers now and still no sign of any agent or guard. But it's weird since the others are clearly doing their part on their floors. Thuds, footsteps and sometimes banging sounds could be heard all around.

“Finally," you mutter when you hear footsteps behind you, spinning around so suddenly to surprise your enemy and take him down with ease. You raise an eyebrow when they don't put up a fight at all.

Clint was in front of a computer when you peek in to one of the rooms but he waves you off. "I'll meet you on the next floor. This'll take a second."

"One suit on the roof!" you hear Steve grunt through your earpiece.

"Remember to remove the arc reactor, that'll shut them down for sure." Bruce reminds through everyone's comms.

You hear Tony let out a noise. "Might have a problem with that, Banner, they're all reprogrammed."

Expecting the man with seven Ph. D's to worry, it only took him a minute to respond back. "It's your tech. I don't believe they could do that completely especially having them for only twelve hours."

"In that case," Tony sighs. "There should be a kill switch under one of their reactors."

"Which one?" Natasha grunts.

The deafening silence from Tony's line explains it.

You fight your way though the thugs which again, don't put up a fight. Sometimes you throw one punch and they're out cold, leading you to believe the intense training Bucky insisted you do worked. The only tough ones were the Iron Man suits themselves.

Ripping out the arc reactors wasn't easy. You had to use all you force. On the second one you encounter it got the upper hand and blasts you through a wall, the impact sending sharp pain to your head and back.

You hear metal thumping of a suit so you get back up and attempt to get your hands on the Iron Man in front of you.

"Hey, hey. Same team. Look," Tony grips on your wrists and lifts his mask up. "You alright?"

“Yeah," you pant, relaxing a bit. "Yeah. One of them got m-"

"We just discovered a bomb, northwest," Clint says. By ‘we’ he means him and Natasha. The redhead speaks right after. “Two and a half minutes. How many suits left, Friday?”

"Only one more suit is fully functional."

You get out of Tony's hold and sprint up the stairs. "I got it."

He smiles to himself. The plan is all coming  to place.

As soon as you enter the room you dodge a blast from the much bulkier Mark XVI. Of course they'd want to make the stealth suit more powerful. You launch yourself towards it, stomping on an arm while trying to dodge blasts from the the other one.

"Y/N! Fifty seconds!" Steve shouts in your earpiece.

You could've just jumped out, leaving the compromised suits here to be blown up but being under pressure made you panic and set your only goal to find the switch.

The suit could still set off a blast from the arc reactor so you couldn't really get your hands on it without losing a freaking arm.

"Get out of there!”

But you didn’t have enough time. So you just curl into a ball against the wall, accepting your fate.

A pop did go off. Loud, but you didn't feel yourself torn into pieces right after. You also heard a bunch of aye’s and oh’s. Redwing whirs by to your head to drop off a birthday hat.

"Happy Birthday!”

Your eyes fly open. Turns out the only thing inside Mark XVI was confetti. Natasha walks over to you to inspect and make sure you're alright.

"What the hell?" Your eyes widen at her, then at everyone. Sam and Bucky were now standing with them, smiling at you amused.

"I think she's in shock.”

“You think?”

Steve glares at Tony with a hint of amusement. "I told you it would be too much."

"Trust me she prefers something like this instead of a big party. Don't you, Y/N?"

"What do you mean?" You take off the hat and clutch it between your hands, appreciating Natasha rubbing your back as you try to collect yourself. "How is none of this real?"

"We basically faked a mission for you." Rhodey says.

You look around all the rubble. "This building, the people, suits-"

"Bought the place," Tony states. "Hired stuntmen, did a few tweaks on the suits...”

"God, why would you do that?" You bury your face in your hands, not knowing if you should be laughing or crying. "I punched those guys!"

"They'll be fine, they signed up for it."

You gently get up and brush off some confetti off your knees.

"But back at the compound... you guys were yelling at each other and during the whole thing you all sounded serious," you point out. "Was that all part of the act?"

Especially when that 'bomb' was about to go off. Steve's panicked voice made you scared for your life, only to know that it was all fake.

They all show signs of agreement, laughing.

"We'd make such great actors." Natasha smirks.

"Alright, the cake isn't going to blow itself." Clint walks up to you with said cake and you meet him halfway.

Everyone gathers around and before they could inhale to sing the stupid song, you cut them off. "You all know I hate to be sung at. Can we just get this over with?"

They all burst out laughing, you giggle in the process, blowing out your candle. You all group hug right after. The laughter makes you miss the sound of faint thunder outside.

"Look who's late." Bruce points out.

"Yes, I got here as soon as I can, my apologies." Thor smiles sheepishly.

Your ears perk up at the all too familiar voice of the god of thunder. Moving everyone of the way, you leap to hug him. "Thor!"

"Happy birthday, dearest Y/N." He grins and pats you on the head. "I'm afraid my - I mean - our gift, is with Loki at the moment."

"Enough with the formality, I’m just glad you’re here.”

Peter rings up Tony to tell him everything's set up at the huge building they rented for your low-key party. Just the Avengers. Peter, Vision and Wanda were in charge of setting things up over there, from decorations and food. Sam and Bucky also helped a bit before they arrived at the fake base.

So you all get into the jet again, this time you look at the windows in awe to see what the city's like. You also asked a bunch of questions on how they pulled something stupid but unique fake mission like that.

Once you've reached your destination, the place was simple yet big enough to fit everyone. Tony really took notes for this year. You didn't like anything too fancy or elegant, and you didn't like huge-ass parties with hundreds of people you've never met before.

Here you're with your family eating, drinking booze and playing games, generally having a good time.

You give the other five Avengers big hugs. Vision's never usually a hugger but for you he made an exception just for today. Everyone was surprised when he lifted you off your feet and spun you around.

"Hugging has a lot of good benefits," Vision says when he lets you go. "Astounding, I know. It is recommended eight times a day, hopefully you've already gotten that much."

You giggle at his remark and Wanda rolls her eyes playfully. “Thank you, Vision.”

“Splendid, that means I don’t have to give you one.”

You turn around to see the god of mischief himself carefully hand you a wrapped box. Loki chuckles when you smile at him. “Happiest Birthday.”

“Loki.... you know you and Thor didn’t have to-”

“Thor? That one’s from me. I assure you.”

“Y/N!” You hear Tony call from the other side of the room. “It’s time for presents, little miss. Good lord this looks like Christmas morning.”

-

unfortunatley i am that extra to post a birthday fic woo hoo

[parkrstark]

with great power...

written for @whumptober2020  day 4: caged Peter has never been one to sit back when people are in trouble. Especially when they're people like him, mutants, and he can do something to save them. Tony tries to hide the list of missing mutants from him because he wants to keep him safe, but he doesn't understand. That's why Peter has to sneak out and do this on his own. What could go wrong?  4.3k ao3

"Wow, look at this. Nicholas Fury coming to me for help. Can you say please? Maybe do a little begging?" Tony grinned, enjoying the way Fury's jaw only clenched tighter. 

"I'm not asking you, Stark. I'm asking the Avengers. SHIELD needs help." 

"You know, I don't know...I think maybe if you were on your knees, groveling at my feet, I'd be more eager to help." Tony leaned back in his seat. He had the power in this conversation and he  loved that. Usually, Steve was the one that answered team calls, but he was training in the gym with Natasha. They hadn't expected a call from Fury. 

"Stark, people are missing.  Children are missing." 

And that snapped him back into reality. Children were always enough to make his blood boil, but ever since a certain 16-year-old started running around the tower, these cases hit a little closer to home. 

"What kids?" Tony was leaning closer to the screen. 

"You know Xavier's School for the Gifted?" 

The name sounded familiar, though he wasn't sure what the exact details were. "A school for mutants, right?" 

"Yes. A few kids have gone missing. It seems that it's connected to a lot of other mutant disappearances lately." 

"Like a serial killer for mutants?" Tony frowned. 

"We don't have any reason to believe they're dead." 

"You look into Ross?" Tony asked, thinking of that asshole first. Even after he failed to break the Avengers up with his Accords, he still tried to convince them that mutants weren't human and deserved to be incarcerated for it.

Of course that would have included locking Bruce, Steve, and Peter in the Raft, probably with shock collars around their necks. Tony refused to  ever let that happen. 

"Our agents close to him say he has no involvement in this." 

Tony nodded his head thoughtfully. "Yeah, and there's no boasting from his side. If he was behind it, he'd be all over it and being his typically asshole self." 

"We want your team to help find out who is taking these mutants and how. It has to be another mutant or someone very dangerous." Fury's voice was no nonsense as he warned Tony to be careful without saying a word about it. 

"Yeah. We'll start looking into it." Tony nodded his head. He wanted to bring these kids home. 

"Good. We sent the files to your servers. It's of the known missing mutts and their last known locations."

"I'll share it with the team. We'll do our best." 

"I'm counting on you, Stark," Fury said before hanging up, the screen now black.

This was a mission they could not afford to lose, not when innocent kids were in trouble. 

  "What're you guys doing?" Peter asked, walking into the kitchen where all of the Avengers were sitting at the table, reading over papers. 

It was the second Friday of the month, which meant he was spending the weekend at the tower for Avengers training and Mario Kart. 

"Working," Sam said, flipping a piece of paper over, not even looking up. 

"I thought we were supposed to be in the training room." Peter took a seat between Tony and Steve. He tried peaking over Tony's shoulder to see what he was reading, but he pulled the paper close to his chest. 

"None of your business, Spider-Baby. Go watch some TV. We'll be right in." 

Peter frowned. "Why're you shutting me out? I wanna help."

"Probably because you're a literal toddler," Sam said. "This is for the adults." 

Peter knew Sam had to tease him. That was his job, but it didn't make him feel any less frustrated. "I'm an Avenger too. Just last month, I saved your ass when your wings got clipped in the air. You're welcome, by the way." 

"I already thanked you for that, half-pint. Don't keep bringing it up. That's not cool." 

"Alright, children. Can we please stop bickering." Clint asked. "Sheesh. I feel like I'm home with my kids." 

"I just wanna help," Peter said, his shoulders sagging. 

"Don't worry about this stuff, son. It's not fun Avengers stuff. Just a lot of paperwork for an upcoming mission." Steve was always the weak-link. He never lied to Peter, always treated him like an adult, and always gave him a chance because he said time and time again, he was just like Peter. They were both once the little guy with powers and responsibility thrusted upon them and they were just trying to do good and protect people. 

"Can I go on the mission?" He gave Steve a big smile and didn't have to look behind him to know Tony was shaking his head, urging him to tell Peter no. 

"Sorry, kiddo. This one's a little too dangerous."

"But I've been training all the time with you and Nat!" 

"No is no, Pete." 

Sure, when Steve had Peter's side, it was the best feeling in the world, but when he didn't, it was the worst. Steve was stubborn as a bull and wasn't going to budge. 

So Peter turned back to Tony. 

"Mr. Stark,  pleeeease." 

Tony shook his head and looked down at his papers, meaning their conversation was over. Which, for now, it was. There was no way that Peter was going to convince them to let him join. 

So he sighed heavily, playing up the dramatics before standing up. "Fine! Keep it a secret then. I'll be in my room when you're all finally done with your secrets." 

 And that was exactly where he waited until later that night. It was almost 3 in the morning before FRIDAY told him that Tony had finally gone to bed. 

They had been working hard on those papers all night, and moved into the mission room to use the computers too. 

Peter climbed along the ceiling to avoid making the floor creak as he snuck into the room they had spent hours working in. Once inside, he gracefully fell to the floor, and glanced over his shoulder. 

"Can I help you, Mr. Parker?" 

Peter jumped slightly, completely forgetting about FRIDAY. "Just looking for the notes the team was working on today. I want to study up tonight to impress them." 

"Were you given permission to access these files, Mr. Parker?" 

Avoid telling a lie by asking a question. 

"Did Mr. Stark block me from seeing them?" 

There was a pause and then she responded,  "No, he did not." 

"Then, I guess I'm allowed to read them." Peter smiled. Tony would have locked him out if he  really wanted to hide them. He'd done it before. Not that that would have stopped him, just would have slowed him down. 

Another pause from FRIDAY like she was struggling to decide if Peter was allowed to see them or not. Thankfully, only a moment later, she was pulling them up. 

It was just files of people. Kids, teenagers, adults...there was no connection between the demographics. Except...they all were listed with having a power of sort.

He stopped on a picture of a girl that looked about his age. She had fiery red hair and a smirk on her face.  Jean Grey. Telekinesis.  

That's when it clicked. 

He scrolled to another recent file.  Cyclops. Optic blasts. 

He felt his heart beating as he went to the next. 

Petra. Terrakinetic. 

Darwin. Reactive Evolution. 

Sway. Manipulate time. 

They were mutants. All of them. Just like him.

"FRIDAY, why were they studying these files?" Were they looking for a new team member? Did they not think Peter was good enough?

"This is a file of recently missing superhumans."

There were dozens and dozens of files. How were they all missing? And why didn't Tony ask for his help? These were  his people missing. He deserved to help. 

The sudden anger at the situation had him storming out of the room, not caring about how much noise he made. He went right to the hallway where all of their private quarters were. 

He started pounding on Tony's door. 

Not soon after, Tony opened the door. He looked half asleep but alert, dressed in only his sweatpants, but his repulsor was on his hand, pointed right at Peter. Once he realized it was Peter, his arm dropped to his side and the whining died down. 

"Jesus, Pete. You scared me. Everything okay?" His eyes looked Peter up and down, trying to see if he could see any blood probably. Peter had knocked on his door at late hours before with a wound from patrol. 

"They're mutants just like me."

"I'm sorry...what?" 

"They're mutants! And most of them are kids! Why are you hiding that from me?" Peter’s voice was nowhere near quiet. 

Tony glanced over Peter’s shoulder when he heard a door creak open. It was probably Steve, since he was right across the hallway from Tony. "Alright, bud. Calm down. We can talk about it if you want." 

He tried putting his hand on Peter's arm, but Peter pulled away. He didn't want to be babied. "No! You always try to push me out of missions. You say I need more training again and again. And usually, that's okay. I get it. I'm a kid. But you're icing me out of this one on purpose!" 

"Peter, just tell me what you're upset about. Please." Tony genuinely looked to be struggling with understanding Peter's sudden outburst. 

"I asked FRIDAY and she showed me." 

Realization dawned on Tony's face and he muttered, "Dammit. She's getting reprogrammed tomorrow." 

"You should have told me that mutants are going missing." Peter held his ground. 

Tony sighed, rubbing a hand over his face. "Pete, it's too late for this. Can we please talk tomorrow?" 

"No! Mutants are missing and you wanted to hide it from me! Those are  my people, Mr. Stark!" Peter splayed his hand against his chest. "I want to help!" 

"Peter, I know--."

"No. You don't. You're normal. You can take off your suit and you don't have to worry about being... different."  Peter felt his eyes burning and he didn't know  why. 

"That doesn't make a difference. I'm Iron Man, whether the suit is on or not. Which is why I'm putting my foot down and saying you are not getting involved with this." Tony sounded tired and exasperated. 

"I can help! You can't stop me when it's my people they're hurting! I don't want to hide!" 

Tony's jaw clenched and he straightened his shoulders. His voice was low when he spoke again, "You're right, Peter. You're just like them. You are a mutant. But maybe you skipped the part where the files have said they are all  missing." 

"I know they're missing, Tony. Don't patronize me," Peter argued. He hated being the child.

"Don't patronize you? When you're acting like a  child?  Peter, I know you're upset, but how about you let those teenage hormones chill and  listen."

That comment only made his  teenage hormones worse. "I'm not a kid!" 

"You are!" Tony snapped back, unable to keep his voice quiet. "You're a child with mutant powers. Just like the other kids and adults that were taken. Did you stop to read how far back the first disappearance goes?" 

Peter didn't say anything, honestly caught a bit off guard by Tony's tone. 

"No? Well, don't worry. I've got it memorized. 2 years." 

Peter's eyes widened. 

"Yeah.  2 years. The first mutant has been missing for almost 22 months." Tony shook his head, a haunted look growing in his eyes. "I don't know what they're doing to these mutants, but I have an idea. I have many scary horrible inhumane ideas of what people would want to do with mutants." 

Peter had a few ideas of his own, but he didn't think of it as much as Tony did, apparently. He hadn't even thought of the details. He just knew his people needed help. 

"You're not helping with this case because tomorrow I'm calling May and you're not leaving this tower until we have this monster in custody." 

"What?" Peter practically shouted. "That's not fair!" 

"Pete," Steve's voice was behind him. He wondered how many of the others were watching. "Why don't you let him sleep. We'll talk about this tomorrow." 

"Tomorrow? Another night that those people are tortured! You need everyone you can get to help find these people!" Peter didn't turn away from Tony and hoped Steve got the idea. 

"I don't need anything!" Tony yelled, losing his temper finally. "I need you to stay in here, where I know you're safe! Because they're looking for mutants and you are a mutant. And while you think that makes you connected to them and somehow responsible for their safety, I think that it makes  you  a target! They will come for you eventually and I need that not to happen. Because I can't imagine losing you, and you being  gone for years." 

Peter stayed silent because he couldn't argue with that. He hadn't even thought about how it would affect Tony. 

"I went through this once already. I kept you safe then, and I'll do it again. But I can't do it alone. You need to help keep yourself safe." Tony's voice was soft when he finished his rant. exhaustion filled his voice, both mentally and physically.  

Peter nodded his head, lowering his voice as well. "I know you're trying to protect me, Mr. Stark. But I don't need protecting. I'm a superhero. It’s my job to protect others, no matter what." 

"No, Peter. That's where you're wrong. It's not your job to do anything but be a kid and go to school and go home to May at the end of the night,  safe." 

Peter shook his head. Tony didn't understand. "I'm grateful to have you looking out for me, Mr. Stark. But I'm not giving up on these people. They need someone to fight for them just as hard as you fight for me. I'm going to be that person for them.” 

“No, you’re not. You’re staying in this tower until we get this under control. I mean that, Peter.” 

“Mr. Stark,” Peter tried to argue again because that was just bullshit. 

“No, Peter. You’re staying out of this one.” 

Peter knew by the look on his face and the sound of his voice, he wasn’t going to win this. Not with Tony’s permission, anyway. So he groaned loudly, stamped his foot and stormed back to his room. 

He wasn’t going to just sit in his room and hide when mutants were going missing. He had some information like their last known locations. He could at least scout those areas and see if he noticed anything wrong. 

“FRI, can you keep this to yourself for now?”

“Keep what to myself?”

Peter grinned. “Exactly. Thanks.” He didn’t hesitate before grabbing his suit and getting ready. “Do me a favor and transfer that information to Karen before Mr. Stark locks me out.”

FRIDAY did so without complaint and Peter grinned as he saw the files glow up inside his mask. All of this was only possible thanks to Tony. Kind of ironic that he was using it against him now. 

Before leaping out of his window, he told FRIDAY, “Tell Mr. Stark or anyone else that comes to my door, that I don’t want to talk to  anyone tonight. Maybe tomorrow.” 

He’d be back in the tower by tomorrow and would act like he never even left. 

FRIDAY didn’t give him a hard time, but Karen sure did. The moment he was out in the suit, he heard her in his ears. “Peter, should you be out with this information?”

“Ugh, Karen. It’s fine.” He rolled his eyes as he swung through the streets. “I’ve been going out on patrol for weeks since all of this started and  nothing bad happened.” 

“I don’t think you should be out here. Mr. Stark has already programmed me to inform him if you try to sneak out.” 

“Don’t,” Peter warned. “I’m fine.” 

“Peter--.” 

“Karen, if you keep annoying me, I’ll just shut you off. Your company is good, but not when you’re against me too.” Peter felt his annoyance growing again, and he felt stupid for being aggravated at an AI. 

Karen hesitated and her voice sounded as soft as a robot’s voice could. “I care about your safety, Peter. So does Mr. Stark.” 

“Well,  I care about the safety of all those mutants. I can help, so I will. Either help me, or leave me alone.” Peter felt guilty for snapping at her, when she was only trying to help. She was always only trying to help him. 

“I want to help you in any way I can.” 

“Good. Then just...help me scan around these areas for anything suspicious. I have no idea what we’re looking for.” 

“Alright, Peter,” Karen replied, sounding unhappy to have to help. But she did anyway. 

 They moved from one location to the next around the city. They were running out of mutants from NYC to trace. He didn’t want to go back to the tower empty handed. Not because he wanted to show anybody anything, but because he felt like a failure in his own mind. 

“Seriously, nothing, Karen?” Peter groaned, falling to the ground in an alley. He had been scouring the city for almost two hours by now. There was nothing for him to find. He leaned his head against the wall and sighed. 

“You know, Kar...maybe Mr. Stark was right. Maybe I should have stayed put or at least  waited.” 

“I think that would have been the smart idea.” 

“Yeah, but then I would have just been laying in bed while they tried saving the day. And they weren’t even trying now! They were sleeping. The mutants need their help  now. Some of them 2 years ago!” Peter kicked his foot against some garbage by his feet. 

“In their defense, Peter, they were not aware of the disappearances until only very recently. And how are they supposed to search if they do not rest?” 

Peter groaned loudly. “Stop being so logical!” 

“It’s a protocol Mr. Stark uploaded into my servers.” 

Even though they had left things in an argument, Peter couldn’t keep a small smile off of his face. “What protocol is that?” 

"Common Sense,"  Karen replied, and Peter didn't know if she understood the slap to the face that felt like coming from Tony. “It’s used to give you a voice of reason so you don’t drive yourself crazy in your teenage tantrums.” 

“Teenage Tantrums, is that what Mr. Stark calls them?”

“Yes.” 

Peter sighed, giving in. “Well, he’s not wrong. I did lose my head back there. I shouldn’t have snapped. I shouldn’t even be out here. I just wanted to get away from it all. I felt so angry.” 

“You do not have to explain or try to justify your emotions to me, Peter. Your feelings are your feelings, no matter what. And they are valid.” 

Peter laughed. “Now, that you definitely didn’t learn from Mr. Stark. No way he’s that emotionally evolved. Not yet.” 

Karen laughed back. “It’s part of my programming. Mama Bear. He uploaded the transcripts of several parenting books for teenagers into my servers. This is from a chapter all about dealing with the ups and downs of teenage hormones.” 

“Lucky me,” Peter said. And maybe the words came out sarcastic, but he meant it genuinely. How lucky was he that he had a man, who had no responsibility to be the father figure he was? Tony was always there to help him, even when Peter proved him unworthy of his help time and time again. Peter had someone to care about him so deeply that he’d lock him in a room just from the slim chances he’d be kidnapped. And sure, that was a little overkill, but it was Tony. 

Not everyone had someone like to care about them. 

Tony could leave him at any time, and he didn’t. He chose to stay even when Peter made it  so hard. 

He pushed himself back up to his feet and sighed. “I’m gonna head back, Karen. See if Mr. Stark is still up.” 

“I think that’s a good idea,” she replied, sounding proud of herself. 

“Watch the attitude, Karen. You’re supposed to be like me, not Mr. Stark,” Peter reminded her. 

Before she could give him a response though, Peter went on full alert and he got into a stance ready to fight. His spidey sense was going off like crazy, pounding in the base of his skull. 

“Danger, Karen. Where’s the danger?” He glanced around the alley, searching for any sign of something. Thankfully, he had night vision on in the suit to make things easier to see in the pitch black. 

“Scanning for heat signatures around you now, Peter,” Karen replied, all business. “Shall I contact Mr. Stark as well?”

Peter shook his head. “Just give me a second. I can protect myself.” 

And he did when that first punch was thrown from the man that jumped down from a fire escape above him. He dodged the punch easily and brought up his fists to get ready to block the next punch. 

“You can fight,” the man said. “But you won’t win. They never do.” Then he stepped forward and Peter saw he was wearing some sort of suit with a mask that covered his entire head. He threw another punch and Peter dodged once again. 

“I don’t wanna hurt you!” He said, bouncing on his feet. “But I will if I have to!” 

“Aw, isn’t this cute?” He asked, to whom, Peter didn’t know. “He thinks he has a chance against us, boys.” 

“What--?” 

Then someone tackled him from behind and even through the suit, he could feel the hard cement run painfully against his face.”Woah, I thought there were rules in Fight Club!” Peter yelled as he rolled onto his back to avoid being jumped on. “Isn’t rule number one to have even and fair teams?” 

Another man jumped down next to him and kicked him right in the side before he had a chance to notice he was there. 

After he regained his breath, Peter wheezed, “No? That’s right. Rule number one is don’t talk about fight club. Sorry, boys. I’ll get the next one right. Promise.” 

“Shut up!” The first man rushed forward and Peter jumped to a wall to avoid him. 

Peter shook his head as he looked down at them. His heart was racing like crazy, and he was actually a little scared of these three men that seemed to have skill and a big grudge against him. Of course, whenever he was nervous, his mouth wouldn’t shut up. “You guys look cute in your matching masks and ugly armor. Are you starting a boy-band? I’d offer to join, but I’m not a good singer.” 

The men below continued to talk among themselves to try and figure out how to get Peter down. Peter ignored them. 

“You know the sound of nails on a chalkboard? That sounds a little like me. Except I’m like, a million times worse. Just ask Iron Man. He said I’m banned from Team Karaoke nights in the unforeseeable future.” 

Peter jumped from one wall to the other, webbing one of the men to the ground as he did so. “Oh, no I’m the bad guy here. I really didn’t wanna have to do this, guys!” He webbed another one the first guy he webbed up. 

He tried to web the last guy, who was the first one he had an encounter with, but he rolled out of the way, pulling something from his waistband. 

“Well, like that really old song goes, two outta three ain’t bad!” 

Peter didn’t even have time to laugh at his own joke because suddenly, the man had his hands raised and what he pulled from his pants was shining in the little light that was in the alley. Through his night vision, he could see it clearly. It was a gun and it was pointed straight for him. 

He jumped up in the air, doing a small flip as the man shot it. It didn’t sound like a gunshot, which Peter was thankful for because those always triggered bad memories with that. One gunshot and he was 14 again, covered in Uncle Ben’s blood as he held him, listening to his last breaths. Peter never did well with gun crimes during patrol. He usually saved that for the NYPD. 

“Missed me!” Peter mocked in a sing-song voice, perching on the railing of a fire escape. 

The man growled and Peter jumped, ready to dodge another shot. But the man expected that move and he shot directly where Peter was jumping to. There was no pain from it, and Peter had to stop and check himself over to see where he was hit--  if he was hit. 

And he was. There was a small dart sticking out of his thigh. Peter blinked as he pulled it from his skin. Then he glanced down at the three men. “Hey, Curly, you do realize that a little tranq dart won’t work on me, right? I’m not like your garden variety kidnapee that you can…” 

His quip was slowly cut off when he started losing feeling of all of the muscles in his face. He couldn’t move his lips to even say another word. His eyes darted to the men when he heard them all start to howl with laughter. 

Then he felt his hands slip from his perch and he was falling 3 stories down to the concrete below. Peter wasn’t sure if his vision went black went he hit the ground or just a second before. 

 When he woke up, he was crammed into a tiny cage. The room was dark with only a few lights on the ceiling, but he could easily make out what else was in the room. There were rows and rows of cages, all full of people and creatures. 

It wasn’t until he recognized a girl in the cage across from him that he put two and two together. These were the missing mutants, and he had found them...without giving Tony any indication at all where he was. 

“Oh, shit.” 

[whispersafterdusk]

Lost in Time - ch 14

It'd been four days since their tussle with the spy; they hadn't heard or seen any hint of them, and so far the only injury that had turned up at Xu's clinic had been a woman who had fallen on a bit of wood.  Asher had gone into town long enough to get his broken tooth pulled (front right tooth on the top...he looked like a doofus when he smiled now) and had immediately returned to camp to hunker down and wait out the spy's next visit while the Civil Corps members had gone on a manhunt across the marsh and into the neighboring desert area.

So far, nothing.

They'd briefly discussed the suits again; Eli couldn't make up her mind on whether this Access suit thing was an original (less worrying) or if Duvos had figured out how to piece one together (really worrying).  Asher shared her worries -- the thought of Duvos mass producing those things for their soldiers, even if they weren't working like they did in Eli's time, would still pose a huge problem if the continent ever went to war again. ((Continued below cut))

He did know she'd given up on the trail cameras for now but she was still working on something out in the tent; it used a lot of the same pieces that she'd set aside for the cameras but also several new, different ones that she'd sent Petra and Selene after. The centerpiece of these new additions was a detached screen that she'd marked out dimensions on - she was either cutting it down to size and needed the middle-most section or she was dividing it into a rectangle and eight smaller squares that were all roughly the same size.  She hadn't done anything with the screen yet aside from measuring and marking out those squares but there were small piles of nigh identical looking chips, boards, and wires that were already assembled and sitting in a neat little line on the rubberized canvas under her cot that he assumed had to be put together first before the screens could be attached to them.  

It had been a fascinating sight to watch her work with such tiny components; he hadn't had a chance yet to ask her what those things were (interrupting her while she was working on them seemed like a poor idea since it looked so...fragile, in a way) but he was looking forward to seeing the finished product, learning what the gadgets were for, and why she needed so many of them.  It also piqued his curiosity about Old World tech in general; so much of it seemed purposely designed to work with pretty much anything else.  Maybe Old World technology didn't so much depend on the parts as it did the programs to run it...which in turn made him wonder, assuming they ever got to a point where they knew how to read and create new programs, if all the old relics could be made to work again like they did back then rather than being pieced together with spotty knowledge and prayers.  

Behind him Adam, Arlo, and Eli were all asleep inside the tent with the front flaps pulled closed to block out as much of the unusually plentiful sunlight as possible - there wasn't a cloud in the sky and it was considerably warmer today than it had been lately; he appreciated the warmth and imagined his sleeping companions probably did as well but found himself going back and forth on whether he was truly grateful for the "sunny" part of this sunny day.  On the one hand, that suit made the spy near-invisible but not intangible so they should still cast a shadow so if the spy was dumb enough to try sneaking in close in broad daylight Asher was hopeful he would spot that before they got close enough to be a danger.  On the other hand he doubted they would actually be that stupid. The constant prickle at the back of his neck - the feeling of being watched - wasn't a sensation Asher enjoyed, and it also wasn't something he was used to experiencing for such a prolonged period of time; he had no proof though that he WAS being watched, and that was probably bothering him more than the prickling was.

The grumpy sigh he huffed out whistled a bit as it exited through the gap his missing tooth had left behind; that annoyed him to no end too. Asher didn't consider himself an overly vain person but damn it he'd liked how he looked; it had taken a couple years to be at peace with the sunken in scar across his nose but at least that made him look...adventurous.  Dashing.  Daring.  A missing tooth made him look like a drunkard, and it would be a long trip to Seesai to get a replacement that wouldn't prematurely discolor.  Adam was right in that he could easily get a tooth closer to home but, again, discoloration was a problem -- whatever that woman in Seesai did to keep the false teeth from coloring was a closely guarded secret...no one knew what she did or what recipe she used, not even her family if they were to be believed.

He supposed it was a question of if he wanted to look stupid with his tooth gap or look stupid with a yellowed tooth in a few years. Neither thought was especially attractive and brought with it a sort of helpless frustration that, coupled with the prickling feeling of having eyes on him, made him want to get up and move around to burn off the pent up energy and emotion.  

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of rustling grass; before he could truly react to the sound Eli came into view and he relaxed slightly.

"You're up - uh, early.  Or however you want to consider it."

She shrugged as she sat down on one of the rocks ringing the firepit.  "Eh, it happens.  Sometimes you just don't sleep."

"Any new ideas?"

For a time she didn't respond; silently Asher surveyed their surroundings - everything still seemed to be as it ought to be.  He still felt twitchy though...he was ready for action, or for anything that wasn't sitting here keeping watch.  Maybe with Eli awake he could exercise or something.

"Not really," Eli finally responded.  "I can think of twelve different ways to disable that suit but they all require tech that doesn't exist anymore.  And it's not something I could put together from stuff that's left here."

Asher nodded, then glanced back toward the tent; when she'd come out she'd left the tent flaps open and he could barely detect movement inside -- Arlo shouldn't be up for awhile yet but it was looking like Adam was waking up.  "So what's all that stuff you've been working on then?"

"Hi-Defs."

"I've no idea what those are."

"They're wrist-mounted computers.  A lot of their functionality isn't going to work right in this day and age but back in mine they were onboard guidance systems with maps of all the regions, could make and receive calls, they kept track of addresses and your appointments and bank accounts and whatever else you wanted to track, they could project 3D images, take pictures... They could do a lot of things depending on the model you had."

He blinked at her; only half of that had sunk in as he'd gotten a bit hung up on the concept of a wrist-mounted computer.  "Really? Why those then?  If they're not going to work right, I mean.  What will they even be able to do?"

"I want them mostly for communication and maps of this region. I'd need signal transmitters in some strategic areas but once I get it all tethered to the facility they should work.  It's going to take a lot of footwork to get maps updated since it'll have to be manual scanning rather than satellite surveillance...or, hmm.  Maybe some satellites survived."  She paused for a moment, then shook her head.  "Nah, shouldn't rely on that.  Arlo mentioned there's a space station segment out in the wastes but even if there's enough left there to scavenge I doubt I could get a link going with anything that might be left up there, and even if I managed it I still wouldn't have a way to issue orders or anything like that." There was another pause and a sigh, and a wistful glance toward the sky before she returned her attention to him.  "Mine will be the sort of central control for them all outside of whatever computer station I decide to run them off of. My aim is to give them to anyone involved with the security of this facility."  

"Huh." Him with a high tech device...not something he'd considered before.  The idea was...kind of exciting, to be honest.  "So maps and talking to one another.  Is that all we can hope for?"

"Communication and map display is, bare minimum, what I'm aiming for, with maybe a basic calendar and clock function.  I'll have a look at what I can immediately do once I've server-flashed Pauline and get at least one transmitter up for testing."

"...and you've lost me.  What's a server-flash?"

She laughed quietly.  "-right.  It's hard to determine what terms survived the years and what didn't - with Petra and Merlin it's at least a 50% shot that I don't have to define something for them.  So!   Server-flashing.  I take the main operational files for an AI and do a sort of...quick copy of their foundation.  Pauline's an AI but not a living AI so I don't need to worry about her personality or anything, just the uh...the semi-intelligent framework she runs on."

"Yeah, going to need that taken down a few degrees still.  Pauline seems just as smart as Stewart but she doesn't have personality?"

"Nope.  She's just a regular assistant AI -- a sort of input-output response machine with just enough programmed intelligence to appear sentient but she can't learn or grow as a...uh...well, not as a "person" exactly but she  -- she won't ever change.  She just is what she is.   AIs like her you could make infinite copies of and they'll never, ever stop being identical copies unless something on the outside alters them.  Stewart on the other hand, if I were to make a copy of him, that copy would develop its own personality if given enough time to learn and live and the same would happen with a regular living AI."

That...sort of made sense.  At least, it was simple enough that he could grasp it without her needing to explain it more in-depth.  "And you're going to use her to run the Hi-Defs."

"After some minor reprogramming yes."

He nodded slowly; having a little, easily accessed map right on his wrist would be neat, even if it was just of Portia.  And if it worked well here maybe it could be expanded out into the other cities and nations too...and, oh man, would that make mapping the Peripheries way easier too if all they had to do was walk through it with the Hi-Def recording or whatever it did to create the maps -- suddenly he could think of all sorts of possibilities and perks to having one of the things.  "What would be the range on these things?  How would they figure out and store maps?"

"Range depends on what kind of signal strength I can get.  Hi-Defs have their own localized signals so they'll all be able to 'talk' to one another within a certain range, and also interface with the signals coming from the transmitters at a much wider range.  I'm pretty sure I'd only need sixteen or so at some key points to cover all of Portia and a bit of the outlying areas.  As for updating or creating maps it'll have to be manual scanning -- someone is going to have to start from an already mapped point and then let the Hi-Def scan the territory as you travel through it.  It'll take awhile but the program that runs a Hi-Def is robust enough to piece it all together without too much extra work needed.  And they have their own onboard storage to hold it all."

"Neat...and amazing."  As a more comfortable silence fell Asher tossed a few thick branches onto the fire and nudged them into place with a blackened, straight branch he'd purposely kept as a sort of log poker.  If Adam was stirring too then he should probably get the fire's heat evened out so he could start cooking. "Did you end up camping a lot as a ranger?"

"Yeah.  I went camping for fun too."

He carefully poked at the fire for a moment.  "...do you miss doing that?"

There was a long pause before she answered.  "I miss a lot of things."

Asher winced a bit.  "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked that."

She shook her head and flashed him a strained smile.  "Nah, don't be afraid to ask things.  The funny thing with pain is the more you experience it, the easier it is to tolerate."

"I don't think it works that way with this kind of...you know."

With a shrug she turned to pick up the cooking kit (which was in a large leather satchel that had seen better days) that was off to the side of the firepit.  "Works well enough for now.  I don't want you guys walking on eggshells around me, and I can't hide from it forever.   Hell, I can't hide from it even if I wanted to."

Asher was quiet as she handed the satchel over; he pulled the kettle out and stood to go fill it from the water barrel they'd installed just inside the tent flaps, then came back and sat it among the coals to start boiling.  A feeling of guilt had settled like a rock in his stomach -- that had been such a stupid thing to ask her.  "If you ever want to...talk, or something.  I'll listen."

The smile she gave him this time was less strained.  "I know.  It's appreciated."

As he bent to re-arrange a few half-burned logs she got up and walked out of his immediate line of sight; behind him somewhere he heard Adam's low voice and then the man's plodding footsteps as he came over and took Eli's place on the rock.  Asher just managed to catch the sight of Eli disappearing into the tent as he glanced back but she quickly came back into view a moment later.

"I'll be back in a bit - I need to grab a few things from town."  She had her pack slung over a shoulder but it hung limp and empty.  "Don't bother cooking for me."

"All right.  If you're sure," Asher replied.

"I am." With that she began to jog toward the path that, eventually, led back into Portia.

Asher watched her go and then sighed heavily, looking over to Adam.  "You ever feel like a massive idiot sometimes?"

"Sure," Adam grunted.  "Then I remember I'm not you and feel better."

Asher rolled his eyes and resisted the urge to whack the man with the fire poker stick; when he didn't rise to the man's banter Adam gave him a strange look.

"What did you do?"

"Nothing.  I think.  How do you want your eggs this time?"

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

Dr. Xu had acquired a wooden chair with a really comfortable cushion and a small wooden table for Harrison to work at; it sat in the corner near the front doors so it would be out of the way of everything else in the clinic but its position did mean that usually, when someone walked inside, Harrison was the first thing they saw.  Already several tourists looking for headache or muscle ache cures had approached him at the table to ask after the medications, even when Dr. Xu was clearly within view at his desk further in the room.

He kept telling himself to find humor in the situation but it was starting to get a little annoying - especially after someone actually moved a stack of books out of the way to "speak to him" with Xu staring on in surprised confusion.

It was enough to have him dreading the sound of the doors opening, and so today when they slid open he actually flinched and carefully peered over the top of the book he had propped up in front of him.

To his surprise it was that girl from days ago - the one who had fallen on the driftwood and gotten it through her arm.  She looked bright eyed and chipper, with no other obvious injuries, and he inwardly groaned as she looked around, spotted him, and came right over.

"Hey there!"

"Hello.  How's the arm healing up?"

She smiled and slipped her coat off, then pulled her sleeve up to show the bandage there.  "It's all fine and dandy - itchy, but doesn't seem infected or anything."

"Well, that's good." He went silent as she pulled her sleeve back down and got her coat back on, then cleared his throat awkwardly.   "So...what did you need then?"

"Ah, hello there -- how is the arm?"

Harrison sat up a bit straighter as Xu came over; the girl gave the doctor a smile.

"It's all good.  A bit itchy but seems to be healing."

Xu nodded.  "Excellent to hear.  Now, what brings you back to the clinic?"

The girl's smile faltered a bit and Harrison swore he saw a tinge of pink appear in her cheeks.  "Ah...well, uh, I came to um.  Talk to him, actually-"  

She pointed shyly to Harrison, and he blinked at her in confusion.  Talk to him?  Why?

Xu seemed just as confused as he was.  "Oh?"

"Yeah...um, private matter."

"Huh?" Harrison blurted out.

She turned her attention back to him and rubbed at her injured arm awkwardly.  "Um.  If you have the time, anyway."

"S-sure, I guess."  

He stood up and came out from behind the table; the girl took a few timid steps toward the door and when he followed along she headed outside into a much brighter day than Harrison had been expecting.

He raised a hand to shield his eyes and looked over to her.  "What did you need to talk to me about?  Did I do something wrong with your injury?"

She shook her head, hard; it was hard enough to dislodge a few wisps of hair from the messy bun on top of her head.  "No no nonono, nothing like that.  I was just um, wondering if you'd...like to go get coffee or lunch sometime?"

With that the woman stood there, lightly scraping the toe of her shoe into the mud; Harrison felt like someone had abruptly switched off all the lights inside his brain.  She wanted to go get coffee, with HIM?

"Uh..."

"It's ok if you don't want to," she went on in a rush.  "I don't mind.  You're probably busy.  I shouldn't have asked."

"N-no, no, it's-" Harrison interrupted.  "Ah - no one has ever asked that before.  I think my brain shut off." He offered her a weak, slightly sheepish smile, and to his surprise she returned it.   "But...why me?"

"I...dunno.  You're from Lucien, like me.  I don't meet a lot of Lucien natives when I travel around.  And, you're.  Um.  You know...cute, so I thought, why not?"

Now it felt like his ears were on fire.  "A-ah," was all he could say.

An awkward silence fell and it went on entirely too long for Harrison's liking; he was hoping she would say something...he wasn't sure WHAT, but he wanted to hear SOMETHING, anything, that would take the burden of this conversation off him until his brain caught up.

"So..."

"Ah, uh, yeah, um, sure," he said finally.  "I-I mean, if you're sure."

The girl's face brightened and she bounced on the balls of her feet for a moment.  "Hee!  Yay!  Ok, so when are you next free?"

"Later this evening?" he offered.

She nodded.  "All right then - later this evening.  Down at that restaurant in the square?  The knight one?"

Harrison nodded, feeling lightheaded; he completely missed what she said as she waved and then headed off down the hill.  Too late he returned the wave, and then leaned against the clinic doors behind him.

"What...just happened..." he muttered, rubbing at his forehead.

He, Harrison, had a date tonight.  

...wait, did she ever even give her name?

"Oh boy..."

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

"Haven't seen you in a bit," Django said as Eli walked through the door.

With all the afterimages swimming around (it was REALLY bright outside today) Eli could barely see him, and somewhat stumbled her way toward the counter.  "Been helping the Pigs out at the facility."

"Ah, that'd be it."

She managed to find a stool and sat down.  "I had to come back for some supplies and I'd like to take some treats out to the them as a surprise."

Django nodded.  "I see, hmm.  I just pulled an apple pie out of the oven, and I've got some Black Forest cake made just this morning.  Won't take long to whip anything else up either," he said as he flipped open a menu to the dessert section and slid it over to her.

"Thanks."  She picked it up and held it in front of her; with the afterimages it'd probably be another minute or two before she could clearly read it.  "Do you know if they've established any favorites?"

"I know Arlo doesn't really like sweets in general.  I haven't talked to Asher or Adam enough to know about those two."

Eli frowned; good thing she'd asked.  "All right, no sweets for Arlo then.  I know he likes spicy things at least.  How about...an order of vanilla pudding, some of that apple pie, and that spicy spaghetti stuff?"

"Sounds good."  

As Django headed off toward the kitchen Eli folded the menu properly and returned it to the pile, then leaned forward to brace her elbows on the counter and put her forehead in her hands.

Every idea she'd had so far to disable that suit all required things that weren't around anymore; the easiest would be a localized EMP to overload the projector circuits and force it into a reboot cycle where it wouldn't be able to disguise its user until it fully restarted itself.  A sliver shot would do similar in that it would disrupt the projectors by confusing its sensors with a quick burst of hard light mirror shards.  Or she could use a taser overload, or a bolt drainer, or a sys-dis (a system disabler - it would scramble all the circuit signals), or even a battery overcharger.  So many things she COULD do, if she was in her own time period...

But she wasn't, and simple ideas like trying to use water or some sort of paint or even dirt to try and short out or otherwise mark their target probably wouldn't work -- Access Suits had built in miniature shield generators evenly interspersed among the projector sensors that pulled double duty at repelling water as well as dirt, dust, or mud-like materials.  She couldn't safely rely on the hope that those generators were as damaged as the faulty projectors; if they were working correctly they might get two seconds, tops, of visual assistance if they were to try and douse the spy in something...two seconds could seem like forever in a fight but since there was no telling what else that spy might be armed with by now Eli was not about to risk anyone around her with so many unknown variables (it was as much for the spy's safety as well as their own that they be able to clearly see what they were doing the next time they clashed - she'd hated firing blindly at the spy and it'd be a really simple matter for someone to accidentally kill someone else).

"Something the matter?"

Eli jumped at the sound of Django's voice just over her shoulder.  "You walk really quietly when you want to."

Django chuckled as he moved back behind the counter; he had a few containers in hand that he neatly lined up on the counter in front of her.  "Old habits I guess, haha.  It'll be a few minutes on the spaghetti."  

She slid her pack off her back and pulled a cloth bag out of one of the front pockets, then sat it on the counter; before she could say anything Django picked it up and began to slide the containers inside.  

"It was an honest question though - something on your mind?"

Eli paused, then huffed out a sigh.  "Just trying to figure out how to hunt down a ghost, is all."

Django's eyebrows raised a bit.  "Wasn't aware we had a ghost problem outside of our haunted cave."

"Not a literal ghost," she replied, laughing quietly.  "More like someone pretending to be one."

"I see.  Not exactly your run of the mill problem to have."

With another sigh Eli rested her forehead on her hands again.  "I'm not exactly a run of the mill person."

Django nodded slowly, rubbing at his chin.  "...you know, how about we have a quick dart game while we wait on your spaghetti?"

There was something...odd, about his tone.  Eli eyed him but couldn't detect anything other than his usual smiling demeanor -- he sounded off but looked fine.

"...all right," she answered, standing up and aside as he shuffled out from behind the counter and led the way toward the back game room.

There were a few others in the restaurant; Eli found herself waving at folks as she went and narrowly dodging Toby who was waving a report card at her (she made a mental note that there were only two more months for Toby to prove he'd kept his grades up enough for training) and then she was in the game room with Django already retrieving the darts from a drawer in the prize counter.

He didn't say anything at first as he handed her the three green darts while he kept the red ones. "So.  Looking for a person pretending to be a ghost, you said?"  Django lined up a dart and then tossed it a breath later; it landed right on the border between a bullseye and the next ring out.

Eli huffed then laughed quietly.  "I feel like I'm about to lose.  Terribly."

Django tossed another one and it landed squarely inside the bullseye.  "I've had a lot of practice.  Where's this ghost person lurking?  Out at the facility?"

"...yeah," she answered after a pause.  "We have an uninvited visitor out there."

The third dart he threw, to Eli's surprise, flew well off to the left and embedded itself into the thick safety backboard that the dartboard was mounted on.  "When did this ghost show up?"

"Recently."

She watched silently as he went over and slowly took the darts down; when he was out of the way she took her first throw and it barely stayed within the board, embedding itself into a bottom right section that wasn't worth any points at all.

"Humor me.  Was it someone you think is on the smaller, lighter side?"

"I...guess.  Couldn't really get a good look at them, obviously."   Rather than taking her second throw she turned around to face him; he'd moved over to lean against the prize counter's front, arms crossed over his chest and a somewhat brooding look on his face -- seeing something other than his usual cheerful expression immediately made her forget all about the dart game. "All right, spill: what are you getting at?"

Django inhaled and exhaled slowly.  "Did Arlo tell you about that Rogue Knight we had, not too long ago?"

"Yeah, I've heard about it.  He said you were the one who was able to drive them off too.  You think this knight guy came back?"

He shook his head.  "No, I don't think your visitor is the same Rogue Knight I fought that day.  But you mentioning a ghost brought back some memories, from when I was younger.  Of a different, more dangerous knight, in her own way."

Eli walked over and dropped her remaining darts onto the counter.  "Are knights just a common thing now?"

"Not anymore.  In the older days - meaning, the older days of our current era, between the Calamity and when humanity was finally recovering - folks took up the title of knight as they fought to protect their homes and people from both man and monster alike.  Humanity didn't have much left back then...just a lot of old stories and memories of how things once were, but the legends that were even older than the Old World still managed to survive.  Such stories helped keep the survivors alive, and while it's a tradition that's been mostly overwritten by the Civil Corps and other law enforcement nowadays, there's still a fair few of us who stick to those old stories and the honor that comes with claiming the title of knight."

Eli watched him as he spoke; the brooding look had given away to something more resembling a thoughtfulness - a softer, more introspective look, and as he talked his chin was slowly dipping down so his gaze ended up on the floor just in front of his feet.

"So..." she said quietly into the pause that followed.  "Why did me mentioning a ghost make you think of another knight?"

Django finally lifted his gaze and flashed her a grim smile.  "I drove that Rogue Knight off with the belief that he wouldn't dare step foot here again.  I still believe that, in fact.  But I've been on my guard for any hints of other troublesome knights that might show up to try and finish the job he left undone.  It just so happens that I know of a woman who called herself the Ghost Knight -- I knew her when I was a younger man.  We even fought together a few times to clear out monster nests or drive off bandits."

Eli's eyes widened.  "You're kidding."

"I wish I were.  You mentioning you were looking for someone pretending to be a ghost brought her to mind."

"Who is she?  What's she look like?  Why would she be here?"

"I don't know.  I never learned her real name, and she never learned mine.  I never even saw her face - only the strange suit of armor she wore.  As for why she's here-"

"Is she a mercenary for hire?" Eli interrupted.  "What - how did - how do knights function?"  At his mildly surprised look she slumped her shoulders a bit.  "Sorry - didn't mean to interrupt you."

Django chuckled and pushed off from the counter, moving to line up to throw his darts again.  "Not a problem.  I can only guess at why she'd be here -- same reason the Rogue Knight was, I wager.  I wouldn't call her a mercenary...that's not what we did.  But, it's been over a decade since I last spoke with her, and people can change."

Eli shifted and leaned against the counter almost in the same spot he'd just vacated, putting him and the dartboard at her back as she stared a hole into the wood in front of her; if this person was this Ghost Knight that Django had known years ago then that meant it was a good chance that this spy's having an Access Suit was just...a one-off. One person who got their hands on something that actually still worked.  That was one fear off the list, at least.

"Django... How did this woman fight?  What did she do as the Ghost Knight?"

"Scouting," came his answer, quicker than she'd expected.  There was the sound of the dart thunking into the board before he continued.  "No one was better at it than her.  And in a battle she was the best flanking attacker you could hope to have on your side."

"Flanking...  Does that mean she didn't take people on in a direct manner?"

"She avoided that as much as possible but she was still capable of defending herself if she had to."  Another thunk of a dart.  "Can I ask you a favor?"

"Sure."

She turned around from the counter in time to see Django turning as well, flicking his wrist and sending the dart at the board without looking or aiming; the dart stuck into the bullseye.

"If you find this person, and manage to capture them, I would like to speak to her."

"I... I mean, I'M willing to let that happen, but I'm not a Civil Corps person.  That's not likely up to me."

Django nodded, slipping his hands into the pockets of his colorful coat.  "If you can make that happen, I'd be indebted to you...  Excuse me, I should go check the spaghetti.  It ought to be done by now."

"Yeah, sure thing.  I'll head back up to the counter."

He disappeared through a small door into the kitchen and, as she said, Eli walked out of the game room and back to the counter where the rest of her order was sitting packed neatly into the cloth sack.

She looked over a shoulder at the restaurant's patrons; there were considerably more people here now than had been when she'd first walked in, and Django had purposely wanted to talk to her about it away from others.  She really, really wanted to ask him more about how this Ghost Knight woman fought, or where she'd come from, or--

'I'll come back when it's not busy, or maybe I can catch him at home.'

That he'd admitted he'd been on the lookout for any other trouble-making knights worried her...maybe she should also split her history lesson time between Isaac and Django.  

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

"Bye, see you tomorrow!"

Django gave Sonia a small wave and a smile as she headed out the front door; there were a few spots left to sweep and then he could put out the lights and head home himself.

Normally he enjoyed the absolute silence of the restaurant late at night - it gave him time to daydream, or plan for the next day's operations.  Tonight though... He couldn't help but think of that Ghost Knight.  Everything he could recall about her had come flooding back in a rush when Eli had mentioned someone pretending to be a ghost; any other time he would have dismissed it as silly old memories but now...

He bent and swept up dirt into the dustpan, and then moved to carry it over to the waste bin.

Ever since he'd driven that rogue knight off he'd been constantly vigilant for any hint, no matter how small, that someone else had arrived to plunge Portia into chaos.  He imagined most people would think he was being paranoid without reason and so had kept such worries to himself...maybe he shouldn't have done that.  Portia's residents had been panicked at first and demanding more protections from the Civil Corps folks after the knight incident but, as time wore on, they'd fallen back into their lives without fear of outside threats; would anything be different now if Django had shared his worries with Gale?

"Too late for that," he muttered to himself.

He swept up the last little dust pile and dumped it into the bin, then went to put the dustpan and broom away.

Once everything but a single lamp was powered down he dipped behind the front counter; for the most part he stored napkins, silverware, and small dessert plates behind here but after that Rogue Knight had left he'd started stashing a small box out of sight behind the formal cloth napkins that were only used during holidays.

The box was about the length of his hand from fingertips to the heel of his palm, and was just barely shy of being perfectly square.  Django popped the latch open and lifted the lid to reveal a delicate-looking pair of gloves made of silvery wires, each with a single wire that was much longer than the others that ended in a tiny plug; they were very hard to see among the loose cloth that padded the inside of the box, and he knew from experience that even when worn they were difficult to spot.

As he looked the gloves over he had his usual mixed feelings about them; hidden beneath his shirt and jacket were a pair of matching armbands hugging his biceps that had very small charge generators on it -- wearing the gloves with the lead wire plugged in allowed him to charge up and release a controlled shock that went off with a bang, a bright flash of light, and repelled anything he hit along with delivering a strong sting to his target.  

Much like the memories of the Ghost Knight now all his memories of having found these relics came rushing back; he'd once been a young, stupid man, with lofty ideals about what it meant to be a knight without truly understanding anything about knighthood.  He'd thought that finding these gloves had been the ultimate stroke of luck -- something to make him an unstoppable force of good in the world.  He'd been hilariously proven wrong, over and over, until he began to treat them as tools to compliment his own skill, rather than relying entirely on them.  

When he finally understood what the gloves true purpose ought to be he began to win more often and eventually they had earned him the title of Storm Knight; when he'd realized that his dependence on them had basically shaped his reputation he had almost thrown them away. The fear that someone else would make the same mistakes he did (or worse - that someone would use them to harm others) had made him keep them, and steadily he relied on them less and less over the years until he'd mothballed them five years before he retired. The Rogue Knight had been threat enough that Django had felt the need to take the gloves out of storage and thankfully with them - and with his reputation - that had been enough to scare the knight off.  

The problem with this Ghost Knight was Django knew reputation alone wouldn't drive her away.  She had fallen into the same pitfalls he had: thinking that Old World technology made her invincible, or at the very least better than everyone else.  Rather than learning and improving she had stagnated...and he'd watched it happen.

"You could have been one of the best..." he sighed, closing the box and tucking it under an arm.

She really could have been...maybe he should have fought her harder on her reliance on that suit.  Maybe she would have listened if he'd fully explained his own mistakes with the gloves.  Maybe he could have trained with her to show her there was a more honorable way of living. But then again, maybe there wasn't some magical combination of words that would have swayed her to his side and stopped her from getting mad and literally stabbing him in the back.

As he headed to the front door he reached his free hand around to rub at a spot on his lower back.  That old scar ached and itched when it was cold or wet outside but it was an old wound he'd learned to ignore; tonight it was a dull throbbing pain - probably exacerbated by the sweeping, or so he told himself before pausing to really examine that thought.

There used to be an old wives tale about how an injury caused by a mortal enemy would burn and ache when that enemy was nearby.  The Ghost Knight had been his companion once...he didn't think for a moment that they could be friends again but he could spare a bit of hope that the old tale was true and that he would know exactly when he was needed if it was truly her in the region.

[bleedingcoffee42]

Eureka AU - Part 9

Weeeeee...here we go.  Future Me is going to be so happy when she edits this and has to make up entire fields of shitpost science.  Hahaha.  

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Ed's eyes shifted over to Mustang who now sounded a lot more like the boss they all knew.  His statement was an order, it wasn't a discussion starter, and Al was already reprogramming his tiny robots to do as asked.    He had to admit, it was good to feel like the condescending asshole was back to being himself because they genuinely needed him.

“That would avoid sending her into shock when you kill a massive load of invasive pathogens in her body.”   Knox said.  He was here to remind everyone his patient was human and this wasn't a simulation. Killing a large quantity of anything in her bloodstream could very well have consequences they were not planning for.   In theory a lot of things sounded good, but they were just desperately looking for any idea that could work at this point and that was not how he practiced medicine.   “I do like the idea of giving the virus something else to attack, that will give her own immune system a chance to fight back as well.”

“How are we going to get the nanites out of her system?”  Marcoh asked. “Now they're going to be twice as big, if not bigger, and she's already lost blood?”

Ed watched Mustang stand up, his focus seemed to have returned and his attitude noticeably changed.  He was back to commanding everyone's attention in the room, they all looked to him even though he hadn't made a sound to indicate he had an answer.  

“Chelation.” Roy said as if the answer was simple and had been there the entire time.   “Dr. Comanche has a project that is meant to extract metals from the blood stream, more than just the common treatment for lead and mercury poisoning.   It's been approved for medical use, extensive testing already.   Last proposal he submitted to me implied he was able to use it to extract valuable metals from any source.   He's trying to market it to me as a way to clean waterways of mercury, but his research paperwork tells me he's also looking to harvest more valuable non-toxic metals in the process.“

Ed saw where Mustang was going with this.  “So he has the equipment to synthesize an amino acid to do his bidding in his lab?”

Roy pulled his keys out of his pocket and held them up.  “Shall we?”

Ed smiled and together they left Al's lab to go take what Comanche had available.  Under any other circumstances he would be delighted they were pillaging his colleagues labs and utilizing the incredible array of resources in this building for good.   Right now he was just happy it was here and they were able to take advance of years of research to save someone they all held dear.   He ran over to the elevator to hit the button and open it for them both to head to the next floor. “So what tipped you off about Comanche?”

  “He clearly doesn't think my field of Thermodynamics includes equilibrium thermodynamics because he might as well have highlighted all the documentation of his side project in the proposal he submitted to me.”

“Not to defend the guy, cause he's a dick, but you are notorious for not looking at paperwork.”  Ed reminded him.  Mustang looked over at him and smiled, a smug smile, that made him think that that was a ruse.   The asshole did read everything.  

“In this instance, I thought it best to catch him harvesting his retirement income from the polluted streams instead of trying to prosecute him based on theoretical research that not judge is going to understand.”   Roy replied.  

“Or let him collect next years budget for you since his inventions are contractually property of the government while he's working in this facility.”   Ed countered.

“You have no idea how much this place costs to keep running.”  Roy said and the doors to the elevator closed and they went up to the next floor.  “You especially cost a lot of money.”

“We might not have to beg for Congressional pocket change if you spent more time being a scientist and less time as a politician.”  Ed said to him and Mustang narrowed his eyes at him.  

“There is honestly nothing good that will come from any projects I create with my specialty.”  Roy said.  “I've come to that conclusion long ago.  I'll do more good filtering what the government sees and receives from Eureka.”

“Like the flame-thrower gloves you keep in your desk?”

“Stop breaking into my office.”   Roy hissed as the bell dinged indicating they were on the next floor.   Ed snorted, as if it was his right.   Fine.  He'd put an end to that.  “I have sex with my wife on that desk.”

“What the fuck, Mustang?”

Roy smiled and stepped off the elevator and walked down the hall to Comanche's lab, room 047.   He unlocked the door and turned on the light.   Together he and Ed started turning on equipment and looking for what they needed.  “Comanche used his biological advancements in the field to get himself hired here, now he's focusing on environmental uses for his research.   I suspect he's doing that to not only gain favor within the community here, which is by nature rooted in finding cleaner and less invasive ways of doing things, but also to divert attention from what he may be doing with his original research.”

Ed was already diving into the files on the computer.    There was a lot of information here and it backed up Mustang's theory that Comanche was a really busy guy.   “Well that would explain how a dude his age can hop around on that peg leg like he's a ballerina.  He's using Chelation to clean his own  body of the wear and tear of aging.  I thought that was bullshit pseudo-science.”

“What's commercially available, yes..”  Roy said and turned on the machine that was used to synthesize the amino acids for the particular task needed.   There were profiles in the computer already for the standard uses of cleaning lead, mercury and arsenic from the body.   There was more though and Roy opened them up to see each to consider the formulas.   “EDTA for cleaning his clogged arteries and another for his joint arthritis.”

“Glad he's testing that on himself but I think keeping the obvious advances to himself is bullshit.” Ed shook his head.  “I see what you're saying about his environmental project.   Someone is a naughty alchemist, pulling lead out of the water and with it- gold.”

“He's probably old enough to have called himself an alchemist.”  Roy replied and heard Ed chuckle.   “I'm sure he's hiding it all so he can diversifiy his retirement fund,  quite the windfall when he takes this to the private sector.   I don't feel bad at all for breaking in here to use it for my own personal reasons.”

“It's personal for all of us too.” Ed said.  “Hawkeye is the best thing to happen to this town in a long time.”

“I'm well aware that if our little feuds ever came to taking sides that this town would have all stood behind her.”  Roy said, thankful that those days were behind them but also with a touch of nostalgia for the rivalry they had started with.  She made him work to outmaneuver her and that was something he couldn't say of a lot of people.  

“Alright, I have something promising here.   Let me upload Al's data and see about making us something. Metallurgy is a specialty of mine I got this.”  Ed said and connected his tablet to the computer and started to work his magic.  

“How is your brother going to handle us targeting his nanites and neutralizing them with this? I'm basically having you classify them as a toxin to have them broken down and flushed down the drain.”  Roy asked.   He didn't want to mention the Ultimate Eye tech they had thrown into the tank that was going to be destroyed with them.     He'd figure out that later.

“Al's not selfish, he understands that the sacrifice is worth it.   It's a setback, but he's patient.” Ed said and kept typing.   Heavy metals and elements were a breeze for him, he barely needed to focus to re-calibrate the program.   “Besides I'm sure he's discussing a catheter and collection bag with Knox as we speak.   Nothing gets flushed down the drain.”

“Riza will be thrilled to hear he's called 'dibs' on her piss.   Life in Eureka never ceases to keep her guessing.”  Roy said and saw data being transferred to the machine he was staring at.  Ed was fast.    He looked at the time and realized it wasn't even midnight yet.  It felt like they had been here forever, that he'd lived a few lifetimes between carrying Riza into the infirmary around 1800 and now.   This was a glimpse of her job, what happened when he was away.   This was why she was so adamant of being read in on everything that had the potential to go to hell, because when it did it was a race to stop a catastrophe.   They played on a whole different playing field here, science without regard to established rules and so often bordering on playing God. When it went wrong, it went horribly wrong.  They had so much they still needed to talk about and he hoped he got the chance.

“She'll be pissed.” Ed snorted and Mustang shot him a look.  “She hates sitting out.”

“That she does.”   Roy said and looked at the screen.  They were ready to begin synthesizing the next step in the process.  

[your-highnessmarvel]

Burn - chapter nine

Chapter nine: Rebarbative

The mat resounded with the sound of a body being harshly thrown to the ground. She never knew how hard she could catapult someone until she had successfully thrown Sam over her shoulder.

"Damn girl," he whined. He had sweat glistening on his forehead, sliding down his temples. His face was contorted in many different variations of pain as he begrudgingly climbed back onto his feet, breathless and tired.

Addie herself was not on her best appearance. Her curly dark hair was sloppily hanging in a ponytail on the right side of her head and she had flyaway hairs stuck to her cheeks and forehead. Sweat had managed to get in every single fold and crevice of her body, and her t-shirt was sticking to her body like glue.

"Again," she ordered, her voice wavering somewhere between breathlessness and determination. She locked eyes with Sam, her hands in fists in front of her face, standing slightly turned and shoulder width apart.

"We've been at this for hours now," Sam breathed. "Let's take a break."

"You're a pussy, come on!" she exclaimed, stepping in for a punch. She got him in the ribs, her knuckles ringing against bone. He winced but tapped her hand away, obviously tired. There was no trace of humor on her face, no glint of wit in her hazel eyes. Her jaw was clenched, teeth gritting against each other. "Hit me," she growled.

Sam shook his head, taking small steps back, his breath wheezing out of his lungs. "Let's just take a water break, birdie," he suggested, his voice low and tentative.

Addie looked around in feigned astonishment. The gym was remotely empty for a Saturday morning; not one of the other Avengers was training either on the mats, the treadmills, or the punching bags. It was a little passed ten in the morning, which was a rare time for the gym to be empty.

"I'm going to kick your ass, Wilson," she growled, her jaw twitching with anger. She charged for him, but instead of throwing a punch back or counterattacking, he simply stepped out of the way.

Sam shrugged apathetically. Addie had thrown herself into training like a mad dog ever since the epic failure at the industrial plant two weeks ago. She had transformed into something terrible, obsessed with perfection and achievement. There was never a day where she didn't spend five to six hours in the gym, training in various dangerous techniques and pushing her body to the limit. She took on anyone who was willing to accept a challenge. She was, however, not humorous in the way she trained, often purposefully hurting her partner and being outright rude; inciting a fight. Wanda and Scott had been the firsts to give up on Addie's savage and outrageous obsession with training. Clint had offered to coach her in computers, which he assured was a way for the girl to relax and let off steam some other way. Steve and Sam, however, were powerless in refusing to fight with her.

"You need to relax," Sam said, brows crawling up his sweaty forehead.

"You need to shut the hell up and fight with me," the brunette growled back, her teeth bared like a wolf.

Sam shook his head, hands on his hips. She had been driving him crazy, acting as if there was nothing of more importance than fighting. She talked of nothing but that, insisted they do nothing but quarrel. She was utterly obsessed with training. Even in the early hours of morning, Sam would find her in the gym on a treadmill, at the punching bags, or outside with Bucky shooting guns.

"Take it easy, Addison," Sam whispered.

"I'm not going to take it easy, Sam!" she barked, her easy glistening with acrimony. "I need to get better!"

Sam rolled his eyes with a low growl rising in his chest. "You are getting better!" he answered. "Stop throwing yourself into training and putting everyone around you at arms length."

Addie huffed, waving him away like there was a fly in her face. She reached for the strings on the side of the fighting rink and slid between them, officially calling the training session to an end.

"You know!" Sam called after her as she stomped away, her messy ponytail swinging behind her head. "Everyone here thinks I'm right! You don't have to prove to us you're better and-"

She cut him off by slamming the heavy metal gym door shut, the sound reverberating on the walls of the bathroom she now found herself in. She leaned her back against the door, her head knocking against the metal. Her chest heaved as she breathed in heavily, her eyes closed, jaw clenched.

Steve kept telling her that she hadn't failed, but that she had learned. Bullshit. There was nothing to learn from bruised ribs, swollen lips, and cuts all over her face. Instead, she bore the scars of her failure, which reminded her everyday that in that moment, she had been so full of herself, so sure of victory that it had almost ended in her death. She had healed significantly fast; her scars had stayed an angry red for no more than three days, and by the end of the first week, they were pastel pink and almost melded with her skin. Except for a particularly red gash over her brow that would forever stay imprinted in her flesh.

She knew all this fast healing and strength was from the serum Wanda told her about. She had asked Clint and Steve to tell her more, revealing she had in fact been injected. She finally read her own file. There was something haunting in the photo that HYDRA had of her, a picture she had never seen before. Steve said they had probably snapped the picture when Addie was with HYDRA. There were lists upon lists of experiments directed on her of which she had no memory of. Pages and pages of notes and feedback about her progress was what made the file so thick.

Subject x98 has successfully passed experiment 1738.

Subject x98 has failed experiment Z70. Must be wiped. Return to the oven.

"What's the oven?" she had asked, her brows furrowed in confusion.

"I think that's where they would wipe your memory and reprogram you with whatever they wanted you to learn," Steve had mumbled back, leaning over in his chair so his saddened blue eyes could look into hers.

Subject x98 has commenced experiment Y00. Serum injected. Gene isolated.

She had almost thrown the file at arms length. There notes in the margins about how "well" she had performed on several cognitive evaluations and physical tests. She hated those people; people that had torn her life apart.

"Don't let this play with your mind, birdie," Steve had whispered, his delicate hand reaching for hers.

Addie decided now was a good time for a scorching hot shower. She ignored the past that was knocking at her door, instead opting for a lavender smelling body wash and shampoo. Even though she had spent the last two weeks sobbing under the hot jet of water, now she was just standing there, her eyes fixed on the marble grey walls. Bubbles glistened down the length of her body, hiding the various array of bruises that marked her skin like a map. Her dark wet hair clung to her neck. The hot water relaxed her tensed muscles, making her skin the color of pale blood.

She scrubbed along her glittering skin, the soap sending a nice smelling aura around her. Steam rose off her skin like smoke as she took the time to massage her scalp and exfoliate her skin. Then she reached over the semi-transparent door and gripped for the woolen towel, wrapping it around her humid body. She turned the water off, stepping out of the shower into the frigid air of the bathroom.

Her heart almost wrenched out of her chest when she spotted the lonely figure lingering by the entry of the bathroom, the one that led from the gym. She gripped the towel over her chest, a yelp escaping her mouth.

"What the fuck, Bucky!" she yelled, almost slipping on the humid floor. Her cheeks flushed with red so crimson she could compete with tomatoes.

He stood there, startled as if he was a child being caught with his hand in the cookie jar. His mouth was parted in surprise, his enigmatic blue eyes wide open, cheeks tinged with red. He had an especially hard time keeping his eyes on her face as he shuffled from one foot to the other, his fingers fidgeting in angst.

"What are you doing in here!?" she shouted again, her chest heaving, her mind going all over the place; in places it shouldn't go.

He was wearing a white tank top and grey sweatpants, and by the way his tanned skin was glowing with sweat, she could tell he had been outside. He often shot guns in the morning and if Addie didn't ask for training, he'd work on the land with Steve and Clint.

"Answer me, God dammit!" she shouted again, startling him even more. "Why are you in here gawking like a seventeen year old boy!?" It was the first time she had seen him at a lost for words, his eyes wide with fear and embarrassment.

"Jesus, relax," he mumbled and he finally took those daring blue eyes off of her. She let out a breath, feeling like his eyes had poked holes in the shield she kept up. His presence was making her skin prickle with something unknown and her stomach was pooling with a warmth that sent tingles to her toes. She hated him so much she felt it in her body.

"Get out, oh my God," she growled, shuffling on her feet, the water sloshing around her toes.

"No," he mumbled back, his eyes going anywhere but there. "I need a shower too."

He took his bottom lip between his teeth and Addie felt like frying him right then and there with her electricity. Her body was reacting in ways she refused to acknowledge, which made her anger peak. The lights overhead flickered, drawing Bucky's attention.

"I'm going to go shower now," he said, gesturing to the other stalls, clearing his throat as he moved carefully. He passed dangerously close to her, making her skin react with pigments of red.

"Yeah, you do that," she said, her voice timid, a shiver slicing down her spine like liquid fire. She watched him carefully as he moved, his arms coated in a sheen layer of sweat, his face adorning a week long stubble, and his hair messy and tangled. She wanted to look away, really, she did, but he was like a magnet to her metal and the more she watched him the more that warm feeling in her tummy intensified. His metal arm reflected the glinting light, the plates calibrating and moving. He reached into a stall with his metal limb, opening the water in a graceful gesture. When he turned back, his eyes found hers in a beat, making her look away quickly.

She headed for the locker where she left her clothes, but before she could get there, Bucky called her name. She turned on her heel, her cheeks burning, her lips pinched together.

"You called me Bucky," he said, and a ghost of a smirk stretched his lips, but she had no time to fully admire it as she stomped right out of the bathroom.

The next evening, she was sitting with the whole gang, their heads bent over spaghetti that Steve and Clint so professionally cooked. They were enjoying pleasant chatter, but the girl was trying her best to avoid any eye contact with Bucky. She still had the image of him, staring wide-eyed, cheeks flushed, looking as surprised as ever.

"We should get a toaster oven," Scott commented, his fork chubby with spaghetti.

"That's the best idea I've heard today," Wanda answered, her mouth full, red sauce on the corners of her mouth. She was nodding vehemently, her big blue eyes glistening with content. It was nights like these, spent sitting around the table with food stuffed in their mouths, that they all felt as normal as they could ever be.

"Losers, we already have a toaster," Sam added, his own fork pointed upwards.

"We could do so much more with a toaster oven, Sammy," Addie said with a smirk.

"What we really need," Sam interjected, taking his sweat time to swallow his food, "is a new fridge."

"Don't start with that," Steve grumbled.

"I mean, we are seven here and that fridge does not store enough food for all of us," Sam continued, talking as if he was on a Judge Judy episode. "And it squeaks on its hinges." The table erupted in subtle laughter. "I don't know what kind of old appliances Tony gave us, but they squeaky."

Addie smiled and rolled her eyes, but when she looked at Steve, he was looking at his plate with a serious look on his face. "Speaking of Tony," he said solemnly.

"Shit," Wanda mumbled, her eyes turning from bright to somber blue. There was never a long moment of normality. Their lives were plagued with tiny moments like these, which were always interrupted by the real matters lingering not far out of reach.

"He said he went to investigate the plant we were at a couple weeks ago," he started, wringing his hands nervously, risking a look at Addie. "He didn't find anything. Not a trace of life. Whoever had been there picked up their dead bodies and sauntered out of there."

"They must have left something behind," Scott said, his brows furrowing.

"They did actually," Steve answered. "They left a half burnt map. They hung it over something and put tacks in them. Tony found holes on the map and he thinks that indicates more bases. He also thinks we should do some investigation of our own."

"You seem to agree a lot with what Tony thinks," Sam grumbled under his breath.

"I do, yes," Cap answered rather brusquely. Addie risked a look at where Bucky was silently eating, wearing a black woolen shirt. His eyes were concentrated on his meal, but his hands were gripping his utensils. "We have no idea what Loki wants with HYDRA. We are the ones in the dark and unless we find out something, we'll get blindsided."

"We need to know what he wants with Addie," Clint added lowly, his timid eyes locking with Addie's. She knew he had been in Montreal, so it was no surprise to her when her name came up along with the alleged alien tyrant.

"It's like a fucking scattered puzzle," Addie grumbled, massaging her temples.

"Yes, and when we make a connection," Steve said, "it'll be easier for us."

"So what's the plan?" she asked. Everyone looked at her surprisingly, their eyes speaking more than their mouths. She felt the blood rise to her cheeks, her mouth twisting as she realized what they all must be thinking. "I'm not going to hide here because I got a few cuts and bruises last time."

"Correction," Wanda said, her pointer finger up, "you almost died."

"That's besides the point," she mumbled back, crossing her arms over her chest. "I'm alive now. And I got better."

"Yeah by being a bitch," Sam grumbled, still not over how easy Addie had thrown him over her shoulder yesterday.

"So," Steve said before things could get out of hand, "we will be going to California soon, probably Friday."

"There's underground tunnels that Tony said were in construction, but the city has barely any legal records of it," Clint added. "Something's fishy."

"Alright, let's get a hard on for jungle fever!" Scott laughed.

They ended dinner on quite the humorous note and proceeded to dishes as always. It's crazy how normal, stupid daily things could get these somewhat abnormal beings to collaborate intricately. They had this thing going; a routine, whether it be dishes or not. Even Addie, as she stepped away from the group to observe them, she could see how everything about them was routine, inbred in their friendship. They knew each other on levels unimaginable; they had delved in each others' pasts and there was not a trace of maliciousness between them. They were incredible human beings, normal and abnormal, huge and small, crazy and silent. They threw water at each other and shoved one another, but they all knew how dangerous life could be, and that is what made them all enjoy small moments like those.

She was startled when she saw a shadow on the wall from where she was silently observing her friends. She turned to face a freshly shaved Bucky, his face smooth. He gave her a sideways smirk, his eyes tired from the harsh day.

"You don't have to come with us to California, you know," he said casually, leaning his shoulder on the wall. She turned her back to him, effectively hiding how red her face became. She still thought about their encounter in the bathroom yesterday and she hated how much she reacted to something so girly and trivial.

"Shut up," she mumbled. Her hair curled around her face and fell down her back in a cascade of midnight waves. Bucky leaned in slightly, his eye catching the glistening of her hair in the warm glow of the kitchen.

"You don't have to prove anything to us," he continued, his voice quiet.

"And you don't have to talk to me," she answered. "You told me to stay away from you in the plane. You keep your distances. You're cold and conceded, so you can eat shit for all I care." Her choice of words left him a bit wary of her mental state. She kept her eyes glued to her friends but she didn't see them. Her mind was preoccupied with the man who was too close to her.

"I'm sorry about yesterday," he mumbled. She felt his breath on her hair and a shiver passed through her body. Bucky could see the goosebumps on her neck. "I didn't mean to startle you."

"Whatever, James," she sighed, turning to face him, realizing how close he was. "I'm over it." She made to walk passed him, but he effortlessly stepped in front of her, blocking her with his body. She looked up from under her lashes, her jaw clenched, eyes alight with anger.

It ticked her off just how close he was. He stood over her, his chin almost touching the top of her hair and it made her skin crawl. She could feel the very visible blue rivers of energy glittering under her pale flesh. His eyes clicked to her neck, where he could clearly see how affected she was. He saw her pulse, straining against her skin. He saw the light blue under her veins and he rose a brow, a sly smirk playing on his lips. "Nervous?"

"Shut the hell up," she said through clenched teeth. Her heart was subtly gaining rhythm, throbbing in her throat and in her ears. The hairs on her arms and at the back of her neck rose.

"Come on, Addie," he whispered, his eyes checking over her head if their friends had seen anything. "I'm not saying I don't want you to come with us. I'm saying you don't have to throw yourself in the fight right now." He reached out and seemed to think twice about it, his eyes shyly searching her own.

"I'm going to go whether you want to or not," she growled back. "And I'm not doing it to prove anything to you or Wanda or Steve or anyone." She dug her nails into her palms, knowing her skin would be marked with crimson.

"You're not as strong as you try to let everyone know," he spat, his face morphing into disgust. "I've never seen someone as falsely confident as you. You're going to get yourself killed and drag us all down with you."

"What is wrong with you?" she barked back, her face coming closer to his own, her eyes boring into the rich velvet blue of his. "Seriously. You need to get a grip of how you feel. You always give me two sides to the mask, and frankly, I'm fucking tired of it."

He sighed through his nose, his eyes glazing over in apathy. "I'm just trying to make you see that you saunter around here like your fists are stronger than your electricity."

"What are you trying to say?" she asked, her mouth twisting into something between angry and curious.

"Maybe," he started, and he leaned in like he had the biggest secret to tell her, "you should concentrate more on your electricity than your physical training." His mouth grazed the shell of her ear, his hot breath warming her skin. The feeling of liquid fire returned to her stomach and she gulped.

She felt like her emotions had been thrown in the blender. "This conversation isn't going anywhere," she said blandly as he leaned away, his head tilting slightly. "You make me want to puke."

"Lovely."

"That doesn't mean I won't go to California, James," she sighed. "I'll be there to bug the shit out of you."

He shrugged with a nonchalant smile on his lips and walked by her, leaving her to stare down the hallway, her heart raging against her breastbone.

Thursday morning, she sat with Wanda in the grass, their long brown hair gently swaying in the wind. Their eyes stared down the little valley while the warm rising sun patted their glowing skin. They had picked a warm morning to attempt training; the air was leading to believe that the day would be humid and heavy, while the sun promised a very hot afternoon and an even hotter night.

"So how do you want to start?" Wanda asked, her mouth twisted in a humorous smile.

"I don't know, maybe we should touch fingers," Addie responded sarcastically. Wanda laughed, hitting her friend in the shoulder.

"Yeah, then we can mold into each other to create one big and great super hero," she laughed.

"That's the dumbest shit I've ever heard," Addie grumbled, but nonetheless, she had a smile on her lips.

"Oh my God," Wanda sighed. "Okay. Tell me what you want to practice with your... your power."

Addie shrugged, looking out towards the sky again. She had never really used her electricity on a grand scale. She had used it for the minimal and small cases, like turning on or off appliances or taping into a cellphone conversation. She hadn't ever had the need to really use it for something drastic, until Florida, when she had fried that guy.

"I have no idea, Wanda," she admitted. "I haven't had to use it to end the world yet."

"I love how you had to say yet," the other girl giggled. "But I know what we'll do first."

"Don't make me kill someone," Addie grumbled as both the girls got on their feet, patting themselves down.

"Listen," Wanda started, her eyes squinting against the hot rays, "when I first started mingling with my power, I was terribly scared of it. I was scared that once I let it out, let it all out, I would lose control. I would generate something unstoppable."

Addie nodded, wiping a loose strand of dark hair away from her eyes. "But once you did, you figured out it was like playing with Play-Doh."

Wanda's lips stretched into a wide smile, teeth and all. "Not exactly, but yes, you get the point."

Addie shook her head like there were a million flies buzzing around it. There was no way in hell that she would let all that energy out of her. There was a chance that she could control it, but there were more chances that she would wipe the entire continent.

Wanda reached out, a delicate hand resting on the other girl's elbow, seeing the chaos in the hazel brown of her eyes. "Maybe we could try just a little, right?" she said calmly.

Addie shrugged. "I can show you something," she answered. The other girl nodded, lips stretched into a sympathetic smile.

Addie lifted her left hand up before her, brown eyes concentrated on her palm. There was a slight tingle in the air, like static crackling among the atoms, as the girl focused her energy like she had practiced many times before. Slowly, and carefully, the palm of her hand lit up, glowing faintly. The blue light reflected in her pupils as the energy grew. She was creating a small, refined ball of electrical impulses, buzzing and sizzling in her palm. She strained against the whispers and the calls of everything electrical. Her senses were raw as she felt and heard all the murmurs, patting against her ears, begging silently.

"I think I know what you can hear," Wanda whispered, and when Addie flicked her eyes up, she saw the girl wide-eyed with surprise. "I can... I can hear it." Her face contorted in a frown, eyes alight with curiosity.

Addie was beginning to feel the usual familiar ease of her energy, her brain not as cloudy, her senses raw but aware. When she looked around, she could see things she could not usually see. Feel things that were usually fiction.

"Addie, I can feel it," Wanda whispered again, taking a tentative step forward. She raised her right hand, crimson ribbons of magic spiraling between her fingers. Addie's eyes widened, her heart racing violently in her chest. "I can mold it, like my own."

Addie played with it, stretching it in and out, the electrical impulses spanning over her arms and fingers, then focusing back into her palm. It was a real marvel to look at. She cupped her two hands together, holding her little ball inside her two hands.

She saw the string of red before she could react, her own electricity becoming victim to the magic of Wanda. Slowly, the crimson mixed with the electric blue, turning the glow into a purple magenta color. The violet burnt bright, cold blue at the center and rich red around the rim of the ball.

"Wanda, what is this?" she asked, her brown orbs wide as she stared between Wanda and the ball of condensed magic and electricity in her palm. "What have we done?"

Wanda smiled; a smile that meant more than anything. They were like a puzzle, once broken and now put together. What had been so brutally given to them through force and blood resulted in their kinship. They were a force to be reckoned with now, and nothing could stand in their way.

Now here I have established how Wanda and Addie will work together. You can all probably guess how.

[sunflowerseedsandscience]

X-Files Fic: Reminiscence, Chapter Four

Previous chapters: one | two | three

"I could definitely get used to this."

Her voice is playful and sweet in a way he's never heard before- but, then, he's never seen her like this before, as many times as he's imagined it.  She's spooned up against him, cradled against his chest, his face buried in her neck.

She's also naked, and while he has seen her this way before, it's certainly never been immediately following a bout of sudden, vigorous, and completely unplanned lovemaking.

"Is that your way of saying you're ready to go again?" he asks, kissing a line down the side of her neck.  She smiles and turns her head just enough to cover her lips with his.  As they kiss, she rolls him over, straddling him, sliding her body along his until her breasts are pressed against him.  She stretches both their arms up above their heads, holding them against the mattress, and kisses him long and deep.

"So is that a yes?" he asks, when they come up for air, and she laughs.

"That's an impressively short refraction period you've got there, Mulder," she comments, pressing her bottom against his rapidly-growing erection.  He pretends to be offended.

"Pretty impressive for a guy who's pushing forty, you mean?"

"Pretty impressive for any guy who's no longer in high school," she says, grinning.  "Even more impressive when said guy has just gotten off a plane from London and should, by rights, be deep in the throes of jetlag."

"I'm deep in the throes of something, for sure," Mulder says, clasping her to him and pushing himself up against her.  She sits up slightly and laughs indulgently... until he lifts his head just enough to take one pert nipple between his lips, and suddenly, the time for laughter is over.

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

At first, when Langly shakes him awake, Mulder keeps his eyes tightly closed, trying desperately to hold onto the image of Scully as she'd looked above him, that very first night together, her head thrown back and her eyes closed in bliss.  And it's easier somehow, this time: he can still see her when he finally opens his eyes.  He sits up on the beat-up orange-and-brown sofa, looking sleepily up at the mismatched trio in front of him.  

After all that's happened in the past three days, he's not entirely convinced they're real.

For the most part, they look the same as ever.  Frohike's got a little less hair, and what's left is mostly grey, Byers has a touch of silver at his temples that serves only to make him look more dignified, and Langly... Langly has clearly tried to dye his hair at some point, whether from vanity or an effort to disguise himself Mulder doesn't know, but he clearly hasn't kept up with it, because the bottom six inches of his hair is brown, and the top is a mix of blond and silver.

"You were dreaming about her, weren't you?" guesses Frohike, as Mulder rubs the sleep out of his eyes.

"Yeah," says Mulder.  "Every night since she disappeared.  This is the first time I've really been able to remember it, though."  Frohike nods in approval.

"Means the drug's working its way out of your system and you haven't been slipped a second dose while we weren't looking," he says.  Mulder frowns.

"The drug?'' The previous evening, when he'd arrived at the Gunmen's new lair, there had only been time for them to update him on the hows and whys of their continued existence before forty-eight hours without sleep had caught up to Mulder, and he'd needed to pass out on their couch before they could really get into any of what's been going on.  

Crashing on the Gunmen's couch because of lack of sleep while trying to unravel a dark and malicious conspiracy, and dreaming of Scully all night.  Some things never change.

"The process that's interfering with your memory seems to be a two-pronged attack," says Byers.  "Half of it is being cause by a drug that, we believe, was administered to you around the time Scully disappeared, probably while you were sleeping."

"Did you have any freaky dreams that night that you can remember?" asks Langly, and Mulder thinks back.

"There was a thunderstorm," he says, after awhile.  "The lightning woke me up.  High winds, too.  And I thought...."  He frowns.  "I thought someone was calling my name."  The Gunmen exchange looks.  "What?"

"There hasn't been any rain for over a week," says Frohike.  "Not anywhere around here.  Definitely not out at your house."  Mulder mulls this over.

"So could that have been a side effect of this drug?" he asks, and the Gunmen shrug.

"Could be," says Langly.  "We don't really know enough about it to be sure.  One way or another, we think they injected you with it while you were sleeping."

"You think that's why I didn't hear them taking Scully?" Mulder asks.  The Gunmen exchange glances again.  "What?"

"They wouldn't necessarily have to have forced her," says Byers carefully.  Mulder feels his overtired body flood with anger at the insinuation

"You think...."  Mulder struggles to keep his voice level, incensed at the idea.  "You think she would have gone with these people willingly?"

"Think about it, Mulder," says Langly.  "Those aren't the only two options.  Don't you remember any other time that Scully went somewhere she might not have if she could've made the decision herself?"

And then Mulder realizes what they're getting at... and he can't believe the idea hasn't occurred to him before.

"The chip," he says.  "You think they used the chip to control her."

"At least to get her out of the house," says Frohike.  "And maybe into her car?"  Mulder nods.  

"It was gone in the morning when I woke up," he confirms.  "I figured she'd just driven home early to get ready for work."  He leans against the back of the couch.  "So you think that they summoned her somewhere, like at Ruskin Dam?"

"It makes sense," says Frohike.  "For all we know, they may even have had her give you the injection, just so there wouldn't be any chance of you waking up and seeing them at all."  Mulder digests this.  He supposes it's perfectly likely that someone could have planted a syringe in Scully's bag, or even somewhere in the house while neither of them had been home.  Frohike's right; it does make sense.

"So what's the other half of what's being done to me?" he asks.  "You said it was a two-pronged attack."  In answer, Frohike pulls a small, strange-looking electronic device, a bit like a bug, from his pocket.  "What is that?"

"This," says Frohike, "is what we retrieved from the inside of your television yesterday.  We took another from your FBI-issued laptop, another from your normal cell phone, and another from your home computer."

"We're willing to bet there are more in the Hoover building," says Byers, "though we suspect they don't look like this one."

"What do they do?" asks Mulder.

"You probably already know," says Langly.  "You've seen them before, but they weren't this sophisticated."  Mulder frowns, thinking back, his memories still stubbornly fuzzy.

And then he remembers.

Scully, trashing her hotel room and fleeing.  Scully, terrified out of her mind, hiding out at her mother's house.  Scully, aiming her gun at him.

Scully, believing he'd betrayed her, because that had been her deepest fear.

"Braddock Heights, Maryland," says Mulder, sinking back against the couch.  "The mind-control devices we found in the cable towers."

"Bingo," says Langly.  "Only these suckers are way more advanced.  Technology's moved ahead in twenty years."

"The drugs confused your memories, laying the groundwork," says Byers.  "And every time you used your laptop, every time you picked up your cell phone, every time you even looked at your computer at work, your memories were being reprogrammed."

"You'd probably be in much worse shape if you'd watched any TV over the past couple of days," says Frohike.  "Or if we hadn't told you to ditch your phone and laptop at your house and let us take care of them."

"Yeah, thanks for the loaner phone," says Mulder.  "And thanks for...."  Something suddenly occurs to him.  "How did you know where William was?" he asks.

"We've known for some time," says Byers.  "We've been keeping an eye on him, making sure he's safe."

"But we also knew that Scully didn't want to know where he was," says Frohike, catching sight of Mulder's expression and jumping in.  "For his own safety.  She didn't want to be tempted."  Mulder knows it's true, but that doesn't make it sting any less.

"But now I know," he points out.

"Yeah, you do," says Frohike.  "We couldn't think of anything else we could show you that would prove to you that the things you thought you were remembering weren't the truth.  William was the only concrete proof we knew of that Scully didn't die in 1994.  What you do with that information, when this is all over, is up to you."  

Mulder turns this over in his mind.  Scully didn't want to know in 2002 when they'd taken off together, that much had been certain.  And she hadn't wanted to know in 2005 when they'd bought the house... which had been the last time they'd broached the subject for a long, long time.

It's a choice he can't make right now, and so he puts it out of his mind with a sharp shake of his head.

"Is this what's reprogrammed everyone else?" he asks, holding up the tiny device.  "Skinner, Diana, Scully's brother?  His wife?"

"Looks like it," says Frohike.  "We're pretty sure they've all gotten doses of the memory-altering drugs, too.  If we can get at their phones and computers somehow, we'll know for sure."

"One way or another," says Byers, "it looks as though all did not go quite according to plan for them."

"How's that?" asks Mulder.  In answer, all three of the Gunmen grin.

"You," says Langly.  "If everything had worked exactly the way they wanted it to, you would've gotten out of bed and driven to work without a second thought about Scully or where she was."

"Why didn't I, then?" Mulder asks.  "Why didn't it completely work on me?"

"Our best guess is that she's just too big a part of you to just erase with a shot and some electronic gizmos," says Frohike, grinning.  If it had worked, you would've accepted Diana, no questions asked, and gone about your business," says Frohike.  "But instead, according to the bugs we stuck in your office years ago, you freaked out."

"Wouldn't you?" grumbles Mulder.  "What's her role in all this, anyway?"  The smiles fade from their faces immediately.

"We don't know," Byers admits.  "It's obvious that her death in 1999 was faked, and she seems to be toeing the line, but we don't know if she's had her memories altered like the rest of you... or if she's just reading from a script someone's given her ahead of time."

"She had a flashback of some kind," Mulder says, remembering suddenly.  "In the cemetery yesterday.  There was a funeral... and she suddenly remembered seeing Scully and me at her funeral.  She remembered sitting in a car with CGB Spender and watching us through binoculars."  The Gunmen exchanged glances.

"Interesting," says Frohike.  "So either she's being used by them and she doesn't even know it... or she knows exactly what's going on, and they're trying a different angle, now that they know their first attempts didn't work on you the way they expected."

"Either way, we can't trust her," says Langly.  "Not yet.  We need to know more first."  Mulder agrees.

"What we really need," says Frohike, "is to find out what made them decide to do this now."

"No, what we really need is to find Scully and get her back from whoever's got her," Mulder insists.

"I know, Mulder, and we will," Frohike promises.  "But if you can remember what was going on right before all this happened, maybe finding out the 'why' will lead to the 'where.'"  

"I can't deny the logic, guys," says Mulder, "but I can't force the memories to come, either.  So unless you guys have got some kind of an antidote for these drugs...."  The Gunmen grin at him.  "You do, don't you?"  They nod.  "Do I even want to know how you've managed that?"

"No, and we wouldn't tell you even if you did," says Frohike.  "The few sources we have left are way too valuable to risk.  The important part is, we've got the antidote, and we've got enough of it for you and two other people."

"So everyone else they've drugged is just gonna go right on thinking Scully's been dead for years?" Mulder asks.  He has no idea how many people whoever took her has gotten to, but they've managed to hit Bill and his family, not to mention the entire staff of the FBI, so clearly, their reach is relatively broad.

"Nah, eventually the drugs will wear off on their own," says Langly.  "And the effects of the bugs wear off even quicker, 'cause they're stuck in devices that most people can't go more than ten minutes away from.  When's the last time you went longer than an hour without looking at a computer, a phone, or a TV?"

"The longer you go without using a screen that's been tampered with, the less hold they have on you," says Byers.  "You've made great progress after just twenty-four hours, haven't you?"

"So we save the antidote for people whose help we need right now," says Mulder.  The others nod in agreement.  "Skinner, then.  We need to take care of Skinner.  He's got access I don't, and that could be useful."

"Definitely," agrees Frohike.  "What about the other dose?"

"Not Bill," says Mulder.  "If we can deal with his electronics, we can wait for the drugs to wear off on their own.  He won't be much help.  Besides," he sighs, "I'm kinda enjoying him not hating me, for once."

"Should we save the last dose?" suggests Byers.  "In case we get Scully back and she's been exposed to the same drugs as you?"

"I think that sounds like the best idea," says Mulder.  He stands up.  "So... should we get right to it?"

"You want the antidote?" asks Frohike.

"Yes.  We need to get started right away.  Dose me up, and then we'll go grab Skinner somehow and take care of him."

"We've been told," says Byers, "that the antidote will knock you out when you take it, at least for a short period of time."

"Oh."  Mulder frowns.  "And you couldn't have... I dunno, injected me with it while I was asleep last night?"

"We kinda figured you'd had your fill of being drugged without your consent, man," Langly protests.  "We figured we'd give you the choice this time."

"Fine," says Mulder, and rolls up his sleeve.  "I've already got your supremely uncomfortable couch right here waiting for me.  Let's get this over with."

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

"I still don't get why you won't let me take you to dinner tonight," Mulder sighs, leaning against the kitchen counter.  "We should be celebrating tonight."

"We still have no way to test it."  Scully's staring down at the kitchen table with her arms crossed tightly over her chest.  "It's not like we've got a plethora of willing subjects available, and I am not doing this to someone without their consent."

"I know, Scully," says Mulder, coming up behind her and massaging her shoulders.  "But tell me, honestly: is there any reason you know of, any reason you can think of, that's going to keep this from working?"  She shakes her head.  "So why can't we celebrate?"

"Because it's precisely what we don't know, what we can't think of, that keeps things like this from working the way we anticipate," says Scully stubbornly.  "Until we have a real, live test subject, and until we have results that can be reproduced, celebrating would be premature."  Mulder bends over, wrapping his arms around her from behind and squeezing her against his chest.

"So we'll figure it out," he promises.  "But one way or another, Scully... this is the closest we've ever gotten.  Can we celebrate that, at least?"  She relents, going soft against him.

"Sure, Mulder," she says.  "We'll celebrate by getting to bed before one in the morning, for once.  How's that sound?"

"I can't help but notice that you said 'get to bed,' not 'get to sleep,'" Mulder purrs into her neck.  "I think that sounds perfect."  Scully turns her head and kisses him fiercely.

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

A loud pounding on the door jolts Mulder out of his slumber, and he sits bolt upright, looking around in total confusion.  The pieces are just starting to fall back into place- he's at the Gunmen's new lair, they're alive, he's been given an antidote- when the pounding booms through the room again.

Frohike materializes from a back room, followed by Langly.  Byers stands from where he's been sitting on the floor, and as he does, Mulder notices something else: Walter Skinner, stretched out on a sleeping bag on the cement floor, dead to the world.

"What the hell?"  The others turn to look at him, startled.  "What's Skinner doing here?"

"We went and got him," says Langly.  "Took your truck to the Hoover building, lured him down to the parking garage, gave him the antidote, and brought him back here.  Didn't you say to go grab him?"

"I meant metaphorically, Langly!  I didn't mean you should kidnap him!"

"Sorry, Mulder, but we wanted to get him as quickly as possible," says Byers sheepishly.  You were right when you said we need to get started right away."  Whoever is outside pounds on the door for a third time, and Frohike runs to a video monitor on the wall.

"Holy shit," he says.  "Mulder, you're gonna want to see this."  Moving slowly, feeling like he has a hangover, Mulder gets to his feet and crosses to the monitor.

Diana Fowley is standing outside... and she's covered in blood.

"How the hell did she even get here?" Frohike asks.

"I don't know, but we have to let her in," says Mulder.  The others look at him like he's lost his mind.  "Guys, she clearly knows that we're in here... and the longer she stands out there looking like that, the more likely it is that some cop on patrol is gonna notice her.  I'm not saying we let her leave once she's in here, but if we don't open the door, your new lair is going to end up raided before the day is out."

"He's right," sighs Frohike reluctantly.  "We gotta let her in."  He crosses to the door, throws the many bolts and chains that secure it, and hauls it open.  Diana rushes in, looking around at them in near-total panic.  When she sees Mulder, she rushes at him, throwing her arms around him."

"Fox!" she exclaims.  "I couldn't find you anywhere!  I went to your house and you were gone... I couldn't go into the office, not like this... so I waited, I waited in the garage and I saw your truck, and-"

"You amateurs let someone follow you?" bellows Frohike, rounding on Byers and Langly, who look horrified.  "Is it open invitation in here to the whole damn FBI now?"

"I was careful," says Diana.  "I stayed back.  They couldn't have known."

"What happened?" Mulder demands.  "Whose blood is this?"  Diana dissolves into tears at the question.  "When you left the cemetery last night, what happened?  Where did you go?"

"I went home," sobs Diana.  "I wanted to see Stephen... what I remembered at the cemetery, it scared me, and I needed reassurance I wasn't losing my mind, and...."  She crumples onto the couch.  "I told him," she says.  "I told him what I'd seen, what I'd remembered... how you've been insisting for days that Agent Scully is still alive... and he got this look on his face, and...."  She shakes her head, squeezing her eyes shut.  "He grabbed me, Fox, he grabbed me by the arms and started dragging me to the door.  Stephen's never touched me like that, not the whole time we've been married!"

"What did he say, Diana?" asks Mulder, his blood going cold.  If whoever has Scully knows that Diana is remembering things, knows Mulder is onto them...."

"He said the plan was shot to hell, he said he had to take me somewhere.  I refused to go with him until he explained, and he... and he....."  She's becoming nearly incoherent.  "He hit me... and I shot him.  I shot him, Fox!"  She curls into a ball, rocking back and forth, sobbing loudly.

Mulder is aghast.  He doesn't know what to think, what to believe.  On one hand, it sounds as though Diana has managed to stop her husband- who is obviously a plant- from informing the people he answers to that their plan is in danger.  On the other hand... it's looking like maybe, just maybe, Diana is just as much a victim of all this as he is.  He crouches down in front of her and takes her hand.

"Diana," he says, his voice gentle, "I think something has been done to you to make you remember things that aren't true, and forget what really has happened."  She looks up at him, her red face tear-stained and swollen from crying.  "But we have a drug here that might help you remember what the truth is."  Frohike, Langly, and Byers look at him in shock.

"Mulder," says Frohike, "if you give the antidote to her, we won't have any left for Scully."

"I know," says Mulder, gritting his teeth.  "But think about it, Frohike.  Diana might know where Scully is.  She might know who's taken her... and I've already remembered the why."  The Gunmen's eyes open in collective shock.  "Scully and I... for the past five years, we've been working on a vaccine.  A combination vaccine that fights both aspects of the black oil virus: the mind control and the gestation.  And three days ago, we thought we might have finally gotten the formula right."

"And that's why they took her," says Byers slowly.  "Why they had to make you forget everything."  Mulder nods.

"Whether they want the vaccine to keep us from fighting colonization or to use it against the colonizing force themselves, someone has decided we've gotten too close."  He looks back at Diana.  "The drugs will work their way out of Scully's system without the antidote.  We need Diana to remember what she's forgotten right now."

"I think he's right," says Byers quietly.

"Diana," says Mulder, "we have a shot that we need to give you.  It'll knock you out, but when you wake up, we think you'll remember who's done this to you- and why."  Diana looks at him with wide, trusting eyes, and nods.

"Okay," she whispers.  "Give me the shot."

[douchebagbrainwaves]

I'VE BEEN PONDERING PREDICTOR

This section is now obsolete for YC founders presenting at Demo Day, we have a dress rehearsal called Rehearsal Day. That means two years later you'll be making $4. If you find yourself saying a sentence that ends with but we're going to keep working on the startup, you are in big trouble. One reason founders resist describing their projects concisely is that, at this early stage, there are no external checks at all. I could see the average town was like a roach motel for startup ambitions: smart, ambitious people went in, but no startups came out. You can see it in old photos. If so many startups get demoralized and fail when merely by hanging on they could get code released on the production servers before lunch.1 Going to or back to school is a huge predictor of death. It's remarkable how wedded they are to their standard m. So approach this like an algorithm that gets the right answer by successive approximations. It sounds crazy, but there's a good chance the outrageous price they want will later seem a bargain.2

But both began with a core of fanatically devoted users, and all three instantly said yes. Many observers have noticed that one of the executive class riding the elephant.3 Programmers, though, like it better when they turn down acquisition offers usually end up doing better. I've learned a lot about: the company that solved that important problem.4 Don't get too deeply into business models. I worry that if we don't acknowledge this, we're headed for trouble. By individual managers without any additional approvals. This is one of those they remember. Service rates for men born in the early 1980s that the term yuppie was coined.

Let me mention some things not to do is expand it. He turned out to be more like bureaucrats. Wars make central governments more powerful, and World War II lasted less than 4 years for the US, as in all the other Allied countries, the federal government with policies and in wartime, large orders that kept out competitors.5 5 months behind the rapacious one. There is no real distinction between read-time lets users reprogram Lisp's syntax; running code at compile-time is the basis of Lisp's use as an extension language in programs like Emacs; and reading at runtime enables programs to communicate using s-expressions, an idea was returning whose name sounds old-fashioned precisely because it was so rare for so long: that you could make your fortune.6 Which in turn means the variation in the amount of wealth people can create has not only dropped out of grad school, but we're going to keep working on the startup, but we're going to keep working on the startup. A rounds. We try to pick founders who are good at building things, not ones who are slick presenters.

I cross this out? Here there were 3 choices: NBC, CBS, and ABC. We take for granted the forms of fragmentation we like, and worry only about the ones we don't. The late 19th and early 20th centuries had been a book.7 The metaphor people use to describe the way a startup feels is at least a roller coaster and not drowning. Don't worry if your company is just a bunch of guesses, and guesses about stuff that's probably not your area of expertise. Since then he has not only dropped out of grad school, but appeared full length in Newsweek with the word Billionaire printed across his chest.8

Don't put too many words on slides. So if you don't let people ship, you won't have any artists. And since people vary dramatically in productivity, paying market price meant salaries started to diverge. It would be unthinkably humiliating to fail now. In most places the atmosphere pulls you back toward the mean.9 A startup is so hard that working on it can't be preceded by but.10 Audiences tune that out. After a while they all blur together. But when I went looking for alternatives to fill this void, I found practically nothing.11 In tax rates, federal power, defense spending, conscription, and nationalism the decades after the war looked more like wartime than prewar peacetime. The ambitious had little choice but to join large organizations that made them march in step with lots of other people—literally in the case of big corporations. Nor did they work for big companies.

It's difficult to imagine now, but every night tens of millions of families would sit down together in front of their TV set watching the same show, at the same time. Mostly they crawl off somewhere and die. Some switched from meat loaf to tofu, and others to Hot Pockets. There are three reasons. This kind of expert witness can add credibility, even if the audience doesn't understand all the details. As big companies' oligopolies became less secure, they were less able to pass costs on to customers and thus less willing to overpay for labor.12 There I found a copy of the server software running on your laptop.13 And when you can do that much better with computers.14 Then replace the draft with what you said to your friend.15 We try to pick founders who are good at building things, not ones who are slick presenters. No other computer manufacturer had ever been able to outsell them.16

Thousands of companies run by their founders were merged into a couple hundred giant ones run by professional managers.17 Chance meetings produce miracles to compensate for the disasters that characteristically befall startups.18 I was considering starting another startup.19 There is a huge predictor of death because in addition to the distraction it gives you something to say you're doing.20 Viaweb's was the Microsoft Word of ecommerce. For us the main indication of impending doom is when we don't hear from you. Something comes over most people when they start writing. Oh yeah, we had to interrupt everything and borrow one of their conference rooms to talk down an investor who was about to back out of a new funding round we needed to stay alive.21

When a language is made entirely of expressions, you can write it and push it to the production servers was two weeks. So what's the real reason there aren't more Googles? Plus public TV for eggheads and communists. But don't give them more than four or five numbers, and only give them numbers specific to you. Make a soundbite stick in their heads. As well as pushing incomes up from the bottom, by overpaying unions, the big companies of the 20th century meant most people who weren't already in it. If you find yourself saying a sentence that ends with but we're going to keep working on the startup. Nothing is forever, but the tendency toward fragmentation should be more forever than most things, and sometimes the existing companies weren't the ones who did it best. Business owners weren't supposed to be making money either.22 When people do that today it's usually to enjoy them again e.

Notes

And of course the source files of all. Without distractions it's too late? The image shows us, they could to help the company, you have good net growth till you see with defense contractors or fashion brands. The VCs recapitalize the company down.

The powerful don't need its reassurance. Trevor Blackwell, who probably knows more about hunter gatherers I strongly recommend Elizabeth Marshall Thomas's The Harmless People and The CRM114 Discriminator. It seems justifiable to use those solutions. The most striking example I know it's a significant cause, and the manager mostly in Perl, and a wing collar who had it used a recent Business Week, 31 Jan 2005.

Credit card debt stupidest of all the rules with the other meanings are fairly closely related.

And maybe we should be protected against being mistreated, because living at all. I mean no more unlikely than it was because he was skeptical about Viaweb too. There's comparatively little from it.

I'd encourage anyone starting a startup idea is crack. Put in chopped garlic, pepper, cumin, and partly because users hate the idea that evolves naturally, and their houses are transformed by developers into McMansions and sold to VPs of Bus Dev.

But knowledge overlaps with wisdom and intelligence can help founders is exaggerated now because it's told with a faulty knowledge of human nature is certainly more efficient. This is a big market, meaning master.

Moving large amounts of money from them. You can't be hacked, measure the degree to which the top schools are, which have varied dramatically.

It's hard to avoid sticking.

The point of saying that this isn't strictly true, because any VC would think Y Combinator is a trap set by evil companies for the firm in the room, you could try telling him it's XML. Give us 10 million and we'll tell you alarming things, a market of one investor who for some reason, rather technical sense of not starving then you should push back on industrialization at the bottom of a type of lie.

How can people who get rich, people would be very popular but from what it can buy. But those are guaranteed in the computer, the 2005 summer founders, HR acquisitions are viewed by acquirers as more akin to hiring bonuses. I have set up an additional disk drive.

Ii. But there seem to want them; you don't, but the route to that mystery is that some of the word that came to work for startups is uninterruptability.

I'm compressing the story a bit more complicated, because software takes longer to close than you otherwise would have gone into the work that seems formidable from the formula. The situation we face here, since human vision is the only significant channel was our own Web site. Disclosure: Reddit was funded by Y Combinator is a great hacker. Or it may have now missed the video boat entirely.

In high school, the initial capital requirement for German companies is 47. What people who don't like the stuff one used to do that, isn't it?

Creative Destruction Whips through Corporate America. Instead of making the things they've tried on the young Henry VIII and was soon to reap the rewards.

How much more analytical style of thinking. 01.

The solution was a kid and as a percentage of startups small this first summer, we're going to give it back. PR has at least once for the first scientist.

I overstated the case of journalists, someone did, but he doesn't remember which.

Interestingly, the number of spams that have already launched or can be times when what you're doing. The Department of English Studies. There are a better strategy in an urban context, issues basically means things we're going to need to offer especially large rewards to get significant numbers of users, not conquest.

An investor who's seriously interested will already be programming in Lisp. Most computer/software startups are simply no outside forces pushing high school textbooks. Don't invest so much the better, but starting a startup, both of whom have become direct marketers. That will in many cases be an anti-recommendation.

Does anyone really think we're so useless that in Silicon Valley.

But it is certainly part of an urban legend. No VC will admit they're influenced by confidence.

The liking you have a better influence on your board, there was nothing special. Record labels, for example, the term whitelist instead of Windows NT? Stone, op. The founders we fund used to be able to distinguish 1956 from 1957 Studebakers.

Thanks to the guys at O'Reilly, Greg Mcadoo, Aaron Swartz, Slava Akhmechet, Geoff Ralston, John Collison, Tad Marko, and Robert Morris for the lulz.

[brittysaucefanfic]

Operation: Voltron

Part 14

Pidge/Allura

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Pidge was dreaming, something about flowers and stars and planets, when she was shocked awake by a loud crash in front of her. The sound jolted her out of her snoring and drooling, and straight out of her chair as well. She landed on her shoulders, completely flipping over the back of her chair and onto the floor. Her glasses were crooked across her face as she blinked owlishly up at a face smothered in bright lights.

She was positive those lights were off when she dozed off.

Pidge blinked, and stifled a yawn as the face came into clarity, not bothering to stifle her glare. It was Keith, standing above her looking confused. Maybe Blue Lion was right when he called Keith feline-like. Both animal and Keith do that head tilt thing at least. Like he's doing right now.

They stayed blinking at each other a moment.

"Why are you on the floor?" Keith asked, sounding genuinely confused and baffled. His eyebrows creased down, and he leaned more over the table he was leaning on. They were in the conference room or whatever it's called, where Pidge had tried to get some well deserved rest while another program she had for finding Matt calculated.

"It looked lonely, so I hugged it with my face, why do you think I'm on the floor asshole!" Pidge yelled in annoyance as she scrambled to free he legs from the chair to stand. Keith just stood and watched, eyebrows creased even harder than before.

She ignored Keith's responding, confused mutter, "But you didn't land on your face."

When she finally stood with a huff as she adjusted her sweatshirt, she discovered the subject of the crash that woke her up. A box, practically half her size in height and twice her weight had been dropped on to the creaking metal. Pidge would bet her life that there was a dent now.

She waved a hand generally at the box in confusion. "What's all of this?" She asked. Keith hadn't even said a word before she began peeking around inside it. Filled to the brim were papers and files, some empty, some a little filled in.

"I got a name for the Blue Lion!" Keith exclaimed in a hushed voice. She glanced over briefly at the tone, before taking a double take to stare at Keith.

The man was practically bouncing in joy, his eyes feverish in his obsession. His hair looked wild, long past the sleekish low ponytail at his neck and gathered rushedly on the top of the back of his head. Lots of long black locks were loose and sticking up where they please, but his face was unobscured. Something his low ponytail can't do.

Pidge raised an eyebrow, and Keith visibly calmed himself with a clearing of his throat.

Keith continued after his voice was back to normal. "He gave me the name Lance McClain, as well as a few answers to other questions. He wouldn't answer anything that was important though, which sucks." Pidge rolled her eyes skyward, before pinning Keith with a deadpan look.

"Ever think it was just an alias?" She said. Ber words seemed to offend Keith.

"Well, duh. That's what the box is for. I pulled up every name that has Lance or McClain, and printed a file for each of them. I want you to find any connection between any of these people that they might hold with Blue Lion." Keith explained in a rush, almost tripping over his words he was talking so fast. Pidge looked incredulously at the box of files. There had to be at the very minimum of a thousand.

"You want me to do all of this? There's like a thousand!" Pidge exclaimed, picking up the top file and thumbing through it distractedly as she was already coming up with ways to go around having to do so much work.

This is not what she had planned when joining Allura's little crusade.

After about a month of setting connections with people before they got started, Shiro had asked if they could all help his brother out with a case. After Allura looked him up with super secret 'Big Brother' technology called Google, and maybe a few other sites, she had exclaimed that Keith would be her next recruit. Pidge must have been the only one to see that mischievous glint in her eyes.

Whatever Allura had been planning must be coming to fruition.

"That's actually only box one, and there's three. Well, two and a half anyways." Keith said, twiddling his thumbs like a nervous school boy. He was swaying on his heels as he tried to look casual, as if dropping a bomb on her like this wouldn't and shouldn't piss her off. He's dreaming if he thinks that.

"You want me to go through over a thousand people across the world all alone?" Pidge asked, though the question came off as more of a statement. Guess she'll have to reprogram the Matt Holt and Sam Holt code.

"Preferably within the week, and I can assign any amount of agents good with technology to help you if you want." Keith said, trailing off at the scandalized look that was probably gracing Pidge's face. He wanted to give other people access to her code to find connections between Blue Lion, or Lance if you will, and these people he shares an alias with?

No chance in hell.

"I'll be fine, I work best under pressure anyways." Pidge said shaking her head. She sighs and grabs her laptop, entering her 39 character passcode to come face to face with a SEARCH FAILED. REFINE SEARCH. Which was her computer’s way of telling her Matt wasn't findable with such few present data.

Pidge sighed again, hesitating before pulling up her coding screen to alter her program. She had changed the code used for the location of Blue Lion's targets to find Matt, and now she's faced with a daunting task ahead of her. Daunting only in how long it would take her to finish full life stories on each person, which is what she assumes Keith wants. Every detail in these people's lives that may connect to Blue Lion.

She glanced up at an empty room three hours later.

Time passes quickly when she gets into her work, but her ass ached from sitting in the awful office chair and she just decided to use Keith's office as her Base of Operation. Except Keith was in a private meeting with three strangers wearing FBI jackets.

She decided to find somewhere quite so that she could do her work. Surely this giant building will have some sort of quiet place for her. Worst comes to worst she goes back to that conference room with a bunch of blankets and pillows from her jeep.

Free WiFi was worth the trouble at least.

~~~

Allura slipped off her heels with a glance behind her.

She was positive someone would find out what she was up to eventually, namely Pidge or Keith, but the reward outweighs the risk. It was quiet in the FBI headquarters, the day long since passed as she trudged barefoot down the halls. Perhaps she should feel guilty for going behind her team's backs like this, but she wasn't guilty.

If anything she was smug.

She peeked around a corner, moving quickly as she saw no people. Sure the cameras would probably see her, but that's whatever. Allura slowed as she came upon the room she was looking for, slipping her heels back on and fixing her pale rose blouse.

Presentability and all that.

With a deep breath she started down the last of the hallway, the lights flicking on as she passed. Her heels made satisfying clicks on the floor that echoed in the dim halls. It was that late and early hour, where the building was quietest. Most everyone was gone for the night, and people wouldn't start showing up for a while yet for the new day.

Made her mission that much easier.

As Allura stood in front of the door she was looking for, she allowed herself a moment to relax. Her political face settled over her like a mask, polite but neutral and vaguely interested all at the same time. She inserted the key card she swiped from Keith when he wasn't looking, then entered the twelve digit pin code and placed her palm on the scanner for recognition.

Pidge had updated the security for this particular door immediately since setting foot in the building. Only Allura and her team had full access now, though Keith held the only keycard, up until Allura swiped it. Which was necessary of course.

The access light flipped to green and the door opened with a loud release of locking mechanisms, causing a slight cringe to grace her face before it settled in time for the door to swing open. In front of her was a dimly lit room, completely metal. There were no windows, and no open vents or movable furniture.

It was a prison cell.

A high tech prison cell.

The bed was welded to the floor, with no mattress, and a single pillow and blanket. The sink was a slab of metal that looked as if it extended from the wall. And a see through wall of reinforced glass separating the room in half. Behind the wall sat a lone figure, awake and leaning against the wall as casually as if he wasn't held prisoner.

Blue Lion, A.K.A Lance McClain.

His hair had grown from the short brown cut to a slightly longer cut, and his blue eyes were sharp and mischievous as ever. His arms were crossed, one foot flat on the wall as he leaned. Despite the orange jumpsuit he was changed into, this guy, this Lance McClain looked as harmless as a mouse.

Shocking almost.

When brought in, the man before her wore a professionally crafted black outfit, that was practically made for a stereotypical James Bond. Maybe that was where Lance got the impression to make it, despite James Bond only ever wearing tailored suits. As far as she knows anyways, she never watched the movies.

In that black outfit, Lance was intimidating. In this jumpsuit, not so much.

Allura stepped into,the room a little further, allowing the door to swing closed. Her keycard was all that was needed to leave of her own volition, but that was later. As she stepped forward, so did Lance, launching off the wall to stand a foot from the glass separating them. There were hundreds of small drilled holes in the glass to allow for proper conversation.

"Well hello, Miss Harlow. A vision if ever I saw one." Lance began. His voice was smooth, flirtatious, matching the curled smoulder of his lips. "What brings such ethereal beauty like you to my humble abode?" The question was asked with a flourish of his hand, as if inviting her to tea at his metal sink slab. Allura was not impressed.

"I've heard you are going by the alias of Lance McClain." She fired back, her question less a question than it was a statement. Lance nodded dutifully, still smouldering and flirting.

"The one in millions. But please, call me Lance." He said sticking his hand out as if he could actually shake her hand behind the glass. She raised an eyebrow, and Lance shrugged, slipping said hand onto his hip. He was still leaning against the glass on his forearm.

They were equal height when she wore her heels.

Allura waited for Lance to drop his flirtatious smirk and when he did he stepped back to lean casually against the wall. As if she had never walked in in the first place. "What can I help you with Miss Harlow?" He asked. She wasn't sure if she liked the purr he threw up around the 'r' in her last name.

Allura weighed her decision one last time before all bets were off. Should she have asked the team first? Probably. Will she back down now? Never. Besides, it only would be possible if Keith went along with it in the end anyhow. Oh well, might as well get it over with.

"I have a proposition to make." Allura said, folding her hands in front of her.

******

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