So, for all the time that I've listened to Sleep Token (been a hot minute now, jeeze) there have been three songs that I have avoided like the plague; Atlantic, Fall for Me and Missing Limbs. I haven't been avoiding them because they're bad, not at all, but because the first time I listened to them, they brought out a Hell of a lot for me. Never in my life had I had a song, let alone three, do that to me, so, I avoided them. Distraction and WTBB cause me enough pain, and these three inch out of the boundary for songs that just push me over the edge.

Even when I did my massive SFX post, I kind of zoned out when I listened to them, mainly focusing on little sounds rather than lyrics and breakdowns. In a weird way I dreaded listening to them again just because. Plus, one of my first ST posts on here is a clip of Fall for Me, which I heard, had to sit down for a minute at, posted it, and refused to look at again (bear with me here I know I'm sounding disastrously dramatic and overly sensitive).

So, today, I decided to take a little re-listen. And Christ Almighty I need a minute. Atlantic had my lying down on my floor having to take a moment, Fall for Me took me right back to one of my first relationships and Missing Limbs had me contemplating how I've loved and been loved. What the fuck man. You all will definitely be getting a little lyric analysis soon, but, here are some of my favourites so far;

- "Eyes like frozen planets, just orbiting the vacuum I am"

- "Flood me like Atlantic, weather me to nothing"

- "Echoing futures are the buckling sutures, that hold shut the wounds of the past"

- "Slowly I remember why I cannot pretend, that I never think of you and all this screaming silence; oh God I wish you were here"

- "The outer rounds of heaven don't keep up on the charm offensive anymore"

- "To swallow my desire and choke on it"

- "The blessings rain on battles in the heaven's arms"

- "I live like I've got missing limbs for you"

Like. Pen game is on POINT.

Flatbush & Atlantic: part i

Quick note: This is taking place in the 2020-21 season, as if the Islanders still play at Barclays; I know they won’t in actuality. In the story, I’m also going to be taking some liberties with what the duties of a team’s general counsel and legal team would actually be in charge of. My understanding, as a pre-law student, is that it’s more on the corporate angle, dealing with contracts and stuff — in addition to that, Cass will also be dealing with some more immigration and employment law as well. 

part i

October 1

“Adiós, mamá. Hablamos pronto. Te amo.” Cassidy hung up, breathing out a tense sigh and rubbing her temples with the heels of her hands. Talking to her mom usually helped to calm her down, bring her back to Earth, but for whatever reason it wasn’t taking. She took a brief glance at the casebook open on her dinged-up Ikea desk. Federal Indian Law. She liked the class, genuinely, but her day had started off bad and gotten worse pretty damn quickly. First she was out of her favorite tea, then her advisor cancelled their meeting, then it started raining as she walked back to her MTA stop, so she had missed the train. Another came fifteen minutes later, but the damage was already done. The only bright spot in the day, aside from calling her mom, had been the cute guy at the Polish deli down the street who had put extra peppers on her Philly cheesesteak. She unwrapped the sandwich, taking a moody bite out of the end. A caramelized onion dropped to the floor. Sighing, she leaned down to pick it up, hurtling it in the direction of the trashcan but only half-looking to see if it reached its target destination. Despite the name, Cass had never had a cheesesteak before she moved to New York, and it wasn’t even because she wasn’t a sandwich person. No, Cass loved a good sandwich, but between her proclivity towards a good BLT and her mom’s homemade Mexican food, she just hadn’t gotten around to it. 

Her laptop dinged with an email notification. What now? She swiped over to the mail page, taking another bite as she read the subject line. Experiential learning requirement - unmet. Her brow furrowed. Unmet? Clicking it open, she scanned the email, clearly something automated from the registrar’s office. Yet to complete Columbia’s experiential learning requirement...We suggest you connect with professors...You have until October 8 to submit...Cassidy never finished her sandwich. “Oh my God,” she muttered to herself, feeling her cheeks heat up. “How could you do this? How could you be so stupid, Cass?” She was normally so on top of everything, never missed a date, never forgot an assignment, so how could she have missed one of the only things left to do to graduate? Her law school required all of the graduates to complete some sort of experiential learning requirement — some kind of externship, clinic, summer associate position, anything to get them “out in the real world.” That’s when it hit her. She had coached her high school’s mock trial team the summer after her first year, and interned at the Hartford County DA’s the summer after. But they paid her. Her school had a weird ‘double-dip’ policy, where you weren’t allowed to take a position for class credit and get paid at the same time. It was a confusing rule, convoluted and bizarre and probably a little bit elitist, but it was a rule. As if the day couldn’t get any worse, and then somehow it did. 

Turning to her laptop, she started searching for just about anything that could possibly help her. The school’s website, the Manhattan District Attorney’s, state offices, NGOs, federal prosecutors, anyone that might have a lead. Frantically dragging over her resumé and throwing together a cover letter that probably (hopefully) looked way more interesting than it actually was, Cassidy fired off email after email after email. Two hours later, she had sent off some twenty-odd applications, hoping that at least one or two would end up panning out. Glancing at her watch, she let out an exasperated breath. 12:22 A.M. Her classes didn’t start until nine, but it took almost an hour and a subway connection to get to Columbia, and she had to eat and shower before. So, really, it meant getting up at about seven. She needed to go to bed. 

Stomach reeling and feeling more resigned than anything, Cass haphazardly brushed her teeth, flossed — it didn’t matter how tired she was, she’d never forget to floss — and clambered into bed, wearing a faded, way-too-big Rangers t-shirt. I’ll be okay. She took a deep breath. It’ll be okay. It has to be. Cassidy Cabrera Shaw was tough as nails and stubborn as hell, and she wasn’t going to let everything she had worked so hard for fall apart so easily. 

Whenever Cass was nervous, or anxious, or afraid, she was never able to sleep well. She ended up waking up at ten past six, sitting in her bed for fifteen minutes praying that she’d fall back asleep, and finally accepting her fate that sleep just wasn’t going to come. Rolling over, she grabbed her phone from where she had left it charging on the nightstand. Nightstand was maybe a generous term for it; technically, it was a wooden milk crate that she had spray painted white when she and the other girls had moved into the apartment two years prior. She had a little bit of money set aside from college, but every penny possible was going towards tuition and those ungodly-expensive books that she had to buy every semester. The mattress and frame were from Ikea, and Cass had brought some things like bedding and a desk from her old room. The rest of it — rugs, lighting, and decorations like her six-inch ceramic peacock (his name was Charles) had come from a combination of Goodwill runs and senior citizen yard sales. 

Wincing as she did so, Cass pulled up her email, bracing herself for the inevitable barrage of rejection. After scrolling past ten or so automated “no longer hiring” and “position has been filled” messages, one caught her eye. She had sent a few emails to professors of hers, not expecting to hear anything back for a few days. It wasn’t perfect by any means, but there certainly were advantages of going to school in a city as massive as New York. All of her professors knew someone and had some kind of connection from their own education, or days in the practice, or childhood summer trips to the Hamptons with someone who just so happened to be a judge on the Second Circuit Court — that last one was last year’s employment law professor. One particular subject line caught her eye. Thought you might be interested, Professor Murakami had written. David, as he preferred to be called, was her Sports Law professor from last year. She didn’t go into the class expecting to enjoy it all that much, if she was being honest. She had gotten a crappy registration time and most other classes were filled, so it had started out as a placeholder and nothing more. Over the semester, though, it had quickly become one of her favorites, combining pieces of everything else she had studied into one cohesive course. Cass also wasn’t in a position to be turning down any potential offers, so she opened the email and started reading. 

I got your email, Cassidy, and think I might be able to help. Okay, so far, so good. I happen to have a contact in the counsel’s office of one of the professional sports teams in the city. That’s exactly what Cass was talking about — where do these people meet each other? Is there some kind of exclusive speakeasy you’re given the password to as soon as you’re admitted to the state bar? Chris Cohen works for the Islanders, and I remember you talking about how interested in hockey you are. Okay, true, but the Islanders? She had practically been born with a Ranger’s jersey on. Beggars can’t be choosers, she thought. I gave him a heads-up that I’d likely be sending a promising candidate his way, so just let me know if this sounds like something you’d be interested in and I’ll send along your contact information. 

Cass couldn’t respond fast enough. Yes, please! 

---

Wednesdays were her ‘easy’ days, if you could say that. She had Environmental Law and Human Rights back-to-back, but anything after noon was pretty much fair game. That being said, it certainly didn’t mean that she was any less stressed. There were at least a hundred pages to read before class the next day, she had a sample essay due for bar prep, and her mind was still racing about the email. Grabbing a gyro from the cart outside of her last class of the day, Cass stress-ate with one hand while continually refreshing her inbox with the other.  Food wasn’t allowed in the library, so she ate the last few bites right outside the doors, throwing away the wrapper and squeezing past the hordes of clearly overwhelmed first-years running to get to class on time. 

Popping her Airpods out of their case and into her ears, Cass briskly made her way up the stairs to the third floor, crossing her fingers that her usual spot, a big blue chair over by the research desk, was open. She was in luck, pulling out a water bottle and laptop and getting to work on editing. Four hours later, she had reached some semblance of satisfaction with her work, shutting off her computer and making her way to the subway. There was about half an hour before she had to transfer to the line that would take her to the apartment; squeezing into one of the last free seats, she tugged out a textbook and a highlighter. Why her professor insisted on assigning the entire text of the United Nations charter was a mystery to her, but she’d rather jump off a cliff than be cold called on without an answer. Transferring at Grand Concourse took about ten minutes — it was rush hour, so the first train to come was entirely full — and another twenty or so minutes later, she was letting herself into her shared East Bronx apartment. 

Hanging up her denim jacket by the door and toeing off her sneakers, Cass let out a not-so-subtle exasperated sigh. 

“One of those days?” Alicia piped in from the kitchen. Alicia also lived in the apartment, one of the four sorority sisters-turned-roommates who had made the move from Connecticut down to New York after graduation. Cass padded into the kitchen, where she was greeted by Alicia in front of a skillet and rice cooker, intensely sautéeing some vegetables.

“You have no idea,” Cass said, hugging her from behind. “Whatcha making?” There were obviously some nights when not everyone was home — most often either Cass or Ryanne, who was in med school — but they always tried to have a few nights a week where someone would cook a meal for the whole house. 

“Japchae, it’s my mom’s recipe,” she replied. “I called her and asked how much sesame oil to use, and she just said ‘until it tastes right.’ Like, I love you, Mom, but that doesn’t really help my cause, does it?”

Cass snorted. “Oh for sure, it’s the same way with me. Do you remember the first time I made tamales down here?” Cass had grown up eating and making tamales with her mom and abuela, but she had never been allowed to really take the reins. She had the recipe, though, so the first night after they were moved in, she ventured down to the closest bodega, bought the ingredients, and decided to try her hand making them from scratch. The recipe, however, left out the key piece of exactly how much water to use for steaming — Cass didn’t know, and her mom had always just eyeballed it. So she had ended up putting in way too little and setting the stove way too hot, and to make a long story short, ended up setting off the fire alarm. The one saving grace was the extremely attractive police office that came to double-check the false alarm, but even he couldn’t wipe the mortified expression off of her face. 

“How could I forget?” Alicia responded with a grin. “Go put your shit down, it’ll be ready in a few.”

Cass playfully rolled her eyes, heading towards her room in the back. “Yes, mother.” Their apartment was a three bedroom; while obviously it would have been amazing for everyone to have their own, it was still New York City and none of them were exactly rolling in the dough. Cassidy and Ryanne were obviously still students, and while Alicia and Stella had actual jobs  — Stella worked international business down by Wall Street and Alicia did something with satellites in Queens — none of them were exactly inclined to set out on their own just yet. So Stella and Alicia shared a room, and she and Ryanne had their own. She shrugged off her jacket, slinging her backpack onto the bed before chugging the rest of her water bottle and checking her phone. Two new emails. A 20% off coupon to Lush, and one from Chris Cohen. Chris Cohen? It took her a minute to remember, but when she did, she couldn’t read it fast enough.

Honestly, Cass didn’t read the whole thing, but got enough information to know that she had an interview Friday afternoon at the office in Brooklyn, that Chris  — he had said to call him Chris — said she came with a stellar recommendation from Professor Murakami (an old law school buddy, figures) and that there was no way in hell she was going to fuck this up. She wouldn’t let herself. 

---

Cass was lucky her Thursdays were so packed; if she had any extra time to stress over her impending interview, she would have, but she couldn’t. She had two ‘free’ hours in between classes, but after she had scarfed down lunch (Alicia had, mercifully, made plenty of leftovers) it was the only stretch she had to hit the gym. Coupled with the time it took to walk there, change, and shower after, there really wasn’t much in the way of downtime. After classes was her bar prep group, and the day was so exhausting that it was pretty much all she could manage to take the train home, microwave dinosaur chicken nuggets, and stumble into bed. After flossing. 

---

If Cassidy lived in any other city, she would have felt wildly out of place on her morning commute. Who shows up to school wearing a suit? She wasn’t an absolute masochist, so her heels were in her bag. But for once in her life she didn’t feel so out of place among the presumably-highbrow, presumably-making-six-figures crowd surrounding her. The suit had been her first big purchase for herself  — she had scraped by without one in college, but invested as soon as she had a little saved up from her summer job at a boutique in town. Her mother had always told her that it was the woman who made the clothes, rather than the other way around, and Cass always did what her mom said. 

Samaira, one of her friends and another editor on the Columbia Law Review, caught up to her as they both left the twice-weekly morning meeting. “You seem kind of jumpy, Cass. What’s up?”

Cassidy wrung her hands and shrugged her shoulders. “I told you that I missed the internship requirement thing, right?” Samaira nodded. “Well, I have an internship in,” she paused to look at her watch, “two hours, and I’m so nervous I’m going to mess this up. I don’t know what I’m going to do if I don’t get it. There’s not time to look for something else, there’s no alternative, and I don’t know what to do if my own stupidity and forgetfulness is the only thing standing in between me and something I’ve worked so fucking hard for—”

Samaira cut her off. “I’m going to stop you there. That’s bull, Cass, and you know it. You are the furthest thing from a disappointment. You’re one of the kindest, sharpest, and most creative people I know, and you’re not going to let something as petty as a deadline stand in your way. Time gets away from all of us sometimes, and it’s nothing to beat yourself up over. I want you to be confident and have faith in yourself, because you deserve it, but if you don’t, it’s okay. I get it. I believe in you enough for the both of us.” She squeezed Cass’ hand. 

She managed a watery smile. “Thanks, Samaira.”

“Any time,” she replied easily. “I’ve got to run to class now, but I want to hear how it went the second you get out, okay?”

“I will.”

Samaira rolled her eyes. “I mean it. You’re going to crush this, Cass. Love you!” She added, waving goodbye as she turned the corner.

There was half an hour before Cass needed to head over to the interview, and before she knew it her feet had taken her to her favorite spot on the north side of Central Park. Grabbing a bagel, she thankfully found the bench empty. After finishing the bagel — she would have preferred cheese, but they were out, so cinnamon raisin it was — and the better part of her Hozier-dominated acoustic playlist, it was time to catch the train. She jumped on with barely a second to spare, grabbing a strap and trying to avoid bumping into anyone. 

A seat opened up about halfway to Brooklyn, and Cass took the opportunity to unceremoniously tug off her much more practical flats and switch into the much more professional ankle-strap heels that had been stuffed in her backpack all day. For a fleeting moment, she was worried what everyone around her would think; she was, after all, technically changing on public transportation. A man got on at the next stop who was dressed head-to-toe in neon orange while carrying a Pomeranian in his purse. Nobody batted an eye. She got over herself pretty quickly.

Getting off at the Barclays Center station, Cass pulled out her phone, opening up the camera to give herself a quick once-over. As much as she hated it, first impressions really were everything. Lipstick? Not smudged. Hair? Minimal flyaways. Teeth? No spinach to be seen. Triple-checking that she had the time right, Cass walked through the doors of the office building, Islanders logo emblazoned on the wall behind the secretary’s desk. 

“Hi,” she said tentatively, catching his attention. “I have an interview with Chris Cohen at 2?” 

The secretary nodded, smiling warmly at her. “No problem. I’m Josh, you can have a seat over there,” he nodded to the small waiting area off to the side, “and I’ll call you when he’s ready for you to be sent up.”

Cass didn’t wait for more than five minutes before Josh gave her the go-ahead, and she was soon headed up the elevator to Chris’ office. “Fourth door on the left. It should have his name on it,” Josh had added. 

She raised her fist, knocking quickly on the frosted glass. It swung open a second later, a kind-looking man with glasses and salt-and-pepper hair answering. “You must be Cassidy. I’m Chris Cohen, so nice to meet you. Come right in,” he said, ushering her through the room, where several other associates sat at desks, and into his office. 

“David’s always good at keeping an eye out for me in his courses, and I was happy he passed you along,” Chris said, pulling out her resumé. “And you’re a 3L, correct?” She nodded. “Good. So let’s dive right into it. What courses and work experience do you have that you feel best position you for success in this position?” Much though Cass was loath to admit it, if there was anything she was good at, it was talking herself up. There was a reason her high school superlative was “Most Likely to be Able to Talk Their Way Out of a Ticket.” She launched into a well-rehearsed response, making sure to lace in her love for hockey once or twice. If nothing else, it would hopefully at least get her some brownie points. He had a few questions about her resumé, asked about her work on the law review, a few hypotheticals about contract law. She was batting a thousand until he asked the dreaded final question. “Do you have any questions for me?” 

Cass was wracking her brain, trying to come up with some intelligent-sounding thing to ask, but nothing came. “Uh—” she started, but was saved by the bell. Or, rather, saved by a frantic door opening and a panicked-sounding Mat Barzal bursting into the room. “Chris, I’ve got a problem.”

Unrequited (Jacob Frye x reader)

This is the first piece of fanfiction I’ve written in a long time so please bare with me if it’s not the greatest thing you have ever read. 

Also I would like to give credit to @skiesoftwilight​ because they helped me so much with this idea and hashing it out and they deserve the credit. Go follow!!! They write amazing reader inserts for Assassin’s Creed and the Batfam!

words: 7,368 

warnings: unrequited love and reader being stupid, also my horrible writing, and probably a whole lot of ooc-ness for all canon characters 

When you and Elizabeth had received orders from the brotherhood that you were to aid the assassins leading the fight against Templars all the way across the Atlantic in London, you were less than happy. You had spent and made your lives in the states, and sailing across the ocean to aid in a fight that not many of your mentors had high hopes of any assassin winning was less than ideal.

But you went. Orders were orders, and a month after receiving them (and a lot of sea sickness on Elizabeth’s part), both of you set foot in London and begrudgingly made way to where you had agreed to meet the British assassins after having taken your belongings to your temporary home provided by the brotherhood. If you could help succeed in the fight against the Templars here, you could prove that no place was too deep in Templar hands to be saved. If not, well… there probably wouldn’t be much of you returning home.

Your contempt for the situation only increased further when you were stopped by a couple of brutes in red wanting nothing more than to harass a couple of foreigners for money. Now, neither you nor Elizabeth were there because of your skills in fighting. Yes, you were a better fighter than your friend, but both of you were contracted as help with planning things, gathering information, and, if needed, severing a few spines with your blades. The both of you went into the lives of assassins hoping to only deal with stealth, and not with what you were currently dealing with. It took some work, but back to back, you two held your own against the brutes with your weapons. Screams from onlookers, running feet, clangs of blades, and gunshots were the main noises that were heard in addition to the jeers and taunts of the brutes, but you and Elizabeth kept calm despite it all. Then came a new voice of a different man and suddenly the people in red were swarmed by others in green. Elizabeth shared a look of exasperation with you, and you only shrugged, going back to the man you were already sparring with. In a matter of moments, the men in red were all dead or incapacitated and you and Elizabeth were left there panting, checking each other over for any injuries, though neither of you were too banged up.

“I take it you’re the Americans sent to aid us?” a woman’s voice rang out.

You were the first to reply. “And I take it you’re the Brits who need the help?” you spoke in a jest, lips quirked up in a half-smile. As the people in green dispersed, you motioned for Elizabeth to follow you as you approached the woman with an outstretched hand after sheathing your blades. “I’m (y/n) and this is Elizabeth.” The woman shook your hand and moved onto Elizabeth’s.

“Evie Frye,” she introduced, “and that simpleton over there is my twin brother Jacob.” She pointed out a man with a top hat only a few yards away, talking to a woman in green. His only response to that was a tip of his hat and he was quickly back to talking to the other woman, leaving you mildly intrigued.

~~~~

You tapped your fingers on the armrest of your seat, reading over Elizabeth’s plans for the fifth time and glancing over at the blueprints of the building, eyes shifting between the two documents making sure everything was on par with your standards. The older of the Frye twins stood over your right shoulder, doing just the same as you.

“I think this might be a better entrance,” you finally broke the silence, pointing out a balcony on the third floor of the building. “There seems to be less guards from the notes we’ve taken on their rounds around the time you’re planning to strike than the other wing of the building. What do you think?” you asked, Evie’s input being crucial, seeing that she and Jacob were the ones doing the infiltrating this time around.

“I think that might be-” she started.

“I’ve been gone an hour and you two are still looking those plans over?” Jacob’s voice interrupted.

“If you want to die, go right on ahead, Jacob, it won’t bother me,” you replied without a beat, turning to look at him with an emotionless face. It only took a few seconds of looking at him for your lips to spread into a wide smile, always being unable to keep up the facade for long when around him.

He returned the grin with one of his own heartstopping ones and walked over to glance over your other shoulder that Evie was not currently occupying.

“(Y/n)’s right, Jacob. She only has the best intentions in mind, though I don’t doubt you’ll somehow find a way to mess things up,” she told him, and while he looked to be about to respond, his face of disbelief showing he was about to rebut what she had said, she continued. “As I was saying, I think that is actually a better idea.”

“One of you could just pick the lock to the door and voila! You’re in!” you spoke, eyes roving over the papers. “Though you’ll have to watch out for the patrols; they pass by every couple of minutes. Oh, and close the door behind you if you don’t want anyone getting suspicious.” You started making new marks on the parchment, making corrections and adding new notes. “Your target should be in one of these rooms,” you then added, pointing out a few rooms on the blueprints. “Should be simple enough for you.” Upon completing your notes, you stood, straightening out your clothes.

“And if worst comes to worst, and I’m looking at you, Jacob, you could always use that balcony as your exit. I’m sure I saw a haystack nearby if you wanted a softer landing,” you added as you began cleaning the desk a bit.

You heard a scoff from your left. “Why must you always believe that I will be the one to mess things up?” Jacob interjected. You could only laugh at that.

“Jacob, you’re my friend and all, but we all know that you can’t go one single mission without messing something up,” you pestered him, grinning as you plucked his hat off his head. “I don’t know what’s cutting off the circulation up here-” you tapped on his head- “but surely it’s what’s keeping you from breaking this streak.” He could only pout at that, knowing your words to be somewhat true but also very lighthearted.

“Now that we’ve got this sorted out,” Evie interrupted, “I’m going to see if there’s anything else that needs tending to before the mission tomorrow.”

You sent a smile her way, her returning it, and waved goodbye.

“I have to head home now, wouldn’t want Elizabeth getting worried,” you told Jacob, stepping away from him.

“I do believe you’re forgetting something,” he spoke, his grin spreading as he knew what was about to come.

With his hat in you hands and a mischievous smirk, you bolted out of the train car, luck on your side as someone was passing through and had opened the door just in time for you to pass through and into the next cart, laughter falling from your lips as you jumped out of the next cart and onto the tracks, stumbling only slightly as you began to sprint in the direction of your house guided only by the streetlights and the moon. Collapsing the hat, you hide it in your coat, speeding up slightly as you heard Jacob’s steps not too far behind and his own laughter following yours.

Truth be told, in the few months you and Elizabeth had been there, you’d become infatuated with the Frye twin currently on your heels. From the moment you first saw him and realized his voice was the one that rang out in that fight, you couldn’t help but be intrigued. His voice, his conviction, his smell, his smile, his strength, his everything had led to this, and some part of you thought that maybe he felt the same. Well, he didn’t let just anyone run off with his hat! You’d become good friends with both of the twins, but your relationship with Jacob just felt a tad deeper. You hadn’t told anyone, and you suspected that no one knew of your feelings for the younger Frye twin. You wanted to tell him, but nerves always got the better of you, and perhaps that was for the best. If anything, a romantic relationship may only serve as a distraction, though you knew he cared little about doing things the correct way. That was another thing you admired about him: his fearlessness about how to live. You had always been a stickler for rules, but around him, you felt you could make your own life in the image you wanted it. One you hoped would include him.

As you ran, finally off the platform, you took every twist and turn you could, hoping to outsmart him or even lose him. After a while, you realized he was on the roofs, and that if you wanted to outrun him and arrive at your home first, you would have to run even faster. Jumping and catching his footing would surely slow him down enough to help you beat him.

There wasn’t much going on around, most people already sleeping as it was past midnight, but you did come across the occasional blighter (whom you had to outrun) and rook. Joy completely overtook your senses as you saw your house approaching and no Jacob in sight. For once you would beat him!

Just as you were steps from your door, he jumped down from the roof, almost startling you, but you quickly sidestepped and with a spin, placed your hand on the doorknob.

Through pants and with a grin, you spoke. “I win.” The pride at finally getting to your home before him was almost tangible, and even he seemed to be proud of the feat.

“I guess you have,” he conceded, grinning as well. “The hat’s yours until tomorrow then.” To that, you could only pull the hat from your coat, pop it open, and place it on your head in triumph, giggling as your trophy for the night tipped over slightly. Oh god, how you loved his hat. (And him).

“You should go get some rest,” you told him after a few moments of silence. You really didn’t want him to go, but with their mission being tomorrow, you also didn’t want to burden him by keeping him away for too long.

He nodded in agreement, then seemed to become a little sheepish. “Before I go though, do you know if Elizabeth is busy the day after tomorrow?”

His question threw you for a loop. Never had he asked about Elizabeth, though maybe it was just about a mission, you assumed. Maybe the sheepishness have to do with the fact that he waited until now to ask instead of asking her himself when he had seen her earlier.

“No, I don’t, but I’m pretty sure if it’s work related, she could make time for you,” you told him, still smiling. You leaned in, giving him a tight hug, and then pulled away, unlocking the door and stepping inside. You didn’t want to let go, but you knew that at some point you’d have to. “Goodnight Jacob,” you spoke softly, pulling his hat off your head and holding it in your arms.

Jacob smiled and quickly bounded off back to where you guessed (and hoped) was the train.

~~~~

Things continued on like that for a while, you hopelessly enamored and him seemingly oblivious. He had begun to ask about Elizabeth more recently, even going so far as to ask you to give messages to her. It took some self convincing, but you were beginning to understand that maybe all these things weren't about work, and that thought hurt. Sure, you had never told Elizabeth about your feelings for Jacob, but watching her giggle and blush like a schoolgirl as she read his letters at the table broke your heart. Seeing her reaction was enough to make you think twice about ever telling her about your feelings for Jacob. Either she would get mad at you for trying to “sabotage her chances,” or she would turn down Jacob, which would hurt him in the end. And you didn’t want either of those things, so deciding to break your heart only further, you kept your feelings quiet.

Only, you apparently were not as good at suppressing your infatuation as you thought. That same day as the letter from Jacob, which he had asked you to pass on to Elizabeth, Evie had taken notice of your poor mood.

“What’s got you feeling down?” Evie asked seconds after she walked into the train car you were currently seated in and reading a book. You thought your face was completely bare of emotion, but apparently not to her. Though you never seemed to be able to hide from her ever.

“Nothing,” you replied nonchalantly, looking up at her and giving a smile and then turning back to the book. If you had to pretend, at least you would try and keep her from worrying, and also keep her from knowing why you were truly so unhappy.

“You and I both know that you’re lying, and while that may have fooled my brother, it doesn’t fool me,” she spoke and moved over to stand in front of you.

You let out a breathy chuckle at that. “Yeah, your brother sure is an idiot,” you joked back, though to you the words rang true for different reasons, such as the fact that he was so oblivious to your feelings for him and the obvious flirting that he seemed to take as only playful banter.

At your words, Evie laughed. “Yes, he certainly-” The sudden look of realization dawning on her features was enough to make you shrink back in regret at your own words. “Oh. Oh. This is… about him.”

“What? No, why would this be about him?” you questioned, trying to play it off but failing miserably in front of your friend.

Instead of listening to your words, she began rambling. “I mean, I had an inkling about that, but I thought I was just looking too deep into your relationship,” Evie began. “And all those times you showed up here looking sad, the same day Jacob would talk about whatever he had left for Elizabeth. And how you would somehow always remember that you had something important to do or some importance place to be whenever he brought her up. It’s all beginning to make sense… I thought you might have feelings for him, but then I began questioning why you would or why any sane person would.”

“Elizabeth appears pretty sane to me,” you mumbled under your breath, turning away from Evie to look out the window of the train car. The words came out harsh, but that was all you had room for in your heart at the moment, no matter how much of a great friend Elizabeth always was. Oh how you wished to be out there in any single one of those buildings you passed, and not here, having your whole love life–or lack thereof–being exposed for all (i.e. you and Evie) to see.

She moved to sit next to you, taking your hands gingerly in hers. “I know this isn’t what you want to hear, but someone needs to tell you.” At those words, you began bracing yourself. Here it comes, you thought, guessing she was about to call you the idiot or something of the sorts. “He’s not worth the heartache you’re putting yourself through. Yes, I know he’s my brother and all and siblings usually defend each other, but you deserve more than someone who can’t even realize that they’re hurting you, much less with one of your best friends, and to me it seems that you have fancied him longer than he’s fancied Elizabeth. You deserve better than that, even if you don’t see that now.”

You didn’t know why you had expected to hear harsh words from her, but these kind words were enough to have you tearing up just as much as, if not more than, the brutal words you awaited. Blinking away your tears, determined not to let her see you cry (since neither of the Frye twins had ever seen you cry), you turned to your friend.

“I don’t know if I can make myself stop, though,” you spoke quietly. “And I guess I saw this coming weeks ago, but I just can’t stop, and I want to so badly.” Oh god, you were about to cry. Dealing with these emotions on your own was bad enough, but finally airing your concerns out loud to someone? You were a wreck waiting to happen, a dam waiting to break. Evie sensed this and squeezed your hand, urging you to continue. “He’s just so perfect in my heart, even if my brain knows he’s far from being that, and watching him and my best friend fawn over each other is so heart wrenching that I don’t even know if my heart can survive this, because I’m pretty damn sure I love him and I know for a fact that he doesn’t and that he would never feel the same because I’m not Elizabeth and I want nothing more than to feel nothing about this.”

Evie allowed for you to rant to her, completely free of any judgement, and pulled you in for a hug just as tears finally fell from your eyes and sobs from your lips, and you stayed like that for a few minutes with your friend comforting you.

You stiffened up as you heard the door to the train car open behind you, but just as quickly as the door opened, it shut again, not giving either of you a chance to see who it was that almost came in. You hoped whoever it was would keep their mouth shut; you didn’t need anyone talking about your breakdown.

“I guess Jacob’s not the only idiot,” you said wearily, wiping away the tears on your cheeks.

“Only if you’re insinuating that we all are idiots, because that’s the only way I’m accepting that statement from you,” she rebutted playfully as you pulled away, rubbing at your eyes.

You smiled at your friend, more than grateful to have had her there to lean on, even if the whole conversation was completely unexpected. “Thank you for this,” you spoke in gratitude after a moment of silence. “You’re probably the only person I could speak to this about.”

“Anytime,” Evie replied and returned your smile.

“I should head out. Elizabeth’s most likely waiting on me right now.” You squeezed Evie in one last hug and stood.

“Just try to remember to not allow-” Evie began, a saying you had heard from her many times before.

“Personal feelings compromise the mission, I know, I know,” you interrupted and finished for her, voice sad as the half-smile you gave her. “I’ve heard you tell Jacob the same thing.” You knew that you would never let your feelings get in the way of any mission, but if emotions were as easy as she was implying, you wouldn’t be in this position. But here you were, and love was a fickle thing that took your heart at the most inconvenient of times. If you could stop loving Jacob at the drop of a dime, you would have already, but it wasn’t that easy. Hopefully Evie would understand that.

~~~~

With breakfast made, you brought out a plate for yourself and for Elizabeth who was already seated at the table, looking over recent news to see if anything came up about her most recent mission. Not that anything would; she was spectacular at what she did and never left any tracks, so there would be absolutely no leads that could even potentially point to her.

“Eat up, we’ve got some scouting to do later today,” you told her, pulling her attention from the newspaper to the smile you gave her. A part of you thought back onto your conversation with Evie from yesterday, but you quickly shoved the thought to the back of your mind. There was no use getting upset all over again.

Elizabeth returned the smile, thanking you for preparing breakfast. “You cook way better than I do, so thanks for not making me cook even though it was my turn.”

“Oh, it’s fine. Just know that I am totally holding this over your head,” you teased, grinning at the thought of what things you could make her do to make a fool of herself.

“No,” she whined, pouting. “I know what that face means, please don’t make me sing in public again! You know I can’t sing! And that was completely embarrassing! I made a fool of myself in front of everyone!”

You tapped your fingertips against each other, scheming already on the many things that could be done. “No promises, if that’s even what I was planning,” you replied to her request with a smirk. “Now, do eat before it gets cold.”

Elizabeth complied, starting on the eggs you had cooked. The house was silent save for the sounds of the two of you eating and the clinking of silverware until your friend broke the silence. “So… I saw you with Evie yesterday,” she stated. “What was that all about? You never cry in front of people.”

Your heart stopped, mind racing and palms sweating as you wondered if she had heard your conversation with Evie. Maybe she was trying to see if you’d lie about it, but she showed no signs of knowing the truth of your conversation. She couldn’t hide anything personal from any of her friends; you knew this.

But you also knew she couldn’t read you very well, and so long as you kept up a charade of sadness–perhaps of mourning–maybe she wouldn’t become suspicious.

You had to think something up, and quick.

Swallowing what food you had in your mouth, you began fabricating a story, pretending to get choked up as you spoke. “I… a letter from my mother arrived a few days ago…” you started. “She said that an old friend of mine had passed, and I know I hadn’t seen him in the longest of times, but hearing of his passing… it was enough to, well, have me crying in front of another.” Oh, that was the weakest story ever! She was bound to see right through it!

Luckily for you, she seemed to believe the lie. Unluckily for you, it seemed to have sparked some anger in her.

“So why did you go to her instead of coming to me?” she interrogated. “We were raised together! We’re practically sisters!”

You only stared at her in shock, surprised at her very negative reaction to what you said.

“We promised each other we would never keep secrets! And here you are, keeping secrets and crying to Evie when I am right here!” She was practically fuming at this point, angered at the prospect of her best friend seeking comfort in the arms of another friend, one you’d known for significantly less time.

“Elizabeth, I was going to tell you,” you tried reasoning, guilt eating at you knowing that she was right. You had made a promise when you were younger to always tell her the truth, but that had stopped when the man you loved started courting your best friend. You couldn’t do that to her, you couldn’t tell her, so here you were, still trying to keep her from knowing about your true feelings. “The thing is that-”

“What, do you like her better than me? Is that it? Would you prefer her to be the person you always lean on? Hmm? Is that it?”

“It’s because I can’t go a single conversation without you making it about yourself! Which you are very obviously doing right now!” you finally shouted back, and while that wasn’t the whole truth, it was part of it. “And nowadays, we can’t have any conversation without you gushing over Jacob and I do not need that! I need a shoulder to cry on, and someone to understand, and you are the opposite of both those things because you can’t possibly understand what I’m going through!” With those words, you left the table and your bewildered best friend as you left the house, plate still half-full with uneaten food.

You needed to breathe. Away from everyone.

~~~~

Your mission went without a hitch later that day, but only because you two had already scouted multiple places together many, many times together; by that point, your scouting missions were already very habit-based, as you knew what to do and how to do it. You only waved Elizabeth off when she tried to bring up your “dead” unnamed friend or apologize for her actions earlier. You couldn’t tell if you were pushing her away because of your guilt or your anger, since both emotions seemed to be meshing into one. You realized that you’d been pushing her away a lot lately in addition to Jacob, and that was based solely around the fact that you hurt any time you saw her and Jacob together or had to listen to one gush about the other.

~~~~

“Alright, here’s what Elizabeth and I gathered yesterday,” were your first words as you walked into the train car you believed Evie would be in, eyes too preoccupied scanning the words on the top parchment to notice what you’d walked into. “It took me all night to condense both of our findings, but I finished before sunrise!” You looked up to see two pairs of eyes staring at you, as opposed to the usual one pair and you stopped in your tracks.

Jacob usually wasn’t in there, but there he was, talking to Evie. And it seemed like you’d interrupted some important conversation as their necks snapped towards you and their eyes bore into you.

“Wow, I didn’t know you actually made use of this room, Jacob. You’re not usually one for any type of planning,” you jested, trying to lighten the mood. When that didn’t work, and they continued staring at you, you set the paper down on the desk. “I… guess I’ll return later to explain it all.” With that, and the discomfort of being stared down, you walked out of the train car, ready to high-tail it back to your house and mostly likely fall into a pit of wondering what you’d done to garner such a reaction from not one, but both of the twins.

Upon hearing footsteps behind you, you turned around, heart racing as soon as you realized it was Jacob. Oh no, what have I done now?

“Hey, can we talk?” he questioned. He looked around the train car for a moment, noticing the rooks inside. “In private?”

Oh shit, I’m in trouble, aren’t I? First, their conversation, and now this? I've fucked something up, haven't I? You could only nod in fear of what this was all about, feeling your hands get clammy as you followed him to an unoccupied train car.

When he turned to you, he must have seen your face, as he was quick to try and calm your nerves. “I’m not here to reprimand you, that’s Evie’s job,” he tried, and while it did calm you down some, it wasn’t enough.

“Then what’s this about? Is it about whatever you were talking about with Evie when I walked in? Because I swear I didn’t hear a thing,” you admitted, wringing your hands together. Wow, he really managed to make you nervous sometimes. Probably the appeal of him, if you were to be honest. He made you nervous and for some reason you liked that. “Like, absolutely nothing. I was reading over those papers and so entranced by them that I wasn’t paying attention to anything, I promise. And I also swear that I didn’t eavesdrop and just pretend to not hear anything, because I would never do that to either of you. Ever. I value the privacy of my friends very much.”

“You’re rambling,” Jacob interrupted with a chuckle, to which you could only reply with a forced one. “And I know you didn’t hear anything, otherwise you would probably be acting different.”

“Sorry,” you apologized. Shaking your head of your previous words, you added, “So what’s this about then?”

He seemed to be stumped at how to start talking to you about whatever was bothering him, so you placed an encouraging hand on his shoulder and gave him a small smile, hoping to coax him into talking about it.

“I know how you feel about me,” he stated after a few moments, as if it were nothing to him even though it was everything to you. And at that, you retracted your hand from his shoulder as if you’d been burned and stepped away. You knew him very well, and you knew he wasn’t fooling around. He was dead serious, and Jacob Frye was never serious around you.

You wished for the world to somehow consume you more than anything in that moment: to get away from the situation. All you could do was turn away from him, fingers in your hair tugging at it in exasperation.

This was horrible–no, worse. This was mortifying. This was the worst thing to ever happen to you. (Though maybe you’d dealt with worse)

Apparently you were much more transparent about your feelings than you originally thought, with both Frye twins having discovered them.

“I guess I’ve always known, but I overheard you talking with Evie the other day and that just solidified things.” Someone, please kill me. “But you do understand that I don’t feel the same, right? I've only ever thought of you as a friend, and this-” he gestured between the two of you, though you were still turned away “-has only ever been completely platonic to me. I’m in love with Elizabeth, and that’s not going to change, I’m sorry. I never wanted for this to happen, but I thought that maybe at some point you would stop having these feelings for me and maybe-”

“Maybe what, Jacob?” you blurted out, hoping to end this conversation soon. “You knew I had feelings for you and you just let me keep thinking that maybe you would feel the same way at some point? If you knew and didn’t feel the same, why not come to me earlier?” God, take me now and erase my entire existence. “Or did you just expect for me to stop liking you after you started showing interest in my best friend, knowing that I liked you? Hmm?”

“Look, I understand where you’re coming from, I really do, but you could have avoided this all. You shouldn’t even be reacting like this; I’m simply trying to tell you to not get your hopes up and that you shouldn’t be feeling so betrayed.” He seemed to be getting defensive.

“Oh, you understand where I’m coming from, do you?” You finally turned to look back at him, teary-eyed, which he had never seen you. His defensiveness quickly faded at the look of pain in your eyes and the flare of your nostrils. “What if Elizabeth had started showing interest in one of your friends after you’d already liked her for a few months? Hmm? And then she began constantly coming to you and asking you for favors to pass things along to him like messages or gifts, and he the same for her? Hmm?? Started courting him and having them both constantly thanking you for helping? What then? You still think I could have avoided all of this?” There was no pause in your words long enough to give Jacob a chance to interject, though the look of surprise in his eyes showed that he had nothing to say and that perhaps he was starting to truly see things from your perspective. “You don’t understand, you could never even begin to, so do not come and tell me that I could have avoided all of this, because you even don’t know what this feels like or what I’m going through!” you seethed, tears blurring your vision as you turned away and walked to the door, ready to just run out.

“And don't you dare utter a word of any of this to Elizabeth, or I will kill you. I don't want her getting hurt.”

With those final words, you left a perplexed Jacob behind and jumped off the train to the tracks, rolling in order to brace the impact. You didn’t stumble as you left the tracks and headed to anywhere but your home or the train, still as graceful as ever because even though your pain was great and your eyes were blurred by tears, your anger at the world was more than enough to compensate.

~~~~

The next few days passed in a blur with you avoiding anyone you knew or that could recognize you, all rooks included. You didn’t need any of them alerting the “boss man” of where you were, which was pretty much anywhere and everywhere. You needed time to think everything through, since in the past week it felt like everything was crumbling around you. After a while, you realized that you’d been wrong to treat Jacob and Elizabeth like that. While they had been ignorant to your feelings, you had spent a long time lying to your best friend and hiding the truth from the other. The way you began distancing yourself from them was not how you should have dealt with any of this.

“You’re a difficult person to track down,” a voice brought you from your reverie.

You were seated atop a building, watching some children play from your vantage point.

“Only when I really want to be,” you replied, turning to Jacob as he sat beside you.

“I was able to find you, so maybe work on that a bit.” His attempt a jest drew a chuckle from your lips.

“I let you find me. I knew one of those kids down there would see me and I knew at least one of you would be looking for me. Sooner or later, one of them was going to tell you where I was.” Truth be told, you were ready to talk to someone, but you didn’t want to be the one to seek them out. And it all worked out, given that he was sitting here next to you. You turned back to the playing children and waved down at them, one of them immediately waving back at you before he went back to the others.

“Hm, I guess you are great at this already,” Jacob commented in appraisal, not having realized that he was quite literally being led to you only because you wanted that.

Silence took over for a few moments before you shattered it with your apology. “I’m sorry.”

“I am too.”

“But you were right. I could have avoided this, but I foolishly allowed myself to think that maybe at some point you would feel the same even after you had begun trying to court Elizabeth, and then I took my anger out on you and I shouldn’t have done that,” you explained yourself, being sincere with everything you were saying and upon turning to him, you noticed he had his full attention on you. Any other day, this would have been a thing of your dreams. Today? You understood that nothing more would ever come and that this was only ever going to be just two friends talking to each other.

“You were right too,” he finally spoke upon realizing you had no more to add. “I didn’t understand, and getting so defensive about it wasn’t going to make anything any better. I should be the one apologizing.”

“Too bad, I already apologized first.” You smiled at him.

“Everything has always got to be a competition with you, hasn’t it?” he questioned back at your remark, a similar smile on his lips.

“I have to prove myself somehow,” you retorted, laughing. Your conversation came to a lull, though neither of you seemed to take any problem with that. As a matter of fact, it seemed that the conflict between you two had been resolved, even if neither of you accepted the other’s apology.

“If it’s any consolation,” he tried filling the silence, you turning to him, “I think that if either one of us had a different occupation, maybe we could have been together.” You sighed at that, but offered him a smile nonetheless. “The main reason I think we can’t be together now or that I don’t return your feelings is that you are too much like me. One of me is enough, but with the notoriety you've seemed to gain since arriving, your recklessness in addition to mine, would have made for an ending that would always include the death of either of us. Elizabeth has been able to stick to the shadows more, so she’s not well-known to anyone other than us. And she is less reckless, which is what I think I need,” he explained. To this, he quickly added, “Don’t tell Evie that. I don’t need her head growing any larger if she thinks that I agree with her.” 

You chuckled. “Only if you promise not to tell Elizabeth that I had feelings for you this whole time. I don’t want her to know,” you compromised, to which he agreed with a nod.

Yet another lull came in the conversation, you wishing up the courage to say what you needed to say. With a sigh, you finally aired your thoughts.

“After we’ve gotten rid of the grandmaster, I think I’m going to head back home.”

To this, Jacob turned to you. “Well yes, I would hope so. Everyone’s worried. As a matter of fact, I think now might be a better time to return home.”

He was either extremely dense, or playing the fool.

You gave him a pointed look. “I meant home home. Back to the states,” you clarified. “And before you say anything, it is not because of you and Elizabeth. When we came here, I knew I wouldn’t stay long after our orders had been completed, and I’ve been missing home terribly. I made up my mind weeks ago that I should head back.” He stared at you with a look of sadness, causing you to turn away. You didn’t ever want to see that look from him again. “It’s where my life is, and it’s where I want to settle down some day, near my family.”

Out of the corner of your eye, you saw him nod in resignation, knowing there wasn’t much he could say about it since it was your life.

“I don’t want to see you go, but if that is what you truly want, it’s okay with me,” he ceded. “Have you told Elizabeth?”

“Not yet, but I’m guessing she knows. Besides, the brotherhood is most likely going to send me somewhere else anyways to aid the cause while I am still in my physical prime. I just want to be with my family whenever I can, and it’s been months at this point.” You didn’t want to leave them because you knew that you probably would never get as close to anyone ever again as you did with the Frye twins, but while you still had family waiting for you in the states, you would try and see them as often as possible. Elizabeth would probably find a way to convince everyone back home and the brotherhood to allow her to stay in London, maybe with the help of the twins, so there would be another thing you left behind.

“Promise you’ll visit,” he spoke. 

“You think I would leave my best friends behind forever?” you replied earnestly, smiling over at him. “You truly are an idiot.”

~~~~

Jacob was right about his worries when he feared that if you had gotten together that something bad would happen. Your notoriety seemed to catch up to you as a few weeks after, your position in a mission had been compromised, leading to some templars to finding your whereabouts and abducting you and bringing you to a stronghold. They staged an ambush to trap the twins and lure them to their demise, and had you and Jacob been together, he might have been reckless in trying to get you back. But the twins were tactful about it, despite the falling out they had recently seemed to have, and expecting the ambush, they were able to get you out just in time, and you left there alive. Had he been reckless, you might have died, and they might have too.

He was right, and you would have to begrudgingly accept the fact that he was.

~~~~

You wished to had been there with the twins when they ultimately defeated Starrick a few days after, but between your still-healing wounds (which Elizabeth treated, after you two had mended your relationship with apologies) and there only having been two invitations to the ball, you and Elizabeth had been stuck playing the waiting game.

Hours later, the twins and Henry were back with their fair share of injuries and it seemed like a celebration was in order, which was why you had all packed into a nearby pub and were currently drinking, congratulations being thrown left and right, as it had been a team effort. Everything had gone back to normal with everyone, but everything just felt so much better now that you didn’t have that ever-looming presence of the absolute bastard known as the grandmaster of the templar order in London.

Which also meant you had no reason to not leave anymore, even if you wanted to stay here with your friends forever. And you had to tell them.

“Now that the templars have been decimated-” your sentence was cut off by cheering from the table- “I have something that I’ve been meaning to tell all of you.” You didn’t want to say goodbye, but you weren’t leaving just yet, so this didn’t have to be a goodbye. “I am going back home, to the states.” You added the clarification, hoping that no one would think what Jacob had thought you meant. “It’s not been the easiest decision, but I hadn’t made plans to stay long after the death of the grandmaster, if we even got this far.” The faces of your friends around you fell, though Jacob looked none too surprised, earning an elbow to the side from Elizabeth.

“You knew? And didn’t try to convince her to stay?” she chastised him.

You laughed at that. “Trust me, I don’t think anyone could convince me otherwise.”

Elizabeth sighed in resignation. 

“We’ll miss you around here,” Evie interjected, sending you a smile. 

“Well I sure hope so! I did not waste almost a year of my life here for none of you to miss me!” you tried lightening the mood, succeeding when your friends laughed.

~~~~

They convinced you to stay another month; “tying up loose ends,” they had told you. And you conceded, wanting to spend as much time with them as you could.

But you knew you had to leave sooner rather than later or you would probably never leave.

(Maybe that was their plan)

They had seen you cry before, and while you wanted to cry now as you hugged them each one last time before boarding the ship, you wanted their last sight of you in a while to be a smile. You didn’t want the image to be ruined with tears rolling down your cheeks. 

You would be back in London soon enough.

After all, Elizabeth would want her best friend there for her wedding.

The Vintage Joshifer Series: End of Love—Chapter 19

End of Love by hutchhitched

A kazillion years ago, I started posting this story. I never intended for it to drag on this long in between updates, but life happens and so does writer’s block. I know there’s little readership in the Joshifer fandom anymore, but I needed to finish it. If you’re still around to read it, thank you. If you want to dive in, I’d appreciate it. You definitely don’t have to be a Joshifer fan to read it since Josh and Jen’s characters are historical actors and not versions of their modern selves.

Historical events in this chapter include the following:

Richard Nixon won the presidential election of 1968. He triumphed over Vice President Humphrey and third party candidate George Wallace, who famously defended segregation at the University of Alabama earlier in the decade. Nixon won by appealing to the Silent Majority, those who believed the radicalism of the 1960s had gone too far. During his presidency he worked to build a national Republican Party after it all but disappeared during the Great Depression during the 1930s. Nixon called this the Southern Strategy (downplaying civil rights by rejecting the GOP’s original stance of the anti-slavery party in 1860, when Lincoln won the election).

After winning the election, Nixon did stop further troop deployments to Vietnam and reduced the numbers already there. Instead, he instituted a bombing campaign of the Vietnam and neighboring Laos and Cambodia. This was called Vietnamization.

 Chicago, Illinois, November 1968

 “Hutch, what’s good?”

 “Andre, my man. It’s been too long.” Josh clapped his friend on the back and welcomed him into headquarters. Volunteers buzzed around them, and Josh reminded himself that spending time with a good friend in from out of town for a day was just as important as working to support the Democratic candidate for president—even though Josh was almost positive his party was going to lose the election.

 Nothing had been the same since Bobby died. The Kennedy magic was gone. Instead of the former Attorney General being the nominee, the current VP who was tainted by LBJ’s Americanization strategy in Vietnam would likely lose to Nixon. If that happened, and it almost certainly would, he knew the positive changes in civil rights and economic equality would disappear with when the GOP took power. It was beyond comprehension, but election day loomed in two days. Two days until the world fell apart.

 “Let’s grab lunch,” Andre suggested. When Josh hesitated, he offered, “My treat.”

 Reluctantly, Josh agreed, and they headed down the street to a local diner he and his friends had frequented during the campaign season. He settled into the booth and stared across the table at his friend. It had been too long. Since that night with the two girls. Before he admitted how much he cared about Jennifer. When he hadn’t sold out.

 “Fucking Nixon,” his friend swore, and Josh grinned. Leave it to Andre to put everything in the bluntest format possible.

 “What the fuck is ‘the silent majority’ anyway?” Josh asked with a roll of his eyes. “Too fucking scared to speak up for what’s right? Racist a majority of the time?”

 Josh was sick to death of Nixon’s campaign strategy—catering to what he termed the “Silent Majority,” a group the Republican candidate insisted comprised the bulk of American society and were sick of the protests in the country. Nixon argued conservatives who were okay with the status quo were the majority in the nation and only radicals demanded change from the government in treatment of women and minorities. It wasn’t true, but a lot of people bought it. Josh just assumed that meant most people were god damned stupid.

 No matter how hard he and other activists worked to right wrongs and get real democracy to win out against conservative assholes, they were met with GOP rhetoric that villainized the very people he’d marched with, who’d sat next to him in jail, who burned their draft cards along with him in unheard protests against American presence in Vietnam.

 Of course, the New Left had grown more radical, pushed for more change and faster, dropped out, doped up, and raged against Johnson’s administration. The problem was he and the other activists had worked and fought and hoped for real change, and the administration and rest of the nation was dragging its collective feet. Josh’s question was why hadn’t more people sought to right the wrongs he and so many of this friends saw as glaring inequalities that only weakened the state of the nation rather than strengthening it. It was time. It was past time, and he was getting really antsy.

 “So, how have you been? Really?” Andre asked. “The last time I saw you, you were hightailing it out of bed with two women in New Haven and coming here to get your girl. Seems like different priorities.”

 Josh shook his head and tried to work his mind around his friend’s words. He’d been feeling unsettled for a long while, but the conflict between him and Jennifer had been growing since the protests in August and her trip to Atlantic City to cover the pageant. He’d considered leaving while she was gone, but he couldn’t quite make himself slink away like a coward. He still had work to do in Chicago, and he loved his…whatever she was to him. They’d been living together for months, but he hated labels. She hadn’t pushed, and he’d been grateful for her willingness to let it go.

 But this election would change everything. He knew it, and he also knew he was biding his time.

 “I don’t know, man. It’s such a bad scene right now. Since Bobby and King and ’Nam and everything, this country’s a bomb.”

 “But you’re a good cat, Josh. You’re making things better.”

 Josh laughed and smiled ruefully. “Am I? It seems to me I’m getting laid a lot by a doll who works for the man instead of the people.”

 “Do you love her?”

 “I…” Josh paused and swallowed hard. He did. That wasn’t in question but admitting it was another thing completely. “She’s fab. She is.”

 “But?”

 “I should be doing more,” he admitted. “I don’t know what, but I keep feeling like I should bug out and work somewhere else. Or dropout all together. Go live with the beautiful people and leave everything behind. Get high and blitzed and commune with nature.”

 Andre took a bite of his burger and shrugged. “Sounds like heaven to me, man, but I don’t think you’d be happy that way. You’re going steady, right?”

 “I’m not sure—”

 “Hutch. Man. You’ve been shacked up with her for months. You’re not sleeping with anyone else. Tune in. You’re together, and you’ve been head over heels for her since college. Wake up,” Andre said, exasperated.

 Josh sat silently for several minutes as he processed the information. No one had forced him to face what was happening until now, and he wasn’t sure he liked what he saw. Jen left him the night of his graduation. Maybe he’d never really forgiven her for that. Perhaps that’s why escaping was always in the back of his mind, to punish her for hurting him so much. Or, it was also possible that he really wasn’t comfortable in such a position. He’d always been restless, always been someone who pushed the boundaries, and falling in love with Jennifer, who came from privilege and affluence, didn’t seem like it fit. None of this was fair to her, but that didn’t change how he felt.

 “Maybe I am,” he admitted, “but I’m not sure it’s enough.”

 “Then be up front with her once you figure it out. You both deserve that.”

 “After the election,” Josh breathed. “After Tuesday.”

 “By then we’ll know if the world’s ending or not.”

 “Right on.”

 ****

 The world ended. Josh sat on the couch in Jen’s apartment as the sun set and the room darkened around him. He’d chosen to watch by himself, unsure how he’d feel when Nixon and Spiro Agnew were declared winners and all the gains over the past eight years would be overturned in a matter of time. Jen was at work, covering local reaction to the election results, and he’d intentionally not watched with his activist friends. Hippies were either remarkably anti-political or flying high, and he needed to be lucid and engaged for this.

 Election results rolled in one after another, and none of it was good for the Democrats. Texas went blue, but the West went red. Big time. George Wallace stole the South for the Dixiecrats, who couldn’t reconcile themselves to JFK or LBJ’s Democratic party of Civil Rights but weren’t on board with the GOP either. A hundred years prior, Republicans were the party of Lincoln and “freed” the slaves.

 “People are fucking stupid,” Josh spat into the emptiness. “Racist fucks. God bless Texas for sticking it out.”

 One by one the states reported, and his hope for the future of his country sunk lower with each call for Nixon. At least there was hope for a pullout in Vietnam. That was big, but would that be enough to make up for what would happen domestically? If Johnson had been able to focus on his Great Society instead of getting caught up in Southeast Asia, things could have been so different.

 “Fuck the Cold War. Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

 When Nixon got 270 votes, Josh lit up a joint and took a long, hard drag. He stared at the TV, the electoral map, the celebration in California at Nixon’s headquarters, the concession speech by Humphrey. His muscles relaxed, his mind wandered, and he turned off the part of him that cared. He started drinking next, and he was blitzed by the time Jen returned. She looked at him, her face a mask of concern mixed with a hint of fear, and he knew she dreaded what he already knew he’d have to do soon. He couldn’t stay. He just couldn’t. He already couldn’t breathe, and the election wasn’t even official yet.

 Jennifer curled up on his lap, and he let her undress him. He couldn’t move. His limbs weighed a million pounds apiece, and he couldn’t feel anything except despair. She kissed him, and he responded, but he didn’t feel anything.

 “Josh?”

 He heard his name, but she was a million miles away from him. Her voice was barely audible, and her face swam in his vision. He wanted to leave, to getaway, to run. He must have vocalized his desperation because Jen raised her hand so he could see her palm. Four sugar cubes lay there, and he breathed a prayer of thanks as he put one on his tongue.

 Josh had tripped before, but none of the other acid he’d taken had given him quite the same effect. The apartment bent and sparkled as the drug spread through his system. Jen’s eyes shone beams of sunlight, and he swore rainbows spilled out of her mouth and ears. He tried to swallow them, his mouth against hers, his fingers wrapped in liquid gold that flowed from her temples and past her shoulders. He was warm and flying and soaring above the earth, and he felt nothing except his skin against hers.

 Every nerve ending was on fire, and her fingers against his chest created bright purple sparks that exploded into golden stars. She straddled him and rocked against him, and he idly wondered why. His lap was warm and damp. His mouth swallowed the diamonds on her chest, hard and cutting against his tongue. Jen’s head fell back, and he realized the diamonds were tits. He bit down hard on her nipple, and she screamed. It sounded like a folk song, a call for peace and justice.

 She grew louder, and he sang with her. Her name fell from his lips, a litany of what was right with the world and everything that was dreadfully wrong. He needed her, and he had to escape. Tears streamed down his face and they glistened from her eyelashes. He palmed her ass and counted the contractions as she milked his cock. They were fucking, he realized. It felt like he was flying, but instead, he was shoving her onto the floor, bending her in half, and rutting against her.

 The floor underneath him shook and exploded into fiery heat. A vice gripped his cock. A melody of praise. Flashing lights. Unicorns flew by his head. His dad walked toward him, out of his wheelchair. His grandfather waved hi, even though he’d died several years ago. Josh wondered if he was going crazy, but he didn’t really care.

 Josh sat up, and Jen lay in a heap on the floor. His right hand jacked his dick mindlessly. It was wet and sticky, just like the puddle beneath his girlfriend. That’s what she was, he admitted. It was easier in his altered state, easier to accept the truth that they were together. She was radiant, skin glowing, as she watched his hand get faster and faster.

 When she spoke, it was in a foreign language. Urdu, maybe, or ancient Greek. Whatever it was made complete sense to him.

 “Jerk it, baby.”

 She reached over and took his cock from him, and he realized he was the one talking, not her.

 “I don’t know Urdu,” he slurred.

 “I do,” she said before swallowing him.

 Her cheeks hallowed out, and he fucked her mouth hard. He was crying, and she joined him as he thrust down her throat.

 “Did I hurt you?” he asked, although he was still inside her. He should have asked if he was hurting her because he hadn’t stopped. He didn’t want to stop. He didn’t want to leave. He didn’t want to go.

 He had to. He had to. He had to. He had to.

 His body split in two. Part of him drifted up to the ceiling and danced there on happy feet. The other sank into the floor in a puddle of melted wax. Streaks of cream-colored icing decorated Jen’s face, and he leaned over to lick her cheek clean. It wasn’t sweet enough. Needed more sugar.

 They had two more cubes. One on his tongue. One on hers. They stumbled to the bedroom. He flew around the room, his wings flapping, circling and swooping and riding the currents. He landed on the bed. The lights went out. She was on top. She was on his face. He was in her mouth. Waterfalls. Waves. Giggles and jokes and mapping body parts with tongues and fingers and marking each other with bands of dried moisture.

 Hours and minutes and seconds and days and decades and centuries passed. No time passed at all, and then a curtain pulled behind his eyes, and he slept.

 ****

 The next morning dawned with a throbbing headache, aching limbs, and a broken heart. He opened his eyes, and he instantly regretted losing control so badly the night before. Their bed was destroyed. The sheets were filthy, striped with evidence of multiple orgasms. The room stunk like sex and piss. His mouth tasted as if something had died inside, and he wanted to murder someone when he saw Jen curled into herself.

 Josh hadn’t been in control of himself last night, and he was scared to death he’d hurt her. She didn’t warrant that. She deserved better than him. She should be lavished with only the best. He’d always been less than he wanted for her.

 He vowed to do better.

 ****

 On Inauguration Day, he wasn’t doing better. January 20 came and went, and Josh had spiraled into a mess. High every day, he’d fallen into a cycle of depression and spent more days on his friend’s couches than doing anything even remotely productive. He was twenty-five and hated what he’d become. He had a brief moment of clarity on New Year’s Eve when he was convinced 1969 would be a good year, but then Nixon took office.

 The new president catered to racist southerners and turned a blind eye to FBI stings targeting the Black Panthers. Riots broke out, more men came home in body bags, and women raged. Jen stayed busy at work, while he tuned out. He avoided his family and Jackson’s. He barely talked to Jen. He was a mess, and he knew it.

 A few weeks after the inauguration, Nixon announced a reduction of American troops in Vietnam, and his younger brother called him from Stanford where he was enrolled in his first year of grad school.

 “The son of a bitch did it,” his brother said when Josh answered the phone.

 Josh blinked rapidly and attempted to ground himself. He was high, as usual, and he found he needed to concentrate inordinately hard to understand what the words his brother spoke meant.

 “Did what?” he garbled and slid down the wall to sit on the kitchen floor.

 “Nixon. He’s pulling us out of ’Nam. We’re safe.”

 “Safe?” he asked. “Safe from what?”

 “What’s wrong with you, man? Are you tripping?”

 “Not today,” Josh sighed and grinned dopily at the wall. “Maybe tomorrow. Definitely was yesterday.”

 Connor grunted in frustration and snarled into the phone, “Have you been paying attention to what’s happening? We’re not going to Vietnam. No more new troops. A pullback of boots on the ground. They’re calling it Vietnamization.”

 “Yay, America…” Josh drawled and waved his finger in the air in celebration.

 “Come to Cali, man. I’ll help you get straight.”

 “Why bother?” Josh asked. “It’s all going to hell anyway.”

 “Just come,” his brother insisted. “I don’t know what’s happened to you, but you’re not the big brother I know. You wanted to save the world, not wallow.”

 “We lost. As soon as Bobby died, it was over.”

 “If you’re not here in four days, I’m coming to get you,” Connor threatened. “Mom and Dad don’t need to know about this, but I’ll tell them if I have to.”

 “Don’t tell them,” Josh entreated. “Dad can’t take the stress. I’ll be there.”

 “Four days.”

 Josh replaced the receiver and looked around the apartment. There were so many good things about his relationship with Jennifer. He’d loved her for a very long time, but he wasn’t where he needed to be—physically or mentally. He wasn’t an undergrad anymore, and he wasn’t doing anything to help the world. He was dragging her down, and the last thing he wanted to do was make life worse for her. Whether or not he liked it, Nixon was the president for the foreseeable future. Josh needed a change of scenery, and his kid brother was a genius. If anyone could help him get back on track, it was Connor.

 With a breaking heart, he entered the bedroom, grabbed a rucksack and started packing. He shoved his clothes into the bag but was careful to leave some of his things that Jen loved to wear when they were alone in their apartment. He grabbed a few books—his dog-eared copies of The Catcher in the Rye, Howl, and On the Road—and his toothbrush. He shuffled through a stack of papers and found his draft card, which he shoved in his front pocket. Once he got to Palo Alto, he and Connor could burn them together in celebration. When he had everything he needed, he grabbed a pencil and a notepad and wrote Jen a note.

 Dear Jen,

 I know you’ve been expecting this for a while, but I didn’t mean to leave while you were at work. I know I have to, though, or I won’t be able to walk away. I’ve loved you since the moment I saw you at Berkeley, but I was too stubborn and terrified to admit it. You’ve always had the same fire as me, even if it’s been directed somewhere else than mine. I’ve lost myself. I’ve got to find the spark again. You deserve that. You’ve always been better than me. You shouldn’t settle for someone broken. Right now, I am. When I’m fixed, I’ll let you know. I love you. Don’t ever doubt that. You’ve been the best part of me for a very long time. I’m so sorry.

 Always, Josh

 He was crying by the time he finished writing. He’d put this off for so long because he wasn’t strong enough to leave, but Connor’s phone call had woken something in him he hadn’t been able to find for ages. He’d call her in a few months—once he had himself together again. He wouldn’t leave her without any word, the way she had with him. He wondered for a second if he was punishing her because of what she’d done, but leaving her was much more of a penalty for him than it was for her.

 He swiped at the note he wrote her, and the tear that had fallen smeared his name. He was already fading in this place. All that was left was to walk out the door.

 Just as he turned to go, he noticed a picture of her peeking out from the corner of her desk. Her long hair was down and falling over her shoulders in blonde waves. She wore a white, high-collared lace dress that made her look like an angel. He tucked the image in his wallet and grabbed his bag before slipping through the door and locking it.

 He was to the bus station within ten minutes and halfway across the state before she found the note. He was almost to California before she stopped crying.

Close to you [Nor/Ice, Fic]

Title: Close to you Author: @rukkilill Prompt: Norway, Iceland - Comfort - Modern Rating: 10+ Content notes: Nor/Ice. Established relationship. 2k length. Summary: Iceland can't remember the last time he's seen Norway looking so exhausted.

It wasn't very often that Iceland saw Norway looking like a frazzled mess. Usually, he managed to appear really put-together, calm and steady and unruffled, even when he had a lot on his plate. That was why, when Iceland went to pick Norway up at the airport, he was surprised to find him looking completely exhausted, with eyes heavy from lack of sleep and his hair, usually so tidy, sticking out in all directions. "Wow, you – uh. Hi, Norway?" "'S good to see you, too." Norway looked as if he might fall over right there on the spot. Iceland decided that it was best not to comment on that. When Norway hugged him, he took forever to let go, but Iceland endured the embarrassment and let him do it. He wanted to say, "You aren't going to collapse on me, are you?" Instead, Iceland gently pried Norway off, took his baggage from him, and held his tongue as they headed out to the car. It wasn't until they were on the road to Reykjavík that Iceland decided to say anything. "Long flight?" he asked, glancing out of the corner of his eye at the exhausted lump in the passenger seat. Norway grunted, pressing his eyes shut. "Weren't only the flight." "Oh?" "Met with America. On business." Oh. That explained everything. Both of them liked America on a personal level; he was warm and friendly enough, if a bit too energetic, and fun to spend time with in small doses. But Iceland had to admit that he sometimes found America exhausting – and that was even when they were talking as friends, never mind their international relations. Matters of business were something else, though, and Iceland didn't envy Norway one bit if that was the reason he'd been over there. Iceland didn't say anything; just reached over and gave Norway's hand a squeeze. No need to talk for now. He got the point. They stayed quiet through the rest of the drive. It wasn't until they stepped into Iceland's house that either of them spoke. "If you want to lie down, I–" "No. Not yet. Put the coffee on, will you?" Iceland frowned, glancing at Norway before moving to hang up his coat. "You don't want some sleep?" he asked, trying to hide the concern in his voice. Norway didn't look much better now than he had at the airport. Who wouldn't want to rest after all that? "Slept on the plane." Yeah right, Iceland thought. Sure you did. He didn't believe it at all. But by the firm set of Norway's eyes, and the stubborn look he gave Iceland before going to sink down on the couch, it was best not to speak his mind. Iceland knew that they were both sometimes way too stubborn, insistent on having things a certain way even when they knew better... but Norway, as far as Iceland saw it, was the worst between the two of them. Oh, well. It was impossible to argue with him. He put the coffee on, at Norway's insistence, then went to join him in the living room. After spending all morning tidying the place up, Iceland was sure it was presentable. But Norway was the kind of person who sprinkled well-meaning critical comments whenever he thought they were necessary, and he expected some of that. It wouldn't be his first time on the receiving end of Norway's nitpicking. But no comments came. Nothing. Iceland sank down onto the sofa, and Norway flopped over to rest his head on Iceland's lap without a word. "Wow," Iceland said, unable to believe it. "You really are exhausted." He slipped Norway's hair through his fingers, brushing his fringe out of his face. Norway sighed under the touch, his eyes drifting shut. "Meetin' went like expected, is all. That guy's impossible." "Oh?" "Mmhm. An' his brother ain't much better, even if he likes to pretend he is." "You met with both of them?" "Aye. And what a colossal waste of time that was. Heads up their ass, the both of them, and gettin' worse. You'll see for yourself at the next Arctic Council meeting." Iceland tilted his head, listening as he kept stroking Norway's hair. If Norway was going to direct his criticism at the North American brothers, he wasn't going to try to dissuade him. But hearing Norway talk about them like that was pretty novel; that meeting must have been more frustrating than expected. "I wonder if they think the same thing about us," he mused. Norway let out a soft huff of a laugh. "Probably," he said. "Wouldn't be surprised." "But there's no way we're as annoying as those two." "'Course not. Still got a load of growing up to do, those 'uns." Blinking his eyes open, Norway looked up at Iceland for a moment. "Come down here, will you?" By now, Iceland knew what Norway actually meant when he said something like that. And he also knew that it was a request, even if it didn't sound like one. But that was fine. He dipped his head, cupping Norway's cheek as he pressed a gentle kiss to his mouth. The kiss was as soft and sleepy as Norway himself. Iceland let it linger a moment before breaking it, brushing another kiss to his forehead. You really need to get to bed, he thought. Would Norway go if he insisted on it? Probably not. He was the worst kind of stubborn. Not for the first time, Iceland found himself wishing he could throw Norway over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, and haul him around wherever, no matter how much Norway would protest about that. But it was impossible. They were almost the same height. And Norway was the stronger of the two of them, and always had been. And – "What's on your mind?" Norway murmured, sleepily kissing at Iceland's cheek. "Um..." Iceland felt his face heating as a blush spread over it. There was no way he could lie; Norway always noticed when he did. Years of knowing each other had given Norway the uncanny ability to see right through him. But maybe he could put a different spin on it. "I... was wishing that I could sweep you off your feet?" "That so." "Yeah. I mean... you know, like, it would be really romantic and stuff." Norway quieted for a moment. He reached up to touch Iceland's face, brushing the pad of his thumb over his cheek. "If ya' want to take me to bed, you just have to say so," Norway said, sounding way too amused about everything. But I already asked you twice! Iceland thought, exasperated. "But..." "I don't mind, y'know. It's been a while since we saw each other last, ain't it." After a moment, Iceland realized what he meant. He opened his mouth to protest, then shut it. Sitting up properly, he stared down at Norway, unable to believe it. Really? he thought, raising an eyebrow. Even though he didn't say it, he didn't have to. Norway just lifted an eyebrow right back, as if it was a perfectly normal suggestion. ...Well. For Norway, maybe it was a normal suggestion. Sometimes it was hard to tell with that guy. "Not right now," Iceland said, blushing even more deeply from the whole ridiculous conversation. "No?" "No! I mean. You aren't serious, are you?" "No." Norway sighed, sitting up. He swept his fingers through his hair. Closed his eyes for a moment as he thought things over. "But might be that you were right. Rest wouldn't be such a bad idea." That's what I've been trying to tell you, Iceland thought. Somehow, he managed to keep the exasperation from showing on his face. "I'll wake you up in an hour or two. Okay?" he asked, leaning over to kiss Norway's cheek. "Have a nap for a while." And then maybe you won't be so weird, he thought. "Fine, then. You win." Finally. Iceland nudged Norway toward the bedroom with as much insistence as he could manage. To his relief, Norway didn't complain much. He went without any more of that stubbornness, and let Iceland return to the kitchen to plan dinner. Pouring himself a coffee, Iceland listened, and waited. First came the sound of the shower. Not long after that, he heard the click of the bedroom door closing. Norway made good on his word. Finally, Iceland thought, more than a little bit relieved. What had made Norway so clingy? Iceland tried to puzzle it out as he thumbed through his recipe books, distracted by the thought. It was true that Norway was always a little bit weird, and he certainly hadn't been any less weird toward Iceland since their relationship had become more... intimate. But this time was a bit different from the usual. Why? Iceland paced around the kitchen, trying to think. Stopped and stared out the window for a bit, as if he might find an answer there, in the late afternoon sunlight. Nope. Normally when Norway visited him, it wasn't after a trans-Atlantic flight. Hopping over from his own place to visit Iceland wasn't much of a bother. But coming from America? That was another thing altogether. Surely he would have wanted rest after that, but maybe more than that, he'd wanted company. And then there was the meeting that he'd come from, the reason he'd been over there in the first place. There were some nations that Norway had lots of patience for, but America wasn't really one of them. Maybe now that he was here, he only wanted to spend some time close to someone that he understood better. Chewing at his lower lip, Iceland decided that must be it. It made as much sense as anything else. The afternoon sunlight spilled into the bedroom, partly obscured by the blind over the window. Iceland didn't bother turning on the lamp. Just stood in the doorway, hesitating, wondering if he should wake Norway. Norway had tucked himself into bed. He'd changed clothes after the shower, throwing on some pyjamas. Damp, towel-mussed hair curled in waves as it dried. As Iceland watched, Norway sighed, pulling the blanket more tightly around himself. So he wasn't properly asleep, then. Silently, Iceland drifted over and sank down onto the edge of the bed. Norway's eyes fluttered, but didn't open. "What time is it?" Norway murmured. "A bit past five." Iceland reached out, brushing a strand of hair away from Norway's cheek, tucking it behind his ear. "We can have supper soon if you want? Or, um. You could sleep longer. It doesn't matter to me." "Stay here for a bit, would you." Well, that wasn't really a proper answer, but fine. Iceland stayed, stroking at Norway's face, flushing a little as Norway turned his head to graze his lips against his fingertips. "Downright foolish, I was." Norway's voice was soft, dozy. "Bein' like that." "What?" "Before. Earlier." "Oh." Iceland thought about it, brushing his thumb over Norway's lips. "Well..." "Well?" "Yeah. A little foolish, I guess." The soft huff of a laugh. A kiss to his knuckles, light and fleeting. "More than a little, I'd think." Iceland didn't answer that. If Norway was willing to admit that he'd been annoying, then Iceland wasn't going to pretend otherwise. But that didn't mean he couldn't ask about it. "Why?" "These last few days made me feel like I'm a million years old. Havin' a word with those two. Then the travel. And then when I saw you... well." Norway sighed, nuzzling at Iceland's hand. "Didn't want to be apart from you for even one blink." Iceland could feel his insides twisting. There was something about the way he put it, the way Norway said it. Iceland knew what he meant. That need for closeness, to be near someone. He'd felt that way before. Plenty of times. Especially when it came to Norway. In that light, all the clinginess made perfect sense. "That's okay," he said softly. "I'm right here." "Aye, that you are." "And you aren't going anywhere. You're staying for a while, right?" Norway's eyes finally cracked open, those deep blue eyes watching Iceland from behind long lashes. "I am," he said. "A week, if you'll have me." There were times when Iceland would have thought a week would be way too much, no matter how close they were to each other. And there were even times when he might have said so. This wasn't one of those times. Bending down, he kissed Norway's cheek, then his lips. The kiss was lingering, soft, close. Neither of them was going anywhere at all.

An Unwise Murder (An Inconvenient Survival)

Summary: “Someone within SHIELD sold out an Avenger. That was their first mistake.” When Avenger Steve Rogers is declared killed in action, everyone expects his best friend and fellow agent Bucky Barnes to go on a rampage. It’s the quirky mechanic with a sharp tongue and a secret talent for less-than-legal hacking that throws the whole agency for a loop. Featuring: A dead Steve (but when is Steve ever dead), a very pissed off, fucked-up secret agent Bucky (so basically your usual Bucky), and a very civilian Tony (who is exactly as harmless as you’d expect Tony Stark to be).

Read on AO3

Here is, as promised, the first part of the Double-0-Bucky/Hacker-Tony fic! To most of you, this part will probably be familiar already, but we have to start at the beginning *shrugs* and don’t worry, the next part will follow soon. Enjoy!

Part I 

Funerals aren’t meant to be a pleasant event, so Bucky doesn’t bother to put on a show.

His face could be carved in stone for all the emotion it conveys, and his muscles are tense, coiled, trembling faintly with the desire to grab his gun and pull the damn trigger.

Bucky isn’t sure if he’d stop shooting once he starts though. Not with how many tempting targets currently surround him. Not with how it would finally shut Pierce the fuck up. People tend to talk a lot less after you’ve emptied a magazine or two into them  — and Bucky has always been a man who appreciates silence.

Fuck, Bucky doesn’t even know what he’s here for. He doesn’t attend mandatory events. It simply isn’t done. The few weeks of the year that Bucky spends in his own country, he wastes drinking and sleeping around, often both at the same time. What’s to stop him from walking straight out of this impersonally sterile room filled with people he doesn’t trust, and go back to his favourite rundown bar to knock back vodka until he can’t feel the cold on his skin anymore?

Oh right. His best friend just got himself killed in action. The lucky bastard.

On a fucking nightmare of a mission in France of all places. If it had been Russia or Iran or North Korea or even just Sokovia (and really, it takes skill to be wanted by all four sides of the conflict), Bucky could have dealt with it.

But France? Bucky takes that as a personal offence.

Avengers don’t get killed in France. Avengers get killed the way they kill: brutal and messy, with no one left behind who’d bother to avenge them. Because justice is a fairy tale, and every act of peace is built on the actions of someone smart enough to wash the blood off their hands before they step in front of a camera.

At least the acknowledgements are short and free of false sentimentality. A whole lot of bullshit, sure, but it’s not like there is another choice. Not when the truth amounts to Steve Rogers died on a mission we weren’t authorised to give, in a country he wasn’t supposed to be in, over intel that we won’t admit exist.

Bucky doesn’t laugh. Barely huffs a a breath, but the people on both sides of him twitch tellingly.

Like all Avengers, Bucky has sought out the back of the room, where he can keep his back to the wall at all times, has a clear view on all available exists and a good excuse to keep an eye on the crowd of mourners.

The thought that one of them — multiple ones, possibly — are faking their sorrow makes Bucky clench his fingers against the urge to start an interrogation right now, Avenger style.

“Don’t kill anyone you might need to sign you off on field work again,” Barton mutters to his left, the words barely audible.

Bucky forces the tense muscles in his shoulders to relax, adopts an at-ease position that won’t fool the other Avengers, but at least won’t traumatise the attending techies and lawyers. The psych department always makes such a fuss when you break their precious, civilian employees.

There’s no point in fooling his colleagues though — if the Avengers can even be called that. It’s not like he meets them for brunch or goes out drinking with them in his downtime. They’re the elite of a internationally operating spy organisation for a reason, and it’s certainly not their ability to play well with others.

Just hours after having one of their own killed in a SHIELD-issued safehouse, all the Avengers are on edge. More so than usual. That the entire op smells like foul play all the way across the Atlantic does about as much to deescalate the situation as throwing a hand grenade into a room filled with weaponized uranium.

Someone inside SHIELD sold out an Avenger.

That was their first mistake. Their second was taking Steve out without killing Bucky as well.

There’s a shift in Bucky’s peripheral vision. Natasha Romanoff, codenamed Black Widow, looks as affected of recent events as she always does: not at all.

Is she the traitor? Bucky wonders as he tilts his head ever so slightly in acknowledgement. The rivalry between Black Widow and Steve is no secret. It isn’t a friendly one either, not that any of the Avengers are the sort of person one might associate the word “friendly” with. She betrayed the Red Room at eighteen. What offer would it take for her to turn on a fellow agent? An Avenger at that? Is she tense because she expects me to do this country a favour by killing Pierce or is she afraid to be found out?

The service lasts barely twenty minutes — unsurprising, considering how much isn’t said, can’t be said, because living within the specter of the highest security clearance makes for a shoddy eulogy — but to Bucky it feels like forever.

It doesn’t help that half the people around him are waiting for him to fly off the handle in either grief or blind rage. Blind rage admittedly being the more likely outcome.

It doesn’t help that the other half undoubtedly suspects him to be the traitor — who better to kill Steve Rogers than his best friend, after all? Especially when Avengers so clearly don’t have best friends — though Bucky can’t fault them for the sensible assumption.

He’d suspect himself too. The black hole that is four years of being held as a POW on his résumé hasn’t left him with what one might call a solid standing within the agency. Or a stable life in general.

Bucky has simply been lucky that Avengers don’t have much use for stability as it is. (Also, Steve was planning a revolt, should they stop attempting to recover Bucky. Not that anyone likes to acknowledge that. Pierce’s secretary still pales every time she catches sight of one of them.)

He’s been lucky that he’s too useful to be killed.

That might change now — Steve Rogers’ death changes a lot of things — but if it comes to that, Bucky will make damn sure to take the traitor with him. Another outcome isn’t acceptable.

And Bucky is very, very good at getting what he wants.

But first, he needs to find someone clean — meaning unaffiliated with SHIELD in any way — who can take a look at the USB flash drive he’s found in one of his dead drops two days after Pierce declared Steve KIA.

Fuck, but the first thing Bucky is gonna do when he sees Steve again is punch him in the fucking face.

*

Tony has always had an interesting way of making friends.

For example, Tony meets his best friend Pepper during a hostage situation when he’s sixteen. He’s never before seen a girl throw high heels at a guy’s head with such a deadly accuracy. Suffice to say Tony likes her immediately — and promises to buy her all the shoes she needs to knock stupid people down, naturally.

They keep in touch afterwards, and it’s the start of something great.

He meets his brother in all but blood much the same way, only Tony barely remembers that one because those kidnappers were smart enough to drug him before trying anything funny. Luckily, Tony has Rhodey for the straight thinking part — or at least he does after that episode.

On another, memorable occasion, Tony befriended one of his kidnappers.

In his defence: they were some pretty alright people, for being criminals holding him for ransom. No unnecessary threats or bodily harm, and they actually gave him drug-free food too. Also, you have no idea how mind-numbingly boring being kidnapped is. Well, not the getting kidnapped part but the staying-kidnapped-whilst-your-kidnappers-fail-to-get-their-money part.

Sadly, some people still believe that Stark Industries will pay for the disowned heir Tony Stark’s safe return. And usually they don’t react too well to being proven wrong. That time being one of those rare exceptions. In no small part thanks to a certain member of the crew whose identity Tony will protect until the day he dies. Or something.

Never mind.

The point is, Tony is used to meeting cool people under very hazardous, extraordinary circumstances.

Which is why — as he will later explain to a very exasperated Rhodey and an even more distrustful Pepper — when Tony locks up his garage at 7.40 pm after a long day of changing oils and busted tires, only to suddenly find himself face to face with a hooded stranger — after he’s already locked the doors, though he won’t share that part with his friends — he doesn’t panic.

He greets the guy — there’s a twenty percent chance Tony knows him, okay, hiding their faces as they track him down isn’t exactly a rarity — like a civilised person instead.

“Hi there,” Tony says with his best customer smile. “How may I help you?”

The guy — who definitely has more upper body strength than Tony, not that he notices or anything — doesn’t so much as twitch. He just stands there, body turned towards Tony, face shadowed by his hood. Tony really should have switched out the broken light bulb ages ago, maybe then he wouldn’t have to squint at his visitor like a sceptical squirrel, trying to make out the guy’s features.

“Anthony Stark?” the guy asks after a moment, voice low and rumbling, like gathering clouds on the far end of the horizon, as a violent storm approaches.

It’s that specific, unfairly nice sound that decides it: Tony definitely doesn’t know this guy. There’s no way he would have forgotten a voice like that.

Tony lets his smile brighten a little because if he’s about to be kidnapped — is it that time of the month already? Tony wouldn’t know, his last calendar sorta had a small accident involving a fire and DUM-E using up all the fire extinguisher on Tony rather than the actual fire. It was a pretty sweet, protective gesture, actually. Tony may or may not have teared up, just a little, but that didn’t change that half his equipment had to be replaced — then he’d like to start their working relationship on a good note. The kidnapping attempts tend to have less violent endings that way.

Additionally, Tony really doesn’t want to start a fight in his garage. This is his work place — which is basically holy, ask anyone. His cars are in here. They are not acceptable collateral damage, no matter what Pepper says.

“Do you know a Steve Rogers?” is mystery guy’s next question.

Which is a damn shame because it takes all of Tony’s not inconsiderable self-control to not tense at that particular inquiry. Steve Rogers.

God fucking damn it.

Tony forces the memories, the reflexive questions — a bloodied, broken body, screams of pain, narrowed, blue eyes glaring at him even as strong hands push him out of the line of fire — down immediately, takes care to keep his expression calm and clueless instead. He’s got lots of practice doing that. It’s just like being confronted with an obnoxious reporter who won’t stop bothering him with stupid questions about why he denies his father’s legacy. Bloodthirsty reporters, bloodthirsty assassins, it’s really just more of the same.

Tony has been handling shit like this since he was nine. If mystery guy expects him to trip up and give up even a single piece of information the easy way, he’s got another thing coming. Tony Stark doesn’t do easy.

Especially not when it concerns people he almost considers tolerable. Those gems are hard enough to find as it is — well, among the boring, totally legal working crowd at least — Tony will protect them with all he has. Not that he wouldn’t do the same for people he doesn’t like, he just wouldn’t be as happy about it.

Mystery guy is in for a surprise.

“Rogers?” Tony furrows his eyebrows in confusion. “That doesn’t ring a bell.” Close enough to the truth to count.

Then, the grin slides completely off Tony’s face and his eyes narrow in open suspicion. “Not that it matters. I don’t make a habit of handing out contact information to strangers who can’t be bothered to introduce themselves. Client privileges, I’m sure you understand.”

And yeah, some sarcasm may slip into those words, but can you blame Tony? He’s been working for almost ten hours in that special place reserved in hell for customer service, and, frankly, Tony is done with the world for the day. That he’s most likely dealing with what’s either a very diligent mercenary or a very strange kidnapper does little to lighten his mood.

Both options are far less appealing than mystery guy’s sexy voice initially indicated. Tony feels a little cheated.

“Oh, I understand,” mystery guy murmurs ominously.

When Tony squints, he can literally see the shadows behind the guy blacken. On an unrelated note, he really needs to stop binge-watching those horror flicks. Clearly it’s messing with his mind.

Not that this keeps Tony from bristling at Mystery Guy’s threatening tone — if anything, it has Tony reflexively square his shoulders because he does not fold.

Mystery guy snorts, and Tony has the fleeting impression that the stranger has the gall to be amused by him. He kind of wants to deck the guy just for that.

“I can see why he liked you.”

Something in those words freezes Tony into place long before his brain has puzzled through their meaning. By the time his mind catches up to the past tense that refers to a person it should absolutely not refer to, mystery guy has already taken a few steps towards the only functioning light bulb in Tony’s garage and slips his hoodie back.

The bleak light reveals a pale, handsome face with a strong jaw and icy, blue eyes. Absently, Tony approves of the way the hoodie has messed up Mystery Guy’s wild hair into something untameable and unfairly attractive, but it’s kind of hard to melt into a puddle of appreciative goo when you’ve just learned of the death of a friend.

Or well, acquaintance maybe. Rhodey always reminds Tony that he can’t just go around, adopting friends left and right just because he wants to. And with Steve it’s hard to say. The guy is almost impossible to read.

Still, it’s Steve they’re talking about. And whatever mess he’s gotten himself involved in, Tony doesn’t doubt for a moment that Steve thought he was doing it for the right reasons. He’s annoyingly self-righteous like that. It sucks even more when you listen to him rant and realize he’s got a point, not that Tony will ever admit such a thing to his face.

Which will be hard to do if Steve is actually—

Tony presses his lips together and defiantly stares up at Mystery Guy. Who is, in fact, taller than him. There really is no justice in the world.

“Who the fuck are you and what the fuck do you want?” is what Tony settles on to summarize the maelstrom of confusing emotions wrecking chaos inside him.

The man takes a threatening step closer. Of course, it’s not that hard to come across as threatening when you’re half a head taller and made of muscles and steel. Still. The guy could at least try to keep his looming on the downlow.

Not that Tony does him the courtesy of giving up an inch. This is his garage, damn it. No one makes Tony feel afraid in his own home.

Mystery Guy growls and there is a lethal coldness in his eyes that Tony doesn’t think a human should be able to portray.

“I was Steve’s best friend. And you’re going to find the people who killed him so that I can return the favor.”

Thoughts? 

Justify My Love - Chapter 6 - If We’re Honest, Chasing You

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5

Book: The Royal Romance Word Count: 3,380 -ish Pairing: Maxwell x MC (Kristina Hampshire), Hana, Drake, OCs Warnings - Language

Series Tags @littleblossom357 @alj4890 @cosigottahavefaith

A/N In this TRR Series (Where books 2 and 3 are thrown to the wind): Kristina (MC) decides she cannot stay in Cordonia after the events of the Coronation Ball. Not so much caring about her own reputation, but caring for the life of the man she has been falling for, which is not the prince. She returns to New York and is faced with her heartbreak and regret while Maxwell is left in Cordonia struggling to understand the truth behind his feelings. Will they let each other go?

**All characters and named places are owned by Pixelberry Studios. Rights to the songs lyrics and  titles in this series belong to:

Justify My Love (Madonna) - Warner/Chappell Music, Inc, Universal Music Publishing Group, Reach Music Publishing, BMG Rights Management

If We’re Honest (Francesca Battistelli) - Warner/Chappell Music, Inc.

Chasing You (Jenn Johnson) - Bethel Music Publishing

——————————

Kristina’s POV

- If We’re Honest -

The three friends watch as Kristina completely falls apart in front of them. Finally, she is giving in to all of her emotions outside a random hotel room in Atlantic City. Lisa immediately kneels down to comfort the small, broken girl into deep, steady breaths worrying she will hyperventilate. “Kris, look at me. Keep your eyes on me.” She eventually talks her friend down enough to be breathing somewhat more evenly. Daniel helps her to her feet, supporting her weight. “Kris, I think it's time we talk.” She slowly nods in agreement while Stephen scoops her up in his arms and takes her into the room she and Lisa are sharing.

He gently sets her on one of the beds propping pillows behind her for support. Daniel grabs a box of the hotel’s tissues and sets them, and himself, to her left. Lisa cuddles up next to Kristina's right side, while Stephen sets himself at her feet. Kristina looks at her friend's eyes filled with concern and love. I can do this. I have to, it's time. It has to be now.

Lisa speaks, “Kris, we know the truth is harder than a lie. We so love you and are here for you, so trust us. Your truth is safe with us.” She reaches across her friend and places an arm around Kristina’s with her own tears trying to escape. She sees so much pain in Kristina's whole being and it's killing Lisa to watch. After Kristina takes a deep breath her first words croak from a broken and deep place inside her heart and soul.

She explains everything in detail from the night of the bachelor party to this minute with her finds. If I’m going to get help I can't hold anything back.

“So, the night and morning after the bachelor party…..”

“Flying to Cordonia looking for a fairytale…

“The Social Season in Cordonia is long and exasperating because…”

“Maxwell, who sponsored me as a suitor for his house…”

“At first Maxwell was like a brother, but his support was so genuine and he was always by my side. He made me laugh and so happy when he…”

“I was falling hard, and not for the prince like I should. I tried to tell Maxwell once that I was falling for someone else, but he reactions was…”

“I wasn't sure where to go next, the scandal with Tariq which wasn't even real. Tariq had…”

She filled in all the details as she recounted everything through the Coronation night. “And I was dragged from the palace and sent home. I was so in love, well I still am so in love with my sweet, crazy ball of energy, and being his little blossom is everything to me. But I lost my honor with the court, and gained a reputation that would only hurt him and his House. I couldn't stay knowing that I would hurt his future, and I would damage the reputation that I was asked to help save.”

“By the end of Social Season, I thought he may be feeling something too, but now I think I was so wrong. Like I explained, even though he is a goofy and foolhardy energy-filled sweetheart, he also is fiercely loyal. I felt even if some lost stars had actually aligned for us, he should be loyal to the responsibilities he had to his brother and his House. I couldn't ruin that by being selfish.”

“He chased after me to the airport, but the the men of the King’s Guard that were sent to make sure I got on that flight held him back. He couldn't run to me and while it hurt like hell hearing him yelling to me, I knew I needed to do what was right by him. I didn't know if he felt the same way about me, but I told myself I wasn't going to ruin his life, regardless.”

“So, here we are tonight and all this is why I’ve given up.” It's quiet for a long moment, almost too long. Kristina begins to panic thinking that maybe admitting all of her stupidity tonight has pushed her friends over an edge. Finally Stephen breaks the silence first. “Well holy shit Kris. First and foremost we love you and want to stand by you in all of your decisions, but I wonder if we should talk about them.” Lisa through her own tears holds Kristina as close as she can, “I never thought in a million years this kind of story was possible, to anyone really. But to you, well, whatever you need, I am here.” “Yeah,” a quiet Daniel is finally heard just above a whisper, “I obviously wasn't there, and can't understand it all, but Kris it sounds like you had amazing friends, best friends, taking care of my best friend. I would never be able to thank this Hana and Drake you told us about enough.” Daniel’s own tears dropping as he wish he could have been there for her, but was eternally grateful to the man and women he’ll never meet.

Stephen, the free spirit of the group is actually quite serious, “ Kris, I think you owe it to yourself and Maxwell to reconnect.” Kristina shakes her head vehemently. “No, there is no way I can without hurting him. I fucked up. I haven't read their texts or listened to any of their message, and none of them were from Maxwell anyway. He made his choice. And you all know I got a new number and phone to avoid what was going on in my life. No one has come looking for me. It's obvious that it's over.”

“Why? How? You can still contact them. You need to Kris. I can't watch you not living your life anymore. You're killing me.” Daniel looks down at his feet. “I’m so sorry Daniel, but I can't. I have to stay here so my problems can't ruin him. Plus I didn't move any of their numbers to my new phone. I can't find them.” 

“FUCKING BULLSHIT KRISTINA!” She recoils at Stephen’s outburst and the his sudden use of her full first name.” “I have no idea how long it took you to really believe your own lie, but that's exactly what it is. You’ve hidden behind guilt and fear for too long. You don't even know if you did or didn't break his heart. You don't even know what he would have said before you got on that plane. And yet here you are still making up his own fucking mind for him. Stop it, no matter what is or isn't felt you can't be so selfish in this!”

Lisa is even hurt by her husband’s harshness. “What's done is done at this point Stephen, yelling at her doesn't accomplish a damn thing. All we can do is help and support her with whatever decisions she makes from now into the future!” Stephen groans. “Daniel, you’re awfully quite for being one of Kristina’s best friends.” She winces at the sound of Stephen using her full name again.

Daniel sits still for a minute more. “I can't be a ‘tie breaker’ here. Both you and Lisa have utterly strong points that are all valid.” He shifts turning to look deep into Kristina's red and puffy eyes. “Kris, you know your my best friend, and really more like a sister. I’m asking you to think hard about this, talk openly and honestly with me about it from here on out. We really are the only family each other has. I believe in my heart this isn't the end of this chapter in your life. I’m going to help you continue to write the next pages.” Kristina firmly hugs him. “We will too, Kris” Lisa nods to Stephen and he nods back. “Kris, lets talk about how to get your man back.”

The morning sun has been up for a while shining light into the darkness that was night. Taking Kristina by the hand, Lisa’s voice echoes though the room, “Lets get you a shower so you can be comfortable and get some sleep. We all need to get some needed sleep since we head home today. Stephen, would please you call down to the front desk and ask for late checkout. Daniel, make sure you sleep enough since you're the only driver on the car rental agreement. And Kris, your life begins again, now. We'll get him back.”

——————————

Maxwell's POV

- Chasing You -

“Thanks Bastien we’ll be at the townhouse shortly.” Drake ends the call and looks to Hana. “Bas looked at all of Tariq’s accounts in the last hour and everything in Tariq's spending points to him still being here in the same neighborhood.” “Drake?” “Yeah Hana? “You ever think about how scary it actually is that Bastien can find out almost everything about anyone?” Laughing Hana waits for Drake's response regarding the man that, for all intents and purposes, has been his father figure for so many years. “Well as long has he stays on our side and doesn't use his powers for evil”, they both smirk, “we should be okay.”

Maxwell begins to stir from his food induced coma, “That meal was incredibly remarkable! I would want to relive and revel in it with another go, but alas there are none in New York City. So, I will document it in my ‘Saving and Bringing My Kristina Home’ scrapbook. Which reminds me.” He grabs his phone. “Group selfie time. Say chheeeeessssseeeee.” Click. “Drake you look like we are driving to you to your own private hell… a night long ball. Look at least slightly less grumpy. This will go in Kristina's scrapbook and you want her look back fondly at her best friends in their quest.” “Fine. The things I do for her and you people.” “Here we go.” Click. “Awe Hana you look amazing! Drake you look, well like a somewhat less version of Grumpy Drake.”

“Lady Hana,” the driver addresses her, “as you requested we are arriving to the rendezvous point where you all will meet with the guards Bastien has sent to retrieve and return the subject.” “Thank you Rick.” Maxwell rubs his hands together. “So what's the plan guys? Kick down the door and take him out with blazing fists of glory? Or, Drake can use his mad defensive skills while I use my dancing skills to have the element of surprise and kick him down to pin him? Ooohhhh, are we crashing in through any windows, because if we are I wouldn't have worn one of my favorite shirts. You know fine fabric is no match for broken and shards of glass.”

“Maxwell, dear. We definitely appreciate your bold and vivacious desire to, um, handle Tariq-“ “But you’re not going.” Maxwell's face falls as he hears Drake's order. Thinking for a moment his face lights up again. “Great I idea Drake, I can get shots of the take down for the scrapbook from afar while no one notices. A perfectly covert operation. You guys are the best planners.”

Maxwell sees the frustration on Drake's face, which is now on the brink of anger. “EEPP!!” Maxwell squeaks and hides behind Hana the best he can in the car. Drake notices Hana's face light up like it does when she has a fabulous idea coming. “Drake, if Maxwell stays away and he can get some good pictures that might just help our cause. If Tariq comes willingly and it shows in the pictures, that could be used in the media for support of his statement.” “Ohhhhh, tricky Hana. I think you would be the quintessential spy. Oh my god, wait. Are you a spy Hana?” Maxwell's eyes widen as the realization hits him. Hana can't help but mess with him a little. “You’ll never know.” She winks. “That's exactly what a spy would say. Drake, keep an eye on her.”

Hana and Drake exit the car to get instructions from the guards and explain their plan of having Maxwell take pictures. “Please, please for the love of everything have someone be by Maxwell's side the whole time.” “We understand Mr. Walker,” Drake raises a hand, “just Drake.” “Yes, well Lady Hana and Drake we realize this will be our one and only chance here. None of us want to have to chase him again. Now if everyone is on the same page, the suspect will be arriving home in twenty minutes from retrieving his dinner and news periodicals. For someone who wishes to hide, he is rather predictable while keeping to an exact schedule. We won't be far from you two, and we have cast a wide net around the area in case he does run.”

Drake nods as he now has been given the entire plan. Hana begins to work into her extra charming character. “Right now I am so thankful for all the lessons to hide my true emotions. Rage on the inside, charm on the outside.” Everyone is in place with Maxwell complaining that he won't get any good shots from this angle and distance just when the expected return of Tariq is right on schedule. Hana and Drake wait for the signal to make their way and knock on the front door of the townhouse. After what feels like a lifetime with a few more knocks the door slowly opens.

‘Click’ Maxwell takes his first photo of the scene. The three have a moment of conversation on the porch then Tariq steps aside to let Hana and Drake in. ‘Click’. “Is that good or bad. Leaving them alone to just walk in like that? How can we know Tariq hasn't been planning something diabolical for a situation like this?” He asks the guard tasked with keeping him a safe distance away. “Please Lord Beaumont, I need to be able to listen for any calls on the radio.”

Minutes feel like hours. Maxwell checks the time. Only seven minutes have passed, though. Eventually the door opens again, Maxwell gets ready for more photos, but Hana and Drake walk out, alone. His heart sinks. Well assuredly will never get her to come back home without her name being cleared. Just as he is going to place his head in hands the townhouse door opens. Tariq has an overnight bag and walks with Hana and Drake. Oh my god! Oh my god! Maxwell almost drops his phone in astonishment but his hands move on their own and ‘click’ he gets the picture of the three as they walk toward the guards. It's another step in finding Kristina.

***************************

Hana, Drake, and Maxwell make the trek back to their hotel. Traffic isn't as bad as on the way to Tariq's, but still it's driving in LA. Maxwell asks a million questions on the way about their talk with Tariq. Of course in his excitement to really believe what's happening he asks some questions two or three times. Finally Hana and Drake get him to talk about their dinner plans and he agrees with his stomach growling. Room services it is again, as they pile into Hana's room.

As they eat Drake gets confirmation from Bastien regarding Tariq’s cooperation and getting on the plan, as well as  the flight information for the three to head to New York in the morning. Liam also calls Drake with much appreciation and the promise of hearing everything about the day as soon as his schedule permits. While eating Maxwell knows the perfect song to add to his new playlist called ‘Bringing Kristina Home’. While immediately adding it, he sings to himself the first couple verses:

‘You hide, I want to find you Go, and I will follow you I want to be where you are As You move, I’m right beside you, love I’m running after you I want to be where You are’

‘I’m chasing You, I’m so in love Captivated, I just can’t get enough I’ll spend my days, running after Your heart Your heart, Your heart, whoa I’m chasing You, with all my love Captivated, I just can't get enough I’ll spend my days, running after Your heart Your heart, Your heart’

He feels a slight nudge. “Earth to Maxwell. Penny for your thoughts?” With the turn of his body towards Hana he can't contain the thrill of knowing he’ll be in New York tomorrow. He grabs her by the hand and moves her to the center of the room. She beams at him as they dance to only a rhythm he can hear with the song in his heart. “It's good to have to back, Maxwell.” She tells him as they sway.

‘Heart, You’ve won my heart and soul And where You lead I’ll go I want to be where You are From the moment I rise to the moment I sleep My affection is for you, and even as I dream I want to know you, I’m after Your heart’

‘I’m chasing You, I’m so in love Captivated, I just can’t get enough I’ll spend my days, running after Your heart Your heart, Your heart’

“While I can't believe I’m admitting this, out loud, but it's nice to see you being more you, Maxwell. But-“ “No, not tonight Drake. Can I hear the ‘but’ tomorrow?” Maxwell pleads. He stops dancing with Hana and looks out the window while Hana gives a nod to Drake for him to continue.

“Maxwell you need to know that while we are heading to New York tomorrow, Bastien hasn't been able to locate Kristina, and he knows more than we do.  She closed all her accounts, let the lease on her apartment run out, and her phone seems to be disabled. He checked the bar but she isn't on the payroll. He made contact with the bar numerous times but each time he got the same answer, they have no idea where she is, they thought she was still in out of the country. That's when Liam knew that we had to take over completely ourselves. Bastien is needed for so many things for Liam and Cordonia. She could be in New York, or somewhere else entirely.”

“Maxwell, while everything Drake said is true, I know in my heart Kristina didn't leave New York. While I don't have proof right now, I know her best friend Daniel there is her only family. In America she has no one else.” Maxwell looks back at his friends. “I believe you're right Hana.” A smile creeping onto his face. “Drake, do we know how long Liam will cover this trip?” Letting out a rough breath and rubbing the back of his neck, “Honestly we don't. He wants her found and home as much as we do, but eventually…”

Maxwell beams, lighting up the entire room. “Well then, that's that. I believe what Hana knows and feels about Kristina, and for right now the three of us have unlimited resources. So I know in my heart we’ll find her, faster than you can imagine. My dreams are always big, and my determination to find her will never cease. Even if eventually I am on my own.” He dance walks to the door and heads out to the hall, but stops and spins back to his friends. “Get a good nights sleep and put those detective hats on kids, because we’ve got my lady to find.” He makes two guns with the fingers of his hands, pulls the triggers, and pretends to holster them. There is a skip in his step while he reaches his room. I’m coming for you, Kristina. Just wait for me.

‘This life, this love, was always meant to be A wild, crazy adventure discovering The thrill, the rush, the more of You I see The more it leaves me wanting You’re everything You’re everything’

‘I’m chasing You, I’m so in love Captivated, I just can’t get enough I’ll spend my days, running after Your heart Your heart, Your heart

Memory 2/2

Second half of my week 6 prompt. 

Find part one here.

Look for the cut!

Tony woke in his bunk. The boat wasn’t just rocking up and down, side-to-side, it was spinning. He was cold and too exhausted to shiver, and he hadn’t zipped the bag up before falling asleep. His left side was even colder than his right, almost numb from his elbow to his shoulder. He struggled to get his arm back into the bag, but he couldn’t reach up to catch the zipper.

“Mr. Stark,” a gravelly voice intruded.

Tony was startled by the voice, but only long after the chance for an appropriate reaction had passed. He twisted to look up the captain. Man looked bigger than ever, or Tony felt smaller than ever. His eyes were very blue against the deeply lined leather of his skin, and he had surprisingly long lashes.

“You need to see the physician,” the captain said firmly.

If there was anything Tony was truly startled about, it was that he’d woken in his own bunk and hadn’t just been taken to medbay while unconscious. He couldn’t remember anything after finding Steve in the ice. Finally, finally finding Steve in the ice.

“Where’s St-… Captain America? Where is he?” Tony asked, more than half dreading being told that it was all a dream, that he’d missed the expedition and they hadn’t found anything anyways.

The captain pursed his chapped lips. The motion made his whiskers bristle out like an annoyed cat. Tony tried to laugh, but the only thing he managed was a vague vibration against his chest. He pulled his knees up slowly, ignored the pain in his hips, and fought to kick out of the sleeping bag.

“Where is he?” he repeated.

Shaking his head, the captain said, “He’s in lab 2. Mr. Stark… Just go to the medbay.”

“No,” Tony said with no heat. He couldn’t muster up the energy for heat, didn’t have a warm molecule in his body. He stumbled off the bunk, and expected the captain to help him stand, but he didn’t. The giant man stood and crossed his arms over his chest. Tony caught the bulkhead and looked at him, but he only shook his grizzly head.

That was fine. It wasn’t like he hadn’t struggled down a hallway by himself before.

(Had Steve carried him out of a building? He thought so, remembered in kaleidoscope fragments being insensible on the floor, the scent of smoke, Captain America’s arms supporting his knees and back. He remembered being carried down a fire escape.

He remembered Steve stepping into his arms and the two of them flying off together. Steve’s weight low on his spine as he flew with Captain America on his back. The sound of Steve’s voice, whooping in childish joy and urging him faster.

He remembered crawling on his knees through his room, shedding pieces of the armor as he went, feet away from the nearest outlet. It might as well have been miles, and there were people just down the hall. Steve, Jan, Hank, Thor – No, Steve, Clint, Natasha, Thor. All he had to do was shout and someone would come to help him across the last few feet to the outlet. He’d crawled on his own, and reached the outlet just in time, just like a dozen other times.)

There was no arc reactor in his chest, but he felt heavy all the same, like he needed a charging port. His joints ached. He pinballed down the corridor, avoiding the shadowy forms of crewmen who had names (everyone did) but he couldn’t remember them.

“Mr. Stark,” the captain said from somewhere behind him. His voice was growing both weary and pleading. “Go to the medbay.”

“No,” Tony croaked. He stepped-slid-slipped down the stairs and leaned against the wall. The corridor broke off left and right. The left-hand side was illuminated. MEDBAY, the sign read, blue on white, and underlined in red. The right-hand side was dark, the sign rusted over. LAB 2. It might as well have said Steve.

He turned to the right, ignored the captain’s exasperated sigh, and slid down the wall. The corridor stretched, and narrowed, closed in on him until his vision was reduced to a horizontal slit.

“Where are you going, Shellhead?” Steve called from behind him. Tony stopped and knocked his head lightly against the wall. Steve’s footsteps caught up, clatterclatter, and he curved around Tony until he stood in front of him. He was dressed in a dark blue knit top and pleated khaki pants (who under the age of 70 wore pleated pants unironically? Steve, that’s who. And he looked damn good in them.) Tony felt his lips pulling up at the corners.

“Are you ducking out on us, Tony? The party’s back the other way.”

“Not you too,” Tony moaned. “I did what you asked. I found you.”

“It’s important to team morale to have you around,” Steve explained. “We like to see you off the battlefield too, you know? It’s your tower. You should join us. Come back.”

He wanted to turn around. He wanted to follow Steve to the common room – Steve had called him Tony, he didn’t need to keep his identity a secret. He could take off the armor (it was so heavy) and sit down, or stand at the bar, or watch Bruce slowly realize that Natasha was trying to flirt with him (No, she and Clint were together, she’d turned double agent for SHIELD against the Soviets – No, the Soviet Union didn’t exist, she was his PA – no, she was Fury’s right hand – no, Fury was dead – no, he’d faked his death. Bruce had Betty – no, Veronica. Go to sleep.)

“Steve. I’m tired.”

“Come back with me,” Steve said softly.

“You’re in the lab.” Tony closed his eyes and tried to make his stomach stop twisting. “That way is the medical bay.”

He opened his eyes and Steve was gone, the corridor was as bright as any other, and he was just outside the door to the lab. There were people crowded around the room in white jackets over thick sweaters, blue nitrile gloves, and hairnets, and safety goggles. Tony pushed through them, and they moved without complaint, silent as ghosts. The first glimpse of Steve on the table was almost enough to make him cry. He was soaking wet, water dripping off the table to patter on the floor.

“Steve.”

There was no way that someone frozen for seventy years (twenty-four? Fifty?) could be alive, but Tony expected him to turn and open his eyes. He pushed past the last pair of white coats to the edge of the table. He froze, and shook his head sharply to clear his vision. It wasn’t Steve on the table, relaxed in cold-induced slumber, tinged blue with chill. It was Tony in the undersuit and one gauntlet, his cheeks hollowed out. His chest rose and fell in jerky, too-even swells. He had a pattern of burns across his chest and neck, tiny holes in the fabric of the undersuit. His vision flickered, and for a second he was looking up at a swinging light from a cot, shadows looming over him, the scent of burnt flesh and metal and ozone thick in the room.

He closed his eyes and pressed his hands to his face until purple and yellow lights exploded behind his eyelids. When he opened his eyes again, the room had solidified, and it was still his own body on the table, soaking wet and tinged blue with the cold, dozens of wounds that had frozen over.

“What is this?” he demanded. When no one responded, he whirled around. The room spun and he fell back against the table, knocking the light eschew. It swung wildly flickering yellow-dark-yellow-dark. He closed his eyes against the swell of dizzy nausea, and felt a sudden impact of cold metal on his shoulders. The ship continued to toss and roll, and Tony reached out to grab onto any solid surface.

“Tony,” Steve said softly. “Tony, just open your eyes.”

Angry and frustrated and tired and cold, Tony let his eyelids drift open. Steve leaned over him, haloed by the overhead lamp, looking just as tired and frustrated and cold as Tony felt. The skin under his eyes was darkened and lined with stress, his hair was a mess, but he was still smiling. He set a hand on Tony’s cheek. The ship had stopped moving and the room was empty but for them. Tony couldn’t help but notice how much Lab 2 looked like a morgue. He was on an examination table and it was filled with water.

“Are you going to get up?” Steve asked.

Tony let his breath out in a shuddery wheeze. He nodded and grabbed the slick edges of the table to pull himself upright. To his shock, Steve slid an arm under his knees and helped him move his feet over the side. He put his other arm around Tony’s shoulders and eased him off the table. His feet felt numb and he stumbled when he tried to support his own weight.

Steve caught him with a soft murmur of noise. “You don’t have to do everything alone,” he said.

Tony leaned into his shoulders, and together they shuffled out of the lab and back into the corridor. They passed the captain at the juncture that would lead back to his cabin. The man had his arms crossed over his chest and he stared Tony down as they came to a slow stop in front of him. Tony peered around the captain’s bulky form, and then back up the sign. MEDBAY.

He knew that the captain would move if Tony turned back for the cabin. He also knew that Steve wouldn’t go with him. His head dropped back, and he forced his spine to straighten.

“Fine,” he said. “Fine. I’ll go see the goddamn physician.” He pushed away from the support of Steve’s arms and walked down the corridor with one hand against the wall. The ship continued to rock, knocking him gently side-to-side, Steve trailing silently at his back.

The door at the end of the hall swung open at a touch, and the boat abruptly stopped moving. He looked over his shoulder to the familiar corridors of the ship, the captain just visible at the turn in the hallway, Steve standing silently beside him, and then turned back to the door. Through the doorway was a shore of dark sand, the sullen blue of Atlantic Ocean with a storm gathering in the distance. The air was cold and electric with impending fury, and far above the water the sky had been torn open.

The tossing of the ship was suddenly a comfort he wasn’t ready to give up. He didn’t want to step through the door, didn’t want to put his feet on solid ground.

“You’re not a coward, Tony,” Steve said softly.

Head bowed, Tony stepped down from the doorway and into a patch of tough grass that had clawed through the sand. He leaned back to look up at the fight going on far above his head. Iron Man and War Machine were bare specs against the gray clouds, but he knew the shape of their fingers, the curve of War Machine’s neck as he angled upward, the vibration of the suit’s thrusters pushing him up and up.

Steve stepped out of the doorway, but didn’t close the door. He stopped at Tony’s side and looked up. His expression was one of profound sadness as he watched, like he knew what was going to happen. Of course, he did know what was going to happen, because Tony knew what was going to happen.

Ahead of them, Captain America ran to the edge of the water, helpless on the ground, every line of his body expressing his frustration and fear. He put a hand to his ear.

“Iron Man, War Machine, stand down!” he commanded. There was no answer. His lips thinned into a worried-angry-frightened line. “Tony, there is another way. Come back.”

“Sorry, Cap,” Tony whispered. He couldn’t hear Iron Man’s response through the comms, but he didn’t need to. He closed his eyes. “I’ll take it from here, Rhodey.”

“Not on your life,” the ghost of Rhodey’s voice replied. “No more fun-vees, remember?”

“Don’t be stupid,” Tony said, his fingers moving in a complicated programed-and-never used pattern.

“Tony? What are you doing? TONY!” Rhodey shouted so loudly that his voice distorted through the comm.

“What’s going?” Captain America demanded, “What’s happening? Talk to me!”

In the air above them, War Machine broke off from Iron Man’s side and curved away from the gaping hole in the sky, jerking and twisting as Rhodey tried to regain control of the armor. He would eventually – it was only ever meant to be used in case of emergency, in the event that Rhodey became incapable of handling the controls himself and needed assistance to land. It was never meant to stand up to the concerted effort of the pilot to resist.

Tony crossed his arms over his chest and watched dully as the spec that was Iron Man angled up into an even steeper climb. He had a bomb held to his chest, designed by Richards to close the tangled crossroads he’d inadvertently created between multiple universes. Between everyone on hand, only Iron Man and War Machine had the flight capability, speed, and shielding to carry the bomb, and between the two of them only Tony really understood how it worked. Most days, Tony really hated that he’d ever learned the word ‘multiverse.’

“Whatever happened to cutting the wire?” Steve asked gently from his side as they watched Iron Man disappear against the madness-inducing darkness of the portal. In the air, Rhodey was weaving drunkenly and turning shaky loops as he fought the auto-land protocol, and Captain America had his hands and jaw clenched equally tight.

“Sometimes you just don’t have the wire clippers on hand,” Tony murmured.

“Tony,” Captain America said – Steve, he’d been Steve then. “Don’t do this again.”

“Practice makes perfect, Cap,” Tony quipped in reply.

Neither Steve or Captain America had been able to argue, because of course Tony was right. He usually was when it counted.

Rhodey’s thrusters abruptly cut out and he plummeted through the air toward the water below as deadweight. Clever, cutting suit power completely and rebooting. Before he’d fallen a dozen yards, power re-engaged and he threw his hands out to reverse his trajectory. It was too late, and Rhodey must have known it, but he rocketed straight up in pursuit of Iron Man.

Five seconds later, there was a sudden crush of pressure that made Rhodey falter and Steve stumble two steps into the surf, and then an explosion of white-gold light that swallowed up the sky. Tony held a hand over his ears and flinched away from the light. He felt a sense of vertigo, twisting, pitching, falling, and then a smack on his shoulders like hitting concrete, the suit breaking away and water rushing in.

The sky dimmed. After the brilliance of the explosion, everything seemed dark and dull. Silence and pressure swallowed the beach. Tony could see Captain America’s mouth moving, screaming something he couldn’t make out. Rhodey tumbled and jittered through the sky, thrusters firing intermittently, flight stabilizers flickering as he flailed his arms in an instinctive attempt to regain his balance. Tony watched as he oriented himself and then turned and dove back toward the waves.

For several beats, there was no sound, no movement. Tony felt the cold settling into his bones as he watched Captain America pace restlessly at the boarder of land and sea. When War Machine broke through the surface with an armor-less Tony in his arms, Steve splashed into the waves to meet him and practically tore Tony out of his grip. They crashed to the sand, water licking at their feet, and Steve yanked Tony’s mouth open to check his airway, tilted Tony’s head back and sealed their lips together. Rhodey dropped heavily on Tony’s other side, the faceplate of the armor looking absolutely murderous in the strange light.

As Steve begged Tony’s lungs to give up the water and accept the air, it started to rain. Heavy sheets fell, dark and cold around them, and the world started to go dark at the edges.

Tony looked away from the struggle in the sand and turned to the Steve who stood beside him. “Did I die?”

Steve’s eyes glowed in the increasing darkness. He tipped his head to one side and glanced back at the trio in the sand. “I guess that’s up to you.”

Tony turned back around. The door back to the ship was still open. The sign above it read Lab 2. Next to it, another door stood next to it, innocuous wood of the medium-gold plywood installed in every hospital ever built. Medbay, the sign above it read.

“Can’t guess what your vote is,” Tony muttered.

Steve smiled at him. His voice filled with gentle laughter. “You know I’m not really here, right?”

“Doesn’t stop you from having an Opinion,” Tony muttered, but he didn’t wait for Steve to respond. With a gusty sigh, he stepped forward and pushed open the Medbay door.

~*~

Tony swayed in the doorway of the hospital room. It was flooded with golden sunlight, trees and blue sky visible outside the window, the walls lined with monitors and medical equipment. He wasn’t surprised to see himself in the bed, but he was somehow surprised to see Steve sitting beside him with a magazine in his lap, one hand up on Tony’s bed, thumb stroking idly over his knuckles.

Tony shuffled into the room and pressed his hands to the foot of the bed. It didn’t move under his touch, the blankets didn’t pull tight over the feet beneath them.

“Are you going to get up?” Steve asked from behind him.

“What’s the benefit if I do?” Tony asked tiredly. The door shut behind him and the scene he’d just lived through felt immediately less-real, another dream among many.

He could feel Steve’s curious gaze on the back of his neck. “Does it matter?”

“No.” Tony looked at the Steve who sat at his bedside. He was wearing those damn khaki pants, a midnight blue button up shirt, and white tennis shoes with bright white tube socks. His familiar brown leather bomber jacket was draped over the back of the chair. Tony gestured to him helplessly. “You’re such a dork.”

As if he’d heard him, Steve looked up from his magazine, looked at Tony on the bed, and squeezed his hand. Tony felt the ghost of the pressure on his fingers and shivered. “You’re going to have a lot to catch up on. A seventeen year old girl in Australia has made a breakthrough in nanotechnology for cancer treatment. It says here that she’s figured out how to program the bots so they’re attracted to radioactive glucose that the patient drinks and gets absorbed by the cancer cells. I guess it makes the tumors glow?” Steve explained. “They’re self-replicating, but they’re supposed to shut down as soon as they’ve eaten up the cancer, and then they just get eaten up by the body.”

“That sounds like the start of a dystopian science fiction novel,” Tony said.

“Sounds like a bad idea to me,” Steve said, “I’ve seen Stargate. Replicators are bad news.”

“That’s my boy,” Tony praised. He wasn’t – Steve wasn’t his. Steve was dream, a fantasy. Somewhere in the real world, Tony was tossing around in his bunk, fevered and sweating. When he woke up, he should maybe go to the medbay after all. He doubted he would find a hospital room with trees and blue sky beyond.

“You’re lost,” Steve said gently beside him. Tony pulled his attention away from the Steve at his bedside and took in his much more tired version. He seemed skinnier somehow, less. Worn down. “You’re caught in a storm, stuck between realities. They need you here.” He set a gentle hand down on Tony’s leg where it remained unmoving under the hospital blankets.

“Here is a dream,” Tony protested weakly.

“Why? Because it’s too good to be true? That you have friends who love you, family? Me?”

Tony’s hands clenched into fists. “I don’t have you. You’re a corpse somewhere in the Arctic Ocean, or the Bering Sea, or stuffed and mounted on some Nazis’ wall!”

Steve didn’t react to the outburst and Tony panted through a dozen breaths that sliced through his throat like chips of ice. He turned a frustrated circle and came to rest with his back to the hospital bed. The heart monitor became slowly audible under the cadence of his breath. Beep…beep, beep…beep.

Tipping his head to one side, Steve said, “Now you’re dying.”

“I’m not! This isn’t real. There is no reality, no universe that exists outside my head where you-!” He pointed at Steve where he sat with his magazine, fingers slid under Tony’s hand. Tony felt the illusion of warmth and a tickle of pressure at the center of his palm.

“Where Captain America would be concerned for Tony Stark? Or where Steve Rogers might return Tony Stark’s severely constipated version of affection?” Steve suggested.

Tony shot him a glare, and Steve hiked an eyebrow at him, daring him to deny it.

“Why would you prefer to stay on the ship, Tony?” Steve asked when Tony didn’t respond. “Why? Because you’re miserable, and cold all the time, and alone?”

“And this reality is so much better?” Tony demanded, gesturing sharply to the hospital bed. He wasn’t sure exactly which one of the Tony-Stark-is-Iron-Man universes it was, or when. The universe where he kept a guilty secret of his identity, and eventually drank away his company, his friendships, his identity, and put them back together again? Where he lied to people to protect them, and it always blew up in his face, but they stayed (and he did it again)? Was this after he’d lost the secret of his identity, but before his life had gone off the rails, before he’d lost and regained the use of his legs, lost and regained his friendship with Rhodey, lost JARVIS, lost Pepper, turned Happy into a monster?

Or the universe where his weapons were responsible for thousands, hundreds of thousands of deaths, and he let it happen? Where his every effort to rectify his mistakes just compounded the problems, and his own ego knocked him off his feet again and again, where he and Steve were at each throats as often as they had each other’s backs?

Wouldn’t it be better to be none of those things? Start over, go through a normal life in a world where superheroes were only on paper.

“Why are you looking for Captain America?” Steve asked curiously.

“Because you won’t leave me alone!” Tony shouted.

“If this is a world where superheroes don’t exist, why are you looking for one?”

Tony’s jaw slackened. He closed his eyes tightly. The room rocked like they were on the ocean, and Tony’s memory shifted again. The Valkyrie was a German bomber, a regular American soldier had boarded and forced the plane down in the ocean to stop its perfectly normal bombs from reaching American soil. Captain America was a comic book hero created to punch Hitler at a time when America refused to get involved. He was a fantasy.

Steve laughed at him. “You’re putting a lot of effort into making yourself believe that,” he observed. His voice was gentle, softly chiding.

“It makes more sense,” Tony said, sagging against the hospital bed.

Steve moved to stand next to him. He crossed his ankles one way and his arms the other, right-over-left, left-over-right. “Sure. Want to tell me why you’re really hiding?”

Tony’s shoulders slumped. Pieces were slotting into place, the crazy knot that his mind had become slowly unraveling, strands straightening out form the tangle of the others. “You’re better off without me.”

“Or are you better off without me?” Steve pressed.

“Never,” Tony whispered. “You make me… You make me try harder.”

“Who made you try harder after Afghanistan? Or was it Vietnam?” Steve asked.

A grinding noise registered before Tony realized that he’d clenched his teeth. Behind him, Steve’s voice drifted through the room honey-slow, reading out the article on the cancer-fighting nanobots. Tony pulled in a noisy breath through his nose. “Yinsen.”

The Steve beside him said nothing. Tony felt the pressure on his hand increase. Behind him, Steve broke off his reading and said in a cheerful, teasing voice, “If you could wake up and explain how this works to me, I’d sure appreciate it. You know how the future confuses us old men. I need you to… I need you. We’ve been stupid about each other for too long. You deserve better from me.”

Tony slammed a fist into the foot of the bed with a sudden burst of heat. For a moment, his cheeks flushed with warmth and his chest expanded sharply. For a moment, he felt the sun slanting across his chest.

At the bedside, Steve sucked in a sharp breath. He stood up to lean over the bed. “Tony, do that again. Move your foot. Squeeze my hand. Nurse!” he shouted, and then quickly lowered his voice. “Tony, just… anything, please.”

“He loves you,” the Steve standing next to him noted, voice almost curious.

“He doesn’t,” Tony insisted, but his voice shook.

A woman in a lab coat walked into the room. Tony stared at her as she looked up from her clipboard. 5’8” with dirty-blond hair pulled back in a tail, Jolie-mouth, Scandinavian features.

“Dr. Winslow,” Steve said, gesturing her over with one hand. “He moved his foot. I was talking to him, and he – he moved.”

She gave him a sympathetic look that made Tony cringe, her eyes flickering over to the monitors. “Captain Rogers, I know that this is hard for you to accept, but he is in a coma. He’s not responding to you consciously.”

“It’s only been two days,” Steve said stubbornly, “And it isn’t a natural coma.”

“However it happened,” she said gently, “The end result is the same. He’s… he’s like a computer without an operating system.”

Her voice faded to a murmur as the sunlight got brighter, the beeps and ticks of the machines growing louder. Tony watched Steve’s expression set harder, his eyes narrowing, his lips turning down at the corners. He was terrifying in the intensity of his belief, his surety that Tony was going to manufacture a miracle and wake up. Maybe it was hard for Steve to accept considering what he’d woken up from.

“You’re really going to let that brilliant mind just die?” Steve prodded from beside him.

“I’m not really here,” Tony insisted.

“You’re just terrified,” Steve observed. “You’re scared that you’re going to wake up and this…” he gestured to the room around them, “Isn’t a dream.” He pointed at Steve. “He isn’t a dream.”

“Haven’t I done enough?” Tony demanded. “Haven’t I crawled through enough shit to deserve to just… stop?”

“Haven’t you crawled through enough shit to deserve to go home?” Steve shot back.

Tony’s teeth clicked shut. A shiver ran up his spine following a flush of warmth from his toes to his neck. He put a hand over his chest, the flat place where the reactor used to be. The pressure around his hand stayed firm and constant.

“How do you know what I deserve?” he asked helplessly. “How could you know anything?”

“Idiot,” Steve said fondly, “I’m a construct of your subconscious.”

Tony looked helplessly at the hospital bed, Steve standing next to him, staring down the doctor giving him news he didn’t want to hear and refused to believe, as if his refusal to believe would make her wrong. His jaw got tighter and tighter, but his hand stayed gentle on Tony’s, thumb rubbing soothingly over Tony’s knuckles as if he might be offended by the doctor’s lack of faith.

“No brainwaves,” Tony said finally. “No operating system.”

“You’re an engineer, aren’t you?” Steve asked with an incredulous snort. “Build one.”

~*~

It was dark when Tony finally got his brain to reboot after a dozen failed attempts. Sensation came back in a quick cascade - a building tingle in his limbs that rushed from his fingertips and toes inward and upward, and then heat, aching joints, tears pooling at the corner of his eyes, pain in his throat, swollen tongue, swollen fingers, dull discomfort at the inside of his elbow, the weight of the blanket on his thighs. The sound of the heart monitor, the sour scent of antiseptic, and a bitter metallic flavor at the back of his throat. A hundred minor complaints registered all at once up and down his body, all demanding his immediate attention.

His lungs re-engaged with a jerk and he sucked in breath that felt like inhaling sand. His priorities realigned, complaints rearranging in order of intensity, and air shot to the top of the list, pushing full bladder down somewhere around 5 and cold feet down somewhere around 500. He vaguely heard –felt, smelled – commotion at his bedside, but fight or flight was suppressed so far under process oxygen that he couldn’t even reorient his attention to decipher who was at his bedside in the first place.

Processes finally fell into place, and he managed to inhale and exhale in the correct sequence. The dark spots in front of his eyes faded, and he became aware of the motion of his chest, the dryness in his throat. People were moving around him, alarms were going off, there were hands everywhere, and he finally realized that he was struggling against them.

“Tony!” Steve shouted over the bedlam. “Tony, you’re safe. You’re back, you’re okay.”

Tony traced the trajectory of Steve’s voice, briefly seeing his voice as colors, lines, equations written in the air. They faded, and he found Steve standing next to him, wide-eyed and glowing with equal parts worry and hope and fear and joy. He twisted and found Rhodey on the other side, eyes luminous in his face, lips practically disappearing into his mouth.

“Honey, I’m home?” he rasped out finally.

“If you weren’t already in a hospital bed, I would put you in a hospital bed,” Rhodey said, but his lips finally crawled out of his mouth and stretched into a smile.

On his other side, Steve was sucking in rapid breaths through his nose like he couldn’t quite figure out how to engage his voice. Rhodey looked in between them and stepped away from the bedside, ostensibly to get out of the nurses’ way. In his absence, Steve leaned in close and set his forehead very gently against the side of Tony head.

“Welcome home,” he said.

Tony leaned into him and nodded, lips stretching into a smile. He was barely aware of the nurses moving around him over the warmth of Steve’s hand in his own.