I'm actually in an INCREDIBLY good mood and have been all day!!

today, tomorrow and all of our lives | n. mackinnon

Word Count: 7.3k Warnings: Some smut in the middle, swearing, minor character death. Summary: Leah reflects on her relationship with Nate through a series of memories they’ve shared in the minutes before they say I do.  a/n: Full disclosure this is the first piece I’ve written in almost 10 years. It turned out way longer than expected and I am so terrified to post it but I hope you all love it as much as I do. Any and all feedback is appreciated, happy reading! 

As she looked into the mirror, running her fingers over the white silk lining her frame, all she felt was calm. Peace. She’d surprised herself in that regard. She’d expected nerves, expected anxiousness, but she didn’t feel either. She simply felt calm. Her fingers moved up toward the tulle settled neatly in her hair, then ran down the fabric of what had once been her grandmother’s veil. Her something borrowed. She thought of her grandmother then, of the relationship between her and her grandfather, one that had lasted almost sixty years before they’d left this life together, just months apart and still madly in love. The kind of love she’d hoped for as she watched them as a child, then as a teen, then as an adult. The same kind of love she felt she’d found when she met him. Her eyes closed, thinking back to the day she’d first laid eyes on him.

The excited little voices of the children filing back into her classroom brought a small smile to Leah’s face in an instant. Kindergarten had just finished art, and as she watched them come in and sit back at their tables, she silently thanked Mrs. Claskey for the lack of paint on their clothes and hands. There’d been a small (according to Mrs. Claskey, not so much to Leah) incident last week at the very end of art class that had somehow ended in Jack Ledger’s entire right arm and half of his shirt covered in brown paint. Of course the 5th graders had already been lined up at the door waiting to come in, so Mrs. Claskey hadn’t had time to clean him up. That’d been a fun afternoon at the sink for Jack and Leah. Once all of the children were seated, Leah stood from her rocking chair at the front of the room and raised her hand. Her students followed suit, having been conditioned to quiet down and raise their own hands when she did so. Their hands lowered as she began to speak.

“Alright, my friends. I know we’re excited, today’s a special day for us. We have new friends coming to spend time with us this week! Do we remember who they are?” As soon as she finished, little hands all over the room shot back up. Leah looked around, pointing to the tiny blonde in the far too large and, Leah suspected second hand, Avalanche jersey dead center. “Emory, who are they?” “The Colorado Avalanche, Ms. Brewer! They play hockey here, at the Pepsi Center! My dad says some day they’ll win the… the um…” “The Stanley Cup?” Leah supplied. That and what information Emory had spoken aloud was about all she knew of them as well, not really following the sport herself. “Yes!” Emory continued, “The Stanley Cup!” Leah nodded and clasped her hands together. “Good job Emory that’s right! Some of the players from the Avalanche are coming to meet us this afternoon. They’re just as excited to meet you as you are to meet them. But before we can do that, we need to talk about the rules for when we have guests in our classroom.” A small groan sounded throughout the room and Leah giggled under her breath. “Okay, okay. I know talking about our rules isn’t always fun, but we want to show them how kind and polite we can be, right?” Twenty-two heads nodded, so she continued. “Good! Okay, who can tell me our rules then? Thomas?” Her gaze fixed on the quiet boy in the back corner, smiling slightly at him as he straightened up in his chair. Leah had been subtly attempting to bring Thomas out of his shell throughout his time in her class. As she remembered his silence and lack of eye contact at the beginning of the year, she felt nothing but pride for how far he’d come. “We don’t leave our spot at the carpet unless you or our guest says that we can. We sit criss cross applesauce and don’t touch our friends while we’re listening. When we want to talk or as a question, we raise our hands until someone calls on us. And we always show kindness to our friends, our visitors and our teachers.” Leah felt a swell of pride at the last bit. She had a great group of kids this year, and though she knew she shouldn’t play favorites, if she’d had a list this class would be up at the top for years to come. Teaching at a school in a low income area of Denver wasn’t what she’d expected herself to do after graduation, but she adored it all the same, and the children she’d taught were all incredibly special to her.

“Good, Thomas! But there’s one more rule we forgot, the most important rule. I know we remember, so how about let’s all say it together?” “Have fun!” “Yes! Have fun! I don’t think it’ll be hard with these new friends.” She glanced up at the clock then that read one o’clock on the dot. “Okay friends, time to make our way to the carpet! Please find your spot in our circle.” As her students got up and made their way to their seats in front of the rocking chair, she heard multiple people enter her room and all twenty-three heads, including her own, turned toward the intruders. Leah studied them for a moment as they made their way through the desks toward the group. There were two of them, both in blue and burgundy jerseys graced with the numbers 29 and 92 and an A and a C, respectively. Excited gasps and whispers filled the front of the room. The first to reach them was 92, and probably the most conventionally attractive man Leah had ever seen in person. His perfectly straight, shining white teeth were on full display, a wide grin stretch prominently across his face. His attention was focused solely on the children, so Leah looked past him and settled her eyes on the other, 29. She was surprised to find his attention fixed on her. She was also surprised at the butterflies that filled her stomach when her eyes met his. The bright blue staring back at her was like a shock to her system. She felt herself blush and quickly averted her gaze down to the jeans, white tank top and baggy yellow cardigan she’d pulled from her closet that morning. ‘Probably would have been a good day to dress it up a bit, Leah.’ She quickly shook herself from her thoughts and smiled at 92, still unable to meet the eyes of 29. “Hi there! I’m Ms. Brewer. We’ve all really been looking forward to this, I know they have especially.” Leah gestured to her excited students, some of the visibly trying to stop themselves from squirming in their places. He smiled at her and took her outstretched hand, shaking it and then setting his sights back to the children. “Hi everybody, we’ve been really excited to meet you! I’m Gabe, and this is Nate.” He gestured behind him to number 29. Nate. The name bounced around her head like a stray pinball. Nathan Mackinnon. She remembered seeing his face plastered over billboards downtown, along with that of who she now remembered 92 to be, captain Gabriel Landeskog. The two large hockey players sat in the admittedly too small chairs in front of the group, and Leah quietly made her way to the corner of the room, plopping in her desk chair to watch the interaction between Gabe, Nate and her students. As they excitedly asked and answered questions and talked about school, hockey and life in general (as much as five and six year old children could), Leah found herself unable to look away from Nate. He wasn’t handsome in the way that Gabe was. His nose and teeth were slightly crooked, and his jaw a bit more squared, but she found him incredibly attractive all the same. He smiled brightly at the group of children in front of him and enthusiastically spoke with them, his laugh speeding up the butterflies she still felt. She again found herself shaking her from her own thoughts, looking down at the papers on her desk. Leah hadn’t dated anyone seriously since her disastrous relationship with Scott had ended just before her college graduation. They had met in high school and began dating junior year, when they were both far too young and impulsive to have actually found the kind of love that was meant to last. They were two different people from the start, Scott preferring to get plastered at a large house party, Leah preferring to spend her Friday night on the couch under a blanket watching bad television. They had somehow lasted through their first three and a half years of college together, though they spent large chunks of it arguing or in silence, before Leah had discovered that the last seven months of their relationship he’d spent in bed with a blonde he’d met in one of his classes. She’d been devastated, but deep down she’d known he wasn’t the man she was meant to marry. Following graduation, she’d packed her things, picked up and moved to Denver for a fresh start, and hadn’t looked back since. She blamed her lack of dating for her current thoughts about Nate. She’d been so lost in her thoughts that she was surprised when she heard one of her students saying her name, immediately turning her attention back to the carpet ready to answer, though she found Millie still speaking to Gabe and Nate. “-she’s the best! She’s so much fun, even when she’s making us do our counting worksheets. Ooh, she lets us sing our weather song every morning, that’s my favorite part of the day.” Millie turned towards Leah and spoke directly to her, “Ms. Brewer, can you sing the song for them! It’s so much fun, they’ll love it.” Leah blushed slightly but chuckled as all twenty-two excited smiles and two curious pairs of eyes turned towards her. “Why don’t we all sing it together? Show them how great we are at it.” Leah led the excited group through their morning weather song about the rain, the snow, the wind and the sunshine and as they finished (loudly) she once again looked at the two blonde men and found Gabe smiling widely at the class while Nate looked at her with a small smile of his own. Her face warmed yet again as they all began clapping and laughing at her as she grinned and took a small bow in her chair. Conversation between Gabe and her students continued, but for a long moment Nate’s gaze remained fixed on her. She looked down at the papers on her desk again, trying not to read too much into his glances that were frequently aimed at her. All too quickly the two men stood from the chairs and bid goodbye to the students and after a collective “aww” and a round of high fives, left the room to meet the fifth graders waiting for them in the gym. As Leah focused on getting her students back to their seats at their tables, she didn’t notice Nate casting one last look through the door as they left, his eyes only set on her. By three o’clock all of her students were gone and Leah made her way around the room, cleaning up leftover trash and wiping the crumbs from their end of day snack from the tables. She jumped as she heard the deep voice coming from just outside her door. “Hi, did you need some help?” Her head snapped towards the voice and her eyes again met the bright blue that hadn’t left her mind for the rest of the afternoon. The small smile she’d gotten before was present on Nate’s face as he watched her drop the wad of colored paper in her hands into the trash. “Oh no thank you, I’ll be okay here.” She silently willed the butterflies dancing around her stomach and the blush painting her cheeks to go away as he stepped further into the classroom and waved her off, starting to push the chairs into the tables as he spoke again. “It’s no problem, it’ll go faster if we work together. Besides, Gabe’s somewhere shooting extra footage with our media team and this’ll get me out of that.” They both chuckled at that and she nodded, keeping her eyes averted as she helped push in the chairs. “I’m Nathan. Mackinnon. Nathan Mackinnon. But, um, everybody just sort of calls me Nate.” “Nice to meet you, Nate. I’m Leah, Leah Brewer.” She knew there were nerves in her voice, but she didn’t know if she’d imagined the hint of them in his. They worked in silence for a few minutes before he spoke again. “So, Leah, are you from Denver?” She shook her head. “No, I grew up in Murraysville. It’s in Pennsylvania, just outside of Pittsburgh.” He lit up a bit, turning towards her fully. “One of my best friends lives there, plays for the Penguins. Sidney’s his name, Sidney Crosby.” She shot him a playfully unimpressed glance as she stopped pushing in the chair. “Now Nate. I may not know much about hockey, but I can assure you, even I know who Sidney Crosby is.” She laughed quietly at the blush that tinted his cheeks and he chuckled along with her, shaking his head. “Yeah that was stupid, sorry.” They kept on cleaning up the last of the classroom until he plopped into the last chair. “So, what brought you to Denver all the way from the East Coast?”
 Leah figured that since he’d sat down, he wasn’t planning on leaving right away, so she made her way to her rocking chair. She thought for a moment before she answered. It wasn’t like she could come right out and tell him Scott had emotionally destroyed her, so she settled for the cliche, generic answer she gave most people when they asked her. “I graduated from college and just… needed a fresh start.” He nodded slightly, but by the look he gave her, she knew he was curious for more. He didn’t press her, and the small talk moved onto other things, her job, then his job and then their families and friends. The conversation flowed so easily between them. By the time she realized almost forty-five minutes had passed, they were laughing and sharing stories as if they’d known each other for years, not hours. “Oh, it’s almost four o’clock, you should probably get back to Gabe and the rest of your team.” He sighed as they both looked at the clock, like he knew she was right but also like he didn’t want to leave. “You’re right. It was really nice meeting you though.” He stood from the chair as she returned the sentiment and turned to leave the room. He’d made it almost fully out the door before he stopped and turned around asking her one last question. “Listen, I don’t… this might be a little forward, I- would you maybe want to go out to dinner sometime? With me? Like, as a date?” She stared at him in surprise for a moment and then thought about her answer. Sure, she hadn’t really dated much since Scott, but it had been three years and thousands of miles since then. And there was something about Nate that intrigued her, something that had caused the butterflies to erupt the minute they’d made eye contact. Something that made her answer fairly easy. “Sure, Nate, I’d really like that.” The memory flooded away as she opened her eyes and looked back into the mirror. One dinner date had led to another, which had led to a few more, then spending the night at her place and then his. She’d met Cox then, which she was glad had gone well because, as Nate had told her later, he couldn’t date somebody Cox didn’t like. That had led to her meeting his teammates and their significant others, and him meeting her friends. That summer when his season and her semester had ended, they traveled to Murraysville where he met her family, and Nova Scotia where she met his. Before they knew it a little over a year had flown by and they’d bought their first house together. She chuckled at that memory, instantly thinking back to the mess of hockey players that had filled their home the day they moved in. “Josty come on, man! The box says fragile!” Leah giggled from her place in the kitchen at the sound of JT’s voice echoing down the hallway, and then at Nate’s voice, floating in from his spot in their living room. “Don’t break any more of my shit, Josty, you know I still haven’t forgiven you and Z for the broken lamp from the Christmas party.” Mel snorted across the counter, Jackie shaking her head as Leah placed the last of the bowls in the cabinet. “They’re a fucking mess, the whole group of them.” Jackie and Mel laughed and nodded in agreement before moving to start on loading the cutlery into the drawers. Leah made her way from the kitchen into the living room, passing by Gabe, EJ and Naz walking to the front door to pull more of the heavier pieces of furniture from the truck. “Thank you guys again for helping us with all of this. No way Nate could have done all the heavy lifting himself the softie.” She smirked at the indignant ‘hey!’ that came from their sofa and the boys chuckled before assuring her again it was no problem and heading for the door, EJ jostling her on his way. She rolled her eyes but smiled at the toothless grin she got in return, passing them to plop down next to her boyfriend, leaning heavily into his side and closing her eyes with a yawn as he lightly kissed her forehead. “Tired, baby?” “Mhm.” As she opened her eyes again, she finally took the chance to look around their living room, the large bay windows bathing the room in sunlight. Boxes were scattered around, the television still waiting to be mounted above the fireplace and the shelves empty, save for one photo. Her eyes landed on it and she smiled fondly, one of her favorites of the two of them. It was taken in Cole Harbour on one of their last trips. They sat together on the boat, her leaning against his side with his arms wrapped around her, much like they were now. They’d gone for a sunset cruise with Sid and Kathy and Tyson and Emma who had also come back up north, just chatting and enjoying the company when Kathy told them to pose, that the sunset created the perfect backdrop behind them. As they leaned into each other and smiled at the camera, Tyson said something from just beside Kathy that had drawn her attention as Kathy snapped the photo. She’s laughing in his direction in the photo, still leaning against Nate who’s smile is directed only at her. The love between the two of them is obvious, which is exactly why it’s one of her favorites. Leah is drawn from the memory captured in the photo when she feels Nate’s lips on the top of her head again and the smile on her face grows even wider. She listens to the sounds of a pot clattering to the floor in the kitchen followed by Jackie’s voice scolding EJ and Gabe and Mel laughing, Josty, JT and Burky pushing each other around in the hallway and Nate’s slow, even breathing right beside her on the couch. As her eyes closed once more, she couldn’t remember if she’d ever in her life felt as happy as she did in that moment. Nate’s fingers ran through her hair and she pulled slightly out of his embrace, taking a moment to silently study the man she’d so quickly found herself falling madly in love with. “What’s on your mind?” he asks her, and she finds herself overwhelmed with emotion as she tries to put her thoughts into words. “I love our friends. I love our new house, but I love even more that we get to make it a home. I love this life that I get to build with you. I love you Nate.” The silent exchange that directly followed was just as meaningful, if not more so, than the words she’d just spoken. She could feel it. He’d felt it too. “I love you, too.” He hadn’t said much, but what he had said had told her everything she needed to know. She’s yanked quickly from that memory as the door to the bridal suite opens. Linnea flounced into the room in her white tulle dress, looking every bit the little princess they all considered her to be. Mel shuffled in behind her before the door is closed again. The soft pink of her dress perfectly complimented her blonde hair and pale skin, amplifying her beauty even further. Mel and Gabe were two of the best things to come from her relationship with Nate, quickly becoming some of her very best friends. Through every hardship or struggle she’d faced during her relationship with Nate he’d been right there beside her, but the Landeskogs had been right there on her other side. She still feels a jolt of happiness when she remembers finding out about Linnea for the first time, and the first time she got to hold her. She couldn’t keep the smile off her face as they entered the room, fiddling with the small diamond bracelet Mel had given to her as a gift the night before from both her and Gabe, her something new. Mel snorted, joking “What, already thinking about the honeymoon?” Of course she hadn’t been before, but she started to now, and she quickly tried to ignore the tingle she felt between her legs at the next memory, one from just a few weeks ago.     “Oh fuck, yes.” Leah’s eyes were shut tightly, mouth wide open, one of Nate’s arms thrown across her lower stomach to keep her from squirming as his tongue slowly circled her clit. She was panting, hard, one of her hands wound tightly in his blonde hair while the other held onto their headboard. She’d already come once on his fingers, but he hadn’t shown any signs of slowing down. He groaned as he pulled away slightly, his mouth and chin covered in her wetness and let his eyes roam back up her body, flushed, until they met hers. “Fucking love your pussy, baby.” He dove back into her cunt then like it was a five-course meal as she tightened her grip on him and moaned loudly, her body thrashing and hurtling toward her second climax. She’d found out early on in their relationship that in contrast to how soft he was with her normally, in bed Nate was filthy. And she fucking loved it. They both shared a high sex drive, and when they first started dating, they’d gone at it like rabbits. In the morning in the shower before she left for work, on their couch when he’d gotten home from a game, one particularly exciting afternoon when he’d come home after practice and laid her out on his kitchen table. They constantly got each other off over FaceTime or Skype when he was on the road, and on their first bye week together they spent almost the entire five days of their trip fucking on every surface of the villa they’d rented. She’d been sore for almost a week. And after almost four years of dating, it hadn’t really slowed down at all. When Nate moved his tongue from inside her back to her clit, flattening it and shaking his head from side to side, she felt her orgasm crash over her. “Fuuuuck yes!” Her back arched sharply off the bed as she rode out the waves of her high, Nate continuing to lick and suck at her through it. As she worked to catch her breath, he kissed his way back up her body, biting down softly on her neck when he reached her sweet spot. “So sexy when you cum. Think you can give me one more, baby?” Though she was exhausted from the first two orgasms he’d given her, she still nodded enthusiastically and let her hand snake down his body, taking him in her hand and guiding him toward her center. She let out a sigh which turned into a quiet moan as he entered her. Of all the men she’d been with, which though admittedly wasn’t many, Nate was the biggest. His length was average, but he was thick, spreading her open and filling her better than any man ever had before. Their mouths met as he started to move inside of her, swallowing the noises she made. She knew it wouldn’t take much for either of them, her already sensitive from her first two highs and him keyed up from the reactions he’d gotten while giving them to her. As his thrusts picked up in both pace and in power, their kisses turned more into breathing and moaning into each other’s mouths before he moved back down to her neck then down further, taking one of her nipples into his mouth and biting before rolling it between his teeth. “Ah, daddy please, I need to come, I need to come.” She whined, rolling her hips up to meet his the best she could. He kept his pace and shook his head slightly. “Wait baby, wait for daddy. I’ll give you what you need, be patient.” He stopped for a moment and took her ankles into his hands, placing them up over his shoulders and she cried out as he began thrusting against her harder and faster, hitting a spot deeper in her than before. Her breathing went ragged and she struggled to get out anything but whines, which quickly turned into yells, then sobs. “Please daddy! Please, I’m gonna, I can’t- I need to cum!” she clawed at his back, her head lolling back against the pillows as she felt his hips begin to move more frantically and uncontrolled. “Yeah baby, fucking cum for me. Show daddy who makes you feel like this, who’s pussy this is.” She shrieked and seconds later felt her fluids gush around him, pulling a loud groan from him as he followed her over the edge. “Fuuuuuck yeah baby, your pussy feels so good when you cum around me. Fucking angel.” He grunted, filling her with his seed. They’d stopped using condoms six months in and he maintains it was one of the best decisions they’d made. She couldn’t help but agree with him as she felt his warmth pulsing inside of her.   When they’d both given each other everything they had, he dropped down gently over her and wrapped his arms around her, holding her as she trembled through the aftershocks of her third high of the night. Soft kisses were planted across her neck and jaw and she lightly combed her fingers through the sweaty mess of blonde on the nape of his neck. These were some of her favorite moments with Nate. Just after a round of great sex when they just laid catching their breaths in the silence, still connected and just basking in the warmth of being together. All she was capable of thinking about in those moments was the man laying over her and how much she loved him. “I love you baby.” He whispered quietly to her as he pulled away from his place at her shoulder, leaving her with a languid, toe curling kiss on her lips and feelings of love for him swirling around her body. It was Mel snorting again that brought her back to reality and she turned toward the other blonde, realizing she’d been biting her lip as she got caught up in the memory. “Jesus, I was kidding. My child is in the room.” Mel smirked and Linnea answered perfectly with a giggle from her spot in the corner, making both women laugh. She turned back toward the mirror to readjust her veil for what felt like the twentieth time since it’d been put in her hair. Mel continued. “Anyways, we just came by to tell you we’ve got about 15 minutes to go time. Maid of honor duties and all.” She winked making both of them laugh again before she swept Linnea into her arms, heading for the door “We’ll leave you alone now, see you in a bit.” As she exited the room, another woman entered. “My baby. Look at you, you look beautiful.” Her mother moved to stand by her side in the mirror, placing a hand gently on her shoulder, eyes filling with tears as they met hers in the mirror. “Your dad would be so proud, sweetheart.” Her own eyes filled with tears this time and as she closed them, she could hear the beeping of the heart monitor and smell the sterile scent of the hospital as clear as day. She couldn’t breathe. The only word to describe her in that moment was numb. Her eyes traced the wires to the white linen blanket, up to the machine that measured the slow heartbeat of the first man she’d ever loved. A face eerily similar to her own, her father had never looked thinner and paler than he did laying there in his hospital gown. ‘Brain aneurysm. Ruptured. Hemorrhagic stroke.’ The words the doctor had spoken to them rested like a weight in her head and in her chest as she stared down at their hands, hers clutching tightly and his limp and unmoving. She couldn’t cry. Not yet. She’d been holding onto hope for days now that he would wake up, that they could talk about how terribly their Steelers were doing and laugh about the clumsiness of her mother. That they could drive home together in his car, singing terribly along to the old Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin tunes he’d brought her up on. That one day he could walk her down the aisle (‘Not until you’re 30!’) and hold his first grandchild. No matter how many times she’d heard the words braindead and pull the plug, she held onto that hope, the same hope she was starting to feel slip between her fingers. The beeping was the only sound in the room aside from her mother’s sniffling and Nate’s steady breathing. Her parents had divorced just before her fourth birthday, but they’d remained great friends and worked together to raise her, something she didn’t realize how grateful she was for until she reached adulthood. It was only fitting that she, Leah and Nate were the three present at his bedside as two of them were what he always called ‘the loves of his life’ and the third one of his ‘favorite people out there’ as he’d called Nate just a few months before. The doctor entered the room again and when Leah met his gaze it was somber. She looked away almost immediately, knowing what was coming as he started speaking to them again. “I’m sorry, we’ve done all that we can, but we believe at this point it’s about a five percent chance he’ll wake, and if he does, we can almost guarantee significant brain damage. It’s in my medical opinion that you may want to consider pulling him off of the life support.” She felt it then, the first tear slip down her cheek where she sat in the chair by her father’s side. She locked eyes with her mother and they both knew what they had to do. This isn’t the way he would have wanted to live, and that’s if he did, and she wasn’t going to put him through any pain and suffering simply because it would make her happy. An hour later, after the three of them had all spoken their goodbyes and spent their last minutes with him, the machines were turned off. The beeping stopped, her father’s hand, still clutched in her own smaller, softer one went cold. Leah wept. She laid down on the bed beside her father’s body and held him, weeping as the last signs of life left his body. She couldn’t do this. She couldn’t get through this. She didn’t want to live a life without her dad’s obnoxiously loud laughter and world famous bear hugs. She didn’t know how she was going to pull herself from the grief crashing over her in waves. Then a warm hand circled her ankle from its place at the foot of the bed, thumb softly smoothing over the skin there. Nate. Her rock, her stability, the calm to help her weather the storm. He’d be right by her side through it, just as he had been in everything else since the day they’d met three years ago. She knew when she felt the letters he was tracing onto her skin. I love you. It was strange but through all of her grief then, she felt the slightest bit of joy, because she also knew that her father had gotten to know and love the man she was going to marry, the love of her life. Her mother quickly pulled a handkerchief from her clutch, chastising both herself and her daughter for ‘ruining her makeup.’ She giggled as she clutched her mother’s hand and then directed a small smile at the pair of sapphire earrings she wore, a gift from her father on her eighteenth birthday and now her something blue. He was there with her, she knew that he was. Quickly wiping at her eyes, she handed the handkerchief back to her mother and went to gather her bouquet from the small table but stopped when her eyes landed on her engagement ring. One that had belonged to Nate’s grandmother, her something old. She floated away into yet another memory, and by far one of the best of her life. The air was crisp and smelled of the first signs of winter as Leah and Nate walked hand in hand down the lakeside pathway through Confluence Park. This was her favorite time of year, filled with memories of pulling out the Christmas decorations far too early with her mother as her father just smirked and shook his head at them. Memories of home games spent with her girls in the family box cheering on the men they loved. Memories of cold mornings spent curled up on the couch with Nate under the blankets, Cox at their feet as they fell in and out of sleep, watching the snowfall through the bay windows. She smiled as Nate gently tugged at Cox’s leash, willing him to slow down as they strolled lazily behind him. “This is my favorite time of year. I know I always complain about how cold it gets, but nothing beats a winter day like this.” Nate brought their joint hands up to his lips to place a kiss and replied, “I know baby. It’s one of my favorite times of year too, just because you love it.” She laughed at the cheesiness of his statement but leaned into his side, looking up at him as they slowed even more. “I love you, you know.” He didn’t reply immediately so she continued walking, only stopping when he did, turning to gaze at him curiously. It was only then that she felt the trembling of his hand still clasped in hers. “Nate? Why are we stopping, are you okay?” Cox whined behind her, probably wondering the same thing. “Yeah baby I’m fine, I just needed to say something and I wanted your full attention when I did.” This intrigued her even further but she didn’t answer, waiting for him to say whatever it is she could see was stewing in there. He stared at her for a moment longer before he started to speak again. “There’s something that I haven’t told you. I spoke to your dad on the phone a few weeks before he died. Spoke to him for quite a while, actually?” Leah was now incredibly confused, so she waited for him to continue. “You know how much I loved and respected him. I don’t know how but in three years he became another father figure to me and I wanted his opinion on something important so I called him to ask.” “What did you ask him?” her interest was thoroughly peaked as Nate’s hand dropped to his pocket, until he pulled out a small velvet box and both hands came to cover her mouth when she realized what was happening. She went completely still, tears already coming to the surface as he took a step closer to her, one of his hands still holding Cox’s leash and the other the box. “I asked him for his blessing.” He looped the leash around his wrist, but Cox was still then, sitting on the pavement at her feet, tail wagging furiously though she knew he had no idea what was occurring. How much her life was about to change. Then Nate took one of her hands from her mouth, her left hand, and held it tightly in his own. “When I was growing up, I watched my parents all the time when they were together, and you could see it in their faces when they looked at each other. It was this pure, real, genuine kind of love that doesn’t scream at you. The kind of love that’s just there, the kind that looks like making each other breakfast or bringing each other the morning paper, the kind that’s sitting on the couch together doing two completely separate things but somehow still being connected, the kind that looks like smiling through raising two children together. I saw other people find it, Mel and Gabe, Erik and Jackie, Sid and Kath. I always wanted that kind of love, but I never believed that I would have it, that I would somehow be lucky enough to find someone that loved me like that or that I could love like that. I think I realized on our third date that even if it wasn’t there yet, I could see that kind of love with you, and then it happened. There isn’t a day that goes by that I’m not thanking whoever’s up there in the sky or wherever they are,” she giggled slightly through her tears at that bit, “that I got lucky enough to fall in love with you. You are everything. You’re kind, you’re witty, you’re intelligent, you’re incredibly beautiful and you’re so loving to everyone around you. But especially me. You’ve loved me through every bad game, through every hotheaded tantrum, through every argument, through every loss and every heartache. It didn’t matter what I was facing, what we were facing, you’ve loved me through all of it and I can only hope to spend the rest of my life giving that love right back to you.” At this point she was ugly crying, clutching his hand so tightly her knuckles were turning white, but he pressed on. “This kind of love, the love we feel for each other is special, once in a lifetime. It doesn’t come around often and my grandma always told me when you find something like it you have to hold on as tightly as you can and never let go. This was hers, actually.” He opened the velvet box then and Leah gasped as she saw the simple round diamond set on a silver band. “After I called your dad to ask for his blessing and he not only told me yes but that he couldn’t be happier not only that his daughter had found someone she loved so much but someone who loved her the way she deserved,” she wept harder at that “I called grandma and told her I had found it, the kind of love she told me to never let go of, and the next time we were in town visiting her she gave me the ring. This ring is from a marriage full of that love and I thought it might be a good luck charm for us, not that we need it.” She laughed loudly at that and he grinned at her, but his smile softened and she found tears to match hers in his eyes as he dropped to one knee. “You’re it for me, baby. My best friend, my soulmate, the love of my life. I’ll never need to wonder again if I’ll ever find this kind of love because hopefully I’ll get to have it with you and the family we’ll build forever. If you say yes, I promise to fall asleep a little more in love with you today, tomorrow and all of our lives. I love you so much. Leah, will you marry me?” She didn’t even need to think, she knew. She’d known for years, just as she was it for him, he was it for her. “Yes. Yes, Nate. I love you. I love you.” He slid the elegant diamond onto her finger and his lips were immediately on hers, kissing her through their laughter and through their tears, over and over again. If you’d ask her, there weren’t words she could put together to describe the love she felt for him in that moment. Everything, every moment and memory that lead them to this place was worth it for the reward of getting to call him her husband for the rest of her life. They spent what felt like hours but could only have been minutes kissing and laughing in that park, elated at the idea of spending their lives together. As they finally pulled away from each other Nate excitedly pulled her left hand forward, flashing it at their dog proudly, making her laugh once again. “Cox, she said yes! Mom and I are getting married.” The knock on the door shook her from her happiest memory, Gabe standing proudly in it’s frame offering her his arm. When she’d thought about who would walk her down the aisle that day, though they’d never fill the void left in her father’s absence, Gabe was the only choice. The older brother she’d never had but had found in him. “Ready to be Mrs. Mackinnon, kid?” The nerves still didn’t come, the calm and the peace remaining. She grabbed the bouquet and crossed the room to take his arm. “Never been more ready in my life.” (+ bonus:) Their bedroom was still save for her husband’s soft snores and the hum of the ceiling fan. The clock on the bedside table next to her that was illuminated by the soft glow coming from her reading lamp read 3:53 am, but she didn’t feel the sleep gripping her like she probably should. She took the quiet moment to glance at the man sleeping soundly beside her, the man she’d called her husband for the last two years but her best friend for far longer. He was the man of her dreams and though they’d faced challenges, she wouldn’t have wanted to face them with anyone else. She scanned quickly back through all the memories she had of their relationship and smiled when they brought back the feelings of intense love between them. And as she looked down at the tiny baby nestled softly in her arms, his eyes an identical blue to his father’s, she remembered the words he’d said the day he proposed. “I promise to fall asleep a little more in love with you today, tomorrow and all of our lives.”

Secret Admirer (A Silvaze Oneshot)

Silver the hedgehog did not understand time travel, that was a truth he had long come to accept. While the books he’d read, often fictional in nature, gave their own takes or explanations with regard to changing history, he’d found that the truth was far less consistent. He’d often jump back a century or two to change things, to save his friends or the world from disaster, but those changes often resulted bizarre contradictions. Upon returning to the future he’d find it totally changed by his actions, so what happened to the prior, destroyed, world?

On one occasion the world might’ve been cracked into chunks by a giant monster only to be flooded by an entirely different one upon his next visit, but he seemed to be unaffected by the world’s changes. Well, that’d been the case nine out of ten times. The first time the future had been saved was the exception to the rule. Following the battle with Solaris, his life and all he was had been reset to zero. He’d been reborn and regrown to the point of being able to change the future again, an occurrence that he didn’t understand and that could hypothetically happen again at any point. That happening now would mean losing his memories again, forgetting not only himself and his friends but his closest partner all over again. Regaining those memories once had been so difficult, a second attempt might well prove impossible.

So, if he didn’t understand time travel and it could be so dangerous, why on earth was he daring to do this? Why had he hidden himself in the bushes of the royal gardens, from dusk till the rapidly approaching dawn, staring up at his best friend’s balcony? Why had he turned back the clock a single day to crouch in the hedgerows for what must have been over ten hours? Well, because the oncoming morning had been a rather bizarre day for him.

——

The day had started in a not so peculiar way. He’d awakened as his door was kicked in and a familiar voice bellowed through the entryway, “Rise and shine mate! Your Sheila’s here and I’m hungry!”

Though this happened every third or so day, her words had sent him tumbling from his hammock and he only just managed to catch himself before he could hit the ramshackle floor, “Good morning Marine,” He managed to groan, floating himself upright, “It’s morning already?”

“Morning, afternoon, evening? What does that matter, I’m telling you to get up, get your head on mate,” She beamed up at him, already dressed in her shipwright’s overalls, “I heard about your late night out, but that’s no excuse to leave your lady hanging, let alone leave me without breakfast!”

“Late night out? What are you...?” As he rubbed the sleep from his eyes, the hedgehog’s brain kicked into gear. Marine only used terms like Sheila when she was talking about one person, “Wait, Blaze is here? I thought she was busy today; we were going to meet up tonight?”

“Well, for obvious reasons, she wants to see you now,” Marine’s grin went from excited to mischievous, “You’d better not keep her waiting.”

Marine had joked about the two of them being more than friends for some time now, so this was nothing new to the hedgehog. Whenever he left for the castle the raccoon would ask if he was going to see his girlfriend. Whenever they went on outings, professional or otherwise, Marine would insist on calling them dates. Blaze still seemed to struggle with it sometimes but, to be honest, he’d learned to let it fly over his head. The words Blaze and girlfriend had practically become synonymous in Silver’s head, even if he knew they weren’t actually the same.

Regardless of Marine’s chosen vernacular, Blaze’s mention was enough to send him into a hurry. Psychic light filled the room, his semi-private space in the bric-a-brac house that Marine had made, and immediately set about preparing him for the day. A set of boots pulled themselves onto his feet, his gloves slipped over his hands and his quills were straightened from frightful bedhead into their usual maple leaf style. There was a time when he wouldn’t have cared to do any of this, when he’d have simply stumbled put there to greet her, but the feline had trained him to be far neater in this second life.

“Alright, let’s go,” He grinned, knocking the door ajar with his powers before stepping around her.

“Hey, don’t get distracted by her, mate. I still want my breakfast!” The shipwright whined, trotting along behind him.

Their hut on the beach was a small place, mostly made of driftwood and iron, so it didn’t take Silver long to perform his usual stumbling dance over Marine’s half-finished inventions and into the kitchen. The combined cooking and eating station was at their home’s entrance, it was the first room any visitors ever saw. He’d made sure to clean the surfaces and put everything away the night before, in an effort to avoid an earful from his feline friend. The sight Silver encountered so heavily contrasted what he’d left last night.

Not only had the raccoon evidently awoken early and started tinkering, laying out all manner of machine on the kitchen table, but his companion looked so very different. For once, the guardian of the Sol emeralds wasn’t wearing her royal robes. Blaze was instead garbed in something far lighter, a long white sundress with a ruffled style. Its straps were thin but made to look thicker by what, even from a distance, the hedgehog could identify as embroidered felt lilies. There she sat, absorbing all of his attention, a simple glass of water placed in front of her. Was she smiling? It looked like she was, but maybe not fully. Well, it wasn’t unlike her to smother such an emotion.

“Good morning, Silver,” The hedgehog felt something strange in his chest as her words distracted him from his staring. Suddenly, it felt hotter than usual. That phenomena had happened a few times, but Blaze had sworn that it wasn’t her power’s doing.

“Good morning, Blaze,” He beamed, ignoring that strange feeling. Marine barged past as he stood somewhat stunned in the doorway, “I thought you were busy today?”

“I am, I’m just,” She went from smiling to fidgeting very quickly, hands set upon get glass, “Stopping in. I wanted to make sure you were okay.”

Blaze was apparently good at hiding her emotions but, for as long as he could remember, Silver had been able to see through them. Right now though, there was something flickering across her brow that Silver couldn’t place. She looked uncomfortable but Silver had seen her uncomfortable, he’d seen her sleeping on tarmac when they couldn’t reach their beds, this was a very different kind of discomfort. As if to make things even stranger, he couldn’t help but notice the heat lines that were blurring the air around her frame. That was a sight he only ever saw when she was seriously angry or upset, it usually indicated an immanent burning outburst and gave him time to mediate.

Again though, he couldn’t help but notice, despite that hint and her apparent discomfort, was that happiness in her eyes? A strange smell seemed to hang around her. It wasn’t unlike the feline to use strong perfume to mask the scent of flames but beneath the smell of lavender there was something else. Something had undoubtedly caught fire, but he couldn’t place what.

“What, me? Yeah, I’m fine,” He said, stepping fully into the room as he pulled himself from another daydream, “That dress is so nice, it really suits you.”

“Thank you,” She quickly uttered, raising the glass to her lips and absentmindedly casting her gaze to the ramshackle room’s large window

“Geez, you two really aren’t good at this,” The younger girl sounded, jumping up to sit at the table, “The dress is nice, Silver? After everything, that’s the best you could manage?”

“I mean, Blaze always looks pretty so it’s difficult to compliment her,” He quickly and bluntly responded, honest as ever, “But that dress makes her look even more beautiful than normal; it really suits her,” Silver saw an opportunity to enquire and turned back the feline, “Is something happening today?”

“No, not particularly, I just...” As the feline was talking, seemingly without her even noticing, her left shoulder ignited, “Was curious what you thought of it. I bought it a while ago thought I should wear it out for once. I’m glad you like it.”

“M-Mate, you’re-

Before the raccoon could finish, Silver had gently stepped to Blaze’s side. Concern was welling in the hedgehog’s head, not because of the fire itself but what it represented in Blaze’s mind. Casually, as he had done so many times before, he reached out and pressed a psychically shielded hand upon her shoulder. In an instant, like a hood covering a candle, he dispelled the flames with a gentle hiss. In their wake though, Silver felt a tenseness in her body.

He leaned in, getting face to face with her, but the prokinetic’s eyes fled from his, “Blaze, are you okay?”

“I’m fine, Silver. Sorry, I just lost focus for a moment,” He’d known her long enough to know when she was lying. Something was going on.

Silver leaned in even further, pushing his forehead against hers, “You feel hotter than usual,” He confirmed aloud, meeting her eyes as he pulled back, “Are you sure? You might be sick...”

“I’m fine, really,” She insisted, “I-I just wanted to see you as soon as I could.”

“See me?” Silver blinked, confused, “But aren’t we meeting tonigh-

Before he could question Blaze any further though, Marine started to yell, “That’s more like it! See Silver, when you try, you can do it. You should sweep her off her feet more often; who knows, she might wear more pretty dresses.”

“Marine,” The guardian frowned, her ears folding, “If you must make such comments could you please keep your voice down.”

“Well I’m sorry I’m getting in the way of you and your boyfriend’s private time,” The youth stuck her tongue out, “But he’s supposed to be making me breakfast!”

“Fine, Marine, I’ll start on breakfast. Just settle down,” The psychic sighed, casting his aura across the room. The cupboards popped open, jam and utensils floated their way down to the worktop as bread jumped up and into the toaster, “So why did you want to see me, Blaze?”

“I just thought I should...” She shook her head, seeming to return to a more stoic demeanour, “I wanted to make sure you two were okay and now I know you both are, I’m glad. That’s all. Thank you for the water, Marine. I should probably get going.”

Something was wrong, something was definitely wrong with his partner. Silver felt his heart beat faster as he called out to her, “Wait, um,” She froze at his exclamation having just left her chair. He had no idea what to say but he knew he didn’t want her to leave, not until he understood, “Do you want some breakfast?”

“I need to hurry back to the castle,” She bit her lip, “But yes, if it’s not too much bother I... suppose, yes.”

The feline slid back into her seat and, instantly, a smug look overcame Marine’s face. Should he have asked that? Did the raccoon know something he didn’t? They seemed to have talked before she woke him up.

“Alright, I can do some toast really quickly, that way you won’t start work on an empty stomach,” Silver suggested, throwing a small smile her way.

The little grin had returned to her face and she had stayed. That was a good sign, right? She really had been hotter than usual though; in fact, she’d gotten even hotter the longer his head pressed against hers. Something was wrong or, at the very least, he didn’t understand what was going on. Regardless, Silver reset the toaster and slid two more slices in.

“So,” Blaze broke the silence again, he tried to stop staring, “Do you two have much planned for today?”

“Oh, the usual, you know. Start work on a couple new ships, go a sail,” Mischief was reborn on the raccoon’s face as she threw her gaze towards him, “Silver?”

“Might do a little bit of gardening or tidy the house a bit. I was honestly just going to wait the day away till I could come see you,” He turned to Blaze and admitted but, still sensing the tension in the air, he felt he had to say more, “So it’s nice to see you now. How about you?”

Almost instantly, Blaze’s gaze broke from him and fell back to her now almost empty glass, “Well, in a manner of speaking, I planned to do the same, until this morning,” Again, that strange half smile had overtaken her face; it was as though she was happy but, simultaneously, grappling with something else. Those heat lines looked even clearer too, Silver swore that he could feel her warmth radiating, “Not to say today’s meetings aren’t important, but I’d be lying if I said they addressed was especially pressing. It’s mostly updates on projects already well under construction, deciding whether and where to assign more funding. I honestly already know which projects need an extra boost and what projects are on the right track.”

“Anything we could help with?” Silver piqued up.

“Oi, don’t speak for me mate,” Marine blustered across as Blaze took a moment to think.

“Well, there was a plan to build a new lighthouse on the island that has rather stalled. The shores aren’t especially dangerous but there has been some call for it,” Blaze responded, ignoring the youngster.

“Wait, a lighthouse? Strewth, that sounds great,” The shipwright claimed, doing a complete one-eighty, “That’ll be easy. With Silver’s help, I could get it done in a weekend.”

“If you want my help then I’m more than happy to give it,” Silver promised, “Will that make your meetings easier?”

“Significantly, thank you-

The popping of the toaster cut the feline off. The psychic cast his hand across the room, but he kept his eyes on his companion, “Jam?”

“Blackcurrant if you still have it,” Blaze ordered, “I think that’s still my favourite of the batch you made.”

The hedgehog felt a wiry smile bend its way over his lips. Silver wasn’t the easiest person to fluster, apparently he was oblivious to most embarrassing things, but that compliment cut to his core. It wasn’t the first time she’d said that, but it still sent heat to his cheeks.

“I want strawberry and peanut butter!” Marine insisted, seeming to struggle with not being the focus for a full second.

“I know Marine, I know,” He managed to mutter, turning his full attention to the task in an attempt to smother his glee.

Quick as a flash, cutlery flew and jars were unscrewed as the hedgehog kited the toast toward completion. One after another, two plates landed on Marine’s ramshackle table. Silver meanwhile simply kept his overly topped toast in his psychic grasp.

Marine immediately set about devouring her plateful but, as ever, Blaze was more courteous. With a quick, “Thank you,” she claimed her first mouthful. Silver took the middle road between the two of them, eating quickly in his own bizarre way, but also knowing how not to make a mess. All the while, he sent the cutlery to clean itself and began to psychically tidy.

The raccoon, her mouth still full, snorted, “Show off. I shouldn’t have to do any chores; you can do them all so easily.”

“It’s important to take responsibility, Marine. Silver won’t always be here to look after you,” Blaze tutted.

“Yeah, so while he is here, I should take advantage of him,” Was her whining response, “If I could do what he can then I’d have made so many more ships by now, you’d practically have a navy!”

“You take advantage of him enough as it is,” The feline insisted, gesturing to the half-formed metal masses on the table, “Look at this mess, it’s all yours but he was planning on cleaning it up. How many times has he done that?”

“Blaze, if you’re going to act like my Mum then can you at least hurry up and marry Dad?” Marine sneered.

Silver had expected another retort, the two could bounce back and forth like this for hours, but instead a silence hung in the air. The time traveller looked to Blaze only for her gaze to quickly flick away from him. She raised her glass to her lips only to find it empty, he hadn’t seen her take the last swig.

Silver felt compelled to break the silence, “Marine, you can’t keep saying these things…”

“Oh, what, now that you’ve actually made a move I can’t joke about you two? No way!” The youngster jeered.

He blinked, “What d-

“I-I need to get going anyway,” Blaze cut him off, “My first meeting is about to start.”

“What, already?” Silver could feel that strange vibe in the air, it was stronger than ever, “But you just got here.”

“It can’t be helped; work may wait for me but I don’t want to delay others. Besides, you’ll see me again tonight, won’t you?” She asked, perhaps rhetorically or perhaps not, “Just come in how you usually do, sneak in through my back window, I might be a little late now that I’ve...” Again, Blaze’s shoulder caught fire but this time the feline noticed and obsessively patted it out. Concern and regret overtook her face before she tore her gaze from him. She rose from her seat and stepped past him, heading toward the door, “I need to go, the meeting will start soon.”

“Blaze, are you sure you’re okay?” He called across, just missing as he reached for her hand but successfully halting her in her tracks, “You’re acting strange today. If you need help with something then I’ll do my best, you know that, right? Just like with the lighthouse.”

“Don’t be so naive,” She’d practically snapped at him but when she looked back at him that strange emotion had filled her eyes, “If you can do this then I can do this.”

He was so confused but he couldn’t get a word in before the door opened. Her smile grew and fused into whatever other emotion had been battling. Silver had seen Blaze set herself alight and charge into battle, he’d seen her conjure a million different flames, but that smile was more blinding than any she could produce. He wanted to etch it into his mind, hold it close and never let it go. He’d seen countless expressions on that pale muzzle of hers, but none of them could compare to this simple yet complete smile.

Her words almost failed to break him from a trance of her own creation, “I’m so glad I managed to see you this morning, but I’m already looking forward to tonight, Silver.”

“S-See you later, Blaze,” What was that? He’d stuttered? Why did his mouth feel dry all of a sudden, what was going on?

Once the door was closed, the grey hedgehog rushed to the window, wanting to watch the guardian depart, only to find she’d frozen a few paces from their porch. She raised a hand to her forehead, seeming to rub her brow, only for her entire upper back to burst into flames again. He watched as she pulled her hand down her face and balled her fists at her side. Though the flames grew brighter for a moment, they were soon snuffed by her own will. Silver watched as she quickly marched away, without another glance back or moment’s hesitation, but his eyes were drawn to her tail. Even while the rest of her had returned to a seemingly serious state, that appendage was flicking back and forth.

“Oh strewth, look mate, she’s left you something!” Silver’s thoughts were again interrupted as he turned to find the raccoon had left her seat.

Atop the chair she’d fled, Blaze had left a small package wrapped in white paper and bound with a cyan ribbon. He approached and Marine, having taken a gander at it herself, passed it his way with a smug grin. Attached to the ribbon was a tag which, in Blaze’s cursive and neat handwriting, read, “To my Secret Admirer. It was my first time making these and I had to rush, but I hope you manage to enjoy them. From your own Secret Admirer.”

“Secret admirer...?” He read aloud, still staring at the small package.

“I mean, come on Silver. You didn’t really think you could trick her, did you?” Marine said, on the verge of laughing, “Who else would leave Blaze flowers? Of course she knew it was you.”

Silver felt the gears in his skull clang and rattle as he struggled to parse through all this. What Marine had just said was clear but the parcel, Blaze’s dress and how uncomfortable she’d looked? It was all compounding, but there was a problem.

“Flowers? What flowers?” Silver asked, still staring at the little parcel.

“Aww come on, mate, don’t play dumb. You’ve been caught. She told me herself, she went out onto her balcony this morning and there was a whole bouquet out there. That’s the way you get into her room, right?” Marine snorted, jumping back onto her chair, “You just fly up there and go through the balcony door, that way no one else knows about you two havin’ your lil’ kissing sessions. Of course she knew it was you, who else could have put the flowers there?”

Did Blaze not receive flowers often? She was the guardian of this dimension after all, not to mention the best person he knew. He supposed them arriving on her balcony did make things different, did perhaps imply they were from him. But they weren’t. Someone else had put them there.

The gift in his hands wasn’t for him, it was for them.

“Who else could have put them there...” Silver parroted, eyes still fixed to the package.

“Mate? Mate, are you still there?” Marine snapped her fingers bur his attention barely wavered from the dozen thoughts fighting in his head. He only just managed to look up at her, “I always knew you had it in you, but I didn’t think it’d be so soon. I was sure you two would pussyfoot around your feelings for another couple of years at least.”

Who could this so-called secret admirer be? There was no way it could be someone from the other dimension, getting here was just too much trouble for them. Was it one of the palace staff? Had a maid or a butler cleaned Blaze’s room and left the flowers there, only for them to be discovered the day after?

The hedgehog’s nose twitched. Whatever he was holding, it was producing the scent that had undercut Blaze’s perfume. The cat had tried her hand at baking or cooking of some sort, by the weight and scent that much was clear, but he couldn’t bring himself to open the parcel. Even though she thought it was, this parcel wasn’t intended for him. This package was intended for her secret admirer, whoever had plucked up the nerve to set flowers on her doorstep. Though he had happily eaten her food before, Blaze always seemed embarrassed about her cooking. She’d never thought highly of what she made.

She must have rushed to make this gift, unwilling to let that show of affection go unreturned for even half a day.

He had to make things right, he had a duty to! And what choice did he have either way, he couldn’t claim responsibility for the bouquet at her back door. No matter how he felt, if it was concern or happiness or... something else. What was this feeling? There was a strange tightness in his chest and a bizarre concoction of emotions swirling in his head, all of which entirely confused him. He kept visualising her where she’d sat when he’d walked in the room, that little smile on her face and how it’d grown as she left.

“Well, go on mate, don’t keep me in suspense. Aren’t you going to open your prezie?” Marine asked, still entirely oblivious.

Thoughts were still streaming through his head, but they’d latched onto a single idea and new thoughts had begun to chorales around it. He had to find out who this admirer was and either tell Blaze or give them her present, he wasn’t sure which. But how could he do that? How could he mend this faux pas?

A sound began to blare in the room, very almost throwing Silver from his feet. The hedgehog’s eyes tracked it to its source, tracing up the wall, only to find the rickety cuckoo clock that Marine had made last month. A painted green bird had poked its head through a pair of doors and began to whistle. It was as he stared at that clock, its hands reading eight in the morning, that a thought fought its way through Silver’s jumbled emotions.

What if he went back in time to scope out Blaze’s actual secret admirer; what if he went back and identified them? Could he do that? Of course he could do it, but should he do it? Was that right? Was that wrong? He felt a headache growing behind his eyes, like an ice-pick wiggling its way into his brain, as all of his confusion returned.

He had to do something, but this was all he could think to do. Having seen that smile on her face, just telling Blaze it wasn’t him didn’t seem right. He’d find out who this secret admirer was and then explain the whole situation tonight, give her the choice whether or not to know who they are and then whether either of them should deliver the present. Something about that still didn’t sit right with him, something he couldn’t place, but he had to do something! He had to make things right; he had to help her!

“I need to go, Marine. I might not be back till tomorrow,” He said, hearing the faintness in his own voice.

“That’a boy! Chase after her, just like Amy does Sonic; bust down the door, interrupt that meeting! Now’s your shot so you’d better not waste it!” Marine yelled, but Silver barely heard her over the racket in his head as he raced out the door and began to channel temporal psychic energy.

—

His position in the bushes was growing more uncomfortable by the microsecond, he’d surely been squatting for hours now. There hadn’t even been a nice night sky to look up at, he’d been staring up at her balcony and its plain white curtains for what felt like days. Traveling back through time to arrive here had been the easy part, the wait was the real killer. He’d sent himself back to just after sunset, knowing that his arrival in the midst of the night might scare off the princess’ potential suitor. It was a far smaller jump through time than he regularly did, the shift backwards hadn’t tired him in the least, but now his eyelids were heavy and the balls of his feet ached. The sun was rising, the world was beginning to awaken, and Silver couldn’t help but feel a little tense. No bouquet had arrived on Blaze’s balcony nor had one been present upon his arrival. No one had so much as entered the royal gardens in the entire time he’d been here.

Silver heard his stomach grumble; it’d been calling out to him for the past three hours, just as time had switched from trickling like molasses to stumbling like a lost snail. Sequestered in the hedge beside him was Blaze’s gift, a parcel not set to exist for what was likely a handful more hours. It was food he wouldn’t dare claim for himself and that had convinced time to tick by even more slowly.

He’d already fantasised about the package’s potential contents, of course he had. Cookies seemed most likely to him, Blaze had made him cookies back when he’d first arrived in her dimension, but perhaps that disqualified them. He’d heard that people made each other chocolate on Valentine’s Day and, with that event being advertised as just a couple of weeks away, he had drawn an association between such a gift and romance. Come to think of it though, he wasn’t especially well educated on what romantic rituals were in this dimension. For all he knew, there could be bread or a croissant in there. He was fairly sure he could rule out fish or some other cooked meat and modestly certain he could limit his assumptions to baked goods, but not entirely.

As his stomach made yet another demand, Silver couldn’t help but sigh. Whoever this supposed romantic was, they were certainly leaving it to the last second. Blaze had a busy day ahead of her, especially since she was set to cook this gift and visit him. There was no way she’d be up any later than seven. The hedgehog had slept over in her room enough times to know that, despite how it clearly annoyed her, the guardian always set an early alarm and insisted on leaving her bedroom by seven. Every day had to be productive in some shape or form. Well, almost every day.

Once or twice, when he’d stayed over, she’d ended up breaking that rule. He’d always blamed himself for those occasions, they’d stay up playing games or reading or simply talking. When they’d lived together in the destroyed future there had been no hard rule on when to wake up, so Blaze always blamed that for her tendency to sleep in around him. Would nights like that still happen after her misplaced assumption was revealed? Could they?

He shook those thoughts from his head, he couldn’t daydream; he had to stay alert! He was on a mission! There was no way she’d sleep in today if she’d found time to bake. By now the chirping of birdsong had begun to breach the airwaves, a sign of the ever-encroaching morning. This was a sound that Silver knew almost too well, on the more common occasions that they hadn’t slept in he’d spent the morning identifying them. Pretty songbirds weren’t uncommon on the island, their chirps and hums punctuated almost every outing, but, for once, Silver couldn’t bring himself to focus on their music. Their presence implied that the moment was approaching, Blaze would awaken soon.

This suitor was really leaving it to the very last moment. If they were leaving it this long then the delivery would surely be quick, but Silver wasn’t even sure how they’d reach her balcony. The overhang was a good ten metres off the ground, Silver could only get up there because he could fly. There were no vines or trellis to climb and the wall was practically smooth. Maybe they’d just throw the bundle of flowers up there? With the right arc it was certainly possible, but a slight miscalculation could ruin them. The longer he’d considered it, the more it made sense that Blaze had assumed he was the source.

By this point he’d, of course, considered this suitor’s nature a hundred times over. He’d gone through countless names and faces, dug his way through a bottomless well of theories and found none that could satisfy him. The closest he’d come was an assumption that only served to raise several additional queries; that this supposed suitor might have been someone that he, and perhaps even Blaze, didn’t know. Those flowers might have been sent her way by some daring admirer, perhaps having gained an admiration for the feline following one of her speeches. The cat seemed to loathe those even more than the meetings that preceded them, but there was no denying that Blaze could keep an audience on their toes.

He’d heard that the feline’s speeches scared some of the populous, the feline herself seemed to think they all did. Blaze could be stern, she could be gruff, but her every word carried a charisma that he couldn’t ignore. Whenever she was on a stage or even just in the room, he could barely take his eyes off of her. It was as if she was magnetic, capable of reeling him in without so much as trying. It wasn’t so unthinkable that someone else would see things as he did. Despite her disagreeing, he’d long assumed that was the norm.

The balcony was still empty. The rustling wind, the groan of his stomach and the chirping of the birds’ morning choir were making his ears ring. He’d be kept in the dark for some time, the sun rose from the castle’s front and set towards its back. This was intentional, so Blaze had told him. When the island had first been settled, this plot had specifically been designated for the palace and designed to grant a sunset view from the royal bedchambers. It was the very first thing decided upon, thought to aid in appeasing the Sol emeralds. Now though, it simply made for an astonishing view. Night was oh so long away, regardless of the path he took to it. He couldn’t dwell on that though, the mere thought made him even sleepier.

Silver dared to cast a quick glance skyward. He found that the clouds had begun to part above him, the deep navy he recalled had shifted more towards an indigo. He’d surely missed the sunrise for a second time by now but, as much as he loved to watch a good sunrise, this was more important. Time kept ticking on and on, its meandering waltz taunting him more and more with each passing second. Though he wholeheartedly believed his task was important and knew he wouldn’t regret this hungry isolation, the hedgehog couldn’t help but grow more aggravated at this secret admirer. What was taking them so long? If they wanted to hide from her then they should have delivered the flowers hours ago, around the one or two in the morning. Sure, they might not have known her schedule, but they had to assume she rose early, right? Thinking otherwise was-

In the blink of an eye, the white curtains were parted. For what couldn’t have been more than a second, Silver saw Blaze in her nightgown before she slipped back and into her room. Morning had arrived, morning had undeniably arrived, yet Blaze’s secret admirer was nowhere to be seen! Attempting to be subtle, trying his hardest to be stealthy, Silver fully poked his head from his bush and took in his greater surroundings. He was still flanked on either side by rose bushes, red lilies still bloomed in their plots before him and the grass looked entirely untrodden. No one had come, no one had even so much as passed though; outside of his presence and that of the flickies, the gardens had gone entirely untouched!

He dared to stretch to his full height, glancing over the hedgerows, only to find a similar scene lay behind him. Though his shift spooked some of the birds, it didn’t reveal any hidden person. No one was here, he was the only one here! If things were regular then Blaze was about to leave and take breakfast; she’d baked instead but that was beside the point, she was going to be out of that room in no more than twenty minutes.

Desperate, feeling sweat mount on his forehead, he half whispered yet half shouted, “Hey! Secret admirer, where are you?”

No reply, not even a movement, came.

As though it was some great feat of psychic might, a realisation made Silver almost faint. Blaze had already opened her curtains; she’d already looked out to the world below. Was she even going to look out her window again? But the events of today had happened, he’d already experienced everything first-hand! Her gift was still in the bush, her secret admirer couldn’t have missed their moment, why would that even happen?

He could feel sweat greasing his palms, he grabbed her gift and held it tight to remind himself that it was real. She had arrived at his home in that cute dress, though awkwardness had limited her, the feline had smiled at him in a way she never had before. It’d all happened, he could remember it clearly, but how many times had he changed the past? Was this his fault? By trying to observe the inciting incident, had he shifted the timeline in such a way that it never occurred? There were sayings about this, that changing the slightest thing could have drastic ramifications for the future. He’d never experienced that in all his travels, he’d always had to really try to change the world, work hard and fight. Little travels tended to make no difference, he’d go back to visit Amy or Sonic and find his future the same, why would that change now?

As his head rattled, Silver couldn’t help but cast his mind back. Blaze’s smile as she’d left the hut, had that just vanished from this reality? The effort she’d gone to this morning, was that gone too? She wouldn’t do it all without cause, she wouldn’t have lied to Marine about the gift; something had to have happened, flowers had to arrive. It was supposed to happen, it had happened! She’d worn that dress for a reason; those flowers must have meant a lot to her, but why?

In all his hours out here, in amongst the roses and the lilies, he’d not even consider it once. What was a bouquet to her when she had this garden filled with flowers?

That simple question spun into another; would she have done what she had for any stranger who delivered her flowers? Given her position, the guardian of the Sol emeralds surely received far more lavish gifts on a regular basis… didn’t she? She did. He knew she’d received flowers, flowers and so much more. Outfits from renown designers, jewellery from around the world, expensive foods and marvellous furnishings. What was a bundle of flowers on her windowsill compared to those gifts? He’d never seen her in that dress or any like it before, so it wasn’t as if her change in garb was tied to receiving just any gift. Was it because she thought it was from him? Had the gift’s form not mattered at all? Was the assumed intent behind it enough to change things or… did it mean more because it had come from him?

Giving gifts wasn’t unlike Silver, despite how difficult it was to pick gifts for Blaze. Usually he’d end up baking her a cake or cook her dinner, that way the effort behind his actions was clear even if it was a bit plain. His jam was a prime example of such a gift, something he’d made for her. Whenever she casually bought him things, utilising her great wealth, he’d end up jumping for joy and beaming. Blaze’s reaction to his gifts were usually more subdued but she always made her thankfulness clear. Though it was rarely as over the top as this morning, she always returned his gestures. Did she do that for anyone else? Surely, if she received so many gifts, being so personal would take up a ridiculous amount of time.

His heart was thumping against his ribcage, beating like their feet against the pavement as they’d fled from Iblis. What was he thinking, how dare he even think this? If was foolish, selfish, naïve! No matter how special their bond was, Blaze surely valued all the gifts she received.

But experience told him that she didn’t. Though Blaze took pride in her position as guardian, she didn’t care for baubles attached to it. She’d complain to him about public appearances and newspaper photos for hours on end, only wear her regular robes despite having a closet filled with different outfits. She didn’t even wear much jewellery, despite having boxes filled with the stuff. It seemed like those gifts, only conjured due to her position as princess, meant litle to the pyrokinetic. But did that mean, no matter how basic, a gift from him meant more? It was all so confusing, what had happened to her secret admirer? Why did they have to put him in such a difficult situation? What were all these feelings?

The clicking of a latch threw Silver from his thoughts and sent him tumbling back into the bush, the flickies immediately fled at one of those two sounds. From an even less comfortable hiding spot, awkwardly lying with her gift atop her chest and rose thorns in his back, the hedgehog watched as Blaze the cat appeared on her balcony. She was dressed, but not in the outfit he’d seen a few hours in the future. Despite her regular robes, the sight of her face as the cracked remnants of thoughts reconstituted in his mind was enough to set his cheeks alight. In a few hours from now, he’d say that Blaze always looked pretty. He’d always considered that to be the truth, but it’d be said out of impulse, as a way to quickly placate Marine. In this moment though, it was undeniable. Even in the shade of her castle, from such a difficult angle and obscured by countless branches, Blaze was beautiful. Her amber eyes could cut the dark so casually as to make the sun jealous.

But her coming out here now was practically a miracle, why had she done it? He wasn’t sure what time it was, but her bout of impromptu gift preparation would undoubtedly take an hour or more. For things to go as they had, she had to start now. Time had run out, the suitor had missed their chance, that smile and her joy was set to be erased from reality. For whatever reason, that person simply hadn’t shown up. Why? What could have happened? Where could they be? He’d been the only one here, it wasn’t as thought they’d got cold feet at the last second. There was no way, he’d stayed up all night, he’d have noticed if someone had come and gone.

It was then that Silver remembered one of the many thoughts he’d cycled through while waiting for the suitor. He didn’t know how time travel really worked, he’d read books and observed a handful of oddities, but he didn’t know the truth about all that. All he knew was that Blaze’s suitor was supposed to leave flowers on her balcony this morning, that Blaze would be leaving her room with no intent on returning any moment now, that he was the only one in range of her balcony and that he was surrounded by flowers. It seemed like the perfect set up for a very specific kind of time paradox that he had never experienced nor observed. A time loop of sorts.

Of course, he immediately dismissed that as a stupid thought born of his tired and hungry state. Having thoughts about their bond or how pretty she looked was entirely pointless now, the suitor was supposed to show up here and secretly drop off a bundle of flowers for the feline so that she’d come to him. That was how things were, that was how things were supposed to be. Besides, the flowers around him were her flowers; surely her supposed secret admirer would bring their own?

His thoughts were cut short as, without the birds chirping to obscure things, Silver was able to hear knocking at Blaze’s bedroom door. Marine had mentioned that the flowers were on her bedroom landing, but perhaps she had been mistaken? Maybe things were somewhere else then he’d have missed-

“It’s Gardon, your majesty! I’ve got news to share,” He managed to only just overhear.

Ah, it was Gardon, perhaps he was the one who delivered this apparent secret suitor’s flowers.

He watched as she turned to look into her bedchamber and spoke, “You may enter.”

“Your highness, I’m afraid a number of today’s meetings have been rescheduled. It’s going to be an earlier start than we anticipated,” Oh, that made things seem even more impossible. What time was it?

“Oh? Has something happened?” She questioned. If Gardon had brought flowers, then he’d have led with them, right? And surely she’d have mentioned them, Blaze was usually very blunt.

“Unfortunately, the manager of the island’s bridge projects has found himself double booked. Apparently, an environmental survey is set to occur for one of the construction sites. He is most apologetic, your highness,” No mention of flowers, nothing; Gardon clearly didn’t have them.

So, if this suitor was going to arrive then this was surely the moment. It had to be here, it had to be now, while she was distracted. They’d run up, throw the flowers, and run away… right?

Silver’s heart began to race once more. He cast his gaze to his surroundings but still no suitor had shown themselves, no individual had arrived to show their affection for Blaze. He was the only one here, he was surrounded by flowers and time was running out. That preposterous, ridiculous, and unfounded concept flagged within his mind again. He’d never known time travel to work as he was imagining. But then, he didn’t know how time travel worked in the first place.

“That’s fine, it can’t be helped, but, Gardon, how many times have I told you not to use that title,” With that complaint, the pieces all aligned, an opportunity had revealed itself.

Without another moment of hesitation, not so much as thinking as he moved, Silver stepped from the bushes and cast his hands to his surroundings. With power of psychokinesis, he clipped roses from the hedge and cut lilies to size. As flower after flower gathered in his psychic grasp he winced, regretting that he hadn’t foreseen this possibility in time enough to take flowers from literally anywhere else. He glanced to his surroundings, making a final check. There was no secret admirer, only him. Explaining himself this evening was going to be oh so awkward, perhaps even more awkward than if a suitor had appeared, but he didn’t have time to dwell on that.

“I-I’m sorry, Blaze,” The koala was stammering, it was almost like destiny! Rushing with his psychic powers, he threw himself into the air with her still to be made gift in one hand and his gift not yet given in the other, “It’s a failing of mine, I know. I must improve.”

He passed behind her and placed the flowers atop her balcony wall. Fortunately, Gardon had assumed a full bow as part of his apology and entirely missed the psychic’s appearance. The hedgehog passed entirely unnoticed.

“Regardless, I’m almost prepared. I’ll be down for breakfast, tell the manager not to worry,” Blaze sighed, turning just in time to miss the psychic as he flipped up and onto the castle’s roof. The very last thing he saw was her ears flickering as she noticed the bouquet.

“V-Very well, thank you,” Gardon’s voice, made almost inaudible by Silver’s new position, was punctuated by the closing of the bedroom door.

Silver didn’t dare look down from his roost, despite how desperately he longed to see the look on her face. Knowing what it led to, it must have been a smile just as beautiful as the one she’d worn before leaving his home. Still, this all didn’t quite sit right with Silver. There was still every chance that her suitor was supposed to show themselves, that he had just abused his power and interrupted someone else. Careful to remain outside Blaze’s potential view, the hedgehog dashed across the palace roof and scanned the grounds as best he could.

He kept to the rooftops, checking all directions in search of some hidden suitor whose plans he might have just ruined. None manifested, no matter how hard he searched, but it took the sight of Blaze leaving the castle, dressed as he’d seen and would go on to see her, for Silver to finally stop. No matter where he looked, no matter how he tried, he could find neither an individual fleeing the grounds nor anyone approaching with flowers. The hedgehog ended up near the front face of the castle, opposite to where he’d been, hiding behind a turret in an attempt to avoid any backward glances from Blaze. Dropping to his backside, his eyes fell upon clouds coloured scarlet and the sun drifting above the horizon. The day was just beginning in the kingdom of Sol; a slightly younger him was out there, still fast asleep.

There was a term for what he’d just created, for the time anomaly he’d just experienced. If everything had gone as he thought it had then Silver had just made a bootstrap paradox, but there was only one way to know for sure. He had to go back, he had to live in what he’d created. No matter how beautiful the sunrise was, it couldn’t compare to her smile, and he didn’t have time to rest.

---

His arrival at his own doorstep was a bumbling one. No less than five minutes after he left, but no more than ten, Silver the hedgehog manifested outside Marine’s shack. The hedgehog immediately did a full three-sixty, taking in his surroundings. As far as he could tell, there were no drastic changes from the morning he had lived through. Their beachside home was still untouched and Blaze was nowhere in sight.

Pressing himself against the building, the hedgehog dared to peer through the kitchen window. He immediately identified Marine, sat at the table and tinkering with a model boat. There was no sign of the feline inside or a time-displaced doppelganger of himself, everything seemed to be how he’d hoped it’d be. How it seemed and how it was weren’t necessarily the same though.

Feeling even more thoroughly exhausted after his jump back through time, he managed to barge his way into the house and locked eyes with the youngster, “Marine, what just happened? Is everything alright?” He practically snapped, stumbling over his feet as he slammed the door shut with his back.

“Silver? What’re you doing back already?” She asked, plainly surprised, but didn’t wait for his answer, “What do you mean what just happened, of course everything’s fine. You ran out there after Blaze… don’t tell me you got cold feet already,” Marine shook her head in disgust, turning back to work.

That was a good sign, but it wasn’t enough for him, “A-And what was she wearing? When she was here as in; was it her normal robes of something different?”

“You should know mate, you complimented her on that dress twice. What’s the matter with you? Why are you back here?” Marine questioned, “Honestly, she went to all that bother, dressing up and coming down here, early in the morning no less, just to see you and drop off a gift. Didn’t she teach you to say thank you for that kind of thing? Honestly mate, if you can’t act now, when will you?”

“Oh, so everything’s fine, just as I left it. Good, a-alright… I need to sit down,” The hedgehog said, going lightheaded with relief as he slid down the door.

He hardly heard Marine’s prattling in response. His eyes flickered to the cuckoo clock in the wall, barely eight minutes had passed since he’d left this building. It wasn’t even ten past eight in the morning, yet he’d endured at least a full day’s worth of stress. As strange as things were, they seemed to have settled down to embrace some kind of consistency.

The concept of a bootstrap paradox was one that didn’t come up in much literature, but there were a handful of tales about individuals traveling back in time to warn themselves of immanent events in bizarre and cyclical manners. He’d once read about a theatre enthusiast traveling back in time to meet a famous playwright only to end up writing all of their plays and living their life, thus inspiring that same fan’s own journey back to meet that same bard. Despite those fictional tales, Silver hadn’t considered that such a paradox was possible.

But, as he now knew better than ever, he didn’t know how time travel worked. He jumped back in time and really just hoped for the best. Perhaps it was all a lot more fluid than he’d imagined, maybe the rules weren’t set in stone so much as written in the sand of some interdimensional beach.

“Mate? What happened in the last five minutes?” Marine was now staring at him quite quizzically, “You look an awful state, are those leaves in your quills? Why are you so muddy?”

“It’s a long and strange and… stupid story, I’m not sure I even understand it myself,” Was all the explanation he could stand to offer, manually pulling himself back to his feet before waddling across the room to slump in his seat.

Immediately, his head was back to buzzing and filled to burst with questions. Who had sent that initial bouquet, who had set all this in motion? Was it better to ask what had set this all into motion or when they’d done it? Silver had no idea, just like the fan turned playwright he’d read about this happening to. They were impossible questions with no answer, at least none he could wrap his head around or ever hope to experience. The universe had made him question his relationship with Blaze, had him deliver her flowers and effectively set up tonight’s rendezvous as a date without any concrete or observable reason.

It took sitting there, half asleep, for a solid few minutes for him to even begin constructing plausible origins for what had occurred. Had a future version of himself, having come to embrace and understand the emotions now bubbling in the present hedgehog’s chest, travelled back in time and set the first bouquet on her windowsill? But then, in doing so, had they overwritten their own timeline and been erased while the events remained, resulting in him going forward and delivering the flowers instead. Would a version of himself really delete themselves from reality just to make himself realise he felt some strange feelings for Blaze a bit earlier? Why would they do that? Perhaps to change the timeline itself, to undo some different calamity.

If there had been an attack and he had lost Blaze again, perhaps that would have prompted the kind of introspection he was still experiencing. He’d lost her once; he didn’t want to even consider losing her again. Maybe a future version of himself had rewritten the timeline through the bouquet, attempting to change things between them in a major way such that the future itself might shift. Maybe he’d given up his life in order to perhaps save Blaze or the world. That seemed like a more traditional reason for him to use time travel, but perhaps the hedgehog was just trying to justify all he’d done and what had happened to himself.

Despite the depth of Silver’s tired contemplation, the pained moaning of his stomach was enough to rupture his thought bubble. The hedgehog’s eyes fell to the white paper parcel in his hand, now a little rough around the edges but still sealed. Hearing his stomach growl again, he finally undid Blaze’s bow and peered inside. A puff of smoke bellowed from the wrapping, forcing him to briefly close his eyes. In the aftermath, Silver found himself staring at six black masses with paper bottoms. Muffins, she had taken the time out of her morning to try and bake him a gift, to return his affection as quickly as possible. Despite their charcoaled exterior, Silver couldn’t help but smile at the sight of the confectionary.

Warmth swelled in his chest as he drew the first one and took a full bite. While it was harder than he’d anticipated, and there was certainly a smoky flavour, he could taste all that she’d tried to do. Blaze had sewn chocolate chips throughout sugary dough of her own making, clearly trying her hardest to make something sweet. Trying his hardest to savour, though urged on by his empty stomach, he quickly made his way through the first and onto a second small cake.

“Are you sure you want to eat those, mate? I could shoot them out a canon instead,” The raccoon cringed, clearly not appreciating the time and effort Blaze had put into her baking.

“I’m sure,” Regardless of what anyone else would think of them; to him, they were perfect.

“Are you still going to see her tonight?” She asked, already refocused on her work, “Gonna be honest, you really do look a state.”

“Yes, I’m still going,” He managed to admit between mouthfuls, “I think I might just nap till then though.”

“And you’ll shower before going too. You’ve set yourself up well, regardless of whatever all this mess is about. I won’t have you spoiling it by showing up filthy,” She insisted before launching into another rant, “Honestly, I don’t know why you decided to roll around in the mud instead of chasing her. Are you that much of a scaredy cat? Come on, there’s still time, she’s probably not running towards the castle; you could just fly out after her, sweep her off her feet, all prince charming like and-

As Marine’s words gradually became white noise, he lost himself in the potent flavour of another muffin and managed to smile. Fate had separated them in the wake of a grandfather paradox only to stitch them back together. For it to still be weaving them together was strange but not ludicrous think. Perhaps that stitch was still tightening, even now. Regardless of how blatant and tailored this supposed intervention had been, no matter how it’d unnerved him, he’d had to act. Not only was such a change in history a threat to his own timeline but the idea that her happiness might be erased was just too much to bear.

Was he going to be able to do this though? Fate had set them down such a strange path and short path; in less than a day their whole relationship had been flipped on its head. In the blink of an eye he’d gone from her companion to her secret admirer, from her best friend to some sort of supposed romantic. That thought warmed his cheeks and made his chest tingle in ways that were becoming frightfully common.

For as crazy as this morning had been, this evening was set to be far more insane. Could he explain this to Blaze? He had to, there was no way he could hide this, she’d know something was bothering him the moment he arrived on her balcony. Still, regardless of time’s whims tossing them about, he’d try to make his care clear. Whether prompted by fate or not, no matter how he struggled to face it, he’d been the one to do it; he was her secret admirer.

New and strange emotions still buzzed in both his head and heart but, as reality itself seemed to have insisted, these feelings were undeniably real, and they weren’t going way. He just had to figure out what they meant. Surely that couldn’t be more difficult than understanding time travel… could it?

RP Log: Cravendy and Lin whittle the time away. @lettersnorth

Cravendy Hound sits on the balcony with an assortment of knick knacks spread around her. All kinds of wood, with and without bark, as well as knives of different sizes and shapes. She takes in a deep breath as she leans back against the railing, practically melting in the warm sun. But no matter how relaxing this might be, little worries spring up like weeds in the back of her mind...will Lin join her today? Did she get her note, and will she know how to get here?

Cravendy Hound groans. Brain, hurry up and remember how to loosen up.

Aislinn North It had taken Aislinn a moment to work out Cravendy's note, particularly in regards to where she would be setting up. This balcony at the back of Heartwood's grounds was tucked away and unless a person frequented the spot it was easy to remember it existed at all. Barring that, the woman also had been juggling a lot recently, both in mind and body. Though things with Cravendy had smoothed out somewhat, 1/2

Aislinn North she held an inkling of nervous energy as she made her way out to the balcony. If anything, this should take her mind off other matters for a time. "Alright, then?" she asked as she arrived. "Almost forgot this existed." 2/2

Cravendy Hound jumps slightly on Lin’s approach, and then turns to watch as she steps up the ladder and onto the balcony. She blinks - what is there to be so cautious about? They’re here to enjoy the daylight and carve some wood, simple as that. Cravs nods to herself, and then tries to smile at the other woman. It looks more like she’s baring her fangs.

Cravendy Hound: “Nice place. Secluded, and the view is ‘ard to beat, though if the wind becomes too much we oughta pack up our things and move indoors. But it’s good right now.” She picks up a rod of wood and a knife, and begins to scrape away ribbons without a moment's hesitation. Then she remembers why Lin came. “......Oh, right. ‘Ere, let me show ye.”

Cravendy Hound hands Lin a piece of wood. “It’s pretty simple. Carve away from yer ‘ands, and go with or across the grain. Why don’t ye give it a shot?”

Aislinn North At Cravendy's insistence she leaned down and took the block of wood being offered. After a quick study of the tools the Seawolf had spread out, Aislinn picked up one of the work worn carving knives. It was obviously a well-used tool and therefore likely to be a good one by Aislinn's thinking. She watched Cravendy a moment and then, ever the mockingbird, began to emulate her. Needless to say, Cravendy made it look much easier than it was. 1/2

Aislinn North Aislinn's knife kept snagging but she was nothing if not patient. "What sort of things do you carve?" asked idly as she hacked away at her poor block of wood. 2/2

Cravendy Hound: “Mostly small figures, like birds. Sometimes eatin’ utensils, if I feel like makin’ somethin’ that’ll be of some use. I don’t really think about it until I’m ‘olding the wood and knife in my hand.” Cravs carefully digs into her piece again, whittling another curl of material away. So far, she was lacking in inspiration, but it was satisfying regardless.

Cravendy Hound eyes what Lin is doing to her block with a grimace, but doesn’t comment on it...directly. “Maybe ye can start with somethin’ simple. A spoon, or a ‘air pin?”

Aislinn North Aislinn paused, glancing at Cravendy over the rim of her glasses. "So you don't actually know what you're going to carve until you're already carving?" For someone like Lin, the idea that there were no blueprints, no schematics, no advanced planning was almost an anathema. In her experience going along with her intuition and acting in the moment only got her into trouble.

Aislinn North Better that everything be carefully thought out and planned for. The exception being, in the heat of a fight, of course. Even then a good strategist should be able to foresee most possibilities and plan for them.

Cravendy Hound: “Yeah,” she answers nonchalantly. It, of course, sometimes led to her sharpening the wood into a simple spike or creating something equally unplanned, but for her, the point was to go with the flow. Cravs looks at her half-carved piece of wood with a hum.

Cravendy Hound shrugs. “No right or wrong way about it. I wouldn’t think too ‘ard about it...and if ye mess up, the wood shavings make good firestarter.”

Aislinn North Right. Aislinn gamely continued on in her endeavor but it was clear the woman was better with a firearm than a blade. And as much as Cravendy said not to think too hard about it, Aislinn had already decided what would be the best course of action. "A spoon can't be too hard, right?" she murmured, almost to herself as she concentrated on trying to steer the knife smoothly down the block. A comfortable sort of quiet settled between the women as they worked.

(Cravendy Hound) fdskjlf for some reason...I'm imagining Lin's spoon to be dual purpose in some way )) (Cravendy Hound) spoon end, and...stabby end is a thought xD )) (Aislinn North) ((She'll end up inventing the spork in Eorzea)) (Cravendy Hound) omg yES ))

Cravendy Hound lifts her work-in-progress up to the light. The curves cut out from it remind her of a fish, and she decides to keep going with it. Without realizing it, she begins to sing - a whisper of a song that is almost lost in the wind. It starts and ends without ever registering in her memory, and afterwards she grins at Lin.

Cravendy Hound: “The woods are nice when they aren’t sendin’ bees or other nasty buggers yer way. Feels...too nice, sometimes. A salty old dog like me is used to a lot worse.”

Aislinn North Her head bent over her work, Aislinn is lost in the minute details of blade against wood until Cravendy's lilting song quietly fills the air. Blinking, she lifted her head in surprise. She never pegged the woman as the type to sing. Though now she wasn't exactly sure why that would be. Sailors sang all the time, didn't they? But what Cravendy said seemed to flummox her even more. "The woods sent bees after you?" she halted as the realization came to her. 1/2

Aislinn North "Ohh. The Shroud. Aye, it can be touchy." she ran a jerky blade down her block of wood once more. "What did you do? I mean, to annoy it?" she clarified. 2/2

Cravendy Hound sucks in air through gritted teeth, and a light blush spreads over her face. “Oh, I don’t know...ye know. The Elementals are very, uh, mysterious.” She then slices away at her wood and, flustered, accidentally takes off a large chunk of the fish’s tail. Damnit. It’s starting to look more like an eel.

Cravendy Hound: “Okay, I’ll come clean. Ye know ‘ow I was practicin’ my aim, but I kept ‘ittin’ the trees instead of the target? I kept doin’ that and...I mean, that could be it.” She presses her lips tightly together. “Maybe.”

Aislinn North: The roundabout answer had Aislinn suppressing a small smile. It sounded as though Cravendy knew exactly what she had done. Aislinn wasn't going to press the issue but she didn't have to, either. Her face lit with silent laughter in the light of Cravendy's confession. 1/2

Aislinn North "Aye, I may have done that once or twice. Learned my lesson though. If I'm going out there in the wilds and not to the range, I'll pack my stunning ammo and a little target node instead. Seems to annoy the Shroud less that way. Or. ..at least I haven't got chased out since doing it that way." she paused in her work and looked Cravendy over. "Glad to see you don't look any worse for wear though. Looks like it was just a polite warning." 2/2

Cravendy Hound grimaces further as she recalls the swarm of bugs and plants that chased her from Peacegarden all the way to Hrystmill. “To be ‘onest, I probably would’ve been carried off by the buggers and thrown into the sun if it weren’t for..er. What was ‘is name...” Cravs waves her knife around, as if the physical motion of twisting her wrist would get the cogs in her head going. “Uhh, some mailman who goes by ‘Windy’ or somethin’. He got the worst of it off my back.”

Cravendy Hound: “Stun ammo...I’ll ‘ave to find some for myself. Don’t want a repeat incident.”

Aislinn North Aislinn had to stop her carving. If she hadn't she was liable to slip and make a bloody mess of one of her fingers. Her shoulders shook from the effort to keep her laughter quiet and contained. "So. ..let me make sure I understand. You were chased off your target practice by a swarm of bees. And then. ..saved by a mailman named 'Windy'. Out in the wilds of the Shroud. A mailman." she could do little more than shake her head. 1/2

Aislinn North "You do seem to end up in the oddest situations, Cravendy." 2/2

(Cravendy Hound) aaahahha xD )) (Cravendy Hound) it's gonna be hilarious when everything snaps into place )) (Aislinn North) ((assuming it ever does. But yes! xD)) (Cravendy Hound) it will!!! I'll make sure of it xD ))

Cravendy Hound nibbles the bottom of her lip. It was...an approximately accurate retelling of what had happened. Ridiculous, but maybe the bees in her hair had rattled her brain and shuffled her memory around. Swiving elementals. “Guy was as stiff as a board, but would say wild things with such ease. Claimed that ‘e could outrun a chocobo. Funny bastard, ‘ope I find ‘im again.”

Cravendy Hound is done carving her fish...eel...thing. Looking at it, you can’t quite tell what it is, though the swirling lines criss crossing over the wood are pleasing enough. She puts it down with a sigh. “I’m a fish out of water ‘ere, but it beats bein’ in Limsa or Ul'dah by a long shot.”

Aislinn North "Snorted "Supposin' if he could, he'd be the kind of mailman you'd want." she glanced down at Cravendy's work. She couldn't rightly say what it was but it was malms ahead of whatever she herself was doing. She looked down at her lap and picked up the block again. "I'm not gonna argue with you about Ul'dah. Neither one of us needs to step foot there. And Limsa. ..I can see why you might be avoiding it." she paused briefly. 1/2

Aislinn North Her block was beginning to resemble some sort of rudimentary spatula of some sort. Perhaps one drawn by a child. "Gridania just takes some getting used to, is all. It's...different." she shook her head. "It's not my favorite place either but there's good things about it." 2/2

Cravendy Hound looks over at Lin’s work, and then searches the array of tools scattered on the deck for one that has a small, curved blade at the tip. She picks it up and offers it to Lin. “This one is better for carvin’ out a ‘ole...so yer spoon is more spoon, and less spatula.”

Cravendy Hound then returns to crossing her arms, looking into the distance with a scowl on her face. She tells herself that by avoiding Limsa, she does everyone else a favor. With everything that had happened...No one wanted to itch that wound open again. But the truth is that she’s scared of what she’ll find. She’s not ready, not yet. But back to Gridania. “......The drinks’re good ‘ere, and that’s all I can ask for.”

Aislinn North She set aside her knife and took the proffered tool. "Right." she eyed the curve of the blade and then set to work. "And you know. ..when the bees aren't chasing you it can be downright pleasant." there may have been a facetious note to Aislinn's voice. She looked over at Cravendy with a brief smile. "Today's not a bad day, anyroads." she waved her tool out over the view the balcony provided, the sound of the wide river rushing below them. 1/2

Aislinn North "But I know what you mean. The forest can feel. ..confining. Closed in. It's not the wide ocean and it certainly isn't Gyr Abania." 2/2

Cravendy Hound: “I’m not pleasant, I’m...” Cravs trails off, her fire blowing out as quickly as it had flared up. Her days as a rough and tumble pirate were long behind her, despite it feeling like it was just yesterday. She snorts. “Bah.”

Cravendy Hound: “Never been to Gyr Abania.” She peers over at Lin, an assumption hanging in the air. She was Ala Mhigan, she probably went there all the time, right? But then again, Cravs was a Sea Wolf avoiding Limsa like the plague. “It seems...dry?”

Aislinn North "Ahh." Aislinn thought she understood now. "Well, the Shroud isn't exactly pleasant either. It has it's moments. That's all. Can still turn on you if you're not careful." She set down her knife. Maybe she'd ought to take stock and pause for a moment. "Dry's a good word for it." she nodded. "Though I haven't been back for..." she paused. Not since going to see the monks. She glanced away as a sadness seemed to settle over her, one she took an effort to shake off. 1/2

Aislinn North "Well, it's been more than a few moons. There's rivers and such but still. ..it's a dry, hard, beautiful place." 2/2

Aislinn North: "Maybe we wander that way one day. Just for a change of scenery."

Cravendy Hound fidgets with the fish-eel figure in her hands. Was that sadness, or perhaps longing in Lin’s voice? She wasn’t sure, except for the fact that there was -something-. But as the sun sets over the mountains, Cravs decides that it’s time to head back in, where they could continue whittling the time away in comfortable silence by warm fires and a well-stocked kitchen.

Lost in Time - ch 19

"I'm sorry - I'm not usually forgetful, I'm just dumb today."

About halfway through his patrol Asher had the realization that Eli's story comment DID make sense -- she'd explained her religious beliefs at the memorial service weeks ago, which seemed to revolve around the idea of everyone being born with a story to tell.  He was there, he'd heard it, and he was kicking himself for forgetting it.

Across the table Eli shrugged.  "We're both running on zero sleep and had more important things to focus on, it's not a big deal.  I can still explain it all again or more in-depth if you're curious."

The Round Table was mostly empty; they were a bit early for the lunch rush.  A headache was starting behind Asher's left eye so he was glad it was quiet in here.   "Only if you feel up to it. I'm still really sorry."

"I don't mind.  So, like I mentioned before-"

She abruptly stopped and Asher could see her eyes flick over his shoulder toward the door so he shifted enough to peer behind him.  Harrison had just come in and he had a girl following along behind him; Asher had seen her around town a lot lately. ((Continued below cut))

Eli watched the two of them for a moment then turned her attention back to him.  "Well, that's a good reminder that I need to stop by the clinic for another bottle of aspirin."

"Man, I could use one of those at the moment," Asher sighed.  "I've stayed awake way longer than this but it doesn't mean it's easy on the body."

She nodded, then abruptly stood.  "Actually, be right back."

As she headed over to where Harrison and the girl were seating themselves at a booth Asher shifted again to give himself a full view of the room; it wasn't that he expected their suspect to waltz in through the door but knowing there was someone out there lurking with bad intentions had his paranoia cranked to the max, and no matter how farfetched a scenario may seem he felt he shouldn't ignore anything his brain spat out at him.  

So he watched as Eli chatted with the two at the table briefly then came back and flopped back down in her seat; right as she returned Sonia came to the table with their food and drinks.

"What was that about?" he asked as he grabbed his fork and speared a chunk of tofu off his plate.

"Was asking Harrison to tell Dr. Xu that I won't be coming to my usual session tonight, in case I don't actually make it to the clinic today to let him know myself."

"Ah."  He stuffed the tofu in his mouth, chewed, and swallowed.  "-I hope you aren't planning on pulling another all-nighter."

She shook her head and downed half the lemonade in her glass in four huge gulps.  "-I don't PLAN on it just yet but I want my schedule open in case I have to.  Once I'm off the clock for today I'm going to help Selene get whatever transmitters she has the parts for assembled and ready to go."

"Need some help?"

Again she shook her head.   "It'd take me longer to teach you how to put it together than it would for me to do it myself.  I appreciate the offer though."

"If you...you know, need anything.  At all.  You can ask me, you know?"

She drained her glass and set it aside before finally starting in on her food.  "I know."

They both ate quickly (a little TOO quickly in Asher's case - now he had a slightly queasy stomach AND the start of a headache) and paid their respective bills before heading toward the Corps building.  As they passed the graveyard Asher could see one of the construction folks - it was the tall blonde man (that was who had designed that stone in the first place, he thought) - carefully examining the burnt surface of the tombstone.  Since it was just polished rock Asher was certain the man could grind off and re-polish it without too much trouble; he was still mad that someone had defaced the grave but in a way thankful that it would be easy to restore.  And, should the vandal decide to-

"--you know, I think we ought to post a person here for a few nights," he said as he slowed to a stop and then turned to backtrack to the graveyard's gates.

"You think whoever did it will come back that quickly?"

He nodded.  "Darren's stone and the others for your squad mates all look sort of similar - if whoever this is is purposely singling you out they might deface the rest of these and might be brave or stupid enough to come back soon."

"I'd think they'd expect us to be keeping a close eye on the place."

"They might, they might not, they might not even care. But." Asher turned to point down the hill the way they'd come and then used his finger in the air to trace along the line of a stone archway they'd walked under.  It was dotted with windows and had an old, iron-banded wooden door that was heavily padlocked; the inside area was used to store the furniture needed for festivals (he'd helped put the benches and chairs used at the memorial services away inside there).  The windows were tiny and probably a little dusty but if someone took up a position at that middle window at the top of the arch they could probably see the entire cemetery from there, and it would be hard to spot them in the dark at that height from the ground.  "If we hide someone up there, they wouldn't even know we're here."

Eli followed his hand and eyed the archway, then shrugged.  "Right, so, another all-nighter then."

"You DID say you were keeping your schedule open."

"Let's check in with Arlo and see what's what before we pencil a stakeout onto the agenda."

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

Her task today had sounded easy on the surface: cut open the flaps of seed sacks, arrange them in a wagon.  They were heavy but not so much that she couldn't carry them, but the knife she'd been given to cut the sacks open seemed little better than a butter knife -- it was good enough to cut the thread sewing the sacks shut but not sharp enough to cut into the burlap itself, which was proving to be a problem because this last sack was sewn shut too tightly for her to get the knife in under the flap, and she couldn't saw a hole in the burlap either.  She could sort of get the tip of the knife wedged in under each individual stitch and snip it loose that way but that meant cutting almost every stitch, by itself, one by one.

As she picked and struggled with the thread the barn door creaked behind her and someone's shadow fell over the floor; it was too beefy to be Sophie or Emily, and not wide enough to be McDonald.  

"I don't have time to play tag right now," she called out without turning around.

"I prefer checkers."

That was one of the answers she'd been expecting so she turned around to face the man that had walked into the barn.  He was...very muscular.   Maybe all muscle, and the only hair on his head was a black mustache that was the same width as his lips.  Lily hadn't seen him before but he definitely had to have been recruited solely for strength.

"I hope you're good at hide and seek."  A phrase meant to ask 'were you noticed or followed?'

The man shook his head, pulled a folded piece of paper out of one of the multiple pockets on his shirt and dropped it onto the floor, then disappeared out of the barn as quickly as he'd appeared.

Lily grunted and with a yank that hurt her arms all the way up to her shoulder blades finally tore the loose stitches apart and the top of the seed bag was finally open; after a moment to let the tingling in her fingers fade she hauled the bag over into the wagon with the rest of them before she retrieved the paper and looked it over.

>FR, KA, WIN - STBY >PL, des pln. PK SEC. > 385. > Markest > 3t. Har wh ws arc n

Ah, good - everything was falling into place.  There were three more operatives on standby, Harrison's family had been secured, and their escape pilots would be hiding out somewhere to the east waiting for their signal to move in and get them out.

She did have an immediate surge of annoyance though at the identity of their escape pilot: 385.  Sky Sharks.  Lily hated those damn pirates... They were paid an obscene amount of money to remain loyal to Duvos, and she knew without a doubt that if someone with deeper pockets came along then the Sharks would switch sides without even blinking.  WHY did Duvos insist on relying on them?  It was baffling, and all she could console herself with was it HAD to be more than money...it wouldn't make sense otherwise to have such a glaring weakness in their field operations.

That last line of the message indicated that a meeting was set up for tonight at the stone arch that was to the west of the harbor; this was good, as they all needed to meet face to face to identify one another, discuss any last-minute questions regarding their responsibilities and expectations, AND she needed to find out which of them had defaced the grave -- rumors had raced through town and she'd already spotted someone examining it to determine how to repair it.  If it hadn't been one of the agents sent to help then it was one hell of a coincidence...and if it HAD been one of them then she was curious about how they'd learned about Summers and how much they'd learned, and what exactly they intended to do with that knowledge.  Prior to finding those counseling records Lily hadn't really heard anything about the woman that would've pointed her out as something special -- Portians were not immune to gossip but they did seem polite enough to not include a ton of personal details and at the time none of it had seemed to be important enough to look into. Lily knew that if she'd known about Summers prior to her meeting with Xan then it was likely they'd have abandoned the plan to steal the AI and would instead be more concerned with snatching the woman.  

Was that what they were hoping to accomplish? Lily hadn't received ANY orders from Xan regarding a change in their target, and it would be a lot more finicky to try and smuggle a woman out versus mechanical parts.  It was an absolute certainty that if Xan had changed his mind on their target then she, as head of this operation, would have heard about it first... Maybe it WAS a coincidence, as impossible as it seemed.  Or maybe whoever did it thought they were...helping?  Spread the security out thin?  That was more plausible than coincidence but ran a high risk of jeopardizing the mission instead since Lily already knew Portia had called on the help of the Flying Pigs and it wouldn't be hard for them to request a few more.

No... Whatever the reasoning, it had to stop. If they got a chance to grab the woman on their way out then fine, whatever.  But she wasn't about to let this mission get sidetracked away from their ordered target -- not unless Xan himself sent her word to change the plan where she had that proof in her hand or heard it from Xan directly.

Outside the barn she heard hoof beats; quickly she stuffed the paper deep into her pocket and pretended to be fussing over the seed bags in the back of the rickety wagon.  A few moments later and both barn doors opened wide as Sophie's granddaughter came into view leading a rather large horse by a rope - it wasn't proper reins but just a simple braided leather cord hooked to one of the rings on the halter and she had the loose end wrapped around her wrist with plenty of slack in the lead for the horse to look about.

"Hey there, Lily.  I'm sorry - Granny didn't tell me you were out here doing this or else I would've come to help you."

Lily scoffed and leaned against the wagon's side.  "Oh pfft, no worries!  It was a little heavy but not that bad!  Sort of.  Do you have anything to sharpen knives here?  The one Sophie lent me turned out to be dull."

Emily led the horse in further and walked it around the wagon so it's back end was close to the wagon's front; Lily came over and handed her the knife in its little leather sheath, and Emily in turn handed her the lead so she could move between the shelves and the wagon to get a few wooden shafts and a yoke into place.  Afterward she maneuvered the horse into place and hooked everything up, then just as quickly freed the animal.

"...why'd you go through all that effort?" Lily asked as Emily started to lead the horse back towards the doors.

"Usually we use a mare named Sunny to pull the wagon but she's getting on in years.  We're switching over to this fine fellow here-" Emily patted the horse's neck with a giggle "-and he's a bit bigger than Sunny.  I wanted to make sure the yoke would still fit.  Seems there's not as big a difference in size in the places where it matters so it shouldn't rub or be uncomfortable, and it also means I don't have to try and do all the measuring in the morning when there's not a lot of light either and too little time to get another yoke down from the attic."

"Aha.  That makes sense.  ...so we're starting tomorrow morning then?"

Once Emily had the horse outside the barn, but was still framed in the doorway, she slipped the halter off and the horse ambled away out of Lily's line of sight.  "Yep!  Right at sunrise, and we should be done by lunchtime."

Ugh.  A late night meeting and now work at an unreasonable hour.  "Ok!" Lily replied, struggling to keep her usual perky cheerfulness in the tone.  "I'll see you at dawn then - hopefully I don't sleep in on accident."

"It's ok if you do but that'll just mean it'll take longer to finish."

Emily waited for Lily to leave the barn then closed the doors and slid the locking bar into place; Lily offered the woman a smile and a wave as she turned to head back into Portia but inwardly she was groaning in frustration.  If she set an alarm and went to bed now she'd get at least a little bit of sleep before the meeting.  She WAS supposed to have dinner with Harrison tonight but the naive little fool could wait -- more important things needed to come first.

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

The signal transmitter buzzed softly.  It was like having a small insect flitting around his head.

But with it sitting in the storage area with him, hooked up to a temporary power source, it covered the immediate area and would let Arlo communicate with Sam, Remington, and Mali who were all hidden nearby in the commerce guild, the Happy Apartments, and the old, closed cafe down the hill.

So far there'd been no signs of life outside; Asher had come up with this idea and he and Eli both expressed doubt that they would see anyone tonight.  Still, it was a good idea made even better by Selene suggesting they take one of the transmitters with them to temporarily let them coordinate through the Hi-Defs -- Eli and the builder had then both scrambled to get one assembled and re-wired for a power stone bracket, and they'd disguised it inside a crate that they carried into the storage area.  All that was left to do then was wait until nightfall, carefully slip inside the storage area (Arlo was certain he hadn't been seen by anyone who was, themselves, visible at the time) and then plug in the transmitter's cord to the bracket and flip it on.

The moon was bright (not full, sadly) but it was intermittently cloudy; when there wasn't cloud cover Arlo was able to see clearly through the small, smudged clean spots he'd wiped in every window in the storage area.  He did have to be careful to toss his jacket over himself each time he accessed his Hi-Def (the light from the screen would stand out in the darkness, after all) but other than that he was free to silently walk from window to window to keep an eye on the graveyard as well as the surrounding areas that he could see, and he'd been pacing in this manner for the last four hours with nothing to show for it.

'It might not be tonight,' he kept telling himself.  It might not be tonight, or tomorrow night, or even any time soon.  

But, not that long ago he and Remington had gotten the chosen security door ready for transport.  Mint estimated they could have it in place and installed within a week; with the door in place they could stop worrying about someone getting into the facility, and once they reached that point they'd be free to focus the entirety of their attention on catching their spy and vandal.  With all of that in mind the fact that they wouldn't likely catch anyone tonight was easier to swallow.

"Anyone seen anything yet?"

Remington's voice came through the Hi-Def - Arlo had the volume set to just barely above a whisper, to him.

"Not ye- Wait."

Mali's response cut off and Arlo tensed; she was stationed at the apartments -- she usually stayed there when she was in Portia so she'd appointed herself to that position because it wouldn't seem strange if she was spotted at an odd hour inside the building (though the point was, of course, for her NOT to be spotted at all). Arlo gave it several breaths, then several breaths more; the silence seemed to press in so he bent down, pulled his jacket over his head and arm, and prodded his Hi-Def awake.  "Mali?  Is everything all right?"

"I'm fine. But I just spotted our first concrete lead."

"What?  Did you see someone?"

"Not exactly. But either our guest is staying here, was visiting friends here, or Happy Apartments has a ghost problem."

Arlo's eyes narrowed -- their target was INSIDE the apartments?  How?  For how long had they been there?  "So you saw our spy."

"I heard a door open and close upstairs, and shortly thereafter the front door opened and closed on its own.  I didn't see anyone, unfortunately -- the lights in the lobby here are heavily dimmed after ten o'clock.   Whoever this was knows where to walk to avoid casting even a hint of a shadow in this light so I didn't see them pass me."

"And if you'd turned the lights on it would've been a dead giveaway." Arlo shuffled awkwardly in the dark, with his jacket still pulled over him, toward the furthest window that looked toward Peach Plaza.  As expected he didn't see anyone, or anything, with the moon behind the clouds again.  

"Should we try and pursue?  Pick up their trail?" Remington asked.

"No," both Arlo and Mali said at the same time.  Arlo waited a moment, then continued.  "We already know this person will be nearly impossible to spot in the dark, even with the moon out, and we've got clouds in the sky tonight that'll make it worse. We have a starting point.  In the morning we'll see who is staying at the apartments and go from there."

"I'll stay here and see if whoever that was returns," Mali said after a moment.  "If they do, and I can see what room they go into, we'll at least know if this person has been staying here or if someone they're working with is."

"Don't try to apprehend them without help," Arlo warned.  "We still don't know if the spy and the vandal are the same person and if they aren't we don't know which one of them is armed or how many people we may be dealing with here."

"I don't intend to because I think we stand to learn more if we wait. It might be glaringly obvious who our culprit is once we examine the occupancy, or it might not be.  Either way, we make our list of suspects and monitor them.   We'll catch our spy, our vandal, both, or more."

Arlo nodded.  "As good a plan as any.  I'm going quiet again - everyone keep their eyes peeled."

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

It was a very long walk from the apartments out to the arch.  The suit was getting a bit warm by the time she spotted the tiniest hint of a flame on the beach ahead of her; as she drew closer to the flame she could make out the silhouette of the man holding it.

He was tall and almost unnaturally thin; he had a lighter in hand and the tiny flame's light caused the surprising number of knives sheathed across his chest, hips, and thighs to glint softly in the dark.  Next to him was a skinny (but not nearly as skinny as he was) woman who had long red hair worn in a pair of braids that fell forward over her shoulders.  The muscular man who had delivered the message was there standing at the back of the group next to Evangeline and Marcus -- Evangeline was a large woman, close to the size of Marcus and the two skinny folk put together, with platinum blonde hair, and Marcus was a dark-haired man who was otherwise unremarkable in the scant glow of the lighter.

They were looking her way; the suit's chameleon abilities were still engaged but it couldn't prevent her from leaving footprints in the sand as she approached.

"Were you followed?" the muscular man asked when she came close.

"No.  The entire town is asleep.  They don't post night guards in Portia; only out at the facility itself.  That might change when construction begins." She came to a stop and turned off the suit; immediately the heat she could feel began to ease.  "Were any of YOU followed?"

They all shook their heads; it was good to see they had all  been smart about this.

"Where do we stand?" Marcus asked.

Lily unfastened the clips at her neckline and gently slid the extra ventilation slits open on the suit's helmet - the wisps of cool air that immediately filtered in were a blessing.  "Construction has been delayed - I'm not sure why.  We should consider ourselves on standby and be ready to move at a moment's notice."  Before any of them had a chance to speak further she huffed out a sigh.  "Who here defaced the grave?" The muscular man crossed his arms and lifted a single finger; she turned to glare at him.  "Stop it.  I won't have you jeopardizing this."

The man snorted loudly.  "Tell that to Xan.  He's disappointed in you - how the heck did you miss something so--"

Lily jabbed a finger toward him.  "-shut up.  Stop it.  Shut up.  At the time I spoke to Xan it wasn't known what else was here. How did he hear about Summers?"

"You really think there wouldn't be rumors like wildfire in the scholar circles?  They can't shut up about the fact we have a real, live Dubeian in our midst.  Xan wants her and to hell with the AI."

Lily narrowed her eyes.  "I don't believe you.  Xan wouldn't so drastically change things without communicating with ME first."

The man rolled his eyes.  "Shut your damn mouth, brat - you aren't special.  I got my orders from Xan's mouth and I will not and DO NOT have to listen to your whining."

Lily stalked forward until she was nearly nose to nose with the man (or as close as she could get - his forearms were thick and he was taller than she was too).  "I'M in charge until told otherwise.  If there's been a change in the plans then I need to hear from Xan directly.  If you don't like that then you're on your own, and no one here should feel like they need to stick their necks out for you."

As she spoke to turned to look at the others one by one; the red head's expression was stony so Lily wasn't sure which side she was taking on this particular argument, Evangeline seemed just as annoyed with the muscled man as Lily felt, and she couldn't get a read on Marcus or knife-man's mood -- they both had really good poker faces.

"And," she went on into the pause.  "Should you think to sell US out if you get caught...  I don't think I need to remind you what Duvos does to traitors.  I might not be able to save any of you if someone squeals but you can bet I WILL get myself out and back to base to let everyone know who botched this and got us - got YOU - caught. And whoever did will pay for it, even if you get sent to prison.  You know there's no hiding if Duvos decides they really want you gone."

An uneasy silence followed; the man covered in knives flicked the lighter closed abruptly but otherwise no one even moved.

After several tense minutes Evangeline rolled her neck; the number of pops that came from the motion prickled Lily's skin.  "All right, I says we vote.  Original plan, or switch to the new one?  Original?" Lily, Evangeline, Marcus, and the red-haired woman raised their hands.   Evangeline briefly glanced around and then nodded.  "Good enough for me.  Xan wants a change he'll have to tell us the usual way."

The muscled man opened his mouth and the man with the knives held up a hand.  "Enough.  I'M willing to trust you, because you're saying it's Xan, but they do got a point: Xan always gets word to his men through specific channels, come hell or high water.  I don't see why he'd stop doing that in this case.  If we're wrong then we're wrong but at least we got a damn AI out of it.  And it's not like the woman is like to go anywhere anytime soon."

"Thank you...?" Lily said, gesturing for the man to introduce himself.

"Windsor," came the answer.  "Franklin.  Kara."  He gestured to the muscled man and the red head in turn.  "Ain't worked with Xan before now but man's got a reputation for doing it by the book and getting shit done.  I don't like the idea of getting on his bad side by not carrying out his orders but without those orders in my hot little hand or having come directly from his face to my ears I'm not sure I want to make him mad by NOT doing what I'd been told the first time 'round."

Lily nodded to him.  "I appreciate your good sense."  She looked to Kara; her expression was just as crabby as it had been when Lily last eyed her.   Whatever the woman's exact thoughts were they were hidden behind a deep frown but at the very least she wasn't objecting to Lily's orders to stay the course.

"...all right.  Now.  Just so we're all CLEAR-" Lily went on, stressing the last word and all but spitting it at Franklin, "-our next step is simply waiting for construction to begin.   When they break ground we'll meet up again four nights later to plan out the doctor switch -- it's not going to be immediate.  Anyone in regular close contact with the doctor is likely to notice even a slight change in behavior, and there's no way Harrison is going to know every little detail about the doctor's life if he gets pressed.  When the servers and the AI are set to be moved over we'll make our move so there's only a window of a few days where the idiot has to keep up the act.  When we leave, we leave him behind, we get home, Xan lets his family loose if he did everything we told him to.  A good boy gets rewarded."

"Simple 'nuff," Windsor said.  "I like a good, clean getaway."

"Any questions?  Any issues with your cover stories we need to hammer out right now?"

Windsor shook his head.  "Just a traveling performer here, miss.  Staying over in South Block since I was led to believe the growth there would bring new audiences - since it ain't, I'm walking between there and Portia to earn enough to go home."

Lily flashed him a thumb's up and looked to Kara; finally the woman's stony expression broke into something that MIGHT have passed for a smile, if one was holding in a fart.

"Just a ruins delver," was her simple explanation.  She had a voice like cracked glass so Lily was glad she wasn't a wordy person.

After a very lengthy pause Franklin grunted.  "Fishing."

Lily sighed.  "Fishing?  That's it?"

"That's it.  I'm here to fish."

She was all but certain now that if there was a weak link in the group, it was going to be this idiot.  She looked to Marcus and Evangeline.

Marcus shrugged.  "Handy man looking for work."

"Mining - already met Dana and got a position," Evangeline said.  "Ought to be able to give a good report about what natural stuff is down there.   Never know - someone might be interested."

At that Lily reached up to slide the ventilation slits shut again, then turned the suit back on.  "Stick to your stories, stay out of trouble, and keep an eye on the clinic.  We'll meet here, same time, four days after construction starts.  Remember that."

She spun on her heel and left -- they could all figure out their own ways back to wherever they were staying and she had a long walk ahead of her to get back to her room-

...the sky was already beginning to lighten.  She didn't think the meeting had taken that long but that time spent coupled with the long walk back to town...damn it. It took about two hours to properly clean and dry the suit out after she'd worn it awhile, and with how she was currently sweating it might take even longer; if she didn't show up to the farm on time people might go looking for her, and she couldn't just leave the job half-finished or leave the suit hanging in her room and risk someone finding it.  She also didn't trust anyone she was working with to properly care for or hide it.

Where could she stash it...

There was that hot springs area that was near enough to the farm...she knew from poking around that no one seemed to use the attic in that tiny dock house.  That would have to work for now - it would take even longer to clean it later but she needed to lay low anyway, and it was less likely someone would try snooping in her room if they knew she was in it.

When she got to the dock house she picked the lock to the building and climbed to the attic; thankfully she managed to find a loose floorboard that she pried up and stuck the suit under it before putting the board back -- while she really doubted anyone would suddenly decide to come up here at least now they wouldn't immediately see the suit if they did, and who would have any reason to go digging around in the rafters?  It was risky but less so than leaving it out in the open.

As she came upon the fields she could see Emily was already outside with the horse and wagon, and there were a few others that Lily didn't recognize that were standing with her; they weren't anyone she'd seen in town before so she imagined they, like her, were hired on hands to assist.  The farm girl was talking to the others but paused and gestured, with a smile, for Lily to come join them once she noticed her crossing the empty field.  

"-and David, you'll take the cornball seeds.  Lily, I'll have you helping Tracy and Bill with the wheat, if you don't mind."

"Sure!" Lily chirped in response, looking over to the two standing on the far end of the little line of farmhands -- Tracy was an average sized, average looking brunette who seemed like she was barely awake and Bill was a tall man in ratty clothing and straw hat.  "I'm Lily - I've never planted wheat before so is there anything special I should know?"

Tracy didn't make any effort to answer but Bill shook his head with a warm smile.  "Naw.  It's easy.  I'll show you."

"All right!  Let's get to planting everyone!" Emily called out then.  She led the wagon along the rows Lily had marked out and helped one of the other farmhands in setting down the sacks of seed next to their correct markers.

Bill handed Lily a little bag attached to a length of rope and showed her to how tie it to her hip so it stayed secure but also could be removed easily by tugging on a loop in a certain way; she then filled the little bag with wheat seeds and followed along with the man as he showed her what he called the easiest and most efficient want to get the seeds into the ground.  Once she'd had her crash course in wheat planting they separated and worked in a line with each of them taking the rows to their immediate left and right.

While she was rather tired she had to admit that this wasn't all that bad, and in just a handful of hours she could go get her suit and figure out a way to sneak it back into Happy Apartments, then take a shower and crawl into bed.  She might even grab something to eat at some point...or might not.  It would depend on how exhausted she was once this field was planted.

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

"Can I ask you something?"

"Is this related to how distracted you've been all afternoon?"

Arlo grimaced.  "...yeah.  It's..."

Their walk today (Eli never had them in one place for too long when she was teaching) had taken them along the river, passed the island that housed the Haunted Cave attraction, down to the ocean shore, and now they were retracing that path at a leisurely pace.  He'd thought he'd done a decent enough job to hide the fact that his mind was anywhere but in the current moment but...well, considering that Eli was trying to teach him to absorb his surroundings and pick out all the little details in an instant, it was little wonder she'd immediately clued in to even a tiny change in his behavior.

What was bothering him was a proverbial rabbit hole he'd accidentally fallen down earlier today when he was going over their known information and current plan.

They had fourteen suspects staying in the Happy Apartments.  That was a lot of people to keep an eye on, and they'd kept EVERYONE who wasn't a native Portian on that list -- since they couldn't rule out that someone had been hiding in the wilderness prior to renting a room they'd decided against eliminating anyone immediately based on date of arrival alone.   Mali was confident that they could quickly strike people off that list and pare it down to a more manageable one, and he shared that confidence, but it had got him thinking about the general situation.

Arlo had heard and read a lot about the war between the Alliance of Free Cities and Duvos, and had also heard a lot of stories from Remington regarding the recent action at Lucien's border.  Lucien had been nearly destroyed in the war and really, it hadn't known peace long enough to truly rebuild.  It almost felt like the peace accord that Duvos had signed was only a pretense - a stalling effort to let them bide their time, build back up, and try to forcibly expand their borders again later. Portia was far to the south of Duvos so there had never been much fear over being invaded or having their resources abruptly taken from them -- all things considered, Portia had probably never been high on their priority list as there were ruins and other natural resources much closer to the Empire's border; the sink hole opening up into the remarkably well preserved medical facility had undoubtedly pushed Portia square into Duvos's sights and they clearly, desperately, wanted what was within it, and history had already shown how they went about obtaining what they wanted.

It seemed odd to make the jump from a snooping spy to a sudden declaration of war but where else would their current behavior lead?  Things were getting tense in the north and just because they had no word of Duvos gearing up to march again didn't mean they hadn't found some way to keep it hidden.  And while he knew any sort of technology in Duvos's hands was bad news it was a chilling thought to consider what it would mean if they got their hands on Stewart -- they might not be able to replicate old medical technology immediately but the knowledge was invaluable and could, in the near future, drastically cut down on recovery time for Duvos's injured soldiers while the rest of the world would have to scramble to learn what they could from those medical texts they'd found just to keep up.

How to even put all of that into words though...

"...if another war breaks out, what do you think you'll do?"

For a time Eli didn't answer; ahead of them the bridge that led over to the Haunted Cave came into view, and near it was a bald, mustached man who was struggling with the reel on his fishing pole.

"Not sure," came her answer.  They walked on another few steps before she continued.   "Fight, probably. It might sound selfish but in a way I'm glad I'm not in charge of anything or anyone anymore."

He looked over to her; her head was down, her gaze fixed on the ground just ahead of them, so he couldn't get a clear look at her face.  "Why's that?  I would've thought it would be the opposite."

She let out a huff of a laugh. "Maybe, if we were three hundred years in the past.  This isn't my world anymore.  I have no business being in charge of people - how could I order them around when I know less about this world and how it all works than they do?  Like -- imagine if you were thrown into MY time period.  How do you think you'd feel?"

"Overwhelmed," Arlo answered, momentarily surprised at how quickly the word had spilled out.  "More than a little lost, as well.  I've not really been far from Portia so the thought of being in a city where a single building holds more people than I've ever seen in my life is...a little daunting."

She nodded, lifting her head a bit to flash him a smile.  "Now try to reverse that.  Everything I knew is gone, or doesn't work or work properly, or is left like that-" she pointed way off to the west where you could just barely make out the top of a ruined building on the horizon.  "If I had access to tools and tech from my time, we would have caught this spy in a matter of days.  But I don't.  And we haven't.   And I feel like I'm flailing around trying to hold on to anything I can to sort of ground myself but...it's hard, you know?  About all I'm good for is a warm body ready to throw myself on the metaphorical fire to keep it from burning others."

"Don't say that," he interrupted, shaking his head at her.  "You're much more than that - to me, and to everyone else."

"LOGICALLY I know that," she replied.  "Emotionally though... I have my good days and my bad ones; I'm just good at keeping the mask on and rolling with it."

"Well, whatever your brain wants to tell you, if it's negative it's wrong.  You're a good friend, you're intelligent, you're tougher than anyone I've ever met," Arlo went on.  "And if there's anything I can do to help, just ask."

She chuckled quietly and stuck her hands into her pockets.  "You and Asher both have said that.  It's appreciated."

He opened his mouth to keep going but paused, as he wasn't sure what to say next.  They were even closer to the bridge now and Arlo could see the rat's nest of a tangle of fishing line that was around the mustached man's reel ahead of them.  The man noticed them coming and offered a frustrated half wave, which Arlo acknowledged with a nod.

"-so, now that I've had my daily mini mental breakdown, why are you worried about war?" she asked, voice quiet.

"...the more I think about the spy, and what they're after, and where they came from, the more I feel like another war is on the horizon," he replied after a moment to sort his thoughts out.  "And thinking about that made me think about what I would do in that situation."

She nodded, then held up a hand before he could continue; lengthening her stride she adjusted her path to head toward the man with the tangled reel.  

"Everything all right there?"  They were still far enough away that she had to almost yell for the man to hear her -- at the very least, the man wasn't within range to hear them chitchatting.

"Yeah yeah," came the shouted response - the man's tone was clearly annoyed.  "Don't buy cheap reels."

She chuckled a bit; again she adjusted herself to go back to the path they had been walking along - they still had to pass by the man but there would be a healthy distance between them.

As they drew near and then finally passed the man Arlo could hear him swearing to himself as he yanked and tugged at the tangled fishing line...but he didn't really seem to be focusing on what he was doing.  It was slightly hard to tell out of the corner of the eye and with how quick they walked by him but Arlo swore the man was trying his damnedest to watch them while looking like he wasn't paying them any attention.  Arlo resisted the urge to look back, to check if the man was openly staring, and simply walked alongside Eli until the man was far behind them.

"You saw that, right?"

He nodded.  "He was watching us."

"Any idea who that was?"

"No, I've never seen him before."

Arlo made a mental note of what the man had looked like (heavily muscled, bald, mustached) and resolved to ask Gale and Antoine if the man was one of those staying at the Happy Apartments -- he was certainly striking enough to be easily remembered.

As Portia's gates loomed ahead of them he remembered they'd been mid-conversation about Duvos and a potential war...he almost felt like he needed, and should, pick up where they'd left off, as the whole thing bothered him a bit more than he'd initially realized, but there was also a part of him that didn't want to think about it at all.  It was that same part of him that hadn't wanted to consider what "shoot to kill" entailed either.

"Eli!"

Arlo looked up sharply at the shout; Toby was running toward them with Jack and the triplets huffing along trying to keep up with him.  Beside him Eli smiled and shook her head.

"There goes the afternoon I guess.  Unless you need me for something?"

He shook his head.  "Your patrol is done, our lesson is over with, and we already did our morning training.  So far as I'm concerned you're off the clock."  He paused, looking again to where the kid was rushing toward them.  "-unless you want me to invent a task so you can avoid being dragged into whatever Toby has planned."

"Nah, it's fine.  I can handle a gaggle of kids."

Toby would be right on them within a few seconds; in those last moments of peace Arlo stepped just ahead of Eli enough to stop her, fixing her with a look.  "Take tomorrow off.  I'll have Asher cover your patrols."

She frowned.  "Arlo-"

"No, I mean it.  If you're having a rough time I'd rather have you rested and ready for action.  Relax for a day - read a book, hike, visit with someone, just do something you like."

"I LIKE being active, and exactly how much relaxation do you think I'm going to get knowing-"

She cut off her words as Toby came to a stumbling halt in front of them, panting loudly.  "Eli...Eli!  Think you can...whew...think you can help me make a bow?"

"A bow?  What for?"

After a few breaths to collect himself Toby stood upright, beaming.  "I wanna learn how to shoot it!  And then I wanna learn how to hunt!  Mom told me about this stew thingy she liked that had fried sea urchin in it but you can't get near them without them shooting their needles at you - I want to surprise her with some meat but without getting turned into a pincushion!"

Eli blinked as all that came in a rush out of the boy's mouth; Arlo had to give the kid credit -- he was at least thinking ahead rather than rushing off for once.

"Well, seems you have a plan," she replied finally.  "But it's not going to be easy to just MAKE a bow - especially not one that'll take down a target like an urchin."

"But...can we try?"

Arlo smiled a bit at the boy's earnest tone, then wagged a finger at him to grab his attention.  "Just make sure you're not shooting it at anything just for fun," he warned once the boy was looking at him.  "Don't damage any buildings or trees, and DON'T shoot it at wildlife unless you're intending to eat it."    

Toby pumped a fist into the air a few times.  "I won't, I promise!"

Finally the four other children caught up and, after a moment to collectively catch their breaths, they all headed back out through the gates with Eli in their midst.  Arlo watched them go silently; he hoped that his impromptu orders for a day off hadn't upset Eli.  Thinking back to her admitting she was looking for something to cling to, to ground herself with...at the moment, one could think that work was the only thing she was using to cope.  Would his ordering her to take a day off do more harm than good?  He certainly hoped not.

...bah.  His stomach felt a bit knotted with the uneasy feeling from contemplating another war along with concern over whether he just made Eli's life a tiny bit more difficult.  He quickly crossed the plaza and headed up the hill toward the Round Table; by the fountain up ahead he could see a small gathering of folks all watching as a skinny man juggled silvery knives.  There was a battered flat cap laying on the ground in front of him with a handful of gols glinting in the sun; the man was yet another person Arlo hadn't seen before and out of curiosity he continued passed the restaurant to stand with the rest of the onlookers as the man juggled.

From here it was difficult to tell if the knives were actually real but the man was certainly treating them as though they were.  As he watched the knives flip from one hand to the other, behind the back, under legs and around elbows Arlo had to admit the man was rather skilled, and there were "oohs" and "ahhs" and gasps from the people around them as they watched the display of flying metal.  When the man reached the end of his juggling act he caught each knife in quick succession, sheathing them in identical, repeating motions, then gave an elaborate bow to a scattering of applause.  A few folks in the crowd dropped more gols into the hat, and Arlo waited patiently until they'd dispersed before approaching the man.

"Quite a talent."

The man didn't reply at first, choosing to bend and pick up the hat and carefully deposit the gols into his pocket so he could shove the hat back onto his head.   "Yep, sure is.  Drove my mum nuts growing up - couldn't leave anything within reach or I'd end up tossing it around.  You from here?"

Arlo nodded.  "I am.  Where are you from?"

"Born in Tallsky.  Came north because my audience was bored with me and I heard South Block was getting busy.  Dunno what folks's definition of busy is but I barely make enough to buy my dinner there.  Figured I'd try my luck here to sees if I can make enough to head back home."

Again he nodded.  "I see.  South Block is a growing trade post but most people you'll find there are traveling through and rarely stay for more than a day or so."

The man snorted.  "Tell me about it.  -- say, ain't a problem hanging around performing is there?"

"So long as you keep your distance and your knives to yourself there shouldn't be an issue.  Where are you staying? South Block?"

"Sure am," the man replied.  "Hopefully I make enough to move on soon.  Bus tickets might be cheap for some but not when you're picking between a bed, a meal, or a ride."

Arlo reached into his pocket and grabbed a handful of gols; without counting them he held them out.  "Here - at the very least try to get a meal for the evening.  The Round Table has reasonable prices and great food."

The man's eyes lit up and he grabbed for the money, then quickly cleared his throat and tried to look a little more dignified as he stowed the gols away with the rest.   "Thanks, stranger.  It's appreciated."

With a curt nod Arlo spun around to head back to the Round Table, and made a mental note to walk to South Block tomorrow to get a list of motel occupants from Yeye.   They hadn't noticed a lot of foot traffic from South Block lately but a singular traveler moving between the two towns could easily be missed.

It was crowded and busy inside the Round Table; there were a few empty booths but he didn't want to take up an entire one by himself so he took the only open seat at the bar which happened to be between Remington and Adam.

He gave them both a nod and then turned to look at Adam.  "How's it going out at the facility?"

"Alls quiet.  They started digging to place the door.  Mali's out there now with Sam - I'm charged with bringing them supper when I'm done with a few errands here in town."

"You should see the thing now. It sure doesn't look as huge as it did now that it's out of that building," Remington chuckled.

Arlo huffed out a sigh.  "That was a nightmare to deal with.  Little wonder the Old World had robots to do that sort of thing - it we hadn't borrowed that winch and pulley we probably wouldn't have been able to manage disconnecting that door from the wall by ourselves."

Sonia hurried by and went to hand him a menu, seemed to do a double take and realize who he was, then stowed the menu back beneath the counter.  "Hi Arlo!  Your usual?"

"Please. With a glass of orange juice please."  He waited until she left then lowered his voice.  "Keep an eye out for a heavily muscled man, bald, with a dark mustache.  He was eying Eli and I up, and I've no idea who he is."

"Will do," Remington replied.  "-er, by the way - Selene's on the prowl.  Party planning.  Just so you aren't blindsided."

Party planning... Remington's birthday was coming up soon and they STILL hadn't had the little gathering to welcome Eli and Asher to the team.   "Got it.  We don't have time for anything extravagant sadly."

Remington wrinkled his nose.  "Man, even if we did, I don't want extravagant."

Arlo chuckled and nodded to Sonia as she sat a chilled glass of orange juice on the counter in front of him; it was cold, tangy, and satisfying, and he had to will himself not to chug it down too quickly.

He would eat, pick up a few things from Total Tools, then head back to the Civil Corps building to-

"-has Eli ever mentioned to anyone when HER birthday is?" he asked then, looking between Adam and Remington.

"I...don't think so.  Maybe to Asher?"

Arlo turned to Adam.  "Has he said anything?"

Adam shook his head.  "Not a peep, and I'm pretty sure he would have if he knew."

"Huh.  We ought to ask her tomorrow morning then," Remington said into the pause that followed.

Arlo blew out a sigh.  "I gave her tomorrow off so whoever runs into her first..."

Sonia came over with their food (Arlo had no idea when the other two had ordered but all of it came out at the same time) and all conversation was set aside in favor of stuffing food in their faces as quickly as they could before they all went their separate ways: Remington to the Corps building, Adam back out to the facility, and Arlo back toward the plaza where hopefully Mars still had his shop open and had whetstones available.

Tonight Mali and Asher would be staking out the graveyard; they were both insistent that the two of them could handle things on their own and didn't need a third.  He didn't have much choice other than to trust to their confidence but as he picked up the whetstones and was heading up the stairs toward the Corps building he wondered if he should have asked Adam if he wanted another pair of eyes tonight out at the facility.

'If he wanted help I'm sure he would have asked,' Arlo found himself thinking as he pushed the door open to the Corps building and plodded across the sitting area toward his room.

That he was free to get a full night's sleep made him feel a tad guilty but, on the other hand, the better rested he was the more attentive he'd be, and that would only help them.  Probably.

Jack's End of Year Video Game Round-up.

There were many things I couldn't do this year, being in lockdown and all, which in turn meant I played a hell of a lot more video games than I normally do. Here's a quick rundown of what I thought of them.

Hitman 2

IO have sort of perfected the Hitman formula now, so future entries in the series simply have to ask the question of what new directions you can take that formula. In that regard Hitman 2 is a resounding success, setting sneaking and assassination in scenarios around the world from race tracks to holiday resorts, and thus making it the best entry yet. It's possible one day the Hitman conceit will wear thin, but today is not that day.

Thronebreaker

Most people will go into Thronebreaker just wanting a stand-alone version of the Gwent we played during Witcher 3. Thronebreaker is not that. Indeed, even beyond the changes to the mechanics brought in by the online version, Thronebreaker is more of a puzzle game which uses the mechanics of Gwent to concoct unique scenarios. Still, the story is pretty good and it is fun overall, even if it didn't end up scratching the itch left by Gwent.

Black Mesa (Xen)

I returned to Black Mesa after Xen was finally added, eager to see what the team had come up with. My feelings are complicated. The Xen portions of the game are really well designed, great to play and visually beautiful. However the levels hew so far from the Half-Life originals that it kind of stops feeling like Half-Life. I would have like to have seen a more faithful recreation to be honest.

Neon Struct

If you've been wanting a spiritual sequel to Thief that actually used the mechanics of Thief, here you go. Though low budget, and therefore having somewhat uninspiring visuals based on reused assets, it's still a really impressive game from what the team had to work with, and it's short enough that it doesn't outstay it's welcome.

Acid Spy

I'm generally usually okay at stealth games but this one was well beyond my skill level. Got through the tutorial but just got frustrated and quit on the first mission.

Salting the Earth

A wonderfully put together visual novel about the legacy of war and the nature of national identities. Also you date buff orc women. One of the best VNs I've played, but it does have some pretty bleak potential endings that clash somewhat with the rest of the story's tone.

Hedon

Speaking of buff orc women, Hedon is a vivid, perfectly designed retro-shooter that really uses the most of it's engine to bring it's world to life, with shades of Thief and Strife thrown in there. Wears its hornieness on it's sleeve, but if you can roll with that you'll have nothing but a good time.

The Painscreek Killings

I really really loved this immersive narrative game, where you explore an abandoned town to piece together a series of suspicious deaths. My only gripes are the town looks very British despite being set in the US, and the final confrontation adding a chase scene felt a little over dramatic.

Deus Ex Mankind Divided

There are many problems with Mankind Divided. Trying to find another story to do with Adam Jensen. Making the game more of an open world by taking away the usual Deus Ex globe-trotting. The clumsy use of racial metaphor being applied to cyborgs. All in all the game just didn't really come together, which is a shame, because the DLC showed such promise, and hinted at the real Deus Ex game we could have had.

Warhammer Armageddon DLC

I managed to complete the Salamanders DLC and got stuck near the end of the Blood Angels one. All in all it's simply 'more' of what the base game offered, and I'm not sure it really needed it.

Unavowed

Easily one of the most interesting games I played this year. So good It inspired me to write a cheesy fanfic. Sure the mechanics of applying squad mechanics to a point and click are interesting, but it's the world, the art and the characters themselves that really make this game. Highly recommended.

Devil Daggers

The ultimate distillation of classic shooter mechanics. One platform, one weapon, endless enemies. I didn't get all that far into it and I think most people won't, but I'm not going to complain for the price. Overdue a revisit.

Dream Daddy

A fun and fluffy dating game that actually does a good job of putting you into the mindset of a recently bereaved bisexual dad. Come for the hunks, stay for the really affecting story of a strained relationship between father and daughter.

Greedfall

Greedfall falls short of the mark in most aspects, but I have to give it credit for being one of the few games to give us a Bioware companion-centric adventure during this drought of Bioware games. It lacks the zing of something like Dragon Age, and handles the subject of colonialism really problematically, but if you can get past those issues, it's a fun ride, and a world I'd like to revisit.

Endless Legend

I've been wanting a game to scratch the Alpha Centauri itch for decades now and Endless Legend finally did it. There is a risk of being overwhelmed by the sheer number of unique factions to play, and I know I still haven't really scratched the surface even after 4 full campaigns. Is that a criticism? I suppose it depends if you think you can have too much of a good thing.

Space Hulk Deathwing Enhanced Edition

A valiant effort was put in to make a faithful FPS of the Space Hulk experience, but ultimately it falls far too short. The visuals look great and the game-feel of stomping around as a Space Marine really works, but the game lacks charm and character. Up against Vermintide, there's no comparison.

Sunless Sea

This is a game that feels like a bottomless abyss of secrets and mysteries tied up in a very brutal one-life-only system. I really enjoyed my time with Sunless Seas, with the music calling me like a wailing siren every now and again, yet in many ways I did find it a bit too unforgiving, and it could have benefited from having a bit more of a progression between lives than the almost solid reset it leaves you with.

Age of Empires / 2 / 3 Definitive Editions

The first Age of Empires has an important place in history, but is borderline unplayable by today's standards. Almost every aspect was improved in 2 and going back now feels like trading a car for a horse and cart. It's clear that the game was intending your slow crawl out of the stone age through hunting and gathering to be part of the game in its own right, but today it's just tedious, and the rest of the game is just so slow.

There isn't much to say about Age of Empire 2 that I haven't already said, but I will point out that multiplayer AOE2 has kept me sane over the course of the lockdown, and I'm glad the Definitive Edition enhanced that experience.

Age of Empire 3 tried too hard to reinvent the wheel. Instead of taking 2 and building on it, it instead contorted it around a colonisation theme, and it didn't really work. On top of that, the mechanics really felt they were built more for single-player story missions. The maps are too small, and the expansion factions clash with the rules badly. Still, there is fun to be had, and I'll be checking out the campaigns next year.

Hand of Fate 2

This game takes the original Hand of Fate and adds way, way too much into it. While I appreciate the addition of companions, a longer story mode, and optional side missions, the game is far too experimental with it's formula, and leaves me struggling with complex missions around being lost in a desert or evading barbarian hordes, when all I wanted was a straight forward dungeon crawl. I tapped out two thirds of the way through the campaign.

Wild Guns Reloaded

I love the style and aesthetic, but I just don't have the reflexes (or the gamepad) for these fast paced arcade games.

Vermintide 2 Drakenfels

Fatshark gave us an entire Vermintide campaign for free this year, at the cost of having to be subjected to obnoxious cosmetic micro-tranactions. Hard to say it was worth the price, but Fatshark really do continue to improve, bringing new scope and ideas to every new mission. As good as it gets.

Pendula Swing

A fun little game that apes the visuals of a Baldur's Gate style RPG but the mechanics of a point and click adventure game set in a fantasy version of the roaring twenties. A strong introduction to it's setting but definitely needs building on if we're to see a continuation. A lot of the world-building feels too simple and half-baked at times, and the gameplay feels like too much is going on too fast. Still, a charming story though.

The Shiva / The Blackwell Series

At first I had no idea that Unavowed was connected to a host of other Wadget Eye adventure games, so naturally I had to check them out. I'd known about The Shiva and the Blackwell games for years, but never actually thought about picking them up. Playing them all back to back was a great experience, and almost felt like a prototype to the episodic storytelling many games do today.

Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light/Temple of Osiris

Guardian of Light is a fun, inventive co-op game for killing some time with a friend. The puzzles are often unique and interesting and get you thinking, and the story, while nothing fantastic, is fun enough to keep you interested and have a laugh about with your co-op partner in a B-Movie kind of way. Temple of Osiris adds way too much to the formula, with more characters, mechanics and more open exploration and it absolutely loses the charm of the first game, and even then it's buggy as hell. Skip the second one.

Command and Conquer Remastered

Big chunks of my childhood are taken up with memories of playing Command and Conquer and Red Alert, so it's difficult to really gauge my thoughts on the remaster. On the one hand the art direction looks great and preserves the feel of the original, and the quality of life improvements to the gameplay help make it more playable. The nostalgia hit is also palpable. That being said, the mechanics have not aged all that well, with much of the game being far, far too hard. Probably the best way to experience the genesis of the RTS genre but just know what you're getting in for.

Superhot Mind Control Delete

I wrote a lot at length about how unsure I was about Mind Control Delete at the time, and that's because it does feel a little unsure about itself. Is it a continuation of the first game? A fun bonus mode? A mediation on the nature of addiction? A critique of video game content? A joke on the player? I don't know, but I do know one thing, and that is that Superhot is still as addictive as hell.

Opus Magnum

Zachtronic's steampunk alchemy game requires far too much maths brain than I am capable of , and so I had to rely on guides a lot of the time, but that being said, it's still amazingly put together and vividly presented. Really feels like a game that could be used in schools.

Necromunda Underhive Wars (Story Mode)

I'll be checking out Underhive's Campaign mode in the new year, but for now I just want to talk about the story mode. Much like Mordheim, this is a game that's not going to work for everyone, but I really dug it and like it's unique take on a squad based TBS. However, in many respects the game does feel like a missed opportunity. The storyline is fun enough, and the arsenal robust, but much of the character of the tabletop game, the weird, chaotic, and sometimes comical things that can happen over the course of a battle seems to have been lost in translation, as has the quirky character to a lot of the gangs.  

Outer Wilds

There is little I can say about Outer Wilds that hasn't already been said by others, particularly that one should go into the game as blind as possible. A beautiful piece of interactive art, words would fail me in describing it anyway.

Life is Strange 2

Fantastically written, amazingly animated, wonderfully acted, and grim and depressing as all hell. I really love Life is Strange 2, but it it a tough game to bare witness to, especially in 2020. It treats it's subject matter with great maturity, but is so dark it's hard to motivate yourself to continue each gruelling episode. Also, I really think it would have fared better if it had not named itself Life is Strange 2, as not following Max and Chloe turned a lot of people away from a game I think they'd have otherwise enjoyed if they'd named it Wolf Brothers or something.

Half Life 2 / Episodes / Portal / 2/ Mel

After playing Black Mesa earlier this year I decided to revisit the entire Half Life 2 and Portal series. What I concluded is that Half Life 2 is not really all that good. A well told story wrapped around weak combat and average encounter design. This much improves across the episodes of course, but in the end I rather feel Half Life 2 is pretty overrated.

Portal, on the other hand, still feels fresh, though I was surprised I'd forgotten just how much was added in Portal 2, to the point Portal feels more like a game demo. That being said, I think the slowly growing mystery and menace of Portal has aged a lot better than the gagfest the series became with 2. Mel, a stand-alone mod that feels like could be a Portal 3 in it's own right, returns to a more serious tone, and feels all the stronger because of it.

Control

Control has gone from a game I didn't really care about all that much to one of my favourites of the year, if not the decade. Sure there are criticisms I could make, but the world has so much depth, the characters so much potential, and the gameplay such perfectly designed chaos, that it wouldn't really matter. A great time was had.

Icewind Dale 2

Finishing Icewind Dale 2 was the final banishing of the old ghosts of Infinity Engine games I never finished as a kid. Sure there was the nostalgia, but Icewind Dale 2 also feels prefect for the Baldurs Gate era's swan song. Beautiful environments, a well written story and great interface and design, only pulled down due to some overly long busywork at various points and the plot being dragged on a little too long. Still, sad to know I have no further Infinity Engine games left to conquer.

Elsinore

The first half of Elsinore is an absolutely great time-loop mystery, which seems to be an interesting interrogation of Shakespearian tropes and asks the question of how much of a Shakespearian tragedy remains the more you change it. The second half, however, quickly devolves into a cosmic horror story that feels a poor fit for the genre and far too grim for the art style, and that's even before it basically devolves into trying to do the same thing Undertale did but worse. A well put together game whose ending did not sit well with me.

Gwent: The Witcher Card Game

Since Thronebreaker didn't sate my appetite I started playing competitive Gwent. It is a wholly different game than the one that appears in The Wither 3, but is certainly fascinating in it's own right. After 200 hours I am officially addicted, somebody please send help.

And that's that. Not doing a top 5 games of the year because I played too many this year and I've spent too much time thinking about them already. Here's hoping I play less in 2021 and can get back to a more normal life.

Whumptober 2019

Day Eleven: Stitches 

Read on AO3

Hi Friends! Hope you are all doing well. Hope you like this one!

Day Ten: Unconscious 

Summary: Peter watches Morgan for the weekend. What happens when things don't go according to plan?

“Come on Peter!” Morgan yelled as she bounced up and down in excitement.

Her hand grasped his and pulled him out of bed. One would have thought that the girl had superpowers with the way she got the teenager out of bed so fast. In a way, she did have superpowers and they were all the more potent than others he’d come across. Her powers weren’t strength or speed. They were the powers young children have. The innocence in their expressions filtering the world and, for a time, they could impart their rose-tinted outlook to those around them. Those who had lost it with age.

Peter stumbled to catch up with her. He loved the way her little feet padded on the wood flooring. Morgan could never walk anywhere. She ran, or danced, or jumped everyplace. It was something to make the trip fun, she said.

She promptly sat down at the counter resting her elbows on the island with her head in her palms. There was an expectant look in her brown eyes as she regarded him and, for a moment, it wasn’t her eyes Peter saw.

“Can we have pancakes?” She said and Peter swallowed before shaking the thought away.

“Yeah, Monkey. How about blueberry?” Peter knew they were one of her favorites and smiled when the girl threw her hands up in the air with excitement. He started making the batter and as he knew she would, Morgan jumped down from the chair and insisted on helping him. Together they cooked the pancakes, creating a huge stack of fluffy goodness.

Peter drowned his in syrup, always the real stuff, while Morgan dusted hers in powdered sugar. He marveled over her restraint in topping choice until she reached over and poured syrup on it before hopping off her chair and getting the whipped cream. He suppressed a snort at the creamy goo decorating her breakfast. Their plates were all but licked clean and like two old men they leaned back in their chairs, hands on their stomachs.

“Well, Monkey. What did you want to do today?”

The girl looked up and a smile stole across her face.

“Pigeons!”

Morgan was obsessed with feeding the pigeons in one of the little parks near their cottage. It mystified Peter because the first time they went was the day after the funeral.

May went back to work and Pepper invited him to stay with them. The house, which he was staying at for the weekend, was too filled for Peter. Every room he went in there were picture frames and reminders so when Pepper invited him to go to the park with them he jumped at the chance to get out for awhile. The drive was quiet and Peter listened to Morgan’s strong heartbeat in the back. Her feet tapped against each other filling the quiet.

Morgan hopped out of the car once they pulled in and the two women walked in front. Peter hung behind watching as they took bread out of a bag and spread even chunks on the ground. The birds had flown off when they first arrived and were hesitant to come back even with the temptation of food.  

“Mom, why won’t they come back?” Morgan asked, her voice laden with disappointment.

“They will, Sweetie. We just have to wait.”

Morgan stood there with one foot resting on the other with her hand in Pepper’s. The birds bobbed closer but kept their distance. Peter stood behind them watching as they watched the birds. He tried to enjoy the day. The breeze was light and the sun warm for the season but grey thoughts clouded his mind.

Morgan pulled on her mom’s hand and Pepper knelt beside her daughter, putting her hands on her shoulders. If not for his powers Peter would not have been able to hear Morgan’s question. He wished he didn’t hear it.

“Why won’t Daddy come back?”

Peter couldn’t see their faces but he heard a hitch in Pepper’s breath. He could hear the increase in her heart rate and how her knees slammed against the pavement as she pulled her daughter into her arms. Peter had to listen as she spoke low and explained why Tony would never smile at her again.

Their cries tore into him but Peter did nothing but stand there and listen; watching as the people he loved tried to make sense of the unbearable. Their arms wound around each other. Morgan’s small ones not circling around Pepper completely.

As if sensing their distraction the pigeons infiltrated the grass around them. Peter watched the birds circle their huddled figure and eat the bread lying on the ground.

In the end Pepper was right. The birds came back with time. Tony wouldn’t.

-

Peter was sure Morgan would never want to set foot in the park again. He knew he didn’t, but time after time when asked what she wanted to do, Morgan faithfully answered that she wanted to see the pigeons.

Peter could tell that Pepper didn’t care to go back by the way her brow would furrow and the suggestion of other things to do, so he volunteered. He looked over at her face, which was pressed against the window of the car. She was looking out at the forest they were passing on their way.

Most of his weekends were spent at their cottage. The city was too much for him. It was always busy and he was thankful to have a place where he could breath. It wasn’t often that Pepper was gone but this weekend there were meetings mandatory to attend. Peter said he could watch her for the weekend and so far spoiled the girl to all her whims.

As much as the memory of the first time they went to the park haunted him, he had to say that the park was nice. Not only were there birds to feed but also a jungle gym and pond at the park. They spent hours there but Morgan never grew tired of it.

He parked the car and Morgan raced away scattering the birds that accumulated at the center of the sidewalk. She always did that. Scattered the birds only to watch them come back. He gave her the bread piece by piece until it was scattered on the sidewalk.

Morgan raced to the swings after begging Peter to push her high. He restrained his strength but sent her into the air, letting her laughter ease the tightness in his chest. He pushed harder and Morgan soared into the sky screaming with a mix of excitement and tinge of fear. Next she ran off to the jungle gym. Peter stayed on the ground as he watched her climb the ladder.

Absentmindedly he rubbed his chest. There was a pressure residing there since he came back making it difficult to breath sometimes. He had yet to really think about what happened with everything. How he was trapped in blackness for years before plucked out and thrown into battle. To say he was avoiding would be an understatement. May thought if he went out on patrol again it could help release the stress and aid in his sleep but his suit stayed locked under his bed in Queens.

The last time he’d worn it was the final battle and the sight of the red suit still sent his heart racing. Truth be told he didn’t deserve it. He didn’t want it anymore. Spiderman was someone else. Someone Peter Parker wasn’t at the moment. Peter knew that someday he would don the symbol again but right now he couldn’t.

He glanced up to see Morgan hopping on the unstable bridge. She was exactly like him. Her movements, the way she talked, and god, her eyes were a replica of Tony’s. There was a pang every time he saw them, every time she looked at him.

At first he was worried she would hate him. That she would see his failures but with those superpowers of children she possessed Morgan took him under her wing. She made sure he had blankets and a stuffed animal to look over him at night. Much to his and Pepper’s amusement she would leave little chocolate kisses for them around the cottage. He loved her like he never thought he would but hoped for. She was the sister he never had, his best friend, and in her own way Morgan made things better.

But although he loved the weekends at the cottage, inevitably all the reminders and love got to be overwhelming. When that was the case he would go sit on the dock.

On one such morning when the fog caressed the still water he sat there without a coat or shoes having ran out of the cottage for air. Tiny shivers wracked his body but he sat there overlooking the water. He heard the little patter of feet and despite his foul mood, smiled. Morgan climbed up, all knees and elbows, and settled next to him. She threw a blanket over them all covered with twigs and leaves from dragging it down the path to the dock.

They sat together and watched the sun rise for the day. Her head rested against his shoulder and as the sun broke the horizon she grabbed his hand, grounding him in the present and away from his thoughts.

“Peter, watch!” She yelled and Peter whipped around realizing he walked away from the play structure while he was thinking. Her small legs vibrated with enthusiasm at the top of the platform; a fireman pole in front of her.

“Look at me!”

“Monkey, wait till I get to the bottom.” he yelled and started jogging forward.

His eyes never left hers and they widened as she jumped.

Her legs swung too wide to wrap around the pole and bounced off the metal causing her body to hit the pole. The pole’s diameter was wide for her small hands and she couldn’t get a hold of it. The metal seemed to slip of out her fingers. Peter watched as she fell backwards. The air provided no resistance and her head fell back to hit the structure she just jumped from. Peter felt as if he was running through tar. He couldn’t get there fast enough and what felt like slow motion moments before fast-forwarded and her body was slamming into the ground. Stillness settling her always-moving body.

Peter pumped his arms and legs hard to get there. Distantly he heard someone yelling. He heard the coos of the birds and more distressingly he couldn’t hear the sound of laughter anymore. The ground hit his knees as he knelt by her prone body. His hands shook as they hovered over her back. What should he do?

It was silent as he fished his phone from his pocket and he realized he had been the one screaming. He swore when his phone got stuck in his pocket. Finally it came free and he dialed 911 and then Pepper. He tossed it aside and crumpled to the ground beside her. Morgan’s face was lying toward him and he could see mulch sticking to her skin. He brought his hand forward to wipe it off ignoring the way his hand shook. There was no way he could move her. If there was spine damage any motion could make it worse. Dark liquid pooled at the back of her head and tears formed in his eyes from staring at the wound.

“Monkey?” He whispered like he was trying to wake her from sleeping. If only he brought his webs. If only he was paying closer attention.

“Damn it!” He screamed, startling the birds on the sidewalk.

Peter wasn’t sure how long he knelt there but he reveled in the way his knees burned. The ambulance came with mountains of equipment. His face was tight with dried tears and he stayed by Morgan in the crowded ambulance. His hand eclipsed hers and he looked helplessly at the straps around her body. The foam around her neck and limbs so the moving vehicle wouldn’t jostle her and they made her look small and weak. Peter hated the sight of it all.

The hospital was crowded and Peter listened to the moving carts and nurses’ talk. He tried to block out the sounds of sickness plaguing the walls but it was inevitable in such a place. The one thing keeping him from breaking down was the sound of Morgan’s heartbeat. In all the time and transfer to another gurney the steady beat never wavered. It was faster than normal but strong as ever.

She was taken out of his sight and Peter slid down the wall covering his face with his hands. This was his fault. It was his duty, a need to look after this family and she had been hurt.

“Peter?” He couldn’t face her yet. Couldn’t look Pepper in the eyes and tell her that it was his fault. “Peter, sweetheart, I just saw Morgan and she’s going to be okay.”

“I’m so sorry, Pepper. I can’t even begin… I’m sorry.” He cried and she stooped down to sit next to him. Her warm hand took his and she kissed his knuckles.

“It’s okay,” she whispered. “It’s okay.”

A sob bubbled up from his throat and he pressed his knees into the sockets of his eyes. Her hand rubbed down his hunched back and a small laugh escaped him. It was ludicrous she was comforting him. He looked up into her blue eyes.

“Can I see her? Does… does she want to see me?”

“Of course she does, Peter. There were five stitches but she’s fine. She got a concussion so she has to stay up for now anyway.” He must have looked doubtful for she added, “I promise.”

“She just jumped and I wasn’t there to catch her.”

Pepper closed her eyes and hugged him giving him the forgiveness he knew he didn’t deserve.

-

He lingered in the door before going in. Her small body was tucked into the bed, white bandages covering her head. Peter knocked and stuck his head in. Goosebumps covered his arms. What if she hated him? What if she screamed that she never waned to see him again? What if…

“Peter!” She said, her voice twinkling. “Mommy just left.”

Peter walked in and sat in the chair already pulled up next to her. He played with his fingers.

“How are you doing, Monkey?” He said quietly.

“Peter, what’s wrong?” Peter forced himself to look at the bandages. To stare at the evidence of his failure.

“I’m so sorry, Monkey. I should have been there and now you’re hurt.”

She stayed silent and Peter lacked the courage to look at her.

“It’s not your fault.” She said and he looked up into her eyes, into Tony’s eyes. “It’s not your fault, Peter. You came back and you stayed that’s all that matters.”

For a moment Peter was sure that it was Tony in front of him. That it was his mentor forgiving him in spirit for all of his failures.  Peter grabbed her hands, holding on for dear life.

“Monkey, I love you.”

“I love you too, Peter.”

-

His alarm blared and he hit the machine wincing at the cracks he heard from under his hand.  Scratching his back Peter grabbed a sweatshirt and left his room. Morgan’s room was dark and he could barely see her sleeping figure in the poor light. He tiptoed over and sat down on the edge of the bed.

“Monkey, time to wake up.” He shook her shoulder gently and could hear her breathing change. She hid a smile and pushed his hand away pretending to snore.

“Monkey’s don’t make that sound. I think that’s a Morgan creature under all these blankets. Who took my Monkey?” He said a tore off the covers, tickling her sides.

Laughter broke out and her hands tried to push his away before attacking him with her own tickles. Peter reached and rubbed his hand on the top of her head feeling the short hairs against his fingers.

She got ready and they left the house quietly. Some bread and picnic food was loaded into the car and soon enough they found themselves at the park. Morgan was out of the car as soon as it parked but Peter stayed seated watching as she chased the pigeons away. Her hair had grown out some but it was still only above her scalp. He reached up and felt his own hair that was the same length. She looked back and he got out of the car getting the bread.

The two of them sat on the benches and threw the bread in front of their legs. Soon enough the hungry birds came cooing and one brave one came forward to take the bread right out of Morgan’s palm.

Peter glanced to the side. Morgan was leaning forward to look at the grey birds. He could see the jagged stitches sticking out from her sheered hair and winced. In a week they would take them out but the scar would be permanent. Morgan asked him a question about why the birds choose this park and he did his best to answer.

The bread ran out but the birds stayed in front of them as they talked into the late morning.

After the stitches were put in she was self-conscious that the doctor’s had to shave part of her hair to get to the wound. Peter willing and eager to do anything to help her feel better decided it would be best if she shaved off her whole head. Surprisingly Morgan liked the way it looked on herself. It made it all the better when Peter came out of the bathroom with his own matching haircut.

“Want some lunch, Monkey?”

She jumped up scattering the birds away, but Peter knew they would be back. They would always come back.

Thank you! Taglist (let me know if you want to be added): @verdonafrost

Day Twelve: Don’t Move

I just stumbled across your tumblr & saw the thing where you said you don’t mind random asks, so I hope this ones ok: I got into DW over the past year & am now hardcore RiverDoctor. Unfortunately it seems like I’ve arrived to the party about 10 years late. Which means I stumbled across the section of the fandom that hates on THoRS bc 12 wasn’t “River’s Doctor” & 11 didn’t get to take her to Darillium for the first time today... Would you have any thoughts on that whole thing?

Wow…well, first I wanna say it’s always great to have new people on board. I know it might seem like you’ve gotten into it too late in the game, but trust me, new people in our corner in the fandom are always welcome (as with any fandom, of course). Feel free to send asks gushing about it to people, I’m sure fellow shippers would be happy to welcome you with open arms. ^_^

As for the rest well…this is gonna get long and probably have the potential to piss certain ppl off bc I have Opinions™, so gonna put the rest of this under a cut.

Hoo boy…yeah, 11/River *ONLY* shippers. See, the thing was, initially, back in late 2013/early 2014, when we were fresh off of Matt’s regeneration ep and all, I could sympathize to a certain degree with ppl who were sad about him leaving and were reluctant to see River/Alex with 12/Peter because it wouldn’t be the same or whatever. I didn’t agree personally (tho initially I was p bummed about Matt leaving, Peter started winning me over real quick not long after he was announced), but I understood that people have a certain attachment to characters and specific dynamics shippy or otherwise. 

But to me, River was always the priority when regarding my interest in DW, and I wanted to see more of her in the show again, regardless of which Doctor it was with. I didn’t like how abruptly Moffat decided to end her story, just because the majority of the big reveals unfolded with Matt as the Doctor and suddenly because he and Karen and Arthur weren’t gonna be on the show anymore it meant Alex had to go as well. That didn’t really seem fair to River as a character, ‘cause it felt like we’d only been shown the bare bones of her story, her background/origin, her getting married to the Doctor, and then her dying. It didn’t feel right for her to just…not be there all of a sudden. Certain episodes (and lbr character dynamics) during series 8 and 9 would have probably benefited from her presence (off the top of my head I’d say Time Heist, how the hell did this show have a heist episode with no River using her time-traveling archaeologist sleuthing skills, like dafuq).

So…pre-THoRS, the Doctor/River fandom after Peter took over the role was a bit of a mixed bag. There were the people who only wanted River with 11 and just angsting in general because there wasn’t gonna be any more of that, but there also was a significant bunch of us who were DEEP into wanting River & 12 to happen. People were still in the fandom, writing fic, drawing fanart, what have you, probably at a slower rate than they had previously, but there was still stuff being put out there, simply because we wanted to entertain what that hot Capalston Sex Storm chemistry might look like. So when news of THoRS suddenly hit us in the face like…

…needless to say, a good number of us were suddenly stoked, new life had been breathed into the fandom and there was pretty much constant excited yelling for like the three and a half-ish months after it was announced. Once the episode finally came out and Darillium got switched from that big dreadful moment where River’s story turned tragic (well, even more tragic than it already was) to literally the most warm and fuzzy soft 24 years of domestic marital bliss for River, there were diverging opinions.

Post-TNotD the fandom had come up with all these headcanons about 11 having lost River directly after losing the Ponds, which was why he was up on that cloud for a century and the generally accepted consensus was that Darillium had to have happened with 11. Admittedly, it doesn’t really paint 11 in the best light after the fact that he seemed to have tried dying on Trenzalore without ever having taken River to Darillium like he’d promised. But, looking back, a lot of 11 & River’s relationship as it was depicted in series 5 & 6 was fraught with emotional hurt on River’s end, so for me personally (and some others), it didn’t really seem entirely out of character for 11 once we really started thinking about it. 

Really, it’s more complicated because of the nature of TV and how with a show like DW it’s really impossible to plan out these big story beats ahead of time with different Doctors. Moffat initially tried getting David to stay an extra season after RTD left, and had David said yes, that means a good chunk of River’s story would have unfolded with 10. It kinda just ends up being a case of who’s currently part of the cast and how can we mold this particular part of the story around them. By the time Steven decided on the way in which he wanted to show Darillium unfold, Matt was already gone, so it had to happen with Peter.

(And I mean, if you wanted to put a positive spin on it, you could see it as 11′s big blustery last-ditch attempt at trying to prevent River dying in the Library from happening.)

I was admittedly a vocal cuntface about how much I DIDN’T want THoRS to end on Darillium before “24 years”. I hated the idea of 12 finally seeing and being with his wife only for it to end all unnecessarily angsty again. Moffat managed to completely upend and rewrite my expectations in that regard, fortunately. 

For a lot of us, it was about River being shown to finally have some no-strings-tied happiness with a Doctor who knew her. I think a lot of people wanted that to be with older!11, but narrative-wise, I think regardless of whether it’s older!11 or 12, the point is the Doctor being at a point where he can be the husband who River needs. One whose memories don’t need to wiped after the fact like all the classic Doctors, War, 9, or pre-Library 10. Aside from the whole HELL YEAH SPACE WIVES angle, I think that’s also what fuels a lot of the desire for River to be with 13 as well, a Doctor who knows and loves her regardless of what face their wearing.

For some ppl in this fandom tho, that didn’t suffice because it didn’t happen with Matt & Alex. And I mean, if that’s how someone feels, that’s their prerogative, but I don’t see any reason to rain on everyone else’s parade when it literally brought new life and excitement and joy and FUN into our fandom after what felt like quite a long dry spell without any River content. 

And I mean, not to get mopey and sad about it (trigger warning for some potentially upsetting stuff), but the news about River being back on DW in September of 2015 couldn’t have come at a better time fore me personally, bc that was literally a time in my life where I had sudden and overwhelming/dangerous mental health issues, to the point where daily I contemplated suicide and knowing that River was finally gonna meet the Scottish version of her husband was quite literally the thing that kept me alive, because I fucking HAD to see it. So, I do tend to bristle when I come across opinions that trash that particular episode, because it means a HELL of a lot to me. 

The only thing I can say about dealing with people who stew in negativity is to just try to avoid them. I don’t follow anyone who professes THoRS-negative opinions and in some very rare cases I’ve blocked certain people. In addition to this, bc Tumblr’s blocking system is balls, I use the xkit blacklist extension and literally put people’s urls into it so I don’t have to see their stuff when others unknowingly put it on my dash. (Tho be aware that if ppl change their urls you might need to go in and change it to their current one, but it’s not that hard to do.) Because at the end of the day, you just want to be able to enjoy the ship. You are the one curating your own fandom experience, and once you know what you want to avoid (or who), you gotta just take the necessary precautions.

Die Schere Hand (An Edward Scissorhands Sanders Sides AU) Chapter 2.5

Previous chapter can be found here: https://mycatshuman.tumblr.com/post/178884468602/die-schere-hand-an-edward-scissorhands-sanders

I would like to thank @civilsounds17 for beta reading this chapter. You really are helping to get this story out of my head! 💚💚

As always feedback is appreciated! (And what is this, another character? And who is that guy with the weird name? Spoiler alert:look up the name, its German for…..)

Pairings: Prinxiety, Logicality

Word count: 3, 073

Warnings: cursing but I think thats it. Let me know if I missed any!

A hand dragged a cup to his lips as the person sucked their green tea through the straw. The person rolled their eyes as they listened to the person on the other end of the phone. It was funny, really, how much drama had been caused today. Everyone was in a flurry over the fact that Patton Sun had been seen driving around with a strange, darkly clothed man. It didn’t bother this person really. They just liked a good show. They were pulled out of their thoughts by the person on the phone.

“What is going on, Remy?!? Do you think it could be a secret lover? Or a long lost family member? Then again, Talyn said they saw Patton drive up the hill and-”

“Wait, the hill?” Remy asked as he pulled off his styling sunglasses to rub at his eyes, not quite believing what he was hearing.

“Yeah!” The other person exclaimed.

“I gotta go,” Remy said as he hung up despite the protests. What exactly was going on? Nobody ever went up there. Sure Remy had ventured a couple of feet past the gargoyles, farther than anyone else, but that was child’s play.

Remy would have gone farther if it weren’t for the stone. He felt himself become foggy as he was transported back to that moment. It was a crisp night, the air nipped slightly at his nose. The leaves crunched under his boots as the wind whistled through the dead branches. Remy had been dared by his friend, Schlange, to go past the gargoyles guarding the entrance at the bottom of the hill. Remy, of course, pushed himself further. He was known to do that. It’s what made him so cool.

Remy remembered walking through the trees, the light from the flashlight held tightly in his hand bouncing off the trees. He had strolled across the fallen leaves with an almost arrogance before he tripped over a root. “Shit!”

Remy wasn’t going to lie, it hurt. He moved the flashlight to show his knee, where there was a small rip in his jeans, a small scrape on his skin. He let out a groan. It annoyed him more than anything. His head whipped up as he heard a branch crack. Remy directed the beam of light in front of him, his eyes the size of dinner plates. He let out a gasp as he noticed the gray stone slab a few feet in front of him.

Remy scrambled up and snuck closer, his face twisting in concentration as he tried to make out the roughly carved symbols in the surface. The symbols turned out to be letters and Remy quickly read over the words and drew back in horror.

In Memory of Father

Rest In Peace

Remy fell back as he tripped over his feet. He landing hard on his backside and winced in pain. His head shot to his left as he heard a foot crunch leaves and twigs. He was too scared to even consider it could be his friend. Plus, his friend was a bit jumpy. He wouldn’t have been able to make it past the first line of trees without alerting Remy.

Remy flung his arm to the side, the light flashed off of something silver before it landed on a pale face with wide blue eyes. Remy sucked in a breath as he froze. The stranger in front of him froze too. They stayed like that for a few minutes. The tension in the air thick as neither moved. The stranger recovered first.

“I-I’m sorry,” they whispered, the deer in headlights look had not disappeared from their face.

Remy stared in awe and fear. “I-I,” his eyes traveled down and he sucked in a breath. Sharp blades made up the stranger’s hands.

The stranger subconsciously moved their hands behind them as they looked down guiltily. “I-I’m sorry!” Remy got out, eyeing the silver scissorhands wearily. “I’ll just leave,” Remy stood up slowly, his hands in the air.

“Sorry,” man muttered. “I was just coming to put a flower on my father’s grave.”

Remy glanced at the headstone and realization fell over him. “Oh.” He looked back at the stranger and noticed a small rose held delicately in the boy’s dangerous hands. Remy looked back up at the stranger. “I’m so sorry. I won’t bother you again. Goodbye.”

The stranger stared at Remy in awe. They seemed to have never met a person like him before. Or anyone for that matter. Remy wondered if they’ve had bad experiences.

Remy stood and backed away slowly. “I’m leaving now. Goodbye,” And once he was a few feet away he turned and hightailed it outta there.

Not before he heard a soft, “Thank you, goodbye.”

Remy took a break just before he broke through the trees. He composed himself as he thought over his encounter with the stranger. He was not going to tell anyone about this. Not even Schlange. Once he looked calm and normal, he strolled out of the forest. His face devoid of any emotion.

“Well? What happened!?!” Schlange asked as he met Remy at the entrance, a little ways from the gargoyles.

Remy regarded him for a moment. He shrugged. “Nothing. It’s just trees. Come on. This is boring.”

Schlange huffed but followed after Remy as he started walking away. Remy stayed quiet as he dropped his friend off at his house and walked home, slipping in the front door silently. As younger Remy fell asleep he made a silent vow to the stranger and himself.

No matter how long it takes. No matter what it takes. That stranger will have a life.

Remy was going to make sure of that.

Remy shook his head as the memories faded and he was brought back to the present. If that dark man in Patton’s car was the same dark stranger from Remy’s childhood, then it looked like part of Remy’s work had been done for him.

Remy felt an odd smile settle on his lips. It was time to check in on his brother Logan.

Logan slowly closed the shears as he cut at the hedges. He stopped for a moment and turned up the volume on his podcast before going back to his trimming. This was going to take him all day but he was not missing his podcast.

Virgil stared out the window with longing as he watched Logan slowly trim the hedges in the same boring shape. Virgil could just picture himself creating shapes out of the foliage while smiling. After all, it was something he enjoyed. It was something familiar and made him feel safe.

“Hey kiddo-” the words died on Patton’s lips as he rounded the corner, the pale grey poodle skirt swirling around his ankles. His hands flew to his pastel blue clothed chest as he noticed Virgil’s forlorn expression. Patton peaked out the window and noticed Logan trimming the hedges. His mind flashed back to the hedges on top of the hill. The shapes, sculptures. Oh! He thought. Virgil wanted to do that. Patton fiddled with the grey cardigan wrapped around his shoulders.

“Kiddo?” He asked softly.

Virgil whirled around with wide blue eyes as he noticed Patton.

Patton jumped slightly. “Easy there Virgil. It’s just me.”

Virgil took a couple of deep breaths before he responded. “Yeah?” He asked, his voice small.

Patton felt his heart squeeze as he realized just how much he scared the man. Patton gave Virgil a warm smile. “I was just thinking,” Patton said as he casually moved to the fridge to pull out the ingredients for dinner. “I saw those lovely hedges up at your home! And well,” Patton looked down sheepishly. “I was wondering if you could make something like that with the hedges here.”

Virgil stared in awe at the bubbly man. He wanted him to actually make something out of the boring hedges. Virgil was speechless. He recovered quickly, clearing his throat as he tried to keep his face blank in an attempt to hide his excitement. “If you want, I wouldn’t mind it,” he answered as nonchalantly as he could.

A wide grin broke across Patton’s face. “Wonderful!” He exclaimed. Then he looked away. “Do you think you could make a cat?” He asked hopefully.

Virgil was almost dumbfounded. This man actually wanted him to shape his hedges. Virgil still wasn’t sure if Patton was pulling his leg or not. He decided to take the risk and trust him.  “Sure. Uh, which one would you like me to do?” He asked as he looked out the window.

Patton smiled fondly at Virgil as his back was turned. Then he glanced out the window. “The one in the corner of the yard,” he replied. He beamed at Virgil.

Virgil nodded and silently walked to the back door. Patton smiled at him as he opened the door for him. “Don’t be afraid to be creative! I’ll leave the door open and the screen door so you can call for me if your hungry or thirsty, okay?”

Virgil nodded. “Yeah,” he replied softly.

Patton beamed at him. “Good!”

Virgil stepped outside and wearily made his way to the corner of the yard, silently praying that Logan didn’t notice him. He really didn’t want Logan to get mad at him. Even though Patton asked him to do this. Once Virgil reached his destination, he glanced over at Logan, who hadn’t gotten very far. He paused every few seconds to listen intently to whatever was being said on the podcast. Sometimes even disagreeing with whatever was said.

Virgil closed his eyes and took a deep breath. You got this,he told himself as he opened his eyes and faced the plant in front of him. He hesitantly reached forward and snipped a small piece off, the motion familiar and comforting. He reached his other hand forward and took off another bit with a snip! Snip! Snip! Snip!

Soon, the motions became instinct as Virgil started cutting off bigger chunks of leafy green. Faster and faster he moved as slowly, the shape of a cat could be seen.

Logan paused in his trimming as a noise grew in the background. And it was not his podcast. Turning around he almost dropped his shears. In the corner of the yard, where a fairly sized rectangular hedge was, stood a green, leafy cat. Logan gaped at Virgil as the man sniped a stray branch off of the cat’s body. A full blown cat stood in place of the rectangular hedge once stood.

It was magnificent. Everything was anatomically correct. Logan was brought out of his awe when he heard an excited squeal behind him. He turned to see Patton in a light grey skirt swirling around his ankles with bare feet scrunched up in the bright green grass. Patton was holding the sleeves of his grey cardigan to his mouth in an attempt to stifle his joyful squeal. Logan felt his body freeze up as he stared at Patton. The longer he stared the hotter his face felt. This wasn’t good. Thankfully, Patton didn’t notice as he squealed again.

“Virgil!” He exclaimed. “This is perfect!”

Virgil whirled around with wide eyes before he saw Patton a relaxed once he knew it wasn’t a murderer coming to kill him.

Patton ran up to the piece and let out another excited squeal. “Ahhh! I love it!” He cried out. Patton turned to Virgil, a huge smile spread across his chubby cheeks. “Virgil!” He gushed. “This is amazing! You are really talented!” He turned to Logan. “Isn’t this wonderful, Logan!”

Logan adjusted his glasses as he took another small glance at the cat looming above Virgil and Patton. “Yes. It is quite satisfactory. Everything is anatomically correct and I quite enjoy the change up.

Virgil stared the two glasses wearing men in disbelief. They liked it? He didn’t really expect them to like it. “U-uh thanks,” he stuttered out awkwardly. He silently cursed himself in his head. He needed to hold it together.

Logan nodded and looked at the other bushes in the yard. “If, uh,” he cleared his throat. “If you would like, the other bushes are at your disposal to create what you wish with them.”

Virgil blue eyes lit up and Logan felt the beginnings of an rare smile on his face.

Then he heard the doorbell. “ I shall get that,” Logan spoke and left Patton and Virgil to talk out ideas for the other plants. Well, more like Patton giving ideas. Virgil seemed to hold back. Almost as if he didn’t feel welcome to giving his own ideas. That would need to be fixed.

Logan journeyed through the house to the front door as the doorbell rang again. Logan scowled. “I’m coming!” He called through the door as he turned the knob and opened the door, ready to tell someone off. The words died on his lips as he took in the black leather jacket, stylish sunglasses, and green tea filled cup from Starbucks.

“Hey, bruh!”

“Remy,” Logan replied with a nod of his head.

Remy chuckled. “Nice ta see ya!” He exclaimed as he snuck a peek behind Logan to see if the stranger was there. Logan wouldn’t notice, what with Remy’s sunglasses covering his eyes. It was just Logan. Remy tried to keep the disappointment off his face.

“What do you want, Remy?” Logan asked.

Remy gasped and feigned offense. “What?! No, ‘how ya doing Remy?’ No ‘how’s my favorite family member?’” Logan’s face remained unmoving. Remy sighed. “Okay, you caught me. I was just wondering,” Remy stirred his straw around his cup slowly. Logan raised a questioning eyebrow. “What’s this I hear about a man Patton was seen driving around with?”

Logan seemed to freeze before he opened his mouth and calmly spoke. “I don’t know if I-”

“Bullshit,” Remy cut him off. “You always know everything about Patton. What with that cru-”

“Remy!” Logan hissed as he frantically checked behind him to make sure the others were still in the backyard. They were. “Yes! Patton brought a man home with him. We are giving him food and shelter. Nothing to it!”

Remy frowned. “He came from the mansion on top of the hill,” he stated bluntly.

Logan stared at him wide eyed from behind his black rimmed glasses. “Wha?”

“No matter. I’m just curious. What exactly are you doing?”

Logan frowned, but he knew that he wouldn’t be able to get the truth out of Remy unless Remy wanted to share it with him. So he sighed reluctantly. “Patton was upset when he learned the man lived alone and decided to adopt him.”

Remy reeled back. “Adopt him?” He sputtered.

Logan, who was used to it by now simply nodded. “Yes.”

Remy thought for a few moments. Patton was a good guy. A good fatherly figure. Most likely, Patton would have found the same little issue as he had. Although, knowing Patton, he would call it a gift or something cheesy like that. Either way, if Patton did, then there was no doubt that he had already told Logan. And Logan, no doubt, probably already said yes.

“When will I get to meet him?” Remy asked.

That threw Logan off visibly. “W-Wh-what-why would you want to meet him?”

Remy noticed the slightly higher tone as he sensed Logan’s panic. “I don’t have to give you a reason. I’m your older brother you have to listen to me. Not the other way around.” He chuckled. “And who knows, he might be cooler than you,” Remy teased.

Logan stared at Remy in disbelief. “Uhhhhh.” Before he could answer however, Patton came bounding into the living room.

“Remy!” He called happily as he noticed the older man in the doorway.

Remy took in Patton’s flowing skirt as he came over to join Logan at the door a stifled a snicket as he gave Logan a pointed look. “Hey, Patton! I was just asking Logan here when the next time we would all have dinner together,” Remy mused.

“Oh uh,” Patton fumbled with the edge of his long skirt nervously. He really didn’t want to overwhelm Virgil but he also didn’t want to disappoint Remy.

“How’s tonight?”

“Oh uh,” Patton still stalled. Remy’s eyes shot over to the hallway door as a soft voice spoke up.

“I’m fine with that.”

Remy’s eyes widened underneath his sunglasses. There he was. Older now, but it was still him. His stranger. He was still as pale as a vampire and he had the same hoodie that he wore when they first met, only now it wasn’t hanging off his shoulders because it was several sizes too big. Remy couldn’t see his hands. And he knew why.

Remy studied the strangers eyes and saw the small hint of recognition in them. Maybe, he remembered Remy. Remy gave a small smirk. “Hey, gurl! Can’t wait until tonight! Patton always makes the best meals. But I’ll be back later. My shift starts in an hour. Talk to ya later!” Remy called as he turned and flapped his hand at the three.

As he got into his car and drove home he felt a small smile settle over his face. This was it. This was going to happen. He was going to keep him vow. What else could he do? He may have been young, but Remy had seen some of himself in the stranger. They had semi similar stories after all.

“Are you sure, Virgil?” Logan asked as soon as he closed the door.

Virgil shifted on his feet as he peeked up at him through his bangs. “Yeah, I’m sure.”

Patton and Logan shared a look, unconvinced. Finally Patton sighed. “Okay, kiddo. Just know that if you ever, at any time, want to cancel, it’s okay,” Patton whispered as he placed a hand on Virgil’s shoulder, causing the pale man to look up.

Virgil gave a small, hopefully convincing, smile. “I’m sure.”

Patton sighed and dropped his hand. He pushed a smile onto his face and adjusted his glasses. “Alrighty then! Come on! Let’s go make dinner!” Patton turned and headed to the kitchen as Logan and Virgil followed behind.

Virgil was sure. He was nervous but sure. After all, he didn’t think he was ever going to see the young teen he met those few years ago. In the woods, at night, at his father’s grave.

(Sorry its a so late! I really hope you enjoyed this chapter! Feel free to yell at me for any mistakes or just let me know if you enjoyed this chapter! And Oooo who is that? And oh he’s in this now. And oh my chuck! History! To be honest I didn’t even plan that. I hope you have a a WONDEFUL week and Happy Halloween!!!💜💜💜💜💜💜🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻 oh and I hope I tagged the right people)

Tag list: @ravens-rambling @soft-transboy

Consequences - Andromeda Tonks et al

A/N:  this spur of the moment story was inspired by This post and This post, by @blitheringmcgonagall and @lytefoot . It’s the first AU on my part... a Snape Lives AU.

Yes, I am writing an AU with Snape living. I know it’s strange, coming from the Dragon.

Rated T for a few choice words and magical violence. Ace safe and it will go up tomorrow on FF.net and Ao3.

“Must you go so early?”

“I have a meeting at 7 with the Directors of MLS and the International Wizarding Confederation. But I will be back in time for tea.” He leaned over and gave her a kiss on the cheek before a peck on the lips. While he departed in a swirl of green flames and purple and gold robes, Andromeda Tonks went back to the modest kitchen of her cottage west of Yeovil, in Somerset. She put a kettle on and sat down to read the news from the morning Daily Prophet, wondering what salacious gossip that dung beetle Rita Skeeter would slander her family with today.

Tap Tap Tap

Andromeda put down the morning paper and went to the window in her kitchen. There stood a magnificent owl, larger than one of the barn owls the school used. The Great Grey Owl hooted softly, looking unlike anything she had seen before. “Who could be owling this early in the morning?”

She opened the window and the owl hopped in. She plucked up some rashers from the pan, cooking up magically, and she handed over one to the owl, who tore it apart immediately. Once down the hatch, the owl hooted again.

“So they need a reply back, do they?”

Hoot Hoot

Andromeda cracked the wax seal on the parchment, recognizing immediately the signet insignia from Hogwarts. Minerva wouldn’t send her an owl if there was anything remiss with her beloved Teddy. No, this must be something else. But the school owls –

“Oh my word!” she gasped reading the scrawl a second time to take it all in. “Well, I’ll be. He is like his Mum that way.” She read it a third time, chuckling at the indignation that dripped with every word written on the parchment, along with a smile breaking out at the fury scratched into the bottom of the parchment stipulating the aforementioned consequences for such behavior.

“You’d think that Headmistress McGonagall would have firecalled me last night after this. Maybe she was too busy keeping order in the school after what happened.

Andromeda went to the secretary, outside of the kitchen, and sat down to write a response to the extraordinary parchment of information before her.

“Dear Mrs. Tonks,

I am writing to you this afternoon to report that your grandson, Edward Lupin, hexed me in front of students in the NEWTS potions section. I am outraged at his behavior and demand that you see to additional consideration for his disrespectful behavior right this instant. How dare he – “

Tap Tap Tap

Andromeda looked up from the parchment and saw a second owl at her window, tapping on the glass. This one, she could only assume came from her recalcitrant grandson, one Teddy Lupin. She pointed her wand at the window and opened it, letting the school barn owl in. She sent him a second rasher, now cooling on the countertop, and took the roll of parchment from him as well. “Does my dear grandson need a reply or can it wait until I send it with this other courier?”

Hooooottttt

“Very good, then. Have another rasher and be on your way, then. Fly safely,” She said out of habit, borne of the years when every bit of correspondence that came to her window set a boulder rolling down her throat and landing with a painful thud in her stomach. She reflected back out of paranoid habit that any time she let Teddy out her sight, even for an hour would give her the worst panic attacks. Thank goodness that she learned to trust Harry, and then Ginny, along with Molly and Bill and Fleur and the rest of the Weasleys with the care of her only grandson.

It took years before she could handle being away more than an hour before a panic attack gripped her heart, making her think it would explode if she didn’t see him that instant, knowing he was safe.

She chuckled at the memory of her former self, one who had lost so much and so many near and dear to her. Now? She trusted her grandson’s Godfather implicitly, along with the Weasleys and those who loved and adored Teddy completely.

She went back to the secretary and sat down at her desk. A bold idea gripped her and she thought, ‘this does deserve my personal attention and not an owl sending a reply.’ He did hex a professor, even if it was for the noblest of reasons.

“Owl, what is your name?”

Hoot Hoooot Hoot

“Vikare, is it? Well, I am going by Floo to Hogwarts. I have an owl carrier. Would you like to travel back in a mere moment rather than fly back?”

Hoooooottttt

“Sorted, then.” Andromeda tucked the parchment in the pocket of her housecoat and set off to her bedroom, intending to dress sharp for her unannounced meeting with the particular professor in question.

“Hogwarts, Headmistress’ fireplace.”

The flames turned bright orange in the parlour fireplace before she pushed her head into the flames. “Headmistress McGonagall, Headmistress?” She knew that Minerva would be present in her quarters but since it was only 8 am on a Friday she gathered that she might actually be in her official office and not her quarters. Then again, she –

“Speaking,” a quiet voice came from the room off of the main one, connecting the spacious quarters for the headmaster/mistress to the office in question.

“Minerva? It’s Andromeda.”

“Andy?” Minerva pulled up a padded chair to the fireplace, intending to sit comfortably and not strain her knees or back at her age. She still had students to deal with in an hour but in front of a dear friend, she could show some vulnerability.

“I received an owl, well, two owls this morning, one from the Potions professor and one from my Grandson. Please tell me that it’s all a misunderstanding.”

Headmistress McGonagall smirked. “Oh I wish I could tell you it’s a misunderstanding but it’s actually the barebones truth. I presume you wish to come through, to talk with your grandson and the professor in question? Will I need to mediate the meeting?”

“It might seem prudent, my dear. Might I come through along with this magnificent specimen of an owl named Vikare? I don’t want the dear bird to tire out from such a long trek back with nothing to deliver.”

“Sure, send him through. I trust you have a Floo-proof cage for him. The last owl that went via cage and no shielding couldn’t fly again for months. Poor fellow kept getting turned around in the first gust of wind.”

Andromeda threw in the Floo Powder, turning the flames green. “My cage is protected, thanks to the nice people at Eeyops and the Weasleys’ Wizarding Wheezes.” She put the enchanted covering on the cage and heard it go completely silent underneath. The magic of the covering was a mild sleeping powder over anything in the cage, where they would sleep through the whole ordeal, only waking a few minutes after the cover was lifted. Whoever came up with that bit of brilliant magic was a genius.

She gently pushed the cage into the fireplace and nudged it into the slipstream, watching it disappear in an instant.

“Do you have the cage?”

“I do. Come through and I will send for your grandson and the professor in question.”

Andromeda stepped into the now empty fireplace and swirled away, remembering to keep her elbows tucked in and her purse in front of her face. At her age, she couldn’t tolerate all of the soot and dust Floo travel entailed now.

“Andy!” Minerva greeted her warmly, letting her brogue slip through some. “I wondered when I would be hearing from you over this situation. I’ve already sent for both of them so they should be here shortly.”

“I assume it happened yesterday?”

“It did, during class. From what I understand of the situation, something upset him earlier in the day, perhaps during his two-hour block of independent study that Pomona has her students engage in this term. Well, from speaking with the other students in the classroom, he came into the room in an epic fit of temper. So I am told, the professor didn’t notice something was very wrong in the classroom and proceeded to start the session, teaching how to brew Dreamless Sleeping potions.

“Well, your grandson cheeked the professor in front of everyone. Now you know the professor in question will not tolerate any insubordination in his classroom, not from anyone.”

“I seem to recall, vaguely. But please, go on.”

“The professor gave immediate detention for it. Your grandson yelled back. The class devolved into chaos and anarchy. Anyway, it got up to a week’s detention before Teddy yelled out what was bothering him so much.”

“And that was?”

The ancient oaken door opened with a loud squeak and there at the door was Teddy Lupin, wearing his robes, hat, and Turquoise blue hair that changed immediately once he saw his grandmother sitting in the headmistress’ office. His hair and eyes shifted to mouse brown and he shrunk down on himself slightly.

“Come in, Mr. Lupin. I was just explaining to your grandmother what happened yesterday.”

“I wish you’d have contacted Uncle Harry,” he muttered.

“I didn’t contact her, Mr. Lupin. I presume the professor sent his own correspondence.”

“I did, Headmistress,” a guttural voice articulated. In the doorway stood Professor Snape, looking worse for wear in his 54 years. “I figured that Mrs. Tonks should know exactly what happened, if not exactly why it happened.”

The professor stumped up each step of the stairs leading to the official office, using a large walking stick with a handle on the end for support. Professor Severus Snape stood there, regarding his disobedient student and the two older witches before him.

His face was scarred horribly on one side, and a large chunk of skin was missing from his face and jaw. Somehow he had survived his wounds inflicted by a magical snake and lived to tell the tale.

“And that would be, Professor Snape?” Andromeda’s voice took on the haughty quality of her Pureblood heritage, looking down upon someone who wasn’t her equal. “Please, do tell me what happened.”

He stumped over and looked at the proffered chair and shook it off. “Your grandson hexed me and this is how I look. Madame Abbot said that the curse will wear off in a month. I have to admit that it was a ruthless bit of brilliance on the part of Mr. Lupin, who seems to have a penchant for taking after his father.”

“You leave him out of this, you bastard.”

“Edward, enough.” Andromeda looked over at her shoulder at her grandson who had the smarts to keep quiet when his grandmother used his formal name. She turned back to the professor and fought down a grin of her own.

Professor Snape stood at the corner of the desk, complete with a long bushy tail, recessed pointed ears that lay flat against his sallow skin and scalp, and was covered in dark grey fur, minus the scar on his face. With his recessed brown eyes and elongated hands, he appeared like he accidentally took Polyjuice potion that had been contaminated with wolf fur.

“Your grandson hexed me, in the middle of class, in front of all of the NEWTs students. It was an uncalled for attack, without provocation – “

“Liar! You know what you did, you sorry – “

“Teddy,” Andromeda’s voice dropped to barely above a whisper, “One more word from you unasked and I will have to silence you myself. I know you would despise not getting a chance to speak up for yourself.”

“Yes, Grandmother.”

“Good lad,” She turned back to the others and saw Minerva with a ghost of a grin on her face, gone immediately. “You were saying, Professor Snape? You said that it was without provocation? My grandson wouldn’t act impulsively, not without excellent reasons, unless you are questioning my childrearing skills.”

The two others had a staring contest and Professor Snape blinked first. He didn’t reply to her unasked question.

“I didn’t think so. Now, it’s obvious that my grandson cursed you with what appears is a non-permanent version of Lupus mutatio lupinotuum pectinem. I assume that is the one you used, correct Teddy?” He nodded solemnly. “But it appears you missed one flick of the wand since the professor here looks incredibly like himself.”

“Probably,” he muttered.

“Did you intend to use that particular spell on him when you cursed him?”

He lifted his chin and his hair went candy floss pink, along with his eyes. “I did. I don’t deny I did it.”

“Why did you, Mr. Lupin?” Professor Snape tried to speak softly but it ended in a slight yip.

“Isn’t it obvious, Professor?” Teddy sneered. “I read what you did, you sod. You outed him. You, of all people. It ’s ‘cause of you that he couldn’t work, ‘cause of you that he was homeless and knotless. Its cause of you that he – “

“Enough,” Professor Snape barked. “Yes, I did out your Father. Would you like to know everything?”

Teddy’s hair turned jet black and prompted green eyes. “I already do know everything,” his answer came out like a slight hiss. “My Godfather told me everything, along with Barrister Granger.”

“Ah, so they told you the child’s version, it seems, in dealing with a dangerous fugitive – “

“Severus, I would be wise to not speak so harshly about my favorite cousin, one that it turns out the ministry made a mockery of justice in condemning him without a trial, subjecting him to the horrors of Azkaban without a trial, much less the fact that you tried to have him along with my son-in-law receive a Dementor’s Kiss out of furious fit of pique. See, I also spoke with Director Potter in regards to everything involving my son-in-law after he and his wife perished that night, one that somehow you survived miraculously, while still grievously injured.” She huffed, slightly. “Teddy, since I think you used the one in question; it’s designed to last until the next full moon, correct?”

“Yes, Grandmother. I wanted the – “

“Mr. Lupin, you’re in enough trouble as it is already.”

He cleared his throat. “I wanted the Professor to know what it felt like as my Father, to know how he was shunned when he was outed, being the monster that mothers tell their children to behave. You intentionally did it, because you were upset to not be awarded something important and so ruined his life financially, using the Toad’s help in the Ministry.”

“A month, you say? Surely there is a counter-curse.”

Andromeda smiled. It was wicked. “Oh, there is one. It’s a Black family secret. But the pain is too much to bear for most mere mortals. It forces you to change back into human form within an hour. Most perish from the agony of the pain of a lycanthropic change unless they are already contaminated with a werewolf bite.”

“He hexed me, Mrs. Tonks.”

She glanced back at Teddy, smiling warmly. “What a tragedy,” She turned back to the Professor standing aside the desk, “just like your birth.” Andromeda turned to Headmistress McGonagall. “Since my Grandson did attack a professor, even with provocation, he still must be punished. I won’t abide him getting away with things like his mother did repeatedly.”

“He should be expelled and do time in Azkaban.”

“No, I don’t think so, Professor Snape. You seem to have done enough damage to my family to last three lifetimes. No, I think that Teddy should have to do detentions with you every night until the curse wears off.” Andromeda turned back to her Grandson, who was standing tall, looking much like his father, but with candy floss hair and turquoise eyes. “Yes, a month’s detention should suffice. “It’s only fitting since you seemed to have escaped most of the consequences for your choices, Severus. However, my Grandson is nothing like you.”

“I will have him for a month, on top of being a bloody wolf?”

“Severus, I concur with the decision. A month’s worth of detentions with you should suffice as punishment, especially in light of the fact that you stood aside while students were tortured when you were Headmaster that year.”

“We’ll discuss that later, Headmistress.” He stomped off with his walking stick, escaping the other witches penetrating gazes.

“Mr. Lupin, you have class shortly. I suggest that you not be tardy.” Professor McGonagall gave Teddy a look. He went over to hug his grandmother and a peck on the cheek before dashing out of the office and down the stairs towards his next lessons.

It might not be the right place for this but I do need to get it out of my system.

• Since the beginning of the year, my health keep getting worse and worse which is causing me a lot of stress. My doctor finally decided to switch my medication to Morphine, 20mg per day. • I pilled up very bad experiences with a few people which eventually lead me to leave FFXIV for a good chunk of time.

• In May, I have been hospitalized as a sudden veil appeared on my right eye. It wasn’t painful, but was blocking my sight and was honestly scary. None of the doctor explained to me what was happening and I left after suffering four failed lumbar punctures. Neurologist already had her answer after her first attempt but kept trying nonetheless, telling me that I was too sensitive to pain. I suffer from fibromyalgia and I told her about it as she came in (for those who don’t know about it, fibromyalgia is a disorder characterized by widespread musculoskeletal pain accompanied by fatigue, sleep, memory and mood issues. Researchers believe that fibromyalgia amplifies painful sensations by affecting the way your brain processes pain signals.) Since then, the veil (which was actually blood as a vessel popped next to my optical nerve) disappeared, but another one appeared on the right eye and I refuse to return to the hospital. It’s still there as of today, blocking a part of my sight.

• During June, my partner told me he was unsure he wanted us to continue together. While I wasn’t upset at him as his reasons were legitimate, I can’t say it didn’t have any effect on my mood and stress. While he eventually found his answers, I’m still not over what happened and the reasons why it happened. • Around the same time, I found myself suffering from new symptoms I still have to deal with: Odd lightning strokes going from the head to the tip of the fingers along with vertigo and sometimes blackout. I fell in the stairs, fortunately not injuring myself. • Still in June, my request for Handicap help has been refused. • Because the things were so hard to deal with (at least I believe so) I almost did the worse during the same month. I’m not going to detail this, only I didn’t think I would get so low to ever think of this once more. Last time was when I was 14. • June 28th, my partner’s boss died from cancer. We were born the same year. Not only it was throwing me back to what happened a few days before and how fragile our life is, it also meant that my partner lost a friend as well as his job.

• In July we had to survive as we could until the family of my partner’s boss finally gave him his June salary. Unfortunately, because of some family problems, the legacy has been solved only this month, and my partner has yet to receive any money he deserves (so it’s been two months and a half we’re living on this June salary). • My lightning strokes / vertigo / blackout problem got worse and I fell again in the stairs, this time injuring myself enough for not being able to move for some time. Morphine was pushed to 40mg LP + 10mg to suffer less for over a month, I’m still in pain today even though I’m under 30mg LP + 10mg per day. Doctors have yet to understand from what those odd symptoms, they believe it’s coming from the stress and anxiety I suffer since months without a break.

• August was only the following of July, absolutely no good news and stuff getting broke and thus needing to be replaced in the house (mostly the oven). • We began to have problems with the accountant who was supposed to fill the unemployment form for my partner to receive unemployment help. As of today, those files are supposedly filled but not sent.

• September came with no news from the family which still owe us over €6000. We asked a friend a little of help to be able to pay the rent. • I contested the decision taken regarding my handicap, help was refused a second time. • I fell once more in the stairs.. I think we should consider moving but it’s not possible as my partner entered in an apprenticeship and while he will eventually receive unemployment care during his studies, I’m pretty unsure we’ll be able to get a new apartment within our situation. • Added to this, my migraines became worse, Carina came to my house for 7 days and I spent 6 of those with a migraine. Yesterday was once more migraine time. Usually medication works well, but it seems that I reached the “no more” point. • Money is more than scarce. We’re basically trying to “survive” up to October but it’s disheartening. 

All that to say.. Me and my partner aren’t doing ok. We’re under a huge stress and have almost nothing left from the money we slowly kept aside “in case of emergency”. Let’s be realistic, with a rent at $600 per month, we cannot live with the help I receive ($700 per month). I do have a tiny bit of money left, I opened my > emergency commission < as well as my > normal commissions <, I switched to > Ko-fi Gold < in case some people would like to throw some money at me monthly (I eventually intend to switch there fully instead of Patreon).

There are other possibilities regarding my odd symptoms, I don’t want to speak about this yet, I need to go through more examination and maybe another hospitalisation.. 

But Jeez.. I’m so so tired.. I need a break.. I didn’t have a single break since the beginning of the year and I spend a lot of time crying and suffering from harsh guts pain because of all this stress accumulating since last year.. 

A Shipwright Worth Her Salt Chapter 02

He leaves the large hunk of bread and container to go with it wrapped in a piece of cloth and hidden in a nook she had pointed out to him as he passes through to head out beyond the walls for a patrol. He’ll check it when he gets back, and as it’s been the last few times, the little crevice will be void of all food, the container washed and clean with only a crumb or two on the cloth he’s wrapped it in.

It’s barely enough for a little girl to get by on, and he doesn’t make it there for long stretches at a time, but he hopes that she’s thriving, since he hasn’t seen her in person since leaving her at the refugee camp months ago.

It’s weeks later that he happens upon it again, and with a bit more time to spare. He can’t help but quirk an eyebrow at the large piece of a Fallen pike that’s hidden beneath a large, tattered tarp inside the bombed out shelter when he makes his way inside. He lifts the faded cover away and stares down at it. It’s a larger chunk of engine block, and there’s some discarded circuitry on the ground around it. Part of the ether tank is under it, and he realizes she’s probably made some type of skid to get it into this makeshift shelter of hers. Most civilians didn’t enjoy living in the skeletal ruins of what once was, but she seemed to thrive away from prying eyes.

She’s a tinkerer, he learned. There’s little things scattered about the crumbling countertops of what he assumes was a garage or kitchenette. Discarded and reclaimed tools, bits of wire and metal, screws and bolts everywhere. He investigates the one cupboard that has a door hanging lopsidedly from it and discovers she’s created a bunk from the cupboard. She’s small, and the cupboard is likely too small, but he assumes she’s making due, since there’s not much of a roof left on the building to begin with.

There’s a sketchbook under a dirty blanket, and he flips it open to see detailed drawings of all sorts of machinery. The bits of the pike have been broken down, with annotated explanations in steady scrawl across the edges of the pages, as well as a rudimentary sparrow, the typical convoy truck that pulls wagons of refugees, and even some older vehicles he’s only seen the husks of in his journey through the EDZ.

On the third to last page is a diagram of the scout radio she repaired for him in their first meeting. To say he’s impressed with her observations is an understatement. When he sets down the book where he found it, he hears a cough behind her.

“Do ya always go through my stuff when ya come by?”

A brief flit of embarrassment crosses his face before his stoic, business-like demeanor reigns it in. He makes a non-committal hum and she huffs, blowing stringy blond hair out of her face before plopping on the ground in front of him and slinging her pack off. She yanks it open, and pulls out a bagged bundle before dumping everything else onto the ground with a loud clatter. A lot of it is fallen tech, but some of it are pieces of guardian weaponry, badly damaged, as well as a radio that looks even worse than the one that sits in on the shelf above the bunk in his barracks. Saladin had insisted he be outfitted with a better comm as his influence grew over the newer guardians.

“Ya need anything fixed up?” She asks after some time spent organizing her finds, lighting a small, dented lantern to cast light on them. Her head lifts and she meets his eyes when he doesn’t answer her.

He blinks at her, shaking his head without sound and his ghost pops out of thin air between them, whirling and chittering as she spins around the girl who looks up in surprise. “Hi there,” Amanda says shyly. The ghost bobs in front of her, shell spinning as if to indicate that her focus was narrowing.

“You again,” The reply comes, in a strangely maternal voice. The ghost advances quickly, and Amanda recoils at the intrusion to her personal space. “Find anything good out there?” She asks in her own version of a backpedal, the cyan light of her center flickering as she speaks.

“Uhh, well today I found some weapons and ammo,” She replies softly. “Most of the shank shells are from a few days ago. Was hopin’ to trade ‘em for glimmer or a toolset, but there’s lots of them being turned in, so I’ll haveta wait until the market is better since I don’t happen on a lot of ‘em.”

His ghost chatters in her electric way, computing something before responding. “Shank shells are something they’re asking for at the outpost.” She scans the girl’s haul, her lens illuminating the equipment on the ground as she rattles in tones that tell her guardian she’s making an analysis. “Probably could get a couple hundred glimmer for this, and the remains of the pike could be used to fix up your sparrow that you accidentally wrecked on our last patrol when you didn’t listen to me about flying directly into the Captain holding the scorch cannon.” Zavala rolled his eyes halfway, stopping abruptly when he notices the girl’s hopeful expression.

“I could do that!” The blonde chimes excitedly.

“No,” He says to his ghost. “Do not start this. There’s no telling when I’ll be called out, and I cannot act as an intermediary for every orphan in the city getting a raw deal at the Exchange.” The scowl on Amanda’s face was pointedly ignored.

“Yes, but every mechanic in the city has weeks of work to do before they’ll be able to get to your sparrow. It’s practically totalled anyway. May as well let her have at it, and worst case you’ll still have at least two weeks to wait for one of the city mechs to work on it.”

“You two done bickering about it?” The girl’s put away all her findings and sits back down, pulling the wrapped parcel onto her lap. “If he don’t want me to help ‘em, that’s fine, um -”

“I’m a ghost. Zavala’s ghost,” The little light says gently. “We’re partners.”

“That’s good,” Amanda says. “Havin’ someone is important.” The guardian and ghost share a pained look over her head, but the comment had no bite in it. She pulls out a crust of bread, and something that looks like a type of soup or broth. There’s not enough to share, but she offers it to him despite the rumbling he can hear from her belly. He shakes his head and she shrugs, before taking slow, concentrated bites.

He looks at his ghost, and she flickers at him pointedly, watching her try not to rush through the meal despite obvious hunger. He knows what that look and the narrowing of her optics means. Give her something to do. We have the glimmer to pay her for an odd job, that look says. It doesn’t have to be the sparrow, it can be anything. Zavala’s gaze remained stoic and firm, a reminder that it was one thing to leave a little food here and there, but he could not fight her battles for her. The world was cruel, though it felt like an arcbolt grenade to the chest to picture just want that could mean for her. Just the realization startles him. He cares for humanity, all of it. He’s a protector of all. But this is something different.

It could be his undoing. He tries not to focus on it further.

“What’s it like on a sparrow,” she asks when she’s half way done with her meal. She packs it back up, likely to have later to take the edge off. Zavala watches her expression change to interest as she regards him. His chest tightens at her hopeful, guarded excitement. “It’s gotta be like flyin’, right?”

“It is more like riding on one of those wagons people come into the city on than flying a ship,” He says slowly. “Except quite a bit faster.”

“You’ve flown a SHIP?!” Her voice is raised and incredulous.

He chuckles at her amazement, he can’t help himself. “Yes. Guardians have to travel across the globe and even to other planets for missions. I have my own.”

“That’s neat! What’re the specs on it? I watch them sometimes, when they take off from the base,” she says. “That way I’ll know if I see yours!”

His ghost, eager to please, projects an image of it directly in front of her, and she all but scampers into her cupboard sleeping area to grab her pad and pencil. She sketches it quickly as his ghost rattles off specifications that he doesn’t care to understand.

“You are interested in flying?” Zavala asks her, propping his chin up with his hand.

She nods, holding up her sketchpad and comparing it to the projection from his ghost before flipping it closed and tucking it on the ground next to her. “Always wanted to fly. See the stars, the other planets the Traveler’s touched.” She leans back and looks up at the night sky through a large chunk of missing roof. “Reckon I made it to the City, and that’s a pretty big feat,” she murmurs. “I’m good at takin’ things apart and makin’ ‘em right again, so I figure I could learn how to build my own someday. Then, head out and see just what’s goin’ on in the solar system.”

His ghost hums her approval. “That sounds like a good dream,” She says. Zavala nods.

“Not a dream,” The girl says defensively. “It’s a goal. Might take a while considerin’ I’m livin’ meal to meal right now, but I’ll get there someday. You’ll see.”

They stay in relative silence after that, listening to the sounds of crickets and rare peacefulness, until Zavala’s ghost relays a message from another titan, his voice booming and at least five times louder than any other person Amanda’s ever heard. Zavala ducks out of the girl’s shelter, laying a hand on her head as he passes, hesitating slightly - not that she noticed - but following through.

It’s the first time since well before her Pa’s died that she can remember someone touching her with fondness. Pa’d been very scattered and lost at the end, moving about life in a haze. She puts both hands on her head, commiting the warm feeling to memory. She still doesn’t feel safe here, but she sleeps more soundly than she has in months.

-/

Three days later, Amanda hears what sounds like a knock on the brick wall on the far side of her shelter. It’s rather early, and other than the blue-skinned guardian, she doesn’t get visitors. She feels panic wash over her just as she hears someone call out. “HELLO?!”

She recognizes that voice. It’s the one Zavala’s ghost relayed to him when he came to visit. Her shoulders relax marginally.

“Hiya,” She calls back, rounding a wall that separated what she’s guessing was a sitting area from the kitchen. Her gaze is calculating. The man has armor, a helmet with horns and no eye-holes, unlike Zavala who doesn’t wear a helmet - or at least not that she’s seen. He looks kind of important. And also strange, since she can’t see his eyes.

He can obviously see her, because he flicks his wrist and speaks to his ghost, who materializes just above his palm. “ZAVALA, YOU’VE SENT ME TO A LITTLE GIRL. HOW IS A LITTLE GIRL GOING TO REPAIR MY COMMUNICATOR?” His voice doesn’t sound angry, she supposes, just impatient and LOUD.

“Zavala sent you?” Amanda’s head cocks to the side at the sight of the ghost’s lens turning orange.

“Trust me, Shaxx. You will not be disappointed.” She blushes at the undertones of confidence in his voice, relayed by the ghost through a bit of static.

The large man, Shaxx, she committed to memory, sighed. “ALRIGHT, BUT IF THIS GOES WRONG, I’M HOLDING YOU RESPONSIBLE.” The ghost disappeared from sight in a shower of white sparks, and Amanda watched as he removed the armor over his right forearm. She could see the loose wires, and cracked plating. The chip in it was probably bad, too.

He holds it out to her, and his hands rest on his hips. She turns and heads into her main space, the shoddy little kitchenette, and sets it on the counter, before looking through a pile of miscellaneous radio parts she’s got stashed in a broken drawer. A rusty screwdriver, a couple sturdier wires, some salvaged plating, and one chip lifted out of a busted helmet comm later, she sat down and got to work.

“YOU REALLY DO KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING,” He said, watching her tongue peek between her teeth as she snaps the metal cover off with a bit of leverage.

“Sure do,” She says with a smile, pulling out her soldering tool to bind the chip to its casing just enough to prevent it from coming loose. “I’ll be done in just another couple’a minutes,” she says, and within five minutes, she’s handing him back the gauntlet. “Made it a bit more sturdy. You look like someone who likes to punch things.”

Shaxx chuckles. “I LIKE YOU, GIRL.” He holds his wrist up to his lips, speaking his authorization code loudly.

“Go ahead,” comes the familiar voice of her guardian friend.

“THE GIRL KNOWS WHAT SHE’S DOING, ZAVALA. SHE MADE IT STURDIER BECAUSE SHE RECOGNIZED THAT I AM A WARRIOR WHO ISN’T AFRAID TO GET HIS HANDS DIRTY.”

Amanda laughs, “Somethin’ like that.”

“SHE’S GOT SPUNK. I CAN SEE WHY YOU LIKE HER.”

She can hear the chuckle of Zavala as Shaxx cuts the comm link and wonders if he heard her. Shaxx reaches into a pouch on his belt. “WHAT’S MY BILL?”

“I - uh,” She pauses. Bill? She got to owe Zavala at least ten or fifteen favors by now. How many times has he left her something to eat? “There’s no charge,” she says quietly. “I owe your friend, the guardian, er, Zavala. A lot.” She wipes her hands off on a towel.

“NONSENSE. YOU MAY OWE ZAVALA, BUT YOU DON’T OWE ME ANYTHING.” He pulls out a larger chunk of glimmer than she’s seen. “OUR TECHS WOULDN’T DO THIS FOR LESS THAN 750 GLIMMER, AND THEY’D TAKE FAR LONGER, INCOMPETENT BUFFOONS, THE LOT OF THEM.” He puts 500 glimmer in her hand, closes her fist around it. “I’LL ASSUME YOU CHARGE LESS, SINCE YOU USE SALVAGED PARTS.” She looks up at him and guesses he’s got to be smiling under that helmet of his.

He straps on his gauntlet and nods. “MIND IF I COME BACK, SHOULD I NEED ANY MORE REPAIRS, LITTLE MECHANIC?”

She shakes her head. “Feel free,” she says with a shy smile.

When Zavala came by two weeks later, she’d had enough food to share, and he let her, eager to hear about the handful of guardians he’d sent her way. What surprised him more so, was that Shaxx had also done the same thing. It was rewarding, seeing the spark in her eyes. It reminded him of eager guardians, looking forward to their first missions. She’d found a purpose.

WHAT’S YOUR FINANCIAL SECRET?

You’re hiding something…

That secret recording, your secret recipe, your secret crush, or your secret talent! Everyone has a secret. Even in money matters. In fact, only a few people would really know your actual money records, spending habits, or financial history – and for sure there are one or two financial matters that you have been keeping to yourself… unknown even to your life partner. You probably had a spending or credit memory you’ve been wanting to forget; unfortunately, for money matters ‘past is past’ doesn’t really apply entirely.

When was the last time you asked your partner about his spending history or give him or her feedback about his or her apparent money habits? Probably a long time ago if not never. According to the book Get Financially Naked, How to Talk Money with your Honey by Manisha Thakor and Sharon Kedar, money is one of top causes of arguments in marriages, top reasons for divorce, and top drivers for general life stress. Generally, men have fairly different spending habits vs women – and I’m sure a lot of women would agree, with their heads nodding. It is usually from illogical and tactless spending behaviour and money habits that most of our financial mishaps or failures root, subsequently giving birth to financial secrets.

But what are the common money matters we keep from people around us, even to our partners. Here’s an interesting list of the money secrets based from our interviews.

Closed Card

You were probably young, and wild, and free back then when spending through a credit card was hyped. It started when you’ve established quite an impressive credit or salary record enough for you to qualify for a credit card. Whether you applied for it, or it was just delivered straight to your house or office address, this ultra-powerful plastic card was once on the hand of the wrong person – you! Thinking it was a bottomless gift from the skies, you’ve probably made uncontrolled and unnecessary purchases. Just amazing! In the beginning, the bills look really small, and they don’t even move a fingernail. But time and persistent bad habits are not the best of friends. Despite making payments, your credit card bills do not seem to be affected, and they just continue to be tougher than you were back when you’re almightily spending. Then, powerless, these card bills take over your regular spending habits and your usual utility bills have then multiplied with the card company’s contribution to the pie.

Needless to say, a good chunk of credit card users who have lost control over their expenses and have been overpowered by the plastics have sunk into the deep irresponsible card usage trap, resulting to debts with continuously growing interest rates and penalty charges. A few have been trying to forget this sad experience, but I bet they never did.

Midnight Purchases

This pertains to your purchases which are unknown to others even to your better half, probably because it was purely unnecessary, irrational, illogical, or even illegal. For instance, boys and husbands purchase gems, diamonds, and/or steam for their online games – while some may be unfamiliar with these, guys, especially gamers, would know these and would have probably had the experience purchasing them at some point in time to advance in whatever game they play. Of course, these can be considered unnecessary, especially when you are in a tight budget. Extravagant shoes or bags which you do not really wear or use could also belong to this section.

Deadly Debt Cycle

Have you ever borrowed money or applied for a loan to pay another loan or a credit card bill? Of course, you have! With or from a relative, a friend, a neighbour, or an actual financial institution, you could have attempted to resolve debts through consolidation. Going for debt consolidation through a cash loan is not a bad route at all, by the way. But in essence, if not properly calculated and assessed, your debt consolidation attempt could lead to more difficult circumstances and further financial struggles.

The short-term sporadic survival within the debt cycle is truly relieving, but may also just be keeping you in the gloomy zone longer than you should have, had you exerted enough effort to pull yourself out of this financially deadly situation. There are institutions out there who can help – but a trusted friend or family member can absolutely help you make the first step in ending the cycle, through their support and your sincere efforts.

Bamboo Bank

Heard about our kababayan who made a piggy bank out of a bamboo tube? In case you do not know the end of the story, all the paper denominations were destroyed by weevils. The insects almost powderized all the cash inside the bamboo coinbank. Good thing he was able to salvage a few and had those replaced in a government institution with the help of a television program team.

Many of us have a secret piggy bank slot or spot at home or in our cars. Be it in the window, under the bed mattress, somewhere in the kitchen, or any place where no one would probably guess money would be placed in. Unfortunately, in many occasions too, we tend to forget where the actual spot was. Sounds family? But beyond forgetting the actual spot where your money was placed, these money sitting somewhere and not saved in the bank or used in any type of investment, are considered underutilized and may actually come out with a diminished value later, partly impacted by inflation and other factors. Your five thousand pesos today might only retain 98% of its purchasing power in the future. Frozen money do not really aid in the economy as well, without circulating in the communities.

But don’t get me wrong – short term saving in piggy banks is good and the habit is definitely encouraged, but saving in banks and investing are particularly better options, especially long term.

Awareness is golden, and so it is highly recommended that you realize your money secrets, revisit your purposes, and review the impact of those to you, your life, and your family and friends. Reveal these secrets to your dearest friend or spouse to seek for support or help. Remember, in many major decisions in life affecting people around you, your financial standing, capability, and habits are of importance. Without facts on actual state, yours or other people’s decision may be pessimistically impacted. The truth hurts, but it will set you free. And with freedom comes peace, and peace contributes to better decision-making.

Secrets do not necessarily mean problems. They just have to surface not just to our conscious mind, but to our financially literate self, as well, to be improved or be addressed in the right manner – because, again, in money matters, ‘past is past’ doesn’t always apply.

For questions or comments regarding this article, please email [email protected].

XI Questions Tag

(I don’t know why I did that in Roman numerals, I’m obviously in a weird mood :)

I was tagged by @byjillianmaria​ for this. Rules: always post the rules, answer the questions given to you, write 11 questions of your own, tag 11 people. I don’t think I really know 11 people here, or can come up with 11 questions, so I promise NOTHING with regards to following rules. Because I am an iconoclast*, baby! (makes air guitar gestures and noises) *iconoclast (n) = a fancy way to say “lazy”.

Questions:

1.) What’s a line of dialogue that you’re most proud of? Holy cripes, that’s kind of a tough one to answer, having written a bunch, and forgotten even more, in the past four years. I would say it’s easier for me to talk about chapters of things I’m proud of, and in that, I’m particularly proud of a chapter I wrote in my Mass Effect series “Once More Unto The Breach” called “We Who Are About Die”. It’s essentially about the people who initially designed and floated the specs for The Catalyst, and how they came together as one race and expended all their efforts, not in self-preservation, but in giving the galaxy a fighting chance against the Reapers. They knew it might take millions and millions of years for their goal to be achieved, if ever, but they were committed, almost as one, to the notion, choosing to die not screaming and in fear, but as an almost indomitable force that would not be denied, no matter how long it too for their plan to bear fruit. However, there was a line my editor particularly adored that spun off from that whole thread, about “the weight of a billions years of justice, no longer denied”.  My Shepard also had some really nice comedic bits throughout that whole series. OMUTB, as my first real “child”, is the series I made absolutely the most mistakes with, but also am the proudest of to this day. “Near Wild Heaven” from “Black Swan” is another personal favorite, a chapter I was having so much fun writing, I had to force myself to stop. 

2.) Which of your characters would you most like to hang out with? Camilla Davies from Black Swan. I suspect she would understand me and my life experiences the best out of anyone on the planet, would be able to give me savagely effective life advice, and possibly transfer my brain into a cloned female body. In fact, I think I’d probably really enjoy hanging out with her, Reese and Alanna; I always felt they were kind of the Three Musketteers of SOAP. Bledoc Caitor, a one off OC I wrote for Once More Unto The Breach as a shoutout to a longtime reader, would be a distant second because he would probably make me the galaxy’s best bowl of ramen, and I really, really love ramen. 3.) Do you have any goals for the rest of 2017? Survive the oncoming storm of massive life and career changes coming up in the final quarter of 2017, and essentially prepare for some major life retooling I hope to achieve in 2018. Unfortunately, this probably means taking a sabbatical or otherwise semi-retiring from writing, at least for a while.

4.) What season inspires you the most? It’s a toss up between Spring and Autumn. Probably Spring; March/April is usually about the time I come out of my winter doldrums and do a lot of my writing again. 5.) If you could rewrite one part of an already-published work, what would it be? The first 20 chapters of Once More Unto the Breach. Well..maybe not ALL of them, but holy crap, there are some massive technical errors and embarrassing gaffs and continuity glitches I made there. I very nearly gave up on the entire endeavor were it not for the fact that I started working with a real top notch editor who essentially trained me how to be a better ,more effective writer, and it’s clear the final 20 chapters are SO much better as a result. I might also redo “To Bask In Your Starshine”. But maybe not. 6.) Do any of your characters have pets? What kind? Shepard kept coming back to the Normandy, even when she didn’t command it anymore, to collect Space Hamsters from the lower decks. Her oldest daughter has a pet kakliosaur. I imagine Camilla has a couple of cats, because they were the only animals she could really relate to: one of them is a tortie Maine Coon, which she adopted because she liked the coloration, not realizing how diva-esque torties are in their behavior. Reese probably has a fancy tropical fish tank setup he poured way too much time and money into. Nicole has a dog, like a golden retriever or a bulldog or something. A mutt for sure.

7.) What’s your favorite thing to do when you’re feeling uninspired? This is the answer - or at least part of it - that will make people gasp in shock and go, “Lyta! You can’t say things like that!” I have two techniques: one I would recommend, and one I would not. It should be obvious which is which. First, I smoke weed. Not often, not all the time, I’m actually on a bit of a six month break from it. I don’t smoke specifically going in to look for inspiration, I just do it to relax, but I would be lying if I said there weren’t times when inspiration didn’t come and come HARD when I was stoned. At least two of my stories, Old Soul and How Can I Sleep?, are the result of me breaking through serious blocks after toking up. Seriously, I could not figure out how to do Old Soul and almost gave up until I got baked and started watching old 1970s tv commercials, and then it came to me. I’m pretty damn sure that good chunks of the final three chapters of Black Swan came to me while I was toked up as well. Second, and much more often, I go for a lot of walks. Like a lot a lot of walks. I try to walk about 12,000 steps a day at a minimum now, which is probably why I’ve lost 20 pounds since April. But for years, I’ve done this when I can, because I find it can get me into a good “zen headspace”, almost like a walking meditation, where ideas flow easier from out of the great miasma of notions inside my brain. Large chunks of Black Swan chapters 5 through 12 were “flashes of inspiration” that came to me when I got “into the zone” during walking, and made sure to write quick emails to myself on my cell phone, so I wouldn’t forget. I’m pretty sure the same goes for Grande Dame, and definitely so for Bearing Witness to Time. If it weren’t for my walks, I wouldn’t have most of my writing ideas. Indeed, it’s gotten so that if I go down a path I haven’t traveled in a long time, my brain starts to play back memories of writing a particular story, as if the brainstorming somehow became encoded in the local metalayer of that location, and walking through it is like replaying a tape in my mind.

8.) Do you have a go-to writing snack/drink? Beef jerky. Usually of the spicy variety It’s high in protein, tasty, and a provides a viscerally satisfying experience in the eating of. Grrr! Chomp! Chew chew chew. 

There is an awesome jerky shop at Container Park in Las Vegas that I love to stock up at whenever I’m there...unfortunately my supply never lasts. I should probably find out if they do mail order.

9.) Do you have any self-indulgent stories/characters that you’d never publish (or even write down)? Hah! Oh boy.....yeeeeeah. There was this one crack fic I came up with called “The Yurizoku Formula, or GAYBIES!” It was a weird story, in the vein of “Chloe Price’s Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny (which I recently took down for personal reasons) or “Today’s Fish is Trout ala Creme” from OMUTB. If I remember correctly, the long and short of it is Warren accidentally infecting Brooke with a virus that makes her incredibly irresistible to all the women on campus, and she has to deal with their unwanted affections as she tries to get through her day, growing increasingly exasperated and flustered, sorta in the vein of Miyuki-chan in Wonderland. I remember it being much funnier and more clever back then than it obviously is. Sometimes I get ideas and my own personal kinks bleed through a little too much...as an example, the end of “The Domina Effect” in Black Swan was originally written to be a faiiiir bit more “sexy” between Rachel and Victoria, but NQW correctly convinced me to drop it. (As an example of my “kinks”, my first complete work ever written was a lesbian erotica sci-fi mind control story which I called Love is the Drug, which sadly I lost the files to before I could submit it to an appropriate archive. There are actually strong echos of this story in A Power Greater Than My Own...the bit where Victoria, as the domme, finds herself feeling helpless in the face of her so-called submissive at the end, because of how hard she’s fallen in love with her. I) I was also thinking about writing an AU fic in the ME universe called Domination: A Love Story, where the Asari are much more in the mold of Frank Herbert’s “Honored Matres” from the later Dune novels, and a 19 year old Shepard is helpless to watch as her colony ship is essentially taken over by an Asari “diplomatic expedition” who are slowly but inexorably brainwashing everyone over to their way of thinking. Not every Asari agrees with this method of behavior however, prompting a young(er) Liara T’Soni to try and help Shepard get through the horror of that particular situation; in the end, she’s forced to temporarily brainwash Shepard, in order to keep up appearances around the Asari Inquisitors, but eventually “releases” Shepard, so the two of them can run off and join a resistance cell.  Huh...I might actually come back to that one someday... Usually, when I get ideas that are terribly self-indulgent, they tend to not hang around, and then get swept out by whatever part of my brain reclaims needed storage space for better things. I’m sure there are whole stories that I’ve completely forgotten about. 10.) What works inspire you to be a better writer? Oh gleesh. Believe it or not, one of the reasons I tend to avoid reading other peoples work in general, with some exceptions, is that I find it very intimidating and daunting. Like “OMG! This person is so good, how could you even think that you are on the same level with them, you absolute hack? What could you possibly have to offer up to the great Singularity of Human Artistic Expression that someone hasn’t already done, and done WAY WAY better than you? For instance, I’ve specifically avoided watching TransParent on Amazon, because I still have an idea for a TV show about a “transhumanist transwoman” which I call “Swing Out Sister”. I probably will never do it, but I’m afraid that if I watch Jeffrey Tambor’s no doubt AMAZING work, I will give it up forever and ever. That said, the things I am watching right now that just blow me away with their style and panache are Rick and Morty and especially BoJack Horseman; I’m most of the way through BoJack season 4 and holy holy holy shit. Obviously, I am a fan of dark, almost cynical takes on the nature of suffering and the human condition. 11.) Say something nice about your writing! (Not a question, don’t care). What?! No! You can’t make me, you’re not my supervisor! Oh, okay. I will say this: people tell me that I am really good at writing dialogue, and this is the only thing I have ever agreed with. I write good dialogue. Sometimes, I even write great dialogue. Once, I wrote superb dialogue - I suspect. Dialogue and snappy patter is my forte, along with weird, high level ideas that I can never properly fill the details in. I’m good at A to C plotting, but figuring out “B” is where I still need a lot of work. Okay, well, I enjoyed this a lot but I am going to be a Naughty Lyta, and not pass it forward. At least, not for now, but I reserve the right to pick it back up and move it forward at a later date.

Lost in Time - ch 1

Winter had been very eager to shove fall out of the picture this year.

It had announced its presence with a torrential downpour that turned to sleet that had eventually given way to a heavy snow that had hammered Portia for a good five, six hours straight and brought with it a bitter cold that was a stark contrast to the chilly but tolerable temperature from only a few days prior.  

It wasn't often that Arlo lamented living on top of a steep hill but he certainly did now as he and the rest of the Civil Corps struggled to clear the pathway without taking a sliding tumble down said hill; after several hours of work they'd only managed to clear to the topmost landing of the sidewalk ramp and they were all soaked, tired, and bruised up from repeated slips and slides -- if this was a sign of what kind of winter they were going to have this year then it wasn't going to be a pleasant one, and they'd likely need more than the one old shovel and broom they'd pulled out of the closet to get through the season. ((Continued below cut))

Arlo himself was armed with that broom and shovel and was quickly tiring of moving the seven inches of snow that sat on top of the three inches of ice and had, within the last hour, stopped piling it neatly alongside the path they were clearing and instead was just happy to move it out of the way however he could.

Behind him, as he cleared away the top layer of snow, Sam and Remington worked together on the ice - Remington cracking and lifting, and Sam getting it out of the way.  Theirs was perhaps the harder job even if Arlo technically had more to move by volume, and after a while (after she chucked a double handful of ice chunks off to the side) Sam straightened from where she'd been bent over, rubbing at her lower back.  "Man, even with my gloves on I can't feel my fingers."

"This is weather only Papa Bear's suited for," Remington grumbled as he wedged the blunt end of the pickaxe under the edge of the next section of a freshly-revealed layer of ice.  They'd tried earlier to use the actual pick end of the pickaxe to try and shatter the ice but had, in the process, accidentally gouged the sidewalk a few times; the only way to prevent any further damage was to use the other end as a makeshift pry bar - it was harder and would take longer but was better than the alternative.

Remington grunted and threw his weight against the haft of the pickaxe and there was a crackling sound as the ice began to splinter and pull away from the stone beneath it.  As the sheet lifted Sam bent again to slide her hands under into the gap between ground and ice.   "--think Selene could rig something up to make this any easier?" she grunted as she lifted in tandem with Remington's prying.

"Think of it as strength training," Arlo replied. "We can't run today so this'll have to do."

"Let me rephrase that - think Selene could rig something to make this faster?" Sam went on, huffing a bit and stumbling as the ice came loose and she shoved it off to the side.  "It's going to take a couple days just to get this ramp cleared off at the rate we're going."

Remington rested the head of the pickaxe on the ground and leaned against the handle, panting.  "Let's switch gears and get the snow out of the way - maybe with some sunlight on it the ice'll melt enough to not be such a pain to pop loose."

"Sounds like a plan to me - give me that broom."

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

For the last three days, thankfully, the weather had been clear and sunny, if still frigid. Remington had been right regarding the sun and the ice -even with the arctic temperatures it had thinned out enough that they'd managed to clear down to the landing near Gale's house and also the ramp and stairs that connected with Central Plaza. There they'd linked up with Paulie and managed to get a narrow footpath carved out around the border of the plaza leading north to the research center and south to Martha's bakery within an afternoon of work.

There were, out of sheer necessity, already compacted paths along Main Street made by Portia's townsfolk and the few stranded tourists present; once they'd gotten walkways open to Martha's and the research center they'd started working on what had already been worn in by stomping boots around town. It was a bit easier to bust up the compacted pathways and if more willing hands joined them they'd have it done soon enough -- Arlo had estimated another four or five days at most to get it clear even if it was just the three of them the entire time (assuming it didn't snow again).  Knowing there was an end coming helped keep spirits high as they shoveled, slowly digging Portia out from under the worst storm anyone could recall in recent memory.

"At least the kids seem to be having a blast," Remington had chuckled as Toby and Polly went whizzing by on polished wooden sleds to thud into a pile of snow they'd left mounded at the base of the tree planter in the center of the plaza.  "Going to have to keep an eye on them, make sure if they go out into the countryside they don't go flying out on top of the river - don't need anyone falling through."

From off to their left they heard a sudden cry then, and turned in time to see Erwa lose his footing and fall backwards onto his rump; with the snow mostly cushioning his fall he at least didn't go sliding down the incline behind the two kids but the ice under the snow left him floundering right at Martha's doorstep, unable to get enough purchase to get his feet back under him.

"-speaking of someone falling," Sam grinned.  "Come on, let's go help him out."

Arlo turned his back to hide his smile - it felt impolite to laugh at Erwa rolling around in the snow - and kept shoveling, listening as Sam and Remington's footsteps crunched over toward the portly man.  The crunching eventually stopped, as did the sound of shoes scratching against ice, and for a brief moment there was the sound of a conversation that was slightly too far off to hear -- the sort of noise where you could recognize someone was talking but not actually make out the individual words.

"'ey, Arlo - have YOU seen Dawa yet today?"

Well, he definitely could hear that.  "Can't say I have.  Why?"  He jammed the tip of the shovel into the snow and turned toward the trio in the distance - Erwa was back on his feet and had his hands out to his sides for balance.

"Because I can't find him, is why," came Erwa's answer.  "He wasn't home when I popped in yesterday, and he's not home right now, and I didn't see any new footprints in the snow aside from mine so it doesn't look like I've just missed him each time.  It's not like him to NOT be at the tree farm - not for any length of time, anyway.  No one else has seen him either."

Arlo frowned - this was NOT the kind of weather anyone should be wandering around in.  "Right.  We'll look for him.  Did anyone see him recently?"

"Not since the day after that storm hit - Emily said she saw him busting ice off the gates to the farm but she's the only one since then."

"Guess we'll start at the farm then and work our way out from there. Let's get moving," Sam said.  She took a careful step around Erwa and began to pick her way up the path, trying to stick to the well-worn and frozen over footprints in the snow.  Erwa wobbled a bit in place and Remington steadied him with a hand on the shoulder and then Remington was off up the hill too.

Sticking to the path they'd made Arlo headed toward Paulie's store first and left the broom and shovel leaning against the counter, then he too began to carefully climb up the path and toward Peach Plaza.  He didn't see anyone else along the way (not that he blamed them - it was bitterly cold) and it didn't take long to meet up with Sam and Remington at the city gates and head out as a group toward the tree farm.

Erwa was right in that there didn't seem to be any new tracks up this way; Arlo could pick out a single set, shaped in such a way that it looked like everyone who'd walked it had all stuck to the same footprints. They too stayed within the tracks, walking in single file all the way up to the farm's gates and beyond, following the footprints up toward the house where the trail then split into five different ones with only one leading up the steps to the building and the others angled out in various directions all seeming to lead out into the groves.

Arlo eyed the tracks - they were all spaced out enough that he doubted any of them met up anywhere close.  "Everyone pick a trail and see where it leads.  We'll meet back here in a half hour and see what we've found."

Remington picked a trail that headed along the fence line, and Arlo watched the snow fall from the fencing as the man kept a hand on it to steady himself as he headed off. 'Hope his knee isn't bothering him too much,' he found himself thinking -- he tried not to let it slip his mind that Remington's knee wasn't in the best shape but the man went out of his way to hide when the joint was aching anyway.  He'd gotten on his case about hiding injuries or aches before but it always seemed to go in one ear and out the other.  'At least we don't lack for ice packs at the moment.'

Arlo shook himself from his thoughts; Sam appeared to have picked a trail that led out to the middle of the tree farm so Arlo chose one that was nearer to the house but angled to the west, and then seemed to veer to skirt along the northern border of the farm.  He knew Dawa liked to walk the property a lot -- he needed to, to be able to catch any issues or potential signs of disease in the trees early enough to do anything about it, so him walking about was a usual occurrence...it COULD be that Erwa had just missed him each time he'd visited, and with the weather being so cold no one was really going outside unless they had to so it was possible Dawa had been outside when no one else was around to see him. Both of those were equally as possible as the man being in trouble somewhere out here and Arlo preferred to hope for sheer poorly timed coincidence as he plodded along.  

The branches around him sagged and creaked under the weight of the ice, and the further he went the more trees he spotted that were wrapped in heavy rope and what looked like burlap, and in a few places he saw a couple of trees that looked to be slowly splitting in half; one of them he recognized as a tree that had been struck by lightning a few summers ago -- there were thick metal rods connecting the two halves of the tree, and steel cables up in the crown of the tree holding the two halves together.  The repair, as ghoulish as it looked, appeared to have actually saved the tree as, once he got up near it, he could see signs where the bark had grown over and bulged out near the bolts that held the rods in place.

Dawa's tracks led right up to this particular tree and went in a circle at its base so clearly the man was keeping a close eye on this one; Arlo edged around the tree and kept going, eying the trail ahead of him and noting how it stopped its meandering among the trees and, about fifty feet ahead of him, straightened out to...hmm.

To the northeast of here Arlo knew was a bridge that crossed the lake that separated the Somber Marsh from the northern shore of Portia's territory along that lake.  Unless he was mistaken it sort of looked like Dawa's path was going to lead him directly to that bridge -- the trail had definitely straightened out enough for that to be a viable destination unless it suddenly veered away far enough ahead that Arlo couldn't spot it from here.  

It certainly seemed to be case as he drew nearer to the abandoned Old World building that made up part of the northwestern border for the tree farm, and sure enough as soon as he'd walked the length of that building and gotten to the far side of it he could see the bridge in the distance, and Dawa's tracks bee-lined straight for it.

"Why would he go out  there..." he wondered aloud.  It didn't make sense to go out to the marsh - there wasn't anything out there except monsters and ruins (even the fishing out there was poor).  Dawa wasn't the sort to go anywhere near a ruin, he didn't fish, and so far as Arlo knew he'd never gone after monster-based resources on his own -- he wasn't even the sort to deal with monsters when they happened to invade his farm: he'd always enlisted someone else's help to shoo them away or exterminate them.

As he hurried along Arlo mentally cursed the weather as he didn't dare move at a pace faster than a brisk walk unless he wanted to take a tumble; it felt like it took an age to reach the bridge and even longer to carefully climb up the ice-coated wooden ramp and metal steps.  Up at the top he could see the tracks heading straight across the bridge; he followed them across and then began to follow a path that seemed to crisscross at random between crumbling rock wall sections, rusted old buildings, and even a couple of gigantic trees that had gaps between exposed roots.

It almost seemed like Dawa was searching for something...but what?  What could possibly be out here that he'd be looking for?  

The bridge he'd crossed led to one of two large islands in the marsh's lake -- this particular island was known for the two ruins on it: the Deepest Ruin and the Somber Marsh Abandoned Ruins.  Dawa's tracks at least didn't lead up to either of those (not that Arlo thought he'd have any reason to go inside either) but eventually the tracks ventured outside of the crumbling, circular stone walls that partially enclosed the ruins, and once those tracks weren't sheltered by the walls they quickly disappeared -- erased by the cutting wind out here that had blown most of the snow away and exposed the ice to the sun (in fact he could almost see dead grass in several spots where the ice had almost melted through).

So Dawa had come out here, searched around, and then headed out of the walls to... The only other places out beyond the walls was another ruined building and a crashed ship that doubled as a bridge to the far side of the marsh, but surely Dawa hadn't gone out THAT far, right?

Rather than trek out there Arlo instead turned to look at the walls -- they were tall enough that maybe they'd give him enough of a vantage point to see if it was even worth it to check the other side of the lake.  He fumbled a few times as he climbed (numb fingers - this cold weather was beginning to get on his nerves) and once he was at the top of the wall he saw an unmistakable black smudge on the far shore to the northeast.  It was just far enough away that between distance and the glare of the sun off the snow Arlo couldn't make out much more than a dark mark on the ground but whatever it was was pretty big.

He'd definitely need to head over there now, if only to see what that was.

It was too steep to climb down the outer side of the wall so he had to go back the way he'd come up and then take the long way around; the wooden foot bridge that spanned across the two halves of the crashed ship was thankfully still intact and was even mostly thawed out so he got across without issue, and then it was just a matter of getting over to whatever the big black smudge was.

The trees were thick on this side of the lake, both in number and in canopy cover, and the snow had the branches sagging low so it was difficult to see through them; the big black smudge remained a big black smudge until finally Arlo was almost on top of it, and there he noticed two things.

One: the big black smudge was a freshly opened sink hole.

And two: there were footprints in the mud that ringed the opening that led to a long skidmark suggesting someone had slid in.

The sinkhole wasn't perfectly circular and was about twenty feet across at its widest point, surrounded by upturned rocks and broken tree roots, and the wind whistled eerily over the gaping hole.  The earth around the sinkhole was sludgy and angled sharply downward toward the opening as well - he didn't dare get close enough to look into the sinkhole or else he'd risk falling in himself.

'I guess Dawa must have heard this thing opening up and came looking for what caused the noise, and fell in.'

"Dawa?" he yelled toward the opening.  His voice echoed back to him; there wasn't a response.  "Dawa?" he tried again, louder.  Again there was no answer aside from the howl of the wind in the hole.

...if the wrapped trees were any indication then Dawa had to have rope stored somewhere on the farm, and there were trees enough here to tie off to provide a handhold to get close enough to investigate.  

Arlo turned and began to hurry back the way he'd come -- by now Sam and Remington would probably be waiting for him anyway, and he'd need their help to get down into the hole.

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

"You sure about this?"

"Yeah.  You and Sam got me beat in the raw strength category, and if I do find Dawa down there he might need the help to haul him out.  I'm pretty sure I can get down there and back out without a problem but I can't promise about him - especially if we don't know how far down this thing goes."

Arlo nodded at Remington; he did have a point - they had no way of knowing if Dawa was in any shape to climb out of there.  "All right.   Sam and I will wait up here - tug on that rope four times if you need us to help pull you up."

"Give me that other coil, there -- no telling how deep this goes."

Sam handed over a spare coil of rope which Remington slung over his shoulder bandolier-style, then with a nod he grabbed hold of the other rope - the one carefully tied to a nearby tree - and began to carefully edge his way forward toward the sinkhole's edge; the mud here went up to his ankles and then midway up his shins before he got to where he could slip over the edge and begin to carefully rappel down into the darkness.

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

Once he was over the lip and down about fifteen feet the incessant howl of the wind across the sinkhole's opening ceased, and now all Remington could hear as he picked his way down was the crumbling of dirt and rock each time his boots touched the wall, and somewhere he could hear a trickle of dripping water -- probably melting snow, and the last thing this sinkhole needed was more moisture to cause a further collapse.

He estimated he was about thirty feet down when he wrapped his legs and one arm around the rope to hold himself in place long enough to use his other hand to click on the little headlamp they'd borrowed from Selene; around him the dark dirt seemed to swallow up the pale yellow light and as he looked down his heart jumped a bit as the lamp illuminated roots and vines that jutted out of the sinkhole's walls.

And the vines looked like they'd once been thick and had choked this entire area out but now there was a large gap through their center, and he could see the glimmer of sap leaking out of hundreds of split and broken ends of the plants as he steadily lowered himself toward them.

"Well, at least something slowed the fall," he mumbled as he went -- he'd be lying if he said he hadn't been silently panicking a little bit as the depth of this hole began to sink in (no pun intended) coupled with the fact that he hadn't seen Dawa or even signs of him until this point.  If the vines had slowed and cushioned the man's fall then there was a pretty good chance he'd survived the drop.

Remington kept at it with his steady rhythm as he rappelled, and then just above where the vines began his boots hit the wall with a muffled thump; again he held himself in place as he experimentally stomped a boot against the wall and again got the thump -- it almost sounded like metal.  He let himself drop a few feet more and then used a hand to dig and pry at the wall ahead of him; something bit into his finger and he yanked his hand back and (perhaps stupidly) stuck his fingers into his mouth but there in the light of his headlamp was a dull, reflective metal visible through the grime he'd scraped free.

This sinkhole must have opened into an underground ruins.

The way down became more difficult as now he had to pick his way through the vines that crisscrossed what he suspected was some sort of ancient elevator shaft as he was starting to see door-like shapes at through the gloom and vine cover regular intervals as he went.   Eventually he reached the end of the rope he'd been using to climb down and he wedged himself into a little gap in front of what he was now sure was a doorway, and tied off the rope's end to the coil he'd brought down with him.  When he was certain it was securely tied he let the coil drop and listened as it hit something not too far away beneath him -- apparently there WAS an intact bottom to this shaft, and it was a lot closer than he'd thought.

He went the distance of four more "floors" and then finally he was almost on top of a rusted out elevator...pod?  Car?  What did the Old World call these things?  It was the thing that carried people up and down the cables - whatever it was called didn't really matter at the moment, honestly.  

From here he could see the ragged hole in the top where Dawa must have either fallen or climbed through, and the metal around that hole was sagging under the weight of the rope coil he'd tossed down; without a doubt it would fully collapse under his weight, so Remington was careful to aim himself at that hole and slide down through it, pulling the coil of rope with him and finally getting his boots back on solid ground within the elevator...thingy.

The air down here was heavy and smelled of dirt and rot; Dawa had already forced the elevator doors open and beyond it was a hallway full of dust and moldering old carpet.  Remington could see footprints in the dust (really, the carpet had mostly rotted into dust itself) and began to follow them...not that he really needed them as there wasn't anywhere he could see to go except down the hallway, though there were doors to his left and right.  He did stop to try one of the doors and couldn't see a way to get it open -- they had no handles and were almost flush with the walls.

"Dawa?  You down here?" he called ahead of him.

There wasn't anything except his own echo so he kept going.  Ahead of him the hallway turned to the left, and the closer he came to the corner the more apparent a thudding, dragging noise was beginning to become, until finally--

"Dawa!"

There around the corner was Dawa -- he had his hand up shielding his eye's from the glare of Remington's headlamp, and was dotted with bruises and cuts that left dozens of bloody spots across his clothing.   "Never been happier to see someone in my life, I was running out of matches," came the man's reply.

"The feeling's mutual - had no idea what to expect to find down here," Remington laughed.  He reached up to slide the headlamp over to his temple so he could look at Dawa without blinding him.  "You in one shape, more or less?"

"I've been better - not worried about a few bruises but I'm ready to eat an entire cow by myself."

Remington nodded.  "I bet.  Come on, let's get you out of here."

"Yeah, about that... Don't know that I can climb out of here.  Not on my leg, anyway."

Dawa gestured toward his left leg and Remington brought the headlamp around again; the yellow of the lamp made the bruised and swollen ankle look ten times worse than it probably was, but even still it was the size of a small melon and looked rather painful.  "Ah.  Hmm.  Well, we've got Sam and Arlo up there ready to pull you out."

"Don't know if I'd trust that -- I mean, don't get me wrong, I trust THEM.  But at current I don't trust gravity, friction, or the structural integrity of a regular ol' rope.  Not even sure I could hold on the entire time to make it out of here either."

"How'd you end up down here anyway?"

Dawa huffed out an annoyed sound.  "It's dumb.  It's really dumb.   So, I heard a noise out here and went looking - you know how I've been keeping an eye out for Aadit, after that Knight scared him off.  So I hear this noise and I think to myself, maybe it's him, or maybe it's that damned Knight come back and is up to no good.  I wait out the storm then walk out here and it takes awhile to find anything weird - but eventually I find this hole, and when I went to look at it it became a bigger hole and I fell right in."

Remington blinked at him.  "Became a BIGGER hole?"

"Yeah, a bigger hole - it was barely bigger than I am when I spotted it.  I guess it'd started opening before all the snow and ice hit, and the storm must've formed a crust over the actual size of the hole because I definitely wasn't near the opening when it all broke loose under me and dumped me in."  He paused and looked around them.  "Who knew there was an old ruin out here completely underground?  Usually these things have some sort of above ground entrance.  Wouldn't have gotten near if I'd thought it'd lead to this."

"Yeah...wouldn't have expected something like this."  Remington rubbed at his chin, thinking -- if Dawa couldn't make it out on his own and didn't think the others could pull him out, then they'd need to find another way up.  "You know, on the way down here I saw a lot of elevator doors lining the shaft.  We're down pretty deep but maybe we can find a way to link up with a floor that's higher up and climb up out of that floor's door."

"Yeah...yeah, I like that idea.  I think I could do a shorter climb, no problem.  And I DID find another elevator back that way-" Dawa jerked a thumb over his shoulder.  "Couldn't get the door open though, and even if I could've I don't think there's any power going to it anymore."

Remington nodded and then dropped to a knee to swing his pack off his back; he rummaged through it and pulled out an old, battered water bottle.  "All right, here's the plan then: I'm going to climb back up and let Sam and Arlo know you're all right, and have one of them get Selene or Higgins so we can get this elevator back up and running."  He handed the bottle to Dawa, who began to chug from it noisily.  "-I'll also get them to bring you something to eat, too."

"You're a lifesaver, Remington.  In this case literally."

With a chuckle Remington pulled his pack back on and tightened the straps.  "S'what we do.  You need anything else in the meantime?"

"Don't think so.  It's actually not so bad down here if you get away from the shaft and around the corner."

"What's ahead of here?"

"There's this big room back there - it's got some old furniture in it, some tables and chairs and a counter.  Might've been some old cafeteria or something.  Been back there since it's warmer."

"All right, then.  I'll be back as soon as I can."

Remington heard a 'don't slip' behind him as he turned to head off; it was going to be a long climb back up.

You’re hiding something…

That secret recording, your secret recipe, your secret crush, or your secret talent! Everyone has a secret. Even in money matters. In fact, only a few people would really know your actual money records, spending habits, or financial history – and for sure there are one or two financial matters that you have been keeping to yourself… unknown even to your life partner. You probably had a spending or credit memory you’ve been wanting to forget; unfortunately, for money matters ‘past is past’ doesn’t really apply entirely.

When was the last time you asked your partner about his spending history or give him or her feedback about his or her apparent money habits? Probably a long time ago if not never. According to the book Get Financially Naked, How to Talk Money with your Honey by Manisha Thakor and Sharon Kedar, money is one of top causes of arguments in marriages, top reasons for divorce, and top drivers for general life stress. Generally, men have fairly different spending habits vs women – and I’m sure a lot of women would agree, with their heads nodding. It is usually from illogical and tactless spending behaviour and money habits that most of our financial mishaps or failures root, subsequently giving birth to financial secrets.

But what are the common money matters we keep from people around us, even to our partners. Here’s an interesting list of the money secrets based from our interviews.

Closed Card

You were probably young, and wild, and free back then when spending through a credit card was hyped. It started when you’ve established quite an impressive credit or salary record enough for you to qualify for a credit card. Whether you applied for it, or it was just delivered straight to your house or office address, this ultra-powerful plastic card was once on the hand of the wrong person – you! Thinking it was a bottomless gift from the skies, you’ve probably made uncontrolled and unnecessary purchases. Just amazing! In the beginning, the bills look really small, and they don’t even move a fingernail. But time and persistent bad habits are not the best of friends. Despite making payments, your credit card bills do not seem to be affected, and they just continue to be tougher than you were back when you’re almightily spending. Then, powerless, these card bills take over your regular spending habits and your usual utility bills have then multiplied with the card company’s contribution to the pie.

Needless to say, a good chunk of credit card users who have lost control over their expenses and have been overpowered by the plastics have sunk into the deep irresponsible card usage trap, resulting to debts with continuously growing interest rates and penalty charges. A few have been trying to forget this sad experience, but I bet they never did.

Midnight Purchases

This pertains to your purchases which are unknown to others even to your better half, probably because it was purely unnecessary, irrational, illogical, or even illegal. For instance, boys and husbands purchase gems, diamonds, and/or steam for their online games – while some may be unfamiliar with these, guys, especially gamers, would know these and would have probably had the experience purchasing them at some point in time to advance in whatever game they play. Of course, these can be considered unnecessary, especially when you are in a tight budget. Extravagant shoes or bags which you do not really wear or use could also belong to this section.

Deadly Debt Cycle

Have you ever borrowed money or applied for a loan to pay another loan or a credit card bill? Of course, you have! With or from a relative, a friend, a neighbour, or an actual financial institution, you could have attempted to resolve debts through consolidation. Going for debt consolidation through a cash loan is not a bad route at all, by the way. But in essence, if not properly calculated and assessed, your debt consolidation attempt could lead to more difficult circumstances and further financial struggles.

The short-term sporadic survival within the debt cycle is truly relieving, but may also just be keeping you in the gloomy zone longer than you should have, had you exerted enough effort to pull yourself out of this financially deadly situation. There are institutions out there who can help – but a trusted friend or family member can absolutely help you make the first step in ending the cycle, through their support and your sincere efforts.

Bamboo Bank

Heard about our kababayan who made a piggy bank out of a bamboo tube? In case you do not know the end of the story, all the paper denominations were destroyed by weevils. The insects almost powderized all the cash inside the bamboo coinbank. Good thing he was able to salvage a few and had those replaced in a government institution with the help of a television program team.

Many of us have a secret piggy bank slot or spot at home or in our cars. Be it in the window, under the bed mattress, somewhere in the kitchen, or any place where no one would probably guess money would be placed in. Unfortunately, in many occasions too, we tend to forget where the actual spot was. Sounds family? But beyond forgetting the actual spot where your money was placed, these money sitting somewhere and not saved in the bank or used in any type of investment, are considered underutilized and may actually come out with a diminished value later, partly impacted by inflation and other factors. Your five thousand pesos today might only retain 98% of its purchasing power in the future. Frozen money do not really aid in the economy as well, without circulating in the communities.

But don’t get me wrong – short term saving in piggy banks is good and the habit is definitely encouraged, but saving in banks and investing are particularly better options, especially long term.

Awareness is golden, and so it is highly recommended that you realize your money secrets, revisit your purposes, and review the impact of those to you, your life, and your family and friends. Reveal these secrets to your dearest friend or spouse to seek for support or help. Remember, in many major decisions in life affecting people around you, your financial standing, capability, and habits are of importance. Without facts on actual state, yours or other people’s decision may be pessimistically impacted. The truth hurts, but it will set you free. And with freedom comes peace, and peace contributes to better decision-making.

Secrets do not necessarily mean problems. They just have to surface not just to our conscious mind, but to our financially literate self, as well, to be improved or be addressed in the right manner – because, again, in money matters, ‘past is past’ doesn’t always apply.

For questions or comments regarding this article, please email [email protected].