Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Everything looks like Tony Stark's dream. And uh, the monsters. The monsters are the dead giveaway. 

You don't really get a pleasant start to this, it's rocky from the get-go. (You hit the ground running, so to say.) You fought them countless times, half-asleep, jabbing your fingers on the buttons in quick succession. But seeing them in person is a different deal altogether.

They're huge, first of all. Towering and imposing, also the foul smell and constant screeching and roaring is beyond overwhelming. Trying to gather your wits to get the fuck out of here, you run. You hate running. Absolutely loathe it. Endurance training is definitely not one of your strengths. So you– sprint to the nearest shop. People are shouting, there's broken glass crunching under your feet, and you have half a thought to thank your choice of big platforms and mourn the loss of your favourite pair. 

You burst through the door, a couple of people racing in after you as well. The door shuts with a foreboding click, cutting off the sound from the street. Huh, soundproof. The staff is already going through the procedures of securing the place, there's a first aid kit on one of the tables and glasses of water distributed freely among the gasping folk.

You watch the silent battle through the large windows. The hunters have arrived and are handling the problem. You thought you'd admire their quick and efficient movements, but you're just nauseous and overwhelmed. Everything happened so fast. Faceless hunters fire shot after shot. There's a man with a fucking sword, of all things. And a girl with an acid-like evol? Wicked.

It's over in less than five minutes. You sit on the chair, mute. Holy fuck. 

—

You would love an opportunity to freak out, properly lose your marbles and the like about– well, everything. But you’re in a public space, there’s people there, living breathing beings who did not sign up to be front row to an amateur performance of Shakespearean level of breakdowns.

Whatever force put you here took care of all the important bits. Otherwise, you’d have no idea where you'd need to go to recover (get for the first time? bullshit your way through?) things like a passport, medical information, diploma and the lot. Opening a bank account, credit history? Where to live? Money, taxes, bills to pay? Groceries? Thankfully, you don't get the chance to spiral into a full-blown panic attack. 

Thing is, this isn’t your phone. You had an old thing, nicked in a few places, but still working. And an old-school book case for your phone with rad stickers, if you say so yourself. The thing in your pocket though is ultra-thin and intimidatingly modern. It unlocks with your fingerprint, thanks for the small mercies. The background and app display are carefully blank, like you're starting anew. However, unlike a completely new phone, this one has a lot of apps pre-installed and when you open the notes it has all the important information you were looking for. You check the calendar – yep, here are your work hours, how long the commute is. You can even click it, and it opens a map with the correct path and train you have to take from your apartment (that answers many important questions, thank fuck). 

You breathe a sigh of relief and praise whatever deity gave you this. How thoughtful. Otherwise you'd be very tempted to just walk into the forest, lie down and let the nature (monsters) run its course. 

That settled, you’re left with only an existential freakout on your itinerary. Fantastic.

—

You weave your way through unfamiliar streets in some sort of trance. Maybe it’s shock. Maybe you’ve overemoted and your capacity for new experiences has been maxed out. You’re not even close to being calm, but numbness serves you just as well for now. 

You fish out your keys from your bag and are not even surprised that they look completely different. Sure, whatever. At least the half-erased mangled keychain is still yours and the sight almost makes you want to cry if you could feel anything at this moment.

Your room is almost an exact replica from your previous apartment you shared with a friend. Only, this one is a studio apartment, no housemates to share the kitchen and bathroom with, you won't hear giggling or swearing from the room over the paper thin walls. As an introvert, it's a blessing. As a human being who needs social interaction and who, fuck, probably just permanently lost contact with all your friends and family, it's devastating. You don't even have time to – mourn, or just– process this. You can't afford falling apart now, you have to keep moving, to settle in. And if the half-crocheted hat you wanted to gift to your friend sends a wave of hollowness that almost makes you collapse right there, well…

Alright. Time to plan, you’ll have plenty of time to wallow in misery with a bottle of gin afterwards.

Your first priority is safety. Then, stability. Financial mostly, mental – you'll figure that out later. Probably. 

From what you’ve gathered, you're a tutor in a language school, thank fuck. You teach kids and teenagers, which is draining but also sometimes fun. Most importantly, it pays the bills. And this kind of job is the farthest thing from all plot related stuff. Perfect. So. Cautious yay? 

You’re truly glad for the numbness or whatever, because going from just being– snatched (haha, raptured?) on your never completed grocery run is– a lot. Being thrust into the unfamiliar-familiar world and immediate danger is even worse. And there was no handy dandy gun strapped to your thigh or anywhere else on your person. No sudden luscious long hair swinging heroically down your back. All signs point to this – you’re an npc, a never-ending cast of not even support characters, just the background, maybe one of those voices in the cafe you hear in Tender Moments. Which is– you’ll sort your feelings about it later.

So you decide to make a list. That if the push comes to shove, who's the safest to approach? You can't let your tastes dictate this decision. You're not MC, you don't have the plot armour.

Alright. 

You take a notebook and a pencil, wary of typing this up. Everything you do online can be tracked, hacked, and you have no idea how you would explain your knowledge – ultimately it would put you at risk, which is the last thing you want. So, paper. To extract that, somebody actually needs to care enough to break in, and you will work hard at being as unremarkable and uninteresting as possible, you've decided. So it'll never even come to that.

All of the love interests are uniquely obsessed with MC. And/or have some soulmate situation going on. You don't know the whole story, haven't finished it yet. Some bits and pieces you learnt out of order because you grew impatient. So, they don't align in your head very well. (And sometimes you were too busy hooting and hollering at the characters to actually pay attention to the plot.) Also, you haven't paid attention to the dates at all, so the year 2048 tells you nothing. You feel like you’ve seen this string of numbers before, which can mean– anything, to be honest.

You stare at your haphazard notes. 

Xavier. There are chances of encountering him if wanderers attack, which – ugh. Soft-spoken and polite, even to strangers. Overall pretty trustworthy. Probably would listen to your story. But becomes completely feral if something concerns MC, so – proceed with caution if you don’t wanna get minced.

Zayne. Unless you're in dire need of a surgery and somehow manage to get into the Akso hospital, no way. And bro's busy working and saving lives, the last thing you want to do is bother him. (Here you have a little *: since he's a sweet tooth, there is a possibility of meeting him at a cafe. However, he seems to have very low tolerance for strangers bothering him, so hardly an option.) 

Rafayel. Hard to reach, elusive. Petulant and flighty. His loyalties firmly lie with MC and Lemurians, everyone else barely gets acknowledged. Hard (impossible to outsiders) to gain his trust. Unless you're MC, basically a lost cause.

Sylus. Mafia boss. In theory, can be hot, and surprisingly, he has the healthiest boundaries of the bunch. Realistically, how would you even get in N109 zone? And secure a meeting with him? Alive? No. Avoid at all costs. 

Caleb. Though his story with MC is touching, he's well and truly insane (a dreamy sigh). Yeah, he carries way too much on his shoulders as is. There’s also the chip and his entanglement with EVER to consider. Avoid avoid avoid. He's a trigger happy freak and you don't have the MC privileges. 

After an hour of pondering, you come to a conclusion. Xavier would be the safest option. Maybe. You won't approach him even if you do see him, but it's good to have that settled. 

You wonder if the MC here is another transmigrater. You wouldn't call them a luckier person necessarily, because, well, debatable. Being an MC is exhausting and scary as fuck. Sure, there are also many cute, sweet and even hot moments, but dear God is it also chillingly terrifying.

—

So, for you, not many things change as a result. Sure, you're in the fantastical future, but not a super distant one, which is? a relief? One of the reasons you were always torn when asked whether you would travel to the past or to the future is this consideration. Because, on one hand, the past is known, somewhat comfortable. You can choose the safest (arguably) location and time period. On the other hand — in the future the medicine should be more advanced and hopefully safer, but you can never know for sure, you could be getting a one way ticket to the apocalypse for all you know. Here it’s basically both. Haha. Um.

Out of a delayed sense of self-preservation or plain anxiety, you now have to keep a physical diary. Previously, all your disorganized thoughts and secrets and frustrations were neatly logged in your notes app. But now, you're too paranoid. And sure, you're a nameless npc, but better safe than sorry.

At first you only kept it at home, innocuous on your nightstand, while you went about your days, trying to adjust to the bizarre world of not-so-distant future and your new routines. However, the blessing of the notes app is that you can quickly jot something down immediately, wherever you are. Walking around with a little notebook and pen in your pocket at all times and writing something in it wherever you need is a bit awkward. Well, a lot awkward. You barely last a day. 

Nope, this is not working for you. You're still paranoid, but you need to be able to keep track of your wondering mind and plot bits you suddenly remember out of nowhere. (Some places you see jog up your memory and you rush to write it down, you never know what might prove useful in the long run). So you go the extra mile, you develop a code, a short hand. Something only a 2025 20-something can be aware of. Write things down to extrapolate at home. 

But sometimes you don't have the patience for this or the code is not sufficient, and nothing has happened in the past couple of weeks, so you loosen a little. Relax, even. These names are pretty common, you reckon. Nobody will take it seriously even if they see it, you try to convince yourself. And it works. You go to work, catch up on a million new shows, watch educational videos to make heads or tails with the whole metaflux protocore bullshit. Fanfiction still exists, after all. Some of your favorite shows even get traction again after newer reboots, so there's plenty of stuff to choose from. One Piece is still ongoing, god help them. You have newer hobbies now, get friendly with co-workers and your younger neighbors. It's not true friendship, not yet, but small talk is probably all you can handle right now anyway. Meaningful connections will have to wait until you're not a breath away from a mental breakdown. 

You settle to this routine pretty easily, you've always been adaptable. Survival mode gradually loosens into something resembling a life.

Until one day you wake up to a message from an unknown number sent around 3 am. You’re still groggy with sleep, the weight of the situation hasn't caught up to you yet. 

"Come claim your coupon! 50% off of your first order at Philo Flower Shop!"

Chapter Text

You wake up with a soft tugging in your gut, pleasure humming under your skin, insistent. You still half-remember your dream. Bless your horny mind and creative imagination, you didn't want to wake up from it and come fully to reality. You can still remember breathy murmurs in a deep voice and talons on your naked thighs, and sturdy horns framed by a crown of ashen hair, used as a steering wheel, while a sinfully long tongue–

You wheeze out a breath when your room comes more in focus in front of your eyes. Um. Well, this is kinda awkward now that you think about it. Because the subject of your dream, well, very much exists. Somewhere out here. An actual live man, not just a pretty face on the screen. Oh lord. Despite your mortification, you can't help but indulge, chase the aftershocks of your pleasant dream, your hips still half grinding into your sheets in search of friction, relief, anything. You swallow. Might as well, nobody needs to know – you shoosh your sense of conscience.

After you're done with your business, you reach for your phone to type the vague ideas and scenes still fresh in your mind, especially after you let your imagination run wild a little bit. Maybe you can write this down for your later… perusal, or, well, type it out. Writing on paper and using that when you want to get your jollies off would be diabolical. 

A message greets you.

"Come claim your coupon! 50% off of your first order at Philo Flower Shop!"

Ah, just some spam. Weird timing, though. 3AM? You blink a couple of times before words fully register and a sense of foreboding washes away your post-orgasmic bliss. Philo. 'Flower Shop'. Aha. Ahaha. Fuck. 

It could be a mistake. A coincidence. Right? You’ve been pretty careful so far and don’t think that any of your actions could have put you on someone’s radar. This is a matter you can’t really process without coffee, so– breakfast.

—

All things considered, you’ve decided to take an avoidant approach and just… ignore it. It’s the easiest and saves you the trouble of brooding over this and working yourself into an overthinking panicked mess. So. Win-win. (You do make a point of googling about online security for a couple of minutes and downloading a VPN, which seems to be a great idea, you really should've done it sooner.)

To take your mind off things, you joyfully boot up your laptop to proceed with the initial idea of writing dragon smut, inspired by your horny dream. You cackle to yourself and put on the ‘Wet and gushy’ playlist. Gods, you love having creative hobbies and a 5/2 with guaranteed weekends.   

It’ll take you a while to finish it, but the question of posting it still stands. You'll have to post it as original work, it's only a fanfic to you. You'll even post it anonymously, just to be safe. Yes, yes, precautions-precautions. That way, there's almost no chance of anyone reading it, to be honest, but that's fine by you. A few stragglers who'll hopefully leave kudos will boost your mood already. And you still want it to be out there, to feed the horny masses of this day and age. Show them how it’s done in the old-fashioned way.

You ponder over a name. It feels weird to name the character anything but Sylus. And you want to read it later for yourself, why else would you write it in the first place? The name can be a dead giveaway, sure, but you’re not as careless as one might think! You have justifications to shoot down your paranoia!

The man himself doesn't read fanfiction, you reason with yourself. And it's not like anyone who is aware of the significance of this name will read it. What kind of criminals or, idk, corrupted authorities read monsterfucker smut? You highly doubt such exist. And there's no one else who would recognize it and see the truth behind fiction. To you, it's all fiction anyway.

—

Another rude wakeup call for you is your colleague returning from her surgery and gushing about a handsome doctor. You don’t even need to ask the doctor’s name, the woman got that covered already, with the additional but wholly unnecessary details like ‘warm hazel eyes’ and ‘hands that are to die for’. You nervously chuckle. 

That’s not the end of it, though. One day you, in the spirit of trying to do something about your mental and physical health, take a walk around the neighborhood in the evening. A stroll, a promenade, if you will. Headphones on, chamomile tea in thermos, you’re very close to a foreign feeling of bliss, until you see Caleb just walking the street, completely normal and ordinary looking, and almost stumble head over your ass right there. You stare for too long, probably forgetting how to breathe. Then quickly change route to go in the opposite direction as fast and unsuspiciously as possible.

(The piercing stare you feel on your back that makes you break out in cold sweat is probably just your paranoia acting up again.)

There are more instances like that, where you get a glimpse into their lives, and it disconcerns you every time. Sure, you're full of yearning and longing and what-not. You have playlists made for your favourites, for fuck's sake. Still, you gotta be honest with yourself. In practice, it won't work. Will not work in a million years. 

You've always been self-sufficient, independent. Welcomed the isolation instead of running from it, but. You're still human. Craving human connection is only natural. There’s a missing chunk, a chasm in place of your loved ones. It’s difficult to open up to new people, connections are difficult for you, feelings of camaraderie come over time and oversharing (traumabonding). 

You try to banish the thoughts of LIs you grew unreasonably attached to while playing the game, one piece that is still familiar and has ties to your original world. The risk is too high and you only have one life to live. No matter here or there, your goal is simple, to live-laugh-love in the most prosaic and uncomplicated way of a wine mom in the suburbs. Only, you're not a mom and have an indifferent attitude to wine. Still. 

—

You fawn and moon over pouty Rafayel in the gallery. You promised you would stay as far away from love interests as possible, but allowed yourself this indulgence. It's not like a hologram can do anything to you or blow your cover or whatever. You just wanted to see him in real life, not on the other side of the screen. And you were curious about his paintings as well, so why not explore this in a safe environment? But, dear god, he's pretty. Beyond words. You can only internally make sounds and stare. You can't even utter a question despite your habit of running your mouth. The man is tall. Ethereal. Face features gentle and soft, waist snatched, fingers long and elegant. Your brain can only go 'Awooga'. 

The hologram Rafayel almost stomps his foot in frustration, and you want to pinch his cheeks and squeal. "What, not gonna ask any questions? Aren't you curious about my artistic vision at all?" 

You just point at the closest painting without taking your eyes off of him. He squints his eyes at you in barely contained annoyance but launches into a programmed speech about his inspiration. Wow, even ai has an attitude. The future is crazy.

You continue staring at his gorgeous profile, trying not to sigh too dreamily. You'll visit this gallery again to properly listen to his explanations when you're in the right headspace. Right now you don't have the capacity or focus for understanding abstract art, its motifs and what-not. Your mind is too full of horny screaming and wishful thinking you’re trying to not look too closely at. 

—

Days go by and nothing happens. No new messages, nothing. Alright then! The avoidance strategy worked, you will from here on out continue avoiding everything and anything. 

You stay clear of the destiny cafe, because you remember it's a regular meet-up spot between the LIs and MC. But there are many arcades, you reason, there's no way fate would be such a dick to align the stars and making you run into somebody, right? And still, even if you do, it's not like you'll stand out. Just an npc in a crowd of npcs. Perfectly ordinary and unremarkable. Besides, the LIs have all of their attention on MC, so. You're safe.

Still, you choose a workday. Morning, just to be sure. The arcade is almost deserted, which is a blessing and you heave a huge sigh of relief. Jesus Christ, if you continue living like this, even grocery runs would feel like special ops missions. You fail to win a plushie. You sulk. Okay, this is not over yet, you proclaim to uncaring fluffy cuties behind the forbidden glass.

Next week you come again. And again. Being careful to stick to the mornings of work days, whenever you have days off work. It's inconvenient as hell, but you stop breaking out in shivers and glancing in every direction like a plushie criminal every time you come to this place. You get slightly better and now proudly have two plushies on your shelf. (You spent so much money on tokens, it's straight up ridiculous. Fuck, but you're susceptible to addictions. Fucking gambling your hard earned money away like an emotionally distant scumbag of a father. Anyway.)

Next time you come, you stroll into the place with familiarity and a feral grin on your face. There's been a new launch. A limited edition cutie calling your name. You rub your hands evilly and beeline to the stand. After half an hour your cursing has become more creative and jittery nerves upgraded into jittery determination. You're halfway through calling the claw machine all the names from the opening lines of the musical Hamilton when you hear a dreadfully familiar voice not so far away from you and freeze. No. There's no way. Your mind is playing tricks on you. Auditory hallucinations caused by stress and sleep deprivation and too much caffeine. Yeah. Yeah, that's right. Your eyes are glued to the plushie that so masterfully evaded your grasp. 

“Let’s see if this helps.” Comes a soft voice to your left.

Crap. Crappity crap. Shit balls.

Trying to behave very very normal, you abandon your pursuit in favour of going to atone for your sins of greed (winning a limited edition plushie). You creep around to the exit, probably failing at behaving like an ordinary npc, but. Your nerves are frazzled. You still remember the message, and having Xavier be in the same arcade you frequent does not inspire any sense of security. 

You do not notice the contemplative gaze that follows you out.

—

Sylus interlude

He taps his brow rhythmically, trying to shoo the headache away. The headache stays persistent in the form of two incorrigible younglings terrorizing his intercom with dramatic reading of... the thing.

"—a light push to your knee, gentle, not impatient or commanding. His stark gaze, darkened with desire but softened by reverence was enough for you to pry your knees apart willingly for him, for this tragic creature, a fiend, bound to—"

"Enough." He echoes quietly, the shriveled part of what was left of his soul aching in a familiar way. He sighs heavily. The writing is atrocious, overly flowery, little substance, which only makes the twins giddier to share it. Yet, it has stumbled, no, trampled all over his never forgotten, still open and raw wounds with baffling precision. 

"Aww, boss!" Luke whines over the static.

"We're just getting to the good part!" Kieran tries to entice with an underlying threat to Sylus’s sanity. 

He just reclines in his seat further, in the tired worn way that makes him feel all of his years. A melancholy settling into his bones. He blindly summons a decanter of something decent and a glass. What an odd way to spend… quality time with his henchmen. That's a thing, he's sure.

"Fine. So be it."

Chapter Text

After this scare you decide to take a break from plushie dictated gambling. Besides, your finances could use a break, your 'fun' fund has depleted considerably over the last couple of weeks. You still go out and buy a bunch of cute meaningless trinkets to soothe your nerves. Yay, shopping therapy. Boo, now you’re broke.

On more positive news, you get a very enthusiastic comment on your fic, which fills you with so much joy. They're particularly interested in the lore behind the curse of the dragon and you happily answer their questions, underlining that it's all fiction and up for interpretation. They insist that your vision is genius and would like to talk more. You proceed to relocate to a social network where you can continue your chats. It looks like you gained a new online friend. Cool! 

Your joy of acquiring a friend who seems to share your penchant for tragic stories and smut wanes a bit when you stare numbly at the name of the profile they’ve given. TaraTrickster. No fucking way.

They carelessly have their Moments account listed. You tap the link to make sure (god, please hear your prayers) that it’s simply a coincidence. Unfortunately for you, after stalking the profile a little bit, you see more or less what you expected: cute photos, ramblings, reposted tricks for tarot readings. That’s Tara the hunter, alright. You scroll, huffing at her enthusiastic posts from time to time, until your finger hovers over a photo. It answers some of your questions, and your lips thin. 

If before you had a vague sort of curiosity about MC and if she's also an (un)lucky soul from your og world, then this dispels the notion. In the picture Tara is hugging MC, who is wearing sunglasses and posing with finger guns. It's cute. It very much gives besties energy. But unless someone out there made a very, almost concerningly similar avatar, then... yeah. That's the character you played. Except she's there, alive, living and making decisions on her own, the brave soul. You chew on your lips. You're uncertain how to feel about this. You don't know what it means.

Fine, whatever. It is what it is. Does it make any difference? Prolly not, so who cares. Your character has your blessing to go have fun, not die and be wooed by the men of one's dreams. Sure. 

—

Honestly, the plot does bother you. Maybe it's the ever present paranoia that doesn't really let go of you completely, or the increasing number of convenient sightings of the LIs you keep stumbling into against your better judgment (you manage to flee the scene before anyone notices you, you’re pretty sure. It still leaves you rattled and unbalanced for the rest of the day.)

You’re almost desperate enough to march to the most convenient LI and just spill everything. If all of them work together and have at least some knowledge of what comes next, that would be for the best, right? Maybe there wouldn’t even be a catastrophic fallout and everybody can be whole and happy, yay! 

Only your memories of the lore and the plot are murky at best. You managed to write everything you could, but it’s still not perfect, not even close. You can’t even say for sure that it would be helpful. Pacing around the room will get you nowhere. Staring at the ceiling or stress-baking chocolate muffins doesn’t help the situation either, just gives you a sugar rush and amplifies your restless energy. Why can’t you seem to be capable of making good healthy decisions? Rhetoric question, moving on.

A ping from your phone.

“Tomorrow’s my day off! ^^ Wanna meet up and chat?”

Meeting in person with Tara? Bad idea, bad idea, bad—

“Sure! Where would you like to go?”

Please don’t say the Destiny Cafe, have mercy on your poor weeping heart, you're halfway to converting to a new religion at this point. (You could just say no if she suggests it, you know that, right? Shhh, you’re a people pleaser, shut up.)

“Have you been to Hatter’s Delight? It’s a coffeeshop on Emerald Boulevard :]”

The name doesn’t ring a bell, so you slump in relief. You stuff the remaining muffin in your mouth and negotiate the time of the meeting. Here’s hoping this outing won’t end in complete disaster.

—

“Ooh, I can see something’s deeply troubling you.” 

You take a hurried step back from Tara, who leaned precariously over the table with a frown on her adorable face.

“Uh, haha, what?”

She gestures to the seat, suddenly smiling radiantly, you almost get a whiplash. Did she use to have such mood swings in the game? You don’t remember. 

“Also, you’re so pretty! When you said ‘look for the tired one with a fuck-ass mullet and in a black shirt’ I certainly didn’t expect someone like you!”

Hearing curse words in her cheery words is a surreal experience, but, well, she reads filthy shit for funsies, that’s probably to be expected. Nevertheless, her compliment makes you blush and duck your head a bit. “Thanks. And you’re so radiant. Like sunshine.” You can’t help but add. Because she is. 

She giggles while you sit awkwardly and drum your fingers on the table. Her presence does surprisingly soothe you, in a way. Maybe you really did need some nice, positive in-person interaction. Maybe the universe does know best.

“So, what’s bothering you, babes?”

You snort. “Many things. I don’t know if anyone can be of help though. But I appreciate your concern.”

She just hums at that, looking at you appraisingly, as you order your coffee in a stilted tone from a hurried server. Who wears a tophat. Right, Hatter’s Delight. Long live weird themed cafes. 

“Maybe,” Tara gets a glint in her eyes that you don’t trust one bit, “There are other ways to resolve your problems.”

You stare at her in confusion until she, with the dramatics of a professional magician, procures a tarot deck. Oh, right. With all your previous chatter about whether merfolk have two dicks and a pussy it’s easy to forget that her interests in mythical creatures and the divine span across many aspects of her life. And she’s a hunter, on top of everything. What a woman. 

She casually starts shuffling the deck after your nod and asks, “What would you like to ask the cards today?”

The whole thing is ridiculous, y’all went from 0 to 100 too quickly, this is your first meeting face to face, for fuck’s sake, but you might as well. “Should I tell somebody about– some important stuff? And what are the consequences of doing that?”

“How wonderfully vague.” She snickers. 

You both stare at the resulting spread, though she of course with more recognition and understanding, while you can only be dumbfounded by the gory pictures. Is this some kind of special edition deck? The illustrations are beautiful, sure, but– there’s a guy being… penetrated by a sword in an intimate place, what does that card even mean?

“Oh, you have some high placements for both options!”

“What options?”

“To tell this person or not, of course.” 

“Ah, right…”

“Here we have inverted Strength,” You can hear the capitalization. The card she points to depicts a coupling of a lion and a woman. Damn, girl, the fuck. “So if you don’t tell this information to the person, you’ll remain a pussy.” Your eyebrows shoot up. Well, fair. But, you also don’t want to die if they react badly. “The option of not telling also has two swords – you’ll just push yourself into a corner here, but I see that this is a difficult choice to make for you.” The poor dude who's being spitroasted by swords… right. 

You listen intently, because so far it echoes your thoughts. More or less. Or maybe Tara is just very persuasive. 

“If you do tell, well, it’s not gonna be easy,” She shows you a card with a very serious looking dude juggling coins. Naked. Okay… “But!” she cheers right back up, “The outcome…” here she looks at you slyly, all twinkling eyes. “Will be splendid — Lovers!” This picture is the most indecent so far, there’s a full blown orgy going on, with a couple lost in the throes of pleasure in the spotlight. You miraculously retain your neutral expression. Good Lord, girl. 

“Tell me, tell me–” she whines, while you’re still overwhelmed by the pictures. You basically have kinky porn on your table in broad daylight, what in the— “Are you about to confess to somebody?” she’s all eager and excited, and you don’t have the heart to bring down the mood, the result leaves you a little bit stumped. Or a lot stumped. Without the lovers it would make sense, you guess. But if she implies that it’s a good outcome, you’ll take it. You have heard that the names in tarot don’t have a direct meaning, so. Yeah. 

“It's sort of a confession, I guess…” You mutter, feigning embarrassment. Though it’s not difficult, considering your table is still littered with pictures of naked people indulging in carnal pleasures. And there’s a server hurrying to your table, just great. “But enough about that, I'm forever grateful for your witchy services, how can I ever repay you?”

She gets even more excited, if you can believe it. “Right! So, recently, I've read this book about Lemurians and I was wondering if you could maybe–”

Ah, so you will be writing Sea God smut after all. Figures.

—

Mopey and sore-hearted after days of agonizing over Tara’s tarot reading, you can’t stay in your apartment. The walls are closing in, you’re suffocating under the weight of your mediocrity, blah blah. So, a distraction! Tara did oh so pleasantly ask for some merman in heat smut, and by god, will you deliver. 

You pack your laptop and thermos and set out on your quest to find a coffeeshop with a corner seat, where no one can see the filth you’re writing with a straight face. It's very nice weather, and you think some matching ambiance will do you good, so you head to Whitesand Bay. 

The coffee shop is nice, all things considered. It even has a terrace where you decide to set camp. The gentle breeze and all that really sets the mood for some good merman fucking. You suppress a devious cackle and crack your knuckles. Showtime. 

Being in the zone, you don’t really notice how you’re humming the tune to Rafayel’s myth. It was a memorable one for you, so it kinda got stuck in your head but now works in your favour. The mere thought of his deeper voice and cold blue eyes sends giddy shivers. In your concentration, you don’t notice you have company. 

“I’m not used to my top-notch presence being ignored so brazenly.”

You hurriedly exit out of your document and look up, “Huh? Pardon?”

Rafayel is sitting across from you like he belongs here, with all the leisure of a king in his palace. You blame the plot and its workings. Damn it all to hell. 

“Here I am, in all my glory, benevolently gracing a fan with my company and you dare ignore me?” His pout is lethal, how can he be so cute–

Your brain is still lagging, so it takes a moment for you to parse through his dramatic phrasing. “A fan? Who said I was a fan? It’s impolite to disturb people while they’re working, sir.”

Even if your mouth shapes words that even, you hope, make sense, your mind is still reeling. What the fuck, what the fuck, you just reached the moment where, weakened by the Ebb day (you’ll call it something else, for safety ofc), Rafayel succumbs to his desire to just take—

Real life Rafayel humphs. “I’ve seen you around the gallery, some say you show up often.” Oh, well, that’s– “And you were humming my aunt’s song!” He says it like an accusation. You can only blink, startled. You honestly had no idea about that. What can you even say? “So don’t pretend to not know my name.” He finished smugly.

You huff. “Alright. It’s impolite to disturb people while they’re working, Rafayel.”

He freezes momentarily when you say his name, but his face quickly smoothes out, so you’re not sure if you imagined it. Weird. Unperturbed, he sprawls on the table, his long legs stretching into the space between tables. 

“So, whatcha writing there like a madman?” He leans dangerously close to the screen of your laptop, and you panic, even though there’s nothing there at the moment.

Red faced, you reel away from him. “Nothing of interest to you, I'm sure.”

He hums condescendingly. “Let me be the judge of that.” And, to your horror, stretches his grabby hands towards your laptop. Boundaries, you entitled twit! The fuck? You shut the screen of the laptop, forcefully powering it off. 

You stare at each other in silence. You, somewhere on your way to a meltdown. He, confused by your outburst. After this you’ll hole up in your apartment and will only leave it for work, you swear. 

Chapter Text

After you eloquently and with grace bullshit your way through the minefield of that dialogue, you make good on your promise. Staying. Inside. (And writing smut, because having Rafayel so close, with his face so expressive, his body leaning towards you is – yeah, you know?) 

You can’t ignore the series of unfortunate events that befalls you. Things are escalating and you don't like how close you’ve come to MC’s orbit. And Rafayel– it’s a dangerous line you’re toeing. Sure, your avoidance approach is something, but you know if something becomes of interest to Rafayel, he won’t let go until he satisfies his curiosity, this man doesn’t live in half-measures. It’s all or nothing with him, pushed to the extremes. 

You kinda wonder what he’s doing out there. Does he already have a bounty on his head? Does MC know he’s a Lemurian, or not yet? Where are you in the timeline anyway? Did Caleb already go Kaboom? These are important questions, but also kinda useless, with no way to prove things. Well, you could ask Tara ‘Yo, is your bestie grieving the tragic loss of her family yet?’, but there are high chances to get a gun to your head for such nonsense. 

When distracting yourself fails, or conversations with colleagues veer into a dangerous territory, you indulge in some good old wallowing in your misery. That leaves you here, in the kitchen, making tea (some calming blend from the apothecary because it’s time to learn healthier coping mechanisms) in your ratty t-shirt and obnoxious pajama pants. Considering. 

And there are many things to consider. Like, maybe you don’t really buy into the whole mystical mambo-jumbo, Tara’s reading was telling. You’re backing yourself into a corner. No matter how careful you behave, it’s still just a stop-gap measure, which the encounter with Rafayel pointed out so rudely. Characters here are characters no more, but people. With free will. Who maybe will follow the plotline and maybe they won’t, you’re not sure about the whole fate bullshit. And, hell! Maybe the game is just a game! And here things will be completely different, parallel universe style. Drink your fucking calming tea before you pop a vein. 

Like all things you’d rather flip a coin for, this makes you want to continue your avoidance tactic. ‘Cause you're not a hero, not even a little bit. You're a scaredy cat, not a smidgen of bravery or righteousness to be found, no sirree. But this is your life now. Time to make decisions like an adult. You groan and take out your diary to do the responsible thing: a pros and cons list. 

—

The bell jingles way past the closing hours of the shop, when Jeremiah’s still elbows deep in the soil, repotting the lovely new shipment of Cosmos atrosanguineus. He sighs, back to business and so soon. He calls back, trying to speed up the process to tend to the customer.

“Back in a mo’!”

Stroking the velvety maroon petals once he’s done, Jeremiah goes to the front, abandoning the gloves on the work bench. He’s met with an unnaturally still Xavier, which basically means he’s at the end of his rope by now, for him. “Wow, Xavier, what happened?” 

“...”

The silence is even more concerning, and when his friend finally looks at him, the way his pupils shake makes Jeremiah’s gut tighten. He strides to lock the door and make the glass windows turn opaque. He then gestures for Xavier to sit.

“Spill before I make you, don’t think I won't.”

After a pause, where Xavier seems to be starting different sentences in his head, finally comes his strained voice, “I know where this is going.” He almost sounds defeated, “Sooner or later, she’ll go to N109 zone. She's stubborn. I can't… go with her.”

He continues, staring blankly ahead, “And some things are not adding up, we need more info. The aether core is gaining traction on the web, I'm being pulled into missions that send me far from her—” He cuts himself off and his mouth tightens. It’s been a while since Jeremiah’s seen his friend so tense. 

“Right.” He lets out a measured breath and sits in front of his work table, flicking up the concealed screens. “Right. Okay, we can scrounge up an identity for her when the need arises. Police her on the language and such, if it really comes to that. I’m afraid there’s not much else…”

His eyes move lightning fast over the screens. There must be something. Their Queen is… the aether core in her heart is both a blessing and a curse, she lacks crucial information– memories. Reincarnation is such a tricky business. “Wait,” he can't believe he said it out loud, but now Xavier’s stare bores into him with the intensity he knows too well.

“There was a… you know how I have some specific words and phrases pinged? And run the program weekly?”

Xavier stares harder, now with an edge of impatience. 

“Right. So there was a curious influx of coded info on a private cloud concerning targeted topics. Since I couldn't make heads or tails with it — besides what I could understand, it was just gibberish — I thought they were curious. I sent them an invitation to the shop, but nobody came.” He rubs his eyebrow in thought. Just say it already. “I still have the contact. Maybe they don’t need guidance, but actually know something we don’t instead.”

“Who would be so careless?” Now Xavier looks a little more alive, the line of his shoulders less wooden and more of a real boy.

Jeremiah just shrugs. Many people are. Unless there are good techies on the team, not many people ‘in the know’ actually bother encrypting their info enough, some don’t even stick to secure channels. It could be one of such people.

“Fine. What do you have on them?”

—

You stew in silence like a piece of carrot in a– well, stew, you get the idea. The list is complete, and to your dismay, the benefits outweigh the drawbacks. This sucks. You really want to roll around and whine ‘but I don’t wanna…’

You can do it. You can take responsibility and be brave (vehement denial of your core being notwithstanding). Okay, maybe if you pretend to be someone else, it’ll be easier. Oh! You can wear a disguise! Wouldn't that be fun? Probably unnecessary, but lends you at least some feeling of security, to do something instead of marching there without a plan, no thoughts, head empty. 

The thought of showing up in Lumiere cosplay does cross your mind and you do have a giggle about it before you serious. Nope, knowing him… that’s a bad, bad choice. You’ll think of something else. (Even though that card where he gets jealous of himself, the idiot, made you want to run around the room and chew on furniture.)

Having done your research, you close the tabs on your laptop:

How to tell difficult news

How to convince somebody you're telling the truth 

How to deal with dangerous people

How to not cum when faced with an angry hot alien—

Gotta love WikiHow, so versatile. 

Wary of going shopping after everything that transpired, you go online in the safety of your home to search for your disguise. There’s a modern variant of Spirit Halloween, which you think is an excellent choice that can give you some ideas. You browse different options while listening to Britney Spears hits on shuffle. Who will be the least suspicious, or the most pity-inspiring/weak looking? (Though for a weakling you don't need a costume, nature got that covered.)

You order the costume that you think will be the perfect fit for the situation at hand. Doubts still eat away at you and you wanna run to the edge of the Earth, away from all the horrors, where you can be weird and offputting in peace before the world implodes or whatever. Sigh.

The fact that you need to sleep when you’re so keyed up on adrenaline is insulting. But this is a big decision and you need to reboot your brain before doing anything rash, spurred on by your mania-induced thoughts. Maybe in the morning you’ll come up with more cons for this endeavor, and all you’ll be left with to commemorate this evening is a shitty costume. God bless.

—

Caleb's life was always filled with responsibilities and worries. Each action is like clockwork, planned and streamlined. Everything serves its purpose and should be done quickly and efficiently.

Thoughts of Pips are like a breath of fresh air. Even knowing she's alive and well through his covert surveillance system is enough. Something to hold on to, to remind himself there's more to life than endless recovery evaluations and careful balancing of forces in preparation for his time in the Fleet. He was used to her haunting his thoughts, the memory of her presence, her cheeky smiles shadowing his days so far away from home.

That's why this new variable is so frustrating. Not only is it beyond confusing, it's... unexpected. And Caleb doesn't deal well with things he didn't plan for in advance. He has enough of that here already. 

There aren't many memories his mind can hold onto before they are whisked away by the fog. However, for some damned reason, right along with his treasured memories of her, which are locked down tight, he vividly remembers random run-ins with another person before the explosion. He doesn't know what pulled his attention then. Maybe their wary posture, the way they seemed afraid of him, or the uneasy feeling of familiarity. This feeling is what confuses him. The hesitation and fear hurts, yeah. Before the explosion and the lab (again), he took pride in crafting an approachable and accommodating persona. To see it failing so randomly and so strongly unnerved him. But the inexplicable familiarity— might it mean that more of his memories were erased? And why didn't he hold on to them as fiercely? 

Questions, questions... His face expressionless, fingers on his right arm still barely responsive, he retreats from the entanglements of his mind. Something to ponder later. It’s not like he even has a place to start. No name, no photo, just his memories. That's all he has now, what is still truly his. 

Chapter Text

Inspiration leads Rafayel to truly bizarre places and things, he can admit that. But following the elusive song of his artistic calling down the beach and instead finding a mystery in the shape of a dumpsterfire made human was a new one.

The conversation with a writer (from what he can tell, considering he glanced at many lines of text in paragraphs on their screen when he approached them) was odd, yeah, and filled with inconsistencies. It’s one of those memories he keeps coming back to, trying to find new angles and silverlinings to understand what was actually going on. Because what it looked like on the surface? Certainly not it. 

Sure, they were a fan (as they should be), but that doesn't explain how they knew Talia's unreleased aria. And one so closely intertwined with the history of his kind. Their reactions didn’t make much sense either. Sassing him back in one breath before collapsing like a tissue under his very normal observations in the next.

“Ah, I have practice with my most devout followers, do not fret.” He tried to pacify their panicking with a languid tone. This seemed to work, but not in a way he’d expected. Their eyes took on a faraway look and they blushed, their fingers twitching to open the laptop, before they ultimately decided against it. 

“Is it something I said?” He drawled, amused. 

“Nope.” They even shook their head, wide-eyed. “Nopety, no-no.” 

“Yeah, that's believable.” But he decided to let it go to not fluster the spooked guppy needlessly. 

After that they were outright obtuse, intent on keeping their mouth shut outside of one-word answers for the rest of the conversation. 

One of the other peculiar things (and if he thinks about it too deeply, he'll combust and die), he felt a distant echo of the Bond when they called his name. Like an after-mirage of blood burning in his veins with the weight of it. Which shouldn't be possible. Nowhere even near the realm of possibility. Absurd. Pah!

He has his beloved, and they’re building something brick by brick. His heart yearns and beats for his one and only, how does this make sense? He knows it couldn’t be a false alarm or something, the everlasting Lumerian bonds can’t be faulty.

He… doesn’t want anyone else to know about this, so he hasn’t confided in anyone without trying to get the answers from the source first. This writer seemed to know a lot more than they let on. But he hasn’t seen them since Whitesand Bay. And was their encounter just a coincidence? Or a trap fashioned after a fateful meeting?

They didn’t show up at the gallery either, even after he carved some time out of his Very Busy schedule to actually go to the presentation Thomas has been pestering him about. Next time he sees them, he'll annoy them to death until they answer his questions. 

—

"I reviewed the patterns, they travel often and over pretty large distances." Jeremiah zooms out of the map to show how their online activities are scattered all over the place. The data he managed to secure in the first place though, was mostly logged from Linkon. He eyes the gleefully sparkling dots of activity, even in the heart of N109 zone. It makes him uneasy. 

"They might not be as innocent as you thought." Xavier notes, observing the map that is spread far and wide to accommodate all the logins. 

"Yeah..." He purses his lips, inner turmoil weighing heavy on his conscience. Who's to say he didn't show their hand by sending a message then? This person might be two (or many) steps ahead already, while Xavier and him have just started looking into it.

"Don't." Jeremiah lifts his head to look at Xavier in confusion. "We know to look for it now. That's enough, you did well."

Hearing that from his captain loosens the knot in his throat. "Yeah, you're right." He fluffs his hair and pulls up the files, "Where do you want to start?"

"From the very beginning," Xavier answers, grim.

“Do you want to check the gibberish again? Maybe it's something you'll be able to get.” Jeremiah waits for his nod and projects one of the notes on the screen.

It reads:

she was a slay mama Queen and was hit me baby one more timing with sleepyhead at UA with the rest of the homestuck crew(? Possible) 

He stares. Jeremiah looks for any signs of recognition or familiarity. A furrow in his brow, Xavier brings a hand to his lips in deep thought. "Some of it... is vaguely familiar, I think. But maybe it’s wishful thinking.”

Yeah, that’s more or less what he expected. Whoever made these notes took care to use lingo unfamiliar to outsiders. Rats.

—

You stand in front of Philo Flower shop in your crappy disguise, sweating and trembling like a leaf. Wish there was a way to buy some guts or iron balls or whatever other metaphors there are, holy shit. Never could've thought you (yourself!) would take initiative and willingly stare down the maw of the great beast of Social Interaction. Oof. 

Just as you’ve gathered all that was left of your wits and bravery, ready to take a step into the unknown, you notice the sign on the door.

“The shop is closed for an indefinite break. For contact, message this number. ××××××××××××××”

Oh.

Is it fate? Telling you that this is a bad idea and you should march your ass back home? That'd be great, but you have to at least pretend to make a token effort. You take a picture with the number just in case. 

You bite your lip in thought. You can't be in the wrong place. The sign is clear, Philo Flower shop. Are there any other Philo shops? Secondary locations? Maybe they're branching out, growing their business or something. You turn off the VPN to check the maps for other shops under the same name in Linkon.

You might as well reward yourself for this fit of bravery (leaving the house) and get some coffee. You feel like there's a disturbance in the air, a sinister presence lurking nearby, and you need a peace of mind. There's a convenient coffee shop next door that you determinately march towards, its safe haven of plush couches and potted plants calling you. 

You're still scrolling through your phone as you enter. There are no other places with the same name, only similar. Mm, shame. Well, you've tried. You turn on the VPN again before your phone can connect with the shop's wifi. Being as careful as you can be now is important.

Situated in the picturesque corner, hugging the obnoxious seasonal drink you ordered, you let out a sigh. Okay. So, how else to secure a meeting you have no idea. Because you're not about to go to the Hunters Association or accost Xavier in his own house. (Even if you knew his address. Technically, you can find out MC’s address, but how to do that, and preferably ethically, not creepily — no idea.)

You drum your fingers on the table, fidget with your rings, your leg keeps bouncing. It's the caffeine, not nerves. Who are you kidding? But you need to find a solution, at least a temporary one, before your fidgeting makes you an enemy of the state and you get booted out of the cozy shop. (And maybe this plane of existence, haha! If god gets tired of playing you for a fool.)

Originally, your plan focused solely on Xavier as the safest (for the given value of safe) choice. Now, unless you wanna be rescued by him if wanderers attack, which you'd rather not risk — there's no guarantee he'll be at the right place at the right time, but all the guarantees of you being turned into a (hot sexy smart) pulp — you have no other leads.

You need to review your list again, the one you made on your first day here. You vaguely remember what you wrote down, the important bits being: to avoid Sylus and Caleb at all costs, don’t bother poor Zayne, and that Rafayel is basically a lost cause.

You sit up, the hamsters in your brain wheels becoming agitated as your thoughts start twisting and turning. Yeah, a lost cause because he’s hard to reach and it’s impossible for outsiders to gain his trust. But now you have a link. He seems to tolerate your existence, maybe even intrigued by your nonsense, which you can use to your advantage. Maybe. Considering his behaviour in real life— it’s tricky. Playing as MC and interacting with him in the game, or with his hologram here is one thing. Doing so in person, with the real deal again — goddamn. You doubt it’ll go better with Xavier, but. Haha. Not thinking about it or you’ll chicken out altogether. It's never too late after all! 

You'd rather not meet in a public space, but chatting them up in a secure location alone, with no potential witnesses, is scary. But needed, you guess. There will be so many secrets flying around, we don't want that getting into the wrong hands. Well then, better relegate the task of finding the right place for parley to the LIs themselves, when it comes to it, let them do the heavy lifting if they want information, you’re too sick of this already. Today’s just not your day.

You sulkily drink your overpriced drink. So. Gallery? Or you can wander around the bay in hopes of just– stumbling into him again? Mo Art studio? Just straight up walking into basically his house would be... a very bold move. One you're not sure you'll survive, to be honest. Right, start from the top, drastic measures will be considered in more dire circumstances, which these are not. Though Rafayel almost never stops at the gallery, it still doesn't hurt to check. 

Oh, the disguise. You’re still wearing it. It’s useless now, you reckon. Ah, fine. Maybe you’ll find a costume party to go to one day, and this one will get its time to shine.

—

They’re travelling to the outskirts, dangerously close to the N109 zone, where the signal seems to be located. Jeremiah is less and less enthused about meeting this person by the minute. Xavier, however, has his battle-focus face on, intent on the road ahead, there’s no turning around before he gets answers.

Jeremiah’s navigation tablet chimes cheerily, but in this situation it can’t be good news.

“Motherfu– Their location changed!”

Xavier whips around, eyes blazing, his sharp bark of “What?” makes Jeremiah sit straight.

“They're at the Philo shop?” He utters in confusion. But how? They were almost there, did the informant sense their approach and bail? It’s still a long drive to the—

“Fuck.” And just like that, Xavier leaves him in the dust with a couple of light particles where he was.

“You fucker, not all of us can teleport!” Jeremiah grumbles and puts the car in reverse to get out of this wretched place. Before he can finish rerouting the path, he gets a call from Xavier. Wow, that was quick, not that he ever doubted his captain. Breathing in to settle his nerves, he answers, “So? Have you found them?” 

“... There’s no one here. Not inside or around the shop. Where is their signal now?”

Jeremiah just sighs and checks the coordinates. What he sees confuses him to no end. “It’s changed again. Do you think they can teleport as well?”

Xavier hums, the sound staticky, “It’s not impossible.”

“This is becoming a chase then–” Xavier appears right next to Jeremiah, cutting him off, the jerk.

“Where to now?”

—

Done with all your lolly-gagging (planning and scheming), you decide to take a nice leisurely stroll to the gallery. The weather is nice, after all, you deserve it, treat yourself and so on. 

Nothing seems to be amiss, no suspicious activity or eyes on you. Good grief, but you’re pent up and hanging by a thread. Maybe you should visit the hospital in the near future, check your blood pressure. Or even do a full-body check-up. The mere thought makes you perk up a bit. It’s so fucking cool to have free hospitals, it still boggles your mind. Like, wow. Sure, the government and the heads of the medical field are corrupted, but! Free medical care! 

Taking a detour to the hospital to schedule a check-up sounds like a great idea, but… Later. And online. The less unnecessary social interaction, the better.

The pristine and modern building of the gallery is upon you. You shuffle your feet a bit before taking a deep breath and going inside. Nobody will eat you, you’ve been here before, it’s fine. You circle Rafayel’s exhibition. There’s a couple stragglers here and there, but no sign of his gorgeous mop of hair. Pretty much what you’ve expected. And, thankfully, no one looks at you weird, even though you’re still in your costume. You didn’t go home to change because, well, better just get on with it, and also it would be downright hilarious to witness Rafayel’s tender artistic soul leave his body when he lays his eyes on this monstrosity. 

You wait by the opening of the exhibition room, biding your time. You’ll wait for… let's say 30 minutes. Or less. In the meantime, you check your phone. It still has your camera roll open and you stare numbly at the photo you last took. There was a number on the door, how could you forget! You have a way to get in contact with Jeremiah, and through him, with Xavier. God, you’re so slow sometimes. How did that slip your mind?

What to write though? ‘I’m the bearer of–’ nope, not doing that. ‘Hello! Some time ago I got–’ blergh. Concocting these types of polite messages always takes a lot out of you. No matter. You check your signal and it’s not doing well. Ah, VPN, probably. It’s one of the free ones that has a limit on traffic, and seems like yours is close to running out. Whatever, you turn it off. 

You’re just opening the notes app where you can rehearse the politest request for a meeting when a shadow falls over you. Oh oh.

“And here I thought you’re not interested in my work anymore. Why are you not going in?”

You look up in surprise. This is perfect timing, actually—

Now hold that thought, because you’re being grabbed around the middle, and the hall is conveniently empty besides you and Rafayel, who looks somewhere between alarmed and disgusted (ah, right, the costume).

A different voice you did not expect to hear here speaks in some kind of device near your shoulder, “Target secured. Rendezvous point at the shop.”

“Raf—”

He’s in time to grab your hand securely before the light envelops all of you.

Chapter Text

Xavier feels like they’re fighting against the wind — a pointless endeavor. Jeremiah and him have been on a wild chase after the elusive informant for almost the whole day, he was right to clear out his schedule to prioritize this. What’s even more frustrating, he can't be sure that the information they have will be of any help or significance to him. 

Xavier is done with this chase. Who this person thinks they are, darting around the city and areas, all smug, always one step ahead of them—

“It's at Flux Arts now!”

All he can manage is a growl in response after a glance at coordinates and teleport. The sight before him is not what he expected. 

Firstly, they’re not alone. He instinctively knows that the one on the shorter side and in mind-boggling attire is their contact. They’re next to a famous artist, Rafayel, and seem awfully chummy with each other. An accomplice? Possible.

He studies what’s visible of their face, trying to catch the illusive feeling he can’t identify. The sunglasses and a clearly taped-on mustache obscure the details, but his eyes still snag on bits and pieces, making his mind race and become muddled with half-formed ideas and question marks. No matter. He can look to his heart’s content later, where this pest won’t weasel away. 

He doesn’t think much (driven up the wall by his frantic search for his love’s salvation, if they have the answers, they will give them), just makes sure he has a secure hold on them and gives Jeremiah the confirmation. He doesn’t even blink when the artist joins the fray. 

They land in the backroom of the Philo shop. He flicks the lights on with a burst of his power and quickly binds the informant and their possible accomplice with his light cord. They don’t even struggle, just sit tight, like it was their plan all along. The artist, though, cuts his binds with ease and assumes a combatant position, his knives raised and flaming. 

“What is the meaning of this?” He seems to be outraged, on his behalf or both of theirs is unclear. (Though he doesn’t cut through the informant’s binds. Interesting.)

Xavier suddenly doesn’t know what to say in this situation. He usually appears even-tempered, even meek, according to other people. Placating the higher-ups while he does what he needs to do anyway has become his reliable strategy. Running around like a headless chicken all day made him lose some of his composure. He might have acted rashly, he thinks with chagrin.

The informant looks at him, dazed. Their sunglasses have been knocked askew, so now he can feel the full weight of their stare. It’s a bit uncomfortable, being scrutinized like this. But he senses no malicious intent behind it, more like… awe? Ignoring the artist’s wailing, he furrows his eyebrows as he studies them in return. 

“Have we met before?”

“Nope. Haven't seen you once in my entire life.” They say with the confidence of a person not believing a single word they say. They sniff, which makes their fake mustache move. Xavier suppresses a sigh. 

“Can I take this off you? It’s ugly. No, hideous! Atrocious.” The artist's voice pipes up. The informant switches gears and stares at Rafayel with a beaming smile.

“I knew you’d love it!” They start cackling and almost fall over on the floor in their mirth. Xavier feels like he’s missing something here. Rafayel appears deeply wounded and even clutches his chest dramatically. However, he doesn’t lower his weapons. Xavier checks his watch, Jeremiah’s ETA is about 30 minutes, which isn’t comforting. 

The tense atmosphere, broken only by the informant’s giggles, changes once they throw out a nonchalant, “Actually, that's– quite fortunate. Not the kidnapping, mind you. But that you're both here.”

Now, what does that mean? The artist echoes his thoughts, “What do you mean, both of us? I don’t know lil’ Mr. Dandelion over there.”

Xavier grimaces. Nevermind. 

—

So. This was all kinds of dramatic. From all sides. Because now Xavier (and it was Xavier, of fucking course) looks part-sheepish, part-furious, and Rafayel just doesn't know what to do with himself. Splendid situation you've found yourself in.

You’re glad you had some time to just stare at Xavier. (Oh my God. Oh my God. He's real. And he's so beautiful you're speechless. Those eyes– the fluffy and very pat-able hair. The symmetry of his face is crazy. Jesus. Lord and savior–) 

Anyway.

“Nevermind.” Xavier reclines on the wall, his face conflicted, “I’m sorry for going to such drastic measures. You appear to have the information that might prove life-saving,” Is that an attempt to play on your heartstrings? Mansplain, manipulate, manwhore, ahaha, “And you were impossible to reach otherwise.”

You tilt your head, “Couldn’t you just… I don't know, call?”

Xavier freezes mid-movement. He looks like that never occurred to him. Seriously? 

“Hey, I still don’t understand why I'm here!” Rafayel, apparently, takes issue with not being the center of attention. Oh, you poor baby, you.

“Rafayel, chill. I’m sure you have questions too. Eh, might as well.” You situate yourself more comfortably, as much as you can, being tied up. Xavier (or Rafayel, the traitor!) doesn’t release you, maybe he thinks it can still be a ploy, a tactic to lower his guard, or hell, maybe he gets off of this, you’re not the one to judge. “Are we waiting for anybody else? Will Sylus swing from the rafters like a deranged bat too?”

“Sylus?” Xavier hisses and you recoil at his tone, "What ties do you have with the leader of Onychinus?” he demands. Rafayel gasps in the background, the diva.

“Absolutely none,” you frantically shake your head, “And I hope to keep it that way. We’re getting sidetracked though.” 

This is getting so out of hand. Let’s put the bubbling hysteria on pause and take a deep breath. Right.

"I don't know a lot," you start by saying. Haha, ‘Let's preface, I'm a dumb dumb with valuable info, but completely harmless by myself, pls don't kill me.’ (You're out of your passive suicidal ideation phase. You think.) “But I do know some things of potential interest to you.”

Heh, time to exercise your bullshitting skills. This one is going to be a doozy.

—

It all happened so fast, Rafayel is still getting whiplash. They’re in a questionable dusty room, with a suspicious man, and! the writer he met possesses even more hidden depths than he could’ve expected. (Not thinking about how their panicked cry lit up the bond til it burned, and how it was the most natural thing to grab their hand. Nah-ah.)

“So, some stuff… Let's call that premonitions, uh—” 

Premonitions? Oh, dear, that doesn’t sound good. “You have the gift of sight? Are you an emissionary?” 

They cough to cover their mumble of ‘An embarrassment rather…’, but he still hears it. They continue, “Not an emissionary. And this gift of sight can be tampered with, maybe, and is in general not super reliable.”

Okay, was that supposed to be comforting? They’re a shitty oracle, then. Rafayel huffs, “And you want us to trust you with this forewording?” 

“Why are you telling us this?” Oh, the pretty-boy has woken up and joined the conversation.

They appear unperturbed by the distrust and thinly veiled hostility. “To clear my conscience. I don't really care what you do with the information. You can go fact check it or you can completely disregard it, that's your call. I just need to do my part and go back to being an exemplary citizen.” 

What transpires next is the most convoluted and bonkers tale he’s ever heard. The worst part is — it’s believable, it might even be true. What an awful, awful day. A week, a year! When they carefully choose words to outright confirm his suspicions that they know he’s a Lemurian and his ties to the Sea God business, without outing him to the other man, he can’t even–

Whatever they told the Blondie must also be enough of a proof, the man looks shaken up in that subdued way of his. Hah! They’re in the same miserable boat now. 

There’s a knock at the door. Now, what’s this? A preppy voice calls out, “Xavier? Everything alright in there?”

This Xavier dude sighs, “Yeah, you can go, just– a lot to think about.”

To Rafayel’s annoyance, the writer-oracle perks up, “Oh, hi, Jeremiah! You good?”

The door answers with stunned silence. Then there’s a cautious question, “Yeah? And how do you know my name?”

“They seem to know a lot of things. More than they should.” Did anyone else get chills? This blonde guy is sure intense.

Rafayel’s biggest weakness is being ignored and out of the loop, he will not stand by this. “Ya, Jeremiah? Nice to meet you, I’ll leave an autograph. Please don’t take it to heart, but it’s not a ‘the more the merrier’ kind of situation. Could you leave? Much appreciated! Now,” he turns to their fail-oracle. 

“What do you know about Lemurian bonds?” Since the wretched creature (cat) is out of the bag, and the Princeling doesn’t seem to care, after all the devastating revelations.

“Uh, they’re everlasting. It’s a vow, which kinda signifies marriage, I'm pretty sure, what else…” They scrunch their nose in concentration, which he refuses to find adorable. “Ah! The bonded can command each other? And, I don't know, summon the other in the time of need or whatever.”

Damn it all, he’s been nursing this question like a wound, it doesn’t matter what the pretty-boy thinks, he can take him, if it comes to that. “Have you heard of any instances where the bond malfunctions? 

“Raf, what?” They look alarmed. Bad news, he called it. “Malfunctions how?”

“Answers to the wrong person.”

Now that's a guilty deer-in-the-headlights stare. 

“So you do know,” he starts outraged, irrationally feeling betrayed. Are they a witch? All this pretense, and for what? “Have you bewitched m– my kind?”

—

The heat of him becomes almost unbearable, Rafayel’s fury blazing, and you do not want to find out what happens next. As for the baffling revelations, they will be addressed at a later date (never).

"Dude, maybe– chill a bit? Before your fancy clothes catch on fire?" That brings him down to earth, followed by an indignant squawk. “To your question, no. I don't know, I haven’t seen anything of such sort.” Maybe pretending to be a fucked-up version of a seer wasn’t a stroke of genius, but rather an idiot excuse. Well, in for a penny, in for a pound. “And– Maybe start from the beginning.”

You're way past caring at this point. Your self-preservation instinct let out a pitiful little sigh at the beginning of this conversation and perished. In this neat condition you could even take the most unhinged LI (not in a fight), knock on wood. You knock on wood, met with puzzled stares.

You sigh when Rafayel doesn’t say anything, looking at you all conflicted and still suspicious, so you give him a verbal nudge, “Who is this ‘wrong’ person we’re talking about?”

“I can’t say.” Now more sulky than angry, he shakes his head, side-eyeing Xavier. Ah, fair.

“Then I'm afraid my speculations won’t help.” You shrug. Xavier watches you two like he wishes he had popcorn, the bastard. At least the forlorn and defeated air has subsided, good for him.

Rafayel nods in begrudged understanding, “I… can tell you later.”

“Sure.” Woo-wee, good talk. It's far from over though, you still have the possible future timeline to talk about, “Gather up, buttercups, there’s more, unfortunately.”

You explain the big bad (EVER), Xander Sciences and the rest of the bleak possible future to the best of your ability. You really wish you paid more attention to the lore. They exchange glances over your head during your explanations, which– rude, but they don't interrupt. Whatever conclusions they come to, they don't share with the class.

“I think that's about it.” You'd probably do a better job if you had your notes with you, but it'd be a risky move. Since it has all the information, which you'd rather not share with these rascals. Also, it's your personal diary, so — embarrassing by default. 

Now the silence is kinda depressing. 

“Can I go home now?” 

Chapter Text

Thankfully, you get home safe and sound (and unbound, Xavier, you kinky motherfucker–). With your phone two contacts heavier, oof. On one hand, yay! yippee! and things of such nature. On the other hand, won't that put you at risk? Being close to them? Won’t being forgettable and normal serve as a better armour?

Well, too late for that. You’ll try your hardest to return to normal after the weirdest, moderately cordial interrogation you experienced, but who knows…

Speaking of normal, Tara sent you a message! You’re really growing fond of her, aren’t you? You look through your chat, where you sent her the picture of your costume in the morning (god, it’s been such a long day).

“Fit check for the confession🤟”

“Babes, with all due respect, what the fuck?”

And almost immediately after:

“Love it, hopefully they have a good sense of humor! Good luck!! ✊️✊️✨️”

She's so supportive, you were even a little teary-eyed, despite the backhanded compliment. You scroll to the new one she sent.

“How did it go?? Wanna go shopping tmrw? It’ll do you good no matter how well or badly your confession went!”

The new message makes you sigh in relief, this is what you needed — something normal, a mundane activity that can take your mind off things. Tara, you’re an angel.

“It went… somewhat well, i think? I’m still alive, so. Counting this as a success in my books. Abt the shopping — hell yeah girlie i’m so in!!”

The next day brings with it peace and quiet and the most scrumptious sandwich for breakfast. You’re in high spirits already. Tara is her usual sunshine self and you both spend half of your brunch looking for thrift stores on the map.

They don’t disappoint. You stay clear of the more bougie ones but manage to find many hidden gems dirt cheap! Like an official Hunter x Hunter sweatshirt you found and clung to like a lifeline, immediately sentimental. Or Lumiere pajamas that you screamed at in overwhelmed delight, much to Tara’s amusement.

Tara does question your fashion choices throughout the whole thing, in her own blunt but polite way. She calls your picks ‘truly…vintage’ and ‘very unique’, or even ‘so old school!’ Which– you’re basically her age, or close to it, but your tastes are a couple decades old because of the transmigrating thing, yeah. Still, you have loads of fun and make many happy memories. You both leave the shops with your tote bags full of cute stuff.

When you take a break for coffee, Tara opens up to you, and you feel truly honoured to be trusted by such a gentle soul. 

“Really, thanks for agreeing to this. Work’s been a nightmare, and some relationships have been kinda taxing,” she stares down at her boba tea, fidgeting with the straw, “My friend has been shutting me out, which I don't blame her for! She’s going through a lot, it’s just…” she proceeds to wilt, and you cover her hand with yours in a hopefully encouraging manner. She laughs tiredly, "I could really use a break.”

“Oh, sweetie, of course!” You catch her gaze with a smile, “I’m always happy to help, you’ve been my guiding light in this cruel unforgiving world as well!” You finish dramatically.

It thankfully works. She snorts like a kitten and you have to suppress your cuteness aggression. “Say,” you continue, your smile growing an edge more manic, “I've had more ideas bouncing in my noggin’, what are your thoughts on some alien smut?” 

Tara gasps in delight, and a contemplative look enters her eyes, “What's the genitals situation on said alien?” You love how straight to business it is with her. “Are we talking tentacles? Boypussy? Something else entirely?” 

You'll never get over the fact how casually she can discuss this in public. No inhibitions, no shame, nothing. You aspire to reach this level of not giving a fuck some day.

“I was thinking of alternative anatomy, yes. I'll probably go on a binge studying the assumed biology of mythical creatures again to figure something out.”

“Can't wait! What about a tail? We always love a good tail that betrays real emotions.”

“An additional limb? That's a great idea, my friend!” You pull up your notes to start scribbling things down, “How would they interact with an earthling? We need some foundation first.”

"Oooh, they can come through the Deepspace tunnel and maybe crash into the Earth, their ship ruined with no hope of return!"

Damn. You stare at her, a bit helpless. Tara is the real seer between the two of you.

Okay, setting secured, you tap your nose in thought. What to add to make the smut extra special, besides the whole alien thing? Your mind flashes to the day before, how Xavier without a second thought conjured ropes, and the way he studied your face intensely. Your brain starts to melt somewhere in the direction of your pants. "Do you think this theoretical alien would enjoy tying up their… prey?"

"Oh, shibari!" Her eyes sparkle and she frantically nods her head with the widest grin. “I have some materials if you need inspiration! My friend practiced on me a while back for her photography class.”

Okay, cool?

—

Next on your list of Normal Ordinary Stuff is scheduling a full-body checkup at the hospital near your apartment. Everything goes smoothly, even though it takes you almost a week to complete all the tests — they sure are thorough here. You don’t remember when you took an X-Ray just because and not after an injury.

Apparently, there are some minor concerns that need addressing, some even require taking medications, ugh. Turns out you’re also lactose intolerant? Huh, that explains some things, but the thought of no more mac’n’cheese is too depressing. You try not to dwell on it.

The rest will be clear after the results of the other tests. But it feels so good to finally get to this, you never got the chance in your original world. You feel very adult and responsible. Pat yourself on the back, you deserve it.

The cherry on top — no one is pestering you, there’s radio silence from Xavier and Rafayel, which is fine by you, the neighbours stopped having arguments during the middle of the night, life is good. Simply marvelous.

You enjoy your days, your colleagues sometimes suspiciously stare at your smiling mug and ask if something happened. Your students even made you a card together for Teacher’s Day, aww. Yes, yes, you're nurturing and kind, definitely not weird and gross. 

Another lovely thing, your friendly colleague Nelly (a divorcee who gushed about her surgeon Zayne, which – understandable, girl) invites you to play kitty cards. It was your favourite in-game game, and finally getting to experience the joy of playing them in real life is beyond words. The kitties are so so cute, and their high-pitched meows make your heart soar. 

You wipe the floor with Nelly, but she doesn’t take it to heart, and in exchange for tokens you get 3(!!!) SSR kitty pins among others! Luck is looking up for you, for once. You're on top of the world.

—

After returning from Snowcrest, Zayne is swept up in the familiar rhythm of work. The nightmare made a resurgence but not enough for his performance to suffer. It’s just another day of surgeries, paperwork and consultations when a sister hospital contacts him for his opinion about a peculiar case. Given his credentials, they hope he can provide some valuable input and possibly give his recommendation on how they should proceed. He fixes his glasses and looks over the test files and other doctors’ comments. 

There are ECGs, some chest X-rays, an MRI and the usual bloodwork. The patient’s heart seems to be in a stable condition, behaving normally at rest and under exercise stress. What seems to be the problem?

And then he sees it: a structure that appears normal at first glance, but might be an indicator of something far more concerning. He pulls up the X-Rays — no recorded history of protocore-related injury, no shards, nothing. The admission file is next. The patient’s evol is — none.

He leans back in his seat. No shards, no evol, but the tests show a concerningly similar pattern to his other patient — her. And knowing what he knows now, after the trip to Snowcrest with her, this comparison is not comforting in the slightest. 

—

The majority of the evaluations have been completed, his arm fully integrated and functional now. Caleb is ready to start his ambitious climb up the ranks in the Fleet. 

He doesn’t have more time on his hands, but he has a bit more freedom. And as he dreamt all this time, he finally gets the chance to study Pip’s profile, see her cute face and teasing posts after such a long time. In the privacy of his new apartment he can afford to become a gooey mess. 

However, he has another thing on his agenda. Caleb didn’t forget (and isn’t that a mercy?) who else occupied his mind during recovery. He hoped he could find some signs, a connection, on Pip’s Moments, but no such luck. 

He switches to people she follows. He’s very not happy to see so many male– associates on her following list. Begrudgingly, he looks through their profiles too. Still, no sign of them. Only a concerning amount of comments from Pips on these guys’ posts. He has to exit out of the app before his inner turmoil can overtake him and he—

After getting himself under control, he continues. Finally, he hits the jackpot with one of her coworkers. This Tara is a nice girl from what he can tell and has pictures with Pips he stares at for maybe too long. He doesn’t even have to scroll very far, and then– there! A photo with them with the accompanying text “I’d say they have an old soul yet impeccable taste (in some things. NOT everything).”

“Found you.” He says with conviction and doesn't even suppress a sigh of relief or his pleased grin. Now he has a place to start and more resources due to his position to uncover this. His eyes trace their face, committing it to memory like something important, sacred.

Seeing them smiling sends a pang to his heart, which he’s still puzzled by. No memories resurface, his mind constantly pulling up blank. If he uncovers this mystery, maybe he will figure out why he feels this way, maybe this will even lead to something greater — means to override whatever’s muddling his mind or understand its workings, so he doesn’t have to keep meticulous encrypted notes of everything he remembers just in case. 

He still can't help but think as he looks at the picture, ‘Good. They should be happy.’

—

Comfy at home in your new-old Lumiere pajamas, you’re sipping tea while watching ‘Drag Queens react to Love is Blind.’ (The amount of questionable sites you had to scour to find the saved episodes from YouTube is above the reasonable number. Nevertheless, you persisted and were rewarded for your efforts.)

Just as Trixie screeches, you get an email with the heading: “Medical Evaluation at the ___ Hospital”. You pause the show and quickly skim its contents — should you freak out or no?

“It has come to our attention…”

“More tests needed…”

“Regretfully, our facility doesn’t provide…”

“See the attached files…”

And finally, a sentence that fills you with dread:

“Recommendation: a further consultation at Akso hospital.

Link to schedule an appointment” 

Oh, you're screwed big time. Well, Zayne isn't the only doctor there, haha, what are your chances? You'll just choose someone else. You do have a choice, right?

You click the link. At the top of the page the name Zayne Li loads mockingly, together with his schedule and free slots. What's the saying? Fuck you sideways with a chainsaw? Sounds about right.

Chapter Text

Sylus gets an uninvited, unwelcome guest early into his day. The man in his ridiculous Princeling cosplay meets him on the roof after a forewarning message. At least, he had enough decency for that.

He waits for Lumiere to start the conversation. They never were on good terms, and the latest fiasco with the Black Market situation read as a final petty “fuck you”. Was he mistaken?

“I have some sensitive information that needs to be shared. After which a collaboration,” the other man says it like something distasteful, and Sylus agrees, “might be required, to deal with the threat quickly and efficiently.”

“Let’s hear it then.” Sylus says, bored. He doesn’t think there is anything they can agree on, so it’s intriguing what this prancing brat has up his sleeve to make statements like that.

In response, he gets a wacky story, gift-wrapped with intentional blanks and a too obvious villain. Sylus would think Lumiere doesn’t take him for a fool, but this primitive manipulation still works. The story reeks of conspiracies and hidden players — it’s a puzzle that would scratch his brain in the most pleasant way. Something exciting in these droll gray days. 

He knows better than agreeing straight away, it’s not even a consideration. If they work together is still up in the air. But he'll take the peace offering. How amusing, he thinks.

"Hm, I'd like to see for myself, if you wouldn't mind terribly so." He adds a mocking flair to the tilt of his head and turns in a clear dismissal, returning to his quarters and so rudely interrupted meal. Lumiere has probably already dissipated into thin air. ‘What a useful power,’ his greed croons.

—

You make an appointment on the farthest possible date, trying to postpone your doom. Is it wise? No. But you have to prepare yourself mentally to withstand the full power of Zayne's broad shoulders and neat cheekbones and stoic demeanor. You know he'll probably be borderline indifferent with a stranger, a cold icicle to your hot and bothered state, but ugh, if the corner of his lips twitches upwards even a little bit, you're done for. 

Among other things, you start noticing a certain mechanical crow following you around. Oh, that's not good. It's actually very, very bad, catastrophical. Bro is a criminal and a murderer and a certified hottie with a body. Not the crow, that is. You know, anyway—

You’re on your way to Mo Art Studio after Rafayel’s demand to continue your convo about the bond, which you're still resolutely not thinking about.  

Yes, you’re going to his studio-house-thing. You can barely control yourself when he meets you at the door with his shirt enticingly unbuttoned to an indecent degree, as usual. It takes great effort to bring your eyes up to his face, but you manage. Yay, you.

He starts speaking as he leads you into a sitting room (damn, that’s a big-ass house. Bro is loaded.) “You asked me last time who is the wrong person the bond is answering to.”

Once you’re seated across from him, you nod.

“From your tales, you know my story, some parts are even unfamiliar to me as of now, so I can only assume they haven't happened yet.”

Oops, yeah. Maybe you went a little overboard. But hey, you didn't know the concrete timeline! You tried to understand it while you were playing it, half-heartedly checking some forums, but as soon as words like “mobius strip” and “time loops” turned up, you just gave up. 

“You know I have a bride.” You stay silent as he talks out loud his thought process, “That we are promised to each other, heart, body and soul.” 

You nod again, and he, without preamble, strikes you down with what you've been avoiding thinking about, in consideration for your sanity, “So, the bond answers to you as well.” 

He must've thought long and hard if he should keep his cards close to his heart or outright say it. Well, you had your suspicions. The question is what to do with that? 

“Okay. Well, not okay, but.” You start again, “Look, I know that it shouldn't, because as far as I'm aware I didn't spend my previous reincarnations with you and certainly wasn't in a position to make a bond.” Which– can you technically count a life in your og world as a ‘past life’? Since that would make you a liar, you don't. 

“Do you remember anything from your past reincarnations?”

You’re bullshitting and not bullshitting at the same time. It's a Schrodinger's cat of lies all up in here. You snort, “No, that's kind of the point of seers, I believe. They can't see their own shit, just others’ business.”

“Not necessarily.” He continues, leveling you with a look that makes your skin crawl a little bit, “Still, it doesn't matter if you remember or not, if you made a bond with me — I have no memories of that either, so it even could be in the future inaccessible to me or you. What matters is that it does. Answer to you.” He finishes in a stilted manner, his body language suddenly awkward and shy. Oh.

You get a bit lightheaded with the power trip these words bring you. Shhh, chill, yo. And isn't that a scary thought? That his autonomy can basically be taken away on a whim by a stranger?

“Well.” No thoughts, head empty, frankly, “We're at an impasse, I think. Like I said, I don't have all the information. Maybe you're right and I'm, I don't know, blocked from seeing that part of the future. Doesn't explain why it works here and now.”

“I see.” What does he see? Share with the class! Two brains are better than one!

“Is there anyone else you can consult? Because I'm in the dark with you on this one.” Well… there is this one possibility, but you won't touch it with a hundred meter pole, so. You are firmly an npc, close your eyes and ears and just lalala these thoughts away.

“I'll think on it and keep in contact.” Gathering his composure, he’s back to his pretentious artist persona. You just nod and give him an awkward thumbs up. Christ, you're a walking embarrassment. 

So, you guess both of you decide on a mature approach of ignoring it. Fantastic. Hey, fine by you. You're a Supreme Ignorer, one of the best in the highest leagues out there. 

As you prepare to leave, clutching your bag like a shield, he notices the kitty pins on it. “Hah, where’d you get these? There’s no way you’re skilled enough to actually win so many.” 

“Excuse you? I’m a very skilled and respected Kitty Cards player. I would obliterate you.”

“Really? Who were the poor people that nurtured your delusions out of pity?” He asks with a taunting smirk. Yes, you’re delusional, but not like that!

“Don’t underestimate me, fishie.” Your eye twitches. You’re not that competitive, but having your hard-earned skills challenged after such a charged conversation is the last thing you need. “The burn to your ego would be so delicious I'd enjoy it with a side dish.” What are you even saying?

“Deal, our dear seer. You’re on.” He stares at you with surprising intensity that you match beat for beat, “I’ll even clear out my schedule for this. To enjoy your misery to the fullest.”

“Please, you just want an excuse to ditch your responsibilities. Regardless, you’ll need this time to nurse your bruised ego, my guy. Don’t say I didn't warn you.”

Fueled with spite and competitiveness, you turn your back to him, throwing out a “Toodles!”, and haughtily go home, not seeing his pleased grin or his twinkling gaze that follows you out.

(Later, you have a moment where you wake up in cold sweat with a sudden realization: did you accidentally plan a kind of date with Rafayel? No, it can’t be.) 

—

No matter how much you’d rather ignore the bad omen (the black crow and all the subsequent metaphors), it bites you in the ass sooner than you thought. 

You’re just finishing the last of your parent-teacher reports when a knock on the door comes.

"There's a drop dead gorgeous blonde guy waiting for you." Nelly tells you with a wink. She's the real npc, a perfect example, everything you're not. Why couldn't you be more like her? Thirst from afar and continue living life, ugh.

‘A drop dead gorgeous blonde guy’? If it was Xavier, he would first text or call, you think – you hope. So that leaves– Sylus. Drop dead is right, you think. 

You gather your things, thoughts swirling around in a mini-typhoon of anxiety. Did he appear in public to appease you? Grant some kind of feeling of safety, being in the crowd? Or is he ensuring your compliance this way? So you don't kick up a fuss? Damn manipulative bastard. You forlornly stare out the window, wishing you could parkour out of here, avoiding any and all confrontations. Sigh.

You meet him at the entrance, because might as well. The more obvious and obnoxious, the better. The first words out of your mouth are, "This could've been an email."

He greets you with an infuriating smirk. "Ah, of course you're not surprised to see me, I should've known." He's a good smirker. And his voice in real life – carcrash, explosions, no survivors. It sucks because it's working. Take your mind out of the gutter, you're in for a lot of potential danger, christ.

"Either compile an email with your request and expect the response in 3 to 5 business days, or we're walking to a secondary public location to discuss… this." That should do it, right? Somewhat safe? By god, you just want to go home, kick back and watch reruns of Onepunchman.

"You think you're in the position to negotiate?" Threatening you in broad daylight, on your turf? What a self-important dick.

You state tiredly, "You came to me, not the other way around." Damn, where's this sass coming from? Maybe Raf is rubbing off on you. (Hehe, you wish he was rubbing on your– stop.)

“How bothersome,” he sighs. What? You're right, he just doesn’t want to admit it. “Fine, I agree to your terms.”

He checks something on the phone, his face inscrutable, and turns to you with a tilt of his head, “Shall we go for a walk?” 

Charming. 

He leads you to a high-end restaurant with private booths, of fucking course. You side-eye him once you’re at the front door and don’t even lower your voice, “My man, how much do you think teachers make?”

“Not to worry. My treat.” 

Well, when he puts it like that. Why does it still sound like a threat though?

Once you’re seated on sinfully plush couches, whose cushions you just want to melt into, all negativity, the tiredness after a full workday dissipates from you. You give yourself a moment of indulgence — to pretend for a bit that you’re not expecting another round of interrogation, that it’s just one of those “Falling for you” dates, and in a moment Sylus will call you kitten and you’ll cringe (but secretly enjoy it).

A courteous server with a twirly mustache and an embroidered vest takes your order — you scan the pretentious menu, picking a couple of familiar-sounding things — and leaves the two of you truly alone.

In the stretched silence Sylus makes a sound like he would clear his throat if it wasn’t too plebeian to do. You sigh. Survive the conversation and then you can hole yourself up in your room with a bottle of plum wine you bought on a whim and your laptop, you've earned it. (Maybe you’ll write a part two for Sylus’s fic, depending on how this goes.)

Avoiding his gaze, since now there are no witnesses if he decides to use his evol, you pretend to bother yourself with the contents of your bag, just for something to do, “Okay, what do you know of me?”

“Plenty, I assure you.” His sultry voice– argh!

“Uh-uh, and that’s plenty vague, my guy.”

He taps his eyebrow, considering. A scheming schemer, “It has been brought to my attention that you have the power to foresee some events, as well as uncover some truths about the past.”

(Which bitch ratted you out? You want to wail, deservingly.) But woah, that sounds… too serious for you. Shit, don’t panic, gaslight yourself into confidence. “Sure, let's go with that. What do you want, then?”

“I’ve been told you can prove the credibility of your knowledge. I’d like to do that, first.”

His face just screams ‘Go on then’, challenging, eager to see your demise. Or maybe you're overthinking. Honestly, you have no idea what has brought this on, and how to talk yourself out of it. What even is the ‘credibility of your knowledge’? Pure nonsense. 

Let's be egotistical for a moment, what do you want to know? He can be a reliable source for situating yourself in the timeline, at least. Hopefully, your guts won’t paint the walls after this.

“Have you met up with… her yet?” you ask with heavy emphasis. His eyes become sharper, he studies you for a long moment. 

“With who?” A smile bordering on painful splits his face. It says ‘proceed with caution’, woo-wee.

You vaguely gesture with your hand, “Your other half, cursed to kill you in every life, your soul-bonded, that ‘her’ person-lady.”

He evaluates your word vomit and apparently finds it acceptable. 

“Ah, so the golden boy has been truthful.” He says with open displeasure. Hold on, now, golden boy? Does he mean Xavier? Um, “No. Not yet.”

Since when do they exchange information? When did that happen?

“Understood.” You say instead. Now you're more aware where you are in the plot. Finally, jeez, took you long enough. MC hasn't gone to the N109 zone yet. Okay, okay. What does that tell you? Shit else it tells you, frankly.

“Is that on the horizon then?”

You furrow your eyebrows, “It should be.” A pause, “Um. Good for you?”

He hums slowly, thinking something over. “It pleases me to know this, yes. But I hunger for more… details you can provide for me.”

Is he doing this on purpose? The questionable word choice and the breathy tone bordering on a moan? Bro, you don't need to try so hard, trust. And oof, you poorly remember N109 zone things, too distracted by... no, you shan't say. You take a breath, stealing your nerves.

“Okay, real talk, I only know so much.”

“That’s fine. Should we discuss payment before or after?” You freeze. Discuss what?

“I thought dinner was the payment..?” 

He just lifts his eyebrow in that cocky way. Right.

—

Food is great, amazing even. Meat so tender it melts on your tongue, freshest vegetables all crispy and flavourful with spices, you barely suppress indecent moans. You’re not much of a cook, so this delicacy – shit, it’s so good.  

Sylus, of course, orders a wine that goes well with what you ordered. You don’t even want to think how expensive it must be. Just drink to your heart's content, your worries gently ebbing away, your limbs and tongue loosening until you’re not as high-strung as a pig for slaughter (are they high-strung though? do they have enough consciousness in them to internalize death at the hands of their supposed caretakers?)

“I mean, they’re already doing bad things, I think, but once they’re bought by EVER… whoo boy. We can’t let that happen.”

“Then I'll buy it.”

You blink at him stupidly, “What?”

“Isn’t that what you implied? I’ll buy this organization.” 

You giggle-snort with an edge of hysteria. Sure, let’s just throw money at the problem and hope that solves it. You’ll never understand rich people, “Honestly, just rerouting Carter would be enough — he’s the valuable one for EVER.”

“Then I'll kill him.” He says it so matter-of-factly, your head spins.

“Sylus, no!”

—

You’re half-aware that your tipsy ass is giggling and shit. But the awareness is somewhere in the background, along with the second bottle of wine. The world around you is kinda fuzzy, like a warm blanket has been draped over your senses, ‘s nice.

You must think it’s all a dream — you don’t feel this nice and relaxed usually — so that means no inhibitions, no consequences, you silence everything else that's not happy and bubbly. 

And there’s no way a reality exists where Sylus sits across from you, amused and tolerating you clumsily pawing at his face, telling him that he's ‘such a pretty, pretty dragon, yes you are, yes you are’. He's all long-suffering sighs and raised eyebrows at some of your statements — it only delights you further, which you tell him, naturally.

“Mm, I see now why people compare them to rubies and other gems. Quite true…” You slur in your careful study of his eyes. They shine with mirth — definitely dreaming.

“Rubies are too trivial for the likes of me.”

You huff, “Maybe…. And anyway, comparing eyes to gems is so overdone, I don't do that in my work.”

An interested hum, “Your work?”

You giggle and drunkenly wag your finger, “Not telling…”

He's smiling, in a good mood, that's nice, even though it swims a little in front of you, “And for another 100 grand?”

You shoot up straight as much as your wobbly state can allow. “Yes, I'm a whore for money, there's no corner of my heart I won't overturn for some cash,” 

“I was thinking more of a bank transfer–” 

“Sure, don't care. I'm only the cogiest of cogs in the capitalist machine.”

He laughs and you're stuck on the sound and his softened features. So pretty.

“Done.” You zoom in back to the present, “So, your work?” He reminds with an inviting gesture.

You shake your head a bit to clear your head, but it's too full of bubbles and fluff, so you abandon the idea, “Yeah… I write a bit. Uh, adult stuff mostly if you know what I mean.” There. You magnanimously gesture in return.

“And what metaphors do you use in your work, if ruby eyes are too simple for you?”

“Ah,” you scruff the back of your head in delayed embarrassment, “this one is also popular, but if the eyes are red I'd rather liken them to a raging volcano or something.”

Sylus stills in place, eyeing you, considering. You tilt your head at him, “M?”

“Nothing,” he answers smoothly, “I guess it is popular, I've read something similar.”

“See?” You wave your hands self-deprecatingly, “It’s just a hobby anyway.”

Chapter Text

The conversation was nothing short of enlightening. Alcohol definitely helped and had a bonus of making them even more entertaining. The longer they converse and the more they let slip, Sylus starts to uncover another layer of Lumiere's manipulation. This is more than a peace offering, it's a hint and a question — ‘do you see what I see’? Clever. He'll decide later whether to share his findings or not. After all, he does so enjoy having all the information and leaving his opponents fumbling. 

His mind operates quickly and efficiently, filing away every nugget they intentionally and unintentionally give out, every twitch and every pause is evaluated. He already has some plans formed and expects the next weeks (maybe months) to be very busy. 

They open the second bottle gleefully. It’s refreshing to see someone be so happy over such trivial things. However, they don’t seem to hold their liquor very well, just a mortal after all. And maybe there’s a certain beauty in that, the fleetingness of one’s being — he lost those privileges a long time ago.

No matter, they're at risk of falling over the table at this rate. He doubts there's any useful information left to be extracted in such a state. Sylus steadies them with a hand on their shoulder, and they lean even closer. 

They don't even question it, so pliant before him, open and trusting. This is a different kind of power rush he hadn't felt in so long. To be trusted so willingly and easily, to be admired in a soft way, not intimidated or envious.

He leashes the complicated feelings that arise and instead uses this moment of weakness to his advantage, though, inexplicably, the act of doing so leaves a sour taste in his mouth. They're so out of it, too captivated by his face and eyes, of all things, they don't even notice when he prods their mind with his evol, just for a surface reading.

Their mind is a convoluted mess (that’s why he prefers sober victims, but needs must), with unshakeable foundations at the core of their being, which he can admire — for one so young, they have a solid sense of self. There's an incessant buzz of worries cloaking some bits, but their intentions are pure and true. It's hard to look at something so precious and kind (without his greed lifting its head in interest, eager to add more to its hoard).

There are many things to consider, but at a later date. He’s more indulgent after that for sure, softer with them, sincerely amused instead of wearing the usual mask. Evaluating their condition, their chances of getting home safe by themselves are low, and they proved to be a valuable player (the fact that their soul makes him sit up at attention notwithstanding). He leads them out of the restaurant, waving away cowering servants and the maitre'd. 

“Would you like me to give you a ride home?”

“How do you know where I live?” They wobble in place, his hand reaching out to steady them without conscious effort. They twist their head in different directions as if looking for something, squinting, “Ah, Mephisto, makes sense. Still creepy, don’t get me wrong!”

He just inclines his head — it will never get old, how familiar they are with many hidden parts of his life. But they mind him trying to level out the field, how hypocritical. “It's quite a long way home, wouldn't a car be preferable to walking?” He recognizes their wariness of riding in his car, but they will hardly agree to being carried all the way home. And he has a reputation to uphold. So, a compromise.

Their struggle to think is evident on their face. The fact that they haven't passed out with how much they drank is actually surprising. He might need to revise his judgement on their ability to hold liquor. “Yeah, I'll get an uber.”

Sylus makes a questioning noise at an unfamiliar term. Another thing to file away under their inconsistent tales. They open a taxi app. Ah, is ‘uber’ a ‘taxi’ in some dialect he's unfamiliar with? It's an affront to his being, he needs to know everything.  

“Would you like me to accompany you?”

They consider it. Then consider some more. “Are you gonna be weird about it?”

Weird? Didn't they have a delightful dinner together? He didn't even mind their fussing or inappropriate touches, though this kind of slight would cost another person their life (and it’s not because he's starved for sincere affection and hasn't felt anyone handling him so gently and reverently in a long time since–).

He pretends to muse for a moment, “I won’t, I suppose."

“Cool.” They sniff and wait for the car, leaning on him. He allows himself to lightly pat their soft fluffy hair. His greed is content with them being so close, and Sylus lets it, for this moment. He knows they're not his. His soul-bonded is a hunter, not a teacher. He knows where she is and what she looks like. Still.

After he escorts them home, he has work to do, the night is still young. It’s safer to think about his dealings right now than– this. 

—

You wake up slowly, disoriented. Through a barely-there opening of your eyes you can vaguely make out the shape of your room. Good. You don't remember how you got home, you... kinda remember the day before, but ugh. You'll care about it later, you don't have the focus or energy right now. 

You reach for your phone, and there’s a message, because of course there is, “You are welcome for your safe return to your residence.”

Pfft. What a loser way of saying something so simple. You grin sleepily at the phone until how you got home and why Sylus was with you hits you full-force, followed by a wave of mortification. Oh god.

You lie there like the world's biggest embarrassment champ and stare at the ceiling through your barely open crusty eyes. Damn, you've hit some new lows yesterday. Well, after some quick compartmentalization you agree that what's done is done, it is what it is and so on. Not like you can change the past, there’s no use dwelling on it.

You shoot a quick text back — a thumbs up emoji with a “thx man i really appreciate it” and scroll through your notifications. Right next to messages from the work chat is a reminder about an evening appointment at Akso. Right. 

To make matters worse (better? definitely better), overnight your bank account has gained a ridiculous sum that you can’t even comprehend. It’s more than you know what to do with. It makes you want to withdraw it immediately and hide somewhere like you do with your other savings (yes, very old grandma of you) but you don't think it's even possible to withdraw such a big sum. You'll probably have to go to a bank and sort this out. Start a savings account, your retirement fund, maybe? Christ. Too real, too serious, too soon. 

Ugh, time to go about your day, probably. You don't really have a hangover (miraculously), but everything is still slow and icky. You order takeout for a late breakfast and leave the curtains drawn for now. With a heavy sigh you get up to make yourself look somewhat presentable.

—

You go to your doctor's appointment in a daze and the biggest sunglasses you have. Frankly, you’re not even shaking in your boots from nervousness, just tired and want to get this over with. Meeting Zayne face to face is gonna be a lot, sure, but it pales in comparison to the monkey business you subjected Sylus to. You can’t believe you’re still alive after all that.

You check in and get your report, navigate the intimidatingly large hospital building with the help of one of those OTTO fuckers. In no time you’re in front of the door, 12 minutes early because yeah. Just in case.

You absent-mindedly scroll on your phone and answer messages (Sylus sent you one of those crow in a ruffle collar stickers. You couldn’t believe your eyes, you thought this was reserved for MC only? Flabbergasted and way out of your depth, you sent a deep-fried cat meme back — you panicked, okay?)

“Patient N__, come in.”

You raise your head, a bit flustered, and stiffly march after Zayne. Damn, he’s tall. A well-mannered, distant mountain of a man. Do not think of that Absolute Zeal card. Or the– no. No thoughts, head empty — remember your mantra. 

You hand him your report, looking at him only from your periphery. You don’t want to ogle him too obviously, so it’s better to not let your eyes… wander, let’s say. He starts asking general questions that you answer to the best of your ability (you’re not really aware of your medical history, because you didn’t go to doctors a lot in the past, which he very much disapproves of. Fair.)

“Have you been tested for an evol? It says on your file you have none listed.”

Lol, no, why would you? There's no way you can have one, coming from where you are, so what’s the point? “No, I haven’t been tested. Didn’t feel like I needed to..?”  

He nods, reviewing the files on his computer. “On one of your tests,” he turns the screen towards you, but all you can see are some graphs and indecipherable (for you) gibberish, cool, cool, “Indicators have been found, matching the frequences of an evol, showing that you should have one.”

Woah, that’s… news. On one hand, cool! Superpowers! On the other hand, this feels like the plot has its eyes on you once again, which means trouble. Zayne continues, ignorant to your growing panic, “If the evol level is low or unstable, you might have never noticed its existence in the first place.”

“Okay.” Deep breaths, silly, nothing to worry about yet. “I see. Disregarding the revelations and my imposing identity crisis, why does it matter?”

“There are concerns of you possibly having or developing a protocore syndrome in the future.” He says with what was possibly intended as comforting cadence, but falls short matched with his too serious face. Your thoughts race. That wasn't supposed to happen. What? 

“Your symptoms are that of a stable protocore syndrome patient, supported by an evol to circumvent the more troublesome side effects. However, it appears that you haven't been in contact with metaflux and you do not possess an evol, by your words.” After a moment he adds, “So you see why further testing is needed.”

“Yeah, yeah…” 

Okay… So, maybe goodbye trustfund, hello expensive medications and surgeries? Thank fuck for Sylus, you could retroactively kiss him (and maybe even– seriously, stop, not the time) for this sudden financial safety net. 

You should be more worried, you think. But this is just so fantastical, so out of the blue, protocore syndrome is not even a real disease in your world. But, you guess, this is your real world now. Damn. 

“How long does it take to test for, uh, having an evol?”

He shakes his head, “Not long. Follow me.”

Without much choice left, you do.

—

So, turns out, you do have an evol. Fucking resonance, just like MC, figures.

“Anhaunsen type.” Zayne states as he checks the results by the machine, his face a mask of professionalism that doesn’t betray any of his real thoughts. “It’s a rare one. But it makes more sense now why you weren’t aware of it.”

He turns to you and signals you to situate yourself back in your seat. Gratefully, you collapse on the chair and sigh. “Have you been in contact with evolvers? Friends, family?”

Your mind flashes through your ordinary life and how spiced up it became with all the LIs trampling all over the normalcy you’ve built. “Not until recently.”

He nods in understanding, “We'd like to run previous tests again to check the progression, as considerable time has passed since they were taken,” a disapproving look thrown your way, and you try not to squirm in place, your reaction probably very telling, “And your condition will need to be monitored regularly in the future.”

Ugh, just your luck. “Understood.”

“As for now, what might mitigate some of the more unfortunate side effects is using your evol. Of course, you will require training at first, but it can become a great aid in the future.”

Something doesn’t feel right about this, you feel like you’re being led to some conclusion you might not like. “If I understand this correctly, since I have the power of… resonance, using it means being in contact with an evolver?” 

He looks over his glasses at you, “In simple terms, yes. Do you have anyone in mind?”

An inappropriate giggle leaves you,“So, you’re saying I need to make… evolver friends? On doctor’s orders?” Your life is wild. 

He inclines his head and the corner of his mouth twitches in suppressed amusement. Oh no. Do not fixate on it, don't be fascinated and entranced, focus on what he's saying, c'mon.

“...recommended. However, there are resources available…”

Chapter Text

You aren't exactly a happy-go-lucky person. Well, maybe compared to other people? But compared to other other people, you're a certified Debbie downer, so. Irrelevant.  

Despite the news, you're trying to look at the bright side. Sure, it sucks to have a fantastical, literally made-up condition on top of whatever is going on in your life, but there’s still delicious soup to eat and shows to watch. (And a lot of money in your bank account, everybody say ‘thank you, Sylus!’)

By Zayne’s recommendation, you check the brochure he gave you — the type parents get when their kids show signs of a developing evol. Very funny. You sign up for an introductory course online right away, like a responsible adult, the epitome of maturity, it is you. 

When you come to the place, tired after work and with an anxiety-induced migraine, you are there with a bunch of kids. Awk-ward. You sit in the back, on a chair that is too small for you, trying to ignore children’s curious gazes and aggressive gossiping. Yay, you’re the talk of the town! Just awesome. After the mortifying experience, you ask for one-on-one classes at the front desk. The clerk seems taken aback by your desperate zeal, but sympathetic once you explain the situation. 

The counsellor assigned to you is nice. She has a very cool elemental evol of wind and very much lifts your spirits. (Haha, get it?) Makes you feel less like a failure, she's very good at being encouraging and highlighting how very normal it is. You’ll take the well-meaning lies for now, there’s not much you can do otherwise anyway. 

The progress isn't exactly quick, but you manage. You get into the flow of going to a different train station after work instead of straight home. Surveillance is apparently still present, because after a couple of days you get a message from Sylus, the man, the myth, the legend, himself:

“What got you going to such uninteresting places recently?”

“Trouble in evol paradise?”

It’s not like you disclosed your whole life story to the man, so it makes sense in a way, for him to be curious. The question is how much do you want to reveal. Eh.

“You could say that.”

A message pops up right as you’re about to enter the building.

“Care to elaborate?”

You snort. Yeah, right. You don’t need more targets on your back, you already have enough.

“Nope. And keep the lovely bird on a less creepy duty than stalking me please, oki?”

“Very well. I will respect your wishes.”

You get the shivers. The consideration is nice, sure, but it still feels like a threat somehow. With him, it’s heebie-jeebies all the way. Okay, at least you’ve established boundaries, cool?

This session proves to be The One. As in, the one you finally manage to do something about the apparent power flowing through your veins or whatever. You resonate with your counsellor — it's a quiet and calm affair overall. Nothing bursts through the walls, no explosions or sudden epiphanies. Just, a firm hand hold and a breeze that sweeps up around the room, very nice, very refreshing.

“Good job!” She tells you enthusiastically, and you preen at the praise. You made someone somewhat proud, even if she’s paid for it. “You handle the basics well, so we can continue at a more sedate pace now. Let's say, once a week?”

Wow, just like in therapy. Once you're not actually at risk and can somewhat regulate your emotions you are free to come less frequently, huh. “Sure. Works for me.”

“Considering your medical recommendation, our meetings will be enough to keep the symptoms at bay for now,” she taps the pencil on the notebook she’s been jotting things down in and looks at you seriously, “But in the future it'd be good to find someone else you can rely on for resonance.”

“Yeah, I gathered as much.” Seems like your hermit lifestyle will sadly need a re-evaluation. How dreadful. 

—

By the way, you absolutely crush Rafayel at Kitty Cards. 

He's sulky, seethes at his cards like they betrayed him, “These vile furry creatures!” 

Your eyes probably sparkle with excitement, and your face hurts from all the smiling. “Let's do one more, one more round!” He sighs, all put upon, but agrees.

He manages to get a leg up on you for, like, 2 rounds, but it's a drop in the ocean of your competency. You gloat and crow and hold it over his head for the whole duration of like two minutes before his kicked puppy expression turns you into a puddle, and you agree to pacify him with dinner. You realise you've been played.

Thankfully, you don’t have to face another ridiculously lush and expensive place, which is surprising, knowing his tastes. The cozy cafe he takes you to is a nice hole-in-the-wall establishment with plenty of secluded corners for a private chat. Nice.

He orders some juicy fish on the grill, you go with a meat stew. Rafayel does most of the heavy lifting in your conversation, he has a lot of things to complain about and he is a master evader of uncomfortable topics, what a socialite. 

However, there is one thing you’d like to bring up, and this is as good of a time as any. You’ll just… test the waters. Waters, get it? Cause he's a fish–

“So, this might be a touchy subject, but. Resonance. Do you know how..?” Not as smooth as you’d like, but when have you ever been smooth?

You’re met with a serious face and a considering look. “Why do you want to know?”

Damn this is awkward. ‘I need to resonate for medical reasons and you're the only one I'm not that scared of and who seems willing to spend time with me without murderous impulses or whatever.’ Yeah, not good. 

“Uh… Reasons?” He stares, unimpressed, so you mumble, “Medical ones.”

“Are you okay?” Woah, he seems genuinely worried, with that furrowed eyebrow. You’re… kinda touched.

“For now. But I need to– uh, do. That. Regularly.” You’re a wordsmith, it is you.

He lifts his eyebrows, amused now, “Is it that embarrassing to talk about?”

“It’s still new to me.” You shrug, “And I'm not good at being so behind everybody. Evolvers have been doing it their whole life, so, fair. But. You know.”

Rafayel’s face expression is complicated now, so instead you study your stew and get a couple more bites in. You’re still hungry, even after this awkwardness. The human spirit is truly unshakeable. 

“Your evol is resonance?”

You resolutely stare at the bowl, “Mm-hm.”

After that you don’t hear him for a while, and when you look up, he looks away. 

“Yes, I know how to resonate,” his eyes hold a certain mischievousness when they slide to you, “And I'm willing to. But– What will I get in return?”

Uh. You're a bad negotiator, truly, you’re very tempted to just ask ‘what do you want’ but that's giving free reign and handing power over you on a silver platter. However, you doubt you can outmaneuver someone like Rafayel. Or anyone, for that matter. Straightforward is your forte. Fuck it.

“What do you have in mind?”

“Hmm,” he regards you for a moment, and you’re this close to start sweating– “Go to an arcade with me. There I can prove my superiority.”

…that’s it? Sounds awfully date-like, but you'll take it. You nod.

“Great!” He lights up like a christmas tree. Do they even have Christmas here? You haven’t been here long enough to tell, “Do you wanna try now?”

“Now-now? Here?” Is he for real? But he just nods like it’s the most normal thing to do. Resonate in a public place on a random evening. “Uh, sure.”

You’re probably crazy for this, but might as well. Then you’ll have something positive to tell your counsellor, she’ll be happy. And Zayne probably too, your next appointment with him is approaching alarmingly fast. Sigh.

This time, it’s surprisingly intimate. Not at all like the professional clean exchange with your counsellor. The handholding makes your heart flutter, especially when he brings your joined hands to his chest, ngh. The hold is strong and secure, his hand is rougher than you expected. Though you should’ve known better, he’s not some kind of workshy nobleman, despite how his chosen persona acts. 

The moment you feel it, the heat at your fingertips, a surge of something not-yours but close enough to hold — the resonance leaves you a bit light-headed this time. And holy shit, it feels so nice and warm, and you're overwhelmed, and it's so pretty, and are you crying? Huh.

“Damn, this feels fucking amazing.” You say hoarsely. 

He stares at you too, eyes wide, filled with emotion. There are small fiery fish floating around you, and they're so cute, holy shit. Though a bit blurry from a couple of stray overwhelmed tears. He reaches out to thumb them away, and you still in place, just– looking at him, and the way the fire casts ethereal warm light onto his face. Wow. 

The moment does not last long, you're taken out of it by the call of your name.

—

You wrestle your gaze away from Rafayel to look at– Xavier? What is he doing here? Bizarrely, this is not the first time you’ve been in the company of both of them. At least, you’re not tied up this time, yay! 

“Xavier? Um, hi?”

You glance at Rafayel, who retreated back into his aloof persona, with an addition of a hostile squint he regards Xavier with. Well, that’s not good. 

“Hello.” He nods at both of you, coming closer to the table, to Rafayel’s displeasure. (Well, it’s not like he crashed your not-date, necessarily. Because this is not a date. And you hope that all of you are friends or can become friends in the future! Wouldn’t that be nice?)

You can’t help but notice that Xavier looks tired, almost ragged. You always seem to catch him at a bad time, poor guy. You wonder what’s happening behind the scenes that got him in this state. HA? Backtrackers? Whatever shady things he does as Lumiere? Speaking of which, was he the one who–

His focus is on your face and a couple of fish still floating around, “You did this?”

Before you can answer, Rafayel interrupts to correct him with a sudden intensity, “We did. Together.”

Xavier looks at you in a manner that makes you want to combust or run away. Why can’t you interact with him like a normal person? Well, it’s still a step up from Sylus who you basically climbed like a tree, jesus. You clear your throat. Unfortunately, with Rafayel’s words still in the air you can’t back out or outright lie, which would be a coward’s way out, but you’re the coward, so. “Uh, yes. We did.”

“I thought you said you didn’t have an evol?”

You squirm in place. Uh. “I thought I didn't. But,” you triumphantly showcase the last fish still floating around, “Turns out I do. Neat, huh?”

Xavier studies the fish, bringing his fist to his chin. It’s too serious for the little guppy doing lazy laps around the table. He stares at it like it’s an important document with forbidden knowledge or whatever. You helplessly glance at Rafayel, but the other is still staring at Xavier with– suspicion? Triumph? You really can’t tell. With something, yeah.

“Do you have a fire evol?” Oh no, you really hoped it wouldn’t come to that. You sigh. Going with the flow, you’re the chillest person to ever chill, nothing can affect you. 

With a glance at Rafayel ‘Is this okay?’ and his long-suffering eye-roll, you scoot to make space on the couch, and Xavier takes your invitation. 

“No. It’s– well, resonance.” 

You see how he immediately solidifies into a battle-ready posture. Oh, dear. 

“You… resonated.” A nod. “With Rafayel?” Another nod. 

You don’t expect the next words. 

“Resonate with me.” With the way he says it and how he looks at you— he says it like it will prove something. And you have a thought about what that might prove, but well. 

Deep breaths, this might as well happen today, why not. We’re going with the flow, remember? (Maybe in your next life you can be a florist in some picturesque place with no corrupted government authorities and no handsome men to disrupt your days.)

Only, you’re interrupted by the buzzing of your phone. Everybody’s so tense, you almost comically jump at the sound. “Ah, my bad. I’ll just… check it real quick.”

It’s from Sylus, and now you really regret not naming his contact something ridiculous and inconspicuous, because Xavier next to you tenses even further.

‘I dealt with Xander Sciences. You can see the full report here.’

Your blood runs cold. What does he mean, dealt with? You try to lean away from Xavier, who seems very interested in the contents of your phone, when Rafayel pipes up, “Well, tell me too! Who is it?”

Xavier speaks in a cold tone, “Why do you have his contact? You said you didn’t have any ties with him.”

It seems to dawn on Rafayel who he’s talking about and he whirls around to you, intrigued, “Well, well! That’s a surprise.”

You send Rafayel a dirty look and instead hiss at Xavier in righteous exasperation, “I think you know why, Xavier. How did he know to find me in the first place, hm? ”

He seems taken aback, eyes perfectly round and innocent. It’s hard to stay mad at such a face, ugh. Your fuse runs out quickly.

Now Rafayel’s phone rings. Seriously? This evening is topping charts in the weird convos department. He answers, “Hello..?” A beat. “Why?” He furrows his eyebrows and glances at you, “Huh?” 

Apparently, he was hung up on, which is— wow. Whoever it was has got the balls. Maybe they could share some with you? You feel like you really need it. 

With an apologetic look your way and a heavy one towards Xavier, Rafayel stands up, “I’m really sorry, but I gotta skedaddle. Don’t forget your part of the deal!”

And… he's gone. Super. Cool, cool, cool. 

Chapter Text

You're still reeling from— everything. Resonance with Rafayel, which felt like the gentlest punch in all your feelings at once, the sudden arrival of Xavier (a new bombshell has entered the villa–) and a report, of all things, from Sylus. It’s– a lot.

Xavier very nonchalantly orders some hotpot, like all of this is a part of a routine you’re just not aware of yet. Despite meeting him a grand total of two times, it’s less tense and more awkward. You ask for coffee, because what else is there to do. 

Xavier’s presence next to you feels expectant. You try to play pretend ignorance while figuring out what would be the best move — checking Sylus’s report now or later. (You don’t want to leave the man on read, especially after he's done something so… effort and time consuming? Maybe? That’d be rude.) Xavier-shaped part of your awareness grows more insistent. 

You lock the phone. He’ll understand. Hopefully.

“So.” Xavier breaks the silence with the grace of a carefully placed chess piece. Ugh, you're not ready for whatever he's about to say, this is way beyond your capabilities for reasonable thinking right now. 

You glance at him with the most pitiful expression, begging to drop the issue. He stills, studying your despairing face, and gentles his presence. It's a fascinating thing to witness up close: the way his shoulders resettle, and his face loses the severity of a focused emotion. Edges smoothing, like a watercolor painting. Huh. 

“Resonate with me?”

He looks so earnest, and his voice is back to that soft calm cadence that completely disarms you every time. Be still, your beating heart. Guess both of you decide to sidestep the Sylus matter for now, good riddance. Not that this is any better. 

“Haa… yep. Sure.” Your fingers tap dance on the table while you're trying to maintain a polite smile and not freak out over his lethal ‘boyfriend’ style charms. Is it gonna be as intense as with Rafayel? You’re not sure your heart can handle something like that twice in a row. (Doubly so, now that you actually have a condition, haha, you're fucked.) “But I’m warning you, I'm very new to this, okay?” 

“You seemed to be doing pretty well with the artist, though.” He keeps a good facade going, but the corners of his mouth dip into sulky territory. Is he–? “You don’t have to if you don’t want to.” He adds with the air of defeated calm, you can almost visualize a cartoonish bag on a stick over his shoulder as he’s limping away, the picture of an abandoned creature, what?

“Don't get me wrong, I do.” You rush to reassure him, “Very much so.” Maybe a bit too honest. Uncomfortably close to vulnerable. Put a lid on it, c’mon. No use leaking your feelings all over emotionally unavailable guys. 

He turns to look at you after your words, brightening up. You’ll probably never get over the fact you can see them so close and personal, in real life. You're too busy admiring his eyelashes (they're so dense and long, like a cow's. Make his eyes look extra kind.) to make for a polite purely platonic position for a handshake. No, while you are zoning out, he takes your hand and— directly puts it on his chest, covering it with his other one, so your hand is trapped in the cozy prison of his soft hoodie and warm hands. It feels almost scandalous like this, in the corner booth, away from prying eyes. You can feel the steady thrum of his heartbeat under your hand, um. This is. What is he doing, that is to say– 

The soft lights of the cafe make him look unfairly pretty, and the half-lidded eyes he regards you with are downright sinful. Your brain crashes, error, error.

“Focus.” His soft command tugs you back from the dreamland or wherever you've escaped to from this bewildering circumstance, and you close your eyes to shut out— all of this.

While Rafayel felt like a flow you could tap into, something lapping at the shore of your consciousness (?), Xavier is— a vast expanse of space, all-encompassing, like the void is staring back at you, cool and unforgiving, but no less beautiful for it. You reach out—

You don't get to bask in the gentle feel of unity, something akin to coming home, soft and fuzzy in a way childhood memories feel. The light behind your eyelids startles you into embarrassed flailing, and you almost fall into Xavier, his hold on your hand still firm, and tugging you closer, oh lord. There are aftershocks of puzzling mirages wisping away — something light and royal, a similar position, only then his eyes were younger, less burdened. 

There are pretty flowers almost growing over both of you, and they feel vaguely familiar. Xavier’s gaze is part-pain and part-awe as he looks at them, something settling in him — a resolve over something, or a decision. 

You cough, gently untangling your limbs (when did you even manage to cling to him octopus-like?) and righting yourself, as your little lightshow also stupefied the approaching waiter. Oops.

You leave Xavier to his musings, thanking and apologizing to the waiter. You take your orders from them and thank them again, for good measure. 

At the sight of a hotpot Xavier finally unfreezes. Oh, thank god. While he’s busy thinking and devouring his food, you hide your phone behind your big mug of coffee and unlock your phone. You’re shaken, as is expected, but your mind has gained a surprising clarity you don’t know what to do with. Might as well put it to good use. 

Sylus’s message is pretty vague, to be honest. You still don't understand why he sent you this. Is he waiting for your, what, approval? You don't really have any real power over– well, anything, no? 

The link to the report redirects you to some kind of secure app that’s very sleek in design and all that, it feels secure. Though you have no idea when it’s been installed on your phone in the first place. Maybe you had it on this phone from the very beginning? Weird shit.

There’s a breakdown of a whole operation, yikes. Too much lingo you’re unfamiliar with, but you think you grasp the overarching meaning: scientists’ loyalties were tested and as a result they were either eliminated or recruited. The information — all the research, the results and theories and what-not — was wiped, degraded, whatever, the useful bits secured on Sylus’s databases. He was thorough, in that brutal and efficient way of his. You can’t help but feel things at this show of competence. Wow.

You find Carter's name in the long list of employees, and he's — dead. With a short and to-the-point note ‘A fanatic. Indoctrination: impossible. Eliminated.’ There are other reports like that next to many unfamiliar names. You scroll through them numbly. 

You're squeamish about the deaths, but overall, this is a good thing. You have to tell yourself it’s a good thing for the future, but you don’t believe in preemptive punishment, that’s unfair, that’s why — but, what did you expect from Sylus, on the other hand? After telling him the possible outcome of events? To just let the threat lie and fester and poison everything around it until it becomes too much to bear? You knew what lengths he’s willing to go to. What all of them can do or have done. And sure, they’re mostly after the baddest of the bad people, but your stupid idealist heart with strong belief in the best of humanity is– yeah. It’s hard to reconcile all of that. Your world also wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows, and yet.

You still should reward his proactive actions, he nipped a future complication in the bud, one less thing to worry about. 

‘Very cool! Good job.’

He answers almost immediately, huh. That’s a– not touching the flutter you had over that. Nope. 

‘You're hard to impress I see’

You stare, dumbfounded. Impress? Impress? Sylus, what the everloving fuck. (Who impresses somebody with taking down a research organization? Well, the same person who pays stupid amounts of money for a silly fact about a hobby, but still. What.) 

‘Please don't do anything rash. There’s no need for any kind of grand gestures. I'm plenty impressed, trust.’

Better to curb this line of thinking from his end before he starts doing something else that your brain is too much of a mush to even conceptualize. God knows his MO is: destroy, dismantle, engulf in flames.

Xavier’s voice makes you startle and look up. “Linkon won't be as safe for the next couple of days.” He’s already finished his dish and who knows how long has been studying your goblin form crouched protectively over your phone with a chin on his palm. Uh. “Be vigilant. Stay safe.” 

“Thank you?” Not like you can do much about it anyway? You don’t have weapons or anything like that to defend yourself with. All you can do is hole up in your apartment again, which has become a trend. At least, it’s the weekend already, which is a mercy. 

—

The next day, while you’re still half-way through your very indulgent and slow morning routine of drinking coffee and browsing the internet, you get two separate texts from Xavier and Rafayel. The content of them basically amounts to this: whether MC really really pinkie promise would be alright in the N109 zone. It’s kinda funny.

You told them of the possibility, before. In a roundabout way, so they don't figure out they're stressing over the same person. Not yet, at least. And you did reassure them that she'd have good protection there. Even kinda-sorta a warm welcome. You really crack yourself up sometimes. Nevertheless, you confirm that yes, she'll be fine in ways that count. No, you don't have a definitive scale of how long she'll be there. Yes, you're sure. Faulty oracle, remember? 

You don’t like thinking of MC that much, to be honest. She’s not at fault, of course, you’re sure she’s a sweet brave soul you would adore, just. Her existence — her being your sorta creation (well, mainly infold’s and a bit yours) and even you, in a way — leaves you wrong-footed. Especially with all the LIs interactions piling up, and their buddy-buddy attitude as of late. Surely, being their friend is the best outcome. You’ve even gone through all this trouble to — warn them. Give them the tools to figure things out and lighten the load. Yeah.

But this evol thing, possible protocore syndrome and the rest — freaks you the fuck out if you look at it too closely. So you don’t.

You finish your obnoxiously large pot of coffee somewhere closer to lunchtime. By that time, you’ve shed some of the wariness of the future and the plot, and your thoughts circle to Xavier’s warning. Not so safe in Linkon, eh? The fact that you’ve been dropped in the world with superpowers and monsters with no weapons or useful skills to your name is depressing. But, you’re a civilian, so why even bother.

Unless… And that’s a dangerous line of thinking, isn’t it? But you do have an evol. The why and how are insignificant (to avoid the panicked screeching in your mind), the right question here is what you can do with it. Is it really purely a support power? Is there truly nothing you can do without involving someone else? 

You sit in front of your laptop, habitually turn on vpn and open an incognito window. That's probably not enough, not even close, but it's all your internet safety knowledge can ask for. 

—

Okay, so resonance has more meanings than you’d thought, actually. There’s stuff related to physics, chemistry, astronomy and all the other sciences you’re vaguely interested in but unfortunately not very good at. You try to parse through the vocabulary you haven’t used since school days, with minimal success. It’s even more than that, somehow, but then, yeah. Your knowledge is decades old at this point.

Okay, okay. Natural frequencies. Synchronous vibration of neighbouring objects, a composite of two or more structures of higher energy… Jesus. Okay. What do we have?

You can maybe resonate with objects? Like, non-living things? You wonder what that would look or feel like, actually. And what even is the point?

You look around your place, trying to find something useful, but everything just looks… ordinary, plain. Not impressive, hm. Okay, a thought to ponder later, then. You scribble it down in your diary with many question marks. All set. 

Can you produce, you don’t know, energy or whatever on your own? You subconsciously must have matched your freak— meaning, vibrations or frequencies with the others’ evols, so. You could try to imitate it again? Recreate the feel of it? Hm.

You close your eyes and focus, too reminiscent of your half-assed stint at meditation in hopes of reducing anxiety, and the reminder isn’t– that enjoyable. The whole thing isn’t. Your mind is usually too active, snarling and bucking, fleeting in every direction at once, instead of a well-constructed understandable monologue, ugh. There’s no one guiding you, you’re alone with your thoughts and the turbulent fluctuations of your… evol. Still, an attempt should be made. Who to choose for this?

The wind evol of your counselor is overshadowed by the might and fireworks that were LIs’ evols. The memory pales in comparison, and you need something solid, something your mind can snatch and pull.

Maybe not Rafayel, you decide after thinking back on the heat and fire. With your luck, you'll end up both failing spectacularly and somehow burning the house down, Sadly, no.

That leaves Xavier. You think it over. Light is probably relatively safe, it won’t raise any suspicions, and his was the closest in time, freshest in your memory.

At first, thinking of Xavier makes you flustered, which isn’t helping. But once you strip all that away– you feel weirdly floaty and detached. Huh, neat. You remember the feeling of the vastness, the blankness of space and its expectant gaze on you, it’s like you’re there. Maybe not you-you, but— something close enough. 

It’s a bizarre experience. The greeting light comes easy once you let go of the metaphorical reins. You feel it pulsing behind your closed eyelids. Cautiously, you open them.

Holy shit. It worked. This is.... Holy shit. 

This is a complete gamechanger, you think giddily. Xavier can teleport with light, can’t he? That’d be hella useful. Hey now, hold your horses, you barely managed to summon a small pitiful flickering light, and you're already thinking about wormholes and speed of light? Bro. 

Also, you don't know if he feels anything when you basically borrow-recreate his evol. Would he even notice? Are you resonating with him long distance? Ahaha, social distancing resonance, covid throwback. Um. 

No, probably not. Otherwise the light would be more impressive. Yeah. It's still plenty impressive! Cause it's yours. 

Doesn't Xavier summon a sword from light? Could you theoretically do the same? But you wouldn't even know the first thing about it. To start, how to use the damn thing. And for a sharp pokey-stabby you don't necessarily need a sword. Made of light. But it would be handy (and hella rad).  

Alright, that’s enough. You might be a bumbling fool, but you did something! Made progress, even. Time to document your findings and– yeah. Celebratory snacks!

—

It's time to deal with some of his former colleagues. Thanks to Xavier’s new contact, (who is now leaning more and more into an associate territory, growing a degree of– preciousness to them, especially in the light of recent revelations), he knows the concrete whereabouts of one of them, which is a great starting point. 

The resonance can't be a simple coincidence. When his eyes landed on her, he knew. With his whole being, the weight of the truth settling in his body comfortably, with certainty and relief. 

With them, it’s a mixed bag. Some things make sense, some don’t. He can't trust them implicitly. The years he's lived rid him of naivety. (But something about them makes him want to trust them. And that, in itself, is odd.) 

The familiarity with which they speak about people they have no business knowing, the aloofness concerning many things and events they couldn’t have witnessed is unsettling, he can admit. But also has a certain charm. A kindred spirit. Being able to see through the fabric of time perhaps allowed them to experience many lives, live through many stories. Something he can relate to, finds comfort in. He very much does love good stories. 

So the resonance— and the home-love-together feeling of it is jarring. It should be wrong. It’s strange that it isn’t. Whatever their past or future may be, they hold something too close resembling— These musings are pointless. What he knows, what he felt is enough. He’s decided he will protect them regardless.

There’s something tugging at him, and he blinks back into full awareness. He stills, evaluating the feeling. It’s not a physical sensation, as such. More on the spiritual level, which he’d rather not meddle with. He sighs. And looks inward. 

Hm. Interesting. If he wasn’t so attuned to, so in sync with his power, he might have even missed it. The drain is– minuscule, laughably tiny. And yet, it’s there, trickling to somewhere far, but not too far. Still in Linkon. He has a guess, but leaves it be. It cuts off abruptly after a moment, anyway. 

Chapter Text

You're trying to make this resonance thing a habit, make it feel natural, however alien these powers still are to you. When you come home, you flick the lights on through the 'breathe in-bask in the space-breathe out' instead of hitting the lightswitch. It's becoming second nature slowly but surely. Can this be your training arc? Will there be a montage, with the 'Eye of a Tiger' soundtrack? 

After the resounding success with Xavier’s evol, you’re eager to try Raf’s. You bought a pack of soy candles, because it might be helpful to have a focus point — a wick. What else are you supposed to safely light on fire, right? This is the future, they don't have gas stoves anymore. (And it wouldn’t be safe to attempt to light a gas stove without previous practice anyway. You’d be Caleb 2.0, but with no fanatical scientists to whisk you away for nefarious goals.) 

You lay it out all prettily on your kitchen table and sit down, giddy. Finding Rafayel-shaped vibrations in the ephemeral space of your mind is easier than you thought. (Is it the Bond– shhh.) You take a moment to just enjoy the lapping waves of flames that warm you inside out, it makes you want to curl up like a snake on a heated stone or something, take a moment to warm your weary bones. 

Once keeping a lid on the eager fire waiting to burst out becomes too much, you just– let it. You don’t need a lot, just a tiny spark to make the wick go ‘wckshh’. As expected, you manage to light it and you woop with joy. Damn, you're making progress, easy as you please. Maybe too easy. But let's not let your paranoid nature take away from the glory of this moment.

Your glee is interrupted by a ping of your phone. Oh, c'mon. It’s a message from Rafayel, because the timing has it out for you personally and can’t be more suspicious.

'yo what are you doing?'

You snap a pic of the lit candle and shoot back, 

'Having a candlelit dinner. Very romantic of me' 

Wait, wait, abort! Where’s the undo button? Do not imply anything. At least you had enough decency to not include a goddamned invitation. 

'are you eating candles then? I don see any food on the table'

'Ye you got me I'm a wax eating monster actually. Do not be afraid'

'so thats what you been doing with my evol? lighting candles? how pedestrian and uncool'

Haha, oops, he felt that? That opens up an avenue for so many questions. You’ve been using light evol for a couple of days already, why didn't Xavier reach out to you then? Are you draining their resources? Should you be worried, panicked even? Because you’re certainly well suited for all matters anxious.

'My bad. Can you feel it? Does it idk distract you?'

'nah its fine. do whatever you want. a warning would be nice tho if you ever decide to go all out and actually do something cool’

Just like that? He's taking it suspiciously well. Very chill about it. Well, let’s not look a gift horse in the mouth. That settled, you grin at the candle and the subtle scent of vanilla floating in the air already. Nice.

Nevermind that, there’s another thing still left unaddressed: resonating with objects.

What to take while you’re so keyed-up on your consecutive successes? You’re in the kitchen area, so– a knife is too dangerous for your clumsy ass, maybe a spoon? An ordinary respectable object. Perfect.

You feel it out blind, not even sure what you’re looking for. It just feels like a steel spoon in your hands, nothing more. Hm. Are you approaching this the wrong way? There should be the elusive esoteric vibrations (it’s all very sciency actually of course, but with the state of innovations now, it might as well all be magic to you), but you feel nothing. It’s like– virtually dead in that regard. There's no energy for you to match with. Okay, so. Marking it as a failure, but these things come in abundance with the territory, you're not bothered.

So, is the living aspect necessary then? What do you have that is ‘alive’ at your disposal? It’s somewhat of a morbid thought, but whatever. 

You have one pathetic little plant on a windowsill, which is still miraculously alive after all these years since you’ve moved out. It can be considered alive despite the drooping leaves and drying out, surely? You shift closer to it, staring intently. Well, it’s just a plant. You don’t even know what kind or type of plant it is, other than – green.

Anyway, you cradle the hedgehog-shaped pot in your hands like a babe and try to ‘feel’ it out. What a weird life you now lead, bonding with a plant. Ridiculous. It goes way better than with the spoon, as in – despite its appearances, it’s not dead, but very much alive, actually. Once you match its vibe and try to ‘amplify’ it, as in, raise the godforsaken frequencies, something— happens. You get smacked on your chin with a suddenly shot up stem, and sneeze on the leaves tickling your nose. What the hell. You put it back on the windowsill, dumbfounded. It’s grown beyond a reasonable size and– bloomed? You didn’t even know it could do that. 

You don’t have enough focus to study it properly though, because there are spots in your vision and you feel like a ravenous beast all of a sudden. Huh.  

—

Some time and a ridiculously large meal after, you document your results with a clearer head and let your thoughts wander. It’s been a while since you shot the shit with Tara, how’s she? If you understand the timeline as of now correctly, the aether core hunt is probably on the rise, and MC must have already left for the N109 zone (the texts from The Boys were quite telling), so things must be stressful. Better to check on her, you think with sympathy.

‘How is my favorite girl doinggg?’

She replies somewhere closer to nighttime, when you’re almost done with your nightly routine of alone-time with tea.

‘:( stressed unfortunately’ 

‘Oh no bby what's wrong??’

The dots come up and fade and go through the cycle a couple of times before,

‘Can I call you if you're not busy?’

‘Of course!’ 

You hurriedly hit pause on the show and answer her call. “Hi, girlie. What's crack a lacking? What got you so down in the dumps?”

She lets out a soft sigh, which doesn’t sound right on her. You frown. “Work, family stuff, the usual.” Another sigh. Oh dear. “But also…”

“Hm?” You make an encouraging sound, injecting as much warmth and non-judgment in it as you're able. 

“My friend didn't show up at work for almost a week. And usually it'd be nothing out of the ordinary — another mission or something, but she also hasn't been answering my texts…”

You walk a fine line between sympathetic and cautious in the subsequent dialogue. She's very worried about MC (and of course it's her, who else) and it– troubles you. You don't know what exactly pings odd in this, but you know you'll forget about it soon anyway, you don't really have the capacity to ‘file thoughts away to examine them further at a later time’, you're not built like that.

The outcome is this: you somehow agree to meet up with her the next day after work to visit MC’s apartment for clues. It’s a very stressful affair. The only thing keeping you sane is the fact that you know for a fact that MC is still in the N109 zone and will stay there. You should be safe from any plot-related shenanigans this could unleash. Yeah. 

If all goes well, you’ll celebrate at a cafe with some sweets, if not (which will be the case here, poor Tara), you decide on an adult sleepover situation at Tara’s place where you can console her and maybe bring a fresh perspective to her endless tarot readings over the situation. 

Predictably, you find nothing. No one answers the door when you ring or knock, and Tara wilts. You half-hug and walk her out of the building, and make her sit down on the bench outside to breathe a little. She’s taking it way more seriously than you expected, but maybe your perception is skewed, what with the plot knowledge and the fact that to you they were all just characters not so long ago. 

Your mind is running through ideas of what can cheer her up quick-like, before you have the chance to pull out the big guns (a finished part 2 of sylus fic, where it all began, maybe it'll take her mind off things) once you’re safe and comfy in her apartment. You look around frantically, still holding her hand and rubbing circles on her back with the other.

There’s a flower stand near, which could work, but you’re not sure. Also, a bakery stand with only a couple of customers, not a big line, thankfully — you can be quick and get some sugar into her. Actually, one of them looks kinda familiar, though you can’t put your finger on why. You squint, trying to make out their features– No. No way. Haha. What even– Why is– What is he doing here?

—

The first mission with the Fleet was a tentative success. He’s already started making waves, his reputation preceding him. He’d had to be quick to learn how to keep his emotions firmly on lock, which is so against his nature it’s not even funny. Nevertheless, this shit’s done, and he has a short reprieve before he’s thrust back into action. Good grief.

Caleb takes the first chance he has to come find Pipsqueak. It’s been too long, and he has to see her alive and well in person and make her unlearn the cruel knowledge that he’s not. After that– come what may.

He’s circling her apartment complex in disguise, dangerously unarmed, going in almost blind with as few devices as he could manage. The Fleet and Lucius and the lot are rotten, he wouldn’t put it past them to bug the everloving fuck of everything he owns. So, precautions. 

She’s not there. From the windows, the door, the balcony — nothing. Checking heat signatures — cold and abandoned. He leashes the rising panic. He knows she should be at home, he checked her work schedule and her friends seem to be busy with other people. Right, okay. Maybe she’s out, grocery shopping or something, that’s a thing. He’ll just wait for her then.

He blends into the crowd seamlessly, walking through the garden, fleeting from vendor to vendor, casual and ordinary, keeping an eye out for Pips in the people coming to and fro, she wouldn’t miss a chance to get some tanghulu, he’s sure of it. 

He’s standing in line for some snacks when his eyes snag on another face. It’s them. What are they doing here, of all places? He carefully retreats even further behind the jovial mask. And they’re not alone, that’s Pip’s colleague, hm.

He planned to check on them as well, when he gets more information to reliably pin down their routines, but this is– unexpected. Tentatively good? 

They’re on the bench, brooding over… Tara, was it? Their posture is a bit tense, though it doesn’t take away from the comforting presence they’re trying to project for the sake of their… friend?

He doesn’t get the chance to plan on how to proceed — it all crashes just because they spot him back. The change is instantaneous: their whole body locks up and they stare at him, wide-eyed for a moment, before adopting a very stern-looking expression that doesn't match the soothing murmurs they pacify their friend with, and march towards him with intention. 

This is a new development. Last he saw, they tried their damn hardest to get as far away from him (which he feels totally normal about, uh-huh). He could melt into the crowd, easy as you please, and disappear without a trace. But he decides to see how this will play out.

They approach him with determination, no hints of fear. (The relief–) Just eyes jumping all over his face, manic around the edges, like they're holding on by a thread and barely believe he's– what? Alive? No, it's not that. Interesting, what is it then?

“What are you doing? You shouldn’t be here!” they whisper in urgency after ordering some buns and two bubble teas from the vendor. Showing their hand so readily? They are frazzled, sure (and oh, the instant urge to level their problems to the ground is not unwelcome, but still jarring), so some concessions can be made. 

“And why’s that?” You can learn a lot, he found, from not giving away your unawareness of the state of your relationship with somebody. If he plays along, he will see — in their actions and words, their level of familiarity — how close they really are. Maybe get a glimpse of the nature of their connection. 

“Argh!” they helplessly throw their hands upwards like a cartoon character. He can’t help but smile more naturally, hiding the fondness threatening to build up in a teasing hum. 

“Where are your… are you by yourself here?” they ask instead, cautious, concern clouding their expression. He wants to wipe that look off their face, but it’s a tricky guess-work what will appease them and what will make them worry even more. Truth is, of course, an option. (Also, interesting choice of words here, where are his… what? Friends? Handlers? How much do they know?)

“Mm-hm, I’m all by my lonesome.” A light and easy tone, no need to put them on edge yet, they’re unbalanced as they are already. 

“Suuure,” they squint in suspicion. They rub their eyebrow in a gesture of distress, and his resolve wobbles but stays put. He’s all over the place emotionally since they entered the picture, which is plain bad. Sober up, Caleb. “Right. Whatever, I– I can share some useful info, might as well.” A sigh. “Do you have secure methods of communication?” 

Now, that’s unexpected and way too straightforward. He’ll snatch the chance to have reliable means to reach them nonetheless.

He hums a confirmation, trying and probably failing to not stare at them too intensely. The need to just– have them close and safe and sound is overwhelming. He acknowledges what he's feeling, but will carefully sort through that later.

They hand him their phone — now, that's a dangerous decision on their part. He doesn't feel inclined to do more… rash things as he hasn't prepared the devices in advance, their meeting today was by chance, but still. Point stands. There’s trust there, good.

He’s surprised to see the [__] app. Who even are they, to have something like this? No matter, it works to his benefit, he won’t have to connect his servers and possibly jeopardize himself in the process. He opens it and quickly adds the codes to build the connection to his account. After activation the chat appears. Good, hums the more insane part of him. He returns the phone before his hands start itching to install a tracker on it. 

“Listen, I have to get back, my excuse is this close to running out of polite pretenses.” They gesture with the drinks and the sugary-smelling bag, “But it’s been great to see you.” They breathe out, stunned at their own words themself, blush starts creeping in and their bewildered expression at their own expanse makes Caleb go through quick compartmentalization to not break down in laughter. He is inappropriately giddy. He will cherish this moment, he wants to bottle it up and keep it.

That was surely an interesting turn of events.

—

Sylus is busier than he could’ve been. Pulling the stunts he has to, now, is no easy task. He had to plant the scientists somewhere and impress the importance of loyalty on them. Bind them in contracts so squeaky clean, nothing can get out.

All pales in comparison to her. She’s finally here, with him, but—

He thought her attitude to be a performance at first. Playing hard to get, prickly and snapping, like a kitten, and he played along, the role of a predator slipping on comfortably, like no time has passed. 

And only then he sees it, by no revelation of his own. She's scared of him. Disgusted. 

She, who could give as good as she got, wrathful and beautiful in it, cunning, his perfect match in battle and out of it. But now — she's cowering. Helpless in her directionless anger and fear clouding her judgement.

He keeps a respectful distance then. Regards her almost like a stranger, again.

She doesn't remember. She doesn't know him. Even her soul feels like they're back to square one, closed off and wrathful towards him. And that's a bitter pill to swallow. How do you reconcile something like that?

It’s even worse since he’s got a taste of– let's say camaraderie here, on earth. Having that usually proved to be enough for many hateful and spiteful things to slide down his back harmlessly. But not this time. 

Maybe that's why the ‘seer’ was so reluctant. Said “good for you”, but unsure, almost apologetic. He shouldn't bring them into his personal matters, yet he's tempted. To ask, if there's hope. How long will it take to have her by his side once more, as an equal, a confidant, a… companion. 

No matter, it's almost time for the closing act. 

Chapter Text

Still rattled from the Caleb jumpscare — and nghh why is he so– those arms are lethal. And the boobs? Jesus fucking christ, not the mommy milkers, you're only human (you want to scream into a pillow and start another fic, with android tricks this time. No angst for this boy, though, only fluff and smut and vibrating dildos). You toddle up to Tara, presenting her with your offerings of sweet sustenance. She latches onto it like it’s her last hope, and you can empathise. You bite into the bun spitefullly and think.

Caleb’s mask is good, he is composed and shows only precisely what he wants. But it does have cracks. The tightening of his neck muscles and fleeting evaluating glances that show way too much emotion for you to be okay, whoosh. You don’t know what came over you and how the fuck you managed to proactively lead the conversation without expiring. And you also have a way to contact him now, holy fuck. You'll freak out about that bit later. 

The sleepover commences as was planned. Tara on a sugar high is a different beast. She talks almost at the speed of light and you can only do so much to assimilate all the information she unloads on you. You reach her apartment in somewhat of a daze, arms laden with snacks from a convenience store.

Tara's place is very cute. It has a preppy witchy vibe. The aesthetics should clash, but strangely don't, it all looks very harmonious. You talk and joke while making non-alcoholic drinks together (tomorrow is a workday for both of you). 

You obligingly look over the tarot spread she has for the MC situation — she wrote down the cards that came up in the readings, what it all might mean and so on. It’s all very over the top, but with you here, it's possible to steer the interpretations into a more positive realm through the power of bluffing and bullshittery. This includes a lot of swearing and puppy eyes from Tara’s side, ok-ay. Is it a natural MC progression? Everyone just becomes obsessed as they enter her orbit? 

Speaking of being obsessed with MC — when you have a break, you hide in the bathroom and pull up the chat with Caleb in that intimidating app again. Okay, first things first, he's probably looking for her, so better get that out of the way before he starts a violent rampage in her honour. 

To write the whole story out will take a while, so you'll do it later. But it's better to alert him about the most important things — the chip, the professor and his motivations, his fucked up ‘siblings’ and, of course, bloody EVER. He knows the bulk of it as is, you're pretty sure. No need to terrorize him with tales of the future where he's little more than a machine, a living weapon who is just pointed in the direction the handlers want. Ugh.

To lighten up the mood, you finally get around to the good news. Telling Tara about part 2 of the fic gets her over the moon, it was the right move. After it, you blab on about your other hobbies and shows you watched, and topics flow naturally from one thing to the next until you arrive at ‘family’.

There’s not much you can say here, because in the most literal sense you’re alone in this world in that way. And whatever gripes you had with your family (a lot, your childhood was kinda fucked up, but not tragic backstory level compared to, like, most characters here, so), you managed to resolve them somewhat after moving out and years of therapy.

You give her an abridged version, bullshiting here and there so she doesn’t think you’ve lost the plot. Tara is a very empathetic person, she even clasps your shoulder in support, words infinitely kind, and you almost tear up again.

Her family also had their fair share of drama, and you listen with interest — her character wasn’t as developed in the story, so this look inside her life is eye-opening. She has siblings who are chaotic monsters, just like her, and frighteningly competent at what they do, well, again, just like her. She also tells you that, yeah, she's not the oldest, actually. “I had an older brother, but I’ve never even–” she sniffles. You immediately sidle up closer to comfort her, of course, while your thoughts are spiraling, your mind spinning. 

You've heard the theory, seen the screenshots, they really do look very much alike. But. O–okay. Putting that on the burner now, you have a friend to comfort. You'll reunite them some day somehow. You'll figure it out. They'd like each other, you think. Such lovable puppies, these two. 

—

Run ragged trying to put out the fires in the suddenly upset balance of the schemes, Rafayel is very close to snapping. EVER is retreating a bit, displeased by some thing or other, more bodies are turning up dead by the day (including some of his contacts), and he hasn't painted in just as long. He's tired, irritated and manually keeps murderous urges at bay. What he needs now is a judgement free friend and comfort or a long retreat into his studio. He can't afford the latter now, and all his friends are judgy and opinionated, but he will wrangle all the comfort he can from his kinsfolk.

Talia looks at him for all of two seconds before enveloping him in a hug, and he sags into the embrace, no energy left to apologize for all the grime and blood he's getting on her tailor-made housedress. She bullies him into the bathroom while he keeps a half-hearted complaining monologue going. She rolls her eyes in all the right places, but continues the mother-henning. 

After soaking in the bath until he's more water than anything else, he wraps himself in the softest robe and patters out into the kitchen, where of course, the table is already groaning under the weight of dishes. Ah, how Talia knows him well. 

Fed and watered, he feels more alive, focus shifted from bloodlust to something more humane. He can finally retract all the more feral characteristics and melt into a puddle of petulant child. Because that's what he wants to be right now. 

Talia imperially raises an eyebrow, and he winces. Yeah, fair. It's been a while since his last visit and even longer since he's let himself wander so far down the mercenary lane.

He doesn't apologize, but does the next best thing and burrows into her side on the couch and endures her condescending head pats. It's more for his benefit, sure, a gentle reminder rather than cutting words (Sea knows it's been a trial and a half to figure out their dynamic and learn not to step on all of each other's sore spots and air out grievances right away instead of letting them fester — they're both vicious beings by design, after all, mercy and kindness don't come easy). He'll sober up and share in a bit. Just a few more minutes of uncomplicated family-feels. 

When he feels sufficiently sane and stable, he word-vomits all (well, not all, but the important and not classified stuff) that's been going on onto Talia. Bond is a sore subject, but he powers through. It's about time he shares this pain and confusion. 

“There's no mistake, dear.” Talia shakes her head, perplexed. “It's one soul that is tied to you. How can one soul be split into two people,” her eyes cloud over in thought, “I don't know, darling, I really don't.”

He hides his face in her midsection, defeated. Great. That doesn't clear it up, at all. There goes his last hope. He can't choose and he doesn't want to. Soulmates are precious, and each bond is unique and should be guarded and valued and—

He knows the fanatical nature of his kind’s obsession. Especially after the brutal eradication and going into hiding among the common folk. Mates are their centre of the universe, their guiding torrent, their solace. Having two is a blessing. (And he has too few of those to– disregard– that’s not even an option.)

“Do they know each other?” She asks carefully after a pause.

“I'm not sure.” He shakes his head, trying not to dislocate her hand in his hair, “One of them is certainly aware and knows a lot about the other, who is in the dark, as far as I can tell.”

Talia hums in thought, the sound a soothing balm to his distress over the whole situation. “Would arranging a meeting help? To explore the possibilities? You know many unions in our community include more than two people, Raf. Maybe you can check if they’re open to the idea.” She pauses. “Are you open to the idea?” 

“To have twice the amount of cuties?” he huffs, “Sounds like a grand time.” 

At the same time, he droops. She's in the N109 zone for the time being, busy and distant, and he's been trying to get to know them, but it's slow going. They keep him at an arms length while flip-flopping all over in their attitude towards him. Also they become an interesting combination of sad and uncomfortable every time she comes up in the conversation. 

He could easily imagine the three of them basking in shared affection and maybe even lost in each other and the throes of pleasure. He has always been a sensual being, these things come naturally to him. Keeping things platonic — that is going to be difficult. But he will respect their choices either way. One soul split into two. How even—

—

Your counselor notifies you that she needs to reschedule your session, her urgent tone evident even through the message. Of course, there's a substitute available since your medical whoopla is important. You think if you should share the good news — you've been using your evol plenty, even on such trivial things like roasting marshmallows. (You wanted to try it out of nostalgia, and it took some tries and disabling a smoke alarm, but the important part is that you did it! And it was, in fact, delicious. Rafayel didn't agree that the browned melting blobs on the photo could taste anything but nasty, the snob.)

After deliberation, you let her rejoice over the fact that you resonated not with one, but two (!) evolvers, and her relief is obvious even through text. Sure, yay, you. 

You don't tell her about your experiments though. You don't know why it feels like something that should be kept close to your chest, maybe your irrational paranoia flaring up again, and it feels stupid, because, well. It might help future babies with Anhaunsen evol. And, she's a professional, she can help. Maybe you've chosen some very convoluted and roundabout way of doing things, because you don't know of a straightforward solution. And still, you'll hoard it like a squirrel its last nut. And continue down your chosen (if dumb) path. 

Your appointment at Akso is tomorrow anyway, even if you fucked something up, it'll show. 

Chapter Text

Xavier's growing accustomed to random pinpricks throughout the day. Instead of irritation though, he feels at peace, even a bit in awe of their audacity. As they grow bolder, more feelings from their end start seeping through, too. So now he orients himself less by the drain and more by the uplift of warmth-home-together. It's small and hazy, but still brings a secret smile to his face. He didn't even know resonance can do that, she certainly never tried to use it this way. 

His proceedings are going suspiciously smoothly, and he can loosen a bit, less an unfeeling man on a mission and more himself. That's something at least, to soothe his overwrought mind (his heart is taken care of by flares of home-love-companionship).

He has to bite the bullet and check in with Sylus soon, the man has his hands full and is elusive to boot, but Xavier’s been circling closer to the N109 zone for a reason. (What’s a better place for cutting trails than this lawless land?)

They’re not working together, as a matter of things, more around each other, but try to not step on each other’s toes. Sylus would only benefit from the chaos and unrest, but for some reason he changed tack and is actually helping. Working towards a common goal with a yesterday-enemy is a funny feeling. He doesn’t know if he likes it and if he should get used to it. 

There's another player stirring shit up, but so far their actions proved favorable. He has suspicions about their identity, but it's not pressing yet. He’s too busy picking up the slack on his own end and melting into shadows when his pursuers get too close. What a bother. 

—

To settle your nerves before the appointment, you retreat into the weird in-between mindspace (you need new vocabulary to describe these things) where resonance happens. There you don't have to call on anyone's evol, you can just bask in the feeling of light and warmth. You don't know when you've figured out this neat trick, but it works great towards keeping your emotional stability in check, which maybe isn't that good for you overall, but, well. Whatever works, you're not picky. 

You go to Akso in high spirits, pumped up a bit, even. You mean, you did well, you might even get some patented Zayne's approval. Wouldn't that be neat?

You sit through the regular checkup of breathing and blood pressure with minimal fuss, though your face does warm at the proximity. Being the sole focus, even if strictly professional, of someone so… so! is a lot to deal with, and your feelings are wobbly as is. You don't dare to retreat to your mind palace-thing in fear of messing up the readings.

After Zayne is done documenting your results, and you’ve managed to get yourself in some semblance of order, he turns to you, polite. His face softens with a barely-there pleased smile. (You're gonna melt into the chair, and poor staff will have to scrub you off it.)

“I see you followed my advice, your condition has improved.”

You become boneless with relief, holy shit, wow, okay. “Yeah, I've been practicing lots.” 

Get it together, there’s more, surely. And– You're gonna tell him about things some time soon anyway, right? Though… Xander Sciences are not really a thing anymore, those who are still left probably work under whichever ridiculous name for a company Sylus chose, so. Is it really necessary? But, well, EVER don't give up so easily, they'll try to sink their claws into him one way or another. And his nightmares… will it really help if he knows the truth behind it? (What a turnaround. Weren't you some months ago avoiding all of them precisely for this reason? How time flies.)

Anyway, all of that is for later. As far as you remember, at this point in time nothing completely bonkers or tragic will happen to him, so you still have time. Point is — you could tell him about your evol shenanigans, he's a trustworthy fella and knows a lot. This might be your only option to extract some advice on the situation in a safe and somewhat objective way. 

“Actually, I explored the… limitations of my evol…” he listens intently, and you swallow nervously, embarrassed. What you're saying sounds way too cool compared to what you’ve actually been doing. You don't wanna get his hopes up, haha. In choppy sentences you describe your so-called experiments, finishing it off with: “Anyway. Just wanted to make sure my curiosity, my hubris won't lead to my downfall and, you know, death.”

He folds his fingers in thought, and you can just sit tight, chewing on your cheek. He’s quick with it though, having come to some kind of conclusion, his eyes cut to yours in restrained curiosity, “Fascinating. Would you be so kind as to demonstrate?” 

“Yeah, sure.”

You do the distance resonance shebang, which leaves you a bit loopy as Zayne checks your vitals again.

After rounds and rounds of this, with Zayne tweaking this machine and that, scribbling notes with an almost excited expression — as much as he can show excitement, that is — you're flustered proper. Especially when he loses some of the professional frost to make way for spitfire questions and theories, his hands steady on you as he guides you through tests he suggests. You didn't expect this kind of academic zeal, but maybe you should've.

“If you don't mind, I would like to see it in action personally.” His usual crisp tone smoothed out into child-like wonder, he looks up from his notes to you, and suddenly you’re struck by how young he looks like this, without the edge of formalities and burdens of the position he took so early, sacrificing his childhood for the noble cause. Your heart stutters. There's very few things you could deny him right now. 

“Of course.”

He pushes his chair closer to yours, and the gesture makes you want to weep, this is so– His hand in yours is steady, his scars stark upclose, real. You breathe in to settle the nerves. 

His evol-space (? you'll get better at naming these things, you swear) is cold in a painful way. You can settle there somewhat, but every stretch of your resonance-muscles feels close to a frostbite. Okay, makes sense. He can't control it much, so this is–expected. Sad, but expected.  

Your stupid heart wants to help though, and maybe it's inadvisable, but you pull from your connection with Rafayel to warm the place somewhat, to manageable levels, at least. So it's less of a godforsaken deep end of a tundra and more a nice winter chill. 

The jagged sharp coldness retreats bit by bit, and you feel like you can take a breath. It's nowhere near enough, but suits for now. The connection with Rafayel fades (with a final affectionate brush that is probably just your imagination running wild), while Zayne's roars with intensity.

You're enveloped in a chilly embrace, cool fleeting force leaving sensation akin to touches. Wow. There's something desperate about it, clingy, and you — let it. Caress you, learn you in return, after you so brazenly did–something to it. 

You open your eyes to find Zayne looking at you, dazed, with a light blush colouring his cheekbones and snowflakes in his hair. He looks, dare you say it, cute. 

Zayne clears his throat once he registers you looking at him. “Hm. I see. Quite enlightening.”

You sit nervously, a bit wobbly after everything. Who could’ve thought this resonance thing would feel like you’re basically fondling their soul? Respectfully. (You’re also very hungry — might’ve overdone it, oops.) “What is?” 

“It has surprising benefits for the… other participating parties as well.”

You hum, non-commital. This is news to you. But, to be fair, it's the first time you tried something like this, so. You carefully pat your hair to gently shake off the snowflakes. 

“By the way, uh. Is there a way to keep all of this private?” You probably should've started with that, yeah. In your defence — you were distracted.  

He finishes writing the sentence calmly, and puts the pen on top of his notes, perfectly perpendicular. “May I ask why?”

“Okay, so,” How to proceed? You weren't exactly ready for this today. “Uh… firstly, is there surveillance in doctors’ offices?”

He raises his eyebrows, adding a slow unimpressed blink, “No.” Right, the patient’s privacy and all that.

“Um. Remember Xander Sciences? And the subsequent article on their very shady research and conveniently vanished staff?”

He turns serious and suspicious, gaze calculating as his view of you starts recalibrating. You need this to work out in your favor, so you don't let him finish his thought process, “So, there are people who wanted to fund this shit,” oops, disapproving glare at the cursing, your bad, “Including the project…” should you say it? Should you? Fuck, but it's a gamble, “...you worked on with Carter.”

He stops, his eyes stuck somewhere between widening in shock and squinting in suspicion, so they just don't move. Huh. He carefully closes the notebook he was writing in, straightens the pen next to it and folds his arms across his chest. This is all very intimidating, don't drool! Take this seriously, goddamn it. 

“How have you come across such information?” 

It’s getting hard to focus, what with the exhaustion after so many resonance activities, but the adrenaline tides you through. Thankfully, your ditsy seer persona is coming in handy once again! You flutter your arms with an unconcerned flare, leaning in, "Plagued with visions, lad. And so far, they've come true, so.” 

Oh, that piqued his interest. Ah, right, Dawnbreaker nightmares, oof. You soften, “But the future isn't set in stone, okay? We've already changed things for… the better, hopefully. I only understand so much, to be honest.” 

He seems like this is a lot for him. Yeah, you unloaded revelation after revelation on him without any preparation. You could've handled it better, ‘we’ was a telling slip of the tongue, but he doesn’t seem focused on it, thank the gods. Oh no, Zayne's now pinching the bridge of his nose, sighing. Poor fella.

“Fine. We can continue this in… unofficial capacity I suppose. Assuming you'd like to continue, of course.”

Oh. This is— better than you expected. Even if it came out worse, you'd agree almost to anything right now, you think. Being this hungry and tired isn’t great for decision-making. “Perfectly fine by me.” 

He shuffles the papers in a suddenly unsure gesture. Maybe he's still processing– all of that, you don't blame him. “There's a person I'd like to see you resonate with to document the effects your evol has the potential for in terms of improvements of chronic conditions.”

That's a lot of words that you totally heard just now, and your vision is definitely not swaying in front of you. “Oh. Okay?”

“I understand your reservations about privacy in these matters, but I'd rather we proceed here, where the equipment is available. I, as you can imagine, don't have a personal clinic.”

Yeah, sounds fair and reasonable. You don't think you have to stress the importance of discretion to Mr. I go to Snowcrest to visit my retired teacher and totally nothing else. You just nod, and it makes you more dizzy. Might've been a bad idea to do that, but, oh well. 

He slowly nods back, his eyes skimming your tense posture with concern. You can probably pass it off as nervousness. God knows you're as awkward as they come. “Then I'll arrange the meeting. Please don't forget to confirm your appointment in accordance to your schedule.”

It's evident he wants to say something else, and you're trying to focus, you swear, but you see two, maybe three blurry Zaynes right now. It's a real shame, you want to see Zayne in HD. You decide to close your eyes to save yourself the trouble of witnessing your vision going low graphics mode.

His voice is somewhere between composed and a bit lost. There's a cool hand on your forehead that you lean into. Ah, bliss. “It seems you're feeling worse after the procedure. Has this happened before?” 

You hum contentedly at the chill weight keeping your nausea at bay. “A few times, when I got a bit overexcited and, well…”

He speaks in a gentler cadence, soft around the edges, “What helped previously? We’ll go from there.” You squint half-heartedly at him, because it feels impolite to have a conversation with your eyes closed.

“Food. And– ugh, rest.” You say, dejected.

“I see.”

—

After your frankly embarrassing fiasco at the hospital, where you were led to the cafeteria by Zayne after you inhaled several protein bars he gave you (which! he totally didn’t have to! how sweet of him), it’s done. Checked off your to-do list. Jesus Christ. 

Also, yeah, as evidenced, a peculiar predicament of thoughtlessly resonating every chance you get made you hungrier on the regular, not only in extreme cases. And that's not a problem, much, but you're too lazy to cook. You usually eat twice a day if you can stomach it, appetite is all but a faint memory in the background while your whole focus is mostly on work and crazy ideas and whatever else your mind has latched onto. So. To actually feel like you're hungry is a bit of a novel thing. 

You take stock of what you know of nutrition. You've already had to revise your diet after the medical evaluation, banning lactose and high cholesterol containing foods. Ugh. You still allow yourself indulgences, you want to be happy and food is a good and easy way of bringing joy. 

But now you need to focus on protein dense foods — not a lot in volume, but rich in nutritional value. You're still too busy to eat, like, 5 times a day to feed your growing needs for energy. So, nuts and various lean meats. Tons of veggies because you're terrified of indigestion (your mother's fear mongering left quite the mark), whole grains and the rest. 

You buy a multicooker for your efforts. Gone are the microwavable meals and canned foods you tried to save with your abundance of spices. Now you set time aside for meal-prepping on the weekends. How bothersome. What's next, working out regularly? You can already feel your mind whining in protest. Right. 

Among all that, you learn that MC has returned, no worse for wear. Tara’s relieved but still fretting messages at least confirmed that, if Sylus’s carefully worded texts with desperate undertones didn’t do so beforehand. (Poor guy, he’s probably not taking her, to put it lightly, uneasiness with him very well.) 

You sure are a popular conversation buddy, huh. Because Caleb starts asking uncomfortable questions too. 

Your saving grace is that he's now on the hella long mission in the deepspace tunnel and won't come back to demand answers in person. Because then you'd fumble. Bullshitting through messages is at least somewhat easier. 

His first call though knocked you right off your groove in surprise. That’s– very brave of him. Very straightforward. What's weird is that he wasn't pumping you for more information during it. Well, he was, but it was about you. Not your ‘visions’ or MC or whatever, but you. What you like to eat, what are your hobbies, personal goals and views on things. It's very weird. But he's very easy to get along with, especially when you can only hear his voice, without the intimidating vision of him in a Colonel uniform you remember too well and maybe spent more time drooling over than is advised.

It’s all easier to deal with once you go through breathing exercises and have a good look at your loony corkboard situation. It’s a leftover thing from your planning days — just a pros and cons list wasn't enough, and it all spiraled out of control. You really got into your detective disguise character by then, so what happened happened. And it does serve you well, having something reminding you that the constant stress and anxiety over having become so entangled with the plot has a reason behind it. A goal. A lofty one, sure, one you could never accomplish alone, but you’d like to think your involvement changed things for the better. Yeah. 

Chapter Text

With your social life overflowing so suddenly, Rafayel’s message about an upcoming arcade meet-up is expected. You almost made peace with being fate’s personal playtoy at this point. Sure, let’s throw you into the throng of things and see you flail, how fun. 

You will not put effort in. Rafayel may look like a model straight off the runway, with his penchant for corset-like belts and embroidered blouses, but this is just a chill hang-out. Yes. So you will dress accordingly. Like you're meeting one of your homies, cause you're basically are. 

It goes as planned — chill with a side of unrequited romantic tension (sue you, resisting the urge to bite his cheeks and squish him is no easy task). You inevitably fail, because plushies evade your grasp, recognizing you as a superior predator, probably. At least, this is how you console yourself.

Rafayel, despite his many promises of bullying you over your awfully mid (and that’s being generous) skills, is a total sweetheart, cheering you on and even winning you plushies you really wanted but couldn’t get. This is not a date, you remind yourself. It’s not, even though it really feels like one.

In a pause when you’ve exhausted your combined tokens, and you happily nuzzle into the plush goodness (a sheep with a fuzzy bell, it’s so precious you could cry), he obviously wants to ask you something, eyes twinkling, but with a hint of nervousness present. Oh, this must be important —

The crash has been inevitable, you could almost feel your dreadful plot-senses tingling before it happened. Yep, Xavier calling your name in a pleasantly surprised voice, like he hasn’t been sniffing out your meet-ups with Rafayel with frightening accuracy. Does he have special enhanced senses for that? Because, seriously, what the fuck. 

—

And so begins the weirdest game of chicken, with you in the front row. They hint at things in seemingly innocent phrases, having a fully different conversation in looks and well-placed gestures. It’s evident they’re talking about Top Secret stuff, and you’d be glad to stay out of it, you would. However.

Okay. You sigh irritably when they start another round. This won't work if they continue dancing around it like poorly socialized schoolchildren. Whatever suspicions they have of each other need to be aired out and settled. Everybody needs to work together for the whole fixing-the-plot-making-everybody-happy-yay to even have a chance to succeed. 

You put your hands on your hips in poor imitation of a scolding mother (don’t laugh, otherwise it won’t work on the two overpowered godlings you have here) and clear your throat in a reproachful manner. 

That shuts them up real quick, and you’re a bit surprised at the efficiency of your act. Wow, okay. Now you have two towering powerhouses looking at you with bashful looks, shoulders slumped, the works. That’s not enough to deter you from dealing with this mess hands on. (Well, at least you’ll try, the rest is up to them.) 

You almost take them by the scruff (there’s no need, they follow you willingly — one intrigued, the other almost eager, it’s–yeah, crazy as anything to past- and present-you) and march towards your apartment with these two in tow. Is your place secure? Probably not. But it’s the one nobody will look into. It pays off, being an npc.

You half-heartedly wave welcome and despair at the lack of guest slippers. You don’t really have guests, and it’s a stupid thing to fixate on — nobody will die by walking on your floor in just their socks, but.

To set to rights your failings as a gracious host, you aggressively give them blankets and put on a kettle, taking out your mismatched mugs.

“Okay. Food first, no shop talk on an empty stomach.” You perch on your computer chair across from the two menaces on your couch and scroll through the takeout app. “Pizza? Wok? Sushi? What are we thinking, guys?”

You’re met with a united look of bewilderment. They’re both so confused, it’s kinda funny to witness them so off-kitler. It’s also– something else to see Xavier under your crocheted purple blanket with stars. He fits right in, and it– does things to you. Nevermind Rafayel who already made himself at home and commandeered your plushies. Right. 

“Why are we here again? Not that it’s not a lovely place, but…” 

Because you're playing mediator so these two don't kill each other in a misguided view of being– who the fuck knows, rivals for MC’s attention (truth), or on different sides of whatever bullshit is going on underground. But, ugh. (Also, Rafayel giving compliments? That are not back handed? That’s a new one.) 

It’s easier to just– “Because. Anyway, orders?”

“Anything that has meat in it.” Xavier blinks sleepily, seemingly content with his lot in life. Okay, sure. 

“Roger that. Raf?”

He puffs up, indignant, but rattles out, “Salmon poke bowl and tuna rolls.”

You add a pizza on top of that, because you can’t go wrong with pizza. And you’ll need something comforting after this shitshow. Was it a good idea? Irrelevant, no backing out now. 

“Okay, while we wait—” You unearth some snacks from the pantry (nuts and rice chips, blegh, so healthy) and make them choose which tea they want. 

“What seems to be the disagreement between you two? State it clearly, c’mon.” That should work, right? 

It's very interesting to observe the ensuing – conversation? Confrontation? Soap opera? 

Xavier projects his harmless demeanor like he's the reasonable non-confrontational one. Sure, like any of you forgot how the first meeting went, christ. This play at civility is even more ridiculous in that light.

Rafayel, however, shed his air-headedness and frivolity, going for a straightforward approach, which is kinda surprising, but is progress? Maybe? You adore the savage ruthless that emerges from the pleasant mask. God, but he’s beautiful like this. 

What's even more interesting, Xavier seems to be in agreement — his looks turned considering, drag over Rafayel’s figure in detached appreciation, it's a whole thing.  

No matter how entertaining that is, you had it up to here, very tempted to just yell something along the lines of ‘You wanna kiss each other so bad it makes you look stupid’ at them and revel in pure spluttering that’d follow. 

Your lapse in judgment rights itself with your phone demanding attention. It’s not a delivery person, but Sylus. Of-fucking-course it is. A classic shitshow of an evening, part 2: Electric Boogaloo. 

‘Are you available for a chat? 

It’s not a pressing matter.’

Nice of him to add that. You look up to the two men hashing it out. Xavier glances your way in a seeking look you don’t know how to decipher, so you just give him two big thumbs up. He relaxes. Okay?

‘Sure, when are you free?’ 

Your life is crazy, absolutely bananas, that. Chatting with a mafia boss like it’s a normal occurrence and your body won’t be dropped in bags in some seedy alley for a word misspoken. Ha-ha.

In the mere minute you were chatting, Rafayel and Xavier seemed to find a common ground and now talk like civilized adults (clutching emotional support plushies not taken into account). They're getting somewhere, good. 

Your doorbell rings, finally, and in your haste to open the door you stumble over your covered crazy detective corkboard leaning on the table. It falls over, and you can only curse. Well, no need to keep the delivery person waiting. You power walk to the door, ignoring snickers behind your back. Children, the lot of them. 

Opening the door— You have the strongest urge to just shut it and pretend it didn't happen. And so you do.

A husky voice, muffled by the door, asks in good humor, “What, not even a greeting?”

Sylus can shove his greeting up his– you need to calm down. Yes, this is complicated, yes, Rafayel and Xavier are starting to make interested noises about the commotion. But you’re in charge here (you’re not), you can handle this (you can’t).

You open the damn door. “When I said ‘sure’, I didn't mean now. ”

“Well, hello to you too. And to your lovely guests.” He smirks, pleased, and presents you with— the takeout you ordered. What. “May I come in?”

“You’re not actually a vampire, right?” The parallels are funny. Hilarious, yes, let’s focus on that, on the absurdity of this evening. “Nevermind, come in, take off your shoes. Do you want tea?”

This is too much for your poor brain to handle, so you just– throw him to the wary and a hair’s breadth away from murder guys in your apartment. You’ll just make more tea, yes. This is your mission. You’re gonna go to that corner of your very limited living space and try to blend in with the walls. 

“Sure. Your choice is fine.” He magnanimously inclines his head, lowering the bags on the table in front of your other guests. You scatter to the relative safety of your kitchen nook. 

“Lumiere,” he greets. Xavier’s expression becomes pinched. Well– “And little red is here too, how fortunate.” 

Rafayel just grunts. “ ‘M not little, you overgrown salt pillar.”

Oh god. Not the biblical references, that’s a way to tip you over from giggly-nerves straight into hysteria. A deranged hiccup of a laugh slips out. Everyone tenses. Damn, how emotionally constipated and uptight they all are, but you can’t really judge them for it. You have enough self-awareness to acknowledge that you’re far from sane and stable too. 

You very bravely march three meters to the low coffee table in front of the couch, which is brimming with charged atmosphere. Joy. 

Another problem arises after you’ve set the new mug with calming tea (one can hope) on the table. Sylus has nowhere to sit. You observe your little studio apartment with three tall intimidating dudes crammed in it. And you, but well. Your goblin self could contort into a vaguely human-shaped ball and squirrel away into an attic to live among other critters, so. 

They all look at you with various ranges of reserved caution, expectation and plain confusion. You smile crookedly in the tense silence, “We’re all friends here, m’kay?”

Here’s hoping your subliminal messaging works. About the seating— you offer your bed, why not at this point. “Y’all — help yourselves. I’ll bring– cutlery, yes.” 

—

You’re ill-equipped to host guests, you’ll need to rectify that for the next time. Wait, next time? You eye the group trying to be civil and look dignified among the opened takeout bags and your cringy but well-loved home decor. Your heart contorts in a mix of fondness and tentative hope. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely next time. 

You plop into your computer chair with a slice of pizza in hand. The solid attempt at a polite conversation stops.

“Not to state the obvious, but, what’s that?” 

You follow their line of sight to the corkboard you absent-mindedly righted on the way. It's a thing of beauty you pinned a bunch of shit to in fear-induced inspiration. Some of it isn't even relevant to the case at hand, you just thought it was cute or funny or motivating. (Yes, you printed out memes. The bad ones, from your Era. Xavier’s eye twitches in recognition. You're delighted.) 

Sylus squints at your artistic rendition of his face, “Is that supposed to be me?”

Pointless question, considering the underlined ‘STYLYS’ under it. (You were Very sleep-deprived.) You awkwardly clear your throat and balance the pizza slice in your hand while trying to flip the board with your foot to hide it from greedy prying eyes. The traitorous chair wheels away, and before you can even attempt an inspired maneuver to save yourself and your food, the black-red mist is there to gently catch and right you in your seat. You gulp and blink at Sylus in complete incomprehension. 

The mist snatches the board on the way, carrying it into Sylus’s waiting hands. Xavier and Rafayel lose the pretence of disinterest and crowd around your bed to look at it as well. You stay seated, frozen in your befuddlement, the pizza slice going cold in solidarity. 

Everything is derailed after that, transformed into a 20-questions game on steroids. Or an impromptu planning meeting, if you want to be optimistic. 

You accept your fate and stuff your face with food, while they proceed to question you on, well, questionable content of the board.

“Damn, that’s EVER too?” 

You don’t even need to see what he’s referencing, it’s all EVER one way or another, “Yep. They're fingering aaall the pies, for real.” 

Rafayel makes a face at your wording but nods.

“Who is Zaynie?”

“Dr. Zayne is busy, we don't bother him.” You’ve put on a garish leopard print robe in the meantime (for emotional comfort, sue you, this is stressful) and made yourself comfortable on the chair. Maybe you should buy a cushion for it, that’d be nice.

“But it's okay to bother us?” Xavier tilts his head to the side like a puppy, and luckily for him, he’s too far away for you to pet his hair.

“He's our resident doctor, okay? He's making breakthroughs, saving lives and making sure I don't die.” 

“Understood.” He says solemnly. Well, that’s a quick switch to acceptance. But okay.

“Should we bring him in the loop tho?” Rafayel muses, lounging on your bed (Sylus grabbed the pillows and relocated to the floor to rest his long legs), “Wouldn't it be handy to have a doctor on standby?”

You tap your lip in thought. That was the idea, but, “Maybe. But I don't know how to approach him for this. Medical is one thing, but… If you remember, our meetings weren't exactly– peak cordial interactions.” Haha. 

Sylus smirks, “Don't know about the others, but if I recall correctly, ours was quite cordial, even more than that.” He says it all in purring tones, eyes fallen to half-mast in his performance.

Surprisingly (unsurprisingly?), it works in riling the others up. You sigh. Rafayel sits up, suspicious and biting, “What do you mean by that?” Xavier just stews in a bubble of judging silence. 

You wave your hands, sleeves flapping comically, trying to dispel the tension with the fruitless gesture, “Nothing! I'm a cuddly drunk, that's all. And he didn't kidnap me, despite his streak, so. You know.” 

“Kidnap?” Sylus feigns offence, “I would never.”

You roll your eyes, “Yeah, yeah, and we totally believe that.”

He examines the others, thoughtful. Rafayel fumes, mumbling something and making plans with vigour, Xavier makes the mistake of looking guilty. Sylus appears delighted at that, “No. Really, you kidnapped them? How… quaint.” 

“It was all a big misunderstanding, okay?” No need for tempers to rise in such close proximity to you and all you hold dear, “Whatever, it's water under the bridge.” 

Rafayel breaks the charged staredown between Xavier and Sylus, “Why us specifically? What ties us together?”

“Um.” Whoop-de-doo. “EVER. Yeah. I don't think I need to elaborate?” 

That gets pretty strong reactions. Xavier grimaces while Rafayel looks positively murderous, Sylus curves his lips in a smile that is anything but pleasant, “Personally, no. But I'd love to learn about the remaining two if you'd humour us.”

What's safe to say? Ugh. “Ok-ay. The Xander Sciences that weren't bought by EVER this time — and isn't that a crazy thought, thank you, Sylus — wanted to recruit Zayne for their immortal life bullshit.” You will not get into the whole emissionary thing. Was it even connected to the evil overlords in any way? Maybe it’s in the myths you didn't get, but, well. It's his business. You continue, “Bro's moral compass is commendable, but, you know. Hostages work like a charm.” 

“Sounds like you like him.” Rafayel notes, sulky. How did he even— Yeah, not getting into that.

You colour slightly and cough. Swiftly moving right along, “The Gaia center also experimented on,” you point at the, arguably, most hilarious part of the board, “Caleb, we want to help him.” 

You found some apple stickers and lovingly pasted it all over the printed photo from a college campus interview you found online after some digging. For visualisation, nothing more. (It was a very weird time at a printing center. Thankfully, the workers had seen worse, and were too dead-eyed to ask.)

“The Gaia center won’t be a problem anymore. We haven’t been idle.”

Oh. That's kinda hot. You give Sylus a thumbs up.

“Why do we want to help this Caleb person?” Xavier asks with a weird inflection in his voice. 

Sylus, bless him, doesn't question it. “If you want to help him, we help him. It's as simple as that.” Wow, you're getting a little bit hot under the collar, here. You can’t– not in front of so many onlookers. Later then. ( Never, are you completely nuts?)

After looking closer at the picture, Rafayel hastily interjects, “Wait, isn’t that her–”

“Yes,” you interrupt before he blows the biggest secret up like an overripe watermelon, “It’s your bodyguard’s adopted brother.” That makes many looks sharpen, oh boy. “He’s alive and super cool and talented, but— partly amnesiac and mind controlled. On top of everything. Poor dude.”

Uh, you need to appeal to your audience here, “So, yeah, we’re helping him from the pureness of our hearts and so she can have her gege back. Understood?”

There’s plenty of blank (amused in Sylus’s case) stares all around. The appeal was wrong, evidently. You add, “ And so we have an insider in the Fleet if you want to put it like that. I like the pureness of our hearts better, though.”

Rafayel wrinkles his nose at the mention of the Fleet, Sylus is unreadable as he often is. Xavier stares at the board with burning intensity.

“Is that all that connects us?”

Haha, as if. “Yep. Yeah.”

They don't know their ‘beloved’s are the same person yet. But it won't be long before they put the two and two together. It's not even that hard, it's glaringly obvious, in plain sight and all that. You just hope the realizations will transpire somewhere faaar away from your humble apartment. 

“Speaking of the Fleet,” You turn to Sylus, “Was there anything about the toring chips in those files?”

A slow cat-like blink. “Not as far as I’m aware.” 

You nod, “Makes sense. So. The Toring Institute of Bullshit sponsors the chips for the Fleet, I think. Maybe not them, but—the name fits. It's a nasty piece of mindaltering work in exchange for ruthless combat efficiency.”

You scratch your neck, mind whirring in panic-filled thinking. It’s still a thing you don’t know how to go around, frankly. If the chip and arm are connected, you don't want Caleb to lose his arm. That'd be all kinds of sad. But also, you want him to have autonomy, it takes priority. He'd be an amputee… temporarily. Until you figure something out. You don't think you're in that part of the fantastical future yet where limbs can be homegrown. From flesh and blood and put together seamlessly. 

So. A new arm then. Okay, that's something. Where the fuck would you get the best of the best (because Caleb deserves only the best) state-of-the-art arm, quickly and discreetly? Kidnap some scientists? Or rather — sway their loyalties. Not all of them are the crazied unethical bunch. Most just want to tinker with their science in peace, with funding overflowing and whatever crazy impossible projects approved.

Sylus has already started reviving the scientific hubbub in the zone, you think. He has some scientists too, which are hopefully aware of the importance of all of you getting along well and working towards a happier, not morally-corrupt future.

Why not add to that? With the folks from the Toring Institute? It might prove costly, the materials and what-not, but. Resources are not a problem, with the combined wealth of the bunch of weirdos in your apartment. Will they listen and agree though, that's a question. Ugh. 

“Your schemes are adorably plain and idealistic.” Have you been muttering, or is Sylus a mind-reader? But, he’s right. You droop with your whole body. 

“Doesn't mean they don't have a kernel of a good idea in them.” Oh. 

“Yeah, I'm not much of a strategist.” You smile gratefully at his attempt to reassure you, how sweet, “Too optimistic, perhaps.” 

Which is hilarious, considering your ever-present anxiety. How your paranoia marries with the trust in all that's good and pure is a mystery to all, including you. 

“That you are.” He says– wistfully? It sounds almost gentle. 

“You don't mean to say this crazy plan might work?” Rafayel is definitely not buying into this idea. All of what you suggested has been crazy so far, you don’t know what’s so surprising.

“With some adjustments.” Sylus allows.

Rafayel despairs, “How is this different from bursting into EVER, guns blazing?”

Okay. This was all kinds of bizarre and staggeringly non-destructive. Hey, you'll take it. Maybe they'll all hunt each other for sport as soon as they leave your apartment, but you really hope they won't. 

—

After their fretting and running on fumes seer (who is simply adorable in their too-big robe) bids them all goodbye, Sylus drops the smile.

“Well, gentlemen,” he starts mockingly, "I feel as if a frank discussion is in order.” 

Lumiere–Xavier seems to be running on tension alone these days, but he nods, subdued. Rafayel seethes, hands twitching to summon the knives, possibly, and a cruel smile splits his face. “Oh, for sure, ally-mine.” 

He notifies Kieran and Luke about the change of plans and gestures to his precious baby, a thing of vintage beauty among these boring cars. 

“Well,” he adds, just to be a dick about it, “hop in.”

Chapter Text

Rafayel, Xavier has come to understand, is well-versed in all things subtle and conversational. 

Xavier has got the training for it, and experience, after the long years of his life and the many paths he walked. He’s less of a half-feral brat now, and can step into the regal persona handling his negotiation duties when needed. He just doesn’t particularly enjoy doing so. 

For Rafayel, the wordplay and double meaning, subtle threats, the lot — it all seems intuitive. (Which is interesting, considering his later revealed Lumerian status. The whole plotting and spying is such a human thing, he thought). The same can’t be said about the seer, who with no grace but no ill intent either, bulldozes through their verbal spar and puts a stop to it. Intriguing. And probably a good move, considering the public setting. 

Leading them both home, though— he knows how precious that is to regular people. Taking initiative, he can understand. But trusting this easily, going as far as to lead them to their apartment? 

He looks around the place and yeah — that’s a home. Something he couldn’t quite grasp the meaning of or manage himself at first when he came to Earth. It’s perfect for reading or napping and has a very comforting vibe overall, he feels his posture loosen naturally, with no input from his side. 

In the privacy of their home, the conversation starts up again but swerves abruptly in tone. Rafayel is fascinating in that way. How so many extremes seem to agree in one person is anyone’s guess. He abandoned the cunning silver-tongue negotiator, all performing smiles with none of the dignity, and went straight into a passionate ruthless warrior who’s protecting what’s his by all means necessary. It’s… mesmerizing in a way. He is one catch of an ally, potentially. 

And when he says, “If your interference hurts me and mine, I won’t stop ‘till I get the retribution my kind sees fit,” Xavier believes him. It’s hard not to. This particular shade of possessiveness agrees with him. 

Additionally, It’s truly something to see the seer ride the line between anxiety and confidence as they handle hosting the two of them with enviable zen over the whole thing. Maybe they already know the favourable outcome of this meeting? Is that the reason behind their blasé attitude?

When Sylus joins the fray, it’s peak situational comedy, he can admit. 

Dubbing Rafayel ‘little red’ is a…choice. An interesting moniker for someone bringing fire in their wake. Could also be a jab at his height, considering Sylus’s ego. Overall, this particular group of people — the sheer destructive, nevermind societal, power present — in the unassuming apartment is, retroactively, funny. 

The wretched board derails his attempt at civility— But, hey, it makes sense. It's not a big stretch, after what he’s observed. When ‘MC’ is mentioned in all of their little facts, it's easy to extrapolate and make guesses. 

The words ‘bride’ and ‘soulbonded’ sear into his mind. There's little room for misinterpretation.

He tries to keep calm in the face of absurdity unraveling before his very eyes, for the sake of their dear seer. They are obviously committed to making – this – work. 

And it's not even a chore, he thinks with baffled distress. He has, heavens, experience in dealing with Sylus. Rafayel is easy on the eyes and puts in a lot of effort to move (more like drag) them along in the conversation. Overall, contributes to the cause without having been asked. He’ll— deal with it. 

—

These cocksure bastards. Sylus being the worst offender. Waltzing in like he has the right—

Yeah, time to chill his fiery temper, it's not helping anybody, especially not his bonded, who’s frazzled as is trying to mediate big personalities gathered here. Rafayel isn’t used to this kind of sharing of the spotlight. Sure, lemurian settlements have an abundance of people, loud in every sense, but this– Rafayel fumes, the iron grip on his sizzling powers slipping when the cocky motherfucker insinuates—

Okay, listen. The situation is even worse. Sure, it all circles around the seer, but also her. Adding two more people (and, considering the trend, dangerous and of questionable morality people to boot, ugh) is so messy, more than he expected. Two more wild cards, sea wept. He didn’t even get the chance to get used to the hunter and the fucking mafia boss over here, nevermind the—

“—name fits. It's a nasty piece of mindaltering work in exchange for ruthless combat efficiency.”

The fucking chips, and the Fleet. He can't help but recoil in disgust. He's no stranger to mindaltering things (including exciting lemurian brewed drugs and the whole sea gods shtick, yeah). But when it seeps into government stationed shit, that's when it gets real bleak, he'd say. 

The seer seems to really care about this Caleb, to Rafayel’s dismay. Well, if they want it, he'll help, still keeping his knives at the ready. He doesn't trust this guy one bit. None of them, to be frank. What a shitshow. 

He'll get around to inviting them for a drink, which shall be glorious according to bossman's tip. He taps the displeasure threatening to overtake his features at that. He's playing the long game, it's fine. 

—

No need to bother the nice person while they're still playing ball, Sylus thinks after mere minutes in the presence of their host and others they chose to keep close. They might seem like they don't have a single calculating bone in their body and yet. They're amassing power. Through unconventional means, sure. By befriending, endearing themself to the right people, how foresightful, he'd say. But frankly? It doesn't look like a tactical ruse. It feels genuine, and that is what makes it work.

The board gave some great insights into the other characters. Their stories, personalities, foes. All laid out in a messy scrawl or typed out before his gaze. There are many, an abundance, really, of question marks. It’s obvious they don’t have the full picture, but they’re trying. How honourable. The main problems are very helpfully highlighted, with sticky notes of possible resolutions on top. It’s charming. 

In general, there’s a lot they left unsaid. They mentioned only the things they deemed necessary to know for him, specifically. And a couple of other things he’s uniquely equipped to deal with, like Xander Sciences, and the Gaia research center. EVER is the overarching theme in all of their…profiles. But also ‘MC’. And considering where it is on his profile (“half a soul — w/MC”), it’s quite telling. And he doesn’t like that these impersonal letters seem to represent someone so precious to him, if his guess is correct. And it can’t not be. 

It’s quick work of scanning where she appears in the others’ lists. 

“bond!! w/MC”, “Astra bullshit — cursed to never be w/MC”, “childhood friend, experimented on w/MC”, “smth to replace the core and reunite with og MC, his Queen?” 

Tempering his rage and confusion to not alert their gracious host is a task and a half. He’s gotten better with it after living among humans for so long, but still. He’s switching (rusted at this point) gears for their sake, here. They want them all to get along? How do they think that will work? He might entertain this camaraderie now, while his curiosity permits — long-term planning is useless here anyway, he follows his whims of nature as a rule, nevermind the others’ no doubt complicated feelings over the whole affair.

He will never give up on his endless chase for her, will be by her side in any role she allows, but seeing how deep the connections run for others too…

A wave of familiar hollowness washes over him. It stays seated deep this time. She’s more friendly and open with the others, has a history with them here, in Linkon, and it’s hard not to find himself wanting in comparison. Would she?

There's also a matter of the seer. Keeping miss hunter in the dark is a way to keep her safe, far away from bloody schemes and dangers lurking in the shadows. It's impossible to keep the seer in the dark, the mere notion is preposterous. So now what? They don’t want to get involved personally in it, but seem adamant about their assorted group “ working together”, going as far as to contribute their own ideas. 

And they have a deadline now, he sees. The note under ‘Caleb’ says “reuniting w/MC in ~2-3 months?? after n109 zone”. 

—

It doesn't need to be said. The others' reactions tell Sylus enough. They've come to the same conclusions, solved the puzzle so helpfully provided by their seer. The tension is running high as he drives his baby far from civilization into the shadows. 

“Your whole existence is a cosmic joke.” He hears Rafayel say with reluctant sympathy. How hypocrital, coming from the God of the Tides . Sylus just sighs. 

There’s a bitter laugh from Xavier. 

“You're right on money with that one.” 

Well, aren’t these two a riot. 

The sad attempt at a talk to keep up pretences while they’re in a moving vehicle isn’t going well. So much so, that the composures are cracking and tempers are loose when they reach their destination.

It's a glorious battle. This kind of directionless violence is not needed of course, it's simply a way to expel emotions. Not in the healthiest or productive way, but. It's something. They avoid lethal manoeuvres out of respect. They're in this together, regardless if they want it or not. 

Heavy breaths mingle in the silence of one of Sylus's top-notch training grounds. The whole thing is wrecked. Scorched chunks, shiny metal warped and unrecognizable. Rafayel is lying starfished on the ground, eyes closed. Xavier is leaning on one of the few simulation machines left, expression softened. Sylus swallows a piece of him that yearns. Right. 

Rafayel, curls plastered onto his sweaty forehead, eyes still closed, breaks the unsteady peace of a post-battle, “Have you guys ever tried pearl punch?”

“I don't think I've heard of…such a thing.”

“It's, well, lemurian drugs. Top-notch. Will make you so relaxed you'll melt into the sand—”

—

Zayne is composed and professional on the outside, as usual. But on the inside, his mind is a flurry of activity. His personal research is back on track with new developments, he can’t remember the last time he stayed up late not because of back-to-back surgeries but for the sake of pure scientific curiosity. There’s a new file he’s keeping to make sense of the latest encounter with his peculiar patient — their foreboding words, an indicator of possible less than savory entanglements, and, at the same time, their cooperative and hopeful attitude — a contradiction he’s wary of.  

Did they seek him out, recognizing what he’s been through? No, too far-fetched. Their face however, when they spoke of visions — it’s like they knew his most guarded secret, the shame and guilt he carries with all the lives he–his counterpart has taken…will have taken? in that bleak colourless world.

There’s a ray of hope, however. Their abilities— it’s resonance, but also more. Evol manipulation? He doesn’t like the uncertainties, isn’t satisfied with the theories. The evidence is puzzling, there are too many variables at play, and the result is unpredictable.

He should evaluate what he has come to.

Resonating with them felt different — less rushed and…fuller. Warmer. Fact.

His evol has been more stable after it — by a considerable margin, according to his private evaluations. Fact.

Based on what they said and their behaviour, they’ve exerted a lot of power during the resonance with him, specifically. Speculation. 

They potentially can alleviate her condition. Tentative assumption.

He’d like to say it’s a tough decision, an uncomfortable position to be in — follow his duty as a doctor, which should always be his priority, or — follow this sudden development, take all the precautions he can and come what may, if there’s even a sliver of hope. Afterall, no matter how he’d like to be honourable and take into account their situation with the same level of consideration, she was always— she comes first. 

‘Yo, doc. I’m gonna try this distance thing with your evol, are you free? Can you document your idk feelings on your end?’

He feels the rush of scientific delight threatening to overtake him. But important things first.

‘Do you have all necessary supplies in close vicinity? We wouldn’t want a repeat of your overexertion.’

‘Yeah I’m good dw”

His fingers stall, hesitating. She returned from her long mission and will come for a routine evaluation soon. Should he?

‘Furthermore, are you available on _ _ at _ _?’

‘Yeah, why? You wanna try that thing with that person? Srry i don’t remember it that well’

‘Yes. Then I’ll update your appointment schedule.’

‘Oki. Now on with the fun stuff!! Buckle up!!’