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The day they discuss Unforgivable Curses in class, Nebula has to ask to be excused early.She’s fairly sure most kids under fifteen haven’t already lived through two of the three (multiple times). She’s fairly sure most kids haven’t performed them (sometimes also while under their influence). Still, it sort of stings when she hears some of her fellow Slytherin students (and even a couple of Hufflepuffs, the snarkier ones) snickering as she leaves. They don’t know, can’t know, shouldn’t know, but it stings.It’s a good thing, Nebula thinks, that she’s the last daughter of Thanos left at Hogwarts. Word of this would no doubt get to Proxima, simpering slithering Prefect Proxima, and she’d be shit out of luck. Possibly even subjected to one of said curses (though not till hols, probably, Thanos would want to do it himself). As it is, she’s probably only going to be subjected to self-inflicted punishment, guilt and all that bollocks, which is almost worse.She can hear each curse being cast, now that she’s alone. Crucio: to chastise her for losing yet another duel, to toughen her up. Imperio: to get her to fight even when all she wanted to do was curl up and cry, to make her cut off her own arm for him.She hasn’t been near the third yet, obviously, but she knows that someday she will. It’s a matter of time.“Nebula?” comes a voice from behind her, a soft, unfamiliar one.Nebula hurries to wipe her eyes on her necktie before she whirls around to glare at the interloper. “What?” she snaps.“You are upset,” says the girl. She’s a Hufflepuff, so almost certainly someone who just watched her freak out; she’s wide-eyed and wearing this bow that sticks off of her head like ears or something. “You should not be upset. It was only a discussion.”Nebula rolls her eyes bitterly. “For you,” she says. “It’s sort of personal to me. Besides, why do you care?”“I felt your pain when you walked past my desk,” the girl says, sitting beside Nebula unceremoniously. “Your hand brushed mine and I felt your pain.”“What the hell?” Nebula mutters.“I’m Mantis,” the girl says, “and I feel feelings.”“Weird,” Nebula replies, glancing at her fake arm like she’s making sure it’s still there.“Many people say that,” Mantis agrees, nodding solemnly like it’s not something to be fazed by (and maybe for her it’s not, maybe she’s that kind of weird). “It does not change the fact that you are upset, though.”“Look, it hit a little close to the trashpile I have to call home, alright?” Nebula snaps, because she can tell when she’s not going to win (one thing that her upbringing has taught her to realize). “I’m a big, stupid Slytherin stereotype, abused by my da the Death Eater.”Mantis’ eyes go even wider than they’ve been. “Your father has used Unforgivable Curses on you?”Nebula pushes up her sleeve with a growl. “Imperiused me into slicing off my own bloody arm after he Cruciatused it to fragments,” she says.“Why?” Mantis asks, her voice breathy.“Needed to toughen me up,” Nebula spits out. “I should be grateful, he upgraded me.”Mantis lets out a wail and flings her arms around Nebula, apropos of… well, anything. She sniffles and cries into Nebula’s neck and holds on tighter than anyone has ever held Nebula out of goodwill, and Nebula is too startled to do anything but let herself be held.They don’t move until they start to hear classrooms emptying, and then it’s only down an abandoned hallway where Nebula whisper-shouts, “What was that?”Mantis is still crying, just a little, and she swipes at her nose and eyes before saying, “I felt your feelings.”“Yeah, but now I don’t feel them as much,” Nebula says.“They will come back,” Mantis says. “I can’t take them entirely. But for right now, you are less sad!”“I should be so angry at you,” Nebula mutters, clenching her fists. “You can’t just do that. People’s feelings are private.”Mantis glances at her feet. “My guardian likes it,” she says quietly. “When I take his bad feelings away.”“Shite,” Nebula hisses. “You didn’t let me finish, weirdo. I should be, but I’m not.” She wraps her arms around her own waist, feeling (ugh) vulnerable. “It’s weird, and you shouldn’t do that without asking, but you… you were trying to do something nice. People aren’t really nice to me, so I appreciate that. I guess.”Mantis beams, and it strikes Nebula that she’s more optimistic than she has any right to be. “People should be nice to you,” she says. “You are not your da the Death Eater.” The Scottishism sounds funny through her accent, but she’s sincere.“He’s not my real da,” Nebula says, because that’s important to the story. “I’m adopted. I’m surprised you haven’t heard of my siblings, we’re infamous. The children - daughters, mostly - of Thanos.”Mantis shrugs. “I imagine you are not any of them,” she says. “You are good, in your head.”“Tell anyone that and it’s your end,” Nebula says, but she’s smirking. “C’mon, I wanna take a walk.” “I am also adopted,” Mantis says as they set out toward the edge of the grounds. “Sort of.”“Should I be offering my condolences?” Nebula asks, calculatedly aloof. She’s already emoted more around this girl today than she does around most people in a year, she needs to make up for it.“He is distant, but I have nothing to complain about,” Mantis says, like she’s rehearsed it. (With an arse like that as a guardian she probably has.) “I can be useful to him.”Nebula curls her lip. “Condolences, then,” she says. “You’re not a kid, you’re an unpaid emotional labourer. How are you so nice?”“I don’t know, I just am,” Mantis says, looking genuinely confused. She’s been asked that before, but there is no good answer, and especially not one that Nebula here would accept.“You’re such a ‘Puff, geez,” Nebula teases (probably).“Yes,” Mantis says. “I am, that is my house.”“But like, such a typical one,” Nebula says. “It’s not a bad thing.” She pauses to clear her throat before admitting, “The Hat said maybe if my life had gone totally different I could’ve been one, or at least that I could’ve gone a lot of ways. But Thanos taught me I had to look out for myself, above anything, so Slytherin it is. He’d probably have killed me if not.”“It’s not a bad thing, your house,” Mantis says earnestly. “It means you are very strong, and clever, and you can take care of yourself.”Nebula waves her fake arm with an ironic smirk. “Not very well.”“How old were you?” Mantis asks softly. She knows with a certainty that Nebula will tell her, because she knows that Nebula doesn’t get to do that nearly often enough.“Just out of first year,” Nebula says, eyes going distant. “Thanos wanted to see what I’d learned, so he pitted me against my sister Gamora. She won, so he decided I was too weak.”“You weren’t,” Mantis insists. “He is weak! Hurting children he claims to love.”“He doesn’t love me,” Nebula says flatly. “I’m an investment.”“Hurting anyone just to do it is weak,” Mantis amends.“Well, anyway, nobody said anything when I got back for second year,” Nebula continues, shrugging off Mantis’ concern. “Everyone stares, but nobody cares.”“I care,” Mantis says. “I am sorry he’s hurt you.”“You didn’t, you’re off the hook,” Nebula says, trying to make light of it, but then all of a sudden she feels the weight of this in a new way. “Why aren’t you scared of me? I’m not… I’m not a good person. I’m not worth helping.”Mantis stops walking and takes Nebula’s hand, the magical one, because she isn’t scared (nor does her particular tactile empathy work on non-natural body parts and it’s meant to show she won’t pry or manipulate emotions without permission). “You only think that because you haven’t known anyone who will tell you otherwise,” she says. “They are not good people, but you are not them. Do you believe the things that your fake father thinks?”“No,” Nebula scoffs. “It’s all shite, he’s loony.”“Have you enjoyed hurting people?”“Only my siblings or other bullies.”“You’re good,” Mantis assures. “I can tell.”Mantis seems sincere, she really does. This startles Nebula, but not in a way she’s opposed to, and she actually doesn’t mind this closeness. Maybe it’s something she’d been missing. So she glances down at their hands and laces their fingers together, declaring, “I think I like having a cute little ‘Puff on my side.”
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“Hurry up!” I exclaimed, running up to MJ’s locker after class. “Betty’s dad is going to be here any minute to give us a ride over to the pizza parlor.”“Calm down, Liz,” MJ replied. It seemed like she was always telling me to calm down, but then again, I was sort of high-strung (my mom’s words). MJ was the opposite of that, though. Cool wasn’t the right word for it, since she didn’t hang out with the popular girls or even want to or anything, but she never cared about what other people thought. I really envied that (Mom also called me neurotic.)“It’s just really important that we’re on time,” I said, trying not to sound high-strung or neurotic. “This party is a really big job, and if we prove we can help out here, we’ll get even more gigs!”MJ rolled her eyes, but she was smiling. “What happened to babysitting being one sitter, one to four kids? I think I like that better.”Honestly, I don’t think MJ would have been a sitter at all if I hadn’t begged her, so that opinion didn’t surprise me. “We’ll still do that,” I said. “But I think we should try this, too.”“If you say so,” MJ said doubtfully.I should introduce myself. My name is Liz Allan (I used to be Liz Toomes, but my dad did some really bad stuff and went to jail, so my mom divorced him) and I’m an eighth-grader in Queens, New York. I’m the president of the Baby-Sitters’ Club, which my friends and I founded so we could be more organized baby-sitters. I like helping kids, and a little spending money is nice! Plus, colleges will be impressed that we started our own business.I’m thirteen years old and an only child. My mom says I always wanted a little brother or sister, and that’s probably why I like babysitting. She’s African-American, and I look a lot like her, but my dad is white, which some people are really rude about. I have black hair that goes past my shoulders and light brown skin, and I guess you could say I dress preppy.MJ, which is short for Michelle Jones, has been my best friend since our teacher paired us for a project on ancient Egypt in sixth grade. She’s one of the only other mixed-race girls in our grade (her mom is also African-American and her dad is also white) so we bonded over that too. She has lighter hair than me, and it’s a little frizzier too. She also dresses grungier than I do, with a lot of army jackets and thrift store clothes. Ever since we became friends, MJ has spent a lot of time at my house because her dad is kind of a jerk, which is how I got her into babysitting.The pizza party today is going to be one of our club’s biggest responsibilities yet, which is why MJ, Betty, and I are all going to help out. Normally a sitting job only requires one sitter, maybe two if the family is large or one of our junior members like Betty is assigned more than two kids, but this is a big party, nearly 30 kids. The kid’s parents will be there too, and it’s going to be hectic and fun! Everything was going along without a hitch, just like I had hoped. All of the kids were having a good time and the parents seemed pleased too. But once the kids started to get picked up, I noticed that MJ was nowhere to be found. It wasn’t like her to just vanish, even if something had annoyed her. She was pretty antisocial sometimes, but she was also conscientious when it was important.So once the guests’ number had dwindled, I left the last few kids with the parents and Betty and I set out looking for her. Betty was concerned too, of course, but MJ sort of intimidated her (MJ intimidated a lot of people), so it was better that I do the investigating.MJ was in the bathroom, sitting on the counter. She looked seriously annoyed and sort of sad.“Don’t freak,” I teased as I walked in. She wouldn’t freak out, that was the joke. “It’s just me.”“Hey,” MJ said, sounding less enthusiastic than her usual self. “All the kids get home okay?”“Betty and the parents are chaperoning the last few,” I told her, pushing up to sit next to her on the counter. “I assume you have a good reason for just disappearing like that.”“It’s dumb,” said MJ, which meant that she did, in fact, have a reason, and it was related to feelings. She really wasn’t comfortable talking about feelings.“Spill,” I said. I knew MJ hated emoting, I knew that better than anyone, but as her best friend it was my job to be someone she could emote to when she needed to. “Nothing fazes you.”MJ rolled her eyes. She was really good at that. “One of the guys working at the counter here called me a d-word,” she explained in a low voice, running a hand through her hair.“A d-word?” I asked. I didn’t always pick up on things like that right away.“The one that rhymes with bike,” MJ said. Oh. Suddenly it made sense why MJ was so upset. Her dad was really conservative, and since he was such a jerk he’d called her things like that before, usually because she didn’t dress super-girly or care about having dates to the school dance. Really stupid reasons! MJ liked to pretend it didn’t bother her, but I knew that it did.“I’m sorry,” I sighed, nudging her shoulder with my own. “People are really ignorant.”“Yeah,” MJ muttered. She was quiet a moment before she added, “Would that be bad, though?”“What?” I asked, not sure what she meant.“Being a rhymes-with-bike,” MJ said softly. “Or at least half of one. I think I like boys sometimes, but…”It took me longer than it should have to finish that sentence for myself (again, I wasn’t always the best at figuring out that stuff), but once I did I laughed good-naturedly. “Of course it’s not bad,” I said, and I meant it.. “That’s just who you are.”MJ winced, glancing at the wall. “But that’s not going to be weird for you?”“Never,” I promised.“Even if I said I had a crush on you?”“Even if,” I echoed. We were really close friends and nothing was going to change that. I knew that as a certainty. But then I looked at MJ and then I really considered it. A lot of things were starting to settle in my mind, most of all how really fond I was of her. I really loved making her smile, and she was so pretty! Maybe I was a rhymes-with-bike, too. I had always been more comfortable with girls than boys. “Yeah,” I added, “I think that sounds awesome. Maybe I have a crush on you too.”MJ blinked with surprise. “Really?”“Really,” I agreed, lacing our fingers together.
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Colleen has been on her knees for so long she’s stopped counting the minutes. Not because it hurts (these floors, though dark-stained wood, are covered in burgundy rugs fine enough to pad and not just prickle) but because she has nothing but her own thoughts. She’s stripped to the fancy underthings all white and silver that were laid out for her, there’s a ribbon (not a collar, never a collar, the sensei in her wouldn’t allow a collar) tied prettily around her throat.And what she knows right now is waiting.It could be ten minutes or two hours before Elektra enters, imposing as ever, a bold devil in black and red where Colleen by contrast looks a demure, pale angel. Neither of them are this easily reduced, of course, and they know it, but the distinctions help.“Hello, my little dragon,” Elektra croons, coming up behind Colleen and wrapping her long braid around her hand like a lead. “Have you been good for me?”“Hai, Joō-sama,” Colleen whispers. She often reverts to Japanese when they’re in scenes like this. “I haven’t touched myself all week.” This is only part of being good, but they never address the other part, which is indulging in emotional self-flagellation that Colleen shouldn’t. A good part of her desire to submit comes from that, but - as Elektra explained it, rather glibly - if that’s true, taking the pleasure of punishment from Elektra is wrong somehow.(That’s an off-color joke, in truth. Colleen would never intentionally allow anyone to actually - physically or mentally - discipline her so strictly, and Elektra wouldn’t try.) Elektra likes her blinded.It’s the kind of thing that, knowing Elektra’s romantic history, someone else might read into, but Colleen knows better. This is about surrender and sensation, anticipation and arousal.And it’s about Colleen, standing all-but-naked in Elektra’s parlor, eyes wrapped in gray silk, arms held at her sides innocently. She knows Elektra is studying her, can feel the heat of her gaze, but she is not to move. She just lets herself be looked at.Then all of a sudden Elektra is behind her, breathing hotly against her skin. Even not taking into consideration that it’s literal truth, Elektra moves like a ninja.“Beautiful,” Elektra whispers, caressing Colleen’s skin.“Arigatō, Joō-sama,” Colleen breathes, arching her neck.“Calme, mon dragon, je sais,” Elektra murmurs, slipping two fingers into Colleen’s open mouth. Colleen doesn’t speak French, and Elektra knows that, almost relishes it, but enough of the words are close enough and her tone and actions make her meaning clear, so Colleen quietens and stills.Elektra hums her approval before pulling back and beginning to loop silken rope around Colleen’s wrists together in front of her. “Up, little dragon,” Elektra instructs, and Colleen raises her arms over her head, then bends them so her joined wrists are at the back of her neck. From there it’s easy for Elektra to wrap the ends of the rope around and between and behind Colleen’s bent arms and neck, passing them between her jaws two and then three and then four times. There are knots pressing into Colleen’s soft wrists and palms, resting on her tongue. And Elektra asks, “Yes?”As gags go, the rope isn’t terribly restrictive, but Colleen prefers that. She still feels the tug of the rope at the corners of her mouth when she slurs her reply, but it’s the right balance for her. And as ties go? She’s immobilized. She could probably work her way out eventually, but she doesn’t want to.So assured, Elektra begins winding more rope around Colleen’s torso, crossing it under and around her breasts, winding it around her hips and pelvis. More knots tease her nipples and adorn the rope between her legs. When Elektra is done, Colleen is utterly helpless. She can still walk, and Elektra helps her balance as she does, but her arms are trapped in place, her eyes and tongue are practically useless, and her mind is starting to drop out. Just as planned.Right now is just for darkness and restriction, for Elektra’s hands and voice. (She can be led, but with only positive results. She won’t be brought to something awful here.)“I think,” Elektra murmurs, “I need to be reminded of what a good girl you are. How many do you think you can take, angel? You may speak.”Colleen doesn’t allow punishments that would feel like punishments (degrading chores, bamboo across her back, anything that the people who made her would do) but she likes the sting of Elektra’s leather flogger. It makes her feel it, helps her punish herself for transgressions she can barely confess. She likes it in Elektra’s hand.(This is because Elektra goes easy on her. She knows who really deserves the blame.)Colleen mumbles an answer, but Elektra says, lightly, teasingly, “I didn’t understand that.” Colleen tries again, to the same lack of effect. “Count for me, perhaps.”So Colleen scrunches up her nose (she can guess that Elektra did, in fact, understand and is just playing with her) and gives twenty short, nonverbal hums, taking care to pause between each so Elektra knows what she means.“So bold,” Elektra murmurs, obviously smiling. She brings Colleen to the center of the room, nudges her feet apart, and says, “Be still for me.” Then she brings another rope from the ceiling and uses it to anchor Colleen in place, bringing her onto her tiptoes. The point will be to stay that way as long as possible, Colleen knows.She stands in wait, trying to judge where Elektra is, when she feels a strike across her bound breasts. It makes her waver and shake, but she holds fast. Colleen doesn’t safeword until she feels blood sticking to her pretty white panties, trailing over the sore muscles in her back. It’s just a little cut, she could have sustained it while training, but she didn’t, and the smell of it brings her into herself.She hasn’t realized it, but she’s been crying, the blindfold is soaked through in spots. Her skin is red and purple. Elektra doesn’t love this sight for itself, but she does love to see Colleen let go.The instant the signal is given, Elektra drops the flogger. (She doesn’t think of herself as a particularly demonstrative person, but Colleen is among those that she’ll be that for, when it’s necessary.) She rushes forward to loosen the rope holding Colleen up, knowing that otherwise she might pull muscles in an unpleasant way, she catches Colleen from falling altogether, she wraps arms tight around Colleen’s bound and flushed torso.“You did so well,” she whispers. “So good, my good girl.”For that’s so much of what this comes down to: after everything, Colleen doubts her own goodness. She wants to be absolved of sins that were never truly hers.“Come, my little dragon,” Elektra murmurs, pressing her cheek against Colleen’s. “Let’s clean you up.” Sometimes they have sex like this, too, Colleen eating Elektra out over and over and over, Elektra holding a vibe to Colleen until she screams. Sometimes, like tonight, sex represents a halfway point.Gently Elektra unties Colleen’s arms, lowering them and massaging out the tension, and helps her to bed. The harness remains, the ropes around her wrists remain, but it’s gentler now, there’s less of a strain and more of an embrace. Elektra sits her up against the pillows, starts to kiss wherever there isn’t rope or bruising. She’s conscious of each mew and moan from Colleen’s lips, of the way the ropes seem to keep her from melting altogether. It’s delicate, but Elektra won’t be the one to break it.They abandon words for awhile, just acting and reacting, and Colleen sobs with relief when she comes, her head falling against her chest.“Watashi no chīsana tenshi ni totte sore wa yokattadesu ka?” Elektra asks in a whisper, sliding up to kiss Colleen on the mouth. "Dragon" is most often for when Elektra is praising her strength, "angel" for when she's praising her heart and soul.“Hai, Joō-sama,” Colleen murmurs, smiling shakily. “More than good. Perfect.”
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The world isn’t saved, indefinitely and completely, but the specific danger is averted, and Polly and Robin are safe. That should be enough. Mostly it is.It’s also difficult, though. Knowing that the one good thing in that hellish future, the daughter she always wanted, isn’t and won’t be in this future.This is something that Melinda tries to keep to herself, but luckily (not luckily) she has another, more obvious reason to be withdrawn and mournful so nobody can tell anyway. Add it to the list of loves and losses. How many people has she held as they breathed their last, by now?Robin isn’t gone, though. She’s just with her real mother, like she’s supposed to be, like she’s always supposed to have been. Mourning that is foolish. Maybe two months after Tahiti and every other thing, the once-again-itinerant team gets a call from Polly.“What is it?” Melinda asks as soon as she gets to the screen, visibly worried. “Is Robin alright? Did she see something?”“She didn’t, but she’s…” Polly sighs. “She misses you.”That shouldn’t be as surprising as it is.Polly isn’t used to reading Melinda’s silence, so she’s a little off the mark when she says, “I know you must be busy with your world-saving and everything. Robin knows that too. But she keeps saying how nice it is that now she gets to have two moms, and…”“I miss her too,” Melinda says quickly, like she’s afraid Robin might be listening and doesn’t want to upset her but also like she means it, because she does. “We’re not going to be anywhere near you for a couple of weeks, but we could set something up for then?”There’s a pause, a disturbance on the screen, and then Robin pops up, grinning shyly. “Māmā,” she says, pronouncing it with those longer vowels like you would in Chinese.“Hi, sweetie,” Melinda says, and then curiously she adds, “You didn’t used to call me that.”“I know,” Robin says, more eagerly than she usually says anything. “But I need a way to tell you two apart now.” Robin is still quiet, still easily set off, but she smiles more. (The visions she gets now aren’t exactly happy, most of them, but it’s not the same apocalyptic doom, and that helps.) They go for ice cream like normal people might, and partway through the walk from Melinda’s “trust me, I’m normal” hotel to the shop Robin grabs both of their hands, though she doesn’t swing them like a baby might.But she does announce to the teenager at the ice cream shop, “These are my moms.”“Aw, how nice,” said teenager coos, grinning at Polly and Melinda in a way that makes both of them blush (and then cringe at the obvious attempt at seeming tolerant).“Mommy and Māmā,” Robin adds, sure of the notion even if her gaze is starting to wander.Melinda is almost too caught up in the possibilities of those words to notice Polly smirk and nod toward an empty table. “After you, honey lamb,” she says, clearly joking based on the counter-person’s assumption. (She doesn’t seem repulsed or alarmed?)Unsurprisingly, Phil is the first topic of conversation, with Polly setting down her plastic spoon and putting her hand gently over Melinda’s. “Knowing it’s coming doesn’t make it any easier,” she says, and even though of course Polly didn’t know so much as suspect that her husband’s days were numbered (and even though Phil and Melinda weren’t married themselves) their experiences are at least similar enough that the words aren’t empty.“I’ve had it both ways,” Melinda remarks, intentionally downplaying. “I don’t know which is worse.”Polly nods in understanding, not wanting to push. “At least you have the others to go through this with you,” she says.“And us,” Robin adds, insistent. “You have us.” They meet up when they can and video chat when they can’t; Sunday nights especially become Robin And Moms time. One of the unforeseen advantages of this is that Robin seems happy to just be in their company, even if she’s not verbal that night, and Polly and Melinda therefore have a lot of time to talk to each other.As it turns out, Polly is fascinating. She’s read hundreds (thousands?) more books than Melinda, she even does a little writing herself. “I always wanted to tell stories,” she says, “and god knows it’s good to have happier ones on hand for Robin.”She’s also efficient and practical in a way that Melinda respects and honestly adores, not that she’d feel comfortable saying so. And she’s kind. Not soft, but truly kind, which Melinda hasn’t felt she deserved since Bahrain. She listens to Melinda’s stories and reacts to them in ways Melinda approves of (sympathy for the sad parts, but not too much; unflinching when it’s messy; amused by the same morbid things) and she offers stories of her own while expecting the reactions Melinda is comfortable giving.They talk about everything: work or something like it, the ups and downs of raising Robin (all of the downs being things like not having the wherewithal to deal with her more horrifying visions and the still-recent adjustment to being responsible for Robin’s education now since a normal school wouldn’t understand her). They talk about things that make them happy.It doesn’t take long for them to (albeit secretly) include each other in that category. Maybe a year has passed when Robin begins an in-person visit by showing Melinda a new picture she’s drawn, smiling proudly. Two women, one brunette and one black-haired, holding hands.“What’s this?” Melinda asks, although she hopes she knows.“Moms,” Robin says.“It’s us,” Polly says in a whisper. “As an us.” Her face betrays no particular reaction.“Oh,” Melinda says, and she asks Robin, “Did you see that or just want to think it?”“Saw,” Robin says, sounding offended.Melinda and Polly both gulp, looking up but not meeting each other’s eyes. “Oh,” Melinda repeats. “I…”“Are you upset?” Polly asks. “I thought… I mean, given everything I didn’t think you’d mind.”“I don’t mind,” Melinda says, finally meeting Polly’s eyes. “And I think we might be the last ones to know.”“Seems right,” Polly agrees, leaning in for a kiss.
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“May I see them?” comes a soft voice from the doorway.It’s Crystalia, the earnest, erstwhile princess that showed up with the Americans just as the battle was beginning and helped in ways Wanda (busy on her own front) did not witness. She’s been reticent, from what Wanda can tell, not shy but quiet since the fighting ended, like she’s unsure what to do with herself. This is the first time she’s spoken to Wanda, and in fact the first time that anybody has tried to speak to Wanda all evening. (Wanda feels, perhaps unfairly, that they fear her; it makes sense, though, that the girl whose magic matches the strength of her own would have no need to be.)It, the magic; them, the magics. That’s what Crystalia asks about. But Wanda is tired and anxious and she doesn’t want to scare the girl by presuming, so she echoes, “Them?”“Your ability, your powers,” Crystalia replies. “The magics you can do. Which of those do you call them?”“Any,” Wanda shrugs, glancing at her lap. It depends on her mood and the moment. She’s afraid of sounding petty if she explains.Crystalia nods. “My people called them gifts, mostly,” she says. “It’s the norm on Attilan to have gifts. They’re all different, but that’s a part of our very being.” She smiles softly, like she knows what Wanda is worried about. “They’re nothing to fear.”Wanda is unsure how much the princess knows about her, so she’s careful to be kind when she says, “I don’t think your people’s gifts are cultivated by fascist sorcerers in a dark basement.”Crystalia sits beside Wanda, strokes her soft blanket like a dog. “Perhaps not,” she says, “but when I came to Earth mine were. Not fascists, but men who acted good but wanted to use me in wicked ways.”“Germans?” Wanda asks.“Americans, most of them,” Crystalia says. “I think the word is propaganda. They wanted me to be propaganda, and once I grew old enough to realize that I hated it. I fled, and I’m lucky that it was the Bombshells who found me. You’re lucky too, you can use your gifts for yourself now.”Wanda curls into herself a bit, frowning. “I am sorry they were cruel,” she says. “Did they teach you to fear your gift? To hate yourself?”“No,” Crystalia says, and carefully she rests her hand over one of Wanda’s. “I’m sorry, too.”“Why aren’t you afraid?” Wanda asks quietly, trying not to jump at the slight unexpected contact. “Everyone else is. I may be set off again and not even realize it.”“I trust you,” Crystalia says. “And I can fix it if you start to stray.” Her eyes go wide. “Please may I see?”Wanda bites her lip. This is a safe situation, and she wants very much to please the other girl, she finds. “Alright, Princess,” she says. “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.”Crystalia giggles. “You don’t have to call me Princess,” she says. “My friends just call me Crystal.”“Crystal,” Wanda repeats. It’s only two letters different than her full name, but it’s infinitely more personable, more fitting. “Alright, Crystal.” And with a moment’s thought, she conjures a wisp of red light in her hand. It grows, wraps around a vase and lifts it. She pulls a few petals from one of the dying flowers inside and disappears them.“Oh!” Crystal exclaims, giggling even more. “That’s marvelous.”“There’s more,” Wanda says softly, nervously. “It’s much worse.”Crystal falters, but she says, “Show me.”Wanda hesitates, not wanting to hurt her new friend, but she doesn’t know how to avoid it. She slips into Crystal’s mind (it’s lighter, more colorful than her own) and faintly she hears a gasp as Crystal does, in fact, register this. She roots around through memories, gleaning fragments of Crystal’s hopes and history, and finally she settles on a flash of a redheaded teenage girl and a much younger Crystal (unmistakably Crystal from the black stripes in her hair). Crystal is crying, unable to be consoled, and when Wanda pulls back into the real world she sees that the real Crystal is doing the same.“Oh no, oh no,” Wanda murmurs. This is exactly why she feared doing this. In a panic she throws her arms around Crystal and holds her close, like Pietro used to do to her when she’d panic. “It’s alright, Crystal, Princess, it was just a memory that I dragged up. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, please don’t get lost…”In a little while, not very long but too long for Wanda’s taste, Crystal slips out of her grief. She pulls away from Wanda to wipe her eyes and, so soft it seems damning, she asks, “Why did you do that?”“I don’t know,” Wanda says, and then she corrects herself. “I do. It’s what I was taught to do. To find vulnerabilities, to highlight them.”“That’s awful,” Crystal says.“You see why I didn’t want to?” Wanda asks. “You can leave, if you like. I won’t be hurt.”Crystal doesn’t move, though. She just fidgets with her hands as she looks at Wanda through watery lashes and says, “You had bad teachers.”“They were very bad people, yes,” Wanda says.“But they were also bad at teaching,” Crystal replies, slow like she’s thinking as she speaks. “If you can enter minds, you can find good thoughts as well as bad. You can conjure more than just pain.”“What do you mean?” Wanda asks.“I’m going to let you into my mind again,” Crystal says. “If you do what you just did, I’m going to spray you with water -”“Do you have a bottle?” Wanda interrupts to ask, smirking though she’s not sure it’s appropriate.“I’m omnielemental,” Crystal replies proudly. “That’s my gift. I can summon and control the elements.”“Oh!” Wanda exclaims, delighted. That’s a much nicer gift than hers.“Go into my mind again,” Crystal says, “and focus on finding a pleasant memory. The first time I used my gift, maybe. Focus on that like you did the other.” She takes Wanda’s hands in her own. “I believe in you.”Later Wanda will cite this as the moment she fell in love. Now, she just nods and concentrates on Crystal’s mind.“I was just barely not a child,” Crystal says, her voice distant. “I had just undergone terrigenesis, that’s what wakes the gifts in my people.”Wanda searches through memories and then all of a sudden there it is, a young and beaming Crystal creating fire in one hand and water in the other. She just watches the memory in awe, feeling Crystal’s joy, reveling in it, and then she hears Crystal laugh and exclaim, “Yes!”Wanda snaps out of it and sees real, present-day Crystal beaming at her.And she’s not sure what possesses her to do it, but she leans in to kiss Crystal almost frantically.“I’m sorry,” Wanda apologizes immediately, “I shouldn’t have.”“Why?” Crystal asks, bright-eyed. “I think you’re wonderful.”
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Ava is in the small washroom of the shuttle (or she thinks it’s a shuttle, she doesn’t know) scrubbing the gold paint from her face, and she’s sort of shocked by the results. She doesn’t remember her own reflection without all of that marring it, being able to put her hand to her temple without coming away gold-fingertipped and leaving smudges that would get her scolded or worse.She doesn’t notice that the memory makes her shudder, but she does notice that she jumps when a voice behind her asks, “Are you okay?”“Oh!” Ava cries. The voice is a woman’s, but not Jemma’s - blessed Jemma, who she finally has a name for, who she wishes she could have thanked more - nor Melinda nor Elena, so it’s not one she’s learned yet. But when she gathers the nerve, she turns to turn and face the woman (girl?) she’s hearing. (Hearing!) She doesn’t mean to be rude, but she has to say, slowly so she can learn her own voice again, “You’re familiar.”“I was the bait,” the woman (girl?) says, nodding and making her curly and disheveled hair bounce against her shoulders. (Ava thinks that perhaps her own hair is even curlier when it’s undone, but she hasn’t checked yet.) “The rebel-hearted tragedy they brought back.”“Rebel-hearted tragedy,” Ava repeats, to appreciate the poetry of it and because it’s much nicer a phrase than just “bait.” Suddenly the poetry of things concerns her greatly.“You were one of his… his girls,” the woman (girl?) says hesitantly, like she doesn’t want to outright say something like “servant” or “slave” and risk offending. “I saw you in his shadow.”Ava flushes. “I barely remember being anywhere else,” she admits, feeling ashamed. “It’s been so long.”“I’m sorry,” the woman (girl?) says, and she steps a little closer. “What’s your name? I’m Tess.”“Ava,” says Ava, her eyes going wide. “My name is Ava.” She falters, but she wants desperately to keep talking, keep filling the air with words, so she asks, “Is Tess short for anything? It seems like it might be.”Tess (who Ava will guess now is somewhere between woman and girl, just like her) shrugs. “Might have been,” she says too casually. “Theresa, maybe, or something else too fancy for me. I don’t remember.” What she doesn’t say (doesn’t have to say) is that she doesn’t remember the ones who might have given her that name that might be longer.That’s something Ava understands. Parents, or something like them, are in short supply here. Still, she doesn’t like how sad the thought of not having any makes Tess look for a quick moment, so she says, “I like Tess. It’s a nice name.”Tess smiles, a little halfheartedly, and says, “Thank you. Um.” She hesitates for a moment, scratching at the back of her neck. “I, um. Flint said I should check on you.”Ava blinks. “Check on me?” That usually means spy on her to sort out if discipline is needed, in her experience, but she’s fairly sure that’s not the case here. Flint is a nice boy, one of the keys to her - all of their - freedom, and in freedom you aren’t disciplined like that, are you?“Yeah,” Tess says. “Make sure you’re okay, that you didn’t need anything, stuff like that.”Ava worries her lip, ecstatic that she can do without coming away tasting paint on her teeth. “Of course I’m alright,” she says, maybe too quickly. “I’m just… fixing myself.” It should be “fixing myself up,” or something else altogether, but she’s forgotten that.Tess frowns again, and this time she lets herself because it’s not self-pitying. “You don’t need to be fixed,” she says, and after a second she adds, “Ava.” She assumes that the other girl will like hearing her name.Ava flushes (that assumption was correct) and pulls her long, pointless sleeves over her hands sheepishly. “I mean, I’m fixing the parts of me that were his,” she says. “Taking them back? I’m not sure.”“You’re making yourself yourself again,” Tess suggests.“Yes!” Ava says, immediately delighted. “Yes, it’s exactly that.” Then, just as suddenly, her face falls as she realizes, “I’m not sure who myself is, though.”Tess winces. “I understand that,” she says. “Look…”“At what?” Ava asks.“No, I mean.” Tess shakes her head. “Just a word you say before you say your point, I guess. What I wanted to say, or ask, was would you like help?”“Doing what?” Ava asks. “I don’t think I can find myself by looking in a cupboard.”“No,” Tess agrees, “but I could help you find clothes and, um.” She motions shyly to her forehead.“Oh,” Ava says again. “Is it not…?” Coming off.“No, it is,” Tess assures. “Just, it looks like it’s going slow. Like someone else helping might… well, help?”“I don’t want to be selfish,” Ava frets.“You’re not,” Tess promises. “I offered. I want to help.”“Okay,” Ava says, and she smiles at Tess, saying because she means it, “I trust you.”“I won’t give you reason to do otherwise,” Tess promises. “And maybe we can find ourselves together.”
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Akela remembers the night they met like it was yesterday. They were both at a party in the Hills, thrown by friends of friends squatting in some abandoned bougie mansion. There were dozens of people, some she knew, some she didn’t; there were drugs and booze, sure, but also art and protest and impossible, radical tenderness.And at the heart of that was Elena, braids wrapped around her head and jewels in her ears, radiating more love than it seemed possible for one person to be able to do alone.It was love, not just infatuation, for Akela from the start.But now she’s gone. Akela keeps fighting after Elena is snatched up, of course she does. She splits away from Mack for both of their safety, even though neither of them want to; he stays busy fixing cars and sharing the good word, she hears, and she writes and organizes and fights if she has to. It’s not empty as long as she tells herself it’s for Elena, it’s what she’d want. Ironically the authorities get her not at a party or a protest but when she sneaks out to do a simple medical errand. Or maybe not ironic, it makes sense that they’re keeping watch on clinics, especially pro-choice, pro-women ones. Even rebels eventually need to go refill their meds or, in her case, get that funny feeling behind their false eye checked out.She fights back, but there’s a part of her that thinks maybe at least if she’s taken she’ll see Elena again.Maybe. For a while it’s just the two of them, Akela and Elena, Lucky and Yo-Yo. They’re the authorities’ worst damn nightmares, two cybernetically-upgraded queer women, the black girl who knows how to kill and the Latina immigrant who knows how to create. And for a while, all they care about is the fight and each other.They follow some of Elena’s friends to a roadside motel in the desert and spend the whole time between each other’s legs. “You’re addictive,” Akela breathes out.“You’re a flatterer,” Elena replies, but cheerfully.“Do you ever wish this was all there was?” Akela asks.“Yes,” Elena replies, “but we have to fight for it. We can’t just bask, not yet.”“I know,” Akela says. “We fight so later they won’t have to.” “I am a dirty computer.”“I am a dirty computer,” Akela repeats hesitantly.“I am ready to be cleaned.” Nothing this time, not after a long pause, and the voice insists, “I am ready to be cleaned.” But Akela isn’t, and she is punished for it.She’d known what they do here. She protested more than once outside government offices that supported these places. She led classes on how to resist. But being here, stripped down to their colorless nothings and strapped to their futuristic exam table, is nothing she could have prepared herself for. Noncompliance, they say, is a sin, and sins are illegal. But the problem is that everything real, at least for them, is noncompliant and therefore a sin, therefore illegal.Elena is foreign. She still prefers to speak in Spanish if she has the choice (lucky that Akela can provide that choice). She’s an artist in her soul and a thief when it’s necessary. She’s Catholic by faith, though also a queer person. Both of her arms were sliced off above the elbows (a sadist’s idea of just punishment) and in place of flesh and blood and bone are cybernetic prostheses. And she’s gifted with speed.Akela is American, but her skin is dark and her people are still strange here. Once they came from Africa, centuries ago; then they were brought to the Spanish Caribbean, not of their own volition of course; then they were again free and spread through the continent. She has only remnants of her parents’ faith, but she wishes there was more even though it butts up against her queerness. She lost an eye in an accident and in its place sits a false, digital one.They’re dangerous. They want things the world doesn’t think they should receive. They belonged to a very particular social circle, other rebels all: all of them brown or queer or disabled or gifted or some combination thereof. This is how they first met Mack, their sweet big-hearted boy, a mechanic and fierce fighter. He wasn’t that they were missing because they’d never felt they were missing anything, but he completed them anyway.For a while they were safe and good.For a while, for a while. When she returns to her bedroom - her cell, really - there’s someone waiting, one of the beatifically-smiling blank-eyed assistants that Akela knows are really slaves. Her mind is fuzzy from her treatment, but she’s not so out of it that she doesn’t care about the person before her.“Hello,” they say. “My name is Mary Apple 43, I’m going to help you through this journey.”Akela lays on her stiff mattress and tries to remain steadfast, but this Mary’s voice sounds - it sounds - “Elena?” she whispers.“My name is Mary Apple 43, but it’s alright that you’re confused,” Elena says. When Akela looks more closely she sees it’s very certainly Elena, golden skin and strong body and black-brown hair. She’s not going to call her anything but Elena. “Cleansing can be a very overwhelming process, but it will be so rewarding.” She lays a hand on Akela’s shoulder -- and that just clinches it. She knows those metal fingers. Knows them intimately. It’s the last straw.She wanted to see Elena again, but not like this.“No,” Akela says, voice heavy. “Your name is Elena Rodriguez, you were my - my lover, my partner. Elena, I know you’re in there!”But Elena, or this shell of her at least, just smiles sadly. “I’ll bring you a sedative,” she says, voice honeyed. “You poor thing, you’re exhausted.”“Elena, no!” Akela shouts, but she knows that at least for today she’s too late.
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When they hear that Seismic Crystal’s pilots fell apart on their trial run, everyone assumes that it was Jemma’s fault. She’s so much newer to this, after all, and not used to the sensory overload of the Drift. (There’s more than one of their colleagues that thinks that while she’s a sweet girl, not to mention brilliant, Jemma isn’t quite Jaeger material; she’s a little too, well, what they say is “inexperienced” but what they mean is “small and neuroatypical.”) These are assumptions that Jemma is mostly used to and therefore mostly isn’t offended by.But it’s not her fault (if “fault” is the right word). It’s Daisy’s.They’re doing alright at first, but then some flicker of thought reminds Daisy of Trip and it’s all over. It’s really no surprise, both of the women knew Daisy’s former copilot well and of course his memory might cross their minds as they undertake this, but it’s too much for Daisy right now and she panics. Of course she does. Why wouldn’t she?Even though she isn’t at “fault” for the snafu, Jemma feels horrible. She’s sure she made the thought surface, thinking about filling Trip’s shoes, and that’s why it was such a shock to Daisy; and on top of that, now Jemma knows exactly how it felt to feel Trip die. No wonder she ran all those years ago!(Jemma also feels awful for being upset when Daisy left, for nursing that hurt. She didn’t run when she lost someone, she thought. But losing someone is not the same as literally feeling someone die, and it was unfair to think that it was.)So all she can do now is find Daisy. She’s not sure what she’ll do when she has found her, but she needs badly to do it.Daisy is just in her bunk, luckily, and the door is partway open so it doesn’t seem like intruding for Jemma to enter. She still knocks to announce her presence, though, and she stays more or less in the doorway as she says, “Daisy, I’m sorry.”Daisy doesn’t look up from her salvaged laptop as she asks, “Why? I’m the screwup.”“No you’re not,” Jemma says insistently. “You had a PTSD episode, which is completely understandable.”“Most pilots can avoid it,” Daisy scoffs.“I’m positive it’s happened before,” Jemma insists, frowning. “Given the nature of the Drift, I’m honestly shocked that this sort of incident isn’t normalized. It’s brilliant tech, but it’s one giant trigger, too.”“Maybe,” Daisy says doubtfully. “I’m still the one to blame, though.”“Have you ever spoken to a psychiatrist?” Jemma asks gently.“Not about this,” Daisy snorts, finally making eye contact (it’s easier when she’s self-deprecating, always). “They loved throwing those at kids in the foster homes, but they were always the sketchiest shrinks available. No need wasting money on the real stuff for the hopeless kids.”“Not all psychiatrists are like that,” Jemma says. “We have a lovely one on staff now, he’s very well-versed in trauma and loss. I could set an appointment up for you?”“Have you spoken to him?” Daisy challenges.“Still do, occasionally,” Jemma says, watching Daisy deflate a little (she’d clearly expected the answer to be no, and Jemma proved her wrong). “After Fitz… I was embarrassingly fragile. Very bad off.” She sighs. “I blamed myself for the whole situation.”“That’s kind of dumb,” Daisy says, but with a little smirk.“Grief is like that,” Jemma says, coming closer to Daisy with an outstretched hand. “Some of us blame ourselves when we’re the ones to survive.”It dawns on Daisy, what Jemma is trying to do, and she knows Jemma well enough to know she’s expecting answers and resolution. So instead of rebuffing her over and over like she’d do to anyone else, she swallows her pride, takes Jemma’s hand, and says bluntly, “We’re close, Jemma. That’s a big part of our compatibility.” Well, hypothetically, anyway.“Yes,” Jemma says. At this point Daisy is the closest person she’s got, but she doesn’t want to say that. It seems like too much somehow.“Thinking of Trip made me realize how awful I’d feel if I lost you too,” Daisy continues, exhaling heavily. “I’m just… I left so I wouldn’t hurt anyone else I loved. Coming back was never the plan.”“But you did it,” Jemma says. “We’re here, and I know I’m not as strong or as tough as you, but Daisy, I have your back.” She pauses, like something just hit her. “Wait. Love… me?” You…?”Daisy cracks a nervous smile. “Surprised you didn’t notice earlier.” In the Drift, she means, but earlier in their acquaintance sort of fits too.“I…” Jemma stares at her own (very fidgeting) hands. “I don’t know. I used to hope, maybe, that you had feelings, but you were so busy, too busy to ask, and you had Trip, and -”“I never had Trip,” Daisy interrupts, clearly trying not to laugh. “I know everyone thought that, and maybe I let them sometimes, because it was easier and it got other people off my back, but we were just close friends. You and Fitz weren’t...?”“We tried, once, but that boy was gay all day,” Jemma says fondly. “Honestly, this girl is too.”Now Daisy actually does laugh. “Wow. Mutual pining for literal years. Could we even be more stereotypical lesbians? I mean, I’m bi, but still.”“Tale as old as time,” Jemma chuckles. “No, wait -”And they both amend it in unison. “Gay-l.”After the giggle fit passes, Daisy reaches for Jemma’s hand. “So we’re doing this? Us as us, not just for the fight.”Jemma nods, but she’s biting her lip. “I want you to promise me something, though,” she says. “You’ll try not to let worry for me stop you from doing what’s right.”“I can promise I’ll try,” Daisy says. “Promise you won’t hate me if I freeze up anyway?”“Oh, Daisy,” Jemma says. “I could never hate you. I want what’s best for you always.”Daisy sighs wistfully and turns to kiss Jemma. “Same,” she says. “Hence the panic.”Jemma deepens the kiss and wraps an arm around Daisy’s shoulders, humming. “I understand,” she says once she pulls back for air and leans her forehead against Daisy’s. “We’ll sort it out. And besides, I know a way we aren’t stereotypical lesbians-or-whatever.”“Oh?” Daisy asks, though she has a guess.“We’re not going to die.”
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“Trish, I need your help.”Trish looks up from her homework, wide-eyed. It’s Jessica asking, which never happens. Jessica doesn’t like asking for anyone’s help, especially not hers!She may be a little starstruck when she asks, “With what?”“My ex is in town this weekend,” Jessica says. “With the carnival.” Luke and Danny both splutter, which makes Jessica glare at them and add, “He’s normal! I just don’t want to go down that road again.”“Because it’s horrifying?” Jeri asks superciliously.Jessica ignores her and says, specifically to Trish, “Can I come over this weekend? We can do girly shit and you can keep me away from Scott.”Trish nods eagerly. “Of course I will! It’ll be so fun.”“Um, we live there too,” says Misty, waving between herself and Colleen. “We not count for girly shit?”“Yeah, sure, whatever,” Jessica says, waving a hand. They’re not really the kind of girls who practically swoon for the chance to do girly shit with people, like Trish definitely is, but that's way more trouble than it's worth to explain. “This is going to be amazing!” Trish squeals, ushering Jessica into the comfortably mediocre apartment that she, Misty, and Colleen share.“Well, at least you don’t still live on top of the sex store,” Jessica says, looking around the place warily. Of course she’s been here before, but it’s kind of a funhouse, mostly because Misty and Colleen bring out each other’s weird. Maybe not the best place for whatever this is. “This is… less raunchy.”“You can put your stuff in my room,” Trish says, bringing Jessica over to do exactly that. “Then Misty and Colleen are going to order pizza and they found some distracting movies for us to watch!!”“Hey,” Misty and Colleen chorus. They’re already set up in the easy chair, jammies and everything.“Ugh, let me guess,” Jessica groans. “Punchkicker.”“Kickpuncher,” Colleen corrects indignantly. “And no.”“We thought we’d start with Scott Pilgrim,” Misty says.“So the opposite of a distraction,” Jessica replies. “The main character is literally named Scott and they say that like, constantly.”“Think of it like negative conditioning,” Trish says hopefully. “Now when you hear the name Scott you’ll think of this instead!”“Ugh,” Jessica says again. “Trish, hide my phone. I’m serious.”“I promise.” They’re barely half an hour into the movie when Jessica starts shifting restlessly. She’s seen it before and she’s never been able to use it to replace her mental association with the name Scott, so she’s really not sure why it’d work now. “Maybe just one look would be fine,” she says quietly. “Could I look just once, Trish?”“No,” Trish says. “Not even once.”Fifteen minutes after that, though, Jessica tries a much more successful technique. “Hey, Trish, we’re close, right?”“Yes,” Trish says, though it’s probably wishful thinking.“Really close, like sisters,” Jessica presses.“Yes? I mean, yes!” Trish exclaims.“Sisters share everything, right?”“Yes?” Although honestly, Trish is fixating on the word “sisters” and wanting to amend or revise it. It really doesn’t feel appropriate, considering the giant crush she definitely has. (Jessica is just so cool!)“Dude,” Misty says over her shoulder, “she’s totally taking advantage of you.”“I’m not going to give in,” Trish says stubbornly.“She’s sort of playing your need for positive female attention,” Colleen adds. “Sorry if that’s rude.”Trish could fight it more, but she knows it’s likely. So she just turns her poutiest pout on Jessica and asks disbelievingly, “Is that true?”“No,” Jessica snaps. “You’re just being a baby.”“I’m being -? Who’s so desperate for an ex-booty call that she asked her friends to child-safe-lock her in?” Trish spits.Jessica huffs and goes to the sideboard, rattling the drawers one by one. “Give me the key, Trish.”“No,” Trish exclaims. “No way. Nope. Nuh-uh. I didn’t want to have to do this, but…” She gets up and yanks Jessica into her room. “Cold turkey, baby. I’m staging an intervention. You’re acting like a junkie, Jessica.”“And you’re acting like a crazy person,” Jessica retorts, flopping on Trish’s immaculately made bed.“It takes one to know one,” Trish replies, because that could technically apply to either of their remarks, and then she decides to just go for it. Kind of. “Maybe it’s not the specific booty call you’re after, just the possibility of one?”“What?” Jessica laughs, a little too awkward to be convincing. “Are you trying to say I’m-”“Hot for it?” Trish asks, and she pushes Jessica flat on the bed and straddles her. “You bet!”“What old cartoon did you fall out of?” Jessica asks. “Normal people just say ‘horny,’ weirdo.”“So you don’t disagree,” Trish crows.“What?” Jessica repeats. “What are you talking about?”“You’re horny, and I’m gonna help you not make bad choices,” Trish says brightly. “Do you like fingers or dildos or vibrators? I’ve never done cunnilingus, but if you wanted I could try.”“What is going on?” Jessica shouts.“I”m going to have sex with you, obviously,” Trish says. “How hard can it be?” But then she takes a step back from herself and startles in a major way. “I mean, if you want to? Oh god, I don’t want to take advantage of you or force you! Ew. I just thought. Uh…?”Jessica sits up as much as she can (which isn’t much, Trish is surprisingly strong). “Whoa,” she exclaims. “Don’t freak out. I don’t want to take advantage of you.”“I’m not a virgin,” Trish says quickly. “And I’ve never slept with a girl before, but I thought about it, and I mean, if you want to have sex, but not with your ex, I think I want to have sex with you, but I don’t know if you even like girls, I didn’t even ask, oh no -”Trish has worked herself up into a frenzy, and Jessica sighs. Feelings suck, and dealing with them sucks, but it’s not like just sleeping with Trish would be a hardship. “You’re okay,” she says quickly.“I’m too presumptuous,” Trish wails. “Presumptuous Patsy, the overeager idiot.”“Nobody ever called you Presumptuous Patsy,” Jessica says.Trish sniffles. “They would have if they were more verbose.”“Well, I think it’s sort of cute,” Jessica admits. “And you’re definitely cute.”She’s not lying. She hadn’t really thought about it, but mostly because she thought Trish was off-limits (too straight, too vulnerable, too innocent, too whatever). This is new and sort of intriguing. And Trish is probably a better decision than she’s made in the past, sexwise.“So you wanna do it?” Trish asks slowly, trying not to look too hopeful.“Yeah, dork,” Jessica says.“Bye!” they hear Misty and Colleen shout, slamming the door as they leave in a big hurry.
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Nakia adores Harlem, its culture and resilience, the mix of old and new, and she enjoys slipping into its crowd and listening to their buzz. She’s never been when she’s not on business, but she always finds a few hours for herself, and more often than not those hours are spent at Harlem’s Paradise. She’s not ignorant of its reputation or scandals, but the fact remains that it provides atmosphere. And now that its proprietor is actually an honorable man, to hear tell anyway, she doesn’t even feel bad about spending her money here.She’s at the bar, sipping some fruity cocktail off of the specials menu, when she sees someone enter. Many patrons come in pairs or groups, but this woman is alone. She has a fire in her eyes that sets her apart from the rest of the Harlemites and hipsters, and immediately Nakia is on her guard. Whether warranted or not, that sort of feeling can destroy.She’s debating with herself whether or not to get involved when who but the mystery woman should approach, one eyebrow raised. “You’re new,” she remarks.“Visiting from out of town,” Nakia says smoothly, not looking the woman in the eye. “Is that an issue?”“Not at all,” the woman replies, holding out a hand. “My name’s Tilda, pleasure to meet you.”“Kia,” Nakia says. It’s barely an alias, but it feels responsible to lie. She doesn’t want to risk… something. “Are you from Harlem yourself?”“Currently,” Tilda says, and she waves down the bartender. “My usual, and another for the lady.”“Oh, a regular,” Nakia purrs. “Delightful!”“It’s a long story,” Tilda chuckles. It’s not a conversation sort of night, though. Not deep conversation. They discuss things like the other’s hair (Tilda, whose is worn in two puffs that sort of make her resemble a cartoon, though not in a bad way, admits that Nakia’s shorter hair may take less doing) and outfits (Nakia makes a show of admiring TIlda’s dress, which is done in a green silk that she herself would select), things like the music and the city. Without knowing Tilda’s intentions, Nakia’s self-assigned task is to keep her attention from whatever is behind the second-story window that keeps catching her gaze.So when TIlda finishes her drink and asks, like a dare, “Wanna dance?” Nakia nods. Dancing is a good distraction, typically.Most of the people on the floor are just swaying and bouncing along with the music, but Tilda is an unrepentant showoff, and once they find the right patch of floor, she immediately starts spinning Nakia around, blues dancing-style. It’s a good thing Nakia knows how not to make a fool of herself, although she wouldn’t say she’s excellent.Tilda, though, is pretty damn near that. She clearly knows what she’s doing, and she’s comfortable leading, which not all women are; she has grace and a surprising amount of pizzazz.Partway through, TIlda starts smirking at Nakia. That fire has returned, she thinks, but in a decidedly less dangerous fashion.Probably.When their third song ends, Tilda dips Nakia like in some old Hollywood film, like something is about to happen, and impulsively, encouraged by Tilda’s tight hold on her and the twist of her lips, Nakia leans up to kiss Tilda.“Girl, you don’t know how lucky you are,” Tilda hums, and just like that they’re flitting off for some privacy. “You do this often?” Tilda asks, breath hot on Nakia’s skin as she pushes her against the club’s wall.Nakia shrugs coyly. The truth is that she doesn’t (not much time being the main reason) but maybe just-Kia (a postgrad student on holiday, she’s decided) does. She’s still not fully sure what game TIlda is playing, and much as she’s enjoying herself she wants the tactical advantage half-truths provide.“Yeah, you seem the secretive type,” Tilda muses. “I’ve known plenty of those.”“Are you also that?” Nakia asks innocently.“Maybe,” Tilda says, nipping at Nakia’s throat. “Maybe I’m all kinds of dangerous.”Technically Nakia is, and just-Kia might say that to flirt, so she chuckles, “Maybe I am too.”“Where you say you were from again?” Tilda asks.“I didn’t,” Nakia replies smugly, lying, “Nairobi.” Even other Black people don’t always know the subtle differences between most African accents, so it’s a safe cover.“Huh,” Tilda says thoughtfully. “And of all of the clubs in the world, you walk into mine.”Nakia’s eyebrows raise. “You didn’t say you owned this place,” she points out.“I don’t,” Tilda shrugs. “Yet.”
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As far as the upstanding citizens in government can tell, Peggy Carter - former agent of the SSR and now founder of SHIELD - has been happily married to fellow agent and war hero Daniel Sousa since 1948. The announcement of their first child - a blue-eyed girl named Stella Rose - surprises no one, and the fact that Stella’s “Aunt” Angie keeps on living in the big old mansion gifted them by Howard Stark, the one that Peggy and Daniel settled into, seems normal as well. After all, she’d lived there before Daniel had, and even though her stage career has finally started to take off a place this nice and big would be far beyond her reach. She’s lived with other people her whole life, besides, it would feel strange to be alone. And having an extra set of hands to help with the baby doesn’t hurt!As far as a half-dozen of their closest friends (the Starks, the Jarvises, Rose who gave Stella her middle name, Angie’s most trusted brother) know for truth, Peggy Carter may love and be married to Daniel Sousa and may have a child with him but she’s had Angie Martinelli in her heart for much, much longer. As they grow, Stella and then baby Michael who follows learn that in polite company Angie is “Aunt” but if it’s just the family she’s “Mama” as Peggy is “Mum.” They know how lucky they are to make it work, this balancing act; they know how fortunate they are that nobody questions them, that they’re all good enough actors not to alert people, that the SSR and then SHIELD (largely because they're rather more international) don’t fall prey to the moral panic and witch hunting that plague other government agencies, at least not in any lasting ways. They’re getting off easy.The way it works is that Peggy sleeps with Daniel and Angie both and loves them both romantically, but Daniel and Angie don’t sleep together and they love each other more as longtime friends or even cousins might. The children don’t know this in so many words, but they know there’s a difference in the way that Dad loves Mum and the way he loves Mama. So when the adults learn that thanks to countless stressors Peggy’s body is very likely done having children, it seems they’ll have to tell Stella and Michael that they won’t have the baby siblings they so desire.Until, one night as they're reading books in bed (Peggy in the middle, since she actively wants to cuddle with both of the others) Angie clears her throat and says, “I could have the next kid.”There’s no question that Daniel will still be the father, though the process of making him so is full of awkward giggles and Angie’s dry remark that it sure is good a woman doesn’t have to orgasm or even be aroused to get knocked up. It only takes a couple of tries, which everyone is glad of, and then comes the fun part.The lie.Peggy and Angie sit down with Stella and Michael one night while Daniel is in DC for business, Angie resting her hand on her still-flat belly like an imitation of a pregnant woman in films. Immediately five-year-old Stella, who’s been through this before, gasps, “Are we having a brother or sister?”“Yes, but it’s different this time,” says Peggy carefully. “You see, the baby is growing inside your mama instead of me.”“So is it our brother or sister or not?” Michael asks, choosing his words carefully. He’s only three and a half, but he’s a big talker and - according to Angie especially - he’s going to be smarter than all of them.“It is,” Angie says. “Your dad is still the dad, and besides, I’m as much your mother as your mum is, right?”Stella nods, not wanting to make her mama sad. “But we can’t tell people that.”“So think of this the same way,” Peggy says. “Think of the child your mama has as your brother or sister, but if someone who’s not close to us asks, you say they’re only like your brother or sister.”“But then who gave Mama a baby?” Michael asks. “I know it was Dad, but we can’t tell that.”“We tell ‘em, when they ask, about my dead soldier boyfriend,” Angie says. “It’s the kinda story nobody pokes holes in.”“But you never had a soldier boyfriend,” Stella frowns, stumbling over the words.“If anyone fusses at me too hard, I’ll just cry,” Angie says smugly. “That’ll shut them up.”“I thought we weren’t s’posed to cry just to get what we want!” Stella pouts.“This is different,” Peggy says. “Remember why we can’t really share our family with everyone?”Stella nods solemnly. “The government would be mean.”“And when the government is mean, it would upset all of our lives,” Peggy says. “If Angie pretended to cry in this situation, it would be for all of our safety.”“The government stinks,” Michael declares. “‘Cept SHIELD, your government doesn’t stink, Mum.”“I’m glad you’ve such confidence in me,” Peggy chuckles, patting her lap so Michael joins her there and kissing the top of his head. “We’ll make it work, loves.”“We’re fightin’ for love, it’ll turn out okay,” Angie adds.And it does. Somehow nobody gets at all suspicious, at least that they say. SHIELD may have its prejudiced individuals, but nobody makes any attempt to out Peggy and Daniel and Angie as queer polyamorists. Broadway, too, is more forgiving than Hollywood, and Angie’s love and family life isn’t nearly the biggest scandal around. Through luck and covertness, they make it through, and in nine months the family grows again.Peggy is, by some magic (which is to say Angie’s tears), allowed in the room for the delivery, and it’s every bit as miraculous as doing this herself. When she’s allowed to bring Daniel and the children in, finally, Angie is cleaned up and beaming, new daughter in her arms.“What’s her name?” Stella asks eagerly.“I was thinkin’ Fred for a boy, so I guess she’s gonna be Ginger,” Angie says, grinning even as Peggy bites her lip to keep from arguing.
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Elektra arrives at court with little fuss, but Karen sees her immediately. As the betrothed of the king’s favorite advisor, she has an advantageous seat to the many goings-on of court, to the comings and goings, and she watches the new lady with such interest that she almost credits her own will with the fact that Elektra comes to be her new handmaid.Later she knows better, of course, but it crosses her mind at first. That relationship begins like most between ladies and their maids: Elektra laces Karen into gowns and brushes out her hair, calls her “milady” and withholds her own opinions when they contradict, treats her kindly when other courtiers do not (Karen is still low on the social hierarchy, given her newness at court and her femaleness more than that). Karen teaches Elektra the ways of this court specifically, confides in her, listens to her tales of life abroad. They get on.And then one night, just as she’s getting ready to fall asleep, Karen turns her big blue eyes on Elektra and asks, “Will you stay? It’s, I’m… I’m lonely.”It’s clear she’s asking for a bedmaid, for someone to innocently share warmth with, but Elektra has been trained to know the difference between lonely and lonely. So once the candles are blown out and they’ve both slipped under the covers, Elektra whispers, smirking, “Milady, has anyone taught you how to please your husband?”“Nobody has taught me much of anything about my husband, himself included,” Karen replies almost dourly. “I’m not sure I can please him.”Perhaps this is in reference to the Lord Wesley’s sour disposition or perhaps to his seeming preference for men, but no matter. That teaching isn’t Elektra’s real desire.“Then you must learn to take pleasure for yourself,” she says gently, and she leans in to kiss Karen on the mouth, slowly, lingering.Karen’s eyes shut immediately, and Elektra smiles to herself, reaching for a bit of silk and wrapping it around those eyes carefully. “If it helps you to let go, or to pretend, so shall it be,” she whispers, watching how Karen needs permission.“More,” she whispers.“As milady wishes,” Elektra whispers, and she rolls on top. Things are different after that, though if anyone else notices anything, it’s just that Karen seems happier and more confident, and they just attribute that to her becoming more used to court. But alone, and they are often alone (Karen learns to employ the excuse of a headache so that she may be free of the court at large), it’s infinitely more thrilling. They’re playful, the exchange of stories and jokes and secrets is freer, they are enthusiastic in the teaching (Elektra) and exploration (Karen) of their bodies. One night as Karen is playing with Elektra’s hair (this and other caretaking activities having become more equal) she abandons caution and manners and calls her just “Ellie.”(This almost wrenches the truth from Elektra. She hasn’t been called that since childhood, and while she has no lasting love for the ones who said it, it reminds her of a time she felt cared for, even if that was naive.)What Elektra does in return is kiss the palm of Karen’s hand and call her “little dove,” so gently the compliment is unmistakable. So too is the balance of power. And then it all threatens to come crashing down.“Be patient, my little dove,” Elektra whispers one night, “I’ve something to tend to before bed, you go on without me.”Karen does, but first she goes toward the library. She’s stopped apologizing for her interest in such things; it’s not a diversion the men would prefer she pursue, but most of what she reads is suitably feminine (romances, poems, light history) and therefore allowed.She stops before she reaches the door, though, for she sees a couple in the alcove, amorously entwined. It’s no business of hers, she thinks, so she stops short and clears her throat to alert them, but then the man’s face moves and Karen feels her veins go icy. His companion is unmistakably Elektra.Just as Elektra sees her, Karen turns and runs. She’s still crying when Elektra returns to the bedchamber, but she manages to spit out, “With one dalliance managed, you return to the other?”Elektra clicks her tongue, very possibly in disappointment. “It isn’t that way, milady,” she says, defensively different. “That man is nothing to me.”Karen scoffs. “It appeared he was,” she says. “That, or perhaps neither of us matter. You take pleasure wherever you find it.”“That was not for pleasure,” Elektra says, and she studies Karen’s face, knowing this is to be a turning point and deciding to take a chance. “Would you listen for a spell, milady?”It is a mark, perhaps, of Karen’s cultivated manners that she nods. “Do I have much choice?”“There are always choices,” Elektra says, but she begins. “I serve an ancient faction. I came here to report on your betrothed and his cohorts, and deal with the problems they pose to the world.” Her voice drops. “They’re wicked men.”And she explains. Karen listens to these things, finding them horrific; she certainly doesn’t doubt them. They’re laced with suspicious details that she herself has seen by accident, dark rumors she’s certainly heard, men’s temperamental likelihoods of behaving so.But despite all of this and how she accepts it, generally, the first thing she asks when she’s given the chance is “Were we a ploy too? Was Ellie?”That’s difficult to answer, but - surprisingly - Elektra wants to be truthful. “Becoming your attendant was the easiest way to get close to the men. Becoming close to you was suggested as well.”Karen crumples, but not wholly. “Oh, I see.”“They did not tell me to feel anything for you, though,” Elektra continues, more softly. “And yet, I find myself undone.”“Undone,” Karen repeats. “What does that even mean?”“Many things I have no right to say,” Elektra murmurs. “Things a girl like you should not have to carry.”That’s too vague for Karen, who says, “I would hope you know that you can tell me anything, and that I’m not…” She shakes her head. “I’m not weak.”“I know that,” Elektra says. “But you are good of heart, and a highborn lady at that! I don’t know which is worse, or if I’d rather let you stay pure or tip you over the edge to suit a wicked girl like me.” She is, Karen notes with some shock, also almost crying now, as if she feels this.“I am not pure,” Karen insists. “I’ve hurt people too.”“Without meaning to!” Elektra exclaims. “You’re still more than an assassin who’s half a whore.”Karen flinches. “Is that what you see? Me shining on a pedestal, you a hopeless and tragic sinner?”“What would you say instead?” Elektra asks.“Something less simple,” Karen huffs. “Something real.”“I haven’t been real my whole life,” Elektra says. “And there’s no point in loving something pretend.”“Why not?” Karen asks softly. “If my betrothed is a monster, why not abandon him? I see a woman before me that’s far superior.”“Even if I kiss strange men and kill them too?” Elektra asks, one eyebrow arched.“What if I helped?” Karen asks suddenly. “If he’s so horrid.”“Little dove, there’s a reason I trained to kill since childhood,” Elektra says. “The way it must be done isn’t easy.”“So I distract him,” Karen says. “Whatever you need.”Elektra blinks. “Most people run from me when they learn what I really am. Or they try to kill me in return.”Karen grins. “I’m not most people.”
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Obviously Tandy has been mugged before. (She’s done the mugging before.) But the mugger isn’t usually a girl, let alone a girl who’s almost as little as she is, let alone one who’s holding not a knife or a shiv to her throat but one of those circular action figure-style ninja blades.Despite the weapon, though, this girl is kind of a noob, and it’s easy for Tandy to conjure a dagger and disarm her assailant. Fast. “Picked the wrong person to mess with,” she says, and she twists the other girl’s arm behind her back to get her to drop the weapon -And she brushes the girl’s bare skin.This chick has the most cluttered hopes of anyone she’s ever snooped on. She’s a softer touch than she used to be, because twenty minutes later the two of them are sitting in the abandoned church with cups of hot cocoa bought for them by a helpless college student (“oh, shit, I forgot my wallet, and my sister just got dumped, and I was going to treat her to something nice to cheer her up…”) and a shitty thermal blanket from the girl’s weird camping backpack spread over their laps.Her name is Ruby, she says, and she’s in a very bad place. At first Tandy thinks drugs, but the suggestion seems to mortally offend Ruby.“Drugs are for the weak,” she says, and Tandy doesn’t bother getting mad. “I’m not weak, I’m the Destroyer of Worlds. Or…” Here she falters. “I was. I could be.”“Well,” Tandy cracks, “you do kind of look like you’re become death. No offense.”Ruby scowls. “You have no idea what I’ve been through.”Tandy raises an eyebrow. “My dad, who died driving his car into the ocean while I was in it, accidentally helped invent a chemical process that turns people into rage zombies, but before that he abused my mom and now she’s a drug addict that I ran away from as soon as I could,” she says. “And in unrelated news I can see people’s hopes when I touch them and summon deadly light daggers out of thin air.”“I don’t have a dad,” Ruby says defiantly. “My mom was artificially inseminated with super-soldier DNA so she could give birth to the savior of Hydra, and I was gonna do that but they’re racist shitheads who kill dogs. I still almost ended the world, then I almost died from a slit throat, and my mom, who was still a Nazi, got murdered by aliens. So I ran away too.”“Um,” Tandy says, blinking. “You win.” They sip cocoa in silence until Tandy dares to ask, “So why New Orleans?”“Always thought it seemed cool,” Ruby shrugs. “Thought it’d help me learn to stop thinking racist Nazi shit. Plus it’s really far away from the people who hate me.”“The learning not to be racist is kinda something you’ll have to do on your own,” Tandy remarks, “but if you want, I can teach you how not to die.”“But I’m -”“Maybe possibly the Destroyer of Worlds, I know,” Tandy interrupts. “But you’re also kind of a lab rat. Again, no offense. You just don’t know how to people.”“Yeah,” Ruby admits, but then she scrunches up her face and asks, “Why help me?”“You’re messed up, but you deserve a chance to not suck.”Ruby makes a little “hmpf” noise, but she says, “I guess that’s the best I”ll get, huh?”“Probably,” Tandy says, but warmly, like a joke. It would be easier to put Ruby up at the sad excuse of a Bowen home, but Tandy doesn’t trust her mother with this weird situation. She does sneak in to borrow an extra sleeping bag, though, and she sets Ruby up in her own sad excuse, the church. Nobody will find her in here, she tells Ruby, and it’s probably true.They talk a little as they’re lying there in the dark, mostly about what Ruby thinks are normal girl things. This means celebrities (Ruby has the serious hots for that superhero Quake, even if they’re allegedly mortal enemies or whatever) and clothes (“I probably need some that don’t make me look like a Star Wars villain,” Ruby sighs, glancing at the torn black bodysuit she arrived in) and boys (this comes up halfheartedly, with Ruby admitting that she never loved her boyfriend Werner or possibly Alex - also a Nazi - and now he’s dead too). Between these things and the answers Ruby gives to Tandy’s baseline personal questions, things like “what clothes do you want?” (“I dunno, I usually wear workout clothes, or, like, jeans and band shirts?”) and “what bands do you like?” (“old stuff like Bowie, loud stuff, rock by angry girls”), Tandy has made a lot more sense of her new, possibly murderous roommate.Ruby Hale is totally freaking gay.Or bi, or whatever. Something.Like, it’s just a hunch, and Ruby clearly hasn’t confirmed it, but it’s a really strong hunch. And if she really was a biologically-engineered Nazi murder baby, of course she wouldn’t realize she wasn’t a straight person. Of course she would be rebelling against the ideology she grew up in.One option, Tandy thinks as she lies awake (due diligence or whatever, she wants to make sure Ruby’s not just faking her weird remorse to get a chance to slit Tandy’s throat with her ninja weapons and steal her shit) would be to just ask. She’s kind of worried that would also end in throat-slitting, though, so she just… doesn’t.What she does do is pull the blanket up over Ruby once she’s asleep, and if she sneaks a peek at Ruby’s hopes in the process?Well.The fake, brightly lit Ruby is currently asleep too (she must be exhausted) and so Tandy lies beside her, to study her. Definitely just that.As if she notices, Ruby rolls over and throws an arm across Tandy’s waist. She’s smiling, a for-real smile Tandy hasn’t seen for real yet.That clinches it.Tandy slips back into real life and burrows into her makeshift bed, but first she slides closer to Ruby. Time to let nature run its course.She wakes to Ruby softly muttering, “Shit!”Sure enough, her arm is on Tandy, but before she has a chance to panic and pull back, Tandy grabs Ruby’s hand. “I know what you want, remember?”Ruby blushes fiercely. “I like boys,” she defends weakly. “I just got cold. Swear.” But she obviously knows she’s fronting.“Chill,” Tandy soothes. “Experiment with me, if you want.” She grins cheekily. “Or just admit you’re into me. Whatever you prefer.”
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Daisy grimaces down at her outfit (it’s basically a French maid’s dress, except worse because it’s latex). “Make the brown girl the hired help,” she grumbles. “How original.”“You need to have access to all of the rooms in the house,” Bobbi says coolly, adjusting her ponytail. “Plus, nobody’s supposed to grope the maids.”“Which means it’s only maybe going to happen,” Daisy snarks.“Third,” Bobbi continues, rolling her eyes even though she knows that’s true, “you weren’t going to let me leash you.”Jemma (who does, in fact, have a leash clipped onto the collar she’s wearing) smiles sheepishly. “Sorry, ma’am,” she says. “I think you look cute.”“I look ridiculous, but you’re sweet to say so,” Daisy replies. She moves to stroke Jemma’s cheek, then drag her thumb across Jemma’s lips. “You’re cute too, but you’re always cute done up.”“It’s going to be odd, being in public like this, but I’m glad I’ll be making you proud,” Jemma says earnestly. “Both of you.”“You will,” Daisy promises.“Besides,” Bobbi smirks, “are you even really a spy until you’ve been undercover at a fetish party?” They split off as soon as soon as they approach the house, Bobbi leading Jemma through the front and Daisy taking the long way around with the other servers in their kinky yet functional attire. (To wit: the dress Daisy has on may be latex, but it’s not tight enough to restrict movement, and her matching boots are “only” three inches high.) This party is a masquerade, which means that at least half-masks cover everyone’s, dom and sub alike, upper faces - good for hiding, bad for spotting people.And as Bobbi and Jemma learn upon their entrance, a submissive whose mask isn’t also a blindfold is rare. They’ve barely been inside three minutes before a tall man sidles over and remarks, “You know, they make things for that.”“For what?” Bobbi asks haughtily, pulling Jemma close.“Your girl has wandering eyes,” he says. “Some might take it as an invitation.”“You can speak to her directly,” Bobbi snaps. “She may not reply, but she listens.”Of course they all knew there would be some dehumanizing behavior shit here, but in her role as Jemma’s domme - pretend and real - Bobbi feels responsible for minimizing Jemma’s discomfort. Jemma is bound (her wrists cuffed to her thighs, which are in turn cuffed together) and gagged (an open-mouthed panel that Bobbi can, and now does, use an attachment to plug up), but she likes that. The rest? It’s totally unnecessary, the kind of stuff that gives this scene a bad name.The man regards Jemma aloofly, appraisingly, but he can tell Bobbi isn’t fucking around and he just says “If you wish” and he floats back into the crowd.“Ew,” Bobbi remarks. “Sorry, honey.”Jemma shrugs, mumbles that it’s fine. She expects some of that, because not everyone plays as respectfully as her girls do. Luckily, they’re at this party to get the drop on a small group of suspicious attendees, meaning most of the guests are probably safe to be around. It’s at least better than if they were infiltrating a Hydra fetish ball or something. But even as someone who does a lot of this stuff, Daisy is still unnerved. There’s like fifteen male doms to every female one, and while there are boy subs, very few of them belong to female dominants: in short, it’s statistically inaccurate and male-gazey like whoa.Plus, she’s definitely been groped like four times already. So much for that.But she’s getting good intel, it’s not totally pointless, and she’s gotten to watch Jemma and Bobbi do their thing, which makes her a little jealous but also definitely turns her on.Just then she hears some guy shout, “Dumb bitch!” and smack someone across the face, not in a sexy way. Like any rational person, she sets down her tray and turns to investigate.Sure enough, it’s some douchey dom towering over his eerily little-looking sub. Maybe she spilled something or stepped on his foot or some other minor whatever, but it’s way out of line for him to behave that way, even here. Especially here.So Daisy pushes up her sleeves (metaphorically) and does her thing.“Hey,” she hisses, getting up in his space. “None of that shit, okay?”He turns to her and scoffs. “What are you gonna do?” he asks. “Dust me?”He clearly means like “featherdust” because she’s dressed as a maid, but she has a sudden mental image of vibrating him so hard he poofs like a Buffy vampire. That’s satisfying.Instead she settles for punching him hard as she can in his gut, smiling sweetly as he doubles over. “For starters, I’ll do that.”He storms off, but before his sub can follow Daisy touches her arm gently. “Find me or someone else if he does that again, okay?” she murmurs, and the girl nods. Bobbi and Jemma have been novel tonight, since there aren’t that many woman-woman pairs and the ones that are present have a very different dynamic (less relationship-y, more bad time in stock photos-y), so after a while people (mostly well-meaning enthusiasts) start asking for some sort of demonstration.“You up for it, honey?” Bobbi asks, mostly to keep their cover, and Jemma nods.So they take center stage and Bobbi nods to Daisy - while everyone’s distracted, it’s a perfect time to snoop around some. Once she’s moving through the crowd, Bobbi announces, “My honey’s not much of a masochist, but she does like it tight. Who wants to see?”There’s an appreciative rumble, and beneath her gag Jemma blushes. She knows she’s pretty, but feeling sexy is something altogether different, and what’s more she knows she’s making Bobbi (and Daisy) proud by being that.So Bobbi uncuffs Jemma’s wrists and thighs and unplugs Jemma’s gag, explaining as much for her benefit as the viewers’, “We both know it’s easier to hear the safeword this way.”Jemma nods. She likes the feeling of being open, although she could do without the man in the crowd who calls out (very enthusiastically) about how much she’ll drool.Bobbi takes a length of rope that someone provides her and ties Jemma’s wrists above her head, attached to a frame. She starts rigging, deftly tying a full-body karada around Jemma (it’s tight, but it’s also reasonably modest, which was Jemma’s only request going into this).It feels a little humiliating, given that Jemma knows that all of these strangers know how aroused she is.And it’s all amazing, it’s exciting and odd and sexy, until a man lumbers out of the crowd and says, slurring his words slightly, “Now someone oughta make her cry.”“You do not have permission to touch my sub,” Bobbi growls, very aware of Jemma’s nervous trembling.“I didn’t say I was gonna,” he says. “But this will.” It’s basically a cattle prod, a taser on a stick, and it comes into contact with Jemma’s skin before anyone can stop it. She’s been hurt much worse, but it’s jarring nonetheless, and she doesn’t want this, so she yells out her safeword.“Stop it,” Bobbi shouts, lashing out at the man. In a perfectly evil move, he kicks her back and makes contact with her right knee, the bad one.“Fuck!” she shrieks as she crumples, and she meets Jemma’s panicked eyes in apology. One of the first things they do when they get a new gag is test out how Jemma sounds wearing it, how intelligible she is, how specifically the safeword sounds. As such, Daisy could recognize that anywhere.Luckily, she’s at a good place in her investigation, so it’s nothing to run out and basically fly herself to the stage. “Asshole,” she shouts, because of course it’s the guy from before. “Back off.”“Or what?” he taunts. “Dyke.”“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Daisy pouts, sending a seismic wave through the floor to knock him off his feet.“The fuck?!” he shouts, but Daisy blasts him directly, grabs the nearby safety scissors, and goes to cut the ropes off of Jemma. Aside from an ugly welt where the taser made contact, she doesn’t seem hurt so much as startled and a bit hysterical.“You okay?” Daisy asks softly, pulling the gag out.Shakily, Jemma nods, but she doesn’t have words yet.“Okay,” Daisy says, kissing her cheek since their covers are blown anyway. “Can you help Bobbi up?”Jemma nods again, offering herself to lean on once Bobbi is in fact standing. “I’m sorry I let you get hurt,” Bobbi whispers, but Jemma shakes her head. Wasn’t her fault.Daisy knocks the man out, then, and as the room turns chaotic she says to the others, “Our ride will be here soon. C’mon.” It’s not until they’re back at base, snuggled in Bobbi’s bed, that Jemma manages to say, “I’m sorry.”“For what, Jem?” Daisy asks immediately, petting her hair.“I ruined the mission,” Jemma mumbles. “Bobbi got hurt and you had to drop everything to save me. I should have just taken it.”“I’m not mad,” Bobbi offers. “I could have poked the bear that is my knee in lots of ways. It was a little embarrassing that that guy took me down, but I’m over that. It was honestly more of a dommespace problem. Pride and shit.”“Well, still,” Jemma frets. “I feel responsible.”“You’re not,” Daisy promises. “I actually got a lot of intel, I think between it and what you guys found we have enough to go forward. Besides, I’m pretty sure I’m the reason that guy lashed out.”“How?” Jemma asks.“He was going after his sub and I stepped in,” Daisy says. “Gave him a little taste of his own medicine. I guess it pissed him off enough to look for someone to take it out on.”“So he’s a bully,” Bobbi summarizes. “A bully who uses BDSM as an excuse. Sounds like that’s his own problem.” She kisses Jemma’s cheek, then the palm of Daisy’s hand. “You two are great. Very good girls.”Jemma sighs, shaky but pleased. She takes Bobbi’s hand and snuggles into Daisy’s side. “I think… I think I’m glad I was already not a masochist, because that may well have put me off it. I’m already going to request that if we do this again, we don’t tie me quite so inescapably.”“Honestly, we’ll skip the public demo,” Bobbi says. “That’s safer.”Daisy laughs tiredly. “Up until the shitty stuff, though, honey, you looked awful cute.”“Thanks, ma’am,” Jemma purrs. “Up until then it was fun.”Bobbi smiles. “You both looked cute,” she says. “Might not be a bad look to bring back later, Dais.”“Hey, my French maid days are over,” Daisy huffs.“I’d wear it,” Jemma offers.“Only if you promise not to do a French accent to match,” Daisy teases. “Or speak French. “I only know ‘merci,’ ‘merde,’ and ‘oui, oui, mon ami, je m’appelle Lafayette,’ so.”They both giggle about that, obviously feeling better, so Bobbi smiles and asks, “Wanna hear the story of the time Hunter and I went undercover at the Hellfire Club?”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Aida - lovely Aida, wide-eyed and immaculately dressed and far too fine to pass for a junkie in Raina’s usual clientele - comes to this side of town in a private car, all tinted windows and conspiracy, and she asks for just one thing: “Make my feelings go away.”Raina says, “That’s my specialty.” Raina has already shot Aida up (she flinches, but most do their first time) when she asks, “What are you running from, anyway?”Aida stiffens. “What makes you think I’m running?”“Call it a hunch,” Raina says dryly, not showing her hand quite yet. “Women like you don’t come here unless it’s dire.”“Women like me,” echoes Aida. “Make-believe ones?”“I didn’t say that,” Raina murmurs, but she looks smug.Aida is, as Raina predicted, showing her own hand instead. “I’m a beautiful lie,” she scoffs, like she’s barely heard Raina speak. “That’s what the Doctor thinks, what he’s said.”“You work for a doctor?” Raina prompts, innocent as can be. “What, he doesn’t hand out zydrate like all the rest?”“Why waste it on a sentient blow-up doll with a high-powered computer processor for a brain?” Aida says viciously.“Also his words?”“Truth.”And the whole gory story comes spilling out, just like Raina knew it would: the woman who used to be Agnes, beloved of a wicked scientist, the disease that ripped her out of her body, the tricks and medicine and engineering that made Aida out of what was left behind, the young and ambitious Doctor who stepped up when the scientist could not.“I thought when he made me real, it would be better,” Aida laments. “Instead it hurts. I feel guilt for moving into some dead woman’s body, unease when I’m held to her standard. Rage and joy and fear one all after another, and I hate it.”“So now what?” Raina asks.“Now I alleviate my discontent like anyone else,” Aida says petulantly. “That’s human, isn’t it? Making bad decisions and suppressing your feelings with chemicals?”Raina fakes a melodramatic sigh. “If we’re doing this I need to get on your level,” she says, and she goes to the cupboard where her emergency weed lives.“I thought you said you didn’t use zydrate yourself,” Aida accuses.“God, I don’t,” Raina shudders. “I like to go really old-school myself.”“What’s that?” Aida asks. “Why are you lighting it on fire?”“This is marijuana, baby doll,” Raina says. “We’ll try it together next time, but it doesn’t mix with Z.”Aida pouts, but the reason her own naïveté bothers her is that she’s intelligent enough to recognize it. “But hurry, being high alone is awful.” “You know what I hate?” Aida asks, lolling against Raina (they’ve since moved to the sagging king-size bed and removed some clothing). “Men, and also the concept of gender.”“Men are garbage,” Raina agrees, tangling fingers in Aida’s hair. “Gender is… complicated.”“How?” Aida asks. “It’s something that someone a long time ago invented based on arbitrary biological variations and enforced.”“Not untrue,” Raina muses. “It’s a power thing, I think. And it’s never hurt capitalism. I’m sort of lucky, I guess. I’ve always felt okay about being a girl.” She shrugs. “I’ve panicked about plenty of other things, but not that.”“Have you had anything fixed?” Aida asks. Her attention span is, like many users’, very short.“A little bit of internal work, but nothing fancy or big,” Raina says. “I didn’t want to bother getting a nose job when they real problem was how my imbalanced brain perceived my nose. Or whatever part of me.”“Couldn’t you fix your brain?” Aida asks.“I medicate,” Raina shrugs. “But neurosurgery is dangerous and it isn’t anything a graverobber can afford, even an excellent one like me, and that’s not a repossession you have even a chance of surviving.”“I bet the Doctor would do it,” Aida says. “He’d take something worse than money as payment, though.”Raina tilts her head. “Figures he’s a pervert.”Aida shakes her head. “Only with me,” she says. “He’d take a gift if you had one.”“Ah, she figures it out,” Raina says smugly. “What was your first clue?”“You carry yourself like someone special,” Aida says, and it’s a little sentimental but that happens on Z sometimes. “What is it? Do you read minds? It’s something with your brain, isn’t it, that’s why you don’t want the surgery.”“I see things,” Raina explains, knowing Aida will understand.“A precog,” Aida murmurs reverently. “We’ve never met one of those before. But giving him that wouldn’t be worth it.”“You just suggested it,” Raina laughs.“I’m high,” Aida says defensively. “I have no filter, isn’t that what people say? I have no filter, and I'm not a woman even though that’s what everyone thinks and I…” Here Aida trails off. “I like kissing you.”“If you’re not a woman, what are you?” Raina asks.“A humanoid robot made of flesh,” Aida shrugs.‘Well, yes,” Raina says, “but how should I refer to you? She, or he, or they, or…?”“Don’t know yet,” Aida says. “Kiss me, though. I know that. I have a hypothesis that kissing is always one hundred percent better when both parties have chosen to do it. Also that you kiss better than men. Help me test this.”“Happy to,” Raina says, and she does.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Karolina is, expected, in Blessings’ stall, grooming her white mane (there are bows in it like a Barbie pony, which is cute, if twee) and listening to Little Mix with one headphone out and one in. She looks so content that Nico almost doesn’t want to gloom up her general presence, but she needs to. Molly’s not going to shut up until she does.“Hey,” she mumbles, glancing everywhere but Karolina’s face. “Um. How are you doing?”Karolina and Blessings both look over at Nico at the same time, and Blessings gives a horsey huff as Karolina says, “Okay. I mean, you’re really busy getting ready for the show, though, aren’t you? Don’t worry about me, I’m… I’m okay.”“I’m sorry we haven’t had time to do much pony squad stuff,” Nico begins.“You’ve been busy,” Karolina repeats. “You have the show to worry about. Our dumb club can wait.”Okay, so Nico’s suspicions were correct. Karolina is feeling left out. The upcoming show (in which Nico and Gert are riding with Eiffel and two of her groupies) is all trails and jumps, while Karolina’s specialty is dressage - but that doesn’t mean that she wouldn’t still be upset about Nico and Gert doing training (and sometimes other) stuff with the bitchy cool girls and not her.“Our club isn’t dumb,” Nico says.“That’s not what some people think,” Karolina mutters. “That’s what she told Xavin, anyway. Right before she told them that freaks like us belong together.”“Screw Eiffel,” says Nico, because it’s obvious that’s who Karolina means. “She’s a jerk.”“But this was always going to happen,” Karolina exclaims, instinctively stroking Blessings’ neck as a self-soothing mechanism. “You were always going to figure out that I was just the weird girl from the cult who cares too much. You were always going to realize you were too cool for me.”She looks distraught, and Nico feels awful that her first reaction is nervous giggling. “I always thought you’d get too cool for me, like you’d realize you were pretty enough and normal enough to be popular.”Karolina can’t find a response to that, though. It’s like the word “pretty” short-circuited her. She adjusts three bows in Blessings’ mane before finally managing to stammer, “I’m what?”Nico (perhaps willfully) misunderstands, though, and tries to tease, “I mean, you’re not normal. Normal is overrated. But if you wanted to, you could pass.”“Why would I want to?” Karolina asks. “I don’t love the constant mockery from people like Eiffel, but I don’t want to stop being myself, either. Sometimes I wish I did, but I… I just can’t.”Nico frowns. “Nobody’s asking you do.” She pauses and considers Karolina’s parents. “Well. I’m not. Or Gert, or Molly, or, y’know, Xavin.” She can’t keep the edge out of her voice when she says that last name, but she’s hoping Karolina doesn’t notice.“Do you have an issue with Xavin?” Karolina asks.She definitely noticed.“No,” Nico says, too quickly. “They’re nice. A little weird, but good weird. And nice, they’re nice too.” But Karolina doesn’t look convinced, so Nico decides to suck it up and blurt out, “I’m jealous of them, okay?”Karolina blinks. “Why?”“Because while I’ve been here being a selfish ass, they’ve been there for you,” Nico says. “And they’re obviously into you, and you seem like you might be into them too, and I don’t blame you. I’m a screwup.”“No you’re not,” Karolina insists. “I’m not mad. Maybe I’ve been feeling ignored, but I’m… I’ll be fine.” She tries to smile casually (even though this took a sudden and terrifying turn). “Besides, why do you care who’s into me? I thought… well, Alex.”Nico wrinkles her nose. “Alex likes me. Liked, maybe, I don’t know. I think he has a crush on Livvie now. But I don’t have a crush on him.” She takes a deep breath. “I have a crush on you.”Karolina goes bright pink. “I have a crush on you too,” she says quickly. “I’ve had a crush on you forever. I think I had a crush on you before I knew what having a crush even was.”Nico gives a nervous laugh. “You’re my best friend,” she says. “I didn’t want to make it weird.”“Neither did I!” Karolina exclaims. “I wasn’t even sure if you liked girls like that.”“I don’t think I knew,” Nico admits, wrinkling her nose. “But the more I thought about it the more sense it made. I like you. You’re amazing, Karolina. You’re my favorite person.”“Gosh,” Karolina says. Blessings chooses this moment to snort, as if she’s indignant that they’ve gone so long without acknowledging her, and the girls both giggle. “What do you say, huh?” Karolina asks the horse, patting her neck. “Do we give this a go?”Nico produces a treat for the horse, which of course the horse sees and noses at Nico to get. “Looks like she’s in favor,” Nico jokes.“You did kinda bribe her,” Karolina teases. “But it works out, ‘cause I’m in favor too.”“Cool,” Nico says, a little breathless. “Um. I just wanted to see you before class, I… I should go get Dai ready, I…”Very hesitantly, Karolina leans over to kiss Nico’s cheek. “Go, it’s good, we’re good,” she says, smiling. “We have time.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Of all the girls on the fifth floor, Karen felt she knew Marci the least well - and that was exactly by Marci’s own design. The curvaceous lawyer was often cold for no reason, looking down her nose at not only Karen’s but the other girls’ more “frivolous” enthusiasms - things like learning to cha-cha in the common room or painting each other’s toenails or poring over fashion magazines - and especially Karen’s (admittedly still developing) worldviews.It was odd, Karen thought. Marci wasn’t unfashionable: in fact, she was one of the best-dressed girls in the house, and her hair and skin were always flawless. She didn’t usually turn down an invitation to Josie’s either. But it was no secret that she considered her job at the law firm more important than everyone else’s; things like photography, radio plays, waiting tables, and answering phones didn’t count in the same way to her. Maybe, Karen thought, Marci found her a disappointment of a career girl, someone unquestionably clever but naïve and seemingly unambitious. Maybe Marci thought she was more of an annoying kid sister type than…Well, what?It hadn’t escaped Karen’s notice that none of her hallmates went with or even talked much about boys, except to complain about work colleagues. It seemed odd at first, but Karen got used to it quickly. Unlike the girls at her high school, none of them were defined by which boy they were partnered with; instead they were defined by who they were, what they did, what they were interested in. None of them talked about marriage like it was the only achievement they’d ever have. After the decidedly conventional social standards in Fagan Corners, it was positively refreshing.At first she wondered about the girls: didn’t they get lonely? If her friends back at home weren’t seeing anyone, it was all they could talk (or more accurately complain) about. But it didn’t seem like they did. More than once she’d seen Jessica and Trish going into Trish’s room for sleepovers (did city girls still practice-kiss like Karen and Sarah had done?) or Elektra lounging on whichever of her friends happened to be closest. Was that what she wanted with Marci? Easy intimacy? Someone to practice with?Of course, right now that would all have to wait. She needed Marci’s help to figure out who had been blackmailing her boss!The two blondes met in Karen’s room after supper, Karen immediately getting to business. (She hoped that maybe if she showed Marci how capable she was, Marci might look at her in a more favorable light.) “I thought we could begin by reexamining the paper scraps I saw in the wastebasket,” she said, immediately spreading said scraps out on her small desk. They didn’t form a complete letter, but there were enough complete phrases that, coupled with Ms. Hogarth’s increasingly erratic behavior, Karen was positive that something suspicious was going on.Marci (who Karen had recruited to help based mostly on her being a lawyer as well) nodded, amused. “I thought Misty was the aspiring detective here,” she remarked.“I shouldn’t have to be a detective to want to set things right,” Karen defended.“How noble.” They bounced theories off of each other awhile, both growing more and more animated as they went. Karen suggested that Ms. Hogarth had Communist associations, which Marci scolded her for (“honestly, Karen, not every problem in the city stems from Communists!”) and Marci opined that one of the other lawyers in the firm might be behind it, which Karen refuted (“this doesn’t seem their style, they’d just sue her or buy her out”). Karen had just suggested they consider Ms. Hogarth’s ex-lovers or former underlings (“I can certainly see why someone might hold a grudge against Ms. Hogarth, and I’ve only known her for two months!”) when Marci exclaimed, “Karen, you’re a genius!”Karen blinked. “How come?”“We were looking for information about someone blackmailing Ms. Hogarth, but we never even thought that the note might be about Ms. Hogarth doing the blackmailing!” Marci crowed. “And I know exactly who it is!”“How?” Karen gasped. “Lawyer gossip?”Marci shook her head and took a sip of the bottle of whiskey they nicked from Jessica before letting loose with the whole story. How once, not so long ago, Karen’s room had been Pam’s, Pam who was close to Marci and a secretary as well; how she’d all but vanished from the fifth floor to live with her supervisor/lover, then all but vanished altogether, leaving only word not to try and track her down.“Don’t you see?” Marci asked wildly.“It’s very unfortunate that your friend was used like that,” Karen said doubtfully, “but what does that -”“Ms. Hogarth was her lover!” Marci interrupted impatiently. “Pam is a Lesbian, and so is your boss!” A moment passed before she added, more timidly, “And I am too.”Karen wasn’t, she thought, the same girl she was half a year ago. That girl would have gasped at the idea of even passing a Lesbian on the street. They just didn’t have those in Fagan Corners (or if they did, they were very good at hiding it). Now, all Karen did was say, surprised to find it was the truth, “Oh! That makes sense.”“You’re not upset?” Marci asked, frowning.“Why?” Karen asked.“We were keeping such a large secret from you,” Marci said.Karen’s eyes widened. “We? You mean, you aren’t the only one?”Marci shook her head. “The fifth floor is full of Lesbian career girls,” she said. “It’s an open secret here.”“Oh!” Karen said again. “So Misty and Colleen…?”“Lesbians,” Marci agreed.“And Jessica and Trish?” Karen pressed.“Supremely Sapphic,” Marci nodded. “And Hope, and Elektra, and everyone at the bar, and apparently some of your coworkers too.”“Actually,” Karen chimed in, feeling a revelation wash over her, “the more I think about it, the surer I am that I’m a Lesbian career girl too!”“Well, there goes $10,” Marci sighed, although she was smirking.Karen canted her head. “Why is that?”“Oh, Elektra’s had a bet going,” Marci said casually. “She knew immediately, but at first I didn’t believe her. And Jessica thought you were, but you wouldn’t figure it out for at least a year.”“At first?” Karen asked, her heart beginning to flutter. “But then?”“Then,” Marci said huskily, “I was afraid you weren’t.”“Oh,” Karen said for the third time, but before she could doubt herself she launched at Marci for a kiss.And Marci? Marci returned the kiss, put her arms around Karen’s waist like they were slow-dancing, and declared, “You have so much to learn.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Stopping a deli robbery is exactly the kind of thing that sorta-famous women with sorta-secret superhero aspirations aren’t supposed to do. Trish can picture exactly how she’d take out the robbers (three male-presenting people, one burly and two slender), but she’s all the way back by the frozen stuff, and she’s not positive she could cross the store without getting shot.She really doesn’t want to deal with that tonight.Instead, she focuses her attention on the other customers in the store. Most of them are up front, in the robbers’ direct line of sight, but a cute woman maybe fifteen years her senior is tucked against a rack of potato chips, clearly trying to will herself out of this situation. Trish can definitely look out for one other woman.After making sure she’s not going to get them both attacked by moving, she scoots closer as quietly as she can and quickly writes out a message on her phone.
>>These guys don’t seem all that bright. I don’t think they know we’re back here. Try not to alert them.
The woman nods shakily and mouths a “thank you.”All Trish really did was state the obvious, but maybe her calm is reassuring. (It’s a complete lie, Trish’s pulse is racing, but she is after all an actress. Not a great one, but apparently good enough.)Trish texts 911 and she and the other woman stay hidden enough through the robbery and keep on escaping notice, and finally the coast is clear and the crooks are gone. Immediately Trish is on her feet and running to the front counter. “I already alerted the cops,” she says, looking around.. “Does anyone need an ambulance?”Nobody does, thankfully, so Trish turns to her other superpower, money. She gives the store owner a check that will cover the register and at least part of the damage, and when the owner expresses gratitude she flips it back and thanks him for his contribution to the neighborhood. She isn’t really thinking about it was a way to impress anyone, she just does it.But when she’s done, the woman she mentally took responsibility for is standing there watching with the awestruck expression that Trish knows all too well.“Oh my god,” she says, “you’re Trish Walker.”Luckily, the deli owner already knows Trish, so this doesn’t cause a scene, but it’s still sort of embarrassing. The woman said “Trish” and not “Patsy,” though, which means Trish isn’t annoyed on top of that. “Surprise,” she says, chuckling.“I thought you looked familiar but I must have been too shocked to put it together,” the woman continues, laughing nervously. She’s speaking too quickly when she continues. “My husband, he, ah. He passed in a robbery a couple of years ago and they make me panic. But don’t mind me, I just wanted to say how much I enjoy your work.”“Thank you,” Trish says, and she means it. She reaches out to touch the woman’s hand as she adds, “I’m so sorry about your husband.” They nod at each other in that accepting-condolences way. “But I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage, ah…?”“May,” the woman says quickly, pushing her glasses (gold, round frames that are hip but not necessarily on purpose) up her nose and extending a hand. “May Parker. It’s good to meet you, Ms. Walker.”“Please, call me Trish.” She hands the deli owner another thirty dollars to cover the bottle of water and snack bar she dropped in for, plus the six-pack and bags of pretzels in May’s hands. “I got it, don’t worry. C’mon.”May is obviously still starstruck, but she puts the groceries in her reusable shopping bag and nods. “My nephew is going to be so jealous,” she says. “He’s got quite the crush on you.”Trish smiles, but she’s bracing for Patsy talk as she asks, “How old is he?”“Oh, sixteen, but he’s very smart,” May says. “He loved your coverage of the events at Midland Circle. Wouldn’t stop telling me all of his own theories, mostly about the science.”“He sounds fun,” Trish says, because she’s not sure what else you’re supposed to say about teenagers.“Between us, he can be a handful to say the least, but I wouldn’t have it any other way,” May says. “I’ve raised him since he was a kid, and it’s been just us since…” Her husband died. She shrugs bashfully, like it’s embarrassing to keep bringing that up. “Of course, I’m sure you don’t want to hear all about my family life.”“I like family stories, don’t worry,” Trish promises. Well, her own family life was less-than-stellar, after all. “Do you live around here?”May chuckles. “Not quite,” she says. “Queens. Peter goes to school in the city, though, and I came in to see a science presentation he was giving.” She smiles ruefully. “Of course, he had his own plans afterward, which is how I ended up at the deli by myself. Thank you for being such a soothing presence, by the way. Robberies just, ah. Like I said.”Trish frowns, then stops to face May and rest a hand on her shoulder. “I’m so sorry,” she says again. “Can I buy you dinner or something? You’re having such a cruddy afternoon, I feel like it’s only right.”“I’m an aunt, not a grandma,” May smirks. “You can use real swears around me, and you don’t have to coddle me. I’ll be alright.”Trish sighs. This is the part where she has to take a bigger leap, because, yeah, May isn’t her usual type but she’s really enjoyed this interaction. So she works up the nerve to say, “Then can I buy you dinner because I want to?”May’s smile grows. “That I’ll allow."
>>[image]
>>What the fuck Jess you can’t spy on me!
>>coincidence. looks like you found a MILF
>>She’s not a mom. She’s an aunt.
>>AILF
>>Goddammit >:|
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Rosalind is just locking up the bank for her lunch when a soft voice behind her asks, “Could you tell me the way to the cemetery?”It’s a woman asking, the refined and seemingly spotless woman who disembarked from the stagecoach last afternoon. A city girl, no doubt; there was no mud at the hem of her skirts, no tarnish on the brooch at her throat. She caught Rosalind’s attention immediately.Because of that and because of some misguided gallantry Rosalind replies, “I’ll even escort you there, if you’d like.”“Oh!” the woman exclaims, but she’s smiling. “I’d be much obliged, Mrs., ah…”“Price,” Rosalind says. “Ms. Rosalind Price.”“I’m sorry to assume,” the woman says immediately, blushing deeply.“Don’t worry on it,” Rosalind replies with a shrug. “And you…?”“Audrey C - Audrey Nathan,” says she, pointedly avoiding her particular form of address.Rosalind recognizes that, and she recognizes the mistake, that start-stop of a recently changed surname. Between that and the request to visit the graveyard, Rosalind can piece the story together. The city girl is a widow, and a fairly new one.It makes Rosalind even more determined to be chivalrous, and she offers her arm in a way Audrey is (given the look on her face) unused to from other women. “I’m just beginning my lunch hour,” she says. “I’ll accompany you there and back.”“Thank you,” says Audrey, and before they set out she glances back at the small sign over the door. “You’re employed at the bank, I take it?”“Its chief officer,” Rosalind agres, careful not to seem boastful or even like it’s something worth boasting about (though were Audrey a man, she’d certainly boast).“My!” Audrey croons, clearly finding it worthy of admiration despite Rosalind’s paltry efforts at humility. “That’s wonderful. I’ve never known a woman banker.”“It’s not terribly common, I’m afraid,” Rosalind says, feeling surprisingly tickled by Audrey’s awe. It’s not like with those same men, where she enjoys cowing them and subverting their expectations; it’s more just like real, genuine pride and happiness that someone else should appreciate the thing she’d worked so hard to accomplish. She shakes her head to dislodge the stupid smile she feels coming on and continues, “But we take on what we’re able out here, and this happened to be best suited for me. ‘Sides, our bank would be an empty storefront were it not for a woman, our Miss Johnson. She’d be a hypocrite for shunning female employees, and while I’ll admit we’ve butted heads in the past even I’d say she’s the farthest possible from a hypocrite.”Something sparks in Audrey’s eyes at that name and bit of detail, but she shrugs it off just as quick. Instead she says, “It’s impressive regardless. I’ve never been exactly skilled with numbers.”Rosalind smiles, surprised to find she feels nearly as sheepish as she’s pretending to be. “Anyways,” she says, “the cemetery’s out on the edge of camp. Given your being from out of town, I’d guess you’re here for a particular grave?”Audrey stares at their feet a moment, trying to maintain her composure, but finally she says, “My late husband’s. I finally worked up the courage to face it.”“Who was your husband?” Rosalind asks.“Philip Coulson,” Audrey says quietly.Of course. The miners and drunks who die here wouldn’t have left behind such an elegant widow. “Finally” is apt given it’s been near eighteen months since Phil’s death (this also explains why Audrey stands beside her in blue and dove grey, not mourning black; it explains less the reversion to her maiden name, as most widows do not, but then with such a famous former husband it may well be easier to travel without dredging up his memory in every stranger she encounters) but at the same time Rosalind won’t fault her. Can’t fault her. If given the chance to avoid facing up to her own late husband’s grave, she’d have taken it in an instant.(Unfortunately, this also means that Rosalind is arm-in-arm with the woman whose dead husband was not only something of a friend to her but the one-time target of her unknowing advances. She’s been in more uncomfortable situations, but not by a terrible lot.)“I’m awfully sorry,” Rosalind says after a pause. “I imagine you’re tired of hearing that, but I feel I should say it no matter.”Audrey gives a tired smile. By now they’ve nearly reached the tombstone-dotted hill, and she slows her pace out of respect and curiosity both. “Thank you,” she says carefully. “Did you know him?”“A little,” Rosalind says, because it’s true. She’d known him well enough to know she liked his company, but not well enough to know of the marriage he’d recently entered into before kissing him. “He was a good man.” Good enough to resist her advances and gently.“I find it interesting how everyone becomes good when they pass,” Audrey muses. They come across the grave, still indicated with a plywood cross because the family (that is, Audrey herself) has yet to select and commission a permanent marker. “Nobody wants to speak ill, so they keep to themselves the more nuanced aspects of their character, like impossible, gullible optimism or the fact that they may have been stubborn goddamn fools.”There’s an anger in her voice, delicate anger but anger nonetheless, as she says that; there are tears in her eyes as she stares down at the dirt.“My late husband,” Rosalind says, again surprising herself, “was twenty kinds of goddamn fool. He put too much stock in hope and ambition.”Audrey laughs without humor. “Phil believed in the goodness inherent to man,” she says. “Always gave folk a second chance. That’s what got him killed.”“Someone being an ass is what got him killed,” Rosalind corrects, instinctively adjusting to squeeze Audrey’s gloved hand despite the boundaries it may cross. “That could’ve happened to lots of us.”“But it didn’t,” Audrey presses. “We’d only been married a few months when he decided to come out here. Left me safe and snug with family and struck out to make an honest fortune.” She glares at his name on the grave. “I was to come out once he’d settled, only he got shot before that could happen. And I was so angry! At the man who shot him, at God, at myself, at Phil. Is that evil of me?”“No,” Rosalind says plainly. “I think it’s normal. You can regret and bemoan your own choices or those of third parties. You can love someone, miss them, and still be furious at them. You can wonder why God would do something to them, to you, no matter your relationship with Him on high. We aren’t all given the patience, or foolhardiness, of Job. and it’s expected to curse the name of the asshole or assholes that took someone away too fast.”Audrey sighs, puts a hand to the cross. “I should have been here,” she says softly. “Should have stopped him from sitting at that table, should have been with him as he breathed his last, should have at least seen him laid to rest amongst all these strangers.”Rosalind is searching for the right words to say - those who knew him here held him in high esteem, perhaps, or know that he loved you above all else - but before she can force out the words, Audrey sobs and throws her arms around Rosalind like a child. What can she do with that but pat the other woman’s back and murmur “You’ll be alright”?After awhile Audrey pulls back, visibly sheepish. “I don’t know what came over me,” she murmurs.“Grief,” Rosalind says, seeing no point in sugarcoating.“Irregardless,” Audrey says. “You don’t know me or have any reason to have been made to suffer all of my histrionics.’“What if I did?” Rosalind takes a chance and asks. “Know you, that is."Audrey blinks. “What are you suggesting?”“The hotel food is insultingly mediocre at best,” Rosalind says. “Come to mine for dinner. I can’t promise much, but it’s a little bit of kindness you seem to need.”Audrey laughs nervously, girlishly, and Rosalind spots a softer blush than before, a more personal one, creeping into her cheeks. “Alright,” she says. “It’s quite good luck I spoke to you, I think.”
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Carina appears at Nebula’s door her second “night” on the little ship, carrying a tray of beverages and looking apprehensive.“Uh?” Nebula grunts, studying the Krylorian girl.“I’m sorry I didn’t come last night,” Carina says, glancing demurely in the general direction of her feet. “I’m ready now. Would you like tea?”Nebula blinks. “Ready for what?”“Whatever you wish of me,” Carina replies, though her expression is blank.“What -? No,” Nebula exclaims, horrified.“Do I not please you?” Carina asks anxiously.Nebula sighs. “I didn’t realize we’d have to do this,” she mutters, and that part is more to herself than to Carina. Then she swallows a sigh and says, “Look. I’m not a pimp, I’m not a slaver, I’m not whatever it is you’re running from.”“What are you, then?” Carina frowns.This takes thought to answer. The ingrained replies - a killer, a warrior, a daughter of Thanos - are hardly reassuring, nor is she all that proud of them despite having been taught to be. Why would she run from that life if she was proud of it? Instead she cracks a smile (it’s doubtless awkward, she’s out of practice) and says, “A scavenger who didn’t leave you behind.”“You don’t expect anything of me? Truly?” Carina asks, finally lifting her eyes.“Other than you not trying to kill me?” Nebula counters. “Not really.”“Why would I do that?” Carina yelps.“Most do,” Nebula says nonchalantly. She can tell this girl will try to pity her for that, and she abhors pity.“I wouldn’t,” Carina promises. “Won’t. You saved me.”“Sort of seemed like you saved yourself,” Nebula remarks, a question hiding beneath the statement. “I’m just giving you a ride.”Carina laughs nervously. “Well, do you want tea, at least?”And the thing is, normally Nebula loathes kindness (and feels only slightly fonder of tea). But there’s something different about Carina’s offers, about Carina herself. There must be, she’s known all along. She wouldn’t have given a ride to just anyone.So she waves Carina in and says, “Make yourself comfortable.” It sounds ironic, but it’s not. This becomes routine, over their travels: tea and conversation. It isn’t entirely natural to either of them (Nebula is as a rule antisocial, and Carina is perpetually anxious) but they try. At first they shy away from any personal subjects, but eventually curiosity gets the best of Nebula and she (very bluntly) asks how Carina came to need a way off of an exotic zoo-warehouse’s smoldering ruins.“The explosion was my own fault,” Carina admits, fussing with her hair. “I picked up the stone in desperation and anger, and then… then it goes dark for a while.”Nebula is shocked by this. It seems an unlikely action for this timid girl to take. “You did that?”“I was desperate,” Carina says, almost defensive. “I wanted to end my, end my sisters’, suffering, to end him as well. I didn’t mean to survive.” To be the only survivor of her so-called sisters, she means. Nebula can tell this just as she can tell they weren’t her real sisters, only other girls like her. Sisters-in-arms who were sorely lacking, well, the arms.But Nebula does not regret survival especially when it is so hard-won, and strangely, she wants to help Carina. “Your sisters are free,” Nebula says, though her tone makes the word “sisters” sound wrong and she hopes Carina won’t notice (it’s only that her own experiences with those have been so lacking). “So are you. That’s nothing to mourn.”“Maybe you’ve learned to stop doing that,” Carina spits out, “but I haven’t.” And then immediately she sees a different surprise flicker across Nebula’s face, or she imagines it at least (product of her own lacking experiences with other socialization), and she squeaks, “That was rude! I’m just -”“Upset,” Nebula supplies, giving a lopsided shrug. “Probably more healthy than pretending not to be.” It’s overly casual, but that’s easier for her to be.“You do that, don’t you,” Carina murmurs timidly.Nebula shrugs again. “It was that or get pulverized,” she says.“Oh,” Carina says, frowning. She gets an idea, then, it’s clear, and she turns it over for a minute before sighing and muttering, “Oh, it’s foolish.”“What, being upset?” Nebula asks. She’s not used to such abrupt changes in thought as this, it’s reasonable for her not to follow.Carina bites her lip. “When I was very small, before… before. Sometimes when I was upset, hurt or sad or just unsure, my mother would let me hold onto her and be close,” she says softly. “And then later, after, one of the ones I lost would do the same.”Nebula can’t help but make a face. “So, cuddling.”“Foolish,” Carina repeats.Nebula considers this, all of it. This isn’t the initial offer to use Carina like a toy, this is something smaller and realer and coming from Carina’s heart. (That should be frightening, hearts usually are, but it’s not.)“Cuddling would be okay,” Nebula says carefully. “I’m out of practice. Probably because most of the creatures that get that close to me get murdered. But you clearly aren’t… that.”“Am I making you uncomfortable?” Carina asks in a rush. “I’m sorry.”“Stop apologizing,” Nebula snaps. “I’m trying to tell you that I’m alright with you being close to me.”Carina stares with innocent surprise. “Truly?”Nebula nods. “This is new,” she says, less wry and more serious than she intends. “But yes.”So Carina rearranges herself in Nebula’s lap, careful like she’s afraid of pushing. She curls up very small, legs tucked into her chest, and she pillows her arms on Nebula’s thighs. “I must seem very pitiful,” she says quietly. “Wanting to be held. I’m, I’m soft.”“You asked for what you wanted,” Nebula says. “That’s strong in its way, I’ve never been able to.”“I don’t think that’s your fault,” Carina replies. “That’s something others did to you.”“Maybe,” Nebula says. “But they can’t fix it now.”“I don’t think you need fixing,” Carina whispers.“You’re the first one,” Nebula says, laughing without humor. “But I kind of like the feeling of someone caring about me.”“I do,” Carina promises.“And I for you,” Nebula says before she can doubt herself.
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The Night Nurse - once a real, legitimate daytime nurse, soured by the city like so many others - operates out of not one but many locations. Considering her work (helping the poor, helping those who fight the good fight) is frowned upon at best and grossly illegal at worst, she can’t afford the target on her back (or her front door) that just one office would create. No, she rarely keeps her clinic in the same abandoned building for longer than a week.The detective in Misty (renowned and commended, thank you) understands this, but the tired woman who needs maintenance on her damn robot arm and also just wants to see her damn girlfriends is the one who has to track down every covert location and resents this fact. She doesn’t begrudge anyone’s safety, but she hates that safety is even an issue for someone who’s just trying to do the right thing. That like a goddamn fool she bought into the system that made it so.She finally finds the door she’s looking for (it’s marked with a crooked little red x in chalk) and slips inside. It’s like most of the other shoddy pop-up clinics she’s visited: a massage table where there should be an exam table, medical supplies stacked precariously on one of those carts that you’d see in a grade school library, whiskey for anesthetic. The equipment is lit up with a cheap standing lamp, which means that at least Misty can tell it’s clean. Though then again, why would she doubt that?She knows how the Night Nurse -Claire -She knows how Claire does.“Took you long enough.”Misty snorts, coming up behind Claire and kissing her neck. Considering the absurdly tall and grossly impractical heels Claire has on, this means Misty’s gotta stand on tiptoe, but she does it anyway. “You don’t get to pull that when I set the meet,” she chides. “I got here as soon as I could.”“I know, I know,” Claire says. “Being allegedly legit means you’re at the mercy of others’ schedules.”Misty glances, rather balefully, at her prosthesis. It exists to replace the limb she lost to one of the biggest crime bosses in the city (one of those pulling the strings), and Claire is the one maintaining it because no doctor in the city proper (which is to say, with their strings pulled) would dare interfere with that kind of cautionary tale. “Pretty sure I’m at their mercy, period,” she remarks.“Poor thing,” Claire croons, only a little sarcastic.“It earn me a kiss?” Misty asks, only a little smartassed.Claire rolls her eyes and obliges, almost cursorily, before pulling away and putting on her surgical gloves. They’re black for the “night” part of Night Nurse, just like the artfully disheveled nurse dress she wears; around here, and especially if you’re one of the vigilante set, you gotta get a gimmick. “More once the messy shit is done,” she says. “I have to maintain some standards of cleanliness.”“Heaven forbid I get my own cooties,” Misty deadpans, but she sits on the de facto exam table anyway. “Where’s Colleen?”Claire shrugs and jerks her head toward the ceiling. “Where do you think?”Misty tracks Claire’s gaze and, sure enough, finds the third of them balanced on a rafter, staring out the highest window like she’s preparing for an attack. She is, is the thing: officially she serves as a bodyguard to Claire and others in their circle, but from a child she’d been trained by ruthless assassins to become one of their own and she’s not afraid to utilize those skills. She doesn’t take them lightly, and she still carries scars from the training that gave them to her, but she uses them to protect, now, and that helps.Misty calls out, “You feel like sayin’ hi, angel-girl?”For as Claire is the Night Nurse, Colleen has styled herself the Angel. A brutal, avenging angel, to be sure, dressed in often-bloodspattered bright white, sometimes even sporting wings (Misty’s still not sure how she wound up fucking, let alone working with, a couple rebel do-gooders playing dress-up, but she’s not complaining), sometimes filled with an inexplicable, power-charged white light in the literal sense. Misty thinks that maybe she got into some weird science when she was young, young enough that she wouldn’t remember, Claire doesn’t like admitting it but she’s pretty sure it’s some whacked-out brujería, but Colleen tries to only worry about living up to whatever it is.So Colleen considers this and leaps gracefully down to the floor (a distance that should break her ankles but doesn’t) while sheathing her katana. “Hi,” she echoes, leaning in to kiss Misty. She’s not a chatty one, oftentimes only speaking when spoken to, but she’s not shy. Just guarded and, again, a little damaged.But who of them isn’t?“Anything going outside?” Misty asks, sort of teasing because she’s pretty sure she’d have noticed it on her walk in.Colleen shakes her head. “Just the usual.” Low-level crime and debauchery.“This isn’t a horrible location,” Claire remarks. “The kind of place I’d consider making permanent if we could make that safe.”“We could,” Colleen says. “The boys get by.”“That’s ‘cause Daredevil isn’t afraid to get into it with the whole town if he has to,” Claire says, lacing the pseudonym with fond disdain.“You sayin’ he fights around?” Misty cracks.“I’m sayin’ that boy’s got a death wish,” Claire grumbles. “I didn’t invite you here to gossip about my dumbass ex, though. Let’s see the arm.”Misty snorts and shrugs off her leather jacket. “If we really started gossiping about dumbass exes we’d never stop,” she says, and Colleen nods, settling on the table next to Misty (on her non-augmented side) not unlike a cat might.Claire nods in a way that means it’s time to get to business. “I’m going to detach the prosthesis,” she says, and Colleen puts her hand in Misty’s “real” one so she can squeeze if it’s painful.Like any relatively modern prosthesis, the robot arm connects to and engages with what remains of Misty’s organic arm, and its momentary removal, no matter how carefully done, does cause a twinge; she’s glad of the small comfort Colleen offers, and gladder that neither of her girls make her feel a baby for it. This is just routine maintenance, mostly.“Looks like your circulation is good,” Claire muses, examining the area in question and gently manipulating it. “This hurt?”“No more than usual,” Misty says. “I’m getting used to the weight of that thing by now.”“You’re still sore,” Colleen points out, running a hand across Misty’s shoulders and back. “I’ll fix it later.”“I know you will,” Misty says fondly.“So why’d you want me to check this out, if you’re not hurting?” Claire asks.“Paranoia, mostly,” Misty says. “I got caught in a brawl last week and I keep wondering if something got messed up.”“Hm.” Claire picks up the prosthesis and examines it individually, more closely. She’s not an engineer, but she knows enough to know how this piece in particular works. “There are probably some screws I could tighten, wires I could adjust. It looks okay to me, but let me just…” She sits on the one folding chair and starts to fiddle, tongue poking out of her mouth as she concentrates.“You’re kinda cute when you work,” Misty remarks.“Stop flirting with me while I’m focusing,” Claire retorts. “Flirt with Colleen, she’s not busy.”“She’s busy being cute, maybe,” Misty suggests, and Colleen smiles that big, goofy smile that they know she hasn’t gotten to smile nearly enough in her life.“You’re a dork,” she says.Misty snaps the angel wings on Colleen’s back. “Takes one to know one.”“You’re both dorks,” Claire says archly. “I’m gonna get your arm back on and test a few things.”So she does, and they do, and as they go on like this Colleen lets her attention wander. She can never go too long without reevaluating her surroundings - old habits and all too often this saves lives. She’s good, very good, at what she does, and not just because of the weird science/brujería/whatever it is.And sure enough, after a moment of concentration she hops off the table, draws her sword, and goes toward the door she’s currently suspicious of.“Baby?” Misty calls, watching with concern. “You good?”Colleen holds up a hand to shush her, shush them both, and approaches the door, then slips through it.“Think she’s okay?” Misty asks quietly.“As okay as ever,” Claire sighs. “Focus up.”So they get back to work and they try to ignore the vague noises of combat and carnage coming from outside. It’s best to let Colleen work when she gets going, and they know she’ll be okay. They worry, of course they do, but they know.Finally she reappears, flicking blood off of her sword and onto the concrete floor. “This location is compromised,” she says.“How many bodies?” Misty asks with a sigh.“One,” Colleen says. “Plus an ear, a foot, and three fingers. That was enough to get it done.”Misty flinches like she always does when dismemberment comes up in conversation, but she says, “I guess I can at least run prints with that. You okay, angel-girl?”Colleen nods. “They couldn’t hurt me,” she says. “Not really.” Another side-effect of her white light, but also just a consequence of being, as mentioned, really fucking good at her job.Still, Claire clicks her tongue. “Don’t care how much of that blood isn’t yours, I’ve still gotta look you over.”“Can there be beer after?” Colleen suggests, grinning.“I think we all deserve some beer,” Misty agrees. “Beer and snuggles.”“We’re all dorks,” Claire sighs.
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Mockingbird has a good feeling about this tour.For one, she can catch rides on the Rising Tide bus, which means she won’t be the only girl in a bus of British boys who, for all their musical genius, still complain about driving on the wrong side of the road, and it also means she can actually spend time with the friends that turned her onto this. For another, they have a new one to show around, the little writer that Skye charmed.For third, Persephone is finally back in the game.None of them know the details of what the Three Heads frontman did to her (well, none of them but Skye, who helped put an end to it like the guardian angel she is) but they all know it was bad. Like, he quietly took a hiatus that’s a fancy cover-up for going to jail for battery (though the sentence is too short) bad. There are rumors he broke her legs, that he knocked her up and then punched the baby out, that a horror-movie amount of acid was involved.Mockingbird isn’t sure what she believes, but she’s been worrying for what feels like a decade.She wasn’t in San Diego last night, so the hotel in Los Angeles is her first time seeing everyone. Hunter kisses her hello (theirs is one of the more on again/off again rockstar/Band-Aide relationships, but it’s not tempestuous as much as it is unfortunately inevitable) and Miles and Lincoln grin at her like schoolboys, Skye introduces her new pet (British, hopelessly wide-eyed, called Jemma) and Yo-Yo compliments the sunglasses perched unnecessarily on her head, everyone regards her with reverence as befits one of the old guard.All she really wants is to see Persephone, though.She finally spots the familiar dark hair out on the hotel balcony and excuses herself. (Skye, at least, gets it. She’s always been protective of Persephone and she’s always seemed to see something going on between Mockingbird and Persephone that both was and wasn’t there.)“Hey,” Mockingbird says quietly as she steps outside. She doesn’t want to startle the other girl.“Birdie,” Persephone breathes out. She’s the only one who ever calls her that. “When did you get in?”“Oh, a few hours ago,” Mockingbird says. “I was in Canada with Fleetwood Mac, but I can’t do that drama for long. Besides, I… I heard you’d be here.”“Good old rumor mill,” Persephone cracks. She still hasn’t turned to look at Mockingbird full-on, and unbidden the acid-related tall tales come to mind.“Just Skye,” Mockingbird defends. “She knew I’d want to…”“To what, gawk?” Persephone asks abruptly. “See which horror story was closest to true?”“To see you,” Mockingbird exclaims. “I missed having you around, Seph. I was worried about you.”“I know you never liked Grant,” Persephone mutters. “I just… I keep imagining your big ‘I told you so.’”Mockingbird makes a face. “That’d be pretty shitty of me. I didn’t trust him and I never liked you with him, but I didn’t want him to hurt you.”Persephone sighs. “Sorry,” she says. “I’m defensive. “I’ve gotten a seriously unreal amount of shit from other people. Why wouldn’t a girl like me who does what I do expect to get assaulted and fucked up? I’m basically asking for it.”“They’re disgusting,” Mockingbird spits out.“Even some of the other girls don’t get why I came back, it feels like,” Persephone sighs. “Which is ironic since they’re part of why. The Band-Aides are the only family I’ve got now.”“Look, if you’re happy I’m happy,” Mockingbird says. “That’s the point. I want you to be happy.”“I’m working on it,” says Persephone, and finally she turns to face Mockingbird. The left side of her face is burned, possibly cut on too, but (this is a horrible thought) she doesn’t look as bad as Mockingbird realizes she expected.“Can I help?” Mockingbird asks quietly. “I mean, I’m obviously going to punch anyone who gives you shit, but aside from that.”“Would you just treat me like everything is still normal?” Persephone asks in response. “Like I’m not a tragic figure that needs to be handled with kid gloves.”“Yeah, of course,” Mockingbird promises. “You want a drink?”“Got one,” Persephone replies, holding up her cup. “I’d take a joint if you had a spare, though.”“Unfortunately, no,” Mockingbird sighs playfully. “You should ask the new girl, though, I bet she’ll react hilariously. Poor thing has never even been to a party with booze before, I don’t think, let alone pot.”Persephone smirks. “Don’t be mean,” she says. “She seems okay. And Skye is obviously smitten.”“Skye deserves to get to be smitten,” Mockingbird says. “Especially if Miles is going to keep being Miles.”Persephone nods. “He’s not the worst, obviously, but Skye can do better. Speaking of, are you and Hunter still doing whatever that is?”“Maybe,” Mockingbird shrugs. “I don’t know. If we’re apart awhile I can convince myself it’d work, but I think I know better than to try making something happen for real. The sex is good, I’ll always care about him, but he’s not for always.”“Is that even something you want?” Persephone asks.“Always? I don’t know, maybe not,” Mockingbird shrugs. “I have a hard time knowing what I’ll want in five or ten years, let alone all of them.”“Yeah,” Persephone muses. “Live in the moment, live free. All the stuff that’s great about this life.”“I missed you,” Mockingbird interrupts.“You said that,” Persephone teases.“Well, I meant it,” Mockingbird retorts. “You’re kind of one of my favorites, you know. Who else will analyze lyrical symbolism with me?” She laughs. “Plus, there’s this.” She comes over to kiss Persephone gently. “If you want.”“I think I’m off kissing rockstars,” Persephone declares. “Band-Aides are much sweeter.”
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Sometimes Isabelle sings in the shower. That’s pretty normal, especially if no one is around to hear, and for the first time in a week her dorm floor’s bathroom is empty.This means a rousing rendition of “U-Turn” by Tegan and Sara is a go. (She never said she was a unique lesbian, alright?)She expects that if anyone else walks in, they’ll either leave her alone or tell her to shut the hell up. What she doesn’t expect is the curtain dividing shower stalls to swing open and reveal a very tall, very hot girl. Who’s also very naked.“Come here often?” Isabelle cracks, because her instinct when startled is to flirt (with girls, anyway; boys just get punched).“That was actually really good,” the other girl says, looking sort of surprised, and suddenly Isabelle remembers: this girl was at the a capella club’s table. The one who tried, sound unheard so totally shallowly, to recruit her. Suddenly her “not a singer” excuse is seeming pretty thin.“Uh, thanks,” Isabelle says sheepishly. Her gaze wanders, because she’s awkward and that’s what happens, but this is a horrible idea because the girl, Vivian or Virginia or some other posh shit like that, is naked. Like, all the way totally freaking naked. She knew that already, but she looked anyway, and now her dumb lesbian brain is screaming.“You should come to tryouts,” the girl says.“For your a capella group,” Isabelle says, trying to think about things that aren’t boobs.Vivian’s boobs.Virginia’s boobs.Whatever the fuck her name is’s boobs. They’re really good boobs.“Our a capella group,” she corrects haughtily. “Of which I’m the co-president.”“Well, Madam President,” Isabelle says, focusing possibly freakily on this chick’s face instead (also a really good face). “Like I told you before, I don’t really do clubs and I don’t sing outside of the shower.”“I saw you talking to the coach of the field hockey team,” mystery woman accuses.“Sports are teams, not clubs,” Isabelle shrugs, “and I have to meet girls somewhere. Better there than the GSA, in my experience.”All of a sudden mystery girl’s expression changes and she tosses her hair (brown-almost-black, with pink streaked in at the bottom). “I’m Victoria,” she says. “You’re Isabelle, right?”“Or Izzy,” Isabelle says. “Belle if I really like you, maybe.”“You’re really pretty, Belle,” Victoria says, and damn, usually Isabelle is the forward one when flirting but she really doesn’t mind Victoria stepping in. (Plus, she did kind of leave that one open.) “You’re a transfer, right?”“Uh, yeah,” Isabelle shrugs. “I started at a community college, but my stepdad basically insisted I get a four-year degree, and he’s paying at least, so…”“You don’t strike me as an academic,” Victoria remarks. “I mean, you’re obviously smart, but I feel like you’re not that into textbooks and essays.”“I’m really not,” Isabelle agrees. “My goal is pretty much to get in and get out.”“And get laid,” Victoria adds smugly. “I mean, I’m guessing. You did say you were considering joining a sports team jus to meet girls.”“I mean, I’m human,” Isabelle says. “I’m a sexual human. I’m, y’know. Someone alive with a sex drive.”“Ha,” Victoria exclaims. “Ex-theatre kid?”“Not hardly,” Isabelle snorts. “I only know RENT for the gay shit. Because of it. Whatever.”“Yeah, but I bet you’ve done ‘Take Me or Leave Me’ at karaoke at least once,” Victoria challenges.“It was Akela’s idea,” Isabelle mutters. “Anyway, being into one musical doesn’t mean I want to commit to making ‘bop-be-whoo’ noises while hotter girls sing pop songs from the 90s.”“So stereotypical,” Victoria sighs. “Besides, I said. You’re pretty hot.”“Butch hot, maybe,” Isabelle shrugs. “I don’t really mesh with Stepford Wife types.”“I’m no such thing,” Victoria huffs. “And I can prove it.” Isabelle doesn’t have a chance to inquire before Victoria practically dives at her, pressing her against the wall and kissing her neck. “Besides, I like butch hot.”“Oh, it’s like that,” Isabelle says with a throaty chuckle. “I can get on board.”“You’re insatiable, aren’t you?” Victoria murmurs, putting her lips to Isabelle’s.“Maybe you’re just irresistible,” Isabelle counters.This keeps up, the kissing and playful but ultimately unmemorable banter. Isabelle is pretty sure she’s going to have tile indentations on her back for a week, but it’s totally worth it. Victoria is an absolute sex goddess (and like, she’s not a total ladykiller herself but she has enough experience to know that kind of thing when she experiences it.)She’s seconds away from screaming in delight when Victoria pulls away, tauntingly trailing fingertips across Isabelle’s chest. “Oh, yeah,” she says. “I only date a capella girls.” And she goes back into her stall, closes the curtain, and begins actually showering, oblivious to Isabelle’s squeaking and complete indignation.Well, she does admire a girl who knows how to get what she wants.
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Jemma wouldn’t have been prepared for an intergalactic luxury resort if she’d spent ten years at the Academy just studying space and its myriad cultures. For one thing, the entire building she’s just stepped into looks like it’s made out of rose gold, which is is the kind of thing that on Earth would only exist in someone’s misguided joke about rich millennial women. There must be hundreds of different types of beings all around, too. The overall vibe is halfway between future and fantasy.But before she can gawk too long, Jemma feels a tap on her shoulder. “My princess,” says the Lady Sif, halfway bowing.Jemma must look baffled, but she returns, “Lady Sif. Good of you to join me here.”“I’ve already seen to our accommodations,” Sif continues, just a touch too loud. “Let me get you settled.”Mystified, Jemma follows Sif to a room on the fourth floor, marveling at her surroundings all the while. Sif carries all but her smallest bag (what a joy to travel in space with the opportunity to have packed beforehand!) and opens the door to the suite (what a joy to travel in space and actually have a proper and non-totalitarian roof over her head!) and it’s so easy for Jemma to pretend this is perfectly normal.Until Sif says, “After you, Princess.”Jemma is smart enough to wait until the door is shut behind them to say, in a low voice, “I’m not a princess. I’m not even upper-class, really.”“For the duration of this trip you are,” Sif says.“Come again?” Jemma asks, sitting on the bed. (The only bed, which she can’t think about at the moment. It’s just too much.)Sif clears her throat. “It would be difficult to get a Midgardian - or Terran, as they say here - xenobiochemist into the places that you need to access on this trip,” she explains. “Given that I was chosen as your escort, it seems right that your, ah, cover should pertain to, well.” She drops to one knee and holds her blade out. “I pledge my life and sword to you, Aldrif Odinsdottir.”“Princess who? What?” Jemma exclaims. “I think people might catch onto an Asgardian princess springing forth Athenalike after Asgard and Odin’s demises. Sorry to say it.”“She exists,” Sif shrugs. “Has for some time. Please don’t raise your voice, I’m not sure how thin the walls are in this place.”“Then unless this is a Netflix original holiday film, people will know I’m not her,” Jemma continues, quieter and more demure.“Princess Aldrif was kidnapped from Asgard as an infant,” Sif explains, shrugging. “Raised among - well, it’s a long story. Her general existence is known, but she herself is not, at least by that name. The real Aldrif goes by Angela and rarely deals with the few of her father’s subjects that remain.”“But most people don’t know that,” Jemma supplies, figuring it out. “So if a girl shows up claiming to be Aldrif and being guarded by one of Odin’s warriors…”“Others will take it for granted that the lost daughter has reappeared,” Sif agrees. “Don’t worry, I’ll guide you through it.” It is, unsurprisingly, less simple than it sounds.They’ve barely sauntered into that night’s soiree when some type of purple, semi-humanoid creature says something to them in an alien tongue and stares expectantly at Jemma for an answer. Asgardians, even if they had not been raised on Asgard, have the gift of Allspeak.Jemma, very clearly, does not.She stares back for a moment, beginning to panic, and then she glances at Sif and hopes to whatever or whoever would have a say about such things that Allspeak still works with sign languages. Help me, she signs. I don’t know what to do.Sif, mercifully, understands, and jumps into action. “The Princess has not spoken since childhood,” she declares, with a tone that implies that the alien shouldn’t push.He does say something else, though, and he’s got that very certain tone in his voice that Jemma recognizes all too well. It’s the tone people used on Fitz after his accident, on Daisy after who know how many traumatic events, on Elena after she lost her arms; it’s the tone people have used on her in the past when they realize she’s got PTSD or anxiety or autism. She may not know what he said exactly, but she knows how to reply. She pastes on a polite smile but she signs to Sif, Tell him a mute or nonverbal person isn’t broken, please.“The Princess appreciates your condolences,” Sif says, “but her life is full just as yours. Was her father’s life less for only having one eye?”The alien seems to agree that it wasn’t and exchanges pleasantries with Sif for another moment before taking his leave. It’s at this point that Sif turns to Jemma and signs, her own movements less practiced, I wasn’t sure how else to solve this, and your signing gave me the idea. I’m sorry.Jemma shrugs and makes a face. I haven’t had a lengthy nonverbal period since uni, she signs, but at least it’s not a complete fabrication. And at least I didn’t have my hearing stolen this time.“You’ve been through too much, Princess,” Sif murmurs, laying a hand on Jemma’s arm. “I promise to make sure this trip goes more smoothly than your others.” Jemma spends most of her first night as Princess Aldrif taking mental notes about the politics around her (it’s funny, she thinks, that people assume that a girl who doesn’t speak either can’t hear them or is too foolish to understand them) and impatiently making Sif explain that (unless one’s mutism is a reaction to trauma, at which point it’s appropriate to express pity for the trauma specifically) there’s no need to pity someone because they don’t have the same abilities that others associate with “normal” creatures in their species. If nothing else comes of this trip, at least Jemma is trying to fight space ableism.She makes the mistake of going to the bar by herself, though, while Sif fields and deflects comments about the death of Asgard. (One nice thing about being Princess Aldrif is that since she was supposedly absconded with and raised elsewhere, she doesn’t have to have emotional reactions to conversations about Asgard-the-place.) She’s already made Sif show her how the word “gin” is written in the local dialect, so she can just point and wait for the pink-skinned bartender to pour her a drink.It’s very peaceful, just sitting and enjoying her intergalactic gin, until a man in a gaudy orange metallic tuxedo sits beside her. “Princess Aldrif, is it?” he asks. At least he speaks her language, or however that works.She may, in fact, be playing a part and also playing at being something she currently isn’t (the last time she’d gone nonverbal for more than an hour was, as she said, during uni, and the last few times it’s happened were directly correlated to either horrific trauma or terrific sex) but she has enough experience by now handling unwanted men gracefully. So she makes an apologetic face and signs at him, I don’t speak, please bother someone else for conversation. (He won’t understand, or at least he won’t understand the insult.)He stares at her blankly. “Can you hear me?”Jemma nods. Small mercies, that.“But you can’t talk?” he presses.Jemma nods, though she wants to correct him to “don’t.” That’s less of a lie.“There’s a Terran story,” he says, leaning in so she can smell the liquor on his breath, “about a princess cursed to voicelessness until she receives true love’s kiss.” And he’s about to do it, too, Jemma realizes. That’s daft, it can’t be true love’s kiss if she doesn’t even know his bloody name, and -She just reacts. She decks him, clumsily but she does, and he splutters, and (thankfully) Sif appears before he can try to do anything. She brings her blade down between them, separating Jemma from the man, and she asks, “Are you alright, Princess?”Jemma nods, but she’s glaring as she signs, He’s presumptuous and not speaking isn’t a curse.“What’s happening?” the man asks frantically, holding a napkin to his face.“You were too forward with the Princess,” Sif says icily.Jemma nods again, but then she has an idea to further her point. (And maybe it’s also born from gin-induced bravado. Intergalactic gin is a lot stronger than Earth gin.) She jumps up and stands on her toes to kiss Sif long and hard, and then she signs, The curse isn’t broken. He stalks away, obviously aggrieved, and Sif laughs. “You have spirit, Princess,” she says.He tried to use fairytale logic on me, Jemma signs. True love’s kiss breaking my curse. But it’s not a curse, and kissing you proved it.Sif’s eyebrows raise. “I’m true love?”Jemma flusters. I like you, anyway. A lot, I always have.“You are a legendary beauty, Princess,” Sif says softly, smiling. “It would be my honor to woo you.”This, Jemma thinks, has taken a turn. Maybe the exact turn she was subconsciously hoping for, but a turn nonetheless, and she’s not sure what to do but ride it out. Show me, she signs, eyes gleaming.And, paying no mind to those watching, Sif lifts Jemma into her arms bridal-style. “Only,” she says, voice low, “if you can promise me you’ll refrain from screaming when I pleasure you.”It would sound to outsiders like a joke, but Jemma knows it to be a practical warning and she hears it like a wicked promise of her most favorite kind.She nods, grinning, and signs, I’ll find a way.
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“So I hear you found another stray,” Claire says as soon as the Skype connection kicks in.“Not even a hello?” Colleen laughs.“Nope,” Claire chuckles. “So tell me about this one.”“She popped up in the middle of the street with her car-sized teleporting bulldog,” Colleen says, keeping a perfectly straight face. “Also, she can control the elements and she’s a princess from the moon.”“Is this two truths and a lie?” Claire asks.“These bags under my eyes aren’t from late nights being the Fist,” Colleen says.“Oh-ho,” Claire laughs. “Get it, Wing.”“I meant that the car-sized bulldog snores!” “Look, if you’re gonna be here awhile you need more than one outfit, and preferably one that doesn’t match your hair,” Colleen says.Crystal tilts her head. “Is that bad?”“It doesn’t not remind me of a bee,” Colleen says. “You don’t have those on the moon, do you?”Crystal shakes her head and glances around the thrift store. “What would you suggest, then?”“I don’t know,” Colleen says, “I’m not great at girly stuff. I tend to go for comfort and practicality and, I dunno, nice butch stuff if I need it.”“Butch?” Crystal asks.“Basically, it means I look like a tomboyish girl who likes girls,” Colleen explains.“But you said you had a boyfriend?” Crystal presses.“Yeah, had,” Colleen smirks. “Besides, you can like both.”“Oh,” Crystal says, looking thoughtful. “Hey, I like this!”It’s a motorcycle jacket, and Colleen thinks she has a hunch. “If people ask about him,” Colleen says, nodding to Lockjaw lumbering along in front of them, “say he’s a science experiment you rescued or something.”“Do dogs not get this big here?” Crystal asks.“Yeah, no,” Colleen chuckles. “Most dogs can walk down the sidewalk without issues and aren’t big enough to ride on. He’s a very good boy, don’t get me wrong, but he’s an anomaly.”“But lots of people are anomalies, you said,” Crystal frowns.“And that doesn’t always get the best reactions,” Colleen says. “This is easier, I promise.”“I don’t like fibbing about who I am,” Crystal declares. “It seems like no matter where I go, there’s someone or something saying I can’t be some part of myself.”Colleen puts a hand over Crystal’s. “Not here, okay?” she hums. “Be whoever you want with me.” The dojo is a strange blend of its former lives right now: the back, with the bed and the bathroom and the little normal things, is the same, the fancy new kitchen is, the computer corner is, but most of the furniture elsewhere is pushed off to the periphery of the room. Part of this is to give the giant dog a place to at least run in circles a little (little being the operative word, considering his size and the apartment’s) but part is because, well. The Iron Fist (much as she resists calling herself that) needs room to train. Can’t let the glowstick do all the work.Crystal is taking the bedroom and Colleen the couch (she bought a cover for it to dampen the Danny smell) so it’s easy enough to wake early and go through some drills without disturbing her guest. It feels good, even, falling back into the old familiar patterns, and she loses track of time as she works.But Crystal interrupts her, with a thoughtful, “What are you doing? It’s beautiful.”“Oh, um,” Colleen says, startling, “some drills. Karate.”“That’s a kind of fighting, right?” Crystal asks.“Yeah,” Colleen agrees. “I used to teach it.”“Why did you stop?” Crystal asks.“It’s a long story,” Colleen sighs. “I had good reasons, but I’m not sure they still hold up.” She tilts her head. “You do much fighting? Or did the royal bodyguards handle it?”Crystal juts her chin out proudly. “I can hold my own,” she says. “Usually a little well-placed electrical charge will get the job done. If fire or water or air or earth won’t.”“I keep forgetting you’re the Avatar,” Colleen sighs playfully.“The what?” Crystal asks.“It’s a cartoon, don’t worry about it,” Colleen says.Crystal nods, and then she seems to think of something. “I bet karate is more practical with people who are afraid of powers, though.”“Probably,” Colleen agrees. “And the elements might be a little extreme to use on a guy who just catcalled you.”“Why would I hit someone who called me a cat?” Crystal asks.Colleen laughs and brushes her hair back. “No, um - it means yelling something objectifying at you. Like ‘hey, nice boobs,’ or ‘wanna come back to my place?’ or something.”“Propositioning you,” Crystal surmises.“Right, yeah,” Colleen says. “But like, the lowest common denominator of that.”“Would you show me how?” Crystal asks. “To fight?”Not to train her for a little battle, just a little friendly coaching. Like she’d done with Misty or Claire. That’s not scary.“Yeah,” Colleen says slowly, nodding. “Yeah, I would. We can start now if you want, no time like the present.”“Yes!” Crystal exclaims. “Only I should put different clothes on, huh? Ones that are more butch.”Colleen can’t help but grin. “More comfortable, anyway,” she says. “C’mon, I’ll lend you some exercise stuff.”“I’m not normally butch, am I?” Crystal babbles as they head for the bureau. “But fighting is butch. Is that okay? Doing a butch thing if I’m not?”“I’ve known badasses who slant femme,” Colleen promises. “You can be and do whatever combination of things you want.”“Good,” Crystal declares, kissing Colleen’s cheek before she can talk herself out of it.
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“I know what you’re up to.”May - Melinda to her friends, who can be counted on one hand and not found in his bar - raises an eyebrow, but she doesn’t turn away from the glasses she’s polishing. The voice belongs to the club’s newest crooner, a tall thing with blonde hair (just a hint of strawberry) who calls herself Bobbi but who people call Mockingbird. She’s not dumb, but May doesn’t have more of a read on her than that.This is either promising or dangerous.“What’s that?” she asks casually. No need to give away the secrets that are still in the vault.Bobbi perches on a bar stool, and when her gaze wanders May allows herself a look. She’s changed out of the sequined, slinky evening dress she performs in (she switches between black, silver, and blue; tonight was blue, darker than her eyes but complementary) and into - hm. Cigarette pants and an old army jacket with BARTON on the label.“You wish every night was ladies’ night,” Bobbi says.Ah. So a secret, but not the secret. “Not every night,” May corrects wryly. She’s known and loved some men, but not exclusively. And if Bobbi has figured that out… “But you seem pretty fond of them yourself.”Bobbi shrugs all-too-casually. “Sometimes,” she says. “I clearly don’t need to justify it to you.”“No,” Melinda agrees. “You just come to chat me up when nobody’s looking?”“Maybe,” Bobbi says. “Where’d you serve?”It’s pretty common knowledge that May was a WAC, but the question feels out of nowhere until she sees that her shirtsleeve has climbed high enough on her bicep to reveal her related tattoo. “Burma,” she says. “Nothing glamorous.” There are days she regrets it, more than there are the opposite, but that’s too familiar to share.“Still, it’s seeing more of the world,” Bobbi remarks. “I did a stint as a nurse, but I was shit at it. Not gentle enough, plus I hate needles.”Something about that is endearing to May; the contrast, maybe? “Where’d you see?”“Just Hawaii,” Bobbi says. “Gorgeous place, but still.”“Was this before or after your stint as a Rockette?” May asks, almost like she’s teasing the boundaries of a lie. That their lovely Mockingbird spent time in New York is Playground lore, and bait to drag in audiences, but May’s never seen any hard evidence.The question obviously ruffles Bobbi’s feathers (as it were), but she says, “After,” and then she tosses her head and admits, “I’m a dilettante. I was only in New York for six months before I fucked up my knee.”“That’s not the same as just getting bored,” May says.“Yeah, but the whole reason I went to volunteer as a nurse was that I felt restless,” Bobbi says. “And even then, I couldn’t help like I wanted. My knee was still healing, plus, y’know. Girl.”“You’re probably better off,” May says. “It’s tough, serving. Part of you never leaves.”“That why you became a PI?” Bobbi asks, and damned if it doesn’t make May’s jaw drop, which in turn makes Bobbi laugh. “Why are you surprised?”Well, she’s surprised because that’s a damn secret, because she’s undercover here and doesn’t need a chanteuse blowing it, because - though maybe it’s ignorant of her - she hadn’t thought a chanteuse could. “Didn’t realize I’d been so obvious,” May remarks, and it actually insults Bobbi more than herself.“You’re not,” Bobbi says lightly. “I just notice more than most people. You’re after the Aryan mafia, right?”In spite of herself, May nods. “They and theirs have already ruined millions of lives,” she says. “I’m trying to help put a stop to that, at least in my corner.”“Want help helping?” Bobbi asks, leaning forward with a surprisingly earnest expression.May blinks. “No offense, but with what?”“I notice things,” Bobbi says. “I’m decent in a fight, if my body doesn’t do me wrong. And I get face time with the fuckers that you don’t.” She rolls her eyes dramatically. “They give me flowers. It’s disgusting.”May clicks her tongue. “It’s not a game, you know.” And she doesn’t need to babysit.“I’m pretty, but I’m not an airhead,” Bobbi snaps. “I know what I’m about.” She arches an eyebrow, turns her lips up in half a smile. “And we could use my dressing room to meet.”“That’s just gonna look like we’re screwing.”“Well, we could use it for that, too.”
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“What do you remember?” Peggy asks softly from the safety of her own mattress. Jiaying is laid out flat on the other, staring at the grimy motel ceiling.“Too much,” Jiaying says. Her voice is her own now, not the vaguely Slavic monotone she’d exhibited; there’s even a little bit of her original accent peeking through.“I’m sorry,” Peggy says quickly, “you can tell me to be quiet if you’d rather. I don’t want to hurt you.”Jiaying shuts her eyes. “You haven’t.”“Oh,” Peggy murmurs. “Well, I still…”“Stop apologizing,” Jiaying says, more firmly. “You’re right to be curious, and I’m sure there are those who would say it was good for me to share.”“That’s what they’ve told me, anyway,” Peggy agrees, trying for levity. “Sharing can be cathartic. Sharon says stiff upper lips are much less in vogue these days.”“Sharon is the blonde,” Jiaying says, not quite making a question of it.“My niece,” Peggy says, nodding. “Harrison’s daughter.”“I’m glad you have her,” Jiaying says, going distant for a minute. “Do you really want to know what I remember?””If you want to say it,” Peggy reminds.“From my fall?”“Do you remember that?”“Better than I wish,” Jiaying says. “The fire burned me, but not irreparably, and it didn’t kill me. I lay there broken, my bones knitting back together, my cells regenerating, and while I did I was found by Hydra. They wanted to know what made me the way I was. They took me, they studied me, they did things I’ll spare you the details of.” They were soldiers, the both of them, so the fact that Jiaying doesn’t describe what was done tells Peggy how serious it was. “And they realized an unkillable woman would make their perfect weapon. So I was that, and I'll spare you those details as well.”“What do you want me to say if not I’m sorry?” Peggy asks.“Don’t say,” Jiaying whispers. “Just come be close.”That’s all the invitation that Peggy needs, and she crosses to Jiaying’s mattress and wraps around her. Jiaying curls onto her side and closes any distance between them, and for a minute it feels like old times.“We’re the last ones left, aren’t we?” Jiaying asks, mouth against Peggy’s neck.“Steve’s still around,” Peggy says, trying for something like optimism. “Alzheimer's, though. Means his memories and his mind come and go, but when he’s good he’s the same as ever.”“You always did have a soft spot for him,” Jiaying mumbles, a little jealously.“Yes,” Peggy nods. “Maybe we’d have been good together in another life, but that’s not how it turned out in this one.” She doesn’t have to say that he’s still been one of the only things keeping her tethered these last few years, what she thought was her last link to the past. Jiaying can tell.“It’s not how it turned out,” Jiaying agrees, burrowing closer. “Nobody else is here, though.” It’s not a question. She knows deep in her bones that the others are gone. She knew it before she asked, she just wanted to hear Peggy say it.“Not anymore,” Peggy murmurs. “They all had lives, full and wonderful lives, and they all thought we both died heroes.”“Ha,” Jiaying snorts, too acerbic. “At least you’ve done nothing to disgrace them. You’re still a hero. I left that behind decades ago.”“It was taken from you,” Peggy amends, lifting Jiaying’s face so she can kiss her gently. “That wasn’t you doing those things.”“Wasn’t it?” Jiaying asks. “I have the memories, why not the blame as well?”Peggy kisses Jiaying again, though just on the cheek. “It wasn’t you,” she insists. “Your heart is good.”“My heart is one of the only parts of me that’s still really mine,” Jiaying cracks.The thought of that - of Jiaying’s body being torn apart, of her skin breaking and her organs regrowing over and over - makes Peggy cringe, but thought is nothing compared to the horrific memories they cursed Jiaying with. “Then it’s unquestionably good,” she says instead, putting her arms around Jiaying snugly.But Jiaying whispers, “I liked it,” and she pushes away.“Liked what, darling?” Peggy asks carefully, though she can guess.“Hurting people,” Jiaying says. “Killing them. Feeling their life drain into me.”Peggy purses her lips. “It’s very possible that they programmed that too,” she says. “As an instinctual reaction or the like.”“But maybe it wasn’t,” Jiaying says. “What then?”“I’m not sure,” Peggy admits. “Do you want to go kill now?”“No,” Jiaying says.“Then I suppose we cross that bridge when we come to it,” Peggy declares. “The important thing is that you’re safe. You’re safe and you’re here and god, Jiaying, I thought I lost you. I watched you fall, I went to my death knowing I could save the world but I couldn’t save you. I woke with your name on my lips, feeling that all over. All I wanted was to save you.”“You were always stubborn,” Jiaying smirks.“But I didn’t get what I wanted, “Peggy says. “I got something even better. You saved yourself.”“Only because you woke me up,” Jiaying counters. "I saw you and I didn’t know you but I knew you. They tried to scrub you out, but it didn’t take, not fully. I still knew even without knowing your name or why you mattered to me that you did.”“That’s why you saved me in Washington,” Peggy supplies.Jiaying nods. “But I knew I had to figure myself out by myself. I wanted to relearn how to live before I relearned how to love.”Peggy swallows. They’ve not said “love” yet, not since finding each other again, and the word makes the weight of seventy years apparent. “But now?” she asks.“Now I think I’m ready for the second,” Jiaying says slowly, shifting to meet Peggy’s eyes.They move carefully, not wanting to hurt the other. All they do just yet is kiss, like they’re shy schoolgirls and not fully-grown women, but that’s all they need. Jiaying runs fingers through Peggy’s hair (shorter than it used to be) and Peggy dotes on Jiaying’s scars (the dozens of them scattered across her skin) and for a while the world just melts away.It’s only when Peggy notices a scar that’s not like the others, slicing across Jiaying’s abdomen, that things change. She kisses it same as the rest, but it makes Jiaying flinch.“Darling?” Peggy hums. “Did that hurt?”Jiaying shakes her head slowly. “Not physically.”“Is it a bad memory?” Peggy asks.“I think I had a child,” Jiaying whispers.
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“So,” Daisy says, flopping down next to Ava. “Are we going to talk about it?”“About what?” Ava asks dryly. “About the way my childhood best friend grew up to be a secret agent, then rescued me from other secret agents from the same organization, except at least some of those agents were part of a splinter group of Nazis hiding in the ranks and whether or not they were Nazis they were not actually reflective of the overall values and mission statement so I have to seriously reevaluate my positions on everything?”“I actually meant the way that you just slept with me and one of my girlfriends,” Daisy says.“Oh,” says Ava. She doesn’t particularly want to talk about the first thing, but at this exact moment it sounds preferable to discussing her romantic-or-something-like-it feelings. “I mean, do we have to?”“We probably should,” Daisy says hesitantly. “I mean, was that your first time…? Shit, I should’ve asked.”“May as well have been,” Ava shrugs, because any other answer would make Daisy sad. “I’m okay.”“Okay,” Daisy says doubtfully. “I just know it can be weird to sleep with other agents and not talk about it, since you work together.”“What makes you think I’m gonna be an agent now?” Ava asks. “I get that what I thought was SHIELD was probably Hydra, but I’m still not eager to sign my life back over.”“It’s not like that,” Daisy says. “Mom’s not stuck, your parents weren’t stuck.”“No, they just got themselves evaporated for the sake of scientific discovery,” Ava retorts.Daisy frowns. That wasn’t the right tactic to take - she was hoping for more of a “your parents had a cause” vibe, not a “your parents died on the job” vibe. This is why she doesn’t do feelings talking very often. “Mom’s not stuck,” she repeats. “If she wanted out she could get out. She’s been really close a couple of times, and the only reason anyone tried to stop her was because they like working with her. But she didn’t, she stayed, she stayed so she can help people, people like me, people like you!” She’s getting worked up, and Ava doesn’t interrupt her. “Even before I knew where I came from, I knew that I wanted to do what my mom does, and when I found out I was one of the people she’d saved... I joined SHIELD to fight for people, for their safety. For their souls. For you. I thought you’d want to use the skills you have to do the same thing.”“Those skills mean I’m good at murder,” Ava supplies. “Not that I can save lives like you or May.”Daisy flushes, half-embarrassed and half-angry. “You’re smart, you’re a brilliant hacker, you can handle yourself in a fight,” she corrects. “Or if you don’t want to be an agent, I thought you… I dunno. You could at least work with us like Wanda does.”Ava snorts. “Molecular disequlibrium isn’t a superpower,” she says. “And aren’t your Simmons and Morse meant to cure me of it once we get back? A proper permanent cure?” Since a very temporary solution was provided by them before Daisy left for this mission, and that solution was administered hours ago.“You could still be a hero,” Daisy says, but she decides to let it sit. “Whatever you’re going to do with yourself, I hope we see each other a lot. We were best friends. I mean, we were eight, but I’d like to be close like that again. I miss you.”“Don’t you already have like four girlfriends?” Ava asks pointedly. “Why do you need a ghost too?”Her code name sounds almost jagged when she says it, and that startles Daisy into a silence that keeps up awkwardly until Wanda ambles out of the bathroom, dressed in pajamas like the other two and squeezing her hair dry with a towel.“I hate being the emotionally mature one,” she sighs, glancing between them. “What’s going on, you two?”“Dais caught feelings,” Ava says, at the same time Daisy sighs, “Ava doesn’t want to do this."This, work with SHIELD to help people; this, make the three of them having sex a regular thing. Both possibilities are so untrue that Wanda laughs.“From the pictures May has showed me and the stories I’ve heard, Daisy has always had feelings for you, even if she didn’t know it,” Wanda says, sitting on Ava’s other side. “And Ava doesn’t want to say anything for certain until she’s better able to evaluate her choices, but she does like the general idea of helping and she does like you. Us.” She smiles smugly. “Does that sound right?”“That’s infuriating,” Ava says, but she’s smiling as she asks Daisy, “Does that get old?”“Sort of, but it’s good to be called on my shit,” Daisy replies, rolling onto her side. “Even when I hate it.”“Is she right?” Ava asks.“I usually am,” Wanda interjects.“Yeah,” Daisy admits. “I think so. If you’re not good with that I’ll shut up, but you did just eat me out, so I don’t think you’re totally opposed.”“Fair point,” Ava replies, and she’s probably trying to play it cool. “I don’t want to rush, about anything. But I do sort of like your feelings.” She turns to grin wolfishly at Wanda. “And yours.”“I don’t want you to rush anything,” Daisy says seriously, “but it’s nice having you around and I want you to know.”“And for what it’s worth,” Wanda chimes in, definitely playing it cool (she still doesn’t love discussing her messy history and similar rescue), “this is sort of the ideal job and social circle for a gold-hearted former mad science project.”“It is hard to imagine, explaining all my shit to people who work in a bank or something,” Ava jokes. “Or to hope that if I did, they’d still be able to see all of me.”Daisy nods. “Quote-unquote normals don’t get it,” she agrees. “I think I do, though. Or I wanna.”“I want to let you,” Ava says.“Then we’re agreed,” Wanda declares, grabbing both of the others’ hands. “Welcome to the club.”