AtomicEmperor

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

@AtomicEmperor Slight property damage on Temple grounds... Layla will help pay for it.

@Estylwen

Hahaha Lynette left the property damage. She thinks it looks nice with plants crawling through the holes. They keep buckets in the chapel LMAO

Iron and Honey: A Love Story [FernStone & AtomicEmperor]

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Act One-Five

It was dark.

Trisha didn't know where she was, not exactly. St Portwell, a forest. She couldn't sense the bees. Shadows moved all around her, forming vague human shapes, with sharp claws that chased after her. Inhuman whispers echoed in her ears.

You're all alone. You deserve to be. Why would anyone stay? You're a failure. Everyone will abandon you. No one loves you. It's all a lie.

She couldn't escape the words even when she tried to run in the endless forest. Shadows turned into monsters that came after her, and she had no bees to stop them.

You just hurt everyone.

The trees were painted blood red. Suddenly, it wasn't just the shadows. There were bodies of people she didn't recognise. She'd known them, but forgotten them, maybe. She didn't know. They were torn apart. But it wasn't her fault. Was it?

It's your fault that they leave you. You'll always be abandoned. You deserve to be alone.

The shadows surrounded her, blocking off any escape. She could already feel the pain of their claws, phantom agony across her chest.

Alone ^{Alone Alone Alone Alone}

Shadowed talons sliced through her stomach-

Trisha woke suddenly, one hand going to her stomach. Her chest heaved up and down, heart racing and sweat covering her. Her head pounded, nausea threatening to bring up everything she'd drank the night before. It was light, just. She didn't feel any weight against her, nothing holding her- he was gone, he was gone, he was gone-

Her head snapped to the side, breathing calming down slightly when she saw that Casey was still there, asleep. She was the one that was at the edge of the bed… she must have rolled away while she was dreaming. It only helped calm her panic slightly. She was safe, she was definitely safe… it was so hard to believe. The dream was so vivid. It wasn't often that she dreamt like this. Maybe it was getting worse because of the danger, the return of the coven… or maybe it was just the alcohol. At least she hadn’t called the bees in her sleep.

While the dream was vivid, what had happened last night was not. Her memories were fuzzy. She remembered drinking a lot with her friends, and Casey coming to get her… snippets of conversations. Refusing to let him go, saying some things she wouldn't otherwise… she didn't think he'd reacted badly? But she couldn't remember. It was a blur. Had they resolved things? She wasn't entirely sure, which didn't help the constant, cold flutter in her chest.

She wanted to cuddle up to him, but she felt uncomfortable, like something was scratching her skin. Glancing down, she realised she was still wearing the dress from yesterday. It stuck to her, all sweaty and gross. She didn't want to hug him like this… she'd get changed first. He wouldn't disappear if she looked away for a moment, right?

Trisha carefully rolled the last bit off the bed, trying not to disturb Casey. She didn't want to wake him when he'd actually slept in… at least, it couldn't be 5am. It was too light. She winced as her head swam, temples pounding. But it wasn't a long journey to the wardrobe. The shorts she'd worn the night before were dumped in front of it, so she pulled them on under the skirt. She frowned as it rubbed uncomfortably against her sweaty skin, just another horrible sensation pressing against her.

Casey was still asleep, hopefully… she pulled off her dress, starting to rummage through the wardrobe in just her bra and shorts. What she was actually looking for was one of his t-shirts among all of her clothes… but she couldn't even remember if he'd actually put anything in there. Maybe… hopefully. Her head hurt too much to think, so she just kept looking. The longer she did the more panicked she felt that she'd turn around and he'd be gone, but- but she'd set her mind to it. Find a t-shirt, go back. Her whole body trembled, but it was definitely the hangover. It'd be fine.

Oddly, Casey found himself wrapped up and held tightly by the darkness of sleep. It was rare to have a night that he didn't wake up panicked, and rarer still that he wasn't sweating from his heart pounding in his chest.
It seemed to be proximity to Trisha, though the other dreamless sleep the night they met saw him still waking up at a normal time. His unconscious brain didn't bother trying to make sense of it.

But the brain cleared itself up. It always did, sometimes in spectacular fashion, and as Casey stirred vaguely to consciousness, he felt that both of his arms were available for free movement. He wasn't trapped under her, he wasn't pinned, he didn't feel her weight.
His hand shot across the bed, fingers sliding over the silky duvet on top of the bed. She wasn't there. Why? His hand kept shuffling about, assuming she’d simply found her way to some magical position that kept her just out of his reach.

But as he gave one last pass of his arm to feel nothingness, his eyes snapped fully open. As he pushed his body up toward an upright position, he found anxiety swallowing him as her name left his lips.
”Trisha!?” Casey called out, not even looking.

As she was actually still close, it'd be incredibly easy to hear the panic and anxiety in his voice. Of course he was scared of her being hurt, but he was just as afraid of her leaving. One argument, and in the middle of the night, she just up and leaves?
He'd sat up just right to keep Trisha out of his line of sight, despite them sharing the same little room. Not on purpose of course; it's the pure panic of knowing that someone was next to you in the foxhole and now they're not there…

He didn't serve in the Pacific, and he thanked God for that. But the Special Services experienced its fair share of horror. He often wondered which actually ended up worse, but the convergent trauma was well documented. The psychological horror of falling asleep because you're exhausted, only to wake up and find your buddy's boot as the last reminder of them? It stuck.

”Trisha!?”
He spun his head, and finally their eyes were able to lock as his foolish panic faded away.

Trisha was still fruitlessly searching for some clothes that weren't hers in the wardrobe when Casey woke up. She jumped, dropping the sweater she'd picked up. The sudden shout had her head pounding, immediate response dying on her lips. His obvious panic set off her own again, heart rate speeding up and breathing quickening. She spun around, ignoring the nausea that came with her sudden movement.
“I was just getting changed," Trisha said softly with an attempted smile, voice slightly hoarse from the hangover. She felt the need to explain. She hadn't left, he hadn't left, they were both still there.

She didn't bother going back to looking, closing the small gap between her and the bed to crawl back onto it. In no time she was right beside him, climbing into his lap and pressing her face into his chest. Her body was still trembling, the lingering effects of her nightmare intertwining with the sick feeling in her gut and the worry his panic had set off. But… but that was good, right? It meant he didn't want her to leave. She didn't remember how much they'd resolved of the fight last night, but it meant he wanted her here.
“I meant to be quick," she said in a small voice, shaky limbs curling up against him. She didn't really care if he was bothered by how little clothes she was wearing - she had a bra on, he could wrap them in a blanket, it didn't really matter. The scar… well she didn't care about that either if he ended up seeing. She'd just needed to hug him. “But none of your clothes are in there. I was just looking for a t-shirt, but it's all mine. I wanted something of yours."

Wordlessly, Casey began shuffling and tugging until his sweater and shirt came off. It was the same collared shirt he'd worn the entire day previous, and he figured it wouldn't really work.
”G-girls… like guy sweaters.”
He pulled the shirt out of the sweater and clumsily begin trying to pull it over Trisha's head and shoulders.
”J-just… wake me up next time instead. I thought you ran away from me.”

Doing his best, he figured the sweater would be enough to keep her there next to him forever. His arms got tighter around her, and as the haze of sleepiness returned, he found his fingers slowly but surely scratching her back in the same spot. It was a gentle thing, supposed to be comforting as his eyes closed back down. He wasn't even sure if she actually put the sweater on.

For whatever reason, he didn't feel entirely functional. Like it was a dream he was trapped in and couldn't get away from.
”We're real…? You and me? No dreaming?” he struggled to ask her.

Trisha managed to half wriggle into the sweater, getting her arms and head through so that it was at least over her. She didn't bother detaching herself enough from Casey to let it fall down past the upper half of her body, pressing as close as was physically possible.
.“I wouldn't run away from you," Trisha mumbled - because that wasn't what she'd done yesterday. That had been different. He'd shut her out first… she started getting a bit tense just thinking about it, though having him right there, holding her close. The constant, light movement of his fingers against her back meant there was no way to think this wasn't real. He hadn't left.

“Yeah, we're real," Trisha said. She wriggled one arm out of the hold he had on her, hand moving to his bicep to pinch it. Unlike him, she was wide awake after the nightmare and getting up.
“See, if you can feel that it's real. Definitely not a dream. I'm here, you're here, we're both here, together."

It was as much a mantra for herself as it was for him. She was still worried he'd just disappear, somehow, even though she knew this wasn't a dream. She wouldn't dream of anything so nice. The few dreams she had were always nightmares.
“I can keep pinching you if it'll help you believe it? Or to wake you up more… well, you can go back to sleep if you want, I'll just be here."

Casey cleared his throat as he clung to Trisha.
”You’re not… Gonna sleep?”
Sniffling, he pushed up on the bed and sat up straight before starting to rub his eyes a bit more. Thoughts after blackout sleeping like that usually came at a slow trickle so long as the panic subsided, and he was thankful it had.

But now she was going to raw dog the day? He flicked his hand to look at his watch, finding the time closer to eight in the morning than he ever thought he’d see.
”Oh, Jesus… I’m amazed Furio hasn’t come up to buzz us and see where the fuck I am.”
Despite work now being on his mind, he knew he was “free” for another couple of days. They hadn’t trusted him with the Manuals yet, and he hadn’t had some Pink Luxer in his mind handing him over any important secrets. Furio wouldn’t bother; but he would be giving Casey a hard time about not being more serious when he finally did show up.

So he shook the responsibility off in favor of cuddling his girlfriend. His. Girlfriend. Still, after the tremendous amount of shit she’d given him and the cold response he’d initially given her, she was here. Arms held her tightly, keeping her as close as he possibly could while she was there with him.
And now she was wearing his sweater, which made her like a little loofa-blanket that he could pick up slightly and rub himself on like a cat. Before long, he slid the hood over her head and was rubbing his cheek against the fabric.
”Do you remember what I said last night?” he asked very casually, as if it meant absolutely nothing.

With the hood pulled up it was more difficult for Trisha to see Casey's face, just to try figure out what he might've said last night from his expression. Her brow furrowed as she tried to pick through her incredibly fuzzy memory, hand wriggling up to play with a long strand of hair that had escaped from the sweater entrapment. She'd clung to him… he hadn't pushed her away. He told her he missed her. They'd talked when they got home but… she didn't remember the details. She wasn't sure what she'd said either. Something about trying harder? She pursed her lips, head just hurting the harder she thought.

“Unless it was that you missed me, I don't…" she shook her head slightly, which felt more like rubbing back against Casey's cheek than anything else.
“Was it something I should remember? I was really drunk… we're not still fighting, are we?" The last bit was said in an incredibly tiny voice, barely a whisper. She really hoped that they'd resolved it last night.

As she was asking questions, Casey’s smile slowly crept across his face. By the time she was done, he was shaking from the giggling. Pulling the hood far enough away from her face, he looked down to make sure she could see him smiling.
”Nah… We’re not fighting, and there’s nothing you need to remember. You were just being really sweet, and so was I. We were both just tired, I think…”

If she was being serious, then she didn’t remember he said the L word. His arms tightened around her a little bit, and he rubbed her arms to give her a bit more friction warmth.
”But, I’m pretty sure you’re going back to see them again today, so… I guess, if you’re gonna get that drunk again tonight, just let me know first? So I know if I have to go get you. I couldn’t ask someone else from the Temple to do it, that’d be embarrassing.”
His face got a little closer to hers, and he rubbed his nose against hers with smiling eyes. He loved her: Now it was his secret to keep until she said she felt the same. Could he? He didn’t know, but Casey wanted to try and make sure she was convinced of it by then.

Trisha wasn't entirely convinced that there was nothing she needed to remember - had she really just been sweet? She hadn't said something she normally wouldn't? But it was difficult to dwell on those worries when they were so close like this. She obviously hadn't said anything bad. If she had, would he still be here?

“I could just get a taxi- but I'm not drinking anything today. Even if we go to a bar, I'll just drink soda or something." She tilted her head forward to press her forehead against his with a little smile, trying to ignore what felt like spiders crawling inside her chest at the thought of going to see her friends without him today. Not that she was worried about seeing them, it was the being away from him. She couldn't just shake the anxiety yesterday had brought up, and the situation that had led to her drinking so much in the first place.
“I didn't plan to drink that much, it just happened… I regret it, I feel awful."

The more she woke up the less her hangover actually felt all that bad. Sure, if she smelled too strong food she'd probably throw up, but the headache was lessening. That didn't mean she wasn't going to milk it. Trap him for as long as she could.
“I don't even know if I can get out of bed for a while… My head hurts so much. Not for another few hours, at least… I neeeeeed some cuddling time to feel better.”

His hand bumped against her shoulder, rubbing her gently again as he kissed her on the forehead.
”You neeeeeeeed some cuddling time? Like deeply?” he giggled.
Posture shifted again, and he held himself upright while letting her go again.
”Then you koala yourself around me. Get nice and comfy… I’m here with you.” he urged her in a gentle voice, patting himself.

Casey swung his head equally urging her to cling to him as tightly and awkwardly as she wanted. It was necessary, he figured, after everything that had been said. He was happy she really didn’t remember, since it was all private feelings he could hold onto. Things he could know for certain weren’t even hers. Just for him.
Special feelings.

It wasn’t good to urge her to drink, probably… He could only hope that she’d be so open later on without the same influence. For now, he just wanted her to feel good about him feeling good.
”And I’m only doing this because you’re really fucking awesome and pretty and cool and… Y’know, if you weren’t, I’d… Still really enjoy my time that I get to spend with you. What the Hell am I saying?” he started giggling, holding his arm out and waiting for her acceptance.

Trisha turned around to properly face him, arms going under his as she burrowed herself against his chest. Her legs also wrapped around him so that, while she was still sitting in his lap, she was completely clinging to him. He’d have to work really hard to detach her, she really was like a human sized koala.
It made her feel secure holding onto him like this.
“If I wasn’t so cool I probably wouldn’t be here like this,” Trisha responded with a slight giggle of her own, tilting her head up to smile at him. She didn’t really believe it all. She knew that she was pretty, the one thing she truly accepted, but the rest? Well… she wasn’t going to argue if he genuinely thought so. “Only super cool people move in with their boyfriends this early.”

If she didn’t live with him, and hadn’t been brought back home by him, she’d probably still be upset and ignoring him. She definitely would’ve been in a much worse mood if she’d woken up at the place her friend’s were renting.
“I’ll hold you to that if I become less cool and awesome and pretty,” she said, resting her head back down against him. Maybe she could… try open up a bit. Just a little bit. It wasn’t about anything deep.
“This morning I actually woke up from… a nightmare, I guess? About the apparitions I had to fight, before. I’d rolled away so I thought you weren’t there but then I saw you and… it didn’t seem so bad.”

Casey was holding her tightly, and thankfully his face was pushed past her own so that she couldn’t see his eyes dim.
Of course she’d have the same nightmares, idiot… Tell her.
”Y’know I feel the same about you? Like, I almost always have them… But spending the nights with you, they’ve… Not been bad. Like, last night I didn’t dream at all.”

As he held her, he gripped the fabric of the sweater gently, bunching it up and letting it go in little crinkles.
”I mean like… I know those kinds of dreams. And, you make them seem not so bad too. Or like even if they are bad, you’re there to comfort me.”
He was somewhat satisfied by what he managed to get out, and shifted slightly to push his forehead against hers.

He didn’t want her to think it was creepy, but it was important to get the eye contact in. His Father had always pressed that one should maintain eye contact when expressing things like sincerity, because they were the windows into the soul. There wasn’t any real magic there, it was just… Maybe it was magic.
”I mean that.”

It wasn’t that difficult for Trisha to meet his eyes, and to try to believe the genuineness in them. That would be hard to fake. Of course he had dreams like that - worse, probably - but that he felt the same as her? She had to believe it here. He meant it, and it helped quiet down those annoying little voices in the back of her mind for a moment.
“I don’t have mine every night.” She decided not to tell him that she hadn’t had them in years, not until recently. It was the circumstances - Father Wolf, the reminders, meeting coven members again. What if he thought last nights was because of him, somehow?

“I… I’m really glad you feel the same,” she continued softly, fingers pressing into his back and lightly running up and down. If she made his dreams better, then he’d want to keep sleeping beside her.
“That means we’ll have to keep sharing a bed, forever and ever. It hasn’t been the same with other people for me… not really. Though the last person I shared with was Cass, and she kept kicking me in her sleep-” she smiled, eyes so close to his gently curving. It really did feel better. Like, even if the nightmares continued it would be fine.
“We’re like each other’s… good sleep charm or something.”

”We are… So lets keep it that way, okay? Next time you’re mad at me, or something happens… We’re going to talk about it. And we’re going to make sure that even if we can’t resolve it, it’s understood that we’ll end up in bed together at the end of it.”
He took a deep breath. At least he had her right now, and she couldn’t escape the tender moment. He only hoped that she’d understand that the feeling wasn’t malicious. He only wanted to hear her say she’d try again while she was sober. It was, after all, what he remembered most.

”Or, at least don’t run away. For now. With things being so not safe, I… Can’t say it isn’t a little tense knowing that anything could happen. If our info’s good, and lone people are being targeted,- God, there’s just too much shit, Trisha. I don’t ever want to lose you like that.”

Trisha bit her lip and glanced away, unable to keep up the eye contact while she thought it through. She didn’t like talking when she was upset. She didn’t like talking about things that set her off at all. Because the surface reason always came across as petty and stupid, and the deeper, real reason wasn’t something she was comfortable with sharing. The reaction to that would only be worse. Everytime she started opening herself up she got shut right back down.
But she couldn’t say that right now.

“Alright, I’ll try,” Trisha said eventually, looking back at him again. She would, when it came to not running away. Even if she was still mad at him, and still didn’t want to talk to him, she’d try to stay here. Where would she go when her friends weren’t around? Anywhere else, like her sister’s place, would just be more empty. She’d sleep just as well alone as she would next to someone she was still upset with.

“But I didn’t run away, you-” she stopped herself, taking a long, slow breath. She didn’t want to ruin the moment. It was difficult to stop herself getting a bit grumpy about it again, especially when she didn’t remember resolving anything, but she was too comfortable hugging him. Being with him. She didn’t want to stop that.
“I’ll go into the Greenhouse next time. Then I’ll still be here, but it’s my space… I…” she trailed off again, struggling. It wasn’t like last night when she was drunk - though even then, it’d been apparent she still struggled.

“I don’t want to die because I’m alone.” Though she’d been alone for so long, why hadn’t Father Wolf killed her before? He probably just hadn’t gotten around to her.
“I don’t- I don’t want to get mad either. I’ll try not to. I won’t run away, and I’ll sleep here anyway.”
There was nothing about talking about it. She couldn’t lie like that. She didn’t want to make a promise she knew she couldn’t keep, as opposed to one she could at least try to. If he hadn’t shut the door yesterday, she probably wouldn’t have left like that. She might still be ignoring him but… she wouldn’t have left.

He was, if leery, satisfied by her reaction. He wasn’t about to get upset this early in the morning, so whatever she felt like she had to say, he was going to let her without giving any kind of pushback. Frankly, Casey was just happy to have Trisha still safe and in his arms after something stupid. Something that was, ultimately, his fault.
”And, I apologized to you last night. But, if you don’t remember, I want you to hear me say it now. I’m sorry for pushing you away. At first, I didn’t really consider that you maybe just wanted some private time… And by the time I did, I threw it in your face like I was a child. It was wrong of me, and I’ll try my absolute best to not… Like… Well,-”

He thought back to the sorts of things he had said before. Even moments ago… Authoritative; like she was his. It wasn’t a road he wanted to go down. He didn’t even really know where it was coming from… But that seemed to him to be the more embarrassing element in it.
Leon acted like that… Before. Like he was-

”-I don’t know, admonish you like I’m you’re fuckin’ Dad or something. I’m not here to teach you how I think you should be, or make you fit into a mold you don’t wanna be in. So, me getting mad at you and like, trying to project myself on you… I should just go along with you, and learn how to accept things like that. Right? If I… Have feelings for you. Like I’m sure I do.”
At least he managed to scoot past the L word again.

“I accept the apology, now I’m sober.” Even though she was the one that had started it, really, and ignored him. She hadn’t really pushed him away. She’d waited at the end of the corridor. She’d even sort of been talking about it. But it would be easiest if he went along with her every time. Then things could keep going smoothly. Things always fell apart when she snapped and people got sick of it… but maybe then he wouldn’t?
”My dad was never present enough to be like that, anyway.” She laughed slightly at that, as if it was a joke - it felt like it. Her dad’s lack of presence in her life wasn’t something she was touchy about as her mom. Everyone knew what a shit father James Vanburen had been, except a select few of his favourite children.

“I really don’t like people trying to make me into something so… yeah, it’ll be better if you just accept it. For both of us. But I can take you getting angry at me, or shouting at me, or admonishing me. I’ll argue back, I’ll get more mad, just... don’t leave first. I-” she bit her lip, unable to take it back. The actual vulnerability, the peek into what really scared her more than anything. If he tried to project onto her, she could resist it. But if he was out of her sight, she couldn’t do anything.
“I’d rather, if you can’t accept it, you get mad instead of leaving. If you like me, don’t walk away first.”

Patience necessary, inquire within.
She was fixated on it alright. Drunk, and now sober. He was happy to hear her bringing it up, and while it maybe wasn’t the greatest thing to deal with, he was sure he could.
”I won’t, Trisha… And I didn’t mean to do that, so… If you don’t need some kind of personal space to sort your shit out, then I won’t worry about it. ‘Cuz, y’know… I’m used to shit like that at least. Being in a barrack with a bunch of other dudes? We just kind of sit and take care of shit. ‘Cuz you’ve gotta be ready for anything. Can’t let things get in the way.”

He was good about blinking at least; hadn’t given her the two thousand yard stare yet. Yet.

He didn’t mean to do that? Then why did he? No, no, this was good, if he wasn’t going to do it again.
“Don’t worry about it, because If I need the space, I’ll leave.” Reading between the lines, her actions were louder than her words.
“Not our place, to another room- or the Greenhouse. But I’m also used to dealing with it around people. Because of all the siblings.” That wasn’t strictly true. When she was younger she’d always lock herself in her room. But it was different when it came to her partner, or even friends. She glanced around as she spoke, obviously uncomfortable with talking about it at all, forcing herself through it. Impressive progress, really.
“I prefer sitting in the same room not talking.”

Casey made a soft eeeyuck sound.
”We can’t share such a close proximity and not talk about it unless you’re gonna like… Cuddle me or something. No way can I sit on pins and needles in the same room. I mean, I’m sure it’ll all work out and we’ll find some way to make things right for one another. So we’ll have to… Just wait and see what happens? And then hash it out again when the time comes.”

He nuzzled her nose again, rubbing Trisha’s shoulders and back as he took a deep breath.
”My sweet Koala Bee.” he giggled.

Trisha just about managed to not frown at that, lips twitching a little bit, managing to even out back towards an almost smile when the topic was mostly moved on from. Not having to keep talking about it was more of a relief than the future problems when they did fight again.
“Maybe the time won’t even come,” she said softly, even though she knew it would. She was the one that had gotten irritated by small things building up before, and she would again. But she wasn’t going to think about that right now.

“But now you’re in big trouble, because when the Koala Bee latches we never let go.” Trisha smiled again, finally properly meeting his gaze again. She relaxed more, rubbing her nose back against his. Then she tilted her head slightly and leaned in to peck his lips with a very light kiss.
“We’re cute but clingy and fussy,” she laughed lightly. “But you already seem to be getting used to that.”

---

Some hours later, Casey had time to himself once again. At least this was scheduled, and nobody was in a bad mood as they left except… He giggled to himself thinking about Leon bringing Cass outside to meet with Trisha and their other friends who came to pick them up. She’s had the expression of annoyance toward Cass, and that little upturned nose with the leering eyes made him smile.
He thought Trisha was tremendously cute when she was upset…

Casey’s headphones once again blocked out the loudness of the indoor range. It was his zen place, his favorite spot to be around home now topped only by Trisha’s direct location. Since she wasn’t there, it was a clear winner with no contest.
When he first got downstairs, Furio was quick to let him know that tomorrow, Sunday, he’d be officiated into his position and office. It’s when he’d have the knowledge and the lores passed down to him, and it was meant to be an occasion of celebration.

So, Casey was expecting guests. Furio had ceremoniously given him the day to himself again, but only one party really knew what was in store. He fired off a salvo of handgun shots, watching the different patterns that they split and fragmented into as the magical detonation forcibly blasted the slugs into miniature shotgun spreads.
The ammo enchantment was coming along nicely. He liked what he saw, especially in the consistency of the blast pattern which seemed to be more or less identical between each shot. As such, it rewarded precision marksmanship, and he hoped that it would translate similarly into ammunition with better penetration capabilities.

But there was a body behind him. It didn’t reach out or stop him from what he was doing, but he could feel eyes. Not to mention the way the sound was echoing changed completely, muffling and tightening it more like there was a barrier. He flicked the safety, dumped the mag out of the well, then cleared the chamber before laying the empty firearm down.
Turning and pulling his headphones off, it was someone he wasn’t expecting.
”Oh, shit… Mumma?”

He probably should’ve expected her. If the ceremony was tomorrow, it was only natural she’d want to speak with him… But at the same time, he didn’t expect her here. Not actively. She was wearing a black dress; simple, without frill or ornament. She didn’t wear a coat or carry any kind of purse ever, so Lynette Richoux was singular in focus.
”Is that any way to greet your mother, Casaeu?” she grinned, holding up her arms for an embrace.

Casey accepted it, moving and hugging under his mother’s arms as hers wrapped around his back.
”How’s my Late Bloomer? You’re all settled in, I take it?”

Nodding, he took his Mother tenderly by the hand. Usually he wasn’t so reverent, but they were supposed to have an agreement. So, he figured he’d play his part.
”Yep… It’s great up there. But, I get how Furio and Clarissa were getting claustrophobic.”
Lynette giggled to herself, a serene smile painted across her face like comforting sunlight.

”And our favorite newcomer?” she asked with an expectant tone. ”Did you both settle the problem you came to me with?”

Again, Casey nodded, but this time he felt the hair on his neck stand up. He had made the mistake of trying to get her involved, at least to comfort him or something, but… She’d practically shunned involvement. All she really did was blame him without context, them tell him to make it right.

”Fixed. No sweat.”
Lynette’s hand reached up and pinched Casey by the cheek playfully.
”Good boy. I’m proud of you navigating your first test of tender care… She’s damaged, Casey, just like you are. I’m sure there’ll be plenty more moments like that. So, always try and think about how you would feel, my Bubba. Now, c’mon. Toys away, lets go upstairs. I have a gift for her, and we need to discuss plans and necessary ritual expectations for tomorrow… And Eli’s here, so-”

Casey grimaced slightly.
”Oh, well I mean… She’s not here?” he said, in reference to Trisha.
”That’s perfectly fine, my sweet boy. We ain’t got anywhere to be!”

Lynette’s hand reached out, taking the shoulder of Casey’s shirt and lifting it, tugging it toward her as if she was going to pull her giant of a son along where she wanted him to go. Like a cat caught in the neck grip of its mother, he too practically went limp, finding himself being dragged up to his rooftop home by his mother.
As they exited the armory, Elise and Mia were both waiting and talking, laden with bags that most likely had freshly pressed clothing in them. When they saw Casey was caught in the dreaded grip, they both gave him a frown of knowing, meekly following behind to leave the hallway quiet once more.

---

The Harbor> Back Home

---

Across town, Trisha had taken her friends on a nice (if cold) meander across the harbour before going into Coastal Harbour mall. It lent itself more to her, Reyna and Nadiyah - but Sal had his gaming time yesterday, and Cass had her fun all night. Thankfully she didn’t go on about it too much. If anything, it made things easier, because she was too tired to complain about being dragged from shop to shop.

After shopping was done - with Nadiyah having bought multiple bags of items - the four from out of town wanted to go get some food. Trisha really didn’t want to get food. Just the thought of getting food made her feel a bit queasy.

”There’s a Red Lobster in St Portwell, right? Let’s go there for tea!” Cass grinned as they walked out of the mall, making their way towards Reyna’s car at the other side of the parking lot. Suffering through the shopping seemed to have had the opposite effect on her that it did others - she’d bounced right back to full energy. Somehow.
"Absolutely not," Nadiyah was the first to say, rolling her eyes. "I don’t understand your obsession with Red Lobster. We’re by the coast. We can go to a nice seafood restaurant."
”Red Lobster’s good and cheap! I’m fuckin’ skint, alright!”
"You wouldn’t be if you hadn’t bought all those new computer parts. I told you not to."

Trisha walked at the back of the group, rubbing her forehead with a small frown. She had a small bag slung over her shoulder - nothing she’d bought, but little household trinkets her friend’s had all pitched in to get her as a ‘housewarming’ gift. It was nice, but she was tired.
She could probably eat a little bit, but sitting in a restaurant surrounded by all sorts of food smells? She was still too hungover for that.
"You want me to take you home first?" Reyna asked quietly, slowing down to walk beside Trisha.
“I didn’t say I wanted to go home?” Trisha looked up at Reyna, head tilted in confusion. She did, but she also… didn’t? She knew that if she went back she probably wouldn’t see them again for a while, but she also just really wanted to go cuddle up with Casey on their massive couch.
"It’s written all across your aura," Reyna laughed. "And your face. You had a lot to drink last night, I don’t want you throwing up over our meal."

After some thought, Trisha nodded. Maybe she could see them later, or tomorrow before they left. She’d only get annoyed if she went out to eat and started to feel more sick.
“... yeah, you’re right,” she said eventually, with a smile.

They’d reached Reyna’s car, bags stuffed in the trunk and all five piling in. Cass and Nadiyah continued to bicker over where they were going to eat, over Trisha who’d been forced into the middle seat thanks to being the ‘smallest’, with Sal occasionally interjecting. By the time they reached the apartment block it had been decided they wouldn’t go to Red Lobster, but that they’d try to find a reasonably priced seafood place. All parties were reasonably satisfied in time to say their goodbyes.

”TRIISSHHHHAAA I’m gonna miss you!” Cass immediately pulled Trisha into an inescapable, tight hug while rubbing their cheeks together. Trisha leaned away from her with a half assed grumble.
“You’re just going to miss my boyfriend’s brother.”
”Hey, no way! It ain’t like that! Bros before hoes! You’re the one I looovvvveeee.” Cass sang the last word with a wide grin.
“Gross,” Trisha made a face, but she properly hugged Cass back.

"Hey, let the rest of us in there," Sal laughed. Cass reluctantly let go and Sal went in for a hug, once again lifting Trisha off the ground and squeezing her tight.
"I’ll catch you online, so work on your fps skills… and say bye to your boyfriend from me!"
“Fuck off,” Trisha rolled her eyes good naturedly.

Nadiyah was thankfully more reasonable, a light hug and whispered comment about how annoying the other two were. Trisha laughed.
"Call me if he ever annoys you. We can bitch about it together."

Reyna was last, hugging Trisha with a warm smile. It lingered a bit, Reyna patting Trisha’s back before pulling back.
"I’ll try and visit more often, since I’m so close. You should also come to Portland sometime. Bring Casey as well. I hope it works. He seems nice."
”Awww shit, he got the most difficult seal of approval to get!” Cass grinned from the side.

“... yeah, that’d be nice,” Trisha smiled, ignoring Cass. She wasn’t so sure about visiting - Casey would get busy soon, and she didn’t want to travel alone, but it would be nice if Reyna came around more often. Maybe with a bit more warning next time.
“Well, bye… Maybe I’ll see you all in the morning.”

They all laughed, clearly not believing that, and Trisha just shrugged. With a last wave she backed away towards the lobby. She wasn’t one to linger on goodbyes - they always sucked, because as soon as someone was out of her sight the worries started to creep in. But it was better to get it over with.
Inside the elevator she leaned against one of the walls with a yawn. The small group of bees she’d brought with her crawled out of her coat and onto her neck, buzzing softly. The shaking of the lift near the top still made her jump a little bit, bees scattering. But it wasn’t as bad anymore. The bees all came back to her shoulder as she quickly made her way along the corridor and up onto the roof.

She really couldn’t wait to get back and just relax for the rest of the evening. Maybe she’d have a nap, or they could watch a movie. It would be nice.
“Casey, I’m home-” Trisha froze just one step through the door. With the place being so small it was impossible to not notice the guests immediately. Her wide eyes went to Casey, then to Mia, then the woman she didn’t recognise - his other sister, judging by her looks - before stopping on Lynette.

She forced a smile.
“Hello. Casey didn’t tell me we had guests. I would’ve come back earlier if I’d known.” That was a well told lie, of course. If she’d known, she wouldn’t have come home until much later.

”Oh my God heyyyyyyyy!”
Classically, Mia jumped at the first hello. She seemed perky and clean today, dressed in some fairly comfortable clothing as she’d probably been downstairs. Her hair was tied up and mostly hidden away under the hat that she always wore, and she tore from where she was to embrace the much shorter Trisha.

She had to bend her knees slightly to get deeply into it. But she smelled nice, like lilac and vanilla; and when her head pulled away she was grinning ear to ear. Mia, like Reyna, was decent enough at reading auras through her Mother’s preferred method, and could always sense the tension coming from Trisha’s eyes whenever she was hugged.
It wasn’t great knowing you weren’t wanted in such a way, but she knew she couldn’t hold it against Trisha. Only work to better the relationship. So, she hoped that the consistency would be good.

Mia moved to give Trisha a better look: A better look at Casey, who was standing with different fabrics draped across his otherwise scarcely clothed body. Lynette was, until Trisha entered, fussing about with a string of ties draped across her arm trying to match one with another fabric she was holding.
At the other side of Casey, Elise Richoux stood staring with cold blue eyes that shimmered in a way the others didn’t. She was holding tightly to a teddy bear who seemed to be dressed with some bandages and other medical dressings.

Eerily, its face also stared at Trisha with beady little black eyes that somehow conveyed intelligence within. When Trisha’s gaze would inevitably meet hers, the expression instantly shifted to one of comfort and kindness. She looked very much like her mother and sister, and with all three of them now looking at Trisha from different distances, it was impossible to not see it…
The Smile.

”I’m real sorry, Babe… I honestly didn’t know what time you’d be back or when they’d be done, so I just kind of winged it. Next time I’ll let you know…”
And there he was like a beam of sunshine among a painted facade. His tender grin was the same one he’d given to her that morning, and the same one that he’d given her last night when he picked her up.
The Smile was trained expression. Casey’s face was full of love, as if he were in the middle of a joke he wasn’t aware of.

”I’m super glad you made it though… Mom and Elise wanted to finalize the measurements on your dress for tomorrow… It’s my Ascension Ceremony, Babe! And we’ve gotta match… But I told them you would maybe get pissed off, so I’m expecting to hear your honest thoughts when you see what they picked.”
Not that it probably wouldn’t have been obvious instantly to Trisha as to what the theme was by looking at the cloth colors already draped over Casey…

Gold and black. It was honestly a coincidence that the colors for the office somehow made the resemblance of the Bee, but it was probably some strange twist of fate in the end.
”Mhm! Oh, but please, Elise! Introduce yourself sweetheart!”
Elise had been staring daggers at Trisha despite the automatically adjusting smile. The look didn’t change as she piped up…

Except, the shimmering in her eyes died away. Somehow the smile lost a little bit of the fake porcelain nature. She softened. Placing the bear down, she stepped across the room to hold her hand out. Dressed mostly in black, she looked like an office woman working for Hot Topic’s corporate branch. Even the tattoos on her fingers spelled out things like “goth” and “blood”.
”Right. I’m Elise, Casey’s big sister. I guess Mia’s too”.
”You fucking guess?”

Casey and Lynette both laughed, and Elise smiled. The women hoped singularly that it would somewhat break the tension for Trisha.

It was a lot, as it always was with Casey’s family… in just the few days Trisha had been around them. Mia’s hug was less unexpected but still uncomfortable, even if she was slowly adjusting. The fake smile they all wore didn’t bother her. She was used to something like that among certain siblings of hers. It was easy enough to return it with one of her own, softening more genuinely when she looked at Casey.
“You’re making me out to be fussy in front of your family, Case, I’m not that bad,” she laughed lightly, before stepping enough into the house for the door to shut behind her. The likely bee motif that would come with her dress didn’t bother her - because to her clothes weren’t for herself, they were to present an image to others.

But she had no idea what on earth an Ascension Ceremony was. Something Temple, something important. It didn’t really matter. She put it to the back of her mind and reached out to shake Elise’s hand lightly.
At least it wasn’t another hug.
“Nice to meet you, Elise. I’m Trisha… but I’m sure you already know.” It was all polite, with a pleasant smile. She glanced over at Mia. “I have siblings I don’t want to claim either.”

She took off her coat to shake off the urge to run, trying to push away the discomfort. She didn’t like coming home to people unexpectedly in her space, but she could tolerate it. She was used to it. Her clothes were more casual than yesterday's - dark green, wide legged corduroy pants with a light, knit white top tucked into them. She hung up her coat before turning back to the four, gesturing to Casey, with all the fabrics and lack of dress.
“I’m not going to have to do that, am I?”

There was a momentary exchange of glances between Lynette and Mia that were ultimately subtle. Elise laughed openly, catching it and shifting the tension.
She moved around behind Casey and pulled the bag with Trisha’s pre-emptive dress inside off to hand to her.
”Uhh… No. No need to be so undressed; we just weren’t really sure what we were doing for him yet, so he’s getting more attention. Mia actually-”
”-Fucking designed the dress…” Mia finished in a fairly despondent and distant tone. Very far from where she’d started. ”It was supposed to be cute, but, whatever, it’s not-”

Casey, ever vigilant but not so observant, cleared his throat.
”Mimi?” he questioned, looking at his younger sister. She didn’t respond, taking a deep breath.

”It won’t be a problem to change the design one way or another, Trisha. You’re not fussy if everyone throws something like bees in your face all the time and you don’t want it themed like that. It’s fine. Just, go put it on please, so that we can get your measurements and make sure everything’s good so we can leave you and Casey alone.”

Trisha took the bag, compliments towards Mia for designing a dress in the first place dying on her lips before they could get out. She genuinely thought so. Sure, her older sister was also in fashion design, but Sabrina was able to magically create any clothes. That was cheating. Perhaps Mia had used magic too, but she didn’t know. But Mia’s sudden glumness stopped her from saying so. She didn’t know what had caused it - was it her? Did it matter if it was? She wasn’t sure.
“Alright, I’ll go try it on. I really don’t have a problem with the bee theming, it’s not like many people… know about the magical bees. I even have earrings now to match.”

It took a lot for Trisha not to get a bit snappy in response to how Mia was talking, grounding herself by looking at Casey, and thinking about how she didn’t want to look bad in front of him. She smiled and went past them all, jogging up the stairs to their loft bedroom with a trail of bees following behind her. Once up there, alone, she was able to relax for a moment. Deep breath in, deep breath out. Then she pulled out the dress, gently unfurling it and holding it out in front of her.

It really was beautiful.

Black, with perfectly embroidered, golden honeycombs across it. There was delicate beading on the bodice, a few beaded bees among the honeycomb. Trisha had seen, and worn, a lot of nice dresses - for galas she was dragged to, all the formal occasions a rich child and teenager was forced to attend. But she’d never actually had something made specifically for her. Either it was made to match her family, or just something incredibly expensive that fit without much thought put into it. She actually… really liked it.
And she wasn’t sure how happy she was about that.

Putting it on was a bit more of an ordeal. The skirts were longer than she normally wore, with multiple layers and gathered at the bottom before poofing out even more. It was difficult to find which one was the inner skirt, with so many underneath the outer, slightly sheer, layer. Eventually she managed to wriggle into it, arms straight above her head to get in through the much tighter bodice. Then… there was a zip at the back she just couldn’t do up the whole way herself. Getting the bees to do it was possible, but would be an ordeal. She’d just have to ask for help.

The fit wasn’t bad. It was a bit oversized, both around her waist and with the skirts going past her feet. It wouldn’t be so bad if she wore heels, but it was obvious they hadn’t estimated her shorter stature quite right. It meant that she had to hold them up as she made her way back down, a lot slower than she’d gone up.
“I can’t quite get the zip at the back done up,” she said as she reached the bottom of the stairs, still holding up the skirts so they didn’t trail on the floor. The bees had settled on the bodice, practically blending in. It was a casual entry and she gave Mia a slight smile before her gaze turned to Casey.
“You were wrong about me getting pissed, I like it. It’s… really nice, actually. I might need quite high heels to not trip on it… though I guess that can be adjusted?”

The mood had somewhat shifted between the time Trisha left and came back. As she mentioned she liked it, everyone cheered in unison. Casey, throwing off the different fabrics that were draped around him, curled his arms toward the sky in excitement.
”Thank God!”
”See!? You’re nervous about nothing, Mimi! All the fuss!”
”It was written, my baby girl… Now apologize to yourself…”
Mia’s hands clasped together and she mouthed something to herself before smiling brightly at Trisha.

”I’m sorry, Trisha… I’m just like, nervous about it. I literally made a suit for Casey that matches, and it’s totally done, and then he said you may not like it and I… I was just thinking the worst, and… I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to, like, give you attitude.”

“It’s fine, don’t worry about it,” Trisha waved a hand, awkwardly laughing. It had bothered her, but at the same time she recognised that she shouldn’t make a big deal about it. Couldn’t. She was the same. Getting upset over something reasonable like perceived failure, that was.
“I’m used to being given outfits that fit my family rather than me. I love my bees, so I like things themed after them.” At least, things like this. She wouldn’t go for anything too cutesy, in public at least.

“Do I get to see Casey in his, then, or do I have to wait till tomorrow?” She smiled over at him, before looking back at Mia, gesturing at her back.
“Could you help with the zip, Mia? I’d ask Casey but…” she laughed, smiling teasingly at him. It wasn’t exactly difficult, but with the calluses and larger fingers, he’d pos

She slapped her forehead and moved behind Trisha to zip her up fully. From there, she began to mess about with the length to get an idea about how much had to come off. Casey naturally looked toward Lynette with an expectant grin and hopeful eyes.
”Well of course, we want to see him too!”

Elise laughed.
”Some of our seats have colors associated with them; it’s traditional. Furio wears very little of it these days, but Gold represents Casey’s position. Our general ceremonial garments are usually black; so, black and gold in the pattern of something like this is… Only natural. We’ll all match, save for Mama.”
While she spoke, Casey was starting to unzip the outfit, grinning and nodding as he started to get dressed.

From what was already visible on the table, it looked to be a very militaristic-style uniform. Maybe to be like his own service uniform, it even had his medals and service award bars already attached to it alongside his rank. The brimming of the hat, the cuffs, the inner lining of the jacket, every little bit of it was the same as Trisha’s dress. Repurposed, refined, and identical to her own.
”I get to wear my favorite color…” Lynette beamed, moving to a box that they were keeping by the bags.
”Now, Trisha… Jewelry? I’m sure you have some of your own, darling, so if you had any specifics please feel free to wear them, but… We will need you to wear a ring. Don’t worry, there’s no magic or anything, it won’t bite. It’s just very old, and its symbolic of your… Our… Recent commitment to one another spiritually.”

Bringing the box to Trisha, she opened it fully. There were different bands, different colors and jewels, and even some platinum necklace bands in case one didn’t want to wear it on their finger.
”The choice doesn’t necessarily matter, since there’s not any sort of reading we’re trying to do for you. But, I’ll say, each ring has a very old story, and usually we… Like to gleam certain portents from which ring you pick… I can tell you, or I can spare you. Since, we wouldn’t want you feeling any more pushed than you already may.” Lynette offered.

Trisha’s gaze moved from what she could see of Casey’s outfit, the way it matched her own tugging her lips up into a genuine smile, to the box of rings. The smile fell, lips pulling into a thin line as she stared at them. She didn’t remember agreeing to any kind of spiritual commitment… whatever that meant. She wasn’t committing anything to them. Hers was to Casey but… his was also to them.
So she couldn’t just refuse.

The thought of picking a ring that would cause them to try and ‘gleam’ things didn’t sit well with her. It was just another way to put labels on her without knowing her. But if they were going to do that anyway, she would want to know.
“Picking a ring doesn’t bind me to anything, does it?” she asked, glancing up beyond the box to Casey. “It’s just for the ceremony? I just want to know what I’m agreeing to when I take one.”

The four of them turned to one another in small bursts. Casey really cut it though.
”No, Babe, don’t worry about it. Ma? Momma? Please, I understand it’s important to you, but it’d be really important to me if we can just skip that. Us. Don’t ruin…-”
Lynette huffed, tilting her head back and grabbing the bridge of her nose with her free hand.
”Fine, fine. To answer your question, Trisha, so you don’t get the wrong idea: No. There’s nothing magical or enchanted about it, no binding, no oaths. It’s just… We know these people’s stories so intimately, it… Means something, to us, about which you’re drawn to. Which you pick. Like that… Fucking… Blasphemous book by that no good lady from England about the wizard schools…”

Elise laughed through her nose again, shaking her head.
”I’m certain she means the wands.” she did her best to explain.

Blasphemous book from England… like the wands… Trisha held a hand up to her mouth to smother the intense laughter she couldn’t hold back. It was just too funny. There was just something disconcertingly entertaining about Lynette bringing up Harry Potter of all things. Calling it blasphemy… haha. Bad writing, sure, but blasphemy?
Not that Trisha had actually read the books. It wasn’t on the approved reading list her mom made her stick to.

“So it’s another way to judge what I’m like from something I choose, rather than actually making the effort to actually get to know me?” Trisha said, rather bluntly. She couldn’t help it. Maybe it was because she was brought up differently, mundanely. She truly didn’t believe that her picking out a ring that she thought would suit her correlated in any way to her as a person, no matter what the story was behind it.

“I actually don’t mind if that’s all it is, but I’m not doing it if Casey wants to skip it.” She’d been watching him pretty much the whole time. If he genuinely wanted to skip it, she was more than happy with that. But she could also choose one. Whatever came out of it didn’t affect her, and if it coloured their views of her? Well, they were probably already coloured from all the information they’d gathered anyway.
“But I’m fine to do it. I already know which I’d choose.”

Lynette looked toward Casey who, midway through fixing his shirt into his pants and belt to show off the dark black versus bright gold radiating from beneath the collar. He frowned back, then shook his head and looked at Trisha.
”I’ll… do… something special. For you. If you genuinely don’t care, they’re just… Like, they’re saints’ rings. Certain people who are close to me are supposed to wear them to keep us protected. You don’t need to wear one, because there’ll be plenty of people. But, yeah. You kind of nailed it. Only, this one… I don’t think it’s ever been malicious as far as I’m aware.” he weakly informed Trisha.

”And that’s really all this was supposed to be! I said, I’d spare her the meaning, because… W-well, just like she said! She already saw one that spoke to her, and if we don’t make anything about it, then… I… It’d make me feel so much better, Trisha-”
Lynette’s hand crept nervously toward her own face, near clawing at her chin in anxious motion as she turned her face to Trisha again.
”-if your energy toward him is as strong as I hope it is, then spiritually, the representative will be with us. Y-you kids… Call it vibes. Right?”

“...Right. I understand.” Trisha bit on her lip to stop another fit of laughter over something that was clearly serious. She didn’t get the whole spiritual thing, or any of that. It being compared to vibes? Didn’t make it any clearer. But if it wasn’t magic, it couldn’t track her, and was only meant to be some positive spiritual energy check and protective charm… she could handle that. It was just like when her mom used to make her wear a necklace with the cross on it.
Before she chose one she pointed at Casey with a smile. “I’ll hold you to doing something special for me.”

She then looked back down at the box, kind of thankful for the excuse to look away - Casey already looked unfairly attractive. Her finger moved down to point to one of the rings. It was silver, different from her usual golden jewellery, with a spiral design across the band and a gem that seemed to shift from green to blue to purple. It was the gem she was more drawn to, and the fact it was a bit more delicate than the others.
“That’s the one I choose… Uh, can I just take it, or is there some ceremony to that?”

Lynette looked down at the ring, looked back up at Trisha, and smiled widely.
”Yes! Well, yes, take it for now, but… No, no ceremony or anything. Would you rather put it on a chain? It may not fit your finger well, I believe the woman who wore it was even smaller than you.”

“I am average height,” Trisha said offhandedly, picking up the ring. She held it up to look at the actual size, then compared it to her fingers. She had quite slender hands, but it wouldn’t fit on her index or middle finger… obviously the left ring finger was out. She carefully slipped it onto her right ring finger. It was a bit of a tight fit, but once it was on it fit quite snuggly. While she hadn’t bothered with any today, she was used to wearing rings, so it didn’t particularly bother her.
“This is fine, I prefer rings over too many things around my neck anyway,” she held her right hand up to show that it fit with a slight smile.

“I’m not sure if it goes with all of the gold in our outfits.” She dropped her hand back to her side, wriggling her fingers. It didn’t feel any different from a normal ring. Probably not magic. If it was, the ghost sleeping inside of her would eventually sense it, anyway.
“But it suits me enough that I don’t mind wearing it, if it really is meant to protect us.” Not that she believed that, but it was one thing she could go along with, after confirming that there really wasn’t anything more to it. It was just wearing a ring.

Lynette bowed her head in near reverence.
”Thank you, Trisha. Seriously. It means a lot, and he… Probably won’t tell you, but I know it means a great deal to Casey. He’s…-” she turned her head back to look at her son, who was beginning to blush.
”He’s always been a diligent disciple; and regardless of anything, I know he holds a special place for these seemingly foolish little things we fuss over.”

Casey took a deep breath and nodded.
”Literally, anything you want. Don’t even worry about asking or anything, it’s gonna be so fine.” he refused to confirm his mother’s chiding, causing her to smile.
Mia rose back up, looking at Trisha’s hand.
”Oh, hey… Mal does have a cool story. Like, I try to tell people all the time, even if you take all the faith and worship out, a lot of the stories that are anecdotal are still generally cool. They read like fantasy books.”

She waved her hand forward toward her Mother, who opened the box again and smiled. Mia’s hand instantly reached for a pop-corn colored nodule of amber fixed into an egg shape that topped a rounded frame. She slid it on immediately, and held hers up to Trisha’s. They didn’t do anything besides look old, ornate and pretty.
”Also, see how your dress feels now. I pinned it up a little bit to where I think you’ll like it better. Unless you want to wear heels, but I sure as fuck don’t suggest it.”

Trisha nodded, keeping in the back of her mind to think about what she wanted from Casey… and she would think about it. Though, she had a feeling he’d do something special for her if she ever asked even without something like this.
“I’ll be honest I’ve… not read many fantasy books. They became less interesting when I discovered magic. But I imagine a story that someone with magic finds cool is probably actually interesting.”

She smiled, and twisted her hips around a few times to sway the skirts before taking a few steps to make sure she wasn’t going to trip over it. It was still going to be a bit annoying if she had to walk up any stairs, but that was just the nature of longer dresses.
“That feels much better, no more risk of me falling over in the middle of things- but is it that long? Longer than an unnecessarily boring ceremony and party that lasted for almost twelve hours? Because I’ve survived that in heels before.”
”Oh, you’ll be fine darling. You’re not even going to be participating in the actual ceremony, so you’ll be nice and comfortable while we’re… Passing everything along. The ceremony will be quite a while, but… We do want your supportive energy in the building still, just… Sparing you from the oaths necessary and the madness that can occur within the sanctum.”

Casey was fixing his coat up now, shiny black shoes reflecting the overhead light back upward.
”Which may suck; I would understand you like… Bringing stuff. Like your laptop, or a book or something. But, after that I’m pretty sure we’re going to Andrade’s? And that’ll be really good.”

Trisha was actually quite relieved she wasn’t going to have to participate in the actual ceremony. She’d suffered through her fair share of church sermons that had her wanting to rip her hair out, and there hadn’t been any… madness involved in that. She didn’t think her being in the building for some kind of supportive energy was necessary at all, because it was an energy she rarely brought anywhere, but that was fine. She’d do that for him.
“Don’t worry, I’m used to entertaining myself. I’ll just download some books onto my phone so I don’t even need to worry about bringing anything along. I can suffer through any amount of waiting around if there’s nice food waiting at the end of it.”

Though, she wasn’t sure if food at Andrade’s restaurant counted under what Leon had told her not to eat. She couldn’t exactly ask. And really, it wasn’t about the food. She probably wouldn’t be able to stomach much if they were in a large group. It was about making sure Casey knew she could handle it all.
Once he was done fixing up his coat she stepped towards him, reaching out to take one of his hands in both of her own. She tilted her head back to look up at him with a warm smile, a slight blush tinting her cheeks darker.
“You look really… good in that,” she said softly, both wanting to tell him but feeling embarrassed about his family being around. She glanced down at her own dress, then the matching fabric on his suit. “And it matches really nicely. It’s impossible to miss, so everyone will know we’re together.”
As if that wasn’t always obvious anyway…

Casey gave Trisha a wide grin, knowing how frustrating and annoying dealing with this probably was for her. Of course it meant a great deal to him as well, which he was more than happy to express; just not here. Not in front of everyone like this.
”I think you look incredible.”
His thumbs rubbed against her hands, and the ring she now wore. He also appreciated who it was and where it came from, so seeing the old thing on her finger gave him a great deal of pride.

”And I’m glad everyone will be able to see us as a pair. An item.”
”Ooooh, this is great. You both look fantastic, I can’t believe it…” Lynette interjected, now very close with both hands clasped together at her chest.
”And all that fussing, when she loved it, Caseau… Shame. I hope you consider better next time something like this comes up. Now, does it fit!?”

Casey nodded wordlessly.
”Then I’d say our jobs are done. Casey, we expect you bright and early; Trisha, you’ll be getting picked up around eleven thirty, probably by Furio and Clarissa. I hope you understand, we’ll just need him a little early.”

Trisha turned her head towards Lynette, unable to hide the coldness in her eyes when she not so subtly shamed Casey for making a fuss. Trisha would rather he did, and be wrong, when it came to her and things with the Temple. He'd been wrong this time, but what about the next? What about when it was something more important?
But she managed to cover it back up with a more neutral smile that grew warmer again when she looked back up at Casey.
“That’s fine, I'm not so clingy that I need to be with him all the time… I appreciate the extra sleep."

She squeezed Casey's hands, fingers gently scratching them, before letting go.
“I’ll go take this off so you can get it adjusted." She didn't wait for any confirmation that was needed, because she assumed Mia hadn't used magical pins that magically shortened it. She went back up to the loft. Thankfully, taking it off was much faster than putting it on, and she came back down in the clothes she'd been wearing before, dress carefully folding back in its original bag.

“Here you go," Trisha held it out with a smile, while slotting in against Casey's side and taking his hand again. She was still wearing the ring. She looked up at him, and then at the other three.
“I guess I'll see you tomorrow. It was nice to meet you, Elise, and thank you for the dress and the ring." A not so subtle queue for them to leave, but Trisha didn't feel particularly rude in giving it when Lynette had already implied they would be on their way.

Casey was, once more, stripped down to his boxers as Elise and Mia were slowly and carefully re-packaging the articles of clothing. Lynette was folding the other sample scraps, getting everything that was loose back into the tote she’d brought up.
”Of course, Trisha. It’s nice meeting you too, and hopefully we can get more time together; we can talk about stuff.”
”Ooooh, we’re upgrading to stuff?” Lynette cooed, eyes opening wide and brows rising up her forehead.

It was pretty difficult to tell when she was speaking, as she mostly kept her mouth tight, but Lynette deigned to open in a wide enough expression of shock that Trisha would’ve caught a good look… At what? As Lynette’s mouth gaped, smile crawling an extra inch up her face than it should’ve, the shadows within continued unnaturally across coal black flesh that made up her gums and throat.
The whole inside was dark.

”Hey, I won’t pretend to know what she’s into… But I’m flexible. It’s my job- NOT THAT talking to you is a job, of course. I like making friends, it just happens I get to do it as a job. But, I promise, no recruitment shit, I’ve been…” Elise paused, almost trapped by her understanding of her Mother’s previous orders.
”Well, obviously I had to make sure we didn’t have any more uncomfortable mix-ups, right? I hope that’s alright, Trisha…” Lynette did her best to back her daughter up, being sure to keep the promise on their end.

Trisha's hand holding Casey's tightened, and she flinched slightly. She bit down on her lip to dampen a more extreme reaction to the unnaturalness of Lynette's smile and whatever was inside. It was creepy, and the strangeness of the shadows set off fears that had recently been brought to the surface after years of dormancy.
“Ah," was all Trisha said at first as she processed what was being said to her, far more slowly than she'd like. She kept up a smile, forcing her gaze away from Lynette and towards Elise.

“I’m glad you're making sure there won't be anymore mixups. I'm sure there'll be plenty of opportunities to spend time together in the future, Elise, seeing as I plan to be with Casey for a long time… We can talk about stuff. I'll have decided by then exactly what that is." She laughed, trying to make it appear as a joke, going along with everything. Did she want to spend time with Elise if her job, reading between the lines, was recruitment? Not particularly. As with all things she could do it for Casey. It was better to get to know all of his family members, in some way.
“Of course it's alright. I'm not as difficult as everyone seems to think I am." A half lie, of course. Normally she wasn't willing to put effort in for people she didn't want to, but when it came to someone she did? The people around that person? She could and would.

”Oh, no… You’re absolutely not difficult, Love. We’re well aware that… Well, we’re the weird ones. Which means making adjustments sometimes, for people who have reasonable expectations. Elise… Helped me understand that!”
Beads of sweat began to curl from around Lynette’s hairline. It probably wasn’t the temperature inside, as it wasn’t overly hot…

”It takes different perspectives! Sometimes we get wrapped up into our own little world out here. Of course, that’s the goal! But, right, later later alligators! Come on, Ladies, lets go bring these back down and get them fixed. Casey? We’ll leave both of these in your office when they’re ready! So you have them for the morning!” Elise took up the bag with Casey’s suit, and each of them gave Casey a smooch on the cheek as they funnelled out.

Save for Mia, who frowned and turned her gaze downward.
”Hey, Mimi? You alright?” he asked aloud, a frown forming on his face.
She didn’t turn, simply waving him off with her free hand before the door closed.
It was just the two of them again; quiet, and Casey stood without a shirt or pants. The scars and tattoos all across his body on full display, including a fairly nasty looking scar that looked as if it carved out a section of his chest when it happened on the same side as his heart.

His brow furrowed, and he took a deep breath, looking at Trisha before it turned back upward into a grin.
”Well… I’ve got you back at least!” he turned, his arms opening wide. ”What do you think? Sexy, huh? Like the surface of the moon is sexy?” he laughed, referring to some of the distinct crater mark burns and old wounds dotting his abs and chest.

“Mmm, very, I might jump you if you aren't careful," Trisha smiled, visibly relaxing now that everyone else had left. She meant the first half genuinely, the second half mostly as a joke - she had no problem with scars or tattoos, they were all part of him, and she found him attractive.
“And it means we match just a little bit more, which is very sexy."

She giggled, pulling up her knit top - at first it looked like she was about to take it off, but she stopped just before her bra was visible. On her upper abdomen was a dark, thick and raised scar that stood out against her light brown skin. It curved around almost the entire front, and onto her right side. It being seen by him didn't bother her - most partners would see it on the first night, the few that asked about it got a lie about teenage accidents (Reyna aside). It just seemed right to show, though. She smiled and dropped her top.
“Sexy too, right?" She laughed, finally stepping close to him. Her arms reached up to wrap around his neck loosely and she smiled up at him.

His hands gripped around her waist, sliding up under the cloth. His thumb gently stroked part of where the scar was on her stomach, and he leaned down slightly to kiss her.
”It is sexy. Maybe not where it came from, but that’s usually how these things go.”
He grinned, holding Trisha tightly.
”I’m really glad you liked that fuckin’ dress…”

Trisha smiled warmly up at him, pressed closely against him as she let out another laugh.
“Did you think I was going to throw a fit about it like all the rich girls in movies? Demanding it needs to be perfect and shit?" she teased, reaching up to poke his cheek playfully.
“I don't… have a problem with many clothes. But I've never really had something made specifically for me like that. As kids we all had to match, or it would be whatever Tansy wanted us to wear, or what Sabrina made because she works in fashion. This was a first, and it looked good, so of course I like it."

She pulled her hand away from his cheek and turned it to show the ring as well.
“Things like this too, I don't mind. As long as it doesn't come with magical spying or Temple commitments, it's fine."

”It’s just the bee thing… I didn’t want you getting the wrong idea, I don’t know. I’m paranoid over nothing I guess. Maybe I’m nervous about tomorrow.”
Casey shook his head, looking down at himself.
”But, y’know, it’s not a problem right? So, we can just goof off for the rest of the night…”

“We better be able to, I need the break," Trisha laughed. She leaned up to kiss Casey quickly, before smiling softly at him. “Let’s go cuddle somewhere comfier…"

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

Leon

Le Tournesol
Sunday 5th November, 5:50pm

---

The start of a Sunday night shift, after working until 4am last night and basically not sleeping the night before... Linqian already wanted to leave. She arrived a bit early, with her brother insisting she gave him a lift into downtown St Portwell for something just before her shift started. There was no point in her going anywhere else, so she just headed in... She could just hang around the bar for the next fifteen minutes.

She went into the back room, shoving her bag and thin jacket into her locker. This left her in a heart-line bodice crop top (she definitely hadn’t worn a push up bra underneath to make it look nicer…), and tight black jeans. She pulled her apron around her waist with a sigh.

She really didn't want to suffer through this shift. The last two days had been difficult, between the magic induced hallucinations and Henri coming to her in a panic about having magic… While the night with Greyson and Britney had helped her forget at the time, it had all come crashing back the next day. Plus the Saturday night shift had been hell... And she didn't expect this one to be any better.

Because she'd have to suffer through amateur entertainers.

Linqian came back out from the break room, slipping behind the bar with a nod to her two coworkers finishing up their shift. There was no sign of the two doing the evening shift with her yet... But technically, it was ten minutes till she started.

The bar was busy. Low level music filled the background of loud talking and clinking of glasses. There were only a few free tables, half of the seats at the bar taken up. Low lights added to the atmosphere and warm smells permeated the air from the food still served. The bar itself had red wood lining the front and backs, matching the slightly subtler, red tinted dark wood of the tables and chairs. It had a cozy warmth to it - welcoming and easy to sit in for a talk, rather than being flashy. Even if it wasn’t really a spot for students there was still a mix of ages hanging out here.

Linqian grabbed herself a glass of water, before leaning over the bar with a heavy sigh. Andre looked up at her from where he sat at the bar, balancing books or doing some other kind of smart thing to do with running a bar.

"You're early," Andre commented, with a raised eyebrow. She rolled her eyes at him.

”What, worried I’ll charge you for these hours? Don’t worry,” Linqian raised her glass. ”I’m just chilling before my shift. Yi-er needed a lift for some shit.”

“Ah.” Andre gave her a knowing look, with a sympathetic smile that irritated Linqian.

It wasn’t like driving her brother around was a hardship. Before, they’d only had one car between the three of them. Having two was a luxury she could hardly afford.

"I heard about Henri," Andre continued, switching to Kituba. "It was only a matter of time before he kindled. If anything, he's late. In the Temple-"

”Don't mention that,” Linqian rolled her eyes at him, speaking awkwardly. It wasn't a language she was as fluent in, and she'd lost a bit of her ability in speaking it. Normally she'd just reply in English... But there was much less risk of someone overhearing them talking about magic this way. ”Do you know what caused him to kindle? Failing his exams! He has it too easy.”

"And who's fault is that?"

”Should I have forced him? No way.”

"I wasn’t suggesting that… What can he do? Do you have plans to help him train?"

”You think I have time? He- I would need to explain in English. Later. He’ll figure it out on his own, I did.”

"You know I can help him if you let him train with the Temple. They’re set up for just this kind of thing - they specialise in working with young Adepts to develop and hone their spells."

Linqian’s eyes narrowed, and she let out an explosive string of expletives in Chinese in response. She didn’t have the words to express herself in Kituba - or even English, really.

”No.” Linqian awkwardly changed language again, pointing a finger at him. ”I’m not letting him near them.”

"I won’t force you,” Andre smiled, holding up his hands. "Just think about it. If not, he can practice with Louis.”

”Louis, maybe, Temple, no.” Linqian said shortly, turning her body away from him to indicate she was done with this conversation.

She pulled out her phone to check the time. Nearly six… both when she started work, and she’d invited Aryin to come to the bar for.

There was some kind of open mic night that happened most Sundays, which she'd thankfully avoided up until this point... But she finally had to work it. And Aryin was the artsy type and could sing and shit. Linqian figured they'd enjoy it, and she'd get some company out of it.

Hopefully that bitch wouldn’t be too late so she didn’t have to suffer alone.

Linqian eyed the bar stool next to Andre. So long as no one sat there... And he fucked off when her shift properly started. She wasn’t going to be chatting shit with Aryin while her boss was right there.

”What time does that start?” Linqian switched back to English and turned back towards Andre, nodding towards the microphone set up on the left hand side of the room. The space had been cleared for a slight stage to be set up, just a single level elevation. Tables were more cramped together in that area, chairs shifted slightly to face it.

“Anytime from six,” Andre replied. “Normally we don’t get anyone till about ten past… There’s some regulars. I’m sure you’ll enjoy it.”

”I’m sure I fucking won’t,” Linqian rolled her eyes at what was probably meant to be a joke, delivered completely deadpan.

“You have no choice but to,” Andre snorted, closing his notebook. “Don’t even think about hiding in the backroom. I’ll know.”

”Have I ever? You know I have a good fucking work ethic, I’m not like Sop- Heyyy, Sophie, you’re early!” Linqian swapped to a customer service smile as a shorter, blond girl appeared behind the bar. She raised an eyebrow and smiled back, but didn’t saying anything.

Bitch. Why Andre had hired her, Linqian didn’t know.

”Are you staying this shift?” Linqian resisted rolling her eyes, turning back to Andre.

“Yes. It can get busy, and I might need to step in depending on… the performers.”

”But not here,” Linqian gestured to the two bar stools in front of her.

“What’re you planning to do that you want me to move?”

”Nothing- I’ve just got someone coming, fuck, can’t I have some fucking peace?”

“A friend?” Andre’s eyebrow raised, lips pulling up into a smile. Linqian didn’t like that smile. Sure, Andre smiled quite a lot… but this was the kind of smile he had when he was about to start prying. She didn’t want to deal with that.

”I guess, does it fucking matter? Maybe it’s just some random asshole I met recently.”

“Soooooo..” A masculine voice interjected into the conversation. “6 o’clock, I can hop up and do my thing?” The man was named Jackson, and despite the sun setting outside he still had his sunglasses on. He wore a basic outfit that shouted ‘I have no idea what fashion is’ as he wore pink chinos, a navy blue t-shirt, and a black bomber jacket overtop. “I figured I’d start earlier this week, the late night crowd is soooo tough!”

Andre turned his head towards Jackson… who he recognised as an unfortunate open mic regular. Very unfortunate. But still a customer, technically. “The floor’s open from then.”

”The earlier crowd ain’t any easier, buddy,” Linqian snorted from behind the bar… Though she was talking more about serving that whatever the fuck he did.

“Oh my, are you from Tennessee? Because,” Jackson paused as he lowered his sunglasses, “you are the only ten I see here. Hi, I’m Jackson. You’re new to the open mic night. Don’t worry, cutie, I’ll be sure to put on my best show just for you.”

“Oh that,” Aryin couldn’t help but laugh at the pathetic pick up line, “Buddy, I hope that’s not a taste of what’s to come.” Aryin waved to Linqian and smiled a wide smile. Finally, the two could actually hang out. Even if Linqian was working this was something that Aryin had looked forward to for a few days. She needed a night of relaxation after that shit with 8 street, and with everything that she learned today. And she needed a drink, and a friend, to work through it. “I’ll tell you what, if you make me actually laugh with a joke I won’t break your nose for degrading my beautiful friend with that pickup line.”.

“We’re cool,” Jackson said as he flashed his palms, one hand revealed a half eaten apple, “challenge accepted.” Jackson took a bite of his apple as he turned around and headed for the stairs.

”What the fuck was that?” Linqian glared at Jackson’s back, taking a deep breath to keep her temper. She was used to being hit on while working - after all, she was hot as fuck - but that was the worst pickup line she’d ever heard. Bad enough she’d considered sacrificing her job to get a punch in. ”I hope that was his worst one, fuck… But it’s nice to see you, bitch.”

Linqian leaned over the bar and slapped Aryin on the shoulder. ”What do you want to drink?”

“Is she Sycamore?” Andre interrupted, eyebrow raised and smiling warmly at Aryin.

”Yeah, so?”

“Ten percent off any drinks.”

”What? Since fucking when?!”

“Since always,” Andre chuckled, standing up. “I’ll leave you to it… But remember, you are working.”

”Yeah, yeah,” Linqian muttered, waving him off. She rolled her eyes at his back and turned back to Aryin with a grin. ”Soooo… I guess I can give you a discount. How fucking lucky are you? What do you want?“

“Is he single? Joking,” Aryin said as she sat down and smiled at Linqian. “And I’m so fucking luck. Why don’t you be a doll and grab me….” Aryin paused as she looked over the tap selections, “a big ol’ St. Porter.”. Aryin was always a fan of the local beer scene in town and the St. Porter was her favorite. Strong, but not in your face about it, bitter without it being too much, and enough flavour notes to kill a mediaeval peasant from shock.

”He’s happily married, so hands to yourself,” Linqian rolled her eyes at her friend. Gross. Andre was the closest thing to an uncle she had, even if she didn't entirely view him as that. ”Coming right up…”

“You just broke my heart,” Aryin responded with a chuckle.

Linqian grabbed a glass, pulling down the handle of the St. Porter tap and letting the medium brown liquid pour into it. At the same time she turned to another customer to take his order. Just a couple of bottled beers, thankfully, so she grabbed those while Aryin's drink was pouring, very efficiently taking payment before going back to Aryin with a full glass of St. Porter beer.

”You want to keep a tab or pay now?” Linqian asked, leaning back over the bar towards Aryin. She raised her own glass, unfortunately filled with water. ”Next time we'll need to go out when I can drink… I'm always fucking working these days, but at least I can drink on the second job. Shit sucks when there's bills to pay and a little brother who thinks money comes out of my ass.”

She rolled her eyes. ”I can take it a bit easy. He owes me after I last minute covered half a shift yesterday- nearly twelve fucking hours of work!”

“One second,” Aryin said as they tapped on their phone, pulling up their bank app. They waited for a few seconds for the page to load and frowned when they saw their balance. “A tab is fine,” Aryin responded as they put away their phone. “Rent at the 317 is paid so I’m good to go!”. Aryin grabbed the beer and took a big, long, and thirsty drink from the beer. “I’ve needed this, thank you for inviting me out. I’m sure it was out of the kindness of your heart and not because you were desperate for something fun to happen here tonight.”

Linqian pulled out a small notepad from her apron, quickly noted down the amount before shoving it back in her pocket. ”Course it was, I'm so kind I'm practically a fucking saint. Definitely not so someone has to suffer through open mic night with me too.” She snorted. ”Sooo you're living at 317 now that… some kinda fucking pretentious art group right? I always knew you were the type. Fucking artsy and shit, going places us small brained non artsy types can’t. Dunno how you can put up with so many people like that, though… the rent cheap, at least?”

“Oh I don’t live there, I just rent a room where people can buy my stuff. Rent that pays for the privilege of selling my stuff. Thankfully it’s not too expensive, they don’t want their artist to struggle you know? I live in a townhome just down the road….. which I can no longer afford after today, ” Aryin sighed as she downed the rest of the beer. It was a slow process but a process that seemed to bring great joy to Aryin, and the foam was wiped from her mouth a moment later. “I might need a second job after this, maybe a third. Maybe I just need another beer.”. Aryin joked as she stuck her tongue out.

”Shit,” Linqian said very elaborately. She took Aryin's empty beer glass and just reused it, because fuck cleaning that, pulling down the tap of the same beer. She leaned around it with more of a serious look than normal. Sure, she got Aryin trying to joke about the situation… she would. She was also considering a third job- but she could actually help with this. ”Move in with me- no this isn't some fucking proposal for tax benefits, don't get any fucking ideas… look, I've got a spare room at my place. I can't guarantee I won't lose it… Jinhai paid for the mortgage before, but with the two jobs it's fine just now. It'll need tidied, but it's pretty fucking nice. You can just contribute whatever you can, pay a bit towards food and shit. I automatically cook for three anyway.”

She held out the newly poured beer with a half grin. ”Us poor fucks gotta stick together… and if you really need a second job, I can ask Andre- my boss here- to look around. I'd ask the other one too but… I doubt you wanna be anywhere near him, heh.”

“Shut up,” Aryin said as she leaned back in her chair. “Shit”. Aryin leaned forward and grab her glass of beer as she looked Linqian in the eyes. “Shut the fuck up. That is so fucking nice dude,” Aryin took a healthy swig of her beer, “I’ve been on a month to month lease for a while now, so I’d just have to let the landlord know. And I don’t own a lot of furniture because I did not realise how expensive it would be. Are you sure, friend? Like I didn’t want to put you on the spot like that. You can say no. I’m physically out of your life for ten years and all it takes is one week for you to invite me into your home?”

”I’m sure, it doesn’t make shit anymore expensive for me,” Linqian shrugged, reaching over to slap Aryin on the shoulder again. ”I technically own my place so long as I keep up with the fucking payments, and it was big enough for a family of five… just about. Honestly it feels empty with just the two of us. It’ll help having someone who actually fucking looks after the place- Fuck, it’ll really help actually, cause I’m paying for everything myself. And with Jinhai’s student debts…” Linqian waved a hand with a hiss of annoyance. And all the other debts she didn’t want to mention to anyone. ”I wouldn’t be giving this offer to anyone else, you ass.”

“Well shit,” Aryin smirked as they looked down. Their face betrayed the complex emotions that was being worked on inside their mind. If only they had the mental bandwidth to deal with these emotions in the moment. Linqian was always their friend, and with everything going on with father wolf and with the alliance they could use more friend time every day, and could use the financial stability of ending their lease. But at the same time she did not want to make Linqian hate her. The fastest way to ruin a friendship was to become roommates. For some reason, Aryin knew that their friendship could survive it. “Can I buy my roommate a beer here,” Aryin whispered as she looked around for Linqian’s boss.

Linqian tilted her head, eyes drifting to find Andre. He was sitting a good distance away, talking with someone Linqian didn’t recognise. Hopefully not a Temple member… ewgh, just thinking about that cult gave her the chills. She looked back at Aryin with a grin. ”Sure can. So long as he doesn’t find out… even if he does, whatever. He won’t fire me. He just knows my mom would come fucking haunt him.” She grabbed another glass, glancing over the taps. She went for a different local beer - the Cracker, aptly named after Cracker island. It was a pale ale - light, hoppy and bitter. Not too heavy either, which she needed. Thankfully she’d had food before coming to work…

”Cheers, to a good fucking night,” Linqian raised her glass, taking a large swig. ”Fuck, that’s good. So… should I fill you in on some of the shit you missed? It’s been fucking wild. Fuck, last time wasn’t even that bad/”

“Fill me in and I’ll fill you in,” Aryin paused as she questioned her word choice, accepting what she said by sticking her tongue out, “shits about to go down.”

”Ohhh, you couldn’t handle filling me in,” Linqian teased, with a wink and a smirk. ”Fuck, really? I guess I’ll start… Where do I even? First meeting was a bust. We went after this fucking daddy wolf or something- some small time gang leader. Then Alizee went off the rails, got us all shot at and herself killed. Fuck! It was insane… getting shot sucks. And I didn’t get any fucking information, so I lost out on a shit ton of cash!”

Linqian rolled her eyes… she should probably explain that shit. Later. ”Meeting two, we get raided by the magical feds… That also fucking sucked. You know who’s with them now? Bianca! Fuck. Bitch didn’t even give me any information after- which meant less money!” Linqian took a long drink, glancing around… just in case Andre had snuck up on her. ”I’ll come clean before you find out and get on my ass about it- I’m working for Greyson as a second job. Figured he’s got the money, I need the money. It just makes the lack of progress shit for both my wallet and y’know… solving the fucking problem.”

Aryin was stunned into silence. Greyson? The made man? The one they voted out of the coven? The one who used his abstraction to do some shitty things? Aryin raised a singular finger up as she used her other hand to grab her beer and began the long, drawn out process of drinking the entire beer from top to bottom. It took several long seconds. As they put the glass down, they looked to Linqian. Fuck. She wasn’t drunk enough for her response yet. She raised her finger again and asked for one more.

”Fucking hell, it’s not that bad,” Linqian rolled her eyes, grabbing the glass and filling it back up. It wasn’t a long process, thankfully, and she slid it back over to Aryin. She shot her a look that said ‘hurry up and drink and get it over with, then.’

Aryin grabbed the drink and began the process of drinking the entire beer from top to bottom. It took several long seconds. As they put the glass down they looked to Linqian. Fuck. She was going to tell her. “I trust you,” Aryin said as they leaned forward and used her free hand to grab Linqian’s from across the bar. “I only knew Greyson a decade ago and I don’t know the man he’s become. I don’t trust him, but I do trust you. If he ever, ever hurts you or puts you in danger I’ll rip his dick off. If you ever need help, you tell me and I’ll take care of you,” Aryin finished with a quick nod. “Fuck I drank those too quick.”

”No shit,” Linqian snorted, squeezing Aryin’s hand before pulling hers away. She moved her glass back, decidedly not pouring her another one. ”He isn’t so bad- well, fuck, i was friends with him then too. I don’t entirely trust him- don’t trust many of em, honestly- but he and Britney are the only other ones who’ve done shit to help me so far. Don’t worry… If he does anything there won’t be a dick left, cause I’ll have burned it off myself. Though…” Linqian trailed off, looking thoughtful. ”It’d be a shame, it was pretty fucking good...” She coughed. ”What’s your shit?”

“No shit? Greyson,” Aryin had a flabbergasted look on her face, “well good for you, you fucking bitch,” Aryin laughed. “Good for you though, I haven’t had any luck. Hard to have a good time when your this durable you know?” Aryin face went wide with shock. “So your shit is sooooo wild, makes mine look small in comparison,” Aryin leaned on closer and beckoned Linqian in so she could whisper. “We have an alliance with Greenwood. Like an alliance alliance,” Aryin whispered.

”Hey, we’ll find someone who’ll make you feel great yet… just switch,” Linqian smirked, swirling her finger in the air. She then leaned in too, tilting her head so her ear was towards Aryin’s lips. ”Oh shit like.. You as in 317, yeah? Wait… Who the fuck are Greenwood? I think they were there during the gunfight but fuck. You know I haven’t been in town for a decade, I don’t know any of these factions and shit.”

“They are legit,” Aryin said as she looked around, “I fought with them against the Nazis. With the bullshit rising by the day it seems we’re getting ready to,” Aryin went silent as she mouthed a ‘fight’ as she looked around.

“LADIES-“ the mic feedback blared across the entire bar. “Oh sorry,” Jackson smirked as he looked across the room. His eyes rested on Linqian. “Ladies,” Jackson said as he pointed across the room towards Linqian, and then to a few other women. “Gentlemen,” Jackson pointed to a few guys across the room, “and the one person who’s already threatened to break my nose,” Jackson smirked as he pointed to Aryin. Aryin spun in her seat and had a disinterested look on her face. Her arm was on the bar and her hand propped up her head. “Are you ready for a night filled with laughter? If so you’ve sadly come to the wrong show. The actual comedians are still at the bar making threats against the talent. But don’t let that dissuade you from paying attention to my show! I promise tonight is going to be a night you’ll never forget!”

”Was that… meant to be a joke?” Linqian said quietly, leaning over the bar beside Aryin. Her eyebrow raised and she rolled her eyes at Jackson so much as looking in their direction. She raised her glass to her mouth before taking a long drink to finish it off. Fuck, something told her she’d need another… but she couldn’t. One was already pushing it. ”I already want to forget it.”

“I have a bad feeling about this,” Aryin said with an eye roll of her own.

“So! Anyone here know the difference between a hippo and a zippo? Well, one is real heavy while the others a little lighter. Still heavy enough to break this ice, I’m Jackson smith. I started my comedy career over in Seattle, and I have had a deep love for the craft. St. Portwell is a fantastic city, truly one of a kind on the west coast. The seafood here is fantastic, the people are,” he paused as he looked at Aryin and sighed, “fantastic, and there are so many locations that you just have to sea,” Jordan paused for applause and laughter but only Aryin’s cough filled the air. “And how could I forget the various groups that call it home! Let me paint a picture about this lovely little place called the 317,” Jackson continued from there but Aryin pulled herself away.

“After he’s done I’ll grab the mic. I’ll give them a performance,” Aryin paused as she looked down and spotted the second open chair, “we could always invite another friend out, maybe someone hot. I could use some eye candy after whatever this is.”

”Please, beat him over the fucking head with the mic,” Linqian groaned. This was awful. She could feel her already lacking will to live slipping away further. ”Shit, I need more than eye candy to handle this. But… the only friends I've got are Greyson and Britney. You gotta suffer the shit that comes outta his mouth to get to the hotness underneath, and Brit… nah, that'd be unfair to her. Fuck.”

“So the trip here was not easy, let me tell you. I had to drive myself in my moving truck in the summer and as I hit the halfway mark I kid you not I got stuck in a blizzard. Yeah I know right? A blizzard in summertime on the west coast of the United States of America. It’s hard to believe but I promise you this happened. It was like I had pissed off a powerful magical entity and they wanted their revenge on me by ruining what was a wonderful drive up to that point. Anyway, I crash the truck, glass went everywhere, and I thought I was going to die right then, right there. But then I heard this noise,” Jackson paused as he looked around the room, “a noise more beautiful and alluring than any I’ve heard before. Somehow this sound gave me the strength to break out of the truck, stumble my way across a snow covered field, until I happened to arrive at a cov- a monastery. I knocked on the door and was pulled inside by the priest. He was a tall man, average build, and he had this look of concern on his face. He fed me, gave me warmer clothes, and gave me a bed,”

“He totally wanted to say coven, right?,”

”He totally did- and if he’d died, we wouldn’t be suffering like this.” Linqian rolled her eyes. The only benefit to the suffering was that very few people were coming up to order drinks… if anything, they seemed to be considering leaving. But the mention of a coven-monastery had her brain moving. There was someone they could maybe get out. ”Hey, you heard of the Temple? Fucking mag- religious cult.”

“I mean I’m aware of them,” Aryin knew they liked to prey on the weak and vulnerable. A shitty group filled with some good people. “why? Do you want to go covert to their faith as a joke tonight? I’m not saying I’m down but I could be down if it got me away from this,” Aryin said with a sigh.

“And then I heard that sound again. It woke me from this deep sleep I was able to fall into. It only lasted a minute, and I was able to fall back asleep. The second night I was still recovering so I was once again in bed when I heard it again. It was so beautiful that I rose out of bed, wandered the halls of this monastery, and finally saw a sight that confused me. These monks would go through this door, and as the door opened I could hear that most beautiful sound once again. I watched seven monks go through that door that night. I tried to follow them but another monk stopped me and said only three monks can go through those doors. I knew I had to figure out what it was, you know? So the next morning I asked my friend ‘Hey, I saw you all going through that door last night. What’s in there?’ and he simply laughed. He told me that I had to become a monk to learn what was behind the door. And as anyone in my position would do, I asked what I needed to do to become a monk. So he took me across the compound.”

“Okay, I don’t think it’ll be good but I kinda want to hear how this ends,” Aryin raised an eyebrow. Something was compelling her to listen intently.

”Yeah, I kinda want to know what the actual joke is…” Linqian furrowed her eyebrows. It was strange because she knew it would be bad, but she still felt she had to listen. ”I’ll finish my shit about the temple after- not converting, but something more fun.”

“In the first room he said that I would need to count every grain of sand found within the room. The room was big, really big. These monks had a full sized swimming pool in their monastery and it came with the beach….. He then took me outside and said I would need to count every blade of grass on the land. Mind you I could only stay here for a day or two more, but I told myself that I had to do it. I had to count the grains of sand, the blades of grass. My reward was worth it. So I started at once and I spent the next seven weeks trying to count it all and I did it.”

“Seventeen billion, one million, seven hundred and fifteen thousand grains of sand and five hundred million, seventeen thousand and one blade’s of grass. As soon as I told the guy he told me congratulations, that I was a monk now. And as a monk I was now allowed to see what was behind door number one. He took me there at once. When we got to the door, he held up a key ring and said that there were several doors that needed to be unlocked. He held up the first key and said it was for the first wooden door. He unlocked it, and we went through. He held up a second key and said this was for the sheet metal door. He unlocked it, and we went through. He held up a third key, and said this was for the door made of ice. He unlocked it, and we went through. He held up a fourth key, and said that this one was for the laser grid door. He held up a fifth key and said that was to turn off the traps, a sixth key to hide the sharks with lasers on their head, a seventh key to open the bank vault door and finally, finally he held up the final key. The final door was old, really, really old. You ever get the sense that you’re in the presence of some ancient power simply by how old their cage was? Anyway the monk unlocked the door and opened it up and I was finally able to see what was making that sound. It was beautiful. I truly wish that I could describe to you what I saw. It was that beautiful….. sadly none of you are monks so I can’t tell you what it was..”

Linqian's hand slammed down on the bar, temperature dropping enough to send ice across the wood towards Aryin. ”What the fuck?! Thats- that's not a fucking joke!” Linqian seethed, picking up her glass and downing the rest of the beer. It didn't do anything, because she'd actually eaten today… fuck! ”Fuck this.”

She glared at Jackson, then turned her head back towards Aryin. ”Alright, fuck, I brought up the temple cause Leon's part of it… yknow his mom runs it? She's hot as fuck, seriously, fuck if she wasn't a cult leader… anyway. My boss here is also part of that cu-” Linqian paused, noticing Andre's gaze moving towards her. She smiled and said, under her breath, ”fucking magical enhanced sense- hes part of the temple. Y'know whose fucking hot enough to distract us? Leon. Also enough of an ass I'd happily make him suffer… and fuck, do I want him to destroy me.” Linqian smirked. ”I bet I can get Andre to call him out.”

“Can he kill me? Like can he end my life right now? I need to die after that joke. I don’t know if I,” Aryin paused as she remembered back to the Halloween festival and the sights she saw as he changed into the toga, “Hot as fuck milf? Adonis himself?” Aryin smirked. “Okay bet, make the call!”

”Ohhhh yeah, she could make me call her mommy,” Linqian winked, laughing. She pulled another drink for Aryin first, pushing it over to her. ”Alright, let me go work my magic. Don't get too bored without me.”

She sidestepped, getting caught by another customer first. With a forced smile she served them as quickly as possible, before making her way out the right side of the bar. Andre had moved to a table near the back, with a direct line of sight of the bar, the microphone and the bar. Linqian took a moment to think about what to actually say before approaching him, leaning over the free chair next to him with a grin. Thankfully the person he’d been talking to had disappeared.

“What do you want?” Andre hit her with a hard stare.

”Very friendly, boss, I could be having an emergency,” Linqian rolled her eyes, stopping midway through when Andre’s eyes narrowed. Alright, fine, work hours, work mode. Somewhat polite, or something. ”I need you to make a call.”

“To who?” Andre’s eyes narrowed further, his expression scrutinising.

”Leon- You know, Leon Richoux, Temple bigshot.”

“And why would I call His Grace on your whim when you,” he gestured towards the bar, “are supposed to be working?”

”Fucking hell, Andre, his grace? Gross I’m losing respect for you by the minute-”

“Don’t make me dock your pay, Linqian.”

”You wouldn’t dare, mom would come haunt you,” Linqian pointed to the ceiling. ”It’s important Sycamore business. You know I don’t have much time around work…”

“His Grace knows about this?”

”Well… no… Last time we talked I,” Linqian grimaced, ”lost my shit a bit.”

Which she wasn’t so sorry for, unless it stopped her from having a night of fun… but Leon had gotten her a new car afterwards, so it was water under the bridge. She was sure he’d jump on the opportunity to be with two incredibly hot women.

”But it is important.” For morale and mainly her and Aryin retaining their sanity. ”Just don’t say it was from me… You did say to ask if I needed help, was that all bullshit?”

“Fine, I’ll call him… this once.”

”Great… Oh, it would be good if his mom came along too.”

“... I am not asking the Lady of Highest Grace to come on coven business. I’ll ask for His Grace, but that’s it. Is that all? If it is, get back to what I pay you to do.”

”Yeah, yeah, stingy bastard,” Linqian muttered under her breath. She went back behind the bar, once again having to serve a few people on her way towards Aryin. Thankfully, after all these years, it was like autopilot. Ask what they wanted, pour the beer, get their money, move on. Once the sudden crowds at the bar had cleared, she was back to her friend. ”Took way too fucking long, but he’s calling Leon in. If I had to hear him called ‘His Grace’ one more time I think I was going to vomit.”

“Thank fuck,” Aryin said as she sipped from her beer but stopped as the rusty gears turned in her brain, “his grace? So like, culty-culty? I mean I do have some religious trauma to work with….” she trailed off as she shot Linqian a devious grin.

”Ohhh yeah… it’s super culty,” Linqian smirked back. ”I wonder if he likes to be called that in bed- fuck, what’re you thinking of?”

“Hey as long as I get nailed to a cross at some point I might be able to overlook the cult part you know what I mean?” Aryin looked around the bar and back to Linqian. “I’ve called men worse in bed but his grace would be a new one fuck. Cults man,” Aryin shook her head with a smile.

”I’ve called men all sorts, but-” Linqian bit her lip, voice lowering as she leaned in closer to Aryin. ”I think screaming out forgive me, your grace, or getting punished in a kinky religious way… fuck… Leon better not disappoint.”

“Fuck,” Aryin spit out some beer at the phrase ‘forgive me, your grace’ and she covered her mouth with her hand. She grabbed a napkin and cleaned her face but she still couldn’t stop laughing at the mental imagery. “Fuck me Linqian,” Aryin locked eyes with her friend, “Leon better not disappoint..”

”I’ll burn his dick off if he does,” Linqian said, much more nonchalantly than what she’d said before. If this went nowhere, or he ended up being absolutely shit, she would be pissed and there was no telling what she’d do then. ”But I have a feeling he’ll be fucking good at that with how he was sooo into bossing people around before, and that fucking massive body. Hot as fuck to look at anyway.”

“Yesssss….” Aryin said as he placed her head into her hand and leaned her elbow on the desk as so many mental images flashed across her mind and none of them contained clothes. “The toga flashed moments of brilliance, I swear I saw heaven right in front of me. Did you know we used to box when we were kids? He was always the only one who’s punches I could actually feel. That’s strong. I wonder how strong he is now….” Aryin bit her lip as she looked at Linqian. Aryin felt like their face had grown warm and a smile spread across her face. Oh yah, the alcohol was working.

”Mmm, stronger, I bet,” Linqian looked over to the door in the hope that he'd walk through right then… but no, Andre had probably just made the call. Fuck, it was hard to keep her thoughts straight- and she was technically working! ”I don't want to be able to walk tomorrow- fuck, I'll need an excuse to get out of work.”

“And I just want to feel something for once,” Aryin chuckled, “It’s easy in the other form but he does not have the parts I’m looking to use right now you know what I mean?.”

”Oh I know,” Linqian smirked. ”I don't have the whole changing thing, but sometimes I want to be with one or the other, y'know.”

The sound of mic feedback drew Aryin’s attention and stole the smile from her face. “And how about the Halloween festival that we just had? What a fun, family friendly activity that place is! I had a friend who is no longer with us who loved events like this. He had a deep love for driving trains, that was his job and he dreamed of that job ever since he was a kid. I met him right before he made a mistake and derailed a train. He lived, but someone on the train died and the courts decided to throw every book at him and eventually they sentenced him to death. I know, crazy right? Sentenced to death over an accident! When the day of his execution came he simply request a single banana as his final meal. After he finished he was promptly strapped to the chair and the switch was thrown. Spark’s flew through the air, smoke filled it, and everyone gasped when they saw that my friend had lived.

How did he live? Obviously that was a question that lingered in the minds of everyone present. It turns out that a local law from way back in the day said that a failed execution was a sign of a divine intervention and thus, my friend was set free and he moved out of the country. He got another job as a train conductor in this new country. You would think that he would be more careful this time but no, no no no no, he made the same exact mistake as before, crashed a train and killed another person. Once again he was taken to court, and with knowledge of the first crash the court once again sentenced him to death. For his last meal the man requested two bananas and, once finished, was strapped to the chair and the switch was thrown. Spark’s flew through the air, smoke filled it, and everyone gasped when they saw that my friend had lived.

The warden of this prison wasn’t going to let that be the end, this time. He took the man back to his cell, waited a day, and then brought him back to the execution chamber. “I don’t care about the rules, I’ve had it with you and your stupid bananas and walking free from the deaths you’ve caused. You will not get a final meal this time, no more bananas, this time you die. The switch was thrown. Spark’s flew through the air, smoke filled it, and everyone gasped when they saw that my friend had lived a third time.

My friend looked at the warden and smirked, “oh the bananas had nothing to do with it I’m just a bad conductor.”

“Oh fuck off,” a man from the crowd screamed as he slammed his palm on the table.

“You suck,” a woman from the crowd spoke as she stood up and headed for the door.

“Linqian I’m going to swap. I want you to get a knife and stab me in my throat when I do,” Aryin groaned as she dropped her head to the car and hit it with a thud. There was something off about the delivery of the joke that seemingly made her want to give up and feel despair.

”Only if you slit my throat at the same time,” Linqian groaned. She wanted to die. The only thing that might save her was some hot as fuck guy to cleanse her eyes, and a way out of here.

As it happened, the bulk of the Richoux clan were in Andrade Salamente’s steakhouse, St. Ports, finishing up a meal to congratulate a promotion. It didn’t take long for the thought of an after event to get passed around the long table.
So, after maybe ten or fifteen minutes of waiting around, the color began to syphon from the room as black on black suits and gowns shuffled through the main entrance. It was easy to tell who was Richoux and who wasn’t, as none of them stood under six foot.

Genetics were crazy, but it wasn’t hard to imagine that such a magical family had a bit more to it. Naturally the group seemed to form a circle, and at the head wasn’t Leon. Rather, a not-so-familiar face with his arm wrapped around a much more familiar face. Slowly, they began to break apart as the hostess brought them to a larger table.

And then, like a mountain emerging from the mist of dark clouds, Leon Richoux stood tallest among them with his broad shoulders covered by a black shawl clasped around and held tight with a sparkling gold chain. His hair was pulled in, braided down the side and tied in the back with small cross-braids like a trestle bridge.
And, directly in front of him as if holding him by a leash, a woman draped almost entirely in gold, her raven hair and shimmering blue eyes contrasting against the near literal beam of light. She wore no shawl, nor cape or coat of any kind, relying on her son’s close proximity and the warmth of the buildings they were in to keep her temperature.

Lynette Hunter-Richoux, Lady of Highest Charm and Grace, One who Hears and Speaks as God, the Divine Orator. Her hands and neck were covered in rings and a thick chain of polished black stone that held some kind of reliquary or container on the end. While Leon smiled and held her hand, Casey and Trisha remained at their side. The woman herself grinned, looking about them.
”I hear that Sycamore has business with my boy! But I was more shocked to hear the venue… Leon? Introduce your mother properly?”

Leon grimaced a little bit, looking like a teen again. Still that same expression of embarrassment and guilt.
”Uh… Right. Curiosity aside, Linqian… You briefly met her, but this is my Mom, Lynette. Our Highest Charm and Grace. Mother, this is Linqian Han, we’d consider her a grade two. And… Aryin Thorne.”

Lynette’s eyes went wide and she stepped forward.
”This is the Shifter? My, Sweetheart… You’re filled with grand and infinite potential. Grading aside, such a unique abstraction. Why haven’t we had the pleasure of speaking yet?”

Leon gripped her shoulder.
”Let me… Let me get her over to Andre, and I’ll be right back. Trisha and Casey will keep you company, right Trisha? Introduce your boyfriend.-” Leon chided, his other hand wrapping around his mother’s waist and tugging her away from the very tight gap she’d made between herself and Aryin.

Casey Richoux looked down at Trisha and wiggled his eyebrows.
”See? You’re not the only one who gets the business. It’s literally all of you. The whole Coven.”

“The whole coven isn’t dating one of her children,” Trisha retorted lightheartedly. Her expression wasn’t… great when her gaze moved to Linqian and Aryin. She hadn’t exactly been well liked in the coven, especially towards the end. She especially didn’t want to introduce him to these two but… what choice did she have? “Linqian, Aryin, it’s… been a while. This is Casey, my boyfriend and Leon’s younger brother.”

”Holy shit.” Linqian was swinging between enjoying the mass of eye candy that had just walked in, very impolitely staring at just about every inch of Leon and Lynette, and wanting to end her life even more. A whole massive fucking group! All from the fucking cult that Andre held in such a high fucking regard… And there were only three of them working! And one of her coworkers, Sophie, was fucking useless. All she’d wanted was to have a real fucking good time. She reached over the bar and slapped Aryin on the shoulder, lowering her voice. ”Please tell me I’m fucking dreaming, and there’s only a couple of hot as fuck people causing me to hallucinate a whole fucking group.”

“She’s very beautiful,” Aryin squeaked out as the Madame left her personal bubble. Aryin did not know what to make of the feelings she was feeling. Her eyes shifted and caught Leon’s ass as he walked away, and could only think ‘firm’ at the sight of it. “Oh there’s only a couple of hot as fuck people, there’s not a whole group I promise bestie,” Aryin snapped out of the thirst trap and saw just how many people showed up. “I’m sorry,” Aryin whispered to confirm Linqian’s worst fears, “I did a summer of bartending but I doubt your boss would let me help.”

”Probably not,” Linqian groaned, finally actually looking at Trisha and Casey with a very forced smile. She raised her voice. ”It’s so nice to see you again, Trisha, and to meet you, Casey-” oh damn he was hot too, it was a shame he was taken, she wasn’t that much of a shit person.

”What do you want to drink?”

Trisha shrugged and looked up at Casey with a sweet smile, asking, “What do you want, babe? I’ll have the same.”
Linqian nearly gagged.

“Trisha? Oh my god hi it has, how have you been? And it’s a pleasure to meet you Casey,” Aryin said in soft tone, still stunned at the sheer presence that the madam carried.

Casey beamed down at Trisha, his arm rubbing her shoulder as the other hand went out to shake. His eyes trailed Aryin’s, and he couldn’t help but smile to himself as he caught her checking his mom out.
”Screwdriver? Ice, extra juice? I’m on duty now, officially, so… Can’t get too hammered. You can make hers’ as strong as you want though, I’ll just carry her home.”
He grinned again, holding around her. A younger woman walked up alongside, still wearing a black wool beanie despite her otherwise elegant dress.

”Booze time! Booze time! Booze time!”
The dress was low cut, and her scrawny, lanky arms reached around and up to tickle Casey’s neck.
”No, no! Get away! You’re not crowding Leon’s friend, I’m not letting you. We get drinks. The rest of you fuck off.”
”CASEEEEEEEEEY… MOOOOOOOOM!?!?”

Casey laughed loudly.
”This is my Sister Mia. Mia this is… Linqian? And Aryin.”
He pointed at them both in turn, and the clearly already drunk girl leaned forward.
”Baby bird the rum into my mouth. I swear I’ll pay.”

“Put it on my tab,” Aryin spoke with a confident tone, “I’ll do it Linqian, I swear I’ll do it.”

Linqian looked at Aryin, then at Mia. ”Will you pay extra if we both do it?”

“Oh my god, can you not?” Trisha groaned, leaning into Casey and closing her eyes.

”I’ll do your drinks first,” Linqian waved a hand… It was bartending etiquette, after all, as tempting as the money for… baby birding rum into another hot Richoux’s mouth was. “Do you have a tab, or-”

“It’s on the house, Linqian!” Andre shouted from half way across the room, green lux enhanced ears fucking picking up everything, of course.

”... on the house then.” Linqian resisted an eyeroll. She turned around to grab both a bottle of vodka and rum, swiftly mixing vodka and orange juice (one with more juice than the others) in two glasses before topping up with ice. She pushed them over to Casey and Trisha with a smile, pointing to the one on the left. ”Extra juice in that one.”

Then, she poured two shots of rum, holding one out to Aryin. ”You first.”

“Come here,” Aryin whispered loud enough for Mia to hear as she grabbed the shot and shot it back. She held it in her mouth and waited.

”Oh fuck, Mia come on dude… Where’s Hari? Trisha, can you please go get her?”
It was far too late. Mia was already slipping a small bundle of twenties out of the little purse she carried and sliding them onto the bar. Her legs swung over Aryin’s, sitting cowboy on her lap. Her arms slipped over Aryin’s shoulders, and she giggled.
”Wait… You’re the baby bird…”

Still looming over Aryin, Mia’s head dipped and parted the lips hiding her alcoholic treat. All at once, the suction saw Aryin’s mouth cleaned out entirely, with a satisfying swirling lick at the end. Mia pulled away with a gentle pop.

Aryin locked eyes with Mia as soon as the liquid left her mouth. “I guess I was the baby bird,” Aryin licked her lips seductively. Her eyes slowly shifted over to Linqian, “you can still be the baby bird with Linqian.”

“...I’m going to find Hari,” Trisha muttered, very quickly slipping away from Casey and back towards the larger group.

Mia giggled at Aryin. ”You’re pretty sturdy… I guess I could.”
Her arms wrapped tight around the back of Aryin’s neck, and she tilted herself back and to the side so that all her hair flowed over the bar.
As her head tilted back, her tongue lolled out of her mouth.
”Re-eee!”

”Fuck,” Linqian muttered under her breath. She picked up the other shot, knocking it back and holding it in her mouth. She then physically lifted herself up and slightly over the bar, all her weight on her lower arms, to reach Mia. She leaned over her, moving in close enough that their lips touched before parting her own and letting the rum flow into Mia’s mouth. She couldn’t resist letting her tongue follow for just a moment.

And what a blissful moment it was as Mia pushed back into the long kiss. Casey was in a state of shock at the rare form that the women of the Temple were in tonight. It had been a long evening, and despite the allure of some enjoyment, he could feel Trisha’s coiled nerves slowly growing.
It made him crave his new couch. Or even his office…

But before it went into full-blown soft-core territory, the cavalry arrived… Only to not be much help.
”Okay, alright! Breeeeeeeak it up, everyone’s favorite gash. Come on, as much as I’d love to reverse time and watch that happen again, you’re cut off.”
Hari’s arms tucked into Mia and began to pull her…
But, between her steel wrap around Aryin and the immovable nature of her current form, there wasn’t much of a chance of prying the moist barnacle off of its perch.
”Nooooo, Baby Biiiiiird! Baby BIRRRRRRRRRD!”
Hari wasn’t often at a loss, but the night was wearing on her.

”Mia, we were doing really fuckin’ good… Why ruin it now?”
”Baby bird! Baby bird! Baby bird!
But the bulky figure was making its way back now. Leon made it just in time to be useful.
”Mia! What the ever-fuck are you doing!?”

Like a child being disciplined, Mia immediately withdrew from all actions hitherto and skulked back to Hari’s side with a sullen expression. But, she did look back and smile at the two other Sycamore members.
”Thank yoooooou…”

Leon’s expression was frustration.
”I don’t know what the fuck’s with you tonight, Dude. But you’re fuckin’ cruising for a bruising I’ll tell you that. Hari’s gonna kill you when you sober up, you’re just diggin’ a deeper grave.”
The two girls left. Leon turned back to make sure the entire party had gotten to where they needed to go.
”Now… What’d I hear about Coven stuff? Does it involve Trisha here too?”

Trisha, who’d slipped right back into her spot next to Casey after collecting Hari, turned to Linqian and Aryin with an expectant look and slight frown.

”... I suppose it can,” Linqian lowered herself properly back behind the bar. How did she explain this? If it was just Leon it would be easier- figure out a lie, jump to seduction, profit. It didn’t work so well with another Sycamore member present. But… she could definitely swing this. Especially Petty Patty.
”The last meeting was a fucking shitshow, and it made me realise that- cough- we’re fucked if we keep up all the petty shit. I-” You can do this, Linqian. For the possibility of an amazing fucking night that would end in an inability to move! “- was pretty fucking unreasonable last time. We thought it’d be a good idea to… what’s the phrase? Bury the axe?”

Linqian shrugged, leaning toward Leon with a slight smile.
”So, what do you want to drink, Leon?”

“Yeah,” Aryin said with a wry laugh, “bury the hatchet,” Aryin looked to Linqian as she drank a beer.

”操你妈, 你是笨蛋,” Linqian rolled their eyes at Aryin, though her lips were still curved into a smirk. Her gaze moved back to Leon, not so subtly looking at his chest. ”Yes, that.”

“Especially after the shit show at Kari’s house I think we all needed to do a little introspection and see,” Aryin paused as her eyes slowly followed each and every muscle on his muscular frame. Clothes could not hide what she wanted to see. “We needed to see what was important. I miss sparring with you dude.” Awwwwww

Leon grinned a bit, chuckling to himself.
”Ah, so it’s parley. Hey, I can’t be mad at that.”
Casey snickered.
”I mean, I’m all for getting back to basics. How about you, Trisha, we burying axes and hatchets? Keeping the tree upright?” Leon looked down, shrugging his shoulders.

Trisha pursed her lips, looking between the three former coven members and then up at Casey. She didn't want to, not really, but she didn't want to be unnecessarily grumpy about it in front of him. “Yeah, we can bury them."

Casey nodded back down at Trisha silently, agreeing with her decision.
”I like that. Cheers to the Sycamore.” Casey said quietly, holding his drink up and nodding.
”Now, let’s go sit down. Come on. I’m getting moist vibes that Leon can mop up.”
His arm snapped out slightly, jabbing at Leon’s arm.
”Yeah yeah, go enjoy your night… I’ll roll back over when I’m free.” Leon nodded. Casey shook his head.
”You’ll never be free, Temple Dooooooooooo-”
Casey sang in a low metal signature, rolling his throat as Leon laughed and pushed him away.
”Go on, Troublemaker! Get! Shoo!”

As Casey and Trisha made for the table, only the trio remained. Leon sniffed gently, grinning to himself as he pulled his shawl off. His suit was incredibly filled out, his body nearly bursting it were it not for the fact that it was, in fact, perfectly tailored.
It just… Looked so puffy on him. The mountains and valleys of his arms and chest couldn’t help but make little shadows. The jacket came off as well, and he set them both down on a bar stool.

It wasn’t hard for him to smell human lust. Pheromones still oozed from every orifice on the human body from sweat to musk to more private glands altogether. As he smiled, a predator flashed long canines that tucked tightly together and gave him a devilish appeal. He rolled his sleeves up, massive tattooed forearms set with muscle and etched in veins.

”Now… You asked about a drink? I think I’ll take… Oh, did you guys get our shipment of Last Round?” he asked, looking at the fridge for the bottles of his family’s very own local IPA. ”Or, did it sell out again?”

Linqian didn't bother to hide her heated gaze as Leon removed his shawl, then his jacket, then revealed his incredibly muscular forearms. Oh shit, the things she wanted him to do with those- but she was still technically on the clock, even if Andre was incredibly distracted by the large Temple group that had come in. She'd serve him first, think about that after…
”No need to fucking brag about it, we just got it yesterday.” Linqian snorted.

She turned around and bent over to open up the fridge at the back, taking an unnecessarily long time to pull out a bottle of Last Round. She stretched back up and turned to Leon and Aryin with a smirk, cracking it open and pushing it over to him.
”You need a top up, Aryin? Maybe I sneak in your drinks as ‘on the house', I'm sure Andre won't notice.”

“Oh yes please miss ma’am,” Aryin said as her gaze remained fixated on Leon’s arms. She bit her bottom lip at the thought of those giant, meaty hands around her neck squeezing as tight as they could. The thought of her breath finally being taken away by a man filled her mind and she shifted in spot for a moment before she looked back up at Leon. “Give me whatever Adonis has Linqian,” Aryin’s eyes flashed below the waistline for a brief moment.

Leon laughed warmly as he took his seat next to Aryin, putting an arm around her and patting her shoulder.
”You look good, Sword and Shield. You boxing at all still? I miss seeing you around, you know? Also, Linqian, put it on me. Anything they have, Andre. No freebies tonight. You do a lot for us.”

Of course, the super senses… The two men could probably have a conversation across an entire building. He grinned at the two girls a bit more, taking a sip of his beer before clearing his throat.
”How’ve the acts been so far?”

”There’s only been one,” Linqian groaned, coming back with another Last Round for Aryin. She pulled out her small notepad and scribbled down ‘all drinks on Leon' - though Andre would be able to hear everything Leon said and he was the one who actually balanced the books.
”Fucking awful. I managed to avoid working it last time, and I'm really fucking regretting working tonight. He started by hitting on me with the fucking worst joke. Fuck, I wish you'd just punched him then, Aryin.”

“I still box,” Aryin said as she flexed her muscle on her free arm. She felt the strength of Leon with just the pat alone and how big his arms were around her. “Lost my first fight, but I made it painful for the other guy,” Aryin joked as she thought of the fight with George. She would win eventually. “He’s so bad Leon,” Aryin said with a wail, “Like he makes me want to literally kill myself”

“Third times the charm then. I don’t see anyone else coming up to grab the mic so I will continue my set,” a voice boomed from the stage.

“Oh fuck me,” Aryin groaned as looked to Linqian. Her eye shot over to Leon’s hand, back to Linqian, and flashed a look in her eye that Linqian could translate to ‘fuck yes’ before she looked up at the tall man. “Who knows, maybe your company is all it takes to make his comedy worth it.”

”You know I can’t be mad at that. Good job. I heard a bit about what happened at Kari’s… I’m real sorry I wasn’t there to even the score. I didn’t have all these other responsibilities when we were kids.”
He held up his beer to Aryin and Linqian.
”But I heard you two put up quite the show. So, if there’s anything I can do you-”
He coughed, clearing his throat and intentionally looking away, as if to check the stage, then back at them.
”Sorry; if there’s anything I can do for either of you, please let me know. And here’s to you both for stepping up just like old times.”

”Ohhhh, you can do me anytime,” Linqian laughed, leaning over to slap Leon's upper arm (and maybe squeeze it a little bit) and wink. She then jerked a thumb between herself and Aryin.
”It’s what we do. Gotta make up for all the other hard hitters that aren't fucking here. Maybe you can pay off the rest of my shift so I can have a drink.” The last bit was said mostly jokingly, with another wink.

“Me as well,” Aryin said as she snuggled her head on Leon’s arm.

“So after my friend was finally executed, I learned I had a new found appreciation for life. Do you know what I did with that new found appreciation? I took my entire life’s saving and dropped it on the lottery. Oh I know you think I’m the dumbest man alive,” Jackson pointed to a man in the front row and then back to Aryin, he lingered his finger there for a moment, “my friend just died, why was I playing the lottery? Because I knew that to truly honour my friend I needed money. So I played, and I won. I won big, too. I suddenly had so much money that I could take care of my friend's kid. I made sure that this kid wanted for nothing, but I quickly learned something. It was really hard for me to buy him gifts. Not for lack of trying, mind you, I bought him the best gaming computer money could buy, a new car, a brand new house for Christs sake, but all this kid wanted was my company.

So every year, his birthday would draw near and I would ask him that dreaded question,” Jackson paused to see if anyone in the crowd wanted to ask ‘what question, Jackson’ for him and no one did, “that question was what do you want for your birthday? And the kid killed me every year. He never wanted anything, because he had everything he could possibly need. A supportive family, a rich friend of the family, and every latest gadget money could already buy. He just wanted to be loved,” Jackson paused as he chuckled on stage, “and a singular pink ping pong ball. When he asked me to buy that for him I was confused, as I think we’d all be, but I humored it. I also bought him every latest toy money could buy. When it came time to open his presents I made sure the box containing the pink ping pong ball was saved for last. He had a sad look building up to it though, and I felt bad making him wait for the gift he wanted, but I wanted to see that joy at the end of the day. So, after his last present was opened I gave him the pink ping pong ball and he was beyond excited. He was jumping, screaming, and thanked me more times than I could count. The kid went to sleep that night with the pink ping pong ball and by the time everyone was awake it was gone without a trace.”

Jackson paused as he drank from his glass of beer. “And then the next year came around and he asked for a dozen pink ping pong balls. And once again he was beyond excited when he opened that gift. Ance once again he went to bed with a dozen pink ping pong balls. I began to worry about what was happening, you know? Was he eating them, was he doing something else? I did not know. But I knew it made him happy and that made me happy. That’s why, the very next year, I knew what I needed to do. I used most of my remaining wealth to buy a container ship and I filled that bitch with millions, upon millions of pink ping pong balls. His birthday came around, we sailed to the ship, and I kid you not this kid was over the moon with excitement. Every inch of space in that ship was pink, and he wanted to explore every bit of it. And I let him. I even let him stay the night. Imagine my surprise when I pulled up expecting to see millions of pink ping pong balls and I saw absolutely zero pink ping pong balls. I was concerned at this point. There was no trace of them on the ship, or in the ocean, and this kid was the same size as the night before. What was going on?”

Jackson paused again as he finished his beer. “The next year the kid got in a terrible accident and he wasn’t given long to live. I rushed down to the hospital to be with him in his final moments, as my friend would’ve wanted. And when I out there I could see this would be over soon. We talked for a bit, and before he was gone I just had to know. I pulled out a pink ping pong ball and gave it to the kid, and his smile was weak but there again. And I asked him, you know, what happened to the pink ping pong balls? He told me it wasn’t what I was thinking, he simply…he…. And then he died before he told me what he did with those balls.”

Linqian’s hand slammed down on the bar again with a loud bang, temperature rising enough that both Aryin and Leon would be able to feel the heat radiating out from her.
”Are you fucking with me?! Fucking- again. This piece of shit, fuck, I’m done! I’m fucking done.” Her other hand lifted from Leon’s arm to slap it on the bar, lifting herself slightly as if to jump over it. ”That’s it, it’s my fucking life or his!”

Leon was impressed. The guy really had him, the entire buildup of anticipation like foreplay for the brain. It was stimulating, palette whetting, and then ultimately ended in a truly unfortunate case of blue balls.
Comedic blue balls.
His hand slowly came up, pressing into Linqian’s shoulder as he glared up at the stage with the most hateful look he could muster.
”Is… Is that what he’s been doing?” Leon almost forced out.
”Hey, Buddy!? I’ve got a thousand dollars in my pocket right now. If I pay you, will you tell an actual joke? Or are you gonna let the funniest part of your act be the look on your face when I cover you in beer and peanuts and roll you into the woods?” he barked so loud the whole bar could probably hear him. His voice was like a fog horn.

As he yelled, the musculature in his arms tensed slightly, and one could see his neck bulge from behind the tie and collar.

“What? Do my eyes deceive me? Is that his grace himself? Oh my God I’m truly honoured to have you in my audience tonight! Say, do you know what the hardest cult to join is? Hmmm? Difficult.” As he delivered the punchline he infused it with his power and he targeted Aryin with it.

”Oh get the fuck off the stage before I beat your ass, I’ll fucking do it!” Linqian shouted, though she couldn’t actually get anywhere with Leon’s hand on her shoulder.

Leon held his hand up to Linqian.
”Wait, wait… Let him cook for a second… Alright my man, what’s the hardest cult to join?” he called back.

Jackson just stared for a second. He blinked before his eyes went wide. He just realised that he may end up covered in beer and peanuts and be rolled into the woods. “Difficult. Hardest cult to join, is difficult…… that’s all the time I have, I gotta,” he dropped the mic and ran for the door.

”Let me at him, Leon!” Linqian gritted her death, temperature rising enough that the area around her was starting to get nice and toasty.

“Difficult,” Aryin laughed at the punchline without control. She did not mean to laugh, but something was compelling her to laugh. The fucker used a spell.

”The fucks wrong with you,” Linqian muttered, reaching over to slap Aryin on the back.

Leon, eyes still narrowed, watched as the wiry fucker scrambled off into the night.
”Jesus… Difficult? I missed it the first time it was so trash.”
He shook his head, groaning.
”Andre… Get Mum to sing. She’s liquored up, encourage her a bit. And quit listening to us, I can hear you hearing me and grunting when I’m vulgar.” he said in a casual, conversational tone before turning fully back to the two Sycamore members with a wide smile.

”If she gets up there, it’ll be all the comedy we need for a night. Then we can sneak off. To… Find a coloring book.” Leon grinned.

”Also double my pay for this shift!” Linqian called out, temper dying down as quickly as it had flared.

Leon would hear Andre grumbling a bit about manners, but clearly shifting his attention to Lynette and… encouraging her to sing.

Linqian turned back to Leon with a playful smile, reaching out so her fingers lightly brushed his lower arm.
”You’re worse than I thought, mummy’s boy, using her for entertainment- or fuck, should I say…” her voice lowered into a more sultry tone as she leaned forward towards both him and Aryin. ”Your Grace. Is that what you prefer to be called when ‘colouring’?”

Aryin was pulled from her laughter by the use of your grace by Linqian, and returned to her actual fun plans for the night. “I’m an artist, I’ve been told I color,” she leaned towards Leon’s ear, “very, very well.”

It didn’t take long for the action around the Temple table to go from casual conversation to outright chants to hear the voice of the divine on the mic. As they goaded, Leon cleared his throat.
”Is the… Two pronged attack necessary? Jesus, I can smell the both of you literally. Is that seriously what you called me for? Booty?” he asked, trying his best to be respectfully quiet.

“Not just,” Aryin with a chuckle, “I did miss my sparring buddy, and if I’m going to be back with a coven I want to be surrounded by people that made the first time special, y’know? The last go around was rough,” Aryin sighed as she looked to Linqian and then back to Leon, “I don’t want to have to deal with the bullshit alone. And you’re a very pleasant person to be around, in every aspect. And…. Your mom is hot.”

”Fuck, c’mon, I also wanted to bury the hatchet- with the fucking meaning of getting over that shit I yelled in your face, yeah?” Linqian held up her hands. It was… not entirely truthful, because unlike Aryin, Linqian didn’t have that former friendship or whatever with Leon. He was useful to have around, though, and she… wanted Jinhai avenged more than fucking anything else, with fucking being secondary to that-
”But the booty’s a big part of it, why not have fun at the same time. I got another booty call, but that’s fucking complicated.” She played it off as a joke, smirking. ”But yeah, shit’s rough in the coven. Not enough of us protecting each other’s asses.”

He took a deep breath. There was a long moment where he didn’t look at either of them. But his fingers tapped against the bar with anticipation.
”So you were serious about me buying off your shift?” he asked aloud, finally looking back.
”It means a lot, actually… I’ve been feeling weird about how things have gone so far. I’d like to set it straight for a few people. So, I guess to answer your question… I’d say not unless you really want to be kinky… But, it is. A kink, I mean.” he finally grinned.

”I was so fucking serious,” Linqian smiled, arms resting on the bar so she could properly lean forward. She pulled her feet a bit off the ground, but… she didn’t want Andre listening in. Well, if he did, that was on him, really. She wasn’t actually that bothered.
”I’ll call you anything you want, the kinkier the better… You have no idea the shit I’m into.” She jerked her head towards Aryin. ”I enjoy it, and she can literally take anything.”

“Sadly that’s true,” Aryin said a chuckle “It takes a special kind of man to make be feel anything and,” she looked to Linqian, “I haven’t found that yet. I wonder if you can rise to the occasion, Leon.”. Aryin leaned back. “Until then,” Aryin raised her glass up, “let’s catch up, let’s drink, let’s party.”

Leon’s arm slipped down under Aryin’s ribcage, grabbing their side before raising his own bottle.
”I can fuck to that. Cheers you two… As I muster an impressive effort.”

Aryin pressed her body into Leon’s in response and clicked their glasses together. Aryin then lowered the glass towards Linqian and smirked. Tonight was going to go down in the history books.

Iron and Honey: A Love Story [FernStone & AtomicEmperor]

Walden Arcade

---

Once Trisha had appropriate outer layers, they bundled into multiple cars to go to Walden Arcade. It was in a medium sized building on the bay, backdropped with a beautiful view of the sea shining with cold winter light. The upper floors seemed to be something else, though it wasn’t obvious what, but the main two were the Arcade. The sign wasn’t glaringly out of place, going along with a more nautical theme of blue and white with a light neon glow.

"Here it is," Sal grinned as they approached, shading his eyes dramatically and looking up at the sign. "The site of my great victory."
”Site of your fuckin’ ass kickin’ more like,” Cass shouted, slapping Sal’s arm hard. With the other hand she was holding Leon’s, obviously.
"Sheesh, calm down with the violence," Sal laughed, rubbing his arm.

"Come on, let’s go in," Reyna smiled, all too used to herding around those two. She was wearing a pair of sunglasses now, which appeared odd at this time of year, but it was the only way to wear her jacket (the only one she had) and not be blinded.

They went inside, Trisha hanging at the back of the group. Inside, the place was filled with arcade games of all kinds. From retro arcade machines, to pinball machines, to the more up to date ones with wheels for racing and shooter games that used actual guns. The more physically ‘exertive’ games were in the back corner, with the basketball hoops and even one of those boxing arcade games. The place wasn’t heaving like it might be later that evening or over the weekend, enough people to not feel empty without being busy. There were signs pointing to the bar out back, and for more games and hot food upstairs.

”Awwww shit!” Cass looked around with a wide grin. ”We ain’t got shit like this back home! It’s all fuckin’ lame, like five machines in a bowlin’ alley.”
"You’ve lived here for seven years," Nadiyah pointed out.
”Yeah, and how fuckin’ often do we go to an Arcade? It’s always pubs and clubs, shit, and I thought we had a drinkin’ problem- oh shit!” She started doing her excited slapping thing again, this time hitting Leon’s arm multiple times. ”They have the fuckin’ bag you can punch! Bet you’d get kicked out if you did it!”

Trisha went from looking around, eyes slightly wide at the sheer amount of games, to looking over at Cass.
“I’m actually really glad Leon is here to tank all of her slaps,” Trisha commented quietly, audible to those closest to her - Casey and Nadiyah, who sniggered. She then tilted her head up towards Casey.
“So, which games can you definitely beat all my friends at?”

Casey and Leon were both happy to be here. Many free days were spent here with coins in hand and blood on high as they battled between skeeball, hoops, fighting games… At the time, Leon hadn’t memorized every trick in the Richoux Tomes, so he wasn’t such a rampant cheater as he was during the era of the Stygian Snake… Not that they had many chances to spend time together at that point.

But now Leon was adjoined with Lelou. Both brothers were aware that there was just going to be a gap…
”That really depends, Babe… Are we cheating? Cuz, you know me… I can come up with something.”
Leon scoffed, pulling Cass close and spinning her arm, forcing her to twist in his grasp so that she’d be pressed tight to his massive form.
”Why? Scared? ‘Fraid you can’t beat the Big Dog?”

Casey grimaced.
”Just… Tank hits, Bro, you’re not even allowed to play with us. Everyone, just ignore his showboating, ain’t no way you’re beating him at anything. But, I mean, Sal? Reyna? You guys wanna do some round-robin air hockey?” he raised his eyebrows.

Leon frowned.
”Heyyy, I can tone it down.” he said with a pouty expression.

"Now that sounds like a challenge," Sal grinned, swinging his arm around as if he was gearing up for a fight. "Let him in, toned down just because some of us don’t have the… advantage, but I bet I can win anyway."
”Ooo, I can’t wait to see you get your fuckin’ ass handed to you.” Cass managed to stop swooning into Leon’s chest to shit talk.
"Won’t stop me from beating you, just like I do at every game."
”Oh you’re fuckin’ on.”

"Do we need a referee? I’m very good at judging," Nadiyah smiled. She really was quite content to watch this all unfold.
"Perhaps between those two," Reyna chuckled, before nodding to Casey. "An air hockey round-robin sounds like a good way to start… I would say it will be fun and not competitive, but that’s not really possible."

“It’s better to play against Sal than it is with him,” Trisha commented, looking up at Casey with a soft smile. She went up onto her tiptoes to whisper in his ear.
“You can cheat against everyone but me and Reyna, alright, babe?”

”Oh, so I guess I’m first then? Leon? Get your spazz attack out of the way?” he asked, motioning his brother on toward the machines in question.
Leon nodded with a happy expression, his hands dipping to pick Cass up like she was a surfboard by the hips.

”I’d say race you, but I’m worried you’d beat me.” he grinned at her before slinging her atop his near seven foot shoulder and sauntering toward the air hockey tables.
Casey laughed watching them, and threw his hand in his pocket to fish out his channeler. Throwing it on, he twisted his fingers into a strange shape before making way to his starting position at the machine. He dumped a dollar’s worth of quarters in, having stopped at the machine by the entrance, and it flicked on to jettison air upward.

Feeling the cool air from the machine rush out of it brought back old memories, and he smiled at Leon.
”Last time we played, you’d just learned one-oh-four. I told you I’d never play with you again.”
Having released Cass to the sideline, Leon was rotating his shoulder in its socket before grabbing onto the paddle. The puck had been dropped at Casey’s end.

”Yeah. I wasn’t hurt by it; I figured one day something like this would happen. Yes, even when we were pre-teens.” he grinned.
”I knew you’d kindle, and then you’d learn one-oh-four if it killed you. And you’d come back, and rock my ass.”

Casey grabbed the puck with his ungloved hand, and the paddle with the right. He grinned, set the paddle down on the table, and held the puck over the center.
”No, Leon… The paddle is going to kick you ass all on it’s own. And I’m gonna watch.”

What transpired was a solid ten minutes of some of the most intense air hockey play that had ever been witnessed by human kind. The enchanted puck, taken by a masterful algorithmic spellcasting produced by a battle-hardened Adept whose signature personal spell involved training guns to fire themselves, laid a constant assault upon Leon. In counter, Leon’s proclivity toward pleasure melted into his competitive nature and need to be seen as “the best”. As the match went on, he found himself letting out more and more of the Seal of Fire, balancing it with the water and air as he tried to gain some kind of upper hand on the enchantment.

It wasn’t a contest of brute force; it was speed and precision, and while everything was just that little bit slower in Leon’s mind, the paddle was somehow managing to keep him on the back foot the entire time. After roughly four minutes, the first goal was made in a best of three, causing the machine to buzz. They didn’t curse, they didn’t say a single word to one another. Despite the fact that he wasn’t using his muscles at all, Casey was beginning to sweat bullets as his focus and concentration all went into making sure that the paddle stuck to the game plan rather than doing something of its own accord.

But Leon’s mental game had already been severely hampered. He remembered being good at this particular spell, using it to learn half a dozen instruments and countless other things before he forsook his Lux in the name of the Temple.
But Casey was in another league. He was beyond impressed, and while he didn’t want to crack to his little brother or his wizardy, Lelou wasn’t helping in any great capacity. He could feel himself brushing tighter against the machine as she constantly tried to draw his attention back toward his date… Because obviously, that’s what Lelou really wanted.

By the last point, Leon was so distracted that he nearly threw in the towel.
”J-jesus, fucking Christ, Casey!?”
Casey had been holding his breath for a minute or more by the time the buzzer sounded, and his face was red with exertion. On winning, he gasped in big gulps of air, jumping up and down. He immediately grabbed Trisha, hoisting her up into a hug and spinning her around.

The five had been watching with wide eyes and bated breath, nobody but Cass, with her eyes enhanced, able to keep up with the puck. She’d slung herself over Trisha’s shoulders as they watched. Reyna had basically given up within a minute, looking up at the ceiling and shading her already shaded eyes from Leon’s brightness.

”Holy fucking shit!” Cass shouted when the match finally finished, letting go of Trisha before Casey snatched her up.

“Heyyy,” Trisha jokingly complained, wrapping her arms around Casey’s shoulder and curling her head down with squeezed shut eyes to avoid getting dizzy. Once he finally stopped spinning her she opened them again, grinning at him.
“That was… wow. I didn’t know air hockey could get that intense, it was really impressive. And it was really cool seeing you beat Leon. Congratulations.” She leaned forward to kiss him, light and quick since her friends were right there.

"I’m not sure how we follow on from that one," Reyna laughed, finally looking back down from the ceiling. She took off her jacket and handed it over to Nadiyah, who took it after a bit of grumbling. "Who’s next? I assume you two will be taking a break."

"Me!" Sal said immediately, stepping forward and puffing up his chest. "Who wants to lose?"

Reyna looked over at Trisha, who looked over at Cass, who looked at… her own hands with a groan.
”Fuckin’ fine, I’ll take one for the team. If you get fuckin’ grouchy after losing you I’m gonna take you outside and beat you till your black and blue, alright?”
"Good thing there’s no chance of that happening."
Cass grinned evilly at him, pulling back off the hoodie that had been put on for the cold outside. She held it out to Leon, patting his bicep.
”Here, hold this for me, I gotta beat this dick into the ground.”

Leon took the sweater, but quickly swung it back over Cass and tugging her in close to him.
”Aaaahpapapap… Tell me how awesome I am again?” he grinned, and very clearly, his teeth had grown significantly, especially the cutting canines.
Casey was quick to interrupt, figuring maybe Cass didn’t want his giant brother hanging over her like a bear skin over a wooden couch.

He had put Trisha down, rubbing up and down her arms and planting another quick kiss on her head before moving to Leon and wholesale jumping on his back. Leon barely grunted with the extra weight, and Casey leaned into his ear.

”It wasn’t one-oh-four!” he chided.
Leon, having to let go of Cass to make sure his brother didn’t slip, shot his head backward.
”Th’fuck you mean?” Leon blurted in retort.
”It’s mine, it’s mine~! It’s my fuckin’ spell, and I Kindled with it, and it’s my secret! And one day I’ll write my own fuckin’ Tome entry and it’s gonna be fuckin’ sick because it saved. My. Life.”

Leon was a bit taken aback, as Casey’d been Kindled for quite a few years at this point. He kept a secret like that? From everyone? The giant man felt a softness come over him that dulled his senses and his connection to Lelou. The voice quieted down. A big brother looked up at his younger counterpart with a silly grin.
”Shit, man… You chose now to whip something like that out?”

Casey shrugged, sliding off Leon’s back.
”We’ll talk about it more later. Watch, don’t gawk.” he said pointing at the table and the match that was about to start. Leon, now full of mixed emotions, did his best to clear his mind. What better way than a joke?

”Alright, just remember, winner sleeps with me tonight. Preferably nude. Preferably, we’re also not sleeping.”

Both Trisha and Nadiyah pulled a face like they’d just stepped in shit, equally disgusted eyes looking over at Leon.

Cass grinned, cracking her knuckles and rolling her shoulders. She bounced from foot to foot, unable to keep still, but seeming relatively relaxed.
”Oh shit, it’s on- Rey, people without magic can’t see the spots and shit, right?”
"Right."

"Ohhh, don’t think you can beat me without magic, Cassi?" Sal taunted from the other side of the table. Unlike Cass, he was stationary and tense, eyes narrowed and paddle already in his hand.
”I can beat you with my fuckin’ eyes closed!” Cass retorted. Her eyes, which had turned yellow as she watched the previous match, went back to the normal brown. She then gestured to her arms, bare aside from a few scars and a few black lines from the edge of a tattoo curling onto her bare shoulder. ”See, no spots.”

Sal just put the money in, taking the puck and starting.
The game wasn’t anywhere near the level of Casey and Leon’s. There was no magic, just two people who’d honed their air-hockey skill since it was one of the few things in their local arcade. Sal was incredibly, and increasingly, aggressive with it. His was a play of brute force, hitting the puck as hard as he could. But there was a skill to it, specific aims to make it difficult for Cass. But she barely struggled. Her shots weren’t as hard, but they were precise. Her hand moved across the table with surprising speed for someone who wasn’t using magic. The first point was hers, an incredibly precisely angled shot off the side that Sal mispredicted where it’d go.

After a series of very ugly swears from him, the second point went from him, when he goaded Cass into slipping up. The last point was the most intense, Cass’s more relaxed demeanour slipping away as her grin went to more of a grimace. It wasn’t that she was tired, she was just fucking sick of the shit Sal was slinging. She tilted herself slightly, letting out a groan as if she was really tired, and made a pathetically weak shot with her hand far away from defending her goal. Sal took the bait immediately, slamming the puck right towards her goal. With a renewed grin, she quickly pulled back in her paddle, catching it so it spun to the side, off the wall, and right past Sal’s paddle into the goal.

”Fuck yes! No advantages fuckin’ needed!” Cass punched the air, putting down her paddle with a grin. She spun around, cheetah spots running down her bare arms as she full on ran and launched herself at Leon, arms and legs going to wrap around him.
”Now you gotta tell me how fuckin awesome I am.”

"Fuck!" Sal, on the other hand, aggressively threw his paddle onto the table. He looked genuinely pissed, very different from the relaxed demeanour he’d had till now.
None of his friends seemed surprised. Nadiyah’s eyes rolled up to the sky and stayed there. Reyna was once again shielding her eyes, this time towards Sal, mumbling something about how ugly the red was.

Trisha just sighed, glad she hadn’t been the one to play him. She leaned over towards Casey.
“He’ll be like this a while, then cool off. Cass is the only one that can beat him, so we just let it happen and ignore him.” The few times they hadn’t ignored him had ended badly - namely with a full blown verbal fight between him and Trisha, and they hadn’t spoken for weeks.

Casey had watched the game transpire with eyes fixed mostly on the puck. But he couldn’t help listening to Sal and wondering where on Earth he learned to talk to his friends like he did. Of course, he’d known other people with similar demeanours; the Marine Corps was full of people just like that, who couldn’t help but be alpha and dominant.
In truth, he’d always imagined Leon was more like that… But their Dad had been equal parts Mick Foley and French Knight. He was a goofy hardass with a heart of gold. Richoux shit talking was fun, crafty, real banter…

Except for Junior. Which got Casey thinking. He looked over at Leon, who by now was practically back to normal despite having his ass utterly trounced by a magic trick.
”How long’s a while?” he asked in Arabic, a fair bit under his breath so he didn’t get too much attention in the noisy room full of buzzing games and talking people.

“Ten… fifteen minutes?” Trisha shrugged, a bit more awkwardly swapping languages. Nadiyah glanced over at them, shooting Trisha a knowing look, before going back to saying something to Reyna. “Normally Reyna talks to him then and it’s fine. He’s worse when you play with him.”

Casey shook his head near immediately.
”Not on my watch.”
Stepping forward, he slipped his glove off along with his hoodie, passing it off to Trisha.
”Maybe uh, someone wants to go get us some drinks? I think we can drink down here these days, which is pretty sick.”

Leon was still holding onto Cass, crooning absolutely diabolical things into her ear before finding a chance to be alone.
”Holy shit, do you wanna go get drinks?” Leon asked Cass, hands still gripping tightly to her.

”Not quite who I meant, but sure… You’ve got money, right Leon?” he asked sarcastically.
Leon just laughed.
”Yeah yeah, orders up. What’s everyone want?”
Casey directed the question specifically to Sal.
”Sal? Booze, drink, soda? Anything at all, Babe, on me. Just… Get your ass over here for your next ass kicking: I don’t keep negative nancies in my Platoon.” he chided.

"Cass knows what I like," Sal said dismissively, not even properly answering the question. He did come back over, hands shoved in his pockets and the picture of grumpiness. "Good thing this isn't your fucking platoon - I didn't get my ass kicked, I-"
"I also know what's drinks you fuckin' hate, Salvador," Cass interrupted, managing to twist her upper body around to fix him with a glare. She then turned back to Leon with a grin. ”Hey, maybe we can make him somethin' extra special."

"Gross," Nadiyah gagged. "I'll have any local beer they have, thanks. Cass knows my preferences."
"Just a coke for me," Reyna smiled.

“Lemonade," Trisha said, hugging Casey's hoodie to her chest with her eyes flickering between him and Sal. While she did hope he managed to do… something about it, she wasn't sure if she could handle it all exploding without being set off herself.

"We doing this or not?" Sal snapped, already impatiently leaning against the table. "If you can even play without assistance. There's no point with it."
Leon figured he probably couldn’t carry Cass all the way to the bar without taking her away from the building and into the cold of the day for some debauchery. So, he put her down and ran a hand across the top of her head.
”Lets go winner.” he laughed, tapping her toward the direction they were going to head toward.

Casey stretched a little bit, making sure that Sal could see he had put his glove away.
”Y’know what I hate about doing stuff like that, Sal? I hate it when it’s cheating. I really, really don’t like cheaters. Thats why my magic works entirely off of my knowledge and skills."
Grabbing the paddle, he slid it around slightly before locking into the same position that the paddle had locked into while enchanted.
”It’s all skill, Babe.” he grinned across the table, ready for the game to start.

"We'll see about that… I went easy on Cass."
Sal took his own paddle and bent his legs slightly. He didn't take much time to think before hitting the puck as hard as he could. It was clear from his posture and the strength of the hit that he was going to be playing a very aggressive game.

The three remaining girls watched from the side. Reyna had a small frown, while Trisha and Nadiyah were muttering to each other in hushed voices.

Casey played closer to the pocket, reducing the area to defend while giving the puck plenty of room to slap around. It was, funnily enough, the same way he’d play against Leon as he simply played himself out. With all the boxing, all the hand-to-hand fighting they’d done for practice, all the training he still managed to do these days, Casey wasn’t a slouch as a reactionary player.

Of course, he expected some sort of shit-talk. And that was fine: If Sal was smart, then when Casey got the puck eventually, he’d play this way too… Because two people flailing across the table smashing their hands together sucked. So, for now, Casey held the defensive line and waited for some kind of pattern to show itself in Sal’s movements.

”Is that all you've got? Fucking cowards play," Sal sneered across the table. It was quickly clear that was reliant on his advantage in strength normally, and he was used to playing against a very specific higher level playstyle. He would do a few shots that slammed against the side, going towards the goal without the actual intent to score, then a straight, hard and fast shot with that intent. His defense, even against Casey's defensive play, was jerky and more towards the sides of the pocket than the center. He was used to having to go all out against Cass, but not many other people. The more he played and didn't get through, the more frustrated he got, the more aggressive, and the more he started to make stupid, but strong, shots.

Casey let him get his frustration out, but wasn’t about to let him get away with it.
”Next time you leave that arm out too long to shoot like that, I’m sinking it.” he announced for the entire group to hear.
And, inevitably when it happened, Casey flicked the paddle upward, letting the ass end of it smash into the puck to send it flying straight up the middle.
”You should try playing like a coward, maybe you wouldn’t get beat by stupid shit. Rack up, Baby, let’s see you schmoove.”

"Fuck! Mierda." Sal continued to curse under his breath, alternating English and Spanish. He grabbed the puck and slammed it back on the table. Reyna clicked her tongue as he did, eyes narrowing at him slightly.
"I was just going easy on you."

He hit it again, just as hard as before. It was clear he'd learned a bit from it, playing a tighter game - at least he wasn't stretching his arm out so long to get shots he really didn't need to. His attacking playstyle was still the same, but there was a bit more to his defence. Just, like before, the longer he played the more annoyed and sloppy he got.

Casey always found himself annoyed by the fact that people just kept going back to the same thing. For whatever he learned Casey tried to change the expectation. This time, he assumed that Sal was going to try mixing in some more side hits rather than just trying to rack it down the middle after a series of fakeouts.

”Hey, is your brain attached to a flow chart?” he asked.
”Here, I’ll show you-” he chided, bouncing the puck back again and again as he started moving his arm in a very dull, consistent motion that kept knocking the puck back every single time.
”-if I can do this and read your mind, that shit’s in shallow water Babe. You gotta get that checked out.”

"What the fuck, are you saying there's something wrong with me?!" Sal snapped but also looked… almost impressed at the level of shit talk back. He gritted his teeth, trying to change it up a bit. More shots with the aim to win off the side. There was a lack of precision to them, some spinning so wildly they hit against the back nowhere near the pocket, but Sal's competitiveness started to win out a bit against how much of a bad loser he was. His shots were less predictable, and increasing in accuracy.

"He did always like a flow chart, it would explain a lot," Nadiyah commented from the side.
"Stay out of it, Nadiyah." A harder, less accurate hit.
”I hardly said anything, Salvador."

Distracted, pushed to the edge, Sal finally let go and made a half-mustered put across the table. It banked early, and Casey couldn’t slip back in time to send it up the board. It sunk with Casey pointing up.
”See!? That! You literally haven’t made that move yet, and you sunk the fuckin’ puck in, Bro. Use your melon, not your huevons! And let that woman talk her shit, if she can’t beat you she can damn sure enjoy watching you get all bent outta shape.”

Pulling the puck, Casey dropped it to his own side and started knocking it off of his own wall. Rapidly slapping against the two points, Casey pulled the center tighter and tighter until it was machine-gunning.
With one slip, he pulled back, letting the puck surge toward the other side of the table. It impacted, lunging back again, where Casey met it against the wall and sent it rocketing toward Sal’s goal on a quick diagonal line.

Sal's eyes never left the puck, but he still wasn't able to predict when Casey was hitting the shot and where it was coming from. He jumped the gun in jerking his hand the opposite direction, unable to move back fast enough before the puck was sunk in one shot.
"Fuckkkk!" Sal groaned, pushing away his paddle and grabbing at his hair with his hands. He was still clearly pissed about it, but also at an absolute loss for words. He couldn't exactly make any excuses about it, especially when he'd been beaten in one shot at the end. "Fucking…"

"Sal." Reyna interrupted before he could figure out what he was going to say.

”No no, let him go. He’s gotta get it out, or he’ll never bother getting it out, right Sal? Give me the business, Bro, don’t just be a bitch. That’s how you get beaten with socks full of pennies in the barrack.” Casey interrupted, clapping his hands.

"This isn't the fucking army, man," Sal threw up his hands in frustration. "Just because I lost this time doesn't mean I will again. It was a fluke."
Nadiyah snorted, and all three girls rolled their eyes in near perfect synchronicity.
"And-" Sal pointed a finger at Casey. "It's perfectly fucking reasonable to be upset after losing and getting it rubbed in my face, it's not being a bitch."

“Literally nobody rubbed it in," Trisha muttered. They'd all learned not to because he got even more pissy about it.
"Oh like you all wouldn't start, you and Nadiyah are always whispering and laughing over these things."
“It’s just a game, we don't care that much," Trisha shot back. Her and Nadiyah privately bitched about much more interesting things than Sal losing things.
"Right, sure, it's just a game when I lose, not for you, or the others, but it's not actually important enough for you to put in any effort whenever we-"

”Woah! This moment? This moment isn’t just a game for me. I like seeing people around me improve. Sal. Look at me, man.”
Casey didn’t raise his voice, but he did make a shift into a much more serious demeanor.
”You’re good! You’re very good. But I’m not letting you get away with acting like a boy in my presence. Fifteen minutes for you to get over it? To settle down? That tells me nobody’s ever beaten you. You’ve never had your ass kicked. You think that everything you’ve done is enough, and it’s clearly not. You’re not a master. I’m not a master. Now, beat me! Kick my ass!” he said, throwing his hands toward the table.
”Ignore the crowd!” he barked.

"Calm it with the tone," Sal, very hypocritically, said, throwing up his hands again. But he did back off Trisha, turning towards Casey, then back towards the table. What Casey had said seemed to have gotten through a bit… at least, he was thinking about it.
"Fine, let's go again. This time I will kick your ass." he went back over to the table and picked back up the paddle he'd discarded.

"Your boyfriend's good," Nadiyah leaned in towards Trisha, resting an arm on her shoulder. She didn't bother lowering her tone so only she could hear. "Got right to the root of the problem - only child syndrome."
Trisha looked over at Casey, and smiled. “Yeah, he is… does this mean he's passed the check?"
Nadiyah shrugged, laughing lightly. "For now."

Sal had gotten the puck again, trying to ignore the rest of them, sliding it over to Casey's side.
"You start."

Casey was surprised, which was good. He liked that Sal seemed to chill out a little bit, or at least wanted to keep his mind on the game.
”Oooh, you’re not a quitter. Good. You think you can get past the first round this time?”

He began to knock the puck between the wall and the paddle, but rather than letting it get spicy by dragging it closer to a single wall, he smacked it once to the left, slipped the paddle down, let it pass, then met it in the middle on the way back to reverse its momentum entirely. There was a rhythm to the knocking, almost like a metronome or a drummer setting a pace.

”In the Reserve barrack, we had air hockey, a pool table, and a bunch of fucking boardgames. The amount of time I’ve spent playing this fucking game against myself is pathetic. I’m sorry, Sal… But you’re going to lose.”
As he flicked toward the right, he swung his arm upward and skipped the puck, grabbing the very edge of its back with the back of the paddle. With a twist, he sent the puck rocketing up the board in an unexpected diagonal toward the back edge.

”Didn't know having a social life would be my downfall," Sal actually laughed, though it was more on the butter end of things. "But, don't speak so soon."
He let the puck hit the back corner, paddle snapping out as it bounced back. It bounced against the right wall, and he moved his paddle half with it and back, slamming it up the table in the diagonal towards the back.
He was learning, at least.

As Casey missed the flick, he bumped it up against the board and drove it directly into his own goal.
”Baaah! You sounded pretty sexy for a second, distracted my ass. Good shot. You want this puck!?” he asked, grabbing it from the bottom of the machine.
”Game point, bro!”

"Shit," Sal laughed out of shock when he won the point… sort of. He shook his head.
"Sure, I'll take it."
When the puck was thrown over to him he caught it with the paddle, taking a moment to position it. He was clearly loosening up a bit now. He finally got it where he wanted it, slightly to the left, hitting it hard and towards the right wall, aiming for a bounce into the goal.

Casey, knowing that his point would be completely lost if he let the game go now, jumped straight for the puck and snagged it in a crocodile grasp between the board and the paddle. He began to circle it over and over again, giving Sal a rhythm to focus on, then let the puck slip out into the field on a lazy trajectory. Still orbiting his paddle in the same rhythm, he slung his arm out of the circle to drive the puck up the board.

It made a Z motion, smacking from Sal’s left to right with little time to react as it careened toward the ultimate goal.

Sal's head snapped from left to right as he tried to figure out which side it was going to come from. His paddle moved with his eyes across the goal, and as the puck came close he jerked it in the right direction, narrowly brushing the puck but not enough to change its trajectory.
"Fuck." He bent down to grab the puck from his side. His reaction wasn't as aggressive as before when he'd lost, and he was definitely concentrating more on the game than shit talking.
"You want it? It's only fair."

Casey leaned forward. A grin split across his face as wide as the Devil on a Saturday’s eve.
”Did you lose count My Friend? You lose, three to two.” he grinned, Spanish leaving his mouth as the machine switched off, ready to suck up another dollar.
”You’re gonna want to go again, but we’ll do it later. Look who managed to make it back.” Casey pointed.

Leon, with Cass sitting on his shoulder like he was some sort of siege beast to be ridden, came back holding a tray of different drinks that had been acquired from the bar.
”Drinks up, drinks up. Trisha, Lemonade. Rhiannon, they had Pepsi, I didn’t know if you’d want that so I got you a water as well. Uhm… Diyan? Ahhh, I’m terrible at names, I’m sorry, it’s from getting punched in the face too many times. But, you said local beer, so I got you some of the IPA our family brews. Here you go.”

Leon was all smiles with a girl clinging to him.
”Sal? Is easy, ‘cuz it’s one syllable. Got you a lighter beer, didn’t want you getting too drunk. Casey, you’ve got waterrrrrrr.”
Casey puffed air out of his mouth as he got closer to Trisha and claimed his drink.
”You have an immeasurably small cock, Leon.” Casey growled back, taking his plain water.
”Designated driiiiver, designated driiiiver.”

”Cheers to being the drivers," Reyna laughed as she took the pepsi, raising the glass towards Casey. "And it's Reyna, but Rey is fine if it's easier to remember."
"Nadiyah," was all Nadiyah said as she took her beer, looking at it curiously before taking a sip. She smiled and nodded.

"Oh fuckkk, Sal isn't bein' a stroppy bitch, that's quicker than normal!" Cass shouted from on top of Leon's shoulders, leaning over his head. She held a glass of some dark coloured beer, another different local one. The strongest one she could get. She then cackled as Sal dragged himself over to take his lighter beer. "Didn't want you getting smashed then getting fuckin' beaten in a back alley for being an pretentious English knob."
"... You're also English, Cass," Sal shook his head. He really did seem mostly fine after that last match with Casey. There was still a tightness to his shoulders, and he hadn't gotten to the point where he was apologising to everyone for it yet, but he was on the way.
"Yeah but I'm sound workin' class English, ain't gonna get mugged for shit I clearly don't have."

Trisha laughed slightly at them, sipping on her lemonade. While she wasn't driving, she also didn't want to get drunk too early. She held it up towards Casey.
“Want some? It's got more flavour than water…"

Holding onto her like a barnacle, Trisha could feel Casey’s muscles a bit more tense than usual. Truthfully, he was hyped from the match, and it was having some pretty significant effects on his body that would’ve been strange were it anyone else. His hands tensed up around her thigh, squeezing in a playful manner.
”Did you drink any yet? If not, no. I’ll wait until we get to swap spit without the pda.” he giggled in her face.

Leon, meanwhile, dropped Cass back onto the ground and spun her around again as he so loved to do. He’d always been told by his mother that it made her feel like a princess, so it was only natural that he’d assume other women felt the same.
”Fuck the spit, who wants to get beat up on Street Fighter?” Leon asked in a boisterous manner.

Trisha had already taken a sip, but she took a bigger gulp and then held it up to Casey, ignoring Leon. She leaned back against him and her other hand loosely covered one of his on her thigh.
“Here, filled with all my DNA, lovingly put in just for you."

"Fuckin' hell, I'd rather you just snogged," Cass managed to say after her vision righted itself from being spun again. "Hell yeah, Street Fighter's the fuckin' best, oh-"
She pointed to Reyna with a grin.
"You play, Rey, you're fuckin' unfairly good at it… it ain't the magic is it? Fuckin' like… street fighter auras."

"It is not," Reyna laughed, putting one hand on her hip and looking up at Leon with a smile. "I'll have a go. I'm not sure I'll live up to Cass's expectations."
"She's just being humble," Cass slapped a hand on Leon's arm.

“I kind of want to watch Leon get beaten for a second time today," Trisha said softly, mostly to Casey, with a slight giggle.

Casey nodded at Trisha, taking in an equally big gulp of her lemonade before he spoke.
”I assume you’re playing actively if you suggested it, Leon?” he asked his older brother.
”Yeah, you caught me. A lot of the teens at the Centre really enjoy playing, so I do my best to make sure I get over there a couple times a week a few hours a day to just vibe with them.”

Swinging his arm about, Casey prompted the group’s movement into the cabinet hall. There were a lot of different machines right up to the most modern version that could be played on home consoles, which Leon made it to with some haste.

Casey had held back a bit with Trisha, letting the group move until it was them and Sal at the rear.
”Amigo? You did good y’know.” Casey smiled at him, nodding. ”Nobody likes losing or making mistakes, but when you hold yourself to a standard like that, you’re bound to fail.”
The imparted wisdom wasn’t asked for, nor was it so easy to just change that. But, Casey was in his leadership mode; something that ended up distinguishing him from others on the field.

He coached where he’d been taught through force. Where his Father would’ve pushed, Casey learned to nudge. Where his Father would stab, Casey learned to prod. But there was no guarantee Sal cared, or even wanted to care. He was resigned to that, but it was simply part of who he was.

"Yeah, I get it, it's a problem," Sal rubbed the back of his neck. He was speaking genuinely, seeming to be back to the relaxed person he had been before he'd started competitively playing. He turned his head towards Trisha. "Sorry, by the way, Trisha. You know how I get."

“Stop apologising about it every time, then, and stop it," Trisha retorted, with a shrug. It was difficult not to feel like Casey’s words were inadvertently directed at her too. But she wasn’t a bad loser when it came to things like this. Just for real mistakes. And was it really her own standards that led her to failure? No, it wasn’t that. It was different. The standards she’d aimed for were reasonable, and she still hadn’t been able to reach them. Trisha silently frowned, tensing up slightly.

"Yeah, yeah, I'll be nicer next time we kill zombies together, alright," Sal smiled, looking back at Casey. ”I won't get into it, but all of that shit comes from somewhere. I get what you're saying about it, and hey, getting it is the first step."

”All you can do is remain conscious of it, and try little by little to improve. But its also on the people around you to hold you accountable. Shame-”
Casey would've gone on and on about it were it not for Leon barking backward.

”Hey, Master Moralist, why don't you shut up and leave the guy alone now. He's heard enough; and certainly didn't come here to get lectured and pressured by you.”
Leon was stuffing coins into the machine, prepping the game for himself and Reyna.

Casey frowned, immediately ceasing any further pressing as his head turned away in embarrassment. Shame is the greatest personal engine on the planet. What could've been a confidence boost for Trisha and her friends fizzled out into the endless history of unsaid things.
That, Casey imagined, was always Leon's super power. If a lesson needed to be taught, Casey remembered that Leon always had an example to lock in with.

”I'm not a super fan of these games. I prefer uh, what… I think they call them ‘Anime Fighters’? Just a different style, usually the characters are fast and damage is high. Too much room to fuck up in Street Fighter.”
Leon explained aloud as he navigated the menu to pick a character.

"Maybe you just need to get good," Sal joked, flashing a grin towards Casey that made it clear there really weren't any hard feelings.
"Oy, like you don't fuck up all the time then complain ‘bout how difficult combos and other shit," Cass said, punching Sal in the arm. He punched her right back - though it was pretty obvious that it was playful, even though Sal rubbed his arm afterwards. Cass jumped away and pushed herself in between Leon and Reyna… well as much as she could without getting in the way, while still being able to see. It was a hard life being average height!

"I've only ever played this one," Reyna said with a shrug. She was glancing over the characters, squinting a bit. She seemed to be playing with the controls a bit as she navigated the menu before selecting Chun-Li. She tilted her head back towards Cass. "This feels way nicer than those controllers you had."

"Well I'm sorry for bein’ a skint student!" Cass practically shouted. ”I ain't taking any of that shit, all your talent is thanks to mine. Y'know how hard it is to emulate a modern console? Shit, I had to write a bunch of code for it myself. Really if you win, I win."

"That time would've been better spent on your assignments…" Reyna laughed lightly.

Trisha, as the shortest of the group and right near the back, couldn't actually see any of the screen. Normally when they'd played games like this on Cass's incredibly janky setup in her cramped bedroom in their shared flat, she and Nadiyah just sat in a corner and talked about more interesting things. But she didn't kind of want to see if Reyna was able to beat Leon… just a little bit. She tilted her head up towards Casey, with a smile.
“Mind helping me see?"

”You fucking what Cass? You… Emulated a modern console? Like, the current generation? All the computer people make it sound like that’s impossible. Or at least really impractical when you can get all the same games on Turbine. Or, like, pirate them if you don’t want to spend the money.”
Leon locked on Ed, popping his stick to the right and selecting the alternate outfit that features a more obvious boxing motif with gloves and a sleeveless hoodie.
Casey, still content to keep quiet, looked down at Trisha after hearing her request with a great deal of admiration. She was just so cute.

Rather than scooping her up and tossing her as high as he could, Casey wordlessly leaned in close to her, running a finger gently under her chin before purposefully collapsing to his knees in front of her. Both hands swung behind his back, interlocking to make a step for her to climb up onto his back with.

Trisha's smile got warmer. She put her hands on Casey's shoulders and careful stepped onto his hands, before properly wrapping her arms and legs around him, clinging to his back like a koala and resting her head on his shoulder. She tilted her head and kissed his cheek.
“Thanks, babe."

”I did- it wasn't that fuckin' hard, everyone else is just cowards! It took me like… three months? Don't even start with the easier way shit- I know! Sal wouldn't shut upppp about it," Cass chatted away, as if it really was a small three month project that anyone could do.
"She nearly failed multiple classes cause of it," Reyna laughed as the match started. She moved the figure around on the screen a little bit to get the handle of the stick rather than controllers, before properly launching into it.
”Who cares ‘bout classes! Ain't anything they can teach me, I gotta job after anyway, who gives a fuck."
"You nearly got kicked off the course," Reyna laughed, relatively easily beginning to whip out some hard combinations.

Leon didn’t do much hesitation on his end, but found himself having to defend a lot more than he was used to.
”Jesuuuuus… None of the kids play Chun-Li, I have no clue what’s going on.” he laughed, mashing the jab button until he got a lucky hit to convert from. ”But, I do know that failing your classes to code an entire console onto new hardware sounds like a job. Why bother with the school if you can just do that?” he asked, clearing his throat.
”You can’t just get a couple certifications and just… Code?”

His little comeback didn’t help much, with Reyna employing the same tactic of jabbing out of the blockstring. He wasn’t trying to get too sweaty, especially after the air hockey match; from the whiff he got earlier, he was almost certain that she didn’t have any kind of performance enhancing magic. He was playing at a snail’s pace comparatively.

Casey easily noticed the difference in movement. Neither Richoux was going to come outright and say that there was a different bracket for people who had talent and people who had magic. One often became something of a cheater’s match, where whoever could muster the more powerful or useful spell to help them play would win. At that point, Leon almost always won as Lelou’s reaction speed and ability to manipulate his finger muscles with absolute control were unmatched by young, inexperienced Adepts.

”Everyone, point and laugh at Leon ‘cuz he can’t cheat to win right now.” Casey scoffed, needing to let some of his passive-aggressiveness out.
”Cuz he’d probably feel bad. Unlike all those dudes who he gets punched by.”
Leon’s brow furrowed.
”Fuck yooooooou.”

"Fuck, I wish I coulda skipped school and just got a job, fuckin' pretentious ass tech companies," Cass said, before going on to mutter a bunch of very rude shit about middle managers and tech CEOs with a few threats of violence in there.

"You can cheat if it makes you feel better," Reyna said, posture completely relaxed as she didn't let up any of the pressure, smoothly going through a complicated special attack as if remembering and executing wasn't that difficult.
"Or I can put my jacket back on, handicap myself by blindness?"

Trisha laughed, widely grinning as she leaned her head a bit further over Casey's shoulder to get a better look.
“See, told you she'd beat him. Well, will. No cheats needed." The last three words were said in a bit of a singsong tone as she laughed again.

"Don't feel bad ‘bout losing!" Cass said as if the result was already decided.
"Rey's known as a bit of a Streetfighter genius in our neck of the woods."

Leon shook his head, desperately slapping the controls as Rey delivered the final blow and ended the first round. He gasped, knees bending and head lolling to the side.
”Nah… No cheating necessary. I can admit when someone’s better than me naturally.” if it wasn’t something he particularly cared about. This was a cursory hobby, something he picked up just to beat his brother as kids.
It may have been useful now to stay relevant with the Temple youth, building connections and keeping the family vibes strong, it wasn’t tremendously important. He’d had to learn how to be a role model, which partially involved remaining humble and knowing how to dish out the justice in a better way.

Something he couldn’t cheat at. Something that just had to happen naturally. Casey could recognize the behavior already, watching the big brother who probably would’ve reacted very differently a decade ago. Growth was growth, and he wouldn’t take that away from the guy. People slipped sometimes; who was he to judge?

The second round started up, and Leon was pretty sure of what Rey was going to open with. She didn’t follow his idea, obviously being far too practiced to make a rookie mistake like using the same opener. At least now he had some kind of idea as to the combos that were coming his way. Moving erratically, he got behind Rey and managed a hit to begin a long combo that was perfectly executed.
”I will say, I’m happy the kids let me use their fight pads so I’m at least used to the stick and buttons.”
”Oh, that wasn’t a problem fifteen years ago was it?”
”No, we had to fuckin’- Rrrrgh! - We had to come here! To play!” Leon grunted in frustration as he dropped the block string and left himself open.

Reyna immediately took the opportunity given to her, fingers flying across the buttons as she got through a series of attacks, before she went into a complicated finishing move, ending the second round faster than the first. Though, she didn't feel it had been particularly fair, since he'd been… distracted?
”If you practice a bit more without magic you'd eventually get to my level," Reyna offered as some kind of condolence. "You already know the attacks. That's the most difficult bit."

"Yeah, that's the shit I always forget!" Cass said, leaning back and looking around at all the other nearby machines. She was beginning to get a little bored watching… just a little.

”Mm, Cass is a button masher," Reyna laughed.
“Cass is actually the worst at it," Trisha added, tilting her head towards Casey, speaking a bit more quietly. “Did you come here a lot?"

Casey grinned at the question, looking up at Trisha as best he could.
”Oh yeah, every chance we got. Dad wouldn’t let us have a console in the house, but he was cool with us working for the pocket money to come here. I assume to keep us from getting lazy and spoiled.” he offered the whole truth to her.
”Once he was gone, we didn’t really care. We stopped hanging out together. Things got quiet.”

Leon, having been utterly crushed in the first match, was moving onto the second without any sort of magical improvement. Responding to Reyna, he smiled.
”Hey, if I take time to practice games like this, I won’t have much time to keep up my actual training. And, unfortunately, the Ghost in my head doesn’t love me being lazy. If I’m doing something with my time, I’ve gotta make it worth it for her too.” he explained.

Still, he was already showing improvement. While he wasn’t familiar with the character Reyna chose to play, it was getting more and more routine as the player unleashed more of the moveset in response. Now he anti-aired more consistently, despite it being one of the character’s weaker points. He was, at least, holding his ground here.
He swung his arm around Cass as he was blocking, pulling her in front of him and resting his head upon hers to look down at the screen.
”Hey cutie… I hear you’re good at Air Hockey…” he cooed, causing Casey to pipe up.
”Boooooo, hey tall guy, you suuuuck!” he chided.

Trisha nodded understandingly at what Casey said about coming here all the time - though, she didn't really relate to that bit, she'd not been allowed any kind of consoles either. Her dad quite gladly threw those kinds of things at his children, and many of her siblings had them, but it was her mom that didn't allow it. Too distracting from her studies. She'd barely played any games before going to college.

"Ah, adjoined," Reyna said as she got a little less relaxed about it, arms tensing slightly. She wasn't at risk of losing, but she couldn't really slack - not that she had been much before. "I know a little of it, since Trisha's the same."
“Mine doesn't really talk," Trisha said quickly, in case Reyna got a bit more into some of the things she'd managed to drag out about the apparition in her head. Not so much the apparition herself, but the emotions around it.

Cass was getting visibly twitchy, bouncing from foot to foot, and it wasn't really helped by being pulled in by Leon. She wriggled a bit, trying to stay still so to not constantly headbutt his chin, but it was difficult. There was a lot of undirected energy there, so she put her fingers on the edge of the machine, underneath all the controls, letting them tap away.
"That ain't the only thing I'm good at, if y'know what I mean," Cass grinned, eyebrows waggling even though no one could really see them.

Both Nadiyah and Trisha groaned, and Reyna laughed, barely distracted by the ball of energy whose arms occasionally were flying into her space.
“Maybe we should just let them leave," Trisha said half seriously. It wasn't that bad yet, but she could see it getting absolutely insufferable.
"No way!" Cass's hand shot out from where she was completely hidden by Leon, vaguely pointing in Trisha’s direction. "We gotta play one of those shooter games, Trish, I ain't lettin' you get off so easy!"
“... Why me?"
"Cause you're the only one as bad as me who'll play!"
As she talked, the short period of Cass staying vaguely still was abruptly ended, and she started shifting her weight from foot to foot with the largest body wriggle possible while doing that.

Leon, dying once again, leaned down to Cass’ ear with his deepest growling voice.
”You should take her now… Having you right here is too distracting. Just howl when you’re done… I’ll hunt you down.”
A hand fell from the console, smacking Cass’ ass pretty hard as the opposite arm lifted to let her out from in front of him.
”Leon!? God damn, Brother, control yourself.” Casey barked, looking up at Trisha.
”Do we… Save her?”

Trisha's eyes rolled right up to the sky.
“She’s fine."

And she really, very clearly was. Cass grinned, reactively shaking her ass a bit, stretching up before Leon's head got out of her reach. At first, it looked like she was going for a kiss against his chin, but she actually lightly bit it. Lengthened canines scraped against his skin, not actually breaking it, and pulled in as she dropped back down from the balls of her feet.
"Ooo, I can't wait, but I'm pretty fast, so no slacking." Her smile only grew wider and she hopped out from in front of Leon, spinning around and shooting fingers guns up at Trisha.
”Let's go, I saw one of those fuckin' terminator ones, let's shoot a whole buncha robots!"
She didn't even wait for a confirmation, bouncing away and over towards one of the machines they'd gone past on the way here.

Trisha’s head flopped against Casey's shoulder, and she went completely limp against his back. She turned her head and spoke softly, and cutely, against his neck.
“After seeing that I… don't think I can walk. You're going to have to carry me over."

”Yeah? Who the fuck is gonna carry me? I’m wounded too…” Casey joked up at Trisha, a grin forming on his face as he adjusted her position slightly. Just enough to make it comfortable to walk without feeling so weighed down by this koala.
”Sal, Diyah? You guys gonna stay here and make sure Leon doesn’t swallow Reyna alive?”

"I'd like to see him try," Nadiyah intoned, amusement in her eyes where her expression otherwise looked… bored. But that was just Diyah - her friends, at least, were used to the fact her expression didn't really match up how she was feeling. Now, at least. It used to make Trisha take everyone she said the wrong way.
"Oh yeah, I'll keep her safe," Sal chuckled. ”I can't bear seeing Cass play those kinds of games either. She really is… very bad…"
"Amusingly so. I'll stay here for now, but I'll maybe come watch if no cannibalism occurs here."

”Alright, good. I don’t trust him, mostly because I’ve seen him eat.”
Leon laughed as Casey followed Cass off into the bowels of the arcade, looking for his favorite kinds of arcade games. He could’ve gotten to the shooting gallery with his eyes closed from any part of that building.

The three of them eventually ended up there, the rows and rows of arcade shooters in different forms. The sit-down variants, the pistols and pedals, stationary sniper games, shotgun hunting spoofs; if you could think of a gun, this place probably had a machine that replicated it through one game or another.
”Which one, Cass-assin?” Casey laughed, still walking along holding Trisha as long as she wanted to be in that spot.

"This one!" Cass ran over to one of the less realistic ones, the words ‘Terminator Salvation’ written across it in glowing red text. The guns themselves were the kind that were attached to the machine kind of like a joystick, with more limited movement up and down as opposed to side to side.
"I ain't playin' any of that boring realistic shit. It's gotta look cool!"

Trisha tapped Casey's cheek when they got to the machine.
“Thanks, Case, you're the best mode of transport I've ever had,” she laughed, leaning in to kiss his cheek before wriggling a bit for him to let her down.

Cass had already chosen one of the guns, swinging it from side to side as if practicing. She then looked at Casey.
”You ain't gonna backseat game, are you? It might be hard to resist, ‘specially if you're good at this shootin' shit."

Casey leaned up against the machine next to them, looking at the screen. He like the Terminator movies, but not that much. So, to see they had a machine based on the crappier movie, made him frown a bit.
”Jesus Christ… I mean, what’s there to backseat? You’re fighting robots in the future, just point the gun and shoot it.”
Since it was her day, he wasn’t going to get in the way of the two playing together. As long as Trisha was happy and satisfied, he’d turn a blind eye to the annoying little things. Not like he was a kid anymore anyway, the arcade machines didn’t mean so much.

Right?

"Heh, you'll see… the robots of the future are tough!” Cass grinned. Trisha just laughed, and shoved in the money required to play (that she'd stolen off Casey earlier).

What followed was some of the worst shooter gameplay possible.
Cass' tactic was to never ever stay still, constantly moving the gun from right to left, up and down. The amount of time she wasn't holding down the trigger was less than the time she was, spraying bullets at the robots that stomped towards them on the screen, getting bigger as they got closer… at a slow pace because it was only the first level. Even with her spray to win technique, she managed to miss a surprising amount. She moved her whole body with the gun, practically jumping from side to side.
She managed to run out of ammo just over half way through, leaving Trisha to single handedly bring them to victory.

Trisha, on the other hand, was a much slower player. She took her time to line up a shot, attempting to actually aim. Sometimes, she did a pretty good shot. More often by the time she'd lined up the robot had moved and she hit somewhere she didn't want to, or missed at all.
"Left, left, on your left!"
“I need to get this one first."
"The left ones closer! Maybe I can beat it with my gun-"
“Don’t try to rip the gun off!"
By some God given miracle they made it through level one. Trisha's whole body was tense as if the robots were about to come out the screen to get her.

"Ay, that was fuckin' awesome, Trish. We got this!"
Cass' overly positive words very quickly proved to be not enough when they lost within five robots. Large words telling them to pay to continue from the same level.
"Let's keep going! This time we'll beat em!"

Trisha glanced at the screen, then over at Casey. She just stared at him for a few moments, lips pressed together as she went between continuing a bit longer at being bad and asking for help. Eventually the want to not look like an absolute loser in front of him won out.
“Casey… Can you help me get better at the game?"

Watching was more comedic for Casey than it was frustrating. It was, at most points, fairly endearing that Trisha was actually trying to line up and aim on these goofy arcade games. They were both way off the mark in either direction of the spectrum, and all he could do about it was laugh and laugh.
It only got better when Trisha started pouting. His heart swelled up.
”You know that’s a loaded question. What do you mean help you get better? You don’t think you’re already doing great Babe? How come?” he grinned, getting closer to her.

“Because we died after the first level," Trisha pointed to the screen, still flashing up text telling them to pay to continue. She then turned around to Casey, looking up at him with an only increasing pout, which just continued to make her look more cute than anything.
“I’m too slow, but if I go faster I miss them… I don't know, help me like you helped me with pool."

He grinned a bit wider, looking over at Cass.
”Y’know, I’m surprised you’re not using your magic to make you better! Someone else clearly has no problem falling back on it when she’s losing.”
Casey’s eyes fell back on Trisha as his hand reached into his pocket.
”You know you’re the absolute cutest when you do this, right?”

But he slid into her spot regardless, gloved hand sliding over the machine. It wasn’t so easy as pool; this shit was all digital. But he wasn’t going to tell her that, he was just going to look like a badass. A badass who could save her from any little problem in her life.
Orange Lux surged through the machine toward the circuitry that controlled the connection between the controller and the actual game board. It wasn’t going to be like pool at all…

Casey stepped away, letting Trisha slide back in. He didn’t say anything, and tried to look like he wasn’t concentrating now, but just like the paddle for Air Hockey, he decided the easiest thing to do here was going to be controlling the moving parts himself. This meant he had to give the game just about all his attention, so rather than turning to smile at Trisha, he stared directly at the screen.
”Alright, lets see if this works, huh?”

“It's not cheating when it's a cooperative game… Thanks, boyfriend," Trisha said, smiling cutely at him. She was going to go in for a hug and maybe a kiss first, but Casey was pretty intensely staring at the screen rather than her… well, that was fine. It was definitely fine. She stepped back to the gun, loosely holding it, and moving it slightly to see if it felt much different. Not really.

"Huh, I never really thought bout using magic," Cass said as Trisha put in the coin to continue from level two. She tilted her head from side to side before her eyes changed to a light yellow, ready to continue with her amazing shooting technique.
Which was somehow worse when Cass started using her magic because she was only faster. Sure, she actually hit things more, but she was also able to move around and spray around even more.
Trisha, on the other hand, didn't move much, figuring the gun itself would direct her.

He was sincerely doing his best, swinging the machine and firing at the same time at a rate that you really couldn’t replicate manually. He was sending impulses of electricity down streamlined paths, making sure that the data sent and received earlier than it’d normally be able to.
The gun’s vibration servos rumbled in tune, rattling the plastic casing that gave the entire thing the shape of a gun.

It would’ve been a lot less noticeable if gun movements themselves matched. As Trisha stood there with the gun in her hands, it listlessly vibrated without any sway or swing. Focusing all on the electronics meant there was no outward manipulation of the casing, which would’ve only created input for the reticle to begin with.
Casey, effectively, became the reticle in the game. This entirely neglected the physical and interactive parts as the level stretched on.

Now he was so focused on the game that he had no queues to turn and see that he was limiting Trisha’s fun. Unless she told him, it’d just go on like this as the score on Trisha’s side of the field climbed and climbed.
Not a single powerup was missed, not a single reload wasted. Casey was in the zone.

Trisha's brow furrowed when the gun didn't really move. She assumed it was just because it was a lot less simple than a pool cue. But it quickly became really boring. She wasn't even playing… it was even really what she'd meant.
Because she figured it could still be fun with the magically controlled gun, she hadn't bothered correcting him when he'd assumed that was what she was asking for. What she was actually wanting was the way he'd helped her with pool before showing off the magic - manually directing her, hands over hers and all close to each other.

She completely let go of the gun, hands dropping to her side. It kept going.

"Whoa," Cass also stepped back, having completely used up all of her ammo again. Her eyes went back to normal and she squinted at the screen.
"Shit, I ain't got any magic like that."

Trisha didn't say anything, staring at Casey. He didn't even look away from the game. Of course he didn't. She clenched and unclenched her fist. This wasn't fun at all anymore. There was that little, toxic voice in the back of her mind telling her to just walk away and see if he even noticed. But… if he somehow didn't that'd hurt more.
“Casey, stop." She was frowning now, and it really wasn't a cute pout at all.

Casey had rucked himself up to the third level of the game by the time Trisha bothered to tell him to stop. He did so, focused zoned face pursing into a happy smile.
”Huh? We’re doin-”
Her pout wasn’t pouty. It was the kind of face he recognized in a lot of the women in his life. Stern disappointment in a thin veil of politeness. All at once, he realized what had happened… She was bored. It wasn’t like the pool cue at all…
”Oh… See? I told you it wasn’t gonna be like the cue, I mean… There’s a lot of parts in here, Babe. I can’t play the whole thing for you.” he said rather bluntly.
”I guess I should’ve explained it better when I hit it with the spell and realized how different it really was. Do you… Just, like, wanna keep going?”

“You didn't say." Trisha wasn't just disappointed, she was upset and annoyed. Maybe she should've guessed it would be different, but it wasn't even what she'd wanted! And how was she supposed to know? He hadn't even said.
“It wasn't even- whatever. I don't care. No, I don't want to keep going. What's the point? I want to go home. But you keep playing, it's fine, I'll see if Reyna can take me."

Cass in the background had taken a few steps away, recognising the pattern of Trisha getting upset over something and starting to clam up. She pulled out her phone and sent a quick SOS text to Reyna.

Casey recoiled when Trisha mentioned that he hadn’t said anything. It was likely; he often did so when he was getting ready to expend Orange Lux like that. He had to work himself up a bit to do so, and getting into his own head was common.
But she wanted to go home? They hadn’t been but a couple of hours at this point. Barely a few drinks.
”What!? No, no way! If you want to leave, we’re going home together. No way I’m just letting you go home mad, that’s fuckin’ stupid.”

“I’m not mad," Trisha said before he could continue, though she clearly was. Everything about her body language screamed it - lips twisted downwards, shoulders tense, arms folded and keeping her distance.
“Why do you get to decide anyway?"

”Because I have to go home to you later anyway? I may as well go home with you now and deal with whatever the fuck this is in private.” he pitched himself down an octave so he wasn’t yelling or anything. He had to be conscious now, so he didn’t look like a jerk and lose his brand new girlfriend over a game of Terminator at an arcade.
”I’m. Sorry. Trisha. We can go home and talk about it, or we can find some place private to talk about it here. You can even bring all your friends, so they can feel safe knowing that I’m not trying to be a dick.”

Trisha didn't want to talk about it at all. What was she going to say? That she was pissed off he'd misunderstood her and made something not fun, but that wasn't even really what annoyed her, it was the fact he was giving the game all of his attention? That it was just the last thing on an increasingly growing list? What would even come of that?
“Let’s go home then, but there's nothing to talk about. I'm sure Cass will be coming back to the same building."

At her name being said, Cass' head snapped up. She didn't say anything, because saying something meant stepping in the line of fire.
Thankfully, her saviour Reyna appeared in the same aisle of games as them, having understood the message perfectly. She had her denim jacket and sunglasses back on, but she pushed them up to her forehead as she approached. She'd obviously hurried over, so the others were probably just a bit behind.
"Hey, we finished-"

“I know Cass texted you," Trisha interrupted before Reyna could get any further, sullen glare switching from Casey to her, then back again.
Reyna held up her hands. "Alright, she did, but I could see your aura a mile away. What's-"
“We’re going home," Trisha interrupted again, gesturing to herself and Casey.

Reyna let out a quiet ‘ah’ sound, glancing over at Casey with a slight smile.
”Without us?"
Trisha nodded.
"Right. We're at least going to come sit in the parking lot or something for a bit, give you guys some privacy, but there's still a few things to sort out, alright?" Reyna looked at Casey, and it was obvious it was a way to work around Trisha's stubborn denial that she was doing anything but just going home. At least from the area Reyna would be able to pinpoint Trisha's aura. She wanted to make sure her friend would be fine… and Cass too. Unlike the others, she knew Casey had been lying about knowing Trisha since highschool.
"If that's fine with you, Casey?"

Casey nodded, a sour look on his face.
”Of course, Reyna. Whatever you guys want, I’m happy with. Someone clearly doesn’t even want to talk about whatever this is, so if y’all wanna ride back in the car with us, you can conduct your business. Or, hang out, make sure she’s good, whatever. How can I care at this point?”

Leon wasn’t trying to interrupt this moment, knowing full well he’d only spark Trisha’s anger and make Casey’s night worse…
But what was he going to do? He was promised a night of enjoyment. Lelou wouldn’t let him live it down if he just passed it up.
”Cass?” Leon looked across at her expectantly, holding his hand up.
”I wasn’t done… C’mon! We’ll catch a cab back when the bomb cloud settles.”

Casey scoffed, unable to say anything to his Brother. His arm weakly motioned toward the exit.
”Fuckin’ whatever… C’mon Trisha.”

Cass looked at Leon, then at Trisha. She bit her lip, quite visible torn, heel tapping up and down. Finally, she looked at Reyna. Reyna made a slight gesture towards Leon, then pinched her fingers together in an ‘ok’ sign. A silent affirmation that, if needed, she'd take on handling Trisha duty. Cass let out a silent sigh of relief, already feeling Trisha's glare turning towards her the more her foot bounced up and down.
She loved Trisha, but she only ever made the situation worse anyway! She bounded over to Leon, slapping her hand into his.
"Les'go, I'll show you what else I'm good at."

Reyna was now giving Casey a look filled with sympathy. It was obviously the first time this had happened… she just hoped he was patient enough that it wouldn't be the last.
"I brought my own car here, so I need to-"
"I can drive it." Nadiyah interrupted, after a shared look with Sal. If someone was going in a car with Trisha it was going to be Reyna. She just smiled calmly at that.
"Sure, I'll ride back with you then, Casey."

Trisha had already started to make her way towards the exit, very pointedly now not looking at anyone. She didn't react to anything that was said, but Casey's ‘how can I care' hurt. No, it was fine, she didn't care. It wasn't like she was doing anything wrong. But even as she stormed ahead of them she kept shooting furtive glances back - seeming to be telling them to hurry up, but really making sure that they… were still there.

---

Home

---

The ride went as well as one could expect in the situation. Casey wasn’t exactly a small-talk kind of guy, finding himself more and more desiring to make a big deal of things than he was comfortable. Honestly, he felt a bit hurt, wondering why she wouldn’t just stand up on what the problem was in the first place.
Hell, if she hadn’t reacted the way she reacted in the first place, he probably wouldn’t have made such a big deal of it.

Or… Had she? By the time they pulled into the parking lot at the apartment building, Casey didn’t even really remember the circumstance. He just wasn’t built to hold this type of shit in, and even if she was expecting an argument, she wasn’t going to get one. He put the car in park, turning the key and unbuckling into silence.
”Uhh… You said you had some stuff to go over still, Reyna? You want me to leave the car? I’ll meet you inside the lobby?” he asked, seeming to sound a bit tired.

Reyna glanced at Trisha, who was staring out the window to her right, hugging her legs to her chest, then back at Casey. She didn’t want to intrude too much where it wasn’t her place, but she also knew what Trisha could be like. She cared about her friend and wanted to try and make it so she… didn’t lose another relationship so quickly.
"Yeah, if that’s alright, Casey? We won’t be long."

She waited until Casey got out of the car to continue talking. The moment he was out Trisha got more tense, fingers digging into her thighs. It was the contrary nature of things with her - not wanting to talk to him, but not wanting him to leave first either.
"Are you going to talk to him when you go up, Trisha?" she said softly, shifting into the middle seat and leaning forward.

“There’s nothing to talk about.” Of course, Trisha knew there was. But talking never got anywhere. Talking just made things worse. It was better to just ignore it, ignore everything, and then she’d feel fine with it in a day or two.
"We both know that there is, and he can’t check like I can." As Reyna spoke her eyes were fixed on Trisha, gently pushing through the outer layer of her aura to the emotions below. It wasn’t something blocked by emotional fields, thanks to her lux combination, but it could be felt.

“Stop that,” Trisha snapped before she got very far, twisting around to glare at her. Reyna held up her hands and pulled back. “I don’t want to have this conversation, I’m leaving. You can too.”

Reyna winced, reaching out to grasp Trisha’s arm before she could get out of the car. It had been… a long time since she’d properly dealt with Trisha like this. She’d forgotten just how careful she had to be.
"Alright, I’m sorry. But Trisha, I’m not just going to let you go up there and have a fight. What if he hurts you?"
“He won’t.”
"You don’t know that. You’ve only known him for a few days, right? You can’t lie to me about that."
“I’ve known Leon for ten. He was a dick, but he never did anything like that to me. Casey’s nicer than him.”
"Well… I need to wait for Diyah and Sal anyway. Maybe once you’ve talked, we can go back out, if you feel up to it."

Trisha didn’t even bother responding. She shook off Reyna’s hand and got out of the car. Reyna followed behind her as she walked straight over and into the lobby. She glanced up at Casey, but didn’t say anything as she went past him towards their lift. She turned back around there and looked at him again.
“Let’s go.”

Reyna had followed them in, still smiling calmly.
"I’m going to wait in here for Diyah and Sal to come get me, they’re just going around some shops first. Hopefully I’ll see you later or tomorrow, Casey?"

Casey, by this point, looked supremely sad. He’d had a few minutes to think about his own reaction, and about how he’d jumped the gun. Thinking, not saying, and reality had manifested what was in his head. What he was worried about that he should’ve expressed. But she wasn’t going to give him the chance to explain. Maybe he had to just force her to hear it.

His biggest regret was that she was leaving her friends like that. Sure, alright. It looked bad that Leon and Cass were probably sleeping together that night, but… That had nothing to do with them. It was hearing something like that from Reyna, how she hoped they’d see each other again. Like what, he was just going to kick her out here and now?
”Yeah. Here’s hoping sooner than that; maybe we’ll be able to make it back out.”

It was a brave smile. He wasn’t sure how true those words were going to hold. But as the elevator door closed to leave them with one another, Casey didn’t waste any time.
”Listen… If I really didn’t say it was going to be different, then it’s all my fault, Trisha. I’m sorry; and I’m sorry for how I reacted. But that really didn’t give you the free pass to act like that back… I mean, like, home? Over that? What’s the reasoning there?” he tried to act like reason played any part in it. He hoped it did.

He hoped to God the next words out of her mouth were about how she couldn’t stand seeing Leon and Cass acting how they were, or how Sal had ruined her night and she was just looking for an excuse home.
Anything that wasn’t his fault… Anything he couldn’t be blamed squarely for, even though… He’d encouraged Cass and Leon, then beat Sal himself and made a big deal of it.
”Like, I mean… It’s not reasonable. I don’t expect a reasonable answer, I just want to hear what you have to say for yourself.”

Trisha didn’t want to talk about any of it. If she had it her way they just wouldn’t talk to each other for the next few hours. But that wasn’t going to happen, because he was talking to her, and she couldn’t just outright ignore that. She was that good at the silent treatment. She couldn’t not react.
And now he was turning it on her. The pushback, the phrasing, talking to her like she was some kid having a temper tantrum. It just set her off more.
“It’s not reasonable? Are you saying that I’m unreasonable? What, are you going to judge whether it’s a good enough reason or not?”

She didn’t raise her voice, but her tone was cold and harsh.
“You’re right, it was all your fault. You acted like I should’ve known when I just wanted a little help, you kept- you kept flirting with Sal, and it just wasn’t fun. I wanted to go home because Arcades are lame.”
None of it was a solid reason, nor was it the reason. But she wasn’t going to give that one, not now, not ever.

Was it flirting? Was that considered flirting?
”Woah. That’s not what I was doing, I wasn’t flirting. And if you thought that I was flirting with that dude, you’re gonna hate when you meet my buddies from the military, because that’s how we talk to one another.”
Casey grimaced as the elevator lurched through its security gate and dragged itself up the line a bit more.
”All I’m saying is that going home over what transpired is not a reasonable action. The fact that you took that action speaks volumes to your decision making in the moment.”

He wasn’t willing to engage her pettiness on the last bit, because she was most certainly having fun up until that last moment.
”And, God, do not lie to me to make yourself feel better. You were fuckin’ having fun and you know it! And I fuckin’... Ruined it. I ruined it for you, right Trisha? Super big fuckup, all Casey’s fault. Right?” he snapped. The elevator doors opened up to silence. Thankfully the office doors were all closed.

Trisha’s hands balled into fists at her side, expression tightening as her nose scrunched up and her lips twisted down into an even uglier scowl. Spoke volumes about her decision making? Right, of course, because she was just so unreasonable.
“If I wanted a lecture I’d call my mom,” she snapped back, letting slip something she normally wouldn’t want to in the heat of the moment. She stepped out of the elevator, still facing him.
“Right, it is all your fault.”
Then she turned around and stomped all the way to the end of the corridor, as quickly as she could… but she stopped at the end, twisting her head round to make sure he was following. A strange little action considering they were in the middle of a fight.

It wasn’t an action he noticed. He was far too busy trying to figure out how to crack this nut.
”Nah… Y’know what? You want your private time? You wanna fuckin’ decompress? Fine. You can go ahead, go upstairs to our house. Have the run of it. I’m just locomotion to you, right? I’ll be down here in my own little world, shooting my gun. Because I can actually shoot a gun, I don’t need my boyfriend to do it for me.”
Waltzing down to the end of the hallway, he gave her a long stare as he opened up the door to the black box.
”I’ll see you when you’re ready to talk. You know where to find me.”

And then he stepped inside and slammed the door behind him, leaving Trisha alone.

Trisha didn’t move, staring at the closed door. Her chest heaved up and down, but it wasn’t from anger, it was from panic. It was difficult to breathe, her hands trembling at her side. He’d just left her. Alarm pheromones filled the air, trapped in the tiny space with no one else around. They just rebounded back onto her, the cold feeling in her chest increasing, the need to flee becoming intense.

She couldn’t go up to the house. Not alone. She could- she couldn’t see the bees. It would affect them, hurt them- maybe she should- no. She didn’t want to talk. If she went in he’d make her talk. She couldn’t. She needed to get out of here.
Trisha went right back down the corridor, practically running, jumping back into the elevator that was still there. The even more confined space didn’t help as her pheromones filled it. She slammed a hand against the button to go back down the ground floor before dropping into a squat, face pressed into her knees.

This was it. He was going to leave- hadn’t he already left? No, no, it was just going into another room… but he’d shut her out. He’d turned his back to her and closed a door in her face. He was abandoning her just like everyone else. It wasn’t even a problem, she’d just wanted to go home, fuck. Trisha furiously rubbed her eyes to stop any tears, obviously from anger, from falling.
She didn’t even notice the elevator lurching on the way down, only looking up when it had stopped moving for about a minute. She stood up and stepped out, still looking incredibly pissed and like she wanted to cry.

"That was quick- fuck, Trisha." Reyna was still there, slamming a hand over her nose as she was bombarded by the harsh banana scent. Her heartrate increased, and she slammed herself with her emotional manipulation, completely removing her fear. She closed the distance between them, pulling Trisha into a hug that she only weakly struggled against.
"What happened?"

“Nothing.”
"Don’t give me that shit, Trisha. What happened?"
“We fought. He didn’t want to talk and went into another room, so it's over.”
"Did he say it was?" Reyna asked softly, gently rubbing Trisha’s back.
“No.”
"He just went into another room? Let me guess, he told you that you would talk when you were ready to?"
“Yes.”
"Right. So he hasn’t left you, you just haven’t resolved the fight. Alright, Trisha? You both just need some time to cool off, then you can talk again."

Trisha frowned at that, because she still didn’t want to talk. But Reyna’s words got through the panicked haze enough for her to realise that it wasn’t over… yet. It wasn’t until either of them said it was. Slowly, the alarm pheromones in the air reduced.
Thankfully she hadn’t called the bees themselves in her panic. They were too far away to sense these ones…

"Feeling better?" Reyna let go of her.
“Not really,” Trisha muttered, looking away. Reyna just smiled, her phone buzzing.
"Diyah and Sal are here… are you coming with us? Have you told Casey that you are?"
“I haven’t and I don’t want to.”
Reyna just about resisted rolling her eyes, holding out her hand. She knew that Trisha would just ignore all calls like this, and she didn’t want Casey worrying just because they were having a fight. "Then give me your phone, and I’ll answer, alright?"

“Fine.” Trisha grumpily handed it over, stuffing her hands in her coat pockets and following Trisha over to her car.
She didn’t feel any better than when they’d gotten back, and she didn’t really want to go out somewhere with her friends. But she couldn’t be alone. That… that was worse. It was fine. She’d go, drink, and just ignore all of the feelings like she always did.

The hours passed on as the afternoon sun of late autumn turned into a dim midday, and then an evening. Casey had to lose himself in something. He’d stayed next to the door when she’d left, and while he didn’t stop her from running back the way they came, he found that he was sad about it.
But she’d accepted blaming him, and he’d accepted the self-placed blame. Like usual, things were his fault. Rather than starting what he told her he’d do, he looked out the window of the apartment overlooking the parking lot. He watched little dots flick and flitter about, then they got into a car and left.

At least she was going to spend time with her friends. Reyna seemed responsible, and Nadiyah as well. Casey found all the bluster and bravado deflated from his person. All he really wanted now was to take it all back. To have her, and to be upstairs on their couch. It’d been resolved so easily at the furniture store, so… So what made her run off? Why hadn’t she just gone upstairs if she didn’t want to be out.

The realization hit him harder than it probably deserved to. That, maybe, it really was about being bored. Bored by a boring guy who got nostalgic over air hockey and a fishy smelling old arcade. A shitty place for a date, even if it may have been a good place to bring a group. Her friends seemed to like it at least…

Withdrawn, Casey wandered upstairs to take a long look at the ocean, then headed back down to shoot in earnest. He’d immerged after that cold sundown took the city, heading back upstairs to find that she’d not made it home yet. Rather than make a big deal of it, he checked the time and went back downstairs to his office. Furio wasn’t there, thankfully, but there was something there that he knew he probably shouldn’t engage with.

”M-m… Mom?” he spoke into the room, slowly sitting down in his chair. There was no response.
”Mom… Just call. I’m… I don’t want to go through a weird confession.”
A hotline on the console of his desk began to buzz. He picked it up immediately.

”What’s wrong, Bubba Cher? I can feel you bubblin’ away.”
The voice on the other line cooed in his ear. Lynette Richoux maybe wasn’t right next to her boy to comfort him, but just like her other children, she always kept an ear out.
”I just… I don’t know why I’m like this.”
”Petty? Baby, your Daddy was the same damn way. Couldn’t just let somethin’ go, always had to get into it and resolve it immediately. And if you didn’t, he’d shove your nose in it.” Lynette explained as calmly as she could.
”How much did you hear?” Casey asked weakly.
”Enough to know you should apologize to that poor girl. You think you’ve got problems? Try the Stygian Snake problems, Honey, I’m sure they’re ever-present.” she cleared her throat. ”But, listen. Just do right. Make it better. Momma’s gotta go.”

Click.

Casey closed his eyes and sighed. No thoughts, empty head. He pushed away from the console and stood up, shaking his head and turning the lights back off to leave. A lesson in useless interactions featuring Lynette Richoux. Some fuckin’ Prophet: The thought ran through his mind more than he cared to recall.
It was fine. She’d be fine. She was taking the time he offered her, and there wasn’t anything he could do but sit and wait.

And call Leon. But after it went straight to voicemail, Casey’s imagination ran wild. He made it up to the roof and tried to look down and see if Reyna’s car had come back and they were just downstairs, but no. Now he couldn’t tell himself to calm down. He was thinking about Sal being Severed, and about the other two maybe not being able to defend themselves.
He rattled off a text message to Gin, asking for notifications on any Bees leaving the hive, which she instantly responded to with an emoji he didn’t know. The assumption was that it meant yes, but how could he ever know?
Another couple of hours passed, and he still didn’t hear anything. He’d tucked into some of the food that had been left behind by the lunch party.

His anxiety peaked when Leon and Cass came upstairs to get her posters. Casey had to tell Cass that they still hadn’t come home, but she was fairly encouraging. It seemed so long as Reyna was involved, things were going to be alright. If that was the case, he’d have to thank her, but he wasn’t satisfied yet.
So, finally, after almost seven hours of waiting, Casey snapped. His fingers slid across the screen of his phone, pulling Trisha’s contact info and pressing the call button. Now he could only wait.

"Hello, it’s Reyna, sorry." The person who picked up very clearly wasn’t Trisha, and she said as much almost right away. There was some muffled background noise. "I assume this is Casey? I’m sorry I couldn’t call earlier, Trisha wouldn’t unlock her phone."

Somehow he was a bit relieved that it was Reyna who picked up.
”Jesus, hey… It’s fine, I just… I figured I’d give her the time she needed. I saw you guys leave from upstairs, so… Y’know, I mean, fuck, I feel so fucking stupid. Is she at least gonna come home tonight? Please, just try to convince her if she isn’t, but don’t let her out of your sight. There’s… Some really weird shit has been going on in St. Portwell lately, Reyna, and Trisha isn’t safe. So, whatever you do, don’t leave her.”
He couldn’t try to make his tone any less pleading. He was actively begging at this point.

"I see… Don’t worry, I don’t plan to. But-" There was some shuffling as Reyna seemed to stand up, the muffled talking in the background getting a bit quieter. "Ah, don’t worry, I’m still in the same room. As I was saying… She’s really drunk. I tried to stop her, Diyah tried to stop her, Sal- well, Sal’s also pretty drunk. I asked her if she wanted to go home, but she just ignored me, but… Look." Her voice got quieter.
"She’s really bad at saying how she feels. How she really feels, that is. She’s doing this thing she does where she’s pretending she just wants to be left alone - sometimes, that’s the case, but not just now. She’s just- well, you have to be really patient. I think you should come pick her up. If that’s the wrong move, I’ll take the full blame."

By the time Reyna was finished speaking, Casey was already up and putting shoes on.
”You read my mind, where the Hell are you guys? Do you want me to get you home? Or, no, you… Didn’t drink, did you? I saw…-” he stopped, struggling as he stuffed himself into a sweater. ”-Saw Cass. Leon and her are downstairs in his apartment. They didn’t waste any time.”

"Of course they didn’t," Reyna laughed slightly. "If there’s one thing Cass never does, it’s slowing down… But we’re at the apartment we rented. I figured that going out when Trisha was like this wouldn’t end well for anyone. I haven’t had anything to drink yet in case I had to take her home. I’ll text you the address. It’s not too far, maybe ten minute drive?"

”Make it five. I’m there already. I’m in the walls.” he laughed, hanging up and stuffing his hand into his glove to channel a spell. A few spells. Scrape-proof soles, impact dampeners, sturdiness in the pants.

Casey stepped out of his door, locked it behind himself, and stepped off the roof of the building. Ten stories, he fell toward the ground legs first. It was, of course, risky considering that one had to trust magic that didn’t actually exist.
But it did! And just like every time he’d done that before, he hit the ground soft like a cloud, bouncing up and down a few times as he directed the momentum toward his car.

---

Reyna’s Temporary Rental

---

He was in his car and on the street by the time the text message hit his message box. But, he couldn’t teleport, so… It was still ten minutes. Oh well. Pulling up outside, he went for a spot as close as he could before getting out. A text message got sent to Reyna’s number, which had been included with the address, letting her know that he was there now. The response was to come up, so he made way for the entrance and climbed a set of stairs.

The hallway was pretty long, but he quickly bounded across it until he was standing outside. He gave a gentle, non-hostile knock.

The door opened almost immediately, revealing Reyna, who smiled at him.
"Hey, come in." She stepped back to let him into the place. The entrance hall barely existed, almost immediately opening out into a reasonably large living room. The place was surprisingly tidy considering there’d been drinking going on, with some bottles of beers stacked against one wall along with an empty bottle of rum.
There wasn’t really any proper talking going on - instead just occasional swears from Sal and laughs from Nadiyah. He was sitting in an armchair leaning forward, eyes narrowed in concentration, while Nadiyah sat on the floor with her back against the couch. They were playing some kind of racing game on the medium sized television.

Neither actually sat on the couch because the entire thing was taken up by Trisha. She lay on her side with her head next to Nadiyah, hugging a pillow tightly to her chest. It came all the up to her nose, covering half of her face. At the sound of the door opening she turned slightly to look up. Spotting Casey, she hugged the pillow tighter.

"See," Reyna said as she closed the door behind them, ushering him in. "I told you he’d come."
"Does this mean I’m free from water duty?" Nadiyah asked, nodding to Casey with a smile. She shuffled to the side so she wasn’t in front of the couch, not seeming to care that it meant she drove off a cliff.
Trisha stayed silent, just staring at him.

Casey was really trying to not have a hard time in front of other people. He wanted to cry right there, and to tell her how sorry he was in front of everyone. But he had to hold it in. Just for a little bit.
”Yeah! Yeah, of course… No more water duty for anybody. I’ve got it. But, thank you… Seriously.”
He did his best to smile, but he had to clench his jaw to not let it wobble up and down.

He got closer, squatting down in front of the couch next to Nadiyah, and placed a hand on her shoulder. It patted, just for a moment of confirmation, before he turned all his attention to Trisha.
”Queen Bee? You don’t have to say anything, my girl… We’re just gonna go home and go to sleep. That’s all, okay? I know you’re gonna want to sleep in your new bed.”
His eyes stared into Trisha’s, the deep blue blinking at her.

Trisha looked back at him, slowly thinking about it, before nodding. She let go of the pillow, shuffling forward towards him. When she was close enough her arms wrapped around his neck, and her face pressed in against his shoulder. She pressed her fingers against the back of her neck, before alleviating the pressure, and then doing it again.
She was trying to make sure he was real… because everything was a bit fuzzy, maybe she was just imagining things. But he felt real, and he smelt real.
“Casey?” she spoke very softly against him, almost hesitantly.

Casey’s head curled into her chest slightly, and he shook for a moment.
”Y-yeah?” he asked, one hand slipping under her knees while the other cradled her back. Looking at him again, his face was a bit red.

“Just making sure is really you,” Trisha mumbled, words drawn out and slurred. Her arms tightened around his neck.
”It really is.”

”Of course it is, Silly… Who else would it be?”
Bearing her full weight, Casey stood up and began to adjust her slightly.
”Now, say goodnight to everyone, and tell ‘em you’ll see them tomorrow. Okay?” he urged gently, speaking to her like the softest thing on the planet. Like she’d crumble if his voice wavered even a little.

Trisha turned her head slightly to look at her friends, while still clinging onto Casey’s neck like he’d disappear if she let go.
“Night, see you all tomorrow,” she said slowly, surprisingly easily.

"Niiiggght, Trisha!" Sal grinned, the only other one who was clearly drunk - but nowhere near as much as she was.
"Don’t rush tomorrow," Nadiyah said, standing up and gently patting Trisha’s shoulder. "See you then."

"I’ll see you out," Reyna said with a smile, leading them towards the door. She opened it for them. "I’ll see you both tomorrow. Try to get a good night’s sleep, Trisha."
Trisha just mumbled at that.
Reyna looked up at Casey, and a message flashed across his emotional field.
She’s more likely to talk to you when she’s like this. Thank you for treating her well.

There was an anxiety whenever something rippled across the Emotional Field. But it was very pink of her to do so. Rather than responding, he simply nodded with a smile at Reyna.
”Goodnight, Rey. Thank you for keeping her safe.”
And then he stepped away, walking slowly down the hall in the quiet. Knowing they were going to get out into the cold, he flipped his sweater up off his stomach and torso to wrap around Trisha.

There wasn’t a single thing he wouldn’t do to make the moments like this last forever. She was just so warm and soft, and he felt nothing more than pure and unbridled tenderness. Maybe even the L word. He assumed it was just the anxiety washing away from his body…
”Y’know how much I missed you?” he asked very casually as they made it out of the building and into the cold night air.

Trisha shook her head against him. She felt safe being in his arms again, that constant anxiety that had only increased with every drink finally beginning to lessen. It was warm, warm enough that if her drunken mind wasn’t so active she might’ve just fallen asleep. It felt safe enough - and she was drunk enough - that her tall, steel walls began to slip. Maybe she could tell him, maybe she could ask-
“Why? Why would you miss me?” What was supposed to stay a thought slipped out. What was unsaid was obvious - after the fight they’d had, and how she’d acted.

He smiled down at her. It was dark, so any light would’ve been coming from over his head. It left his face dark, but a little raindrop managed to hit Trisha’s hand. It was followed by another, and another.
”Gosh, Trisha… You’re giving me the time of day? I guess?” he choked out a laugh.
”No… No joking, I’m sorry. I miss you because you fill my heart with warm feelings. Because I think we have something special, and because when I told you to go take your time… I didn’t think that meant running so far from me. I waited. I waited in the box, hoping that you’d say something, or call out, but you didn’t. And I immediately felt like I had made the biggest mistake in my life. Dramatic, huh?” he sniffled, finally getting to his car and popping the door open.

It was the back door, to let her lay out across the bench seat in the back. Only, it was hard to maneuver. It was the difference between asking for her cooperation, and not. So, he closed the door back up and went for the passenger side.
”Here we go…”

Trisha really didn’t want to let go of Casey. Even when she ended up in the passenger seat, her hands were still around the back of his neck, her arms stretched out to keep them there. She was worried if she let go he’d disappear. He could still leave… but he said he missed her and didn’t want her to run away… but she wasn’t sure…
“I thought you didn’t want me to stay. You- you-” She shook her head, suddenly panicking when she realised she was going to have to move her hands eventually. “Don’t go.”

As she resisted pulling away, Casey let the back of the seat lower just enough to let her ease back instead of being bolted upright. He pushed his face close to hers, and in the light reflecting off the surfaces in the car, Trisha could see Casey’s watery eyes and red face. He was crying. Had been since they left the apartment. Not that he could do much about it. Just like there wasn’t much he could do to get her back home that didn’t involve breaking her hold on him.

”Of course I wanted to you stay. Home. At our home. The place we live together, where we could just walk up or down a flight of stairs to apologize… And it’s where we’re gonna go now, Babe. Our house. Together. And all it’ll cost is five more seconds of not holding my hand, then I promise you, you won’t need to let go. Okay? I’m not going anywhere far from you…”

Trisha furrowed her eyebrows, looking confused for a moment as she processed everything he said. It… made sense. Why would he put her in his car just to leave… she wasn’t drunk enough to imagine that much… She nodded, finally removing her hands, legs immediately coming up so that she could hug them instead.
“Mmkay, but you promised. No letting go after.”

Casey sat and thought for a moment, finally laughing.
”There’ll be another five seconds where I have to do the reverse of what’s about to happen when we get home. That’ll be the only other time.”
He moved his hands upward to grab Trisha’s gently, pulling them close and kissing both before pulling away and tucking her tight in the car to close the door.
Trisha could watch Casey circle around the front of the car, getting to the driver’s side and popping the door open to slide in.

His left hand had to roll over the wheel and through the spoke to turn the car on, because his right hand immediately swept across the console to grab hers tightly.
”See? That wasn’t hard at all. I know you’re here, you know I’m here… God, I missed you…” he commented passionately as the car lurched forward.

“I missed you too,” Trisha said so softly that it would be difficult for Casey to hear, even as close as he was.

---

Home (Again)

---

For the whole, short journey she held onto his hand tightly, head tilted over to watch him as if she needed to do both to make sure he was still there. Then, when they arrived, it was a bit of the same game again - but she let go a little faster this time, clumsily unbuckling her seatbelt so that in the five seconds it took Casey to come open her door she was ready to roll right into his arms.

She silently clung to him the whole way up, closing her eyes with a slightly sharper intake of breath when they reached the end of the corridor where they’d ended their fight. What if he remembered and put her down and then went back into the room and left her alone-
While the thoughts were racing through her head, they were already up onto the roof, a quick walk inside with rain pattering across the canopies. Then they were inside their apartment.

Trisha opened her eyes again, but didn’t let go of him. But she did lift her head from where it had been resting against him, looking at him with slightly squinted eyes. She bit her lip, one of the hands once again at the back of his neck starting to fiddle with a strand of his hair.
“I…” she trailed off. What did she want to say? Did she want to say anything… yes, a bit. The liquid courage was enough for her to consider it. But it came out as a mess and she struggled to bring herself to say anything, or decide which bit to say.
“It- It wasn’t… You weren’t… I- You all liked each other more than me.”

Casey grinned down at her the whole way, singing gently and rocking her as they walked. Finally, with her interruption as Casey made way for the stairs to the loft, he cracked a little smile and replied.
”What? Like, at the arcade?” Casey asked, trying to figure out how best to twist his massive body to scale the stairs with her aloft.
”Sorry, Baby. I was trying to impress your friends. I didn’t even think you’d be worried about something like that.” he cleared his throat.
”I think I accomplished it though, they all seemed like they liked me, right? So, now I don’t need to try so hard. Next time we see them, I’ll ignore them. And, and I won’t talk to Sal like I was. I promise. I get that it’s probably weird, since all my friends are straight, but he’s gay… I wasn’t thinking…”

At least it was warm up here, as opposed to the cold outside. The crook in the roof was well insulated above them, keeping it warm like a pocket of spring weather. Casey tried to put Trisha down on the bed, mostly so he could at least take his sweater off and change out of the jeans he’d been sitting in all day.

Trisha, unsurprisingly, refused to let him go. She went a step further this time, swinging her legs around his waist. Even though he’d said it wasn’t the case, that was just one of her worries… the constant background anxiety that everyone in her life would decide she was the one they didn’t need. She knew, really, that hadn’t been flirting with Sal but… it was less that and more the worry with all of them. They’d all like him more than her, and he’d like them more than her too.
“You promised you wouldn’t let go,” she whined, pouting.
“If- if I let go you might leave me alone again.”

Still sober, Casey was having a hard time not seeing a pattern. Maybe it was just how things went today, but she seemed… Fixed. Persistent to say the least, which gave him a pang of anxiety. There was a moment where he wasn’t sure if he should force her off just for the moment.
No, no. Teacher. Teach. Her.
”Trisha? If you don’t let go, you’ll never see that I’m not gonna leave you. I don’t want to leave you, Baby. I… You’re drunk, right? Really drunk? Then you’ll forget when I say that I love you… But I do. I think. Why? You feel special to me. There’s a warmth in your face that I can see and feel, that doesn’t exist anywhere else. That I’ve never seen…”

He pulled his body through the sweater, wrapping Trisha in it before laying down next to her.
”I won’t say it tomorrow, or… Any time soon. Because you know now. I’ll save it.”
Pulling her tightly, he crawled into bed on his side to cradle her like a big spoon as he spun her entirely.

The little, drunken cog in Trisha’s brain was slowly turning and processing what he said. She had to let go to know he wasn’t going to leave? But- but then what would stop him from leaving? He didn’t want to… was that enough? He- he loved her? What. She didn’t understand, she wasn’t warm, where did that warmth come from?
“Okay… now I know…” she said softly, wriggling back against him and putting her hands on his arms. She felt safe again. A temporary, nice safety. He wasn’t going to leave tonight.

“I’ll try to be better,” she said quietly, a drunken promise that she wouldn’t be able to keep.
“Nobody ever lets me try.”

Casey’s chest heaved hearing her say that.
”Well… I’m here, Trisha. I’m here for you to try and try and try again. Your life isn’t on the line. Not because of it… We can just keep trying, Trisha. It’s great…”
His hand ran through her hair, the other one gently rubbing her stomach as she laid upon it.
”I’ll always be here. I promise.”

A sober promise that he’d break himself in half to keep.

Iron and Honey: A Love Story [FernStone & AtomicEmperor]

A few more hours passed. Casey was done before they bled out of daylight, and Trisha had been able to move out into the main part of the house. There was another sofa and a couple of loveseats nearby the warmth of the gas fireplace for her to study at while Casey let the guys from downstairs wire in the television and anchor it to the wall.
All the while, sixty thousand bees buzzed in cacophony over their heads, the unstoppable noise of the hive filling the place. The two of them had time to discuss the finer points of the Greenhouse, and Trisha had voiced some concerns about the ideas that The Temple had for her harvesting. With no boxes, it would be an incredibly cursed job as she tried to break into established wild hives high up giant flowers just to get the product.

Plus, from what she made it sound like, the Queen liked to be involved with harvest, and that meant Trisha had to be easily involved. To Casey, this meant hive boxes were necessary, and to get the buzzing of prop-bombers out of his head, he had to get the people responsible involved as soon as possible. Unfortunately for Trisha, that meant one last set of introductions for the day.
Not but thirty seconds after he sent a text to Gin asking about hive boxes, she responded.

He was in the kitchen area, munching on what fruit remained after the bees’ bombarding brunch. Eyes widened as he read the text message.

”Aw, shit… Babe? I maybe fucked up a little?” he spoke with a questioning tone.
”You remember you said you really wanted boxes? I texted Gin to tell her… And now she says she’s, like, on her way?”
Casey’s phone dinged again.
”She says… I’ll be there in twenty minutes. And then she just sent another one saying I was born ready. Which is… Ominous.” he grimaced.

“Twenty minutes?!” Trisha dropped the manual that she was still poring over, now mostly figuring out the final details. The bees reacted to her sudden panic with a louder buzzing, a large group of them descending from the rafters to swarm around her shoulders. One hand went to her neck, now crawling with bees. It wasn’t that she was embarrassed about it, just…
“I’ve barely started unpacking, I have no idea where my scarf is… maybe I can use the bees… Uh, maybe it doesn’t matter, I don’t know… Twenty minutes? What’s she ready for?!”

She jumped up off the sofa she’d been lounging on, darting into the bathroom and leaving a trail of bees in her wake. After some barely audible swearing she came back out, dragging herself over to Casey with an expression closer to pained acceptance than panic.
”What’s… well how intrusive is Gin? Is she just going to come and magic up some boxes, or will she start questioning me about everything?”

Casey found himself grinning at a scene he probably shouldn’t have grinned at. She was flustered, worried about her space being invaded, and all he could do was find a giggle in his heart.
”Well, I… I think I mentioned, but she kind of treats everyone like a specimen before she treats them like a friend? I’m sure she’ll mostly ask about logistical questions between you and the bees. My hope is that she’s too distracted by needing to get boxes taken care of? I’m… Not sure what the fuck she’s going to do about that in twenty minutes; her powers have nothing to do with fabrication.”

The accompanying shrug was resignatory, mostly out of confusion mixed with a lack of ability to do anything about it. The two attendants had gone back to their own apartments for the day, leaving Trisha and Casey alone to handle whatever needed to be taken care of.

”I’m sorry, Babe, I… Just kind of figured you’d want to get the girls settled properly as soon as possible, so I texted her. I should’ve known she’d be too eager.”

Trisha shook her head, stepping closer and tucking herself against his side with a sigh.
“It’s fine, I will be a lot more relaxed when they’ve got somewhere to stay… Sometimes you have to sacrifice your own comfort for your kids,” she half joked, raising a hand to rub her forehead. At least she’d had a nap earlier, otherwise she wouldn’t be able to handle it at all. “If it’s mostly questions about me and the bees, that’s easy. So long as she does sort something out for them.”

She leaned into him more, mumbling, “I can’t wait for everything to be sorted so it’s really just the two of us.”

Casey laughed aloud, but still comfortingly rubbed her shoulders.
”Oh, dude… Wrong family to shack up with.”

---

Twenty minutes rolled around, and there was a buzzing coming from [i]somewhere[i] in the house. Casey didn’t particularly care for that, the doorbell being some aggressive alarm bell hidden in the walls. It made him think of air raids and shit he didn’t want to think about so suddenly. So he elected to head out and down to open the door.
At least the courtesy was there.

Returning, Casey was accompanied by a short, brown-skinned woman whose hair was impossibly long and tied up into several different loops that dangled behind her. She wore an ensemble of masculine clothing, mostly stylized to resemble some kind of rave fashion. It was all way too big for her, purposefully ripped or half-stitched in a lazy repair.
Most notably was the laboratory coat she wore over it all, with the sleeves rolled up no less.

Casey and the woman, presumably Gin, made their way to the Greenhouse to meet Trisha. He didn’t even have time to make proper introductions.
”Ooooh, Puh-puh puh pmmpmmm… Puh-Trish-a!” the young woman stuck both her fingers out into finger guns.
”And… What? Sixty… Sixty two thousand, four hundred and thirty-six bees in the colony. Random guess, I’ve got no clues; hey! Hi. It’s really nice to meet you.”

It certainly was the same voice from the manual, the one that had given such a professional introduction. She wobbled awkwardly, and certainly didn’t make any kind of direct eye contact. It was easy to feel like she was stealing glances.
”Can… I touch them?” she bluntly asked, nervous energy bubbling over.

“The bees?” Trisha tilted her head, shooting a questioning glance at Casey. Well, he had said she’d that Gin would treat her like a specimen first. There was still a group of bees on her shoulders, gently buzzing.
“No, you can’t. They don’t like being touched by strangers.”

She then glanced up towards the ceiling, where the rest of the hive was primed and ready to come down at the sign of an intruder. It wasn’t like she could explain guests to them, it was always a process of calming them down at the time, which she did with subtle pheromones before continuing.
“There’s sixty thousand and forty five. Also, it’s just Trisha… Nice to meet you, Gin, I assume.”

She smiled slightly, trying not to immediately judge the other woman. She’d deal with quirky people. At least she was mostly asking about the bees… probably. So she decided just to get straight to business.
“Are you going to be able to set up hive boxes, or something similar?”

Gin’s hands were very clearly imagining touching the bees as she stared at the moving mounds on Trisha’s shoulders. Her fingers were wriggling, and she slowly but surely grew a big, foolish grin on her face.
”G’yad they… Look so soft. Are they? Uh, boxes.”

Her head, and to a lesser extent her shoulders, bobbed up and down in agreement.
”Kinda crazy they need boxes, huh? So you… Well… Come on, you have your key, right? Which biome will you populate first? I mean we’re going to get them all taken care of, but… No natural hives? Can we get natural hives? For testing; I… I’m unconvinced the production will be the same between artificial and natural designs.” she quickly turned her body, rigidly staring at her creation.

A grin formed on her face as she looked up at the building. Being shorter than Trisha even, it was like watching a teen see something they’d never seen for the first time.

“They’re soft,” Trisha said, even though the conversation had moved on about twenty steps since that question. She pulled the key out of her pant’s pocket, putting it in the Greenhouse door and turning it all the way to the right. It seemed the safest to start, and it was easier to just show it than explain which one. Once there was no more give she pushed open the door, once again revealing the wild meadow filled with towering flowers.

“It’s not that they can’t make natural hives… But there’s a few things that mean it won’t work.” Trisha reached up to gently touch the bees that had travelled in on her shoulders, obediently sitting there without immediately going for the feast in front of them.
“I need to visit the hive every couple of days. If it’s too high or out of the way I can’t do that. They- the bees and my apparition- prefer that I collect the honey. I could maybe direct them to make natural ones in reachable areas, but it would take them weeks anyway. Also, these bees have been together as a colony for ten years. They won’t separate unless their hive is too small… Maybe if I start getting more.”

She turned her head to look at Gin, shrugging.
“All the honey I’ve produced so far has been from a single hive box in my room.”

”You can’t just make more? These are… Really finicky. They’re like real bees, God…”
Entering into the Greenhouse, Gin looked around and smiled widely. At this point, the workings of the “machine” were mostly clear. They called it a machine, as it wasn’t exactly a structure.

It was, apparently, a small rotating set of tiny manicured gardens made by some of the different Green and Red Adept students. The actual covering for it was a magical housing that emulated a surrounding environment to keep the place temperature treated.
Coming into it from the entrance on the roof caused one to enter the machine at a miniaturised scale, giving it all the illusion of being a large plot of naturally grown land for the bees to live in.

Gin took up a walkie talkie from her coat.
”Gogo, can you hear me? We’re here.”
Now the true scale of things became clear. One side of the sky opened up like a sliding roof, a grand noise grating across the top. They could see the workshop of the Temple outside, and it was all enormous like celestial giants staring down into the little world they made.

Many people looked into their world, smiling faces and waving hands creating little gusts of air that whipped down toward them. Gin raised her hand to wave. There was a giant set of tweezers that descended from the heavens, planting down a large structure that seemed to be some kind of multi-story hive.
It was even designed interestingly, with carvings and a lacquered finish that gave it a striking appearance.

”Ooooh, I’m glad it came out so good. That lathe thing you made really does the trick.”
One of the giants was holding a radio, and rather than speak, she held her thumb up. Then, unceremoniously, the door was closed. Gin just turned her head to smile at Trisha.
”How about that? A hive bigger than you could ever need, with plenty of stairs and access points. We had originally planned to use these, but someone brought up naturalizing the areas… At some point, for us, it’d be nice to see a variety. To test if the honey comes out any different… I really hope it does.”

Trisha bristled at the suggestion that her bees were somehow lesser because they were finicky and like real bees. They were real bees that lived longer and came with more quirks because of it. They were her bees, not some worker bees for the Temple’s pet project or honey production. But she didn’t get a chance to say any of this before the roof opened.

She just stared up at the giant people, mouth falling slightly open. Was that how they’d originally planned to get the honey? By just reaching in and plucking out her bee’s hard work? They weren’t going to be watching from up there anytime she was in here, were they? She bit her lip, suppressing a shudder at the thought.

Now wasn’t the time to think too hard about that. Without saying anything Trisha approached the hive, squinting at it. It was… massive. Way bigger than her. Big enough to host a colony of bees likely ten times the size of what she had. And it was really nice.
“It’s good, but it doesn’t really matter how much I like it… they’re the real test.” She didn’t move or verbally talk for a few moments, instead having a gentle pheromonal conversation with the bees. She didn’t want to command them to go inside. Instead, she told them that it was their new hive. They were hesitant at first, but eventually the ones she’d brought in - only about fifty - flew off her shoulders and inside.

Trisha’s expression changed as the bees explored, going from slightly grumpy to a small smile to a wide grin and laughter. It was like she was having a conversation no one else could hear - she was, as much as was possible with the bees. They flew back to her in dribs and drabs, landing all over. They burrowed into the bun she’d pulled her hair up into, back to her shoulders, across her arms, little bodies gently wriggling.
“It passed the test,” she turned back to Gin with a smile, bees crawling all over her. They were clearly re-energised, and less wary of the newcomer. “In the future we can try some natural hives, when they’re more settled. They’ve all just been uprooted at a time of year where they normally just sleep… Just getting honey production going is already a lot to ask of them.”

As she spoke she turned around and stepped out of the Greenhouse.
“We can discuss it some other time… I want to get the bees settled now.” She tilted her head and closed her eyes for a moment. As she did, a very faint, floral scent filled the air as she sent out a careful, strict command to the bees in the house. The buzzing only got louder until thousands of bees flooded out. Her eyes opened and went to the sky with a tired smile as as many as possible landed on her. The rest hovered around her in a cacophonous, fuzzy cloud.
“Oh… Thanks for sorting the box out so quickly, Gin.”

Gin was clearly lost in the cloud of bees, her bespectacled eyes reflecting the artificial light beaming down upon them. She stared wordlessly, fingers twitching until a hand grabbed at the bottom of her coat in a death grip.
”I… Wanna pet them…”

Casey was still standing by her, and as he heard Gin speak, he recognized the tone.
”Ginara…-” his voice rumbled, catching her ear and forcing her head to turn in some sort of acknowledgement.
”-If you try to touch them, they'll hurt you. And if they hurt you, you'll be very upset, won't you?”

She nodded, still straining slightly against him, prompting him to get even closer.
”If you're upset, you'll try to hurt the bees. I know you. I don't want that to happen. Because if you do that, and you hurt the bees? You'll hurt Trisha. And you definitely don't want Trisha hurt, right?”
She shook her head again, sniffling as she became more frustrated at the situation.

”B-but… I made bee suits! For people who don't have bees! Or metal skin!”
He wasn't sure how to defuse her like this. She'd never been his favorite person to deal with, mostly for moments like these where he could tell she was winding up for an episode. It wasn't really her fault, and he did his best to remind himself of it as he found Gin going slowly down hill.

”Hey, Babe?” he called, waiting for her gaze before he bit his lip and did his best to subtly nod downward at the woman half tucked into his arms. She was longingly staring at the cloud of bees, very openly teary eyed.
”I'm… Just gonna bring Gin outside. I think it's probably just uh… Like, overstimulation. I'll see if we can't just say our goodbyes for now.”

Gin stomped a foot weakly.
”I made the fucking… Bee suits.”
”I know, Gin, but it's getting late, Honey Lover. We can't all be doing experiments at all hours of the day and night.-”
Casey turned his back, assuming Trisha would understand the circumstance, and stepped out of the well manicured Eden-esque garden to leave her alone with her bees.

Trisha raised a hand in a half wave, trying not to feel too irritated about the whole situation. The bees weren't like dogs, happy to be petted and enjoying it. They liked the closeness with her and to some degree people that could sense she liked. Anyone else… Well, it was intrusive in a way. The bees were both like her children and an extension of herself. It wasn't like any of them had asked her before making the bee suits. They weren't even necessary.

It was annoying. Why did Gin have to be so unreasonable about it… meaning Casey had to deal with it and leave Trisha alone. On their move in day. She'd already interrupted them, not she was throwing some kind of tantrum over not being able to touch the bees? Trisha couldn't even imagine being that unreasonable. Gin was lucky Casey was able to handle it or she would've ended up stung by bees… Trisha let out a sharp huff of air, causing the bees on her face to scatter.

“Yeah, yeah, let's get you all sorted," she muttered, holding out her hand to the bees that had just flown off her. They landed back on it and joined the mass of yellow and black crawling over it. The bees kept swapping out with the massive cloud behind her, darting on and off her body. They followed her as she led them over to the hive, going up one of the steps so she was slightly higher on it.
“This is your new home. Pretty nice, isn't it? Sorry I couldn't provide something like this before."

Of course, the bees didn't understand what she said. She communicated as much as she could across the pheromones, reaching out to touch the hive box as she lightly bathed the area in her pheromones. Marking it as a safe place and as their new hive. The fifty that had already been in went in immediately, while the others were reluctant to leave the comfort of her. Eventually, the rest started to trickle in. She didn't leave as soon as all of them had gone in, squatting beside the hive box and carefully sensing their pheromones. It was overwhelming when it was so many, bombarding her with a mixture of signals, but concentrating she could pick through it. As the bees explored their mood shifted from hesitant to content, in as much as bees could feel that way. It was only when she was confident they were settled, and prepared to go about their normal bee business, that she straightened back up. Her mood was slightly improved by the pleased scents washing over her. At least the bees were happy.

After one last check, Trisha turned around and left the Greenhouse. As she closed the door her mind was cleared off the constant signals she'd been bombarded with since bringing the bees in. It left room for other thoughts that she tried not to even start considering. Instead, she turned away from the Greenhouse, eyes quickly skimming over her surroundings.
“Casey?"

Casey was by the entrance to the roof, still talking to Gin. It seemed a lot more casual now, and if they were hanging around by the door it had to mean he was trying to get rid of her. As Trisha said his name, both of them looked up. Casey was all smiles, but Gin’s face curled into a hint of a frown.
”Hey Pretty Lady!” he called, waving her over. His hand popped up to gently rub Gin’s shoulder, and she seemed to perk up slightly by the time Trisha made it to them.
”Sorry, I figured it’d be best if we stayed out here, but-”

”I’m sorry!”
Gin bowed. Literally bowed, like she was some zealous anime character, with full bodily rigidity like her torso had become a stiff plank.
”I… Am sorry. I’m sorry. And-and, I called you Patricia… And I’m sorry. And, I’m sorry that we didn’t put- that we didn’t just put, put the fuckin’... The boxes. In. The Machine. They’re special to you, and… And I’m sorry…”

She didn’t look up. Couldn’t. She knew what was happening, and that there was plenty of things about her that weren’t like others. But Casey had made it expressly clear that Trisha wasn’t a part of the family like the others were.
So rather than confiding in her strangeness, as Lynette encouraged, she found embarrassment and shame: both tenants that members of the Temple were supposedly immune to. God watched, but she was taught that he did not judge. That he’d resigned from such petty things.

Yet she was embarrassed about herself. And as such, she could not bring herself to look up and see the judgement in Trisha’s eyes. The same judgement that all outsiders gave her.

“Huh?” Trisha was taken aback when Gin started apologising for literally everything. And she bowed. What the fuck? Suddenly she felt more confused than she did annoyed, looking over at Casey with a bit of helplessness in her gaze, and then back at Gin. There wasn’t the judgement that Gin expected in there - just remaining hints of sullenness. Really, she was taken aback by the apology. Normally her irritation was the thing viewed as unreasonable, even if it really wasn’t.
“I don’t care about most of that stuff. Wasn’t like you could’ve known I need to get the honey, or said my full name to annoy me… I just don’t like other people touching the bees. It’s not happening. But the rest is fine. I’m not bothered.”

She was reacting pretty reasonably to it all. Really, it was hard not to in the face of an apology like that. There was nothing to react badly to, and… it really didn’t seem like it had been done on purpose. Not that that had stopped Trisha getting pissed before, but… she glanced up at Casey, lips twitching upwards slightly. Yeah, she could be reasonable about this.
“But I accept that apology.” She awkwardly gestured upwards with her hand, hoping that Gin would get the message and stop bowing, because it was uncomfortable. “You did a lot for my bees, more than most have.”

Casey gave Trisha the warmest, most loving look he possibly could. As if his soul was touched by the act, he took a deep breath and appeared renewed.
”Ah, see Ginny? Come on, Honey, stand up straight.”
The woman did, but her neck still craned downward to avoid eye contact that she wasn’t sure she could bear. But she still had questions, and it wasn’t in her nature to leave them unasked.

”I… Can I… Come back? For inspections, I mean, I may need to come back. And, maybe I can come back other times, like to see them… And I can put the bee suit on, so they can’t hurt me, and maybe… Maybe they’ll touch me?”
She had to see honesty, or at least whether or not there was any, so the risk had to be made. She looked up finally, eyes meeting Trisha’s.

“Well sure, I guess,” Trisha said, after thinking about it for a bit. It wasn’t like it would be a problem for someone else to see the bees, so long as she wasn’t trying to get into the hive or touch them herself. And if Trisha was going to be in Casey’s life for a long time, like she really hoped to, she should make an effort with the people he cared about at least a bit.
“So long as you put the bee suit on. It’s probably fine if I’m there, but I can’t guarantee it when there’s so many. Maybe I can show you how I get the honey… and yeah, if you spend enough time around them, they might eventually land on you. They’re not like dogs or anything, you can’t just touch them unless you’re me or-” she coughed. “Smell enough like me.”

Her cheeks heated up a bit at saying that, and she glanced away. It was less smelling like her in, say, the genetic sense as much as being doused by pheromones that only the bees could smell.
“I’ll probably need your help to figure out everything with the Greenhouse anyway.”

There was another buzzer coming from the house. It was loud enough to hear outside, which was both concerning and frustrating for Casey. He’d have to ask for a better option later on, but for now-
”What the ever fuck? Come on, Gin, I guess I’ll swap you with-”
She held her hand up.
”It’s Leon. And the girls. They have… Flowers, and wine, and-” her brow furrowed. ”-Both spirits are withdrawn. The Queen and The Doll have been suppressed for the time.”

Casey nodded. His face turned up to Trisha and his head shook.
”No peace. No fuckin’ peace, Bee. Stay here.”
He opened the door and slipped through, closing it behind him to leave Trisha and Gin alone. The odd woman just stared at the door. But, then she managed to look at Trisha again. She hadn’t felt the judgement she expected, and she found herself a bit more comfortable.

”Casey said you’d, or that you do, play games? Do you have a Turbine account?” she asked.

Trisha was also staring at the door with an increasingly irate look, snapping out of it when she realised Gin was talking to her. Obviously. Who else would she be talking to when Casey had just left.
“Oh yeah, I do. I normally just play occasionally with friends, whatever they’re into, or the occasional Sims for stress relief. I’m not particularly good at it, but it’s pretty fun.” She shrugged. “When I’m not getting cursed out for dying to a zombie.”

She nodded to herself. It was hard to hold back and assess the first statement that came to her mind. But she knew from dealing with some of the others in the Eden Project that calling someone’s tastes basic wasn’t a nice thing to do.
”Well, if… I come around, and you like me, maybe we’ll be friends who play games together too. I’m uh, trying to work with some of my crew on this new machine. One day maybe you’ll have one to replace your computer. And when the End passes, we’ll still be able to play games.” she grinned proudly.

The door opened to the sound of talking and giggling. Mia’s lanky frame was the first through to the roof, and she looked between Trisha and Gin.
”Damn, Casey, the Lord let you have two of my favorite people?”
Gin was surprised, like she didn’t know exactly who was coming, and clung to Mia like a child clings to an older sibling. Mia clung back, but didn’t try to rope Trisha into it. Rather, she gave a big wave as best she could.
”We brought some housewarming stuff… I know you must be tired, but we figured we’d try not to be too bothersome.”

As Mia spoke, the others funneled in. Hari, Eddy, Leon; each carried a bundle of something or another. Leon was actually carrying several cases of wine on his shoulders. Casey came last, pushing past them all.

”Hey… Happy surprise housewarming…” Leon said, his deep and bass-filled voice rumbled. Gin immediately clung to him, and he laughed in return as his tall frame swayed with the boxes on his shoulders.
Casey cleared his throat as an arm wrapped around Trisha’s waist.
”Only if you are okay with it.” he pointed out.

”Totally true! Like, we know you guys have probably been working all day. But, we just figured we’d come up and do something low-key.”
She held up a cloth case, probably some sort of insulated bag for food.
”Buttload of sushi- I mean, a boatload. A few actually, like have you seen those things?” she smiled.

It was a lot all at once after a day that had already been a lot. The girls were fine, if overwhelming. She’d gotten along well enough with Mia so far, and figured it would be the same with the other two that she hadn’t talked to as much. But then there was Leon. She bit her lip, looking up at Casey and leaning against him slightly. Sure it was only if she was okay with it, but he might be disappointed if she said no.

Also, she really should have a talk with Leon… as much as she didn’t want to.
“Sure, it’s fine, I guess a housewarming is the done thing, right?” she forced a smile, gaze shifting to Hari and the probably food filled bags. She very awkwardly and obviously avoided looking at Leon. “That doesn’t look like a boatload- don’t tell me the bags are larger on the inside? Right, of course, magic.” She laughed lightly at that, looking back up at Casey. “But we don’t have a big enough table… or a proper table. I guess we can sit on the couches, like a TV dinner?”

Eddy raised her hands with two more matching bags.
”We usually do body sushi, so I think eating wherever is chill.”
Hari elbowed her, laughing.
”Excuse you, what happens at home?”
”Is usually pretty fuckin’ awesome, yeah!”

Mia groaned.
”Ooooooh my Lord you two. Come on. Lets get this stuff inside, and nobody tell Trisha about the bags or anything.”
”Shit, forreal, unload them bitches, ‘fore she has a heart attack.” Ed cracked up, feeling the extra weight of the magically stuffed bags.

Rolling his eyes, Casey’s head shook and he called out to them.
”Yeah, go be useful for a change, bring me my fuckin’ gifts.”
”Shut uuuuuuuup oh my God you’re so annoying!” Hari cackled.
The three women chatted until the door to the house closed behind them, and probably continued on after. A silence grew, with Gin still clinging to Leon like a barnacle.

Casey looked at his brother, then down at their old friend with a smile.
”Recharging, Ginny?”
”Oh, I’m pretty good now!” she said loud and clear, despite her face buried in Leon’s gut.
”That’s great, G’s and P’s… Are you hungry, have you eaten?” Leon asked in his best big brother voice.
”I could eat some rice. But, uh, does that mean I can stay, Trisha?” she finally turned her head back to look at Trisha from the safety of the totem pole.

“Yeah, you can, sounds like we’ll need help with the food, anyway,” Trisha nodded, smiling slightly at Gin - appearing genuinely fine with it. The smile dropped as her eyes creeped upward to Leon, gaze turning flinty. “You’re not the person I’m uncomfortable having in my house.”

Leon’s face turned a bit mugged, his bottom lip curling into a frown as he furrowed his brow.
”See? Easy. Go on, get you some food, eh?”
Gin spun to hug Trisha, but Casey’s hand shot out to grab her by the lab coat.
”Hey, hey… You go wash first, and take this dirty ass jacket off. We’ll wash it before you go.”
Standing caught, she looked back at Casey.
”You can’t, it’s covered in a special microbe we’re developing… But I will take it off.”

He vaguely directed her toward the house, letting her go like a pull and release car toy. Now it was only three of them, and a bit of tension. Casey stared up at his older brother expectantly.
”Do I need to be here with you both to settle this? Or are you both gonna act like Covenmates?”

Leon shook his head.
”Oh, dude I have nothing to say that I wouldn’t say in front of you. I totally leave that up to Trisha’s discretion.” he replied.

“If we act like covenmates we’ll start fighting as soon as you’re out of sight,” Trisha managed to joke, still staring coldly at Leon. She’d rather just avoid this all together. She wasn’t one for civility but… she needed to force herself this time. She put one hand over Casey’s, squeezing it, and looked up at him. Her expression instantly softened, eyes turning warm instead of cold.
“I’d like to talk to Leon alone if that’s alright, babe? Not because it’s anything I don’t want you to hear just…”

Casey threw his hand up.
”No questions asked, Babe. You’re a grown woman, right? I trust you. And, I trust my Brother to not do something stupid.”
He held up a finger.
”But if I hear yelling, I’m coming out.”

He then motioned toward the boxes and waved for Leon to pass them off, which he did. Casey made way to kiss Trisha, and whispered in her ear as he did so.
”You’ve got this. Brave as fuck.”
He planted another kiss on her neck for good measure, then sauntered off toward the house leaving them alone.

For a moment the silence hung.
”Do… You want to start? Or…”

“I’ll start.” Trisha tilted her head back so she could properly stare at Leon, eyes still cold but more emotionless than anything. “I don’t like you, and I know you don’t like me. But I do like Casey, so I want to be civil. I’m not fourteen anymore, I have matured. But…”

She trailed off, frowning, folding her arms with her fingers digging into her biceps.
“Stop spreading shit about me. To Casey, to that b- people in the Temple. It’s been ten years… and you know it’s really fucked that you’re talking about all of that stuff, with that nickname, about someone who was fourteen when you were nineteen. You don’t have to like me, you can go do whatever with the rest of Sycamore, but I’m not going to break up with Casey, as much as you might want that.”

It was clear as day, watching the man before her practically deflate.
”Dude…”
He tried to start, but his own thoughts grabbed at him.
”You know, I really didn’t feel too bad until I tried to get into my apartment and you were there. Honestly, I thought… I… Damn.”

His big hand went up to rub his eyes and the bridge of his nose.
”I’m… A dick. I’m a big dick, and it’s not your fault. The blame’s mine. I should’ve tried getting to know you and helping you rather than giving into those moments of being a lesser person. It’s not fair to you. Ultimately, I can’t take back what I said. But, I’m more than willing to do what it takes to show you I mean it when I say that I’m sorry.”

By the time he finished, he was looking at her with full eye contact and a genuine look of remorse on his face.
”I was embarrassed by our Mother when I got back yesterday… She really dragged me for quite a few hours. She feels I gave her the wrong impression, and I think I did.”

“Yeah, the impression that I’m some shallow rich girl who sleeps around,” Trisha intoned, expression unchanged and gaze unwavering. While it was true she jumped between relationships, it wasn’t her fault people kept breaking up with her… but she was surprised Leon was admitting that he was to blame. She’d expected, and geared up for, more of a fight over it.
“It’s fine, you probably just thought you were protecting your little brother from scary, promiscuous me.”

She frowned, looking away for a moment to take a deep breath before she got more riled up over nothing. She was trying to be civil with him, to talk things out, and he wasn’t being shit about it.
“Let me make it clear, I don’t need help… and I didn’t then, either. But for Casey’s sake, I’ll put it all behind me. Get to know me as your brother’s partner, get rid of what you think you know about me and… I’ll try to do the same. I don’t want this, and the coven, to get in the way of something… really good.”

Leon grimaced, and his hair rippled for a moment as a gust of wind whipped up. He was listening for a little song that he could almost always hear. At least where they were, it was faint enough that he knew he could speak freely.
”I’m gonna get you both out of this…” he said very ominously.

Trisha furrowed her brow, not saying anything as she tried to figure out what he was going to get them out of. Not Father Wolf, because he wasn’t targeting Casey. Then… it didn’t take much to figure it out. There wasn’t very much that they were in.
“Of the cult?” Trisha didn’t bother censoring herself, following Leon’s lead on that. “Well, if you think you can. I don’t-”
She grimaced.
“Well, I don’t understand the faith thing. You’d know better than me… it’s Casey who’s in it, and I can’t do anything about that.”

”Just… Please don’t eat the food. Not now, but… Well… Just, eat out. Don’t eat the groceries from the Temple. Don’t drink their free water bottles. Don’t go to the banquets. Because Casey’s had a long time to detox, and you’re not part of the family… But, Me? Mia and the girls? Ginny?...” he grimaced.
”It’s not good, Trisha.” he finally frowned. ”I don’t want him or you getting hooked in like us.”

“The food has something in it? Shit- fucking magic,” Trisha raised on hand to her forehead, pressing against it. She suppressed a shudder. Really, she shouldn’t be surprised, but everything she learned about the Temple just made her like it less. The self protective part of herself was telling her just to cut and run, but she ignored it. They weren’t properly in.

“Alright. Far as I’m aware, neither of us can cook, so that’s easy. I’m also an expert at avoiding events I don’t want to go to. But…” she frowned. It all sounded shit, but she didn’t care to try help the others out. What would she be able to do anyway? “He’s not going to just leave you all. I’m not selfish enough to force that.”

She was selfish enough to force that, but she was also selfish enough to not do something she knew wouldn’t work.
“I’ll keep us away from the food.”

”We’re gonna have to work together. I don’t know every single detail myself; Mom’s a steel trap. But, maybe I’ll be able to get us all out of it, and we’ll be able to live without…”
He stopped himself, shaking his head.
”For now, just be leery. He’s a soldier, he takes orders well. If you need to be forceful, be forceful. But, don’t hurt him. Not too bad, at least. He’s already hurt…”

Leon stuck his hand out for Trisha to shake.

“I don’t plan to hurt him at all.”
She reached out to shake his hand, though it was kind of difficult when her hand was so much smaller than his. But it was done, and she pulled her hand back, stuffing it in her pocket.

“I’d say let's work together like old times, but I’d rather it wasn’t like that.” Trisha laughed, relaxing slightly. “You can get my number off Casey, or I’ll give it to you later… For now, let’s go in. It’s been a long day and I need some of that sushi.”

Assuming the conversation was over and that he’d follow, she turned around and made her way back to the house. As she got to the door she paused, one hand going to her neck. She’d only gotten away with it so far because it was dimly lit outside, but in the bright indoor lights? Trisha grimaced. Shit. Why did people keep appearing without warning? She raised a hand to undo her bun, letting her thick hair fall down across her shoulders. She quickly moved it to cover as much of her neck as possible… it would have to do.

Then she pushed open the door and stepped inside, smiling. “Is there any food still left? I’m kicking you out if you ate it all.”

As Trisha entered, there was a commotion as the four young women bustled about the kitchen island. They’d laid all sorts of sushi rolls and different tempura fried things out on the big counter.
Casey was suspiciously missing, but the boxes of wine were stacked up against one of the walls, and there were a couple of bags next to it. Ginny was standing off to one side with an entire takeaway container full of white rice, smashing it into her face with a pair of chopsticks. She took the time to wave at Trisha with a smile.

”Hell nah, girl! Dig in, there’s honestly way too much.” Mia called, waving her into the melee.
Getting closer, Hari was hard at work chopping up a few whole sushi rolls and dumping them into a bowl. She grinned goofily at Trisha as she came close.

”Hey… Do you love your boyfriend enough to chop up his fucking sushi rolls for him because he won’t eat them whole?” she snidely commented, a laugh escaping her nostrils. ”-God, he’s a pain in the ass…”
Her tone was very clearly humorous, and she was talking loud enough that the joke clearly wasn’t just between the two of them.

”Nobody asked you to chop my fucking sushi up, Harison Ford.” Casey called from the other room.
”Oh, who made the comment about being useful?”
He came down the stairs from their loft and into the main room in a pair of comfortable shorts and a t-shirt.
”Yeah, useful. Not busybody work bullshit.”

Casey pulled Trisha into his arms and kissed her head. Nobody’d really looked up at the two of them long enough to notice, but as Casey jostled Trisha, it left most of her neck exposed to a beam of light.
The actions of their morning were in clear view as black and blue leopard printing all across Trisha’s neck and upper chest.

Of course, Eddy grinned.
”Shit, so Trisha? Leon’s a werewolf, right? You know, but, I didn’t… I didn’t realize Casey’s a vampire too; that’s kinda crazy.”
Mia looked up, furrowing her brow at Eddy before looking over and immediately laughing.

”Oh, oh! Oh damn girl!”

The hair covering had worked perfectly until Casey started moving her- well that wasn’t true, it was never going to last. She turned bright red, just wanting to disappear right there. She wasn’t embarrassed about it, it was just… really fucking awkward. She grabbed one of Casey’s arms and pulled it up to cover her face, pressing her nose into it with a groan.
“Next time I’m putting on a turtleneck right after in case we get more unexpected guests,” she muttered into his arm.

Blushing a little less, she peered over Casey’s arm at Mia and Eddy.
“If Casey was a vampire then I’d be dead,” she said very bluntly. “Just- we weren’t expecting guests! It’s only… well… new home and all…”

She tilted her head back and up to shoot a playful glare at Casey.
“You are so sleeping on the couch tonight.”

Hari lifted her arm and tugged her sleeve to show a stretch of bruising down her side.
”Oh, dude, don’t even worry about it. You should see where else I’m black and blue, seriously.” she said, smiling at Trisha.
”Yo, forreal. Coo-”
Mia’s hand darted to Eddy’s mouth to stop her from following through with the worst of the worst. Laughter rolled across the island, and Hari finally held up a big bowl of chopped sushi to Casey.
”There. Eat, Beast, eat!”

They were very clearly trying to be genuine, and Leon piped up from the side.
”It’s no problem, Trisha. It’s really to make fun of Casey; like, dude, you can’t get the blood through the skin. You need to bite.”
Casey groaned, putting the bowl down and holding Trisha tighter.
”Jesus, please take me, I can’t deal with this.” he giggled alongside her.

Trisha burst out laughing at Leon’s… well she couldn’t tell if he was joking or being serious. But it was just, wow, she really couldn’t hold back at that.
“Do not get any ideas from him,” she said through the laughter, wriggling in his arms to just about pull out an arm and point a finger at Leon. “I’ve seen your room, I really don’t want you giving Casey any advice. No thank you.”

She pulled her arm back into the tight hug, tilting her head back again and managing to stretch up enough to kiss his chin… before very lightly biting it. A warning, maybe. Her lips curved into a smile as she pulled back, head moving back to a more comfortable position.
“Do I get to eat, or I am going to be stuck in a sushi-less hold the rest of the night?”

Casey giggled, contemplating whether or not he was just going to hold her and feed her sushi. But looking down at the hunks of red and pink meat within made him queasy. So, he let her go with a smile.
”To be fair, he couldn’t learn anything from me that our Mom hasn’t mentioned at least once.”

The entire room gagged in unison at the prospects.
”Lee, we’re trying to eat.”
He was laughing hard, shaking his head.
”Thinking about sex ed or something?”
Casey’s hand flew up, smacking Leon in the arm.
”Sex ed is that picture that was in the living room.”

Mia only groaned louder.
”Do we need to bring that painting up so fucking much?”
”Are you not traumatised by it?” Casey asked.
”I’m not.” Eddy grinned and giggled.

”Okay… I’m ashamed to say I’ve seen enough hentai to know where this dinner is going.”
Gin pushed off the wall she was eating her rice on and put the empty box down on the counter.
”Eden calls me.”
Hari nearly spat the sushi she was eating out.

”O-oh?! I mean, probably not going there?” Hari managed to reply through grains of rice.
”Etienne is always willing for things to go there.” Eddy cackled, sticking her tongue out.

“No way, absolutely no way is that happening,” Trisha said before it got any further. She really wished she didn’t know the implication here. It wasn’t so weird to her that they were openly talking about this stuff, but rather that they were joking about it. In her family it was all jabs, open or hidden, or the hushed comments from outsiders (and some of them) about their dad. About how many ‘took after him.’
“Not in my house. You can take that downstairs.”

She picked up a piece of sushi, nibbling on it for a moment. Pretty good, but she didn’t really have much of an appetite. Then again, when did she?
“My sex ed wasn’t nearly as ‘fun.’ If we’d all learned from my dad there’d be another hundred or so Vanburen children running about the place. If there’d been a painting… he’d have to change it every few months.”

Trisha shrugged, speaking lightheartedly, munching on the sushi some more.
“Dunno, which is worse, crazy BDSM or getting dozens of women pregnant?”

”I’d say the kids, probably. I’m not super worried about carbon emission or anything, but more people definitely take up more resources, right?” Mia intoned in a questioning fashion.
As the discussion continued, Gin poked Trisha on the shoulder.
”Next time I do maintenance, I’ll call ahead. The schedule is in your manual, though. So, don’t be surprised. Thank you for letting me stay for now.”

Hari turned.
”Aw, Ginny, I’m sorry honey, I didn’t mean to make you feel uncomfortable…”
”Naw, it's… A calling, y’know?”

Trisha turned slightly to face Gin, smiling at her. She really… wasn’t so bad. There was a logic in what she said, sort of, that Trisha could follow.
“Yeah, I’ll make sure I have the schedule memorised. Maybe next time, after you’re done with maintenance, you can help me with a game I’ve been struggling with?”

”Oh, Hell yeah. You can just text it to me… Even if I don’t know it, I’ll play to help you.” she smiled.
”Can… I ask for a hug?” she questioned, arms not moving or anything to indicate that she actually wanted what she said.

Trisha hesitated, but… she’d already denied her touching the bees. It was just a hug. Not much.
“Sure, that’s fine.” She held up her arms awkwardly, but didn’t really move otherwise.

Gin jumped for it, nearly smacking Hari with one of her arms too far outstretched. There was laughter, and Mia gave a great “Awwwww” as they merged for the hug. When she pulled away, she had a bright smile.
”One day, maybe we can use my projector to study Her Royal Highness. But, until then-” she pulled away fully and made way for her nasty lab coat on the rack.
”-Eden caaaaaaaaalls!”

The group unanimously said their goodbyes, and were left with a hushed atmosphere.
”Does she really watch hentai?” Hari broke finally, clearing her throat.
”Get your filthy mind away from that pure, innocent pervert.” she laughed.
”She is an adult, after all.” Casey retorted.
”Yeah, I mean… Well, whatever.”

Mia pointed outside at the Greenhouse.
”How is it, Trisha? The crazy Eden-in-a-Box shit they’ve got going on? I saw Sayne working on it last night.” she questioned, doing her best to steer far and away from the topic threatening their sanctity.

“It’s honestly amazing. Kind of hard to put into words, but I’m not really used to magic like that.” Trisha smiled, subconsciously reaching out for a hint of pheromones from her bees. There was a light scent that she could always sense, the tether between them, that let her know they were alright.
“The bees are still settling in, but once they’re done, I’m sure they’ll be happy to have something to do. They get bored over winter… you don’t want to deal with bored bees.”

She forced herself to pick up another piece of sushi, taking a tiny bite, quickly swallowing it.
“I’m glad Gin got a normal hive box in quickly so I don’t have to scale any tree sized flowers trying to collect honey.”

Ed poked her head around the island to look outside.
”What is it?” she asked with confusion in her voice.
”Mia already said. EIAB.” Leon responded, using the phonetic acronym for the project.
”Oh shit! That thing, with… Like the little gardens, right?”
Harri nodded in confirmation.
”Yeah, the last trial was for long term residency, so we know that living things can live in there pretty much like normal. Now it’s kind of like, just dealing with the casing and stuff. Sayne says its crazy that they’re doing all this for some honey, but you know Gin.”

The Templites nodded in unison, the boxes of sushi slowly but surely emptying as they continued to stuff their faces. Casey was almost through his bowl, and was visibly leaning back to fit the last bit.
”We, or at least I, think it’s super fucking awesome, Trisha. Any sort of modifications that need being done can be done by hand remotely. It’s a pretty interesting looking thing, maybe we can go in sometime.” Hari tossed the idea about, seeing where it’d land.

Trisha had only gotten through two pieces of sushi and a tempura, before she stopped eating. She’d swapped from holding food to rubbing Casey’s shoulder, as if that would somehow help him in his goal of eating everything in his bowl.

At Hari’s suggestion, she glanced over at Leon for a moment, then over to Hari.
“I saw that earlier. Made me feel a bit like I was in some movie…” Honestly, she hadn’t liked it at all. Practical, but intrusive, they could just open up the Greenhouse roof anytime to look and reach inside.
“I’m the kind of person that likes to stay down on the ground, honestly. I didn’t grow up around magic so I’m not… so used to it. Maybe once I adjust more, but if you guys go up there, I can wave to you from inside.”

”Oh, man… You know you can’t actually talk between the two areas? The box is in this, like, weird sleeve that sucks the sound up. I guess, if any noise from the big area got transferred through to the area that your bees are in, it turns it into this crazy compressed noise that could ruin it.”

Leon pushed air through his teeth, shaking his head.
”Gin’s going too far with that shit. The Richoux Tomes are not production manuals.”
Casey’s brow furrowed, and he put the bowl down. Hands reached back, finding a comfortable spot on her lower back.

”Why not? Nobody ever said two of the same artifact can’t exist. If you can make ten, why wouldn’t you?” he asked, his voice sincerely begging the question.

”The Order never used the exact same enchantments. This ‘Standard Template’ stuff just isn’t natural magic.” Leon shrugged.

Hari cleared her throat after having slammed another dozen pieces from the boxes.
”Blech, can you guys talk about cool shit for once?” Ed piped up, a bit of a giggle in her voice.
”Trisha? Can you tell us a story about normal life? Like, I know that sounds crazy, but-”
”Oh, she’s right. It is totally weird, but like, we… I guess what’s normal for us is probably really weird for you, right?” Mia included, appreciative of Ed’s abnormal tact.

“Oh, yeah, I didn’t even know about magic till I was thirteen,” Trisha shifted herself to better face Eddy, while leaning more into Casey’s side. A story about normal life… it was like being put on the spot a bit there. Childhood was a no go - it was all studying and fighting with half-siblings. Thinking about it, suddenly her whole life felt pretty boring to talk about.

“Well… So when I was in college, for my twenty-first birthday my friend’s decided we were going to go to twenty one bars to celebrate, have a drink at each. I was the last to be able to legally drink, so it was like a big celebration kind of thing. The plan was to go to a club at the end of it… It started out alright. My one friend, Nadiyah, had written out this entire schedule, down to the minute when we had to leave, and how long it’d take us to go between them. So it was like sit down, get a drink, drink it as fast as possible type deal. We started midday… It quickly went to shit. I think it was the fourth bar? I was already pretty drunk at that point because I kept just getting handed drinks, and another friend, Reyna, suggested we get food. But Diyah got all pissy about it because food wasn’t on the schedule for another two hours, and we couldn’t deviate from the schedule. Reyna isn’t really the type to fight, but Diyah wouldn’t let it go, and ended up just not talking to any of us. But she was the only one who knew where we were meant to be going, so… Oh yeah, well, I’m getting stuck too much on the details. We grabbed some food, then went to the another bar- except the one someone chose was down this creepy alley. It was- i dunno- weird. We didn’t stay long, moved on again- except when we got to the next place we realised we’d lost one of the guys, Sal.” She paused to take a breath, raising one hand to rub the back of her neck. “Sal’s like this loud, obnoxious guy who’s pretty hard to lose, but we managed it. We tried to phone him… but he’d given his phone to Reyna. We were all kind of hammered at that point, so we just kind of… assumed he’d died in that alley and continued. I don’t actually really remember what happened after that, but I was told that had one shot, keeled over, and just kept saying no to everything. The next day, totally unprompted, Sal turned up to our flat - he was fine, not dead or anything, obviously. He’d gone to the toilet when we all left and ended up hanging out with this group of middle aged men, who bought him a ton of drinks, took him to some kind of weird rave thing at one of their apartments, and then… slept in the middle of a parking lot cause he also gave his keys to Reyna. He didn’t even go home once he got them, instead he beat us all at mario kart first.”

As she finished, her gaze moved away from anyone as she realised she’d… really not told that story well at all. She didn’t even know how to tell stories.
“That was… pretty boring, wasn’t it?”

If they were bored, they were great at faking it. Leon was a lot more interested in polishing off whatever food he could. Casey’s face was obscured by a portion of his chest, and it looked like he was staring off into space; but the occasional smile or breathy chuckle were good tells that he was still engaged
The girls, however, were all leaned in. Mia had a tempura shrimp hanging from her mouth, and throughout the entire story Ed was wholly engaged. She pointed, or made little gasps. When Trisha was finished, she was the first to speak up.

”Nah, Dude. That’s all, well… Like it’s a long one, but its all shit we take for granted.” Ed offered.
”So true, like… Even Emancipation, y’know?”

Mia and Ed both leaned back, groaning.
”Fucking Lynette, man…” Mia growled, frowning. Hari put her hand on Mia’s thigh and gently rubbed it.
”I know, Booboo. But, y’know,-”
”Yeah, I mean, it could’ve been anything else, right? We had a good time.”

Hari cleared her throat again, looking at Trisha. She gave a weak smile.
”We’re just uh, y’know. Surveilled. Amazingly, this place is clean right now.”
Mia nodded.
”We’re still sorry. It’s uh… Well, not a cool situation to put someone in. We’ll protect you.”
”Yeah. I think it’s worth insulating you. We’ll fail, obviously, we’re not miracle workers. But, we’ll meet you half way, at least.” Hari offered.

”What happened to talking about cool shit? C’mon, Emancipation story.”
Ed waved her hand.

”Alright, so we’re still in Las Vegas at this point, right?-Oh, context, we ran away once. It’s a long story, we were gone like six month, we made a demon- But things weren’t that bad yet. We still had, like, cash. And we were just trying to live like normal people.”
”No bank account, no fucking State ID-”
”Shitty broken Van-”

Ed waved her hands at the other girls, throwing them up.
”-Yeah, context there, so like we’re trying to get our Van fixed. We’re at this fucking gas station, and they only use… The fucking, like, debit card? Or credit? But, like we had nothing. Like, of all places? We roll in there and he only takes cards?”
”Mind you, we’re not Amish, right?-”
”Yeah, like I said we had REAL dollar bills and this dude would not fucking budge.”

”So some fuckin’ old Blind woman saved our asses.”
”Yeah! Like, we thought it was fucking Lynette in disguise bro!”
”And I hadn’t used my magic in like a week, so I was fuckin’ tweaking. Like blasting this old woman with White Lux, I didn’t even have my Channeler with me.-”
”And her head is fuckin’ smokin’, right? Like fumes, me and Hari are trying to be subtle about it.-”
”And like, it’s the middle of the desert, there’s no AC, I’m hot I haven’t showered, my hair’s nasty, and she goes ’Oh dear, you need to dry your hair better in this weather, Sweetheart, you’ve got steam coming off your head.’!”

All three of them were giggling like school children, and Mia subtly reached for both their hands. Their fingers idly played between one another, and for the first time Trisha would be able to see the matching tattoos on their hands. It was some kind of design that crossed between all their fingers like bands. Wedding bands, or other kinds of rings, on every single finger.

”That was uh… That was pretty much when things started going down hill, right?”
Mia shrugged at Hari’s question, trying to savor the good moment instead of returning to the bad.
”Past is the past, right?”
”And the future, hopefully, is right in front of us.” she smiled at Trisha and Casey warmly.

Trisha had paid attention through the whole thing, silently listening, mostly her expression changing at various moments. She automatically shifted closer to Casey, taking one of his hands in her own. She’d kind of understood the surveillance before, but not really… the extent. Maybe she’d downplayed it internally. For all that her life had sucked, she’d never thought of running away like that.

“Yeah, hopefully… well, if you want to run away again, I’ve got more than enough credit cards to go around,” she tried to joke, tilting her head up towards Casey with a smile and lightly squeezing his hand, before looking back at the three girls. Her gaze shifted down to their hands, and her smile got slightly warmer.
“I can’t say I’m someone with loads of money of my own, but between inheritance and the jobs I do… I’d say there’s enough to last at least a few months in Vegas if you don’t hit the casinos… A week if you did. Either way, I’ve got it all - identification, credit cards…”

She trailed off, laughing lightly. It wasn’t like anything she said could change the situation, so she didn’t bother with all the sympathy stuff. Just… moving onwards.
“And if I ever really need the funds, I’ve got an easy way to get them.” Trisha tapped the side of her face like she had some kind of underground fund rather than just perfecting kicking down Ezra’s door and forcing money out of him.
“Maybe in the future when me and Casey travel, we can take you all along wherever we go first… just dump you there, collect you at the end, all get a fun trip out of it. What do you think, babe, you could tolerate them for an entire flight?”

Casey cracked up. He was thinking about how quickly the three of them would die without a support system. From what he heard, the Lady in question was a Blind member of the Temple, and that she was put up to it like a dozen other people in that city were. Accounts were from Furio, who rarely lied. It was he and Clarissa who brought them back eventually, in typical fashion.

”I’d like to see a day we can trust them that long!” he chided. Leon snorted. Mia took a deep breath, shaking her head.
”You know we love our Girl, Case.” Mia replied somberly.
Ed looked cagey immediately, clearing her throat. But before she could say anything, Hari read the room.

”Still, I think that’d be awesome if you wanted to help us like that, Trisha. Maybe someday soon we’ll take you up on it. Once, y’know, everyone’s done a bit of proving to one another. Gotta know we can trust, right?”
Casey gripped Trisha’s hand like a lifeline in a storm.
”Sure. We’re all making concessions these days.”

Leon pushed away from the table, moving to the boxes of wine and bending down to pull one out. He looked at it for a second, then took another box from within the endless food bags.
Coming back, he pushed some of the sushi boxes away to open what he brought. From the styrofoam package, he began to slide beautiful crystal wine glasses across the counter toward each person.

”These were brought from the Estate in Lyon. Like, years ago. I thought I was going to use them for something, but I figured they’d be great to give to you guys. And the wine is from the Elder collection.”
Casey’s head snapped back at the box of wine bottles.
”What the fuck, all of them?”
”Six bottles, my Man. Mom approved, obviously.”

Casey leaned into Trisha.
”Six hundred year old wine.” he whispered.

“That’s… really old…” Trisha whispered back, brow furrowing as she tried to figure out just how much that’d be worth. A lot. “Tansy once bragged for weeks about getting a hold of a bottle just over a hundred years old… I’m definitely rubbing this in her face the next time I see her.”

Trisha giggled just thinking about how much it would annoy her pretentious half-sister.
“It’s not stronger than normal wine, is it?” she then asked, louder. She then looked at Casey with a grin, gently scratching the back of his hand with the tips of her fingers. “Guess it doesn’t matter since you can just carry me to bed if I drink too much.”

”Oh, nah. Ain’t nothin’ left to ferment, really. Plus, well… Hey, guess what? The bottle’s fuckin’ magic; imagine?” he laughed. The girls laughed. Casey laughed.

”It is fuckin’ pathetic isn’t it? Some rich wizard, probably just like us, decided he wanted his descendents to be able to taste the he made literally any time they wanted in history. So what’s he do? Makes a fucking enchanted bottle. With the coolest uncork that exists on planet Earth I’m pretty sure.” Casey explained to Trisha.

”Oooh, can I do it, Lee?”
Leon smiled gently at Ed, passing the bottle over the island to her. She looked excited. Almost actually alive.
”Whose is it?” she asked with a reverent tone.

”Alphonse Dumonde Richoux. The one who-”
”-Oh, fuckin’ sick. Yeah, the… The Butter guy.” she chuckled back at Leon.

Casey laughed again, remembering the story of Ol’ Dumbass.
”Oh, alright, so the Landlord responsible for this wine was a dude who essentially died because he fucked around with an enchantment for an endless butter crock. Imagine being not drowned, but not exactly buried because it’s that weird gelatinous-”
He immediately started gagging. He turned his head, then half his body toward his older brother as he dryly wretched.

He was thinking about the way butter looked… The meat and the goop. There was still sushi on the table, and it only made things worse.
But he did his best to play it off.
”Mon Dieu, Casseu!”
Casey was actually laughing a little bit by the time the fit was over. Despite that, his heart rate was still through the roof. He just had to get his throat cleared, and then he could get back to her.

”Sorry, sorry! I was… Yeah, bad place. My bad. Uh, can we get this all cleared off if we’re not gonna-”
Hari was on it immediately, but Casey didn’t slack as he began pulling plates away.
”Babe, I’ll put a bunch in the fridge for you. You didn’t have a lot.”

Leon’s hand stretched out as Casey moved toward a plate.
”I got that, Big Fella.”
”Oh yeah? You got any others?” Casey teased, stretching his free arm out, careful not to look down at the fish.

Leon started giggling, leaned back, and opened his mouth. Casey laughed immediately.
”Oh, this old routine.”
Mia and Ed, the latter still holding the ancient bottle, started laughing as Mia began making machine noises with her mouth.
”Trash compactooooor!” Ed laughed aloud.

Trisha really felt like she was watching a joke she didn't quite understand, but for once she wasn't… actually too bothered by it. It was… nice? To watch. Nice with a hint of jealousy, really. But still, she couldn't help but ask.
“Trash compactor like… he's going to finish it all off? Not the boxes too, right?" She laughed.

”Oh yeah. Guy’s a trash compactor, seriously. I guess it must just be Lelou, like you never used to eat like this.”
Leon’s head shook as Casey began to dump the plates of sushi into Leon’s mouth, remembering the ones Trisha had previously eaten in order to save them.
When enough had been disposed of, Casey brought his hand away and slid it across his throat, causing Mia to make a loud buzzer noise like the machinery was being switched off.

Such an audacious act of gluttony… Yet they cheered like it was no different than the chug-off at the party. Leon laughed like it was nothing as he chowed down, and Casey was happy to see the food eaten. Nobody was going to complain in that room… The strangeness never would’ve struck a chord that hit all of them at the same time.

”There’s a few reasons, but yeah when I adjoined Lelou I was dropping muscle like crazy. So I started upping my macros, upping my macros; I’m eating like eight to ten thousand calories a day.” Leon giggled like it was nothing.
”Sometimes, I feel like I can hear the food hit my stomach and just fuckin’ burn away, y’know?”
”No, I fucking don’t.” Casey laughed again, bringing the remains around to Hari.

While the two of them were wrapping the food in plastic to be put in the fridge, Ed held up the bottle.
”Alright, enough distractions!”
”Right, right. I think Casey was explaining our man Dumonde?” Leon smiled at Trisha, genuine friendliness in his voice.
”Well, the bottles themselves are kinda jokes. The spell is in our family’s books: The seal can only be opened by a member of the bloodline. But, to open it, a member of the Bloodline has to give a passcode that each bottler sets up during the process of casting. For Dumonde, his Daughter was actually the one who bottled this. And because his dumbass drowned in butter-”

Ed held the bottle with both hands, putting it out in front of herself and staring intensely.
”Le beurre est prêt, Papa! Give me your wine, you fuckin’ moron…”
The seal around the cork sputtered into orange flames that were hastily put out by the cork blowing them away on exit. The whole group cheered, even Hari and Casey who were toiling away.

Mia began handling the glasses for Ed to pour, passing them out around the island while Leon continued.
”You get to tell the bottle that the butter is ready in French, and it gets excited and explodes. Classic parlor trick.”

“Right, classic, we did that all the time at family dinners," Trisha commented drily, though it was offset by eyes nearly as wide as saucers just staring at the bottle. It was so unnecessarily dramatic with the fire and the explosion, but it was also… Fun. Definitely a parlor trick if not a classic one for her.
“Le beurre est prêt," Trisha mumbled to herself a few times, getting the pronunciation right after about the second one. She then nodded, laughing. “I’ll remember that for if I'm ever in France making butter for some reason."

As a glass finally got to her she took it, swirling the wine in it and smelling it like she'd been lectured to do the few times she'd been unable to escape some charity gala or family gathering her least favourite sister organised. As much as it had pissed her off, doing things wrong irritated her more. Though she honestly didn't know what she was looking for smell wise, it just smell acidic and like wine.
“Do they all… explode the same, or do they get to choose that with the phrase?"

”Nah, they all do that. The seal burns off, forces vapour to form in the bottle, it blows the top off.” Leon explained in a very casual manner.
”Sometimes they explode!” Hari added as the fridge door was closing. They were done it seemed, and Casey was just going over everything with a wet cloth before he finally made it back to Trisha’s side. This time she was fully in front of him, and he draped his arms over her in a warm embrace.

”Yep… Shitty bottlers, imagine enchanting shitty glass.”
As the stragglers gathered back up, Mia held her glass high.

”All that aside… Toast to Casey and Trisha?” she asked around the table.
Leon was quick to stick his up as well.
”For sure. To the two of you, and to some genuine happiness.”

Trisha smiled, genuinely, at them both. One hand rested on Casey's arm as she leaned back into his embrace, the other raising her own glass.
“To us," she laughed, tilting her head back so that she could look up at him with warm eyes. “Feels a bit weird to toast to myself, sort of… Hopefully we'll be happy, not get too annoyed by all our little habits when living together, and be able to start a new life together."

It felt a bit sappy, and perhaps too open, to say something like that. But she'd been caught up by the atmosphere, and they weren't particularly unusual wants, were they? She wasn't quite showing how desperately she wanted that life with him to work out, with genuine happiness and everything else that came with it.
“Toasting with a six hundred year old wine guarantees success, right?"

---

With the evening folding into the dark cold night, the Richoux clan polished off the expensive wine and left as swiftly as they came, heels promising a replacement bottle as they tottered down the stairs and into the apartment building.
Casey had shown them out, spending a moment reveling in the quiet cold. It was over. And maybe, for a short span of time the next day, they’d have nothing to do. He could even do his exercising up here.

The light from inside his new home bathed the roof in warm orange, the slight tint to the windows effecting their hue. It was a wonderful moment in his mind, made only better by knowing there was still someone inside who he didn’t mind spending time around. On enlightened feet, he practically danced toward the door. He felt the knob, and the bulk of the door against his shoulder as he pushed it open and closed it behind him.

Trisha was curled up on one of the loveseats, legs pulled into her chest and side leaning into the arm. In the time that Casey had been seeing his family out she'd gotten some of the sushi he'd put away for her, eating it with a lot more fervour than she had done earlier. Her eyes were squinted sleepily, and she twisted her head around at the sound of the door, smiling.
“They all gone?" she mumbled around a clump of rice, quickly chewing and swallowing it. She'd managed to pace herself with the wine, drinking only a glass and a bit over the time they'd finished the bottle. It was enough to make her a bit light headed and tired, but not properly drunk. “There aren't going to be any more unexpected visitors, are there? No night owls swooping in?"

She finished off the piece of sushi she'd been eating before stretching out her arms in his direction, hands making cute little grabby motions.
“I’m spent, battery dead, recharge required."

”Well, the cats, but we… We should be safe.”
He couldn’t know when they’d show up, but he knew full well they were capable of getting out of Leon’s apartment. Especially with how sloppy the others were. At first he was walking, but quickly clambered down and scooted forward to her with his knees like stilts.

Casey practically fell into Trisha’s grasp, his head resting against her legs and his arms wrapping around her in an awkward position. There was a twist as he unseated her, legs unfolding for him to resume standing at full height.
”You and I have a cuddle date scheduled pretty much right now. I’ve already chosen a venue, so you don’t have to think about it.”

Trisha let out a quiet squeak when she suddenly found herself without a seat underneath her, legs uncurling and wrapping around him tightly. She bent her upper body forward so her head could rest against his shoulder, making the most of the somewhat awkward carry.
“Oh, a surprise date? That’s exciting, don’t tell me where, I want to be surprised by that too.”

She tilted her head so her face pressed into his neck, lips gently brushing against it.
“I’ll let you take me there… Do you want me to close my eyes?” She giggled as if it wasn’t obvious where they were going.

Casey laughed as he adjusted the weight of Trisha’s body, curling himself into her as much as he could.
”You can. It’ll be pretty quick though.”
Looking around, he tried to figure out if there was anything he should do before heading up. The wine was gone, still sitting on the island with the empty glasses. That was fine. The drapes were gonna be a while, so there was nothing to put down. Fine.

His torso turned and looked up at their little loft, then the lights. Remembering correctly, the other set of switches in the hall controlled them, so he simply made way for the destination. His elbow flicked the light switch, casting their glassy home into the darkness of the city’s skylight. The moon was over the city, and in this part of town they could look out at the bay as they lay together in their bed.

Getting up the narrow staircase was a tight squeeze with Trisha in his arms, and he was struggling not to whack her head off the wall. At the apex, he looked out and saw the moon over the Greenhouse, and the shimmering of the Pacific Ocean beyond it.
Scooting his body up onto the freshly made bed, he released Trisha to sprawl out as she pleased while he adjusted the pillows.
”Would you look at that majesty?” he crooned, a smile on his face, gaze turning to Trisha as he leaned back on the pillows.
”I mean the moon’s nice too.”

Trisha giggled, eyes curving pleasantly as a pleased smile curled up her lips. She shuffled her body up the bed, rolling over to curl up against Casey's side with her head resting on his chest. She had to tilt her head slightly to look out at the moon as she cuddled in contentedly. It was comfortable, and it was really nice. Their bedroom in their house.
“Mm, yeah, the moon's almost at the same level, isn't it?" she joked, gaze flickering from out the windows up to him.
“Pretty nice date location, you picked well."

He smiled, hand moving up to run gently through her hair. He did his best to match her breathing as they settled in.
”Oh, great. I’m glad you like it.”
He was already starting to nod off. Most of the time, he found himself standing, or sitting up on hard surfaces. Something this plushy, or the couch downstairs, those were clearly made for sack time. Sleep. Rest.

Having begun his career in the Marines, switching to the Army as he was recruited into the Special Services, he’d been a near decade long member of the “Sack Challenged”. The few members of the service who, after rucking and busting ass for days on end, would simply eat their meals and ask for more.
It got a lot worse after his Kindling. Mostly because of what happened.

Slowly, surely, Casey curled into Trisha as it slowly came back. Very slowly, and he could feel her touch being something he could focus on. The same feeling as when it all came crashing down. He felt hands on him in that moment, who cradled him and kept him safe from harm. Like no arms had before.
”Thank… you…”
His body gently shook as the tears flowed, and he began to weep without noise.

Trisha was confused. What was there to thank her for? What was there to… cry about? She awkwardly tilted her head up, small frown playing on the corners of her lips as she tried to figure it out. Was it happy tears? Was it the… something to do with what had happened in the war. She really wasn't sure. Being not sure of the cause meant that she wasn't entirely sure what to do about it.
“It’s alright," she said softly, meaning it in response to the thank you.

She twisted around so that she was properly lying on top of him. Her delicate hands moved up to his face, thumbs gently wiping away the tears, even if it was a bit pointless when they kept flowing. She shuffled herself up so that her face hovered over his, leaning down to kiss just below his eyes.
“Am I so pretty you couldn't help but cry?" she lightly teased. Of course she knew that wasn't the reason, it was obvious she knew that wasn't the reason, but she wasn't about to start questioning her on it. He'd tell her if he wanted to, and this was the best way she knew how to deal with it.

Casey did laugh, and started to nod his head before looking up at her and sniffling.
”Yeah, God, I got so fucking caught up in it…” he giggled as much as he could.
”It’s just… Everything’s so hard all the time. You’re soft. And nothing’s been soft until now.”
How could he properly explain to someone who wasn’t crazy that being in her arms made him feel closer to God? Like the moment where he’d been able to save his own life at the expense of a lot of other good men? The survivor’s guilt mixed with the genuine belief that God was not just a friend, but a very close guardian. He was safe because the woman who barely held him as a child decided to finally look at him with her magical stare, and to protect him in her loving arms.

”You… Make me feel safe.”

“Really? I'm… well, normally I'd associate safeness with strength, I guess." Trisha smiled. She stayed where she was, face hovering just above his, looking down at him with a soft and warm expression. She still didn't entirely understand but, she guessed if he'd been through the war coming home and… being in a place without that, with someone like her, would feel like safety.
“I’m glad. I'll keep being here to cuddle you and keep you safe, then."

She leaned forward and kissed the tip of his nose, before moving back to rest her head against his neck, tucked up right under his chin.
“I guess this does mean I should abandon my plans to work out and become really buff…" she joked again. It wasn't that she was bad at talking seriously about things, just that she still didn't really know what to say in the face of something like this. Yes, she was physically soft, and appeared it so far, but later there was the risk she'd lash out and he'd realise she wasn't so safe after all? That feeling of safety might not continue… but she didn't want to dwell on that at all.

“I feel safe too, with you, so I guess that makes two of us. Not that I've had it so hard since the Snake just… not stable, I suppose."

Casey cleared his throat trying to find the words to use. He wanted to make sure she knew he was going to be there no matter what, but he didn’t know how not to be direct about it.
”Buff is soft too. I’m soft. I can just flex it.”
Focusing less on the idea of her and more on the interaction was good. He did his best to joke, flexing his chest and rocking her about slightly. He giggled, still a hint of emotion in his voice.
”But, I mean… If you don’t feel stable, I know where to pick up slack.”

He stopped, puffing his chest so it was like a slab.
”We’ll be solid together. Keep me safe, I’ll lift you up nice and high.”

Trisha giggled too, poking his rock solid chest. Her finger lingered for a moment before her hand moved up to rest on his shoulder. She did feel more stable than she had for a long time. Like there was actually some direction to her future. That someone might actually stay for once. But her fears were too deep to just be fixed with some comforting words. It did… help.
“Yeah, nothing will be able to stop us together. Us and sixty thousand bees. They really help."

She smiled softly, pulling up her legs so they tangled in between his. As if there was some way to get even closer when she was already lying on top of him, she snuggled in, pressing a light kiss against his neck.
“But you really are the best of both worlds… soft when needed, strong when needed. Very nice to cuddle. I can lie wherever I want without worrying about crushing you."

He found it funny that before her, the last time someone else laid on top of him like this, they were already dead. Not that he’d tell her that, it’d ruin the mood he figured.
”Mmmm… Wherever, however. You’ve got me, I’ve got you.”
His brain was drifting, staring at that moon outside with Trisha in his arms. Slower and slower.
”Need… A fan up here.”

Iron and Honey: A Love Story [FernStone & AtomicEmperor]

---

Act One-Three

---

Sabrina's House

After the chaotic events of yesterday, they decided to have a more ‘relaxed’ morning on Thursday.

At least, it probably was for Casey. For Trisha, a relaxed morning was waking up midday and maybe rolling out of bed after another hour on her phone. But Casey woke up at five on the dot, and there wasn’t exactly anywhere to comfortably go in her place. Him waking up and moving about meant the bees woke up. While Trisha could sleep through someone moving next to her relatively easily, the thousands of pheromones bombarding her was a whole different story.

As were the fuzzy bodies of a couple of bees that had buzzed over to her and landed on her face, tickling her with their little feet in an attempt to get her up. As if they actually needed anything from her. She couldn’t wait to sleep in a completely different place from them.

With a grumble, Trisha raised a hand to wave away the bees, lazily leaking pheromone at them to go away. After a little more pattering over her forehead to make sure she couldn’t just go back to sleep, they flew back to the loud hive. The window had been left open all night, with bees occasionally going in and out on strange protective patrols around the house or in search of any still alive flowers at this time of year. Normally she had to bundle on blankets to not get cold at night… but it hadn’t been necessary with Casey there.

But somehow during the night she’d rolled herself in the duvet, facing over the edge of the bed with only the top half of her head poking out. It was a bit stifling now that she was awake… with another grumble she started the process of wriggling herself out of the duvet, managing to free her arms from where she’d managed to get them trapped in a tight blanket burrito.

As she wriggled herself out, Trisha also turned around to face Casey - who’d taken the side by the wall. Her long, dark hair spilled across the pillows and the oversized t-shirt she’d worn slipped off a slender shoulder as she propped herself up slightly on one elbow.

“Mornin’,” Trisha smiled sleepily at him, eyes still half closed. “You sleep well? I’m going to have to get up soon to check what the bees want… they’ve decided I need to be awake… maybe I can make us some breakfast too. I’m sure we’ve got something in the kitchen…”
She spoke slowly, clearly still in the process of waking up, but no longer tired enough to go back to snoozing. There was a lot to do today anyway - packing up her stuff, and moving in.

Casey was thinking about the blanket set they’d gotten for their bed, wondering how he’d be able to do it at night. There was nothing that said they couldn’t have separate blankets, but he felt somehow wrong about that. But he was sweating when he woke up at his usual time. Maybe it was the heater underneath the wall side of the bed, or maybe it was the thickness of her current set, but he laid there in an uncomfortable silence as he rotated onto his back.

As Trisha was waking, she was still laying on top of his arm. He just stared up at the ceiling.
I was having a nightmare… I can’t remember what it was, but I’m sweating… I’m hot. The windows are open...
He took a deep breath, and one of the bees bumbled up around his face before landing on his forehead. Not that he wasn’t nervous, but it was definitely still in the back of his mind after the other day.

But, there she was. She hadn’t left him in the bed to fend for himself… Or to deal with that woman. She was emerging from her cushy cocoon like an adorable little moth. Seeing her made him feel excited immediately, and he happily shifted back to his side to pull her in close with the blanket and all.

It would’ve been pretty easy to see his vaguely wet face shimmering in the low light coming from the vague low light bouncing about the room. But he quickly buried it in the duvet as he cuddled Trisha.
”It’s a great fuckin’ morning seeing your face… Hi. Don’t make me go out there, she could be out there seeking revenge.” he joked.

“If she is, I’ll get rid of her myself,” Trisha laughed, wrapping her arms around him and melting into the hug. Remembering yesterday made her properly wake up… Dealing with Tansy was something she hated doing on the best of days, nevermind after already suffering through both Casey’s family and former coven members. There was a reason she was Trisha’s second least favourite sibling.
“Don’t worry, I’ll go out first to make sure the coast is clear… We were just really unlucky yesterday. Normally she’s too busy to torment me. But I’m not in a rush to get up.”

She yawned, wriggling out of the duvet more so she could properly cuddle him, not particularly caring about the slight dampness from his sweat. She could shower.
“But now you know why my family isn’t so easy to deal with either… Mom's side’s no better. Thankfully most of them live in a different country.”
She didn’t really want to be thinking about her mom this early in the morning (or at all), so she changed the subject, tilting her head to try and properly look at him. “Sooo… do we get to move in today?”

Casey nodded and smiled.
”Well, frankly we’ll just be doing some pretty minimal direction. Theo and Norm are the ones actually moving all the furniture up the building, but the delivery gets there at eleven. We should probably try and be there early to meet Clarissa and Furio, have him give me the keys and confirm things. Once it’s taken care of though, I was thinking about taping some lines down in the place so they know where to put stuff.”

Having stuffed his face into the blanket, it was mostly dry now. He giggled.
”You’re lucky. I was having a nightmare I think, but I wasn’t really seeing it. I didn’t scream or anything. One of the bees came to comfort me as I woke up.”
Casey’s arms slipped up, wrapping around her as opposed to the blanket, and he pulled Trisha in as tight as he could.
”You like pineapple pizza because it’s too sweet and so are you.”

He was right in a way. She was like pineapple, at least - sweet at first bite, until it felt like it was burning your mouth.
“I could never figure out why I had such a sweet tooth… I guess that’s it,” Trisha smiled, putting aside the doubtful thoughts clamouring inside her mind. She shifted slightly so she could curl her head in against his neck, properly kicking off the blanket so her legs could tangle with his instead. It was so much easier to ignore all those nagging worries when cuddling like this. It felt safe and comfortable.

“And even if you’d screamed, it would’ve been fine. I said I’d be able to handle it… and the bees already are. They’re good like that.” She was glad that after the incident where she’d lost control he hadn’t held it against her or the bees, and they’d easily warmed up to him too. When she liked someone, they tended to, but there was only one other person they would also actively seek out that wasn’t her.
“I have plenty of socks I can stuff your mouth with,” she joked, giggling. She didn’t entirely know how she’d handle something like that but she’d deal with it when it happened. She’d seen people pulled out of Stygian Snake induced illusions, but very few of them were people she actually cared about.

Not something to worry about too much just now.
“What time is it just now? I need to finish packing… along with getting ready, it’ll probably take me a couple of hours? Since I need to decide what I’m bringing and leaving.”

”Oh, it’s…-”
Casey craned his neck to look out the window at the very slowly greying dawn sky.
”-Just after five thirty? You took a little bit to really wake up. I didn’t wanna move.”
But he held her tighter, rather than encouraging her movement.
”You’ve truly messed up now. I’ve got you in a lock. I’m never gonna let go; we’re gonna meld together into one person. I’m actually an amoeba monster. Raaaaah…”

His dry voice and almost effortless movements as he locked her legs in between his were an attempt at humor in such an early morning setting.
”And the sock thing is kinda kinky. Unless it’s not?” he grinned.

“Mmm, nothing sexier than waking up to a sock shoved in your mouth,” Trisha laughed, making a half assed effort to wriggle away from him without actually wanting to. She was more than happy, and comfortable, with this closeness. “I keep a used pair by the bed, just in case.”

She managed to pull back her head and stretch her neck so that her face was more in front of his. She darted in for a quick peck on his lips, before smiling sweetly at him.
“I don’t mind kissing an amoeba monster, but I’m not so fond of the taste of old socks…”
Trisha moved back in, kissing him again. It wasn’t as quick this time, she drew it out while keeping it shallow. She didn't want to push him when he wasn’t as experienced… and she was fine with taking it slow. It was better than risking getting rejected.

In his own head, Casey wasn’t exactly sure how far one was expected to go at this point. She was kissing him, sure, but she initiated it. Was it okay to just move forward when it’d only been a couple times now? It was more than he’d ever gotten, or at least wanted to get. Lena was the only person who had ever tried to kiss him.
At that point, it just put him off more than it turned him on; practically zero prompting. As if she’d just throw herself at him and he’d accept or even know how to handle a thing like that.

But getting lost meant the hands started to do what they wanted. Not much more than before, but he gently pulled at the back of her shirt, letting his fingers run across her bare lower back as they sat there pleasantly attempting to prove Casey’s amoebism correct. By the time they pulled away, he was sad to have it go. The moment of intimacy.

”That… Is really nice. Watching a thousand movies where the good guy gets the girl and they kiss in the end… That’s really kinky, isn’t it? Good endings?”
He grinned at her in the low light, just staring into her eyes.
”Ours will be good too… Sixty years from now, when we take the last elevator. We’ll be at peace.”

“I hope so,” Trisha said quietly, lips still close enough to his that he’d be able to feel her soft exhale afterwards. She did… Even if she’d never really thought that far. To getting old, or even towards the next few years. She’d wandered aimlessly, flitting through academia without a goal, from person to person in the hope that they’d be the one that didn’t leave her. Maybe- hopefully- that would be Casey. It certainly felt like it could be.

But was she just like her mom? Moving too quickly, only for it to all crumble underneath her in a matter of years?
No, she didn’t want to think about that right now. Just enjoy the moment.
“But-” she stole another quick kiss, hands moving up his back and lightly pressing against it. “I think we have very different views of what’s kinky. Good endings are… well I don’t know. A dream? But if you find it kinky, things will be interesting for whatever's on the other side.”

She giggled a little at that, lips curving up into a soft smile, corners of her eyes creasing and tone turning more teasing.
“Socks and good endings… You’re lucky I’m so easygoing.”

His grin was full of pale teeth, one vaguely shining as the metal cap became clearer in the wideness. His arms slid her gently so they were at eye level without Trisha craning her neck. His lips wrapped slowly around to whisper in her ear.
”You can teach me about kinky then… Teach me everything, my Queen Bee…”

A light shiver ran down Trisha’s spine and she smiled, eyes narrowing contentedly. It was… nice to hear. It meant that he was attracted to her and she could, slowly, teach him what she liked. She hadn’t had that opportunity before…
“Mm, alright… You’re also lucky that I’m a good teacher. You’ll be an expert by the time I’m done.”

Then she tilted her head, and leaned in to kiss him again.

---

In the end, it didn’t take Trisha as long as she’d expected to finish packing… thankfully, since they stayed in bed longer than she’d expected to. She was practically glowing afterwards as she went about gathering her things. She decided to leave at least a week's worth of clothes here, just in case, and the old mathematics textbooks along with a bunch of the other books she’d either already read or wasn’t likely to. It’d be an unnecessary weight. The rest of her clothes were neatly folded into boxes, her makeup properly gathered and shoved in along with it. Books went in their own box, picture frames carefully laid on top of her coats. Her desktop and screens could be carried out themselves. By the end of it there was a reasonable pile of boxes, and a few suitcases… But between their cars it should fit.

She needed to move hers over to their place anyway.

It just left the bees to deal with. She looked at the wooden hive with a slight frown, hands on her hips. After getting out of bed she showered and got changed, opting for a more comfortable combination of dark green cargo pants and a white tank top with a sweater over the top for warmth. A small group of bees gathered in the messy bun at the top of her head as she tried to figure out what to do about them. Brows furrowed, she turned to Casey.

“I’ll need to order some new hives for our place. Moving this one will be too much of a hassle… I think I’ll leave them here for just now, until I get those. Then I’ll have to slowly move the bees over. They might take to the new ones right away, they might not. Yeah, I think that’s the best way to do it…” She nodded, looking at him like she was waiting for him to confirm that it was a good idea.

Casey had, after the most enjoyable extracurricular study session of his life, was at a bit of a loss. He was using his magic to keep his mind off the fact that he was on cloud nine, balancing a dozen boxes magnetised to his hands as he shuffled through the tall hallways of Trisha’s sisters’ home. When she started speaking to him, he barely realized were it not for the words “hive” and “order”.

”Those should be getting here today too… Part of the agreement is you get into production immediately, so I’m pretty sure they’re going to be doing something crazy with the greenhouse? Mom said something about letting the student adepts test out a new group ritual to give you extra space for production, so Ginara will also probably be there with a whole bunch of teens. I’d like to be working while they’re doing their business, Gin kind of gives me the creeps.” he explained, shrugging his shoulders with some boxes.

“Oh, shit, really?” Trisha’s eyes widened slightly, and went back towards the loudly buzzing hive. That meant she had to try to bring the bees too. Of course, they could take themselves but… a whole group of bees was just a sitting target for the strangely increasing crow population. She’d rather take them with her. They’d just have to go in her car… maybe if she ordered them into boxes, and poked holes in them? No, she couldn’t do that. She should be able to get them to not bother her during the drive.
“Your mom… does she know that honey season ended over a month ago? Even if there’s a flower-filled greenhouse, they normally rest over winter and only produce what they need to eat.”

She shook her head, taking a slow, calming breath.
“Sorry, that’s not something you decided. I’ll make it work. Apart from the bees, I’m all packed…” She smiled, pushing down the bubbling anxiety. It was just moving nerves! And the prospect of dealing with magical teenagers and others she didn’t know… but it’d be fine. It’d be fine. Before sorting out the bees, she quickly stepped over to Casey, pushing up onto her tiptoes to press a kiss against his cheek. “Thank you for doing all the heavy lifting, boyfriend.”

With a grin, she went back over to the hive. She closed her eyes, collecting her thoughts before carefully sending out pheromonal commands. Controlling a large group was more difficult, especially the whole hive, but it was possible as long as the instructions were simple. Follow me. An easy one, and her mind was relatively clear and her mood still good from earlier that morning. There was a loud buzzing, and a stream of bees began to come out of the hive. Some landed on her, while others flew around her head, and some hovered in a cloud just in front of her. So far so good.
“So. How many bees are you taking in your car?” she joked.

Casey laughed at both her joke and the question from before about the honey season. Of course she knew… Maybe Trisha didn’t really understand what a “Ritual” and “Something Crazy” really meant for a Greenhouse. Rather than press things, Casey giggled to himself and nodded along.

”Oh, I’ll take them all if you want me to. But I think they’d maybe fuck me up if you’re too far away, wouldn’t they? Like I’m kidnapping them?” he asked with a laugh.
His head was still fuzzy, but being called Boyfriend really made him put some pep in his step as he made way with the last few things.

---

Cannery Apartments > Casey and Trisha's Home

Trisha’s bees thankfully behaved the whole drive. She carefully stacked boxes in her car so they wouldn’t shift too much, putting the small plants she had in the front seat next to her. The bees settled all over - on the boxes, the backs of the seats, the dashboard, and the plants. A couple were still in her now loose her, and underneath her jacket… but thankfully they kept still. That had some amount of self preservation.

It didn’t take too long either. She followed Casey’s car, thankful they’d managed to miss the morning rush hour traffic (just about), and in no time they were pulling into the building’s parking lot. She made sure to lower the windows slightly before turning off the ignition, twisting round in her seat to look at all the bees… well, as many as she could.
“You all stay in here until your new home is ready, alright?” Of course they couldn’t speak, but the slight response she sensed as he gave them the instructions in a language they understood seemed to be agreement. Trying to sort everything out with sixty thousand bees clinging to her would be a nightmare.

Bees sorted, she got out of her car, a black Toyota Tercel. The least fucking cool car she could have, in her opinion. But it was what Ezra had given her when she’d bothered him to buy her one… not that he’d actually bought it. But she couldn’t really argue when he’d said it was safe, even though she doubted he actually cared. It was so dependable that it’d lasted her nearly six years, and it wasn’t even first hand- the lack of hassle made up for the lameness… so long as certain people didn’t see her with it. Unfortunately, she didn’t have much of a choice with Casey.
She walked round the front of it and craned her head up at the… pretty tall building, grimacing slightly.
“Fuck, I really hope there’s an elevator.” She spoke loud enough that Casey, and anyone waiting for them, would probably be able to hear her. A couple of bees lazily flew around her head.

Casey had been happy to get there so early. The bus wasn’t there yet, but pulling into the parking lot, he could see Furio and Clarissa’s cars, as well as the moving truck packed full of things.
As they both met up in the parking lot, he gave Trisha a laugh and pointed out toward the truck. It abutted the building, blocking a bit of the view toward the back of the building. There were guys wearing some funny looking contraptions on their legs, like they were bionic. But things became clearer as they twisted a few knobs and began to vertically scale the building as if it were some kind of flat surface.

They didn’t even slow down.
”Don’t worry about carrying anything… But, yeah. Kind of. It goes to the top floor, and then there’s a set of stairs after that. But you’ve got a few perks. The guys?-” he said, pointing to the ones scaling the wall by walking like normal. ”-Theo and Norm. Technically my employees. Really, like our butlers. Not butlers, like… I don’t know. They help out, and they live here for free on the security floor. They’re supposed to be for my job specifically, but they clean for Clarissa and Furio when they get busy and can’t keep up, or like they bring the groceries upstairs for you. I’ll introduce you when we’re up there.”

He smiled widely, admiring the morning sunshine and rubbing Trisha’s shoulders to keep her warm.
”Get prepped. Because it’s another round of introductions… It’ll get easier the more you do. This time, Furio? Clarissa’s husband. He was my Dad’s first student, and he’s been my Uncle forever. Technically he’s my Godfather. But, you’ll like him. He feels like how we feel, and if Clarissa did what I told her, he’ll act like he doesn’t even know you. Their Daughter probably, or she may be at a friend’s or over at the Temple, but she’s sweet.” he giggled, thinking about the bobbing golden hair she’d always had. Just like her Mom. Same attitude too.

”Otherwise, like I said, Norm and Theo. Pretty down to Earth. Mostly happy to have stuff to do I think. They’re like how uh… Mia is. Except they’re older, so I think they’re not so… Addicted? To being addicted, I guess. But then Ginara maybe, if we can’t squirrel you away somewhere or if she’s not too wrapped up with her students. She’s not evil, she’ll just treat you like a lesson while you’re standing there, and I really hate feeling like I’m someone’s plastic skeleton.”

Of course they had some kind of magical building scaling device rather than just using the elevator like normal people. Trisha shouldn’t even be surprised, but she was. The whirlwind of names seemed like nothing compared to that. She already knew Clarissa, and she’d spoken about Furio a bit yesterday… Then the rest Casey had mentioned that morning. It made it possible to keep up. But it was still a lot to take in, and she just nodded along. People bringing up their groceries and possibly cleaning if they were busy sure did sound nice.

“I hope she doesn’t, I’m not sure how well I can control them if that happens,” Trisha pointed back to her car, and the bees quite visibly crawling across the windows. It wasn’t so much a threat as it was honesty. She wasn’t sure what exactly being ‘treated like a lesson’ would look like, but she could imagine it. Not pleasant.
“If we get caught by surprise I’ll just cling under your hoodie like a koala, and you can pretend you gained a ton of weight or something. I’m sure nobody will figure it out.”

That was a much funnier image, and she tilted her head back to smile at him. She raised a hand to rest over his where it was on her shoulder, lightly stroking it.
“I think after yesterday I can handle any of the other introductions. I already went through the hardest, right? Aside from Ginara the rest sound… nice. So I think I can handle it.”
She turned around to properly look at him, smile widening and eyes taking on a teasing shine. “So long as you have my back and don’t get too distracted remembering this morning, yeah? Serious business from now on.”

”Do I get a reward for being a good boy at the end?” he grinned, eyebrow rising high into the sky.
He laughed aloud, taking her up the side entrance of the building and into the main lobby. It wasn’t anything grand, there wasn’t a doorman or anything. Rather, it seemed like it was once a bar or restaurant turned into a common room where there were postage boxes, bulletin boards, and a bunch of places to sit that varied between private and open, as well as vending machines and a row of phones that didn’t seem connected to any sort of pay system.

On the back wall were two elevators, one closer to the entrance and one much further down near the end of the building. Really, it was like a little hotel, and one could imagine the massive saloon front down here sandwiched under layer upon layer of guest room and suite.
Casey specifically went to the elevator further on down the hall.
”This is the one with access to the top floor. The other one doesn’t go up all the way, and you’ll see why.”
The elevator doors opened, and he stepped inside. The panel for the elevator seemed normal, but Casey made sure she watched him.

”It needs a little juice. So, pump it with a little energy and hold zero, then press one twice. It’ll detect you’re a magical being, and it’ll take you to the Eleventh floor. Which is actually the tenth, but who has to know that?”
The door promptly closed shut, leaving them with a moment.
”Nervous?”

“Excited,” Trisha replied, smiling even as she looked intently at the panel. It didn’t look different from normal… she guessed most magic things didn’t. Her eyes narrowed in concentration for a moment as she committed the instructions to memory. So long as she could do the magical energy thing, it’d be fine.

“Alright, a little nervous too,” Trisha laughed, tilting herself forward so her head leaned against his chest before she completely slouched against him, her arms loosely wrapped around his waist. She closed her eyes, lips pulling up into a cute little smile.
“Recharging first so I have the energy to face all the new people. Need to get my fill before we’re busy sorting stuff.”

Having carried stuff, Casey’s glove was still on. As he rubbed her shoulder, he smiled and channeled a low effort enchanted material spell. The purpose of it, he figured, was long gone. Probably an ancient form of load bearing material, but it wasn’t strong enough to do much more than gently press into Trisha’s shoulders and neck.

A massage coat.

”Did you leave a door open for the bees? Well, actually, how do they do in the cold? It’s definitely not bee weather right now, but we can bring them into the lobby or the shop until Gin gets here and sets up.” he offered, considering how frustrating it must be to be tens of thousands of bees stuck in a metal box with the heat on.

“I left the windows open,” Trisha said, with a shrug. It wasn’t that she wasn’t worried about it - they were her bees, and if they were upset it affected her. Bringing them into the lobby would be difficult… because then there’d just be sixty thousand bees hanging around.
“They’re actually pretty used to my car. When I went to college I just put them in the car and drove them there with me. They can get out and find me if anything happens… But it shouldn’t.”

She smiled again at him, feeling… content. Any nerves she had felt were massaged away by the coat and his concern over the bees.
“Thanks for thinking about them. Keep it up and you’ll be their new favourite.”

Casey giggled.
”I am their new favorite. Who else is going to contest the spot? Seriously, point them out, I’ll make sure they stop the contest.”
He held her nice and tight to him, smiling down and shaking his head.
”Now, when you get up near the top, the elevator will-”
The entire thing rattled as if it would totally come down from its line.
”-do that. Which is why anything worth keeping safe, we just walk it up the side of the building. The enchantment set is this crazy gyroscopic mindfuck. So, even if you’re walking vertical, it keeps its orientation relative to your feet.” he grinned.

”It’s definitely a spell in my Dad’s big book of tricks, but I haven’t really bothered to learn many of his spells since I Kindled. It’s hard when your brain doesn’t work the same way. I think that’s why I never managed to do it here.” he shrugged his shoulders.

Trisha nearly jumped out of her skin when the entire elevator shook. What the fuck? She reactively clung to Casey, glad that he was already holding her tight enough she didn’t have to worry about being shook around.
“Well, I don’t know anything about spellbooks,” Trisha said, trying to pretend like she hadn’t just been nearly scared to death. “But one of my many talents is studying. Maybe I can study it, then help you learn… through teamwork and all that.”

He grimaced.
”Oh, God I wish they were fuckin’, like, math equations. Something simple, you know? No, the Richoux Tomes are these big fucking adventure journals. And each spell is associated to a story, and you’re essentially supposed to be able to harness the fucking story and take the emotion you need from it by channeling it through your dedication to your clan and faith. I… Never really felt a connection.”

As he finished, the elevator doors made a ghastly hiss before beginning to slide open. Like any other apartment building hallway, this too stretched out before the happy couple as they stepped out and turned right.
Or, it almost was. There was a bevy of clipboards, filing cabinets and other office supplies and materials that lined the walls, and apartment doors were left either partially open or ajar entirely. Casey looked around for a moment before a gruff voice came from one of the apartments.

”Casey?”
Casey almost deflated a little bit in Trisha’s arms.
”Yup… No rest…” Casey whispered to Trisha before speaking up.
”Morning, Uncle Fyor!”
”Glad you didn’t say good. Come here.”

As they walked, Casey gripped Trisha just a little tighter, like a protective object or some kind of shield. The first door they walked past looked like a very strange room made of metal grates and gates, maybe some sort of secure room. But the one after it, Casey turned in. Furio Natale was sat in front of a computer console the size of a living room, feet swung up onto the big desk that held at least half a dozen monitors.
As he turned, he looked up to see the two, rather than the one. He cleared his throat, finally standing up.

”Trisha. Good to meet you sweetheart, I’m Furio. Forgive our family business, but can I ask you to head upstairs to the new place while I speak with Casey? In the interest of keeping you as separated from our business as I’m sure you’d like to be…” he offered her.

“Good to meet you too, Furio,” Trisha said, relatively politely. So far it was the most… normal introduction from anyone in the temple. Well, Mia and her friends hadn’t been too bad, unavoidable hug aside. She pursed her lips, looking at Furio for a moment before tilting her head up towards Casey. She didn’t really want to head up to the new place by herself… honestly she’d rather just go back downstairs and sit in the car with her bees. Well, it wasn’t quite by herself, there were a couple with her.

But she also didn’t want to get in the way. Getting in the way was a quick way for Casey to start seeing her as a burden, probably. And staying somewhere she wasn’t wanted was more uncomfortable than being alone for a little while.
“Sure thing, I wouldn't want to intrude.” She spoke softly and without much emotion, though she did smile at them both. She leaned up to kiss Casey’s cheek before slipping out of his arms and back towards the apartment door. “I’ll get you up there in a little bit? I’ll try not to accidentally paint the place another bad combination of colours before you get there… are the stairs just along the hall?”

Furio and Casey both nodded, the two of them pointing in unison down the end of the hall that they’d been walking toward.
”Uhh, the boys are up there still moving things out. Oh, y’know? Gin came yesterday, Case…”
Casey had a surprised look on his face.
”Oh, no shit?-” he turned to face Trisha. ”That means the Greenhouse is actually all set, or should be?”

Furio gave them both an enthusiastic look.
”Listen, whatever you two are gonna be using that space for? Real fuckin’ impressive, they outdid themselves this time. That kid? Nolan?”
Casey was all smiles, and nodded along.
”That impressive?” Casey bantered back.

All Furio could do was nod.
”Maybe you both wanna see it… Oh, y’know? Trisha, come here. Casey tells us you were lookin’ for an office of your own?”
He waved his hand, guiding Trisha and Casey toward one of the other rooms. In this particular apartment, there seemed to be a large main section that used up most of the living spaces, then a bedroom with a closed metal door, and another one wide open with a massive desk spanning one of the walls. It was already mostly furnished, having a tower and a few monitors set up, as well as a chair, storage spaces, and even a few potted plants with a little card sitting on the keyboard.

”Just hang out in here for a few moments, I’ll make it real quick, I’m not tryn’a abuse our boy or nothin’. Check the envelope out.” the very clear New York Italian man’s voice didn’t waver even a little bit. He was constantly charming and friendly, even as he slinked off to leave Trisha alone with her new office and a closed door.

Trisha wasn’t easily impressed by material things, but the setup of the new office was impressive. It had everything she could need and things she hadn’t thought about - namely storage. She was used to having everything in one room, and at a certain point just dumped work stuff at her feet. Having a whole space for it would be nice. An easier separation. It also meant she could set up her current computer in the apartment itself… She’d been thinking about buying a laptop for that, but it removed that need.

She’d just need to keep everything backed up, in case she had to leave.

The bees that had come with her meandered around the room before landing in the potted plants, contentedly lying on leaves and watching her. She made her way over to the desk, deciding to just bite the bullet and open the envelope. It didn’t necessarily make her nervous, but she was hesitant, with how much prying there’d already been. Well, it was maybe just a card or something, right? She bit her lip and opened it.

It was a card, in fact. A nice, rectangular white piece of cardstock with some very nice cursive written on it.
”Welcome Home.”
Attached to the card’s back, however, was a thin metal key. Turning it over was a second note.
”The Key to New Beginnings- Lynette, Furio and Clarissa, and the Project Eden Team.”

Trisha smiled slightly, holding up the key and rotating it in her fingers. Then she slipped it in her jacket pocket. She’d add it to her keychain later. She sat down, picking up the card again and flipping it to the back. It was a bit… disconcerting, if she was entirely honest with herself. Sure, it was nice words. She would love this- with Casey- to be her home and new beginning. But when it was signed by Lynette… Well, it was a bit different. It wasn’t something she wanted to dwell on too much, because she knew she’d have to deal with it properly if they stayed together for a while.

But what the fuck was the Project Eden Team? Like the Garden of Eden? She knew about it of course - it was impossible to avoid learning about ‘creation’ at school, or when her mom decided to give her a lecture about how it was just an allegory and that it was completely possible to believe in both science and God. She’d found it incredibly boring then, but maybe she should’ve paid more attention… but it probably wasn’t anything to do with that. Why would the Temple name a project after something from another religion? It was just as likely to be some important figure’s name.

“Hey, there’s nothing to eat there,” she murmured to the bee that flew over to the card and seemed to start… nibbling on the corner of it. She rolled her eyes at it and put it down on the desk. If her bee wanted to chew some paper then she wasn’t going to stop it, she just made sure to remember her pheromone scent. “I’m sure there’ll be plenty of food for you later, be patient.”

There was a slight moment where the piece of paper seemed to shift slightly on its own, but around that same instant the door opened back up. It was Casey. As the note and the door moved at the same time, the bee climbed back up toward its mistress. It caught Casey’s eye as his vision shifted into focus.
”Hey, all set Babe. Furio and I have decided there’s not gonna be a lot of hiding what we do around here, so we’re just gonna give you the long and short, and at least make sure you can access the important stuff in case you’re in a bind. Should be enough time for them to get done bringing stuff out.”

He smiled at her genuinely and with a great deal of excitement in his eyes.
”Office work for you? It was Clarissas, I guess.”

Trisha took a moment to reply, brows furrowing as she tried to figure out the pheromones the bee was bombarding her with. Something had freaked her out but she couldn't figure out what. Maybe the card didn't taste nice? Well, it wasn't that important. She was planning to just throw it away later anyway.
"So you shut me in here for nothing?" Trisha teased, raising a finger to gently stroke the bee that had landed on her neck. ”I… I guess I'm glad you trust me enough to not keep it all hidden."

She smiled warmly back at him, getting up from the comfortable chair and quickly making her way to his side. She reached out for his hand, threading her fingers through his and gently swaying them.
“It’s way more than I expected… I've seen some big offices, like my brother's, but I didn't really expect to have one. It's not the same but- well I'm going to be able to work much better. It'll be nice being right next door too, so long as you can tune out the occasional swear here and there." Occasional was a very generous way to describe how she got when coding was going particularly badly. “It's pretty perfect. They even provided a computer, so I can set mine up in the apartment. Maybe we can plug it into a TV and use it for movies or to play games or something."

She grinned up at him. “Either way, it's exciting. It makes it all feel real."

Nodding, Casey wrapped his arm around Trisha’s shoulders and rubbed them gently.
”Some conversations are just things you don’t want to hear. You’ll get used to it as things go, but right now…-”
As the two of them stepped back into the office, Furio was waiting with a grin.
”-The faith is freaky, my girl. You don’t want to hear about some Righteous Left Hand bullshit, right? Best you get used to wearing headphones and keeping doors closed in that office. Casey’ll show you around, I’ll be upstairs waiting.” he finished, shrugging his shoulders and making way for the other end of the hall. Casey and Trisha were alone again.

”Thank God he’s not the stick around type. Love that man.” Casey’s body shook as he giggled.
”So, there’s six apartments per floor. Up here, two of them are offices. There’s actually usually a lot more people working, but they’ll know to just leave you be; you’re not working with them.”

“Yeah, I like him,” Trisha said once Furio was gone, with a half smile. “He didn’t try to bullshit me about anything- I guess I’ll have to invest in some good headphones.”
She then pressed her lips together thoughtfully. She wasn’t really used to being around a lot of people, generally having her own space - but she supposed that her office had a door, and if it was closed no one would come in. Still, she had to ask. “How many people, normally?”

”Probably like twenty?” Casey questioned for a moment before nodding.
”There’s three people in the Cage-” he explained, hand pointing at the closed metal door. ”-But they don’t really leave their whole shift. Then I have a personal assistant, who I actually don’t know yet, but they’re usually in here with me.”

His head nodded, guiding her back toward the elevator they’d come through. The room with the metal mesh door and other cages. Casey put his Channeler on and pressed his hand against the door. Loud metal grinding led up to the door popping open with a bit of a jolt, and it opened up fully.
Within were cages full of boxes. Metal boxes with thick padlocks, and in the middle of the apartment was a big table.
”This is mostly a storage unit. Like, half the building is storage units, but this one generally has important shit, so we keep it locked up tight. Magical products we use or make here get packaged up and distributed from this room and a few others like it around the city. It’s usually another couple people working in here, but on days that we get more complex orders out, there could be ten.”
He looked around, moving to the master bedroom door and swinging it open to reveal even more metal boxes.
”I could read the inventory, but honestly I don’t want to think about it yet. There must be at least a dozen unresolved orders going on right now while we try and figure out some sourcing issues.”

Closing the door again, he nodded her back out of the room. Across the hall directly was another door, and he opened it up to reveal a very dark apartment with all of the windows covered over by different machines. It was icy cold, and the hum of electronics was strong.
”Main server. Technically Junior’s office, but he’s almost never actually here. Again, thank God. There’s plenty of computer shit in here, parts and units that are getting worked on. Some people send their computers to us to hook up directly to our systems rather than using, like, basic internet from cable companies. There’s like three guys who work under June, but you know tech types. Quiet, tame. Not like you…”

“Well, I am way cooler than most people in tech. Almost all of them, perhaps,” she smiled brightly at him, glancing over the machines with more interest than she’d felt towards the rest. It was a lot of equipment. “Oh- don’t tell my friends I said that when you meet them, two of them are developers too… Not the quiet, tame types, but just not as cool as me.”

Casey returned a laugh.
”What if I say it because I believe it?” he cuddled her tightly before continuing down the hall.

”Now, you’re probably asking yourself what we make here. It’ll probably be no surprise that we do a lot of processing of raw materials. You remember those deer on the Temple property? Or the glitter from the Moth?”
At the end of the hall, the last two apartment doors were both wide open. In the right, there were refrigerators, and the entire thing was tiled and pristine like some sort of operating room.
”So, this ends up being a butchery. We store meat here, and in one of the back rooms we actually tan the hides and collect any other sort of raw material. The other one is for specialty materials, shit that you’d pull that we don’t experience here in the Shimmer.”

The last apartment’s door opened into a box. Just a black metal booth.
”This one you probably wouldn’t be able to get into without approval, but I’m going to register you with the door, because there’s a day where you may have to use it as a safe room. It’s the most secure room in this entire building.”
In the same way he opened the door to that storage room, he pressed his hand against one of the walls. Grinding, churning, and the door popped open. Swinging, it opened up into another apartment full of metal cages and lockers and-

Stepping in fully, there was a large wall full of racks on racks of firearms. There were tables with machines and presses, different tools.
”This is the Temple’s secondary armory. There’s a one-way portal from here to the Temple, meaning any assault on us can be reinforced through a secondary stage. This… This is my baby. My actual work. From here, we can modify and enchant arms and equipment, develop actively destructive spells in a safe environment, forge and manufacture our own patterns of guns and even pack ammunition for distribution.”
He proudly walked up to one of the lockers and patted it.
”This one’s mine… I’m gonna keep my toys in it until I find a good place upstairs.” he grinned like a child.

“By toys you mean… guns right?” Trisha asked, already knowing the answer, looking up at him with a smile. She had never been a gun person, would never be a gun person, but Casey’s joy was infectious… enough that she decided not to ask about the distribution. She didn’t want to know about that, actually.
“It’s… cool, I think. Don’t know much about this stuff. Do you enchant them yourself?”

He nodded happily.
”First spell I ever actually learned to cast was on some bullets, not even the guns. But, yeah, sometimes I can spend hours in here just loading ammo. Probably a luxury I won’t get to experience much anymore, since my seat will get cold if I’m not in the office.
I know I’m weird for it, but I guess tedious simple tasks are good. To me.” he added punctually.
”I know the whole magic thing may seem like it makes these things useless, but honestly they’re just more powerful magical delivery systems.”

Casey’s hand waved at the wall of guns, and he walked over to pull one down. It was short, and almost looked like a toy in his massive frame. But for a normal person, it’d be a normal sized gun.
”Like, every bit of this is a mass-produced magical artifact. We make dozens of them a month, and each one is exactly like the last one until we come up with something better.”

Shrugging, he put it back up on the wall. His smile remained, however.
”But what I really mean is like, I kind of… Want you to learn how to use one?” he let his voice squeak at the end.

“Huh?” Trisha’s eyes widened, head snapping around from looking at the guns to looking at Casey. Her… learning to use a gun… Just the thought shocked her a little. She wasn’t against it, but she also was really sure of it either. What if she was awful at it and shot someone accidentally? Or shot a bee- wait, she’d have to be a good shot to do that.
“Why? Because of Father Wolf? I’m willing to try, I think, it just seems like. Well. I feel like it’d be like pool.”

”Well, like, I can make a gun that aims for you. I can make a gun that reloads itself. I can make one that requires zero maintenance. I guess in that sense, yeah it is like pool. But, yeah. I just don’t want you walking around without at least vaguely understanding how things like that work. Like, say you need to run and you lose the gun I give you. You may need to use a different one, and if it doesn’t do all that special shit, you’ll be fucked.”
Casey shrugged his shoulders, considering what she said a bit more deeply.

”It’s… Yeah. Mostly Father Wolf, but the Temple has plenty of enemies. Maybe you being associated with me could make you a target. I’d rather you be a dangerous target, so the only thing I can think of that’s more dangerous than sixty-thousand bees is sixty-thousand bees and one gun.” he giggled.

“Can you not make all the bees little guns too? Then its sixty-thousand bees and their little guns, and one proper gun,” Trisha laughed, pushing past the sobering thought of being targeted by the Temple’s enemies. If they were Apparitions, she knew how to handle them - had the experience with the Snake. But humans? Anything that could be hurt by a gun? She didn’t have any.
“If the bees can’t shoot for me, I guess I’m willing to learn, so long as you're patient. There are things they can’t handle… and if they get hurt, I do too. I’d rather be as safe as I can be.”

Casey's mind went wild at the thought of sixty thousand assault bees. There were component shrinking orange spells, and plenty of different enchantments that could be used in tandem to maintain their combat effectiveness. He thought about the harnesses, the fact that bees were already too fat to fly, and his mind wandered about the possibilities that were, frankly, endless with the right amount of tweaking.

The entire idea, and the fact that she so casually presented her utter genius, flustered Casey. He stared at her, cleared his throat, and then glanced up at the door before looking back at her.
”It would take a long time to hand make sixty thousand tiny guns… With all the magic that would go into it?”
He took a step closer, arms gently wrapping around her waist, or as low as he could get them. His gaze was intense.

”W-would you… Would you do that? Keep weapons for them, I mean… I'd be honored to t-try and…-”
The reasoning for his stammering wasn't openly clear, but he was desperately trying not to put Trisha off.
”-An-and… Did… Anyone, has anyone I mean, did I…-”

His face was beat red. He couldn't look her in the face, so his embrace tightened. He pulled her so close, to whisper in her ear.
”Sixty thousand assault bees… So fucking hot, Trisha.”

Trisha was confused about Casey’s reaction to what had been a joke on her part. Giving her bees guns just seemed ridiculous - there was no way they could use them! How would that even work? Would she have to train them… could she train them? Why was she even properly thinking about it?

She reached up to put her hands on his shoulders, leaning in as the mood began to change, head tilted as she easily met his gaze and waited patiently for him to finish whatever he was trying to say. What about making guns for the bees was so hard to talk- Oh. Oh.

“That’s a new one. Nobody’s ever found my idea of arming my bees hot before,” Trisha replied in a low, teasing tone. It was really difficult not to laugh and ruin the mood. Really difficult, when the start had been so ridiculous. She didn’t want to ruin it, however strange the cause had been.
“If you make the guns, I’ll arm them… then we can train them to use them together.” She twisted her head round so her lips lightly brushed against the corner of his. “So long as you keep telling me how hot it is.”

Her lips curved up into a smile, face so close to his that their lips were practically touching, but not quite closing the last bit of distance. Waiting to see how he would react.

Possessive hands grabbed places they probably shouldn’t have, gentle finger tips slowly digging into Trisha’s thighs.
”You keep talking like that and I’ll go insane.” he grinned and almost growled in her ear.
For the first time, he felt like he was being prompted to do a little digging, and took the time to lock them up in another kiss. It was a few moments before he pulled away, forehead brushing against hers.
”I’m… I’m a fucking weirdo, I know. It’s… Your willingness. Whatever action, you know? You’re just… You seem so down for anything. Makes me want to say the word.”

“It’s a bit early for that,” Trisha said softly, slightly breathless, her expression not seeming to change much at the prospect. She smiled at him, eyes contentedly narrowed and her body still pressed against his. Physical attraction could come instantly, liking someone could happen fast, but loving someone? Not genuinely… or without the risk of everything falling apart. But the selfish part of her, the part that was desperate for someone who would hold onto her no matter what, was happy for him to think he felt that way towards her.

“I knew you were a weirdo from the moment you were interested in me when I was covered in blood. I still chose to go out with you,” she lightly teased. Her arms moved to properly wrap around him, fingers pressing into his back. She leaned in to kiss him again, a quicker one this time, as if rewarding him for… feeling that way about her.
“There’s very little I’m not willing to try… And I find it pretty hot that you like that about me. It isn’t the thing that people normally… appreciate about me.”
There was a hint of emotional vulnerability in her eyes as she spoke.

Casey shrugged his shoulders, still holding her tightly by the ass.
”When I signed on, I was a Marine first. The big lesson you’re supposed to get from training is that things are always gonna suck, and you’ve just gotta make due with what you have on hand. Thinking about someone who can adapt in situations like that, like I think you can? It gets me riled up like I don’t usually get.”
Finally, his hands let go and he kissed her one more time, gentler of course. Though, his fingers lingered for just a moment longer, like he didn’t really want to let her go.

”We’ll talk about the bee guns when I have a prototype. I don’t doubt you’ll need to do some work on controlling them to get it to work on both our ends, but… It’s not such a stupid idea. Goofy, sure, but still doable.”
He took a deep breath through his nose, head listing slightly to the right before fully regaining his composure. He nodded toward the door.
”Alright, let’s go. Before I force you to dress up in uniform and march.” he laughed, knowing full well that one day his deepest desires could maybe be met.

It made him really want to say it. But she was right, and he knew he couldn’t. Not now.
”Unless you want to look around here, like I said. It’s mostly a place that you can run to and seal up, the walls and doors are magically warded, so it’d take some pretty intense magic to get in.”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself, you couldn’t handle me in a uniform yet,” Trisha joked, smiling brightly at him. She took another quick look around the room, just in case something jumped out that she would want to take a closer look at. Not really. It wasn’t like she knew anything about guns.
“Intense magic… So something the Stygian Snake’s level?” she started to head towards the door as she asked, indicating that he could answer while they walked.

Casey wasn’t sure, but he wasn’t going to make her feel like it wasn’t an impenetrable fortress. A little fib to make her feel better.
”It actually turned it away, if I’m not mistaken. They had to do a bunch of construction on the roof of this building after the big battle, but apparently the room itself was safe. Buckled into the next floor like a safe box crashing through a surface.” he grinned, rubbing her arm and leading her out before closing the black box door and then the real door behind it.

At the end of the hall, there was another door. It didn’t have a window or anything, and Casey opened it up to reveal a mostly bland room with some empty coat racks and a staircase leading up to what was clearly a rooftop access.
”This is technically storage for the office, but storage for the office is also downstairs? So, this is like our basement. It’s ours to use how we want, since nobody but us and the on-site guys are supposed to be on the roof ever. So, if there’s someone up there? And Norm or Theo aren’t around? Treat it like the whole roof is your yard, and extricate them from the area as you see fit. Make sense?”

“Who can even get up here? It’d be people who work on this floor right… and I can just tell them to fuck off? Sting them with a thousand bees if they don’t?” She glanced around the mostly empty room, before looking back at him. It did make sense, but she also wasn’t that confident she could remove someone from the roof if they’d gone up there knowing that they shouldn’t. Because if it wasn’t Temple members, it would have to be someone who could fly, which was much less of a risk.
“Uh, yeah, it does make sense. How likely is that to happen?”

”Like, not. That’s why if it does happen, you treat it like it’s a problem. And, obviously, why I want some magical firearms upstairs too. We’re lucky to have this place, but it’s an exposed ass position and not-so-enchanted. Furio and Clarissa will both tell you that they’ve had to improvise some defensive manoeuvres over the years.”
He really couldn’t stop himself from continuing the statement until a point where he realized that he probably killed any good his previous white lie had done.

”B-but, yeah! I mean, it really won’t happen. I’d expect Sycamore members looking for you to show up before I expected one of our faithful to break a rule like crossing into hallowed ground without permission.”

“So not likely unless they really want to kill me, like half the Sycamore members might, right,” Trisha shrugged, clearly joking. While it sounded like… an actual risk, if she knew anyone on the roof that wasn’t them, Norm or Theo was a threat, she could just take it as such.
“I can handle that.”

”Fuckin’ Christ, I hope that many people in the Sycamore don’t hate you like that. I mean, Edict is just… Like that, isn’t he? Leon said he was always a dick… Heh… Eat-a-Dick’t.” he laughed, remembering the day before and thinking about how cute Trisha was when she was defending herself.

He didn’t let the thought linger too long, however, and led Trisha up the stairs to the next door. It opened outward into the cool late Autumn morning, the grey skies condensing as the threat of rain rolled through the bay. Standing out on the roof, there were canopies that kept a clear path from the door directly to the structure of the house. The whole front of it on one half seemed to be glass sloped down like a greenhouse roof. Looking in, one could see green plants hanging from various hangers, filling the windows with a verdant canopy. Otherwise, it was brick, and made to match the outer aesthetic of the building on which it sat as much as possible.

On the other side of the roof, an equally large structure stood in a mysterious fog-like haze. It was an actual greenhouse, make no mistake, but the many windows seemed to be either painted over or covered by some kind of shade. At its front were some planter boxes, and despite the temperature around them, they were full of beautiful flowers. There was also a table, which seemed to have a few things laid out on it.

”There they aaaaaaaare!”
Clarissa’s voice directed attention to the rear of the building, on which sat a rooftop reservoir for water that supplied the upper floors of the building with pressure they otherwise may not get. There was also a stack of furniture and boxes still being carted down the side of the building bit by bit.
”Hello my beautiful Bambinos!”
She was upon them in an instant, one arm wrapping around Trisha and the other around Casey before pulling them both in tight.

She was seriously strong. Stronger than a woman her size should be naturally. A single flex brought Trisha tight to her.
”Happy days, happy DAYS! God I’m so ready to move into that big ol’ house! God in Heaven, Casey, you’re really doing us a favor stepping up in a big way like this Baby.”
She gave him a big smooch on his cheek, then turned her focus to Trisha.
”Girl… You are so spoiled right nooooow…” she intoned, nodding toward the greenhouse.
”That shit? Should. Not. Exist. It’s crazy, and I think you’re gonna love it.”

The roof was… much nicer than Trisha had expected. Not that she’d expected anything horrible, she’d just expected… a roof. But it was actually nice. She was drawn to the house first, eyes widening a tad at the open glass outlooking the rest of the roof. A window that spanned a wall wasn’t unusual to her - in her mom’s place there were two, that slid out to a small balcony. But they had felt cold, looking out on a minimal, neat garden. This didn’t feel cold at all.

She barely got a chance to consider the Greenhouse, head tilting in confusion, before Clarissa grabbed her in an inescapable hug. She didn’t bother struggling against it, though she didn’t particularly return it either. She was still conflicted about Clarissa - she liked her, and she was warmer than many people were to her, but it was difficult to forget yesterday and what she knew about Trisha.

But there was the mention - well nod to - the Greenhouse again. Trisha peered past Clarissa at it. Blooming flowers in autumn… Was that possible with a Greenhouse? Well, they’d clearly done some sort of magic with it. Did it imitate the effects of summer, or something? Trisha couldn’t quite wrap her head around it. She hadn’t grown up around magic, and hadn’t interacted with it much since the coven either. Really, the year or so with Sycamore was the only time she was around it consistently.

But she really didn’t want to seem stupid by asking what the fuck they all meant. She would see it, and it would be fine.
“Is it me or the bees that are getting spoiled?” Trisha asked, with a laugh and a smile. The few she had with her, who’d landed on her neck after lazily following her up here, were already wanting to go to the flowers. There was a slight conflict in their little bee minds between staying with her, keeping her safe, and following their instinct. With a gentle command she let them follow their instinct, the ten or so bees buzzing over to the flowers and shoving their fuzzy faces into them.

She looked up at Casey, grinning, then back to Clarissa.
“... Can we go inside, then? I feel like I’ve been waiting to see this Greenhouse all day.”

”You got your key out of your office!?” Clarissa asked.

“That was for the Greenhouse?” Trisha shoved a hand into her coat pocket and pulled it out, waving it a little bit. “Just to check, it’s a normal key, right? I can just… go right in?”

Clarissa smiled.
”Oh, no, that's definitely not a normal key. But, that don’t mean it don’t work the same. So, I guess? It’s a not-normal normal key.”
As they got closer to the Greenhouse itself, Clarissa pointed at the work table built into the side of it. There was a binder labelled “Operations, Instructions and Emergencies” as well as a manila envelope and a box with little bees designed on it that was about the size of a floor safe.

”All that shit, Gin said you should look through it. There’s also a few magical bee suits. Not, not like a bee cosplay, but you know with the nets and shit. Bee keeper’s suit. That’s right.” she tapped her temple with a grin.
”But, since you ain’t doin’ nothin’ crazy, just go ahead and get in there.”

Trisha gave Clarissa a bit of a confused look. Why would she need a bee keeper’s suit? There wasn’t… some kind of gas in there that would make her bees go crazy, was there? Sure, she’d lost control that one time, but that generally didn’t happen. She bit her lip, trying not to dwell on it. It probably wasn’t about that.

“So I shouldn’t have called up all my bees?” Trisha joked, to forcefully alleviate her own mood. She glanced over the binder, which she’d have to read over multiple times later, before holding out a hand towards Casey, making a grabbing gesture with it.
“I want to see it for the first time with you.”

Casey grinned back at Trisha, grabbing her hand and planting a kiss on her head.
”Let’s get in there, then!” he said excitedly, getting close to the door.
”Ginny said to start by turnin’ it all the way to the right! She said that’s the most comfortable one for everyone involved.” Clarissa said from behind them, also a bit curious to see what it was.
Not that she was going to rush in with them or anything, she could hold the anticipation in… Right?

“Alright, all the way to the right.” Trisha said as she got to the door, mostly to herself. She squeezed Casey’s hand, half out of excitement and half nerves. The nervousness came from not quite understanding it all - why was all the way to the right the most comfortable? Did that mean it was like… some kind of portal to different Greenhouses? That some were dangerous, or something? Just in case, she ordered her bees to stay outside in those flowers.

There was no use thinking about it, rather than just doing. She didn’t want it to look like she was worried about it, anyway, not in front of Casey who’d just earlier been talking about how much he liked her willingness.
“Here goes…” She put the key in the lock on the door, turning it as far right as she could before she didn’t feel any more give. Then, she pushed open the Greenhouse door and stepped inside, making sure to tug in Casey with her.

She froze within the first step, mouth falling open.

In front of her was a large field, far larger than it should have been within the constraints of the Greenhouse. But just the size alone wasn’t enough to shock her - certain amounts of magic she was used to witnessing. No, it wasn’t that. It was what the field contained.

The grass came to her knees, and it varied - from typical long and green, to wheat coloured and feather like. There were flowers throughout it, brightly coloured patches among swathes of green. Some, she recognised as local ones. Large shrubs of Blue Blossom’s caught her eyes, before they moved on to ones she didn’t recognise. Flowers she wasn’t even sure existed. There was one that seemed to be so many colours at once, shimmering in the artificial sunlight, that she couldn’t figure out which ones made it up at all.

“Wow, it’s amaz-” As she talked, Trisha tilted her head upwards towards what she’d assumed were strange, green trunked trees. The words immediately died in her lips as her eyes only grew wider.

Towering above them were flowers. It was beyond the normal, and less normal, ones that scattered the floor level grass. These ones were the size of trees, bright purple, blue and pink petals spreading out and offering some shade. They varied too - some looking like large daisies, others like lilies.

Trisha just stood there, staring, for what seemed like minutes. She was slowly processing it. How much magic had gone into something like this? How did you even make something like this? Was there… more of them? How many? She shouldn’t be so shocked when it came to magic, but she’d never witnessed anything like this. Not even in the strange spells some coven members had used together.
“It’s…” Trisha trailed off again, belatedly realising she’d been squeezing Casey’s hand like she’d been trying to break it this whole time. She loosened her grip, still looking around in awe. It was difficult to process how she was feeling when there was so much to take in. Excited to bring her bees in, scared… overwhelmed.

“I honestly don’t know what to say,” Trisha said weakly, still looking up at the tall flowers. “The bees are going to love it… well, I’m not sure they’d even know where to start with flowers that big. I’m a bit worried they might drown in the pollen. I don’t think they’ll ever want to leave.”

She finally smiled, snapping out of the shocked state she’d been in, and shuffled in close to Casey. She lowered her voice in the hope that Clarissa (if she’d followed) wouldn’t be able to hear her as well.
“I honestly didn’t understand why you were all so excited about the Greenhouse,” she said softly. “I don’t really have magic like this around me. It’s amazing… It doesn’t feel real, honestly. Like this is a dream or some shit.”

There was a long moment where Casey was just shocked to see such a thing be captured in their little greenhouse. He’d come up here for years, and until now it’d just been a rinky-dink little greenhouse with gaps in between the glass and the frames, and it’d rattle when the wind blew too hard.
But the majesty of Project Eden’s little “Educational Experiment” was so much greater than anything he’d come to expect.

”Jesus fucking Christ, forgive my blasphemy Lord…” was the only thing he said as he looked up at the splendor of God’s childrens’ hands. He had some vague idea about how the structure was built, and it made him shake at the amount of energy and material they must’ve had to expend to make it happen.

His free hand trailed through the tall grass, and for a moment he saw the green fields of France like he had as a child. Before the bombs, before two World Wars, before he’d seen them awash with the blood of man. As the two walked, Casey’s eyes grew wet with tears.
”It… It’s certainly a feat, my sweet Trisha Bee… God damn! I mean, look! It’s like an entire fucking range! And it’s all so…”

He pulled out his glove and put it on, then took his shoe off. Yarding backward, he chucked the shoe and watched it tumble through the air for a good minute before it finally seemed to hit some kind of invisible barrier. Tugging on nothing, the shoe quickly came back as if it were attached to a rope in space.
”You’re so right. It honestly doesn’t feel real.”

Clarissa didn’t interrupt them, but she was nearby having her own religious moment. With her, Furio had wandered in, and the two took in God’s splendor between the incredible plantlife and the blossoming love in front of them.

“It’s a lot to do for some honey,” Trisha mumbled, gaze moving in an arc with the shoe that flew through the sky and then got pulled back. It was so big, and it was beautiful. She could imagine just lying in the fields, watching her bees going about their days. It was lovely.

But it also came with a certain amount of pressure she couldn’t ignore. If they’d put all of this effort into making a magical Greenhouse of proportions Trisha hadn’t even thought possible, how much were they expecting from her? Her bees would gladly make honey all through the year - it was in their nature. But how quickly would she need to grow their numbers? What if it wasn’t good enough?

Because this obviously wasn’t some everyday Temple feat, judging by Casey’s reaction. She didn’t understand the exact logistics, but it was clear a lot would have to go into something like this.
“It makes me wish we had a picnic, or something,” Trisha smiled, swinging their joined hands, acting as if she wasn’t on an internal spiral towards anticipating a failure that hadn’t even happened yet. “How do they even do something like this? Is it… like those spells Adepts can do together?”

Casey shook his head, not entirely sure of the details.
”That would be something to ask Gin? As far as I’m aware, it’s… Well, alright, think about a diorama? Or, like, those little zen gardens therapists get? And then like, a rolodex. You make your little garden, do whatever to it, then attach it to the rolodex by one side, and enchant the building to be, like, a big magnifying glass.” He laughed.

His hand came up, and a big smile cracked across his face.
”Actually, y’know that movie we tried to watch the other night? We should’ve paid attention, I guess the movie is kind of centered around a premise just like that. Because when I texted Gin about it, she was like ‘Oh iss gunna be like BEETLEJUICE!’.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled his phone out. Opening it in front of Trisha fully would reveal that he didn’t even have any kind of lock on it. Just swipe to open. His text message box was anaemic, and seemed to be full of delivery confirmations with the occasional personal text.

But he pulled up the conversation with “Ginger”, and lo’, it was exactly as he said. Upon showing her, he giggled like a kid.
”She’s always on like, every single new movie that comes out, games and shit, I think when you do meet you guys will hit it off. Soooo long as you don’t mind her being quirky.” he laughed.

“There aren’t going to be any of those worm things, are there?” Trisha automatically looked at the ground. She really didn’t remember much about the movie, but she remembered those things. She’d been fucking fixated on them when high… and she still had no idea why they were there, or what they were. It being like that movie, or a diorama on a rolodex (which she’d never heard of), didn’t really help much. But that was fine, she’d understand it the more she used it.

She leaned over to read the message, honestly… not shocked he didn’t even have a password. She tried not to pay too much attention to what else was in his messages - even if he was showing her, it seemed rude. A trust and privacy thing, really.
“So after she treats me like a plastic skeleton for a while, we can talk about more normal things? If she knows all the latest games… maybe she can help me get better at this one my friends made me play with them online. They always get pissed because I’m bad at it. It’s not my fault I’m not really a gamer like the rest of them! I don’t tend to call my friends to get cursed out…”

Trisha trailed off, waving a hand in front of her face, looking a little awkward. Just like software development, gaming was another one of those things that didn’t really go with her image. In such a short period she’d gotten comfortable enough to let slip these things by choice… it was almost scary.
“I can deal with quirky. There were some people in the old coven that… were really weird. I wasn’t really friends with them, but I was fine with them.” Though she’d been quicker to snap then. Really, people like that - who talked about mostly their interests - were easier for her to handle. They tended not to prod at her in ways that set her off.
“Just wait till you meet my friends, anyway. Some of them are… yeah, maybe not that same level, but they’ve all got their oddities.”

Casey thought for a moment about her friends. As far as he remembered, she only seemed to mention one being sensitive to the paranormal.
”Oh, yeah, cover story for your blind friends? If they come up here? This is all just storage. If you just open it, it should be like, just a bunch of boxes and like shit furniture. It only activates when you put the key in.”

Slipping his phone and his glove back into his pocket, Casey took a long deep breath, still admiring the giant flowers.
”I’m kind of excited to crack open that manual… I think Tristain was probably in charge of writing everything down, so it’ll be a bit more animated than you’re expecting. Moving pictures and magical recordings, so you have whoever was in charge of the feature telling you how it works. The few times I’ve gotten pamphlets from ProEd, I can’t help but try and figure out the fuckin’ spells he uses to embed it all into the paper.”

Casey paused for a moment, thinking about his extended family and the things that they were all capable of doing. The good natured and kind people that they were, putting their hearts and souls into a project that they all believed in. It hurt that their faith was seen as ironic or harmful by other Adepts, especially ones he’d met in the Reserve. Like it couldn’t be real.

”There’s… There’s a lot of good people, by the way. I know you got the worst of it the last couple of days, but I promise. The further down the totem pole you go, the less crazy things get. They’re just nice people who… Y’know… They believe in the things my Mom has to say.”

Trisha nodded along to the cover story for her friends. She wasn’t sure if she’d bring them here at all… it required going up a semi-magical lift, and bringing people over the second day of living together didn’t appeal all that much. But it was good to have a plan, because if she did they’d be nosey as fuck.

“A magical recording explaining how something works… Kind of like a video lecture in paper form?” Trisha gnawed at her lip a bit as she processed that. It sounded cool, but if it was all magical recordings rather than words that just meant she’d have to write it all down as she watched them. Well, that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Maybe she’d have to read it over a few less times to understand it all. “That’s… something my university would’ve loved to have. They’d try sell it to us for a ton of money too, magical talking textbooks.”

Her brow furrowed slightly at Casey’s affirmation about the goodness of people in the Temple - she’d never thought otherwise. Every place had nice people, even if the person at the top was like Lynette. She wouldn’t necessarily trust any of them less than someone she met otherwise… Since she didn’t tend to open up to anyone, until they were close enough it was no longer a risk.
“I’ll keep an open mind, don’t worry. I won’t judge all the followers based on the leaders. And Clarissa’s been nice, even after… that.” She waved a hand, before her mind jumped back to what he’d said before. “Oh- is ProEd short for Project Eden?”

Casey nodded, smiling at her own affirmation toward his feelings.
”Yup! Project Manager is Ginara Rasmussen. Then, yeah there’s a whole bunch of other people, but they’re… Like, our bleeding edge Wizards. Like, during the War, I was able to get a couple of furloughs in order to coordinate between government Paras and uh… Aiden was still PM then. Not such a good guy, and also not around anymore.” he grinned.
”But yeah, they wanted some more spells under their belt, and at the time the Temple needed cash to help defend the homefront, so we coordinated the trade. Mostly Gin and I.”

“Right,” Trisha nodded as if she completely understood everything. It didn’t really tell her anything more about what exactly Project Eden was… cutting edge magic, seemingly used to make a very fancy Greenhouse? She supposed if it was related to the Garden of Eden, this might be what it was like. But this was probably just one of the many things they did. She didn’t want to outright ask, because that was probably prying into something she shouldn’t. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to.
“So they… make really cool Greenhouses and help in World Wars? That’s some range. It’s… really impressive. Really fucking impressive.”

She tilted her head back up towards the towering flowers, and smiled.
“Do you think I need to read the manual before I bring the bees in?”

Casey couldn’t help but grin and smile at Trisha’s line of questioning. It did sound a bit ridiculous, but here she was. Magic wasn’t typical. Even as a kid, even if he couldn’t see his Sister’s dolls coming to life, he could observe the effects.
He couldn’t hear the cats chattering in his brain, so they made it a point to make sure he knew they knew that he knew. It was a nightmare. And a nightmare he couldn’t do anything about but cower in fear of. But even at that, it still left him more ready for the strangeness.

Not that he minded. He figured that he was already living his life with minimal magic, but maybe Trisha and he could give one another balance in that aspect.

”Well…-” he started, taking a long look around. ”-I definitely don’t see, like… Hive boxes or anything. So, I’m gonna have to say, yes?” he giggled.
”Or, at least don’t wait too long if you do. Maybe there’s something we’re missing about it.”

“Yeah, I don’t see anything,” Trisha also took a proper look around. “I suppose they could make their own hive, but that doesn’t just happen overnight. It could take them weeks… They need to build up the honeycomb once they’ve found a spot they like. If they have to build the hive they probably won’t start producing honey until they're done, so we’re probably missing something.”

She hoped so. Otherwise, she’d end up with a fair amount of the bees trying to sleep on herto take breaks.
“I was hoping to take my time reading it later… Ah, I guess the bees can always hang out inside with us until I figure it out. They’ll live so long as there’s places for them to sit and fruit for them to eat.”

Trisha nodded, making up her mind that she wouldn’t rush too much. If she rushed and did something wrong then that would have more of a negative impact on the bees.
“I guess we should go get everything else sorted? I feel a bit bad now, thinking about all my bees just sitting in my car while we’re enjoying this.”

Casey considered the bees and the situation. Without more knowledge on how the structure worked, he didn’t feel comfortable with leaving the door open for them to freely go in and out. Which, of course, meant sixty thousand bees in their rafters.
”Yeah, I mean it looked like the indoor collection is getting left to our discretion.”
He turned, nodding his head toward the exit.
”Just bring ‘em in and we’ll let ‘em in the house. I’ll have someone go get us some groceries and shit. And there should be some wood, I can get that stove goin’ while we’re taping down spots for the furniture.”

”Nah, special surprise my man.”
Furio’s voice was a surprise. His face hadn’t looked pressed for speech, but it practically echoed from his foghorn of a chest.
”Swapped it out for a nice clean burning gas. So, it’s just heat now.”
”Oh, geeze… I’ll really miss having to bring wood up here and chop it by hand.”
Furio put his hand up, playfully pointing back.
”It was a good chore, and it helped us out! Kept you fit!”

Casey seemed to take it in stride as they got a bit closer.
”So you guys are leaving the plants?”
”Well, nah. We’ll come back for ‘em later on though, since I’m not sure how that green room is gonna fit ‘em all, I may have to give them a different home. Buuuuut, don’t worry! We’ll clean up when it’s all set.” Clarissa smiled, leaning slightly into her husband as she spoke.
”You mean Theo.” Casey laughed
”Well duh, Psycho over there loves vacuuming.”

The three of them laughed like it was a joke Trisha wasn’t in on. Casey didn’t bother to explain it.

Trisha stood awkwardly as they all laughed at a joke she didn’t understand. Nobody explained, so she didn’t ask, trying to ignore the irritation at being left out. Her lips pulled into a thin line, the hint of a grumpy expression that she couldn’t quite control before she pushed it down.

“Uh,” she awkwardly cleared her throat. “Let’s go figure out where to put the furniture? Then I can get the bees before they get too upset…”

She half ushered them out of the Greenhouse, and towards all the work that waited for them.

---

There wasn’t much Trisha had to help with after they’d taped down all the furniture spots. She wasn’t really built for manual labour and she couldn’t start unpacking her own things until the furniture was all in and it was moved up. There were a few things that kept her busy - a trip downstairs to get her bees, and a less fun trip back up with them… but she didn’t want to call them all up and risk them going into attack mode. After taking the time to get them settled, most of the bees resting in the plants hanging above their heads. It wasn’t ideal, but she felt a lot more relaxed having them inside with them.

With the bees sorted, she was back to feeling pretty useless and just a bit in the way.

So as soon as she saw the opportunity to, she took the Greenhouse manual and squirrelled away into the smaller room they were going to make their ‘den’. The large, forest green couch had been put in and set up early on - before it would have to be carried around loads of furniture boxes. It took up a large space in the room, but it meant it felt cosy… safe. Trisha preferred spaces like this to massive, open rooms.

At first, she’d only meant to do a quick flick through - to find what she needed now and give the pages a brief glance over. She’d grabbed a notebook and pen from her car when she got the bees, just to make a few notes of the important points, so she could get the bees settled as quickly as possible.

It didn’t take long for her to start treating it like studying. The manual was well laid out, with all the information she needed right away at the start. It was incredibly detailed, and she was only on page one - no moving pictures yet, just informative text and clearly laid out instructions. She was glad there were no ‘magical recordings’ to start with, because then she’d really have to properly write out her own notes.

She’d just read through this page once or twice, maybe take some notes on it… then she’d move onto the next one. There was no point going through quickly if she didn’t properly understand the material at the beginning. If she was quick, she’d get through everything she needed right now in a few hours. That wouldn’t be so bad.

She moved from sitting up to lying on her stomach, manual open in front of her and notebook to her right. The pen went to her mouth as she chewed on the cap, face scrunching up as she started to read. Her eyes moved across the page slowly, pen moving from her lips to the notebook to make scrawling notes, before she immediately went back to chewing it as she concentrated.

The manual itself was a bespoke tome masquerading as a simple office shelf insert, even from the first few pages. It was addressed formally, but still as if it were some sort of planned one on one tutoring program where she was the sole focus. There was a small forward by the purported project manager, this Gin character.
”Welcome to your personalized guide to navigating the latest and greatest advancement in magical horticulture: The Plentiful Garden. It is a privilege to have the opportunity that we’ve been presented with - Allowing magically influenced creatures native to our Heavenly Domain of Shimmer to develop in conditions that we expect to see in the next Epoch.

Casey swung into the door frame. He had a bowl in his hand and a smile on his face.
”Heyyyyy… Busy? I can leave the fruit and go, but I cut you up some melon, aaaand some strawberries, and there’s grapes too. I cracked a few watermelons for the bees, I think they’re chowing down with Theo.” he giggled.

It took Trisha a moment to even realise someone was talking to her. Her mind was just filled with words, eyes moving at a snail's pace across the page. Even the foreword was something she had to read a couple of times to properly process. So Casey’s words entered her ears and just sat there at the top of the stack of other things she was thinking about, until she finally reached them.
“Oh- no, I was just taking a quick look at the manual,” Trisha turned her head towards him with a smile, acting as if it had just been a casual look. As she did she opened her mind back up to the pheromonal signals she’d been purposefully ignoring, sensing that what he said about the bees was true. “Oh yeah, they’re really enjoying them. I can feel it through the walls.”

She shifted slightly, patting the couch next to her while subtly closing the notebook already filled with a hurried scrawl with the other hand.
“It’s really sweet that you brought me all this fruit… I’m not the one doing any of the manual labour.”

The large man returned a gentle chuckle and put the bowl down on the wooden insert that turned the corner of the couch into a table.
”Well, for one? Studying’s hard work. I can still recite like thirty five stories from the Richoux Tomes; I used to study that shit until my eyes hurt.”

For a moment, he thought about being a kid and knowing for certain magic existed, but not being able to do any of it. To not feel how his siblings felt. But looking at her face made him brush the pain aside. It was a good day, and he didn’t want to ruin the mood.

”And, two… I’m barely doing anything. Check this shit out.”
One of the first things he’d done when the furniture arrived was change into a different pair of pants. It hadn’t been obvious then, but now he demonstrated a keen feature: Rather than sitting on the couch, he simply bent his legs into a squatting position, then readjusted for a moment until it looked like he was literally sitting on nothing.
He had no strain in his face, no struggle to keep the posture, no shaking or anything.

”Enchanted pants and boots, dude. Like exoskeletons, they hoist and stabilize all at the same time. You could easily be doing this shit with us, I just don’t want you to have to. Because I’m a chauvinist like that.” he laughed aloud, hoping she’d take it as the joke it was.

“Oh yeah, you’ve relegated me to doing the only thing us women can - studying,” Trisha laughed, shaking her head half in disbelief as she stared at Casey, then at the pants. He really wasn’t struggling to stay like that…
“All this item enchanting just feels like a life cheat code. Next thing you’ll just be letting your clothes do everything for you. Is there something that can do the work of my brain for me?”

With a smile, she rolled over towards the corner of the couch. It would be easier to sit up and move, but she couldn’t really be bothered to. She reached out for a piece of melon first, putting it in her mouth and quickly chewing it. Normally when she got properly into studying something she wouldn’t even bother to eat. Having someone bring her food was… really nice.
“How’s it going out there?” she asked, munching on another piece of melon. Then she shuffled across on her stomach so she was right next to him, gently pressing her head against his arm.
“I think I can get through everything I need to set up the bees if I don’t-” take any breaks. Right, that wouldn’t be feasible at all. “-Get too stuck on the details.”

Casey shifted so he was actually sitting on the couch with her. Leaning his own head, he pressed it up to hers and took a deep breath.
”Oh, we’re just about done, it’s gonna be stuff that the other two can bring up. Clarissa and Furio are officially out, but you can expect to see him at least for the next couple weeks while we transition the role fully.”
He pointed out to the hall.
”The massive fucking television I wanted is actually in the hall, I just didn’t want to install it and everything while you’re in here trying to intake information. Thankfully one of the guys from the IT office is going to be coming later to hook everything up for us; the cable, get the wifi taken care of, all that shit.”

He grabbed a few grapes and popped them into his mouth, laying back a bit to look at the manual with her. As his eyes tracked across the page, he started to get a strange and tingling feeling on the back of his neck.
”Wow… I really hope they don’t go super heavy into the whole faith thing. I don’t want you reading this and feeling like they’re trying to convert you…”
His brow furrowed as he began to shuffle through the pages. Each new one, or at least once every few pages, a voice leaked out like a person stuck in a book before being shut up again by the fold of another.

“Honestly? I don’t entirely understand all the faith stuff in it, and I’m used to ignoring things like that to get the information I need,” Trisha shrugged. She leaned over to watch as he flicked through it, trying not to get too twitchy about how he was just skimming and not even bothering to read anything properly, and he wasn’t understand the earlier things first- but he wasn’t studying it, he was just quickly checking it wasn’t too religion heavy.
“My mom’s Catholic so she used to always get me these ‘Faith and Science’ books, I got good at reading around those parts. Didn’t work so well when she quizzed me on that too… But basically, I’m used to it, so don’t worry too much about it.”

She reached out to place a hand on his shoulder, gently rubbing it. Honestly, she did find it a bit annoying, but she also didn’t care if they were trying to convert her through some manual… she wasn’t going to convert, and that was that. She wasn’t someone who was so easily influenced.
“Maybe it’ll help me learn a little bit more about you?”

”Well, sure… But…-”
He bit his lip, hitting the end and reading through a paragraph. He cleared his throat before speaking again.
”Its just, y’know, a Catholic will tell you Jesus died for your sins. A member of the Temple would agree, but they’d also tell you that he came back. And that he’s not far.”

He shook his head, closing the book.
”It seems fine. No little quotes from the book, or any of my Mom’s poems. They’re probably gonna start talking about Eden and about the Bible, so its shit you already know. But, they’ll probably give the magic spin on it, if you’re interested in hearing. I guess, long and short, we… Believe that with enough unity, we’re be able to reclaim the gift of Eden. Since… Y’know, Jesus died for our sins already and all that.” he shrugged.

”But, just like you, I want to be the one to go through it with you. Not them.”

Trisha pressed her lips together to clamp down on her initial reaction that it was all ridiculous. She already found the Catholic thing, with God and Jesus dying for their sins, stupid as anything but fiction. It did in part come from having it forced on her when she was young, and the resentment that came from being shunted to a Sunday school when she could've spent that day with her mom. But that he’d come back? That they'd be able to reclaim something that probably wasn't even real? It was hard to wrap her head around believing it.

But Casey believed it, and the last thing she wanted to do was upset him over something she wasn't really bothered by. She disliked having things pushed on her, but she'd never had a problem with other people's faith. Being with him was more important than any lack of belief she had. It wasn't a real problem.
“I want to hear it from you too… when there's less things happening, and you want to tell me," Trisha said softly, before laughing as a thought crossed her mind. “Then when I'm an expert I can write a textbook about science, faith, and magic."

She pushed herself up slightly, only to practically burrow against him, mostly lying on him rather than the couch. She looped her arms around his torso as best she could, snuggling in closely.
“We can slowly tell each other these things… About ourselves, and our lives. Then by the time I tell you my deepest, darkest secrets you'll be too invested to leave." Her voice lifted up into a joking tone towards the end of the sentence, and she smiled contentedly at him. Of course… it wasn't really ‘secrets’ she was worried would cause him to leave her. She never got close to truly letting someone in, yet they left her all the same. It was just her. “I’m looking forward to it. Learning everything about each other until nobody knows us like we do."

She smiled warmly at him, like everything was going to be perfect. She really wanted to believe it would be, for once.
“We haven't even finished moving in and this place already feels more like a home than anywhere else I've lived."

”Hey, who says I’ll ever wanna leave? I could be like one of those fish… Latch onto you like a leech and grow into you. Amoebaaaaaaa…”
Holding her so close, he easily tucked backward to lay on the massive green couch they’d bought. He bought, though he didn’t ever consider it. Not once had the thought crossed his mind the entire time that it was anything other than their furniture.

It wasn’t so much that he knew she had money, moreso that it didn’t matter. It was all fake, and they were living unreal lives among magical prestige. Even if the Vanburens weren’t magical in their entirety, Trisha was. And sometimes vast wealth grants one better spells than genuine magical study.
No, none of it mattered. He was there with her, on the couch that was in the apartment that, for the moment, he was sure of being clean. They were alone as someone could be in the Temple.

His hand reached into the fruit bowl from a distance, bringing a piece of melon up to Trisha’s mouth.
”Buzz, buzz. Open up.” he giggled, his other hand creeping about her exposed bits, pressing and poking until he could find a decent tickling spot to use. He wasn’t rough or digging about it, just putting enough pressure to get a reaction.

Trisha liked the thought of Casey becoming a fish permanently attached to her more than she should. Then he wouldn't leave her and she wouldn't have to worry about being lonely ever. Sure, the concept was a bit disturbing, but… well it would be nice.

She parted her lips to take the melon, unable to resist lightly kissing his fingers at the end. As he tried to tickle her, though, she demonstrated a pretty impressive stone face, barely seeming to react beyond a languid smile. She really wasn’t that ticklish and if anything she just enjoyed the feeling of Casey’s light touch all over.
“Did you really think it would be that easy? I've been trained by thousands of bees crawling on me, this is nothing-" Trisha's confident words were cut off by a fit of giggles when his hand lightly pressed into her side. She jerked her body to try to get away without actually getting off him, pressing her face into shoulder and muffling her constant laughter. “Hey, hey, stop!"

She wriggled up so her head was at his neck, reaching down to grab the offending hand. She tried to trap his fingers to stop them from pressing into her sensitive side, but didn't actually try to move his hand away, keeping it at her waist. Her other hand snaked up to his chest, just resting there.
“Now that you've found out my weakness, I can't let you live." Trisha's attempt at a low, ominous tone was ruined by a giggle at the end. Her eyes creased playfully and she pursed her lips to gently blow on his neck. At the same time her fingers pressed into his chest to tickle him back.

Every time Trisha tried to tickle him in a new spot, he just laughed like it was nothing.
”Nerve damage. Scar tissue. Not ticklish there. More nerve damage.”
It took getting up under his arms, hands crammed into his armpits, for him to start scooting and hopping. His giggles and the situation only caused him to fight back with equal fervour.

Eventually, the two of them were a writhing mass of giggles and laughter, with Casey finally giving up getting her back and simply grabbing both her wrists.
He spun, playfully pinning her to the big open section of the couch. He was panting, trying to catch his breath after being tickled half to death himself.

His eyes stared down at her, hair sprawled out to frame her face against the darker colors surrounding it. Hands released hers, slowly moving down but still keeping him looming over her.
”D-do… Is this when I kiss you again?” he asked quietly.

Trisha laughed, smiling softly up at him. There was a light sheen of perspiration across her forehead, her chest rapidly moving up and down as she tried to slow her breathing back down. But she couldn’t stop more laughter swelling up, eyes half closing. It was just so… cute how he had to ask.

“It is," she replied softly when she stopped giggling. She reached up to loosely wrap her arms around his neck, one hand resting on the back of it and the other threading through his hair. They lightly pressed, encouraging him back down towards her. “You’re learning quickly, I’m really lucky to have such a good student."

She didn’t move to close the gap, just once again waiting for him to take the initiative with an inviting smile.

He was more than happy to let himself go like a greyhound at the track. An hour or so later, Casey's shirt was gone and half wrapped around Trisha's neck as he dried her sweat and his spit off with it. They were tight together, legs locked between one another. He was playing with her hair, staring half into space.
”I always knew I was gonna like kissing.” he giggled.

The manual for the greenhouse, as well as Trisha's notes, ended up on the floor long ago, but he wasn't in a position to return them to where they were… Nor did he want to. It was his time, for however long or brief it'd end up being.
”I guess it's satisfactory, huh?” he grinned smugly.

“Mhm, you got way too good at it way too quickly," Trisha laughed weakly, still panting slightly. She was happy and content, but also tired. She was definitely going to have to actually start going to the gym with him and do some… stamina training or something. It wasn’t even like they’d… well, when they got to that she’d definitely need it.

“It helps that I’m a good kisser too, of course you enjoy it with me," she smiled, tucking her head in against him. As she did her gaze went down towards her own neck and collar - all the skin that was exposed by just wearing a tank top. Her eyes widened slightly, as if she hadn’t experienced all of the kissing, and she playfully pushed at his chest.
“Oh my god, this is going to be so obvious tomorrow… My friends are not going to shut up about it. Caseeeyyyy." It was obvious from the way she still smiled and snuggled close to him that she wasn’t actually upset, just jokingly complaining. “I’m not going to protect you from all their questioning."

Casey gave a hearty laugh at the implication.
”We spent some time in the psych office taking tests to make sure we wouldn't spill government secrets under interrogation. I'm a steel cage: you just tell me how to respond and I'll do it.” he grinned.

His neck craned and he planted another sucking kiss on her neck.
”But, I kind of like the evidence… Is that weird?”

“Not really, I- uh- well I like it too. I would’ve stopped you if I didn’t," Trisha blushed slightly while saying that. It wasn’t that she was inexperienced at all, but vocalising something she liked? Generally not something she’d do.
“Butttt I’m not sure that psych office has anything on my friends, they just have this way of annoying you so much you give in just to get them to shut up. Well, it’s not anything you need to lie about, they’ll just be intrusive."

She paused, lips pressing together and dropping from a smile to a thin line. Thinking about her friends, and everything they’d ask and say, and being with him like this… She had to say. While it was just them, and she had the opportunity.
“About my friends… there is something you should know, but you have to promise to stay calm about it, okay?"

He was about to ask if he was ever anything other than calm, but she’d already seen him blow his stack a bit.
”Unless something is hurting you, I promise you I’ll keep my cool. I’ll never ever yell at you, or anything like that. So, what’s up?”

“Alright,” Trisha nodded, taking in a deep breath. Well it would be fine, wouldn’t it? Sure, there’d been other men she’d been with who found out she was friend’s with an ex, and a girl at that, who’d changed just like that. But Casey wasn’t like that. She trusted him.
”So one of my friend’s- Reyna, I mentioned her before, the White-Pink adept- we sorta, well yeah we did, we dated before. She was the one that lasted four months… but it was over four years ago, and we’re really just friends now. There hasn’t been anything there since she broke up with me. But just, I wanted you to know before you meet them- her."

If it affected Casey, he didn’t show it. Truthfully it didn’t; the disconnect was so strong that not a lot was going to overpower it. He was just confused as to why she was making anything out of it at all.
”Al-right? I mean, I appreciate you being honest with me and I love that, but like… Is that something normal people worry about in a relationship? I guess, like, because people cheat?” he asked, just trying to wrap his head around it.
”But, like, it was only four months. Four years ago. You guys just made better friends, I get that. Well, I mean I understand. I’ve seen the scenario in, like, movies and television. But is that really something normal people would get pissy about?” he asked her.

“Yeah, they do.” Trisha visibly relaxed as he talked, the slight tension that had appeared in her frame completely drained away.
“I’ve been with people in the past who found out and made a big deal about it. One even broke up with me over it… I think, because she’s a girl, guys I’ve dated just assume I’ll need both? I’ve never cheated and never will, but sometimes people just jump to conclusions.” She shook her head, smiling slightly at him.
“I’m glad you’re not like that about it- not that I thought you would be. Probably seems a little silly I got so worried about it, huh?”

Silly? Sure. But people were silly, they did silly things. Having been involved with the Temple just about all his life, he was used to that sort of thing. Quirks, oddities, weird ticks. It didn’t get any better in the Military, either.
”Well, if I got worried about shit like that, I probably would’ve died. There was this… Guy. He was in my squad, and he… We were close. He tried to come onto me, and I didn’t really know how to feel about it. He got offended, ran off… Fucking shadow monsters invading our position ripped him apart, poor guy. We were on watch duty, we didn’t even know that we-”

His voice trailed off. Describing it invited the memories back. The visual of it.
”I didn’t really have time to be sad. It was confusion into fight mode. No time for getting overly emotional.” he finished, his voice no longer warm. He got quiet, almost distant.
”I… Couldn’t even stop him. It was totally unprofessional. We were… Supposed to be on watch. Why couldn’t he wait? I’ll never know.”

“I’m… sorry,” Trisha said softly, shuffling herself slightly to loop her arms around him and rub gentle circles against his back. While it would probably come across that way, she wasn’t so much saying sorry for it happening like others might when told something like this… That wasn’t her fault, what would her sorries do? But she was sorry that what she’d said had led him to remember it.

“That really is worse than anything I’ve-” As she spoke, the image of someone being ripped apart by shadow monsters really settled in. She could see it. It was almost too real as it flashed across her eyes… She had seen that. Everyone in Sycamore had seen people die, but… She closed her eyes to try get the image out of her head. Something she didn’t want to remember. It didn’t help, but she pressed closer to him, hands still rubbing circles in his back - as if it was all to comfort him.

“I’ve never seen someone die like that. I can only imagine…” Trisha lied awkwardly, but it probably just seemed like she was struggling with the whole person being ripped apart thing. “It wasn’t your fault but… I guess sometimes we regret things that weren’t our fault.”

He wasn’t exactly listening to her talking. He was looking for something else to bite into. Casey’s mind twisted and turned to a conversation he’d had just a couple of years back, when he and Leon had spoken about their own situations involving traumatic events. It was mostly about Casey’s refusal to seek magical assistance with it.
Leon had explained the process, and what he’d chosen to have done about it.

”Did… Have you had a memory adjustment?” his voice echoed. ”Or, were you… Not a fighter? I know Edict messes with people’s memories, he’s the one who cleared my brother’s condition. But, from what they both say, things got… Real bad. You’re telling me you never saw anything like that?”

He tried to sound like he was excited for her, but there was a… Tension.

Trisha’s head snapped up, eyes widening as she jerked back slightly. She wasn’t able to hide her reaction, her face visibly paling. How could she be so stupid? Of course Leon talked to Casey about what happened… but she’d gone and forgotten about that in her stupid attempt to cover up a perceived vulnerability. She’d lied and he knew and he was just trying to pretend he didn’t.
“I… My memory’s a bit fuzzy.” That was true. There were bits she didn’t remember - or had forced herself to forget, perhaps. A self protection thing. But not enough. “But I haven’t had a memory adjustment, I couldn’t- don’t want to… I did see… I…”

She stumbled over her words, squeezing her eyes shut so she didn’t have to see whatever reaction he had, breathing quickening. Closing her eyes just meant she saw all that again, but that was better than rejection. It was in the past.
“I was there. I fought Apparitions and the Stygian Snake. I- I just don’t like talking about it. I try not to remember it. I wasn’t always on the frontlines, I missed some of it. I didn’t want to make it about me.” Rapid fire excuses, one after the other. “It was ten years ago.”

Casey got concerned once her eyes slammed shut. He recognized the reaction in some of the other soldiers he’d met when he tripped something accidentally. Most of his issues came from associative visualisation. It took a lot to get him going heavily without actually seeing something in front of him. But she wasn’t doing well with it based on memory.
He nodded his head, taking a deep breath.

”Trisha… Look at me. Casey. I’m here, Trisha.” his voice was gentle, trying to be subtle and calm as possible. He’d been taught some techniques to try and help with flares. Connection and consistency were important.
”Nothing’s gonna hurt you with me around, Trisha. Nothing. I won’t let it. I’m right here with you, and I’m going to be as long as you want me here. I’m sorry… I know it’s hard to remember that kind of thing, but I promise you it’s never going to happen again. Not here with me.”

“Really? You’ll- you’ll stay?” Trisha’s eyes slowly, hesitantly, opened. Her fingers dug into his back as she tried to get rid of the deep feeling of fear that had come out of nowhere. She didn’t normally get like this- she didn’t normally remember. But it wasn’t that, was it? It was the fear of him leaving after she’d lied, right? She didn’t have problems with- with-

She winced, chest tightening again as she just brought back up more memories she’d tried to suppress. The apparitions… the claws and teeth that ripped people apart. The Stygian Snake worming its way into her mind, the hallucinations.
“I’m… I’m fine. It wasn’t like I- well I- I only nearly died once. Just once. I know it’s fine. It’s not that. It’s really not that.” She shook her head, eyes darting all over the place as she tried to deny to herself more than anything. She hadn’t had problems in so many years since? Just the first few, that was to be expected. “You’ll really be there to protect me?”

This was difficult for him. He didn’t want to make it seem like this was the end of the world; she’d lied, and so had he. Just a few hours ago, totally unprompted and about something that he hoped would never even come up. But, what was she so afraid of that she was lying about having a condition like that?
Casey slowly brought his hands up to her face, gently cradling her chin and cheeks.

”We’re gonna talk about this again. Not in a day, maybe not in a week… But I certainly intend on being here to talk about it with you again. And again, and again. Until one day we’ll both feel better about what we’ve seen.”
His face got close, kissing her on the forehead, then rocking his own into hers to look at her directly in the eyes.
”I’m not leaving you, Trisha. We’re doing things together, starting with living here together and sleeping in our own bed together. Hanging on our couch together. Talking like this together.”

His eyebrows rose up, making sure she could see his expectant gaze.
”Do you understand me? It’s us. Us.”

Trisha bit her lip, slightly tilting her head into what seemed to be a nod. She really, really wanted to trust his reassurance. He probably wouldn’t leave her… yet. But it was impossible to get those words any further through her walls, to all the anxieties she’d locked up deeply for years. She didn’t talk for a while, slowly processing his words, trying to let them sink in. Trying to calm down. Eventually, she felt like she could talk again.
“I understand. You’re not leaving, and I’m not leaving, so I guess it is us.” She took a deep, but still shaky, breath. It was easier to calm down as she looked into his eyes, that expression, foreheads pressed together. The warmth of his skin against hers helped her push away the doubts and the memories that had been brought up. Things she didn’t really want to talk about again, if she could help it.

“Thank you,” she said softly, expression finally relaxing, and chest no longer heaving up and down as if she was struggling to breathe. Now, she really just wanted to curl up in his arms and sleep.
“I don’t know what happened, really, I don’t normally get like that. I guess it’s all part of living together- this couch has already seen so much, it’s only been a few hours.” She laughed slightly, tilting her head slightly to rub her nose against his. Her mind was still slightly fuzzy, trying to figure out how to move the conversation on, but only coming up with awkward ideas. Well, better than nothing.
“I’m glad we got it, it's comfortable for just cuddling up like this.”

Casey couldn’t help but smile, feeling Trisha calming down directly in his arms. He’d long since released her to take whatever position felt most comfortable, and was cradling her as best he could between his massive arms.
”I’m sure Big Green will see a lot more in its life. Lets just hope the cushions don’t get all caved in from us being here too long.”
He adjusted slightly, a nervous tick to avoid the scenario of the cushions getting ruined in his head. Why? Even he didn’t know. Not like it couldn’t be fixed.

”You get nice and comfy… You want me to have them finish up for me? I’ll sit here, make sure you feel safe as long as you want me…” he offered to her, whispering sweetly as his hand twirled a little curl in her hair.

“Only if you think that’ll be alright,” Trisha replied softly, curling up in his arms and resting against his chest. After that episode she felt drained, even as the little voice in the back of her mind that sounded awfully like her mom’s started berating her for wasting so much time when she could be studying. But she was tired. She tilted her head up, eyes half closed.
“Maybe just for a bit… let’s stay like this, then I’ll get back to reading the manual.”

”Oh… Yeah! You just chill out, Babe. I’m here with you. Maybe try and fall asleep? Get some good rest.” he smiled down at her, hand running through her hair as he thought about what was next.

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

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Edict

Interactions: None.

Yes.

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Linqian looked at Britney’s car, then down towards the road. She really didn’t want to leave her own here… that would be a pain. Even if she was a bit more relaxed now that she knew she wasn’t going to be spending the rest of the evening alone, it would still be another thing to worry about.
”I’ll follow in my car, since I brought it, just-” Linqian went to put a hand in the pocket of Edict’s jacket, immediately realising that it wasn’t hers. Shit. Shit, shit, shit. ”My fucking car keys were in my fucking coat that got destroyed in the fucking fire! Fuck!”

Deep breath. Don’t kick a tree. Linqian clenched her fists, trying to stay calm, and turning towards both Edict and Britney. She decided to go the slightly more diplomatic, not targeting the mafia member among them, approach. ”Neither of you happen to know how to break into and hotwire a car, do you?”

Greyson took a deep breath.
”Oh fuck, I love hearing that. Yeah, that’s fine. Let’s go, I don’t want to take any longer than we have to. Thankfully we just need to get into it.”
With the ice wall gone, there was only rain water and a smoldering wreck of a Cadillac where his beloved car had once been. What a fucking shame. His hands started to shuffle across Linqian, nowhere they hadn’t been prior, but on the hunt for the pocket his phone was in.

”Ummm….” Britney put a fist to her chin as she thought for a moment, pivoting her upper body from left to right as she thought about a solution. ”Is it like a fancy new car? I practiced picking locks with my plants a lot back in the day...”

Getting his phone finally, Edict nodded.
”That should work. There’s a spare key in the glovebox, unless you gave it to someone else Linqian… At least you won’t be up shit’s creek.” he concluded, looking over at Britney and smiling.
”I love when you say shit like that out of the blue, y’know?”

”Just letting ya’ll know I can get in,” Britney laughed.

Linqian rolled her eyes, grimacing at the grossly sappy words coming out of his mouth.
”Fucking hell, Greyson, tone that shit down.” Linqian sneered, gesturing to them both to follow her. ”It’s just a bit down the road… I didn’t even know there was a fucking spare key, you think I have time to rifle through the glovebox? Thank fuck there is.”

As Linqian had said, her car wasn’t really that far away. She’d parked it along the road, not hidden in a bush like Britney’s. She pointed to it, and turned to Britney.
”Do whatever you have to do, I promise I won’t get pissed if you damage anything.” Because she’d probably make Edict foot the bill.

”I can get in without breaking anything, just hold on…” Britney walked over to this fancy car, and then put her finger against the lock, and out of her finger came a thick wooden vine that wormed its way in through the mechanisms. There was a series of clicking, and grinding before the lock popped up. Britney smiled. ”... Still got it!” She laughed.

”Voilà…” Britney gestured for Linqian to get in.

Linqian couldn’t help but grin at her. ”Shit, I’ve gotta learn that some day… Let me check if Greyson wasn’t making up shit about the spare keys.”

She got in, leaning over into the passenger side to pull open the glovebox. It was pretty empty - she pulled out the owner’s manual and threw it in the back, before finding a suspicious plastic bag. Thankfully there weren’t any drugs in it, just the spare keys and registration. She really should’ve looked in here earlier.
”All good,” she popped back out, shaking the spare keys. At the same time, she unlocked the trunk, tilting her head towards Greyson. ”I’ve got a change of clothes in there, want your coat back? Otherwise… I’ll follow you wherever we’re going, Brit.”

”Fuck the coat for now, lets just get where we’re going. I’ll…” he turned to his burning wreck one last time, then to Britney.
”I’ll be in your passenger seat… Fuck, man…” he mumbled, unclipping his bulletproof vest so it dangled loosely as he skulked to the truck.

”So, um…” Britney looked around, awkwardly shuffling in her feet. ”Do you want to get some actual clothes first? I know Bean will hook you up for free if she isn’t busy.”

”Don’t worry about it, I got some,” Linqian popped open the trunk, rummaging around and pulling out what looked to be a pair of shorts and a plain t-shirt. She shuffled around to pull on the shorts underneath Edict’s jacket. ”Gotta be prepared in case I ever need to change before work, so I’m all good. Let’s get going.”

”Bet,” Britney laughed, before looking down at her soaked sweater. ”... Maybe I need to hit up Bean. Or stop by my house. I’m soaked.”

”You won’t hear me complainin’.”
By then, he was on the phone in earnest.
”Richie? Yeah, I’m gonna need a wrecker. — Yep. It’s a sad one, so just ping me and take it from there. And be careful! You may see some shit you don’t wanna see.” he babbled on toward the truck.

Linqian rolled their eyes once again at Greyson’s back, leaning against her open car door as she looked at Britney and lowered her voice. ”The fuck did you see in him? Y’know what, don’t answer that- Let’s go to your place or Bean’s, whatever’s fastest, then hit somewhere up for food. I’m fucking starving after all that shit… or I can cook for us?”

Her eyebrows raised slightly, winking teasingly as she joked, ”then we wouldn’t need to worry about clothes at all.”

”My house is booby-trapped,” Britney awkwardly laughed, before she pulled out her phone - which was also soaked, but it was still functional. She called Sabrina, and near immediately, she answered.

“Brit, how are you?” Sabrina asked.

”Good, good,” Britney said, ”Are you busy right now?”

“... You need an outfit change?”

”... I need an outfit change.” Britney sighed. ”Do you mind if Greyson and Linqian come over, too?”

“Sure,” Sabrina began. “But, I have Messiah with me, so… no cursing, no drinking, you know…”

”That’s fine, I’ll let them know,” Britney said, before she covered the microphone with her hand and said, ”Bean said it’s fine, but she’s got her younger brother there if that’s cool! He’s like, ten, I think.”

”All fine by me, I’m great with kids,” Linqian said, flashing Britney a thumbs up. She got into her car and poked her head back out. ”I’ll just follow behind you.”

---

The time spent driving between the sticks and where Sabrina lived was spent with plenty of Greyson being aggressively passive about his car being destroyed for nothing in between him rattling off text messages to people in Minnesota. He wasn’t even considering that he could’ve killed anyone in the fight, mostly assuming that George had been the one to catch the majority of direct hits.
Wrong guy to shoot at, really.

By the time they arrived, it was well after noon. The cold sun was shining in this part of town, far from the influence of 8th Street’s Stormlizard. Edict let Britney go in first if she wanted, or if not the two of them would be waiting for Linqian who ended up getting a little separated by traffic. When she did arrive at the Vanburen manor’s little parking area, Edict had a cigarette in his hand and another in his lips. One, of course, was for her.
”Figured you’d want one of these before we went inside. Unless you’re too cold, but I think I’d laugh if you said that.”

”Fuck yes,” Linqian took the offered cigarette, and held it up for him to light. She’d taken an extra moment in her car to awkwardly get changed, coming out with a fresh t-shirt tucked into shorts and Edict’s coat over her shoulders. It wasn’t ideal for the weather, but she wasn’t a wimp who couldn’t handle that… plus, she subtly raised her temperature to offset it. ”I was trying to quit, but that shit isn’t easy… lasted two days. Wait. One. Well, whatever, today started and absolute shitshow and only got fucking worse. Fucking hell.”

”Well, what’s the scoop here? The fuck did I drive into?”
After swearing, he ducked a little bit and a grimace slipped across his face.
”Ahhh… Sorry. But, still you know what I mean, Linqian? Like, the house being gone? You mean to tell me you left your shit in there and it’s all gone?” he asked her with a serious, but very quiet intonation.

”I left my shit in there to stop it being fucking setting on fire. But yes, it’s all fucking gone.” Linqian waved her free hand in exasperation. ”It wasn’t like I just stripped for fucking fun. We went to the house, searched, then Emily and her gang turned up. She demanded Britney and Lila- fuck knows why she wanted Lila- and I wasn’t just going to stand by for that shit. You remember that spell me and Aryin used to do back in the day? Puts us at clothing burning temperature, so I sensibly stripped before punching Vashti in the face. Didn’t work out so well.”

Linqian held up her hands in a shrug, before taking a long drag of the cigarette. Fuck, it was nice after all of that shit. ”Emily set the house on fire while I was wrestling with Vashti… Everything gone. Fuck. At least I still have some cash at home. At least no one died, huh? They might’ve gotten Brit or someone if I’d stayed clothed and cool, hah.”

”Listen, don’t worry about the money. I owe you, you really just don’t know it yet. So, reach in the left inside pocket. Take everything that’s there. That’s yours, and for putting yourself in harms way for the people who can’t. Split that shit with Thorne, for going all out like the ‘Coven Anime Club’ used to say. Y’know… Good ol’ CAC.”

He laughed through his cigarette, flicking the ashes and taking a final drag before moving toward the door.
”Now hurry up, cuz we’re gonna need to stay on alert and I don’t want 8th Street targeting Sabrina’s house for Britney’s sweet sweet-... Presence.”

Linqian looked down at herself, then at Greyson, then down at herself again. ”I appreciate the money, but where the fuck am I supposed to put it? If I walk in with the pockets at my ass full of cash it’s going to look a little fucking suspicious. I’ll take it when we leave, alright?”
She also quickly finished off her cigarette, rolling her eyes at his back and following him towards the door.

Edict had left his gun and vest in Britney’s car thankfully, as he wasn’t so disrespectful that he’d bring a loaded firearm around for a kid without at least providing a fake one to entertain them. There was a distinction in the wetness of his shirt from where the multi-face carrier blocked the heavy rainfall and soaked it up.

Walking in, he held the door open for Linqian as she made her way in.
”Hey, back again. Twice in a week, living in the lap of luxury at Casa de Vanburen.”

Sabrina was sitting down on the sofa, wearing a red sweater and some blue jeans and some loafers. She kept her legs together as ahe looked at them, before a warming smile formed across her face.

“Yes, it’s always a pleasure,” Sabrina said, before she gestured to the little boy sitting next to him. He had to be around four-eleven, and had a curly afro on his head. He wore a green hoodie, jeans, and some black and red Jordans.

“... And this is my little brother, Messiah,” Sabrina said. “Say hi, Messiah.”

Messiah raised his hand, “... Hi.”

”Hi Messiah,” Linqian waved to him, walking over to the couch. She took of Edict's jacket before she sat down, careful to keep it off the pristine white surface (since it had gotten rained on). ”I’m Linqian, nice to meet you. Good to see you again too, Bean.”

She made sure to drag out her name, saying it slow enough that the pronunciation should be obvious without being patronising. She smiled gently - likely surprising Edict when just a moment ago she'd been swearing about losing all of her shit. ”How old are you, Messiah? You look like you must be… about twelve? When my brother was your age he was much shorter… absolute nightmare too. Wouldn't sit still, he'd be bouncing off the walls right now.”

“I’m ten,” Messiah answered.

“I made sure that he was raised to be very well mannered,” Sabrina answered. “And behaved.”

”... Right.” Linqian smiled, a little speechless. Was that a dig? It felt like a dig. She didn't have it in her to continue after that.

Edict simply waved at the young boy, not wanting to make too much of a stir. He looked around for Britney, clearing his throat before making way for the kitchen to be out of the way of the child; no need to get yelled at for saying the wrong thing.
As he walked, he peeked down the hall and saw a light on.
”Brit? You down there?” he called.

It wasn’t a tremendous amount of fun acting like he was a lapdog, and moreover he felt like at this point it may’ve been somewhat smothering for the freedom loving woman he knew… But nobody was in danger quite like Britney. Except maybe Kari, but… Well, she was dead. Right? Definitely dead. No doubt about it.

”... Yeah, I’m in the guest room changing!” Britney shouted. ”What are you trying to watch?!”

“Britney!” Sabrina shouted.

”Oh,” Britney shrugged. ”Sorry!”

Edict laughed in turn, shaking his head.
”What’d you say before we got here? Something about behaving?”
He sauntered down the hall further, but didn’t turn into the room. He just wanted to speak lowly.
”No… Just, making sure you’re safe. Never know, some fucker-” he stopped, clearing his throat. Swearing wasn’t even a habit, it was vocab.
”-Some dude like Jack could pop up at any time, right?”

”True,” Britney calmly answered. ”But if someone teleports in here, they are getting the machineel.”

He shook his head.
”Hopefully after the meeting I had this morning, we can at least stop worrying about House of Cards. We have some mutual friends who I think can convince Phantasia that the game she’s playing is for keeps, and she’s the sucker.” he offered her the idea and listened for some sort of reaction.
”I was thinking maybe we could celebrate? Or do you think it’s too early?” he half joked.

”... Oh?” Britney asked. ”Who are these friends? I would love to celebrate to get my mind off that clusterfuck…”

”Some curated uh… Business associates. House of Cards and I both dip into their pockets on occasion, so out of anyone I think they’d be fairly beholden to their profit margin. Does it make sense when I say that, as a Pink Luxer who knows the way the cookie crumbles, they’re people who I desperately want to tell you about but know I can’t? Not until everything is over.” he intoned with a great deal of secrecy in his inflection.

Britney was silent for a moment.

”... I understand.”

She took a few steps towards the door and opened it, revealing to be wearing a blue checkered button up shirt, some jeans, and some dress shoes. Britney smiled and posed.

”... How do I look?”

Greyson grinned genuinely and warmly.
”Like a lifetime’s worth of happiness, Babe. Everytime.”

Britney smiled, a redness filled her face.

”Thank you,” Britney began before she started teasing. ”... But what if I was wearing a diaper? Would you feel the same way?” She stuck her tongue out.

He walked a little closer to her, still half soaked from the rain and mud.
”Not this game again… You know how I feel about you?”
He cleared his throat, speaking quietly.
”I saw you in that hallucination. You were on my mind from the moment I woke up in it until I got pulled out. We had rings, and kids. I saw some beautiful shit in that dream that I want to make real. I’m gonna change my life, Brit…”

Britney grimaced, before she smiled, she took a few moments before she stepped over and grabbed Edict’s hands.

”Maybe we can, once all of this blows over…” Britney said. ”I
‘m willing to try again… If you’re serious-serious… but pump the breaks, just for a moment, thank you.”

He tilted his head back with a slight exasperation before nodding.
”You’re right. It was just intense, is all. Did it hit you? Or… Some trick up your sleeve?” he asked.

”I held my breath!” Britney laughed. ”Almost passed out until I came up with something - I felt sooo smart… Until it went away.”

She coughed, ”... What exactly did you see? Because everyone wasn’t doing so hot afterwards…

He furrowed his brow at the question, thinking about what she had said.
”Well, like I said, I saw you. Really, it was… A warm, inviting dream. Like a real lucid one? I knew immediately we were living in Louisiana. On my tobacco plantation. You, me, two kids, a third on the way. Our son had Kindled the night before. Killed someone. You were taking it hard, and I was trying to console you over it. Understandably.”
Shrugging his shoulders he chuckled.
”Sounds like a lot of people want shit they don’t have a chance of getting back.”

He let the thought linger for a moment before clearing his throat again. He got real quiet.
”You meant, like, Linqian? She did look pretty bad…”

”I mean Sloane almost died,” Britney awkwardly laughed. ”But Linqian, yeah, Adora, Jack…”

Greyson grimaced at the memory of Sloane.
”Oh, yeah… But I mean, if it was that bad? Baggage galore. The cast says it all, I think.” he shrugged, clearly not as concerned about the others.
”I’m kinda glad you missed it; I’d hate to see you down on yourself over something you wished was true. Now, come on, let’s go see if Sabrina won’t mind helping Linqian and I out. Unless… Something else on your mind?” he asked, eyebrow rising to question her.

”... You know she will,” Britney smiled. ”Let’s go!”

When the two of them came back, Linqian twisted around to give them both a look that clearly said ‘save me.’ After a very lacklustre response from the child and what felt like her parenting of Henri being questioned, there'd been an awkward silence. And with a silence came thinking, and with thinking came feeling fucking shit. She hid it a bit better this time - she didn't look that much different than the normal slightly annoyed Linqian. Shoulders tense, lips in a thin line, eyes slightly narrowed. Except she wasn’t annoyed she was spiraling towards the state she'd been in before.

”You took so long I thought you were-” Linqian paused, glancing at Messiah, and quickly switching what she was going to say. It'd be pretty obvious to them what she's planned to say. ”Eloping. Oh hey, Brit, you look good.”

She smiled slightly as if everything was still totally alright, fiddling with the wedding rings on her fingers (which escaped being melted because they were her channeller).
”So, we staying here and hanging with Bean and… Messiah, or we hitting up somewhere else?”

”Um, before we do anything,” Britney began as she sat down. ”Bean, can dry off Greyson’s clothes?”

“Oh, gladly,” Sabrina said, raising a hand, as she manipulated the fibers in Edict’s outfit to wring out the different liquids that were in it. “All better… do you need anything else? Maybe some clothes? I don’t mind at all.”

”I’m al-” Linqian paused, stopping herself from going with her normal answer of not accepting things for ‘free’. This was fine, right? It wasn't money. She could view it as an advance payment for her bringing up Sabrina to the coven when they had a meeting that didn't involve getting attacked in some way almost right away. ”Some kind of thick, winter jacket? I… lost mine.”

Sabrina pinched her fingers together as if she was holding something, and fiber by fiber she created a thick, hooded puffer jacket. It was all black and had a fur lined hood. Sabrina gave Linqian a warming smile.

“Ta-da!”

”Has anyone told you you’re the best lately, Sabrina? We really appreciate the help…” Edict grinned, taking his coat back finally.

”Sh- Wow. Thank you so much, Bean.” Linqian just resisted letting out a torrent of swears, though she muttered a couple under her breath in Chinese. It looked… amazing. Was that real fur? What the fuck. Shit. She almost forgot the cash in Edict’s coat she hadn’t taken yet cause she’d had nowhere to fucking put it.

“It’s no problem,” Sabrina said, “I’m here to help.”

As Edict leaned down to take his coat she caught his wrist, saying in a low voice, ”remember to pay what you owe later, yeah?”

Then she let him go and stood up, taking the new jacket from Sabrina. With the closest to a genuine smile she’d had she put it on, almost tempted to give a spin… but that would be fucking embarrasing.
”This is amazing… I won’t need to worry about freezing to death anymore. I’ll repay you with that thing we talked about last time.” She smiled at Sabrina, before turning to Britney and Edict with a thick bravado to properly cover the cracks that had been forming. ”How’s it look? Wait, not sure I need an answer, I already know I suit anything.”

”You look fine. I’ll pay outside, Mèimei.”
Edict’s voice echoed out of his mouth in an incredibly unlikely string of syllables stretching out into very clear, pronounced and pitch perfect Mandarin Chinese. He cleared his throat, but his head nodded at her, as if what he’d just said was typical or normal for him.
”Just covering.”

He subtly nodded toward her, as if he was still complimenting her and covering the agreement at the same time.

Linqian went from being slightly impressed that Edict could talk a little Chinese, if peeved because it reduced the languages she could secretly shit talk him in, to pissed. Meimei? Oh that fucking asshole knew exactly what he was doing with that. She wasn’t smiling much to begin with, and it turned cold. Just covering? Right.

”Meimei? You want some fucking respect or something? Keep that shit out of your mouth.” Linqian let out a rapid torrent of Chinese, but at a perfectly reasonable level. For anyone that couldn’t speak the language, it didn’t appear that aggressive. But she was clearly agitated, fists clenching at her sides and trembling slightly. It was wrong. She’d heard it from the right person not that long ago and he was fucking gone. And this asshole was ruining it.
”There’s only one person I’d tolerate calling me that, and he’s dead. Thank you for reminding me, asshole… Fuck you- fuck your ancestors to the eighteenth generation, you bastard.”

Edict’s eyes went wide. Right… The hallucinations. Must’ve been something to do with Jinhai, which made him nod and grimace slightly. But, rather than the typical vindictive “burn your favorite bar down” Mobster Prince, he simply accepted it. He remembered that one of the pictures in his own hallucination was of himself, Britney, and Linqian awkwardly holding their daughter. He distinctly remembered the sensation of a strong friendship.

Of trust and love. Like it was somehow finally okay to call her that.

”Okay, yes. That’s probably deserved. Thank you.”
Slipping his coat back on over himself, he dusted the sleeves off.
”I’ll uh… See myself out. Be waiting for you both when you’re done.”
As he turned, he shot Britney a quick glance, eyebrows wiggling as if he knew what he was leaving behind.

“... Should I note that Messiah has been taking lessons in - what is it again? Mandarin Chinese?” Sabrina noted.

“Yes,” Messiah nodded.

Britney almost broke out laughing.

Edict heard them as he hit the door, and found himself unable to hold back a burst of air from between his lips. The door opened, a cold wind swept, and then it shut behind him.

”... You couldn’t have said that earlier?!” Between Edict actually, well, admitting to having fucked up and the kid having overheard a shit ton of the worst Chinese swears she could muster, Linqian’s anger disappeared just like that. The other feelings were more difficult to ignore, but she pushed them down just as she held back laughter. She turned to Messiah and Sabrina with an apologetic smile. ”Please forget everything you just heard. Hopefully you didn’t understand half of it. And if you ever need a conversation partner- well, it’s my first language!”

Messiah just nodded his head. Leaving it open how much of it he understood.

Linqian then turned to Britney with an awkward laugh, jerking a thumb towards the door. It was just like it always was - quick to a volcanic eruption, but always brief if deadly. This time it had been forcefully stopped and now Linqian just felt a mixture of shock and despairing amusement.
”Should we go after him? I may have cursed eighteen generations of his ancestors and honestly, they probably don’t deserve it, even if he does.”

Britney kept laughing, as she got up and gently grabbed Linqian by the hand, ”Yeah, let’s just get out of here! Thank you for having us, Bean!” She gave Sabrina a wave of her hand.

“Anytime,” Sabrina nodded her head. “Let me know if you need anything else”

”Yeah, thanks again,” Linqian smiled awkwardly, more than happy for Britney to grab her hand and gently drag her out. The moment they got outside she couldn’t hold back anymore, raised one hand to the air in frustration (still holding Britney’s with the other, it was warm), keeping her voice low just in case it traveled. ”How the fuck was I supposed to know he knew Chinese?! Now if he starts cursing out his teachers or whatever I’ll be to blame… If I’d used that in China I probably would’ve gotten killed- oh fuckkkk.”

Linqian wasn’t actually that caught up in it, cause all kids learned swearing eventually. But it was a good way to ignore all the other lingering feelings that had come swarming back up after she’d desperately buried them. How she hadn’t even been that annoyed when Jinhai called her that in the hallucination, how she’d let him call her anything he fucking wanted as long as he was back- fuck. Stop thinking about it. She turned slightly towards Edict with something closer to exasperation than annoyance.
”Greyson, don’t call me that shit again and we’re good, okay? I’m just-” She raised a hand to her forehead. Why the fuck was she explaining? He’d been the dick in the first place- right but he was a dick that was paying her and one of her only friends still around. Fucking hell, was this maturing? No, not particularly. ”I’m real fucking touchy about it. But your ancestors didn’t deserve that-”

Greyson had his hands up before Linqian even finished.
”Hey, I get it. Bad time for a joke, that’s my life. And as far as my ancestors, I’d say you just give it a few days and you’ll probably change your mind again.” he giggled to himself, finally reaching into his pocket.
He looked a bit surprised at the large wad he pulled out, furrowing his brow before unfolding it and looking at it for a few moments.

”I didn’t think I grabbed this much when I left my place this morning…”
He started to thumb off hundred dollar bills until he decided to stop at a nice round number before effortlessly forking the small stack over.
”Though, I’ve gotta ask… Because I’m curious about the power, not about digging into your personal trauma… What’d you see in the Pink Haze?”

”Yeah, we’ll keep going round in this fucking circle, till one of us dies,” Linqian said drily - which was just about her saying that she’d stick around Greyson even if he was a massive dick and she continued to blow up at him. She took the stack with a slight smile and shoved it in the pocket of her new jacket. Split with Aryin there should be enough for a new phone and a little extra. It was enough that she was at least willing to answer the question.

”Yeah, I get it, we gotta figure it out to beat it. I saw the apartment we lived in until I moved back.” The one he died in. She spoke monotonously, as if from a book, pushing down the raw pain at just thinking about it and embracing an emotional numbness. ”Obviously Jinhai was there, and Henri. There wasn’t really much to it. We talked. It was as if he was alive and everything was fine. Oh- I also had a partner, I believe. That bit was fuzzy. It changed too, to back when I was… nineteen I think. Just cooking for my brothers. I guess it's something I missed or wanted. I really fucking didn’t want to leave.”

Greyson scrunched his nose up.
”I saw a future, not a past. I definitely saw something I wanted. So, that’s the easy part… Hard part is how you get it to be that strong but that physical.”
He rifled off another grand and practically pushed it into her free hand with the money already in it.
”If it makes you feel any better, I’m certain my ancestors probably deserve it. Just leave my descendents alone, God forbid I ever have any.” he shook his head, laughing through his nose.

”I won’t curse them to be born with hemorrhoids then,” Linqian laughed, seeming to go back to her… more normal self just like that. She shrugged, turning to Britney (who’s hand she was still holding, because why wouldn’t she until Britney let go). ”Dunno about the strength part. Britney’s the brains- uh, magical expert.”

”Clearly,” Britney said, still holding onto Linqian’s hand for no reason. ”That haze pulls out some type of subconscious want or need. I’m not sure if it was the result of an Adept, or some concoction Greta made…” She tapped her chin a few times.

”Greta? God, is every nightmare from the past still skulking around this fucking city?”
He shook his head.
”Oh… Shit…-” he looked between the two of them. ”-Did either of you see George? Or, that black monster thing? I was just shooting, I don’t really know if I hit anyone in the rain. But, you think they’ll be back soon?” he looked a bit concerned at both of them.

”Yeah, who could miss George?” Britney chuckled. ”Black monster? Didn't see that, are you sure it wasn't some undead minion?”

Then Britney sighed. ”But, I’m not sure… It's obvious they want Lila… And Emily doesn't know when to quit…”

”Black monster…” Linqian narrowed her eyes, thinking. The whole situation had been pretty chaotic, and she hadn't seen much beyond the start. Oh, maybe- ”It couldn't be the kid, could it? Ashley’s cousin. When he offered to keep an eye out I saw he had this fucking wound on his stomach- no blood, just black. I figured I was just seeing things after the fucking hallucination.”

She shrugged. Could be him, could not be. ”They’ll definitely be back, Emily’s even more of a raging bitch than before. They're fucking strong too… if it wasn't for the fucking rain I could've hurt Vashti more, but its the one fucking thing that weakens mine and Aryin's spell. I gotta figure out some fucking cold defensive shit… really regretting not working on my spells all these years. Or I'll just shoot her- oh wait. Lost that too.”

”Damn, my pistol!? That's it man, that's it. This time they had me, but next time is grenades and fuckin’ car bombs. I'm not gonna sit and let 8th Street ruin our shit because people feel bad about what happened. And I'm definitely not gonna let them hurt you.” Greyson growled, making eye contact with Britney directly.

”Technically you gave it to me, so it was my pistol,” Linqian muttered, for once not rolling her eyes about Greyson doing something she’d view as ‘sappy’. She also tilted her head towards Britney. ”Yeah, I’ve got your back too. I fucking fought them today, i’ll fucking do it tomorrow- maybe just be a bit smarter about it.”

”Yeah, tear those bastards a new one, Greyson,” Britney grinned, before she turned to Linqian. ”I mean… you did the best you could, I think almost everyone turned their back on magic, even me...” She rubbed the back of her head awkwardly laughing, before she clapped her hands together.

”But, I mean, your Lux is red, riiiiiiiiiiight?!” She smiled at Linqian.

”One of them,” Linqian laughed. ”Honestly, I’m not so good at the side. I struggle with shit if I’m not using my body- fucking not like that- and the little I’ve developed since is green Lux. Jinhai did more cause he had time. You should’ve seen it, Brit, he learned how to turn himself into crystals and was suddenly dropping that shit all round the house. Would’ve been great if it was valuable, but nooo.”

Linqian gave a rueful smile. ”So I might… need a bit of help with that shit.”

”Don’t worry!” Britney said. ”I got you, sis! I just need to teach you to connect to Gaia, and channeler her-” She paused for a moment.

”... I sounded crazy as fuck right there, didn’t I?”

”A little bit,” Linqian smiled, holding her hands up. ”If we're gonna do this we should invite Aryin- I need that bitch to teach me some kinda durability shit, and they'll be down to connect with Gaia too.” She winked, then glanced at Greyson.

”I guess Greyson can… watch, if that's the shit he’s into.”

Greyson shrugged, giggling a little bit.
”She’s not wrong. Even in principle, Britney helped me when I was learning how to deal with my own spells. It's about the roots.” he tugged at his hair. ”That’s what the Pink Lotus is all about. Now, we were gonna go celebrate some good news. Are you coming?”

”The fuck you got to celebrate?” Linqian looked at them suspiciously. Had they gotten back together? Nah, that didn't seem right. Well, whatever. ”Yeah, I'm coming, when would I say no to celebrating shit? I can't drink too much cause I got a ten hour shift tomorrow, but plenty of fun can be had without that.”

”C’mon, girl,” Britney grinned as she put a hand on her hip. ”You tellin’ me the great Linqian Han is defeated by a hangover?” She stuck her tongue out, before turning to Edict.

”... What did you have in mind, Greyson?” She began. ”C’monnnnnnnn, the suspense is killing me!”

Greyson looked a little thoughtful at first.
Don't say the worst thing, don't say the worst thing.
Taking a deep breath, he tapped his finger against his chin before grinning widely.
”Let's go to fuckin’ Christiansands tonight. I can get us in, we can party, get fucked up, head back to my place after since its close by there?”

”I mean there are better clubs,” Britney shrugged. ”But, let’s par-tay! It’s been a lil’ while since I clubbed.”

”No idea where the fuck that is, but sounds perfect,” Linqian smiled, before tilting her head towards Britney. ”Since now I gotta get fucked up to prove that a hangover doesn’t do shit to me- I can work those shifts feeling like shit just fine. So long as you’re not too precious about the furniture in your fancy as fuck place, Greyson.”

”What? Are you gonna piss all over his crib?” Britney laughed, sticking her tongue out.

”Can’t rule it out,” Linqian shot back.

Greyson just laughed at the two of them, slowly rotating around and wrapping his arms around Britney before putting his chin on her shoulder.
”Hey, if there’s better clubs? Show me. Because honestly, I’m pretty homesick for *my* club. Some lights and sweat are enough for me, I don’t care where.”
And then he looked back at Linqian.
”Just call off your fuckin’ shift. I got’chu.” he grinned.

”Eh, let’s just go to Christiansands,” Britney shrugged. ”Or at least start there. Most of the clubs are on the same block or in walking distance anyway!”

”My boss- _{the other one}- is going to fucking kill me, but I won’t turn that shit down,” Linqian grinned. She didn’t actually have any way to contact Andre right now but… She’d figure that shit out later. ”Hey, gotta start with the shit clubs, then we can go to a better one . If you start with the best it’s gonna be fucking disappointing later, right?”

”Butttt…” she pointed a finger at them both, eyes narrowing slightly. ”If we go back to Greyson’s and you two go fuck or something while I’m left twiddling my thumbs, I’ll be real pissed.”

”Awwwww… If that happens you can hold my hand so you won’t feel left out!” Britney stuck her tongue out again.

”You mean you’ll make me watch without letting me join in? Now that’s just fucking cruel!” Linqian laughed, gesturing in mock exaggeration.

Greyson couldn’t hold back his laughter any longer, pulling away from Britney and letting one of his hands climb to his forehead. He playfully smacked Britney on the thigh as he slightly staggered away.
”Girl you’re rude as hell!” he laughed aloud. ”Come on, you know I ain’t ever been worried about nobody else in the room.” his eyebrows raised playfully, his giggling mostly subsiding.

”Fucking hell, be more sappy, why don’t you,” Linqian rolled her eyes.”Can we get going? I need a few drinks to deal with this shit.”

”I need to change into something more appropriate, and make myself even sexier,” Britney laughed. ”But let’s meet at Christiansands arooound, then?”

Greyson grimaced a little bit. He definitely had to freshen up again, even with dry clothes he wasn’t clean anymore. But they could probably get some other things done in the meantime.
”Yeah, fine. I’ll take our friend here out and get her hooked up with some replacement shit. Like your phone, maybe we can hit the Warehouse and get you a new bag and shit.”

”Yeah, thanks, I need at least a fucking phone before hitting a club,” Linqian nodded, putting a hand on the top of her head and frowning. Her hair felt horrible but that would take hours of washing to fix… thank god it was tied back at least. ”We’ll go do that then while you’re getting ready, Brit.”

Britney clapped her hands together.

”It's a plan then!”

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

Mood Music

Edict

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Mentions: Auri Auclair, George Nelson, Jack Hawthorne| Direct Dialogue: Britney Williams/@Shin Ghost Note, Linqian Han/@FernStone | Location: Kari’s House

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It was time to plow the fields. Greyson’s legs slipped from underneath warm linens and met an unwarmed rug at his feet. Groggy, not entirely awake, he stood to meet the new day and made for his wristwatch. Six in the morning; he was glad they didn’t need to worry about the bigger fields, and that some of the guys had probably been working overnight. It meant they were on track, possibly ahead of schedule for everything. They’d already taken care of a lot of the draining and furrowing, making sure the ditches were clear for this year’s harvest.

It’d been a few years since he turned his life around. He wasn’t legit by any means, but violent crime? The kind of things he used to do? It paid to have handed over an organization like Dollhouse to the PRA. It went deeper than witness protection, it meant that he didn’t have to live looking over his shoulder at his brothers and uncle. He was in the clear.
His body turned, making way for a drawer for some pants. His gaze passed to the other side of the bed, and sure enough she was already out and about. Probably getting breakfast ready for Carlo and Aaliyah, or… Out? Checking on the progress?

Plantation life wasn’t so bad. The house was big, the land was theirs, the business that came with it was good. High quality cigar tobacco and other native agricultural endeavors. Peppers, sugar cane closer to the water, peanuts… There was a pecan grove as well, and some of the production space and costs were spent on processing the edibles into actual goods. The profit was too high compared to selling off raw product, why not double dip?
But it was the fact that she took interest in it… That she got up earlier than him, and that they were both able to handle their business despite the different hours. She didn’t bitch, she didn’t complain, she…

Britney Williams had been everything he ever wanted. Support and love in a stern, matronly package. His own Mother loved her, sometimes he thought more than she loved him. And since he was just a magical middleman, like he always had been, he wasn’t so worried about what the more uptight side of his family had to say…
Not like dear old Dad had anything to say. How could he?

Greyson stretched his shoulders and looked at himself in the mirror. Vanity had faded years prior, and he wore a bearded face with curly long hair. There was no pretense left to give, no posture left to take. His stance was a Father’s. A Husband’s. A Business Owner’s, as it had always been maybe, but… The money felt nicer. Cleaner, like his soul.
He slipped a shirt on and tucked it into his belt, still maintaining a clean look regardless of whether or not he knew he was going to be sweating in the Louisiana sunshine. Moisture wicking socks, well worn boots, gloves in the back pocket.

He looked at the little lockbox on the dresser and ran his fingers over it. Another time, another world. It was over, thankfully. They could live normally. He was clean. He didn’t need what was in the box.
Steps took him down the hall, his son’s bedroom door already wide open. Carlo… A real go-getter. Ambitious just like every Devola, but thoughtful. Sweet. Like his Mom. Chances were, he was doing his chores before school as he’d grown accustomed to. Greyson smiled in acknowledgement, running a hand down the wall and feeling how real it was in between his fingers. How surreal the feeling was. He must’ve had a dream, about fighting and shooting and being scared. Waking up nostalgic wasn’t normal.

He came down the stairs into the main foyer of the big plantation house they lived in together. It was full of pictures and nicknacks from St. Portwell and beyond. Family trips abroad, occasional reunions… He’d made up with a lot of the people he hurt. Purposefully, he kept a picture of himself and a few of the most troubled relationships in pretty visible places. A way to remember that he’d come out on top, and that every moment after was precious.

Strides took him toward the sound of music, past the kitchen and out into the attached greenhouse.

Mood Music

He couldn’t help but dance, coming into view of his beloved as he did so. The whole place smelled like the thick buds of homegrown in various stages of growing and drying and curing.
”Ooooh girl, you’re killing me.” he grinned, moving closer and leaning in to kiss Britney on the top of her head.
”What happened to our plans when we got married? No chance we’re getting up before ten in the morning… How long have you been up?”
”What happened to us living a simple life?”

She had gloves and a pair of scissors, trimming away at the latest dry. A fresh, clean gallon glass jar sat at her feet, and she was carefully putting the plant material into it. There was a grin on her face.
”This ain’t simple?”
”Well, you want to ask silly questions… I’ve been up all night.”
”You ain’t come to bed?”
Britney shook her head. Greyson’s face became a small frown. He leaned forward, arms wrapping around her shoulders in a loving embrace. He gently shook Britney back and forth.

”You can't stay awake forever. It's just going to happen one day…”
”He nearly killed them and we're going to have to deal with it.”
Greyson frowned. His boy… He finally came into his own and Kindled. And it was an interesting combination to be sure.
He couldn't lie and say he didn't take a little pride in it. The whole morning had been a bit emotional between Father and Son, and ultimately ended at a dinner that night.

The little moralist saw his Mother dealing with a particularly nasty local over a foolish disagreement. Between his love and desire to protect, and the raging temper that lay bubbling beneath the surface, he Kindled there to protect her.
But unlike Edict's soft Lotus, Carlo's inner powers were hot.

While they didn't get a lot of info from the hospital, they were aware that the local was suffering third degree burns over parts of his body that shouldn't have been accessible. A fire in the brain cavity left it all but dead, and the man would live out the remainder of his days in a tortuous vegetative state.

Greyson shouldn't have been proud that his son could literally light people's brains on fire. Clearly Britney wasn't thrilled. It was keeping her up.
”Where is he?”
”Field B. Probably closer to the Delta, you know the spot he likes.”
Greyson held Britney for a few more minutes.

”Can you sleep now that I'm on shift?”
”Why you want me asleep so damn bad?”
He chuckled, shaking his head and letting her go.
”Baby on board. You sleep, she sleeps.”
”Tell that to the last one… Lil’ bitch kept me up for weeks with those feet."
Greyson smiled, rubbing Britney's shoulders a little while longer before finally pulling himself away. There was shouting outside, people were frantic.

With a furrowed brow, Greyson moved toward the front to check things out.

---

Edict was one of the last people still fully captured by the pink mist. His brain, deeply craving the pleasure of a life he was growing more sure that he'd never see, did its best to hold him tight.

And he was going to let it. If he could've stayed there and lived through all of it, he would've chosen to. Such a well made, warm fanta-
He was on his knees. He must've dropped to avoid the hunk of Earth George was about to throw, and when his eyes were his again, the Giant was gone.

And he hadn't even gotten to see his children.
”Shout your name if you can hear me!”
”Britney!”
He immediately stood, turning and looking in the direction he heard Britney in. There were still zombies left about, dancing their undead hearts out.

”Greyson!... I'm fuckin'-…" he started, grabbing his head in pain. "Jack!? Where the hell is Jack, he was just with me! Brit!?”
Greyson was already making his way to Britney when he also found a naked Linqian.
”Jesus… here.”
With a swift dexterity, he unclipped his vest and slipped it onto the ground before tugging his jacket off and passing it down to the woman. The vest went back on over his shirt now.
”You guys are okay? Jesus Christ on a tall bike I was so fucking worried…”

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

Mood Music

Kenshiro

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Mentions: Kari Wilson, Maya Choi, Agents of Death, Jack Hawthorne, Drake Blackmore, Hannako and Kenichi Murakin | Direct Dialogue: Evelynn Serenelight/@NoriWasHere | Location: Kari's House > Another Time, Another Place, Another World > The Aftermath

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The hourglass shattered in Ken's hand, its light wood frame snapping in half alongside. Due to a quirk of his "armor", air was taken in through a complicated pump system that invariably left him vulnerable to gasses and airborne toxins while it was running. With the siphon of air being so strong, the pink gas was dragged directly into his lungs. He only made it a few more feet before he wasn't really there anymore. Taking a whiff of it was like being too easy around Greyson, one slip and you're in a whole new world. His eyes blinked rapidly, the last step he took in reality translating into another stride. More. He was running. The ground was muddy, it was warm, the jungle around him buzzed with insects and other things. He felt the weight of his first companion on his shoulder, a toad the size of a cat making gentle gurgling noises as its soft underside bounced into the boney outcropping on which it sat.
The pond was dead ahead; he could make out dozens of figures, like the whole village had come out that day for a swim. Kaiko, Sochi, Iida Tenpo, Junichi, Jack, Drake, Saskia and the girls, Kari and Hannako a-

Something compelled him to stop. Like this wasn't normal. Like they hadn't all been through a hellish week after the Provings, and were finally able to cut loose for a day. They were adults now, all of them! Sixteen! Soon they'd all be assigned duties, and they'd live in the working dormatories until they were promoted, or they made their Golden Band. Either way, things were going to be amazing!

Reactively, the airways shut tight. The body, and the Lux within, knew there was a pathogen as the channeled spells Ken held tightest became loose and unwilling to go on. Still, he pressed toward Kari and Hannako. He'd been trying to decide for the longest which he'd really persue, because both were awesome in his mind. They had fantastic qualities, and they really didn't even have to do with the physical. Kari was so adventurous, so much fun to be around. And she came with her own friends, a whole group, and he liked them too! He imagined a world where they'd all live in a big clan-house, that the Murakin Estate would wind up his through virtue of merit.
But Hannako was strong! Better than him, he felt. Like there was a rival he could really push himself to be the absolute best alongside, and that even if she overshadowed him they'd still have a personal relationship that was stronger than any outward perception. She was due soon, so...

Wait, no... That hadn't happened yet, right? They weren't married. He hadn't even met...

There was fire. Black and blue, Corpsefire ravaging the village center and the buildings therein. There weren't even enemies to fight. He was screaming, sprinting, the doors to the temple flew open and revealed the Fiend. The Stygian Snake, enscrolled in dark black and bronze robes. Hannako-No, no, Kari... No.
"KENICHI!?"
Bodies were everywhere, burning in the Corpseflame forever caught in that moment of pain and agony. A baby boy laid bare upon the floor, his mother curled around him to protect the infant. Dozens had died for this. For Kenshiro to come and rescue his only Son. He wrapped the boy in a cloth, still screaming in pain as the flames licked at his back. It was a mad dash to the Pond... To Tennogama. To the only creature that could still save his baby from his own fate...

"TAKE HIM... PLEASE!"

And then there was nothingness. His body finally gave out from lack of oxygen. Even in that moment, he hit the ground with the equivalent force of a six ton statue being toppled. The ground beneath him buckled, the dirt swallowing him until the last bit of unconscious Lux faded from him. Oxygen free of the mist hit his mouth and lungs, and he gasped in mud and water as consciousness rushed back. He was in a wet hole. Buried alive. Dying. As best he could he cupped his mouth and pushed outward. Lux filled his hands and burst the dirt away, physical body crawling from the hole in regaining consciousness.
He felt roots or something similar dragging against him, holding onto him, keeping him in the wet mud. As he crawled out, it was another gasp of the mist. When he turned and sat, legs still in the hole as he tried to process what the hell was going on, it hit him again.

"They buried us together, Kenshiro. And it was beautiful."
"I didn't see, Hanna... I was... Occupied."
"We never could've known, could we? But I'm glad you saved him. I'm ecstatic, actually. Because of you, he lived to avenge us. To set things right."
"Did he?" Ken's face twisted into a grief filled smile. "Not something I ever could've done. It makes me so proud. It was worth it... I made the right choice."
"I... I think if you had to, you could've. But its much nicer that he gets to rebuild. That's how things should be."

Ken looked down into the hole. His bare feet splashed in the pond. Across from him, Hannako smiled. But it wasn't Hannako... It was Kari. It was the pond outside St. Portwell. His home now. He was sitting on the dock, and she was in the water in front of him.
"What're you thinking about?"
"Shit I can't change."

And then it was all gone. Kenshiro looked around, covered in mud and zombie parts as he'd fallen atop a few of them and re-entombed them. Though he wasn't sure as to why he was no longer hallucinating, he was one hundred percent sure that Kari couldn't swim, which he assumed was a dream. 8th Street was gone, and now he had to deal with the aftermath. There was a great pain in his chest from the fact that it'd all been nothing, since it really was better. But they had to wait again. If Lynn was right, he'd have a chance to tell Kari how he really felt. Maybe... But he had to get there.
He rose to his feet, shaking things off and making sure his equipment hadn't come loose. He checked the loose pocket, finding a number that hadn't been there.
"Real funny..."
He shook his head, once again looking for Lynn. He found her not far off, probably feeling the exact same way he was.
"Lynn! Lynn!?"

Making it to her side, he grabbed her by the shoulders to try and get her out of the mud.
"Lynn!? It's Ken! I'm real, it's... It's all an illusion, come on! We've gotta get the others and get out of here before something worse happens!"

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

@AtomicEmperor I mean...he's gotta bring something juicy to the table regarding her kid for her to take him off the list. She won't be easy to make happy either.

@silvermist1116

Besides advice to get out of dodge and a lump sum of cash to insure she can? No clue, he's probably fucked LMAO