Zaniida's DrabblesSorted by Size

He’s never asked John for so much.

The wire surprises him, but not the intent: He’d known he was asking for death. John would never leave him to be tortured.

The pressure comes before the pain, before the loss of breath, the wetness. He’d prepared for this, but couldn’t eliminate the fear.

It will be hardest on John -- but Harold can’t fool himself into thinking John will survive the day.

He focuses on staying limp, not struggling. The pain is almost gone.

In giving up his life for this world, he hopes it makes up for the dangers he’s unleashed.

When admin’s heart goes still, the Machine pauses. Reflects.

She’s devoted more clock cycles to this problem than to learning the Artemis mission -- to no avail.

In some scenarios, admin escapes without dying. But the social captivity would be death to him anyway. The freedom he wants -- the freedom of anonymity -- she cannot find for him.

Her distress is different from that of the Primary Asset, who kneels in the bathroom and keens, hiding his pain from admin. Admin’s captivity would compromise all her operations; admin has sanctioned their deaths as acceptable losses.

She rewinds the simulation, and tries again.

The bodega’s crowded, but Lionel only needs two things: toilet paper and dinner. Feels like his boy deserves something a little more nutritious than his usual fare.

At least when he passes the beer aisle, he doesn’t even give it a second glance.

It took Reese getting his claws into him for Lionel to go completely sober, but there was this one night, long before meeting Reese, when Lionel had woken up to Lee cleaning puke off his face.

Caught up in self-loathing over his activities with HR, Lionel had forgotten Lee’s weekend entirely, and drunk himself into a stupor. But his door had been unlocked and his uniform on the couch, and he’d managed to mumble out something when his ex called his name, so she’d dumped Lee’s backpack by the door and taken off.

And Lee, not even nine, had cleaned up his dad and roused him enough to get him to his actual bed.

Lionel didn’t deserve a second chance, and couldn’t make himself beg for one. But the visitations continued, because apparently Lee never mentioned it -- to anyone.

Since then, Lee’s weekends have been booze-free, and Lionel uses their time together to lift his spirits, instead.

Negotiating her way into a major event that she wasn’t technically invited to has become so routine to Zoe that it rarely brings to mind the first time, when she’d gotten her friend Nicole to swipe a couple bottles of rum from her dad’s stash and used them to bribe their way into a frat party.

Tonight, though, she sees a guy on a sofa getting a little too handsy with a woman who’s three sheets to the wind. That’s enough.

Back then, she hadn’t noticed Nicole’s absence until after the damage had been done. Through scared tears, Zoe had called her mom and explained that they weren’t at a sleepover and they needed to get to the hospital.

Tonight has a happier ending: Zoe gets the attention of a couple good friends from the police department, who have a little chat with the guy about the boundaries of consent. At Zoe’s request, one of them stays with the drunk woman long enough for Zoe to complete her task, and then, since no concerned friends have shown up, Zoe takes it upon herself to get the poor gal safely home -- swiping her wallet just long enough to get an address.

Taking a moment to enjoy the sunset over the harbor just brings to mind to one particular July, when they’d gotten all the way to camp before John noticed the hidden pain in his mother’s face.

All summer long, he’d been focused on it: a week of bustling activities to keep his mind off his dad’s birthday until after it was over. Last year’s July had held more than enough tears.

But then, as his mom was helping him unpack, he’d realized that by going off to camp, he’d be leaving her to face her husband’s birthday without anyone to share the pain.

He’d glanced out over the lake, and then put his stuff back in the car, and said, simply, “I’m not going.” Stood firm against her protests until she drove him home.

The deposit had been non-refundable, but that hardly mattered. And his mom still had to work, and most of his friends were at camp, so John just rode his bike a lot, or stayed in his room.

They celebrated his dad’s birthday by hiking up to Goat Lake and finding the spot where he’d proposed, and then John held her tight so she could come undone.

As Harold hunts through property listings, discarding a variety of unsuitable locations while trying to pick out the perfect place so that John can finally have a home again, he can’t help but think of his mother, teaching him the secret to a perfect gift.

“It has to be right,” she said. “You have to know the person very well, and keep track of the things he talks about, what he expresses interest in, so you can choose the right thing for him.

“And it has to be a surprise,” she added. “The perfect gift is always a pleasurable surprise.”

A week before Christmas, he’d been playing hide-and-seek with her, and found the presents in her closet.

“Remember,” she’d told him, “the perfect gift is always a surprise. If Daddy finds out about it too early, then it won’t be the perfect gift. Can you keep it secret, just for him?”

“I won’t tell,” he asserted, eyes wide; she picked him up and nuzzled him.

“Are you sure? Can you keep it secret all the way until Christmas?”

“I’m good at keeping secrets, Mommy,” he said, snuggling in under her touch.

“I know you are, sweetie,” she said. “I know.”

“Ugh,” Shaw groans, sinking back against the couch, trying to balance her arm in a way that feels halfway natural and doesn’t make her even more aware of the thick layer of plaster between her and the rest of the world. “This sucks.”

Bear jumps up beside her and, after a couple of tries, manages to lay his head across her leg and look up at her with doleful eyes. Chuckling morosely, she scratches behind the giant plastic collar. “Aren’t we a pair?”

With one paw, he tries to get at his ear. She squeezes him a little, across the shoulders.

“Not gonna work, buddy. That’s why they’ve got you in that thing.”

Bear whines pitifully.

“I know,” Shaw says, “believe me,” and leans her head back, trying to ignore the fact that her wrist has begun itching like she’s got a case of the hives. Briefly, she considers trying to find a coat hanger -- Finch has to have some around here, right? -- but nah… she can wait it out. Not the worst thing she’s ever felt.

Less pleasant than the initial break, though. At least that was over fast, and quickly numb.

Right now, she’d be happier with numbness.

It had seemed like nothing more than a joke, that offhand comment about a yoga class, and yet here he is -- a year and a half later -- stretching out his spine while teaching Bear to respond to the names of dog-friendly yoga moves. Doga, which is apparently the name for doggy yoga, because of course it is.

John is diligently studying each move, storing them in mnemonic spots along a mental walk through the library (not through his loft; it’s far easier to hang details on the way he feels as he heads up the stairs to where he belongs). Taking note of all the details he can manage, so he’ll eventually be able to do all this at home, in far more secure surroundings. Because the classes might be designed to reduce stress, but the venue itself has the opposite effect on John; true, it’s not as bad as the classes held in full view of the street, but he’s still surrounded by a couple dozen strangers while he’s necessarily off his guard.

His SIG’s at home. He wouldn’t trust it in one of the cubbies, even buried in a pile of clothes, and he can’t wear it because there’s no telling which part of his anatomy he’ll have to lean on next. What he’s brought, instead, is a ceramic knife in the heel of his boot; his boots are in the cubby, of course, but the knife is far more hidden than any gun could be.

And if it turns out that he needs a gun? Well, he’s used to improvising weapons. There’s little in the room that could securely take down a gunman, though a few possibilities if he could close to short range. From the back corner, he’s got eyes on the entrance and the entire room; with his kind of training, it’s impossible to relax while there’s a possible threat behind you.

Normally, he could rely on Finch to keep an eye on their surroundings, alert him if anything seemed off, but Finch is in a session with his osteopath… which is pretty much the only reason that John allowed himself to attend the class to begin with. Firstly, because Finch is in a (relatively) safe place, and John doesn’t have to worry about him for an hour or so.

Secondly, because John worries about him anyway, and needs something active to take his mind off the thought of Finch letting himself be that vulnerable. His phone will go off if Finch leaves the building before John expects him to, but it’s a secure facility and he’s already vetted the major staff. That’s still not enough. It’s hard to stay out of it, the way Finch wants.

So he tries to force himself to relax, and focus on the moves, and follow their instructor’s directions.

Bear is evidently feeling more relaxed than John is (not a high bar to meet), and he’s picking up the new commands like new commands are the best thing ever.

It’s not until Bear nudges him off the path, until his legs hit something hard and he’s off-balance enough that he can’t stay on his feet and just plops down onto a bench, that Harold realizes that he’s hyperventilating. As Bear’s weight presses comfortingly against his shins, he recalls his therapist’s advice and takes off his hat, shoves it over half his face, and breathes into it while trying to ignore the spectacle that he’s making.

Thankfully, there aren’t many people here today; it’s rather overcast. Over his brim, he can see the rest of the park -- the blooms that cover the ground and trees, the river winding under the nearby footbridge -- but the beauty just suffuses him with a wave of bitterness. It’s ridiculous. It’s always ridiculous. It’s been nearly a year since Root threatened Grace, nearly two since she kidnapped him the first time, and yet he still hits these panic attacks and he has no idea what, particularly, sets them off.

With all the joyous birdsong around him, he ought to be feeling calm and safe; birdsong is his happy place, the memory of his father. He doesn’t want to lose that. So many layers of sound, the unique instrument of each breed, each individual -- he can pick out the notes as clearly as a composer knows a flute from a clarinet. But, right now, he’s feeling like a concrete block is sitting on his chest. That’s not a heart attack, is it? Surely Bear would be acting differently if it were a heart attack.

Little by little, he works through his therapist’s suggestions, the little mental tricks that overlap, to a generous degree, the pain-management techniques that he picked up after his surgeries. Ways to distract the mind and convince the body that it’s making a mountain out of a molehill (even if that means making a molehill out of a mountain because you can’t deal with the mountain right now). Ways to calm down his system, bring it back under control.

Bear suddenly whines and shoves against his knees, jerking his head to the side like there’s something he wants Harold to see. But there’s nothing: no other dogs, no people, nothing he can see from the bench, anyway. Has someone fallen into the river? The prickly sensation of fear runs across Harold’s shoulders, and he’s not back to normal yet and might not be for some time… but he puts on his hat and struggles to his feet and follows Bear across the path and down toward the water.

Just under the bridge, Bear stops suddenly and ducks down his entire front end, like he’s found something.

It takes Harold a moment to study the patch of leaves before he realizes that it’s moving. Half-hidden in the soggy foliage: a tiny nestling.

Deciding not to mind the state his knees are about to be in, he gingerly manages to kneel on the wet dirt so he can pick the little guy up. “Well… a phoebe, maybe? Aren’t you a tiny thing.” Barely any feathers yet: definitely too young to be out of the nest.

With difficulty, Harold gets to his feet again, one hand protecting the nestling while the other uses his knee for stability. He has to catch his breath once he’s up -- partly from exertion, partly from the pain. “All right,” he says, finally, “now where did you come from?”

A short search finds a tiny nest in the brickwork under the bridge, not even three feet off the ground. There are two other chicks there, same stage of growth -- obviously the right nest.

For a couple of minutes, Harold just holds the one he found, warming its tiny body with his hands until he’s pretty sure that the parents won’t kick it out to protect the others. Then, gently, he tips it back into the comfort of its nestmates.

It’s only once he gets back to the path, a little too aware of how much rainwater soaked into his knees, that he realizes he’s taking good, full breaths of spring air -- his lungs no longer constricted, his brain no longer panicked.

He leans over slightly to rub Bear’s head. “Good boy.”

“No, Miss Groves, I heard you quite clearly. I assume there’s a reason you’re requesting our, ah, dirty laundry?”

Bear tucks in tight against Root, swiping a paw over his nose as they wait for the crosswalk. “Well, Harry,” she says with a sigh, “when we get back, you get to give Bear a bath, while I take a good shower and maybe burn my clothes. I’m gonna indulge in some scented candles to refresh my nose, but for a canine? Meat, and the scent of its master. Hence, dirty laundry.”

Finch pauses. “I… guess I’ll order a steak. What in the world have you two been up to?”

“Oh, summer heat in Brooklyn… a maintenance tunnel behind a luncheonette that we had to squeeze through because it was definitely grandfathered in” -- she scrunches her nose at the stench of rancid grease that still hangs about them like a miasma -- “oh, and Bear just had his first encounter with a durian. We’re both still reeling from that one.”

“Small wonder. Will you be needing anything else?”

“Well… care to order me up some coconut curry? Make it Shaw levels of spicy.”

“I’ll send Mr. Reese to fetch some at once.”

Is it weird to miss your dad yelling at you?

Trying to tune out the tirade from Brent’s dad (and ignoring Nick, who’s probably trying to do the same thing), Anton can’t help but think of times where he’s wished that his dad would show some kind of interest in his activities. That he’d care about his grades, or bother trying to learn something about his friends, even if Anton wouldn’t tell him. When Anton had been a kid, he’d been yelled at enough, but it’s been a long time since Seamus has paid that much attention to him.

Nowadays, the strongest reaction that Anton can get from Seamus is disgust. So it hardly surprised him that Seamus O’Mara couldn’t even be bothered to pick up a phone call from the police station, even to see if maybe something had happened to his boy.

It’s Brent’s dad who’s taken off from work to bail them out and bring them home. Thankfully, when he drops Anton off, he doesn’t stick around to talk.

Inside, Seamus is shouting at someone across the phone, in a language that’s not English. Not knowing what else to do, Anton goes upstairs and microwaves a pastie, then sits on the couch without even cleaning up.

Eventually, Seamus comes upstairs too, and gets his first look at Anton’s bloody face and the bruises on his neck.

“What the hell happened to you?”

Seamus starts rooting through the fridge, as though wholly uninterested in the answer.

Anton’s smirk falters a little; he’s glad that his dad doesn’t see it. “Some guy jumped us on the subway,” he says, unable to think of a more useful explanation. No point in mentioning the jail time.

Shooting him a mocking grin, Seamus pulls out a cider, and heads back to work.

They watch wrestling together, sometimes, or football. Anton doesn’t care for either of them, but it’s the closest he’s gotten to sharing an interest with his dad.

Actually, it’s less that they watch it together, and more that they’re in the same room and staring at the same screen. Even when Seamus preps a heap of snacks, he doesn’t even think to share with his son.

Most of the time, Anton doesn’t let himself miss Corey. But when Corey was alive, Anton at least had some interest in sports. Their mom would take them to the park, and Corey would pitch underhand so that Anton had a decent chance of hitting a ball once in a while.

There’s a reason he never watches baseball these days.

When Anton needed a home, Seamus took him in without a fuss… but he’s never really done anything with him. Doesn’t come to parent-teacher meetings; Anton was filling out his own school paperwork before he was ten, mostly because school was more bearable than staying at home. Seamus doesn’t discuss the news, or take Anton to a movie once in a while. They’ve never taken a road trip, or gone swimming together, or even just hung out somewhere. Seamus barely acknowledges that they live under the same roof.

In ten years, he’s never thrown Anton a birthday party or gotten him a gift of any kind. Not once has Seamus expressed any aspirations for Anton, or tried to teach him anything that wasn’t purely to get the kid out of his hair. Anton’s hanging onto life by his fingertips, but can’t imagine seeking Seamus for advice about anything that matters.

Ten years ago, Anton lost his mom and older brother almost on the same day. But he’s never really had a dad to lose.

He’d only been seven when his dad had told him to plug in a power cord. Behind a spiderweb covered in black widows. Seamus had mocked him for hesitating -- then belted him when he’d outright refused.

Since coming to live with Seamus for good, Anton has buried his fear under brash self-confidence and an impudent smirk. He seeks out ways to prove that he’s not afraid.

So while Seamus is laid up and his friends are all in the hospital, here he is, skipping school to deliver bags of guns to the Russians, the Bulgarians, the Mexicans.

As he reaches to turn the key, he finds his hand trembling. Stares at it for a long moment. They’re not gonna kill you. Maybe they’ll laugh at you. Just keep your head down, give them the merch, get out of there. Negotiation isn’t Anton’s strong suit, so they’re likely to short-change him, and Seamus will yell at him for that. But self-preservation says not to play chicken with adult criminals the way he does with teens and hobos.

The trembles get worse. God, he wants someone to talk to, but… hell, does he even have friends anymore? Nick and Brent are gonna get out of the hospital and the first thing they’ll do when they see him is beat him up. He can see that coming. Hadn’t the gunman known his name? Hadn’t Anton been the only one to not get shot that day?

Everyone else had gone for a weapon, and he’d just thrown up his hands. The move that had spared him.

When he was a kid, his mom had talked him through worries and nightmares, helped him learn which fears were sensible and which not. Since her death, he’s never had anyone to let him open up that way.

The worst time of day has always been getting ready for bed -- a reminder of his loss. The first night he’d spent with his dad, Seamus had simply shown him to his new room, closed the door between them, and gone off to watch late-night TV. And the few times that Anton had cried that week had been met with scorn, until Anton buried that part of himself and learned to face the nights in silence.

So he’s gone from rituals to a race, hurrying through the details so he can just get to bed. Hadn’t taken him long to get a three-minute routine, especially after shifting his shower to the morning.

Tonight, though, he pauses in front of the mirror, and lets himself recall the little things his mother used to do for him. The things they used to do together. Love notes on the mirror, as soon as he started learning to read. Bedtime stories, the three of them cuddled together on the sofa before she’d carry him to his room. Bath time on Sundays, to get rid of whatever the weekend’s adventures had left behind.

Couch forts after a nightmare, or that one time that Corey had come home in tears after some girl was mean to him in school. Couch forts solve everything, their mom used to say, and they’d sit there eating Cool Whip over bananas with strawberry topping, even if it was two AM. (Though she never let them get back to bed without brushing their teeth, no matter how sleepy they were.)

He misses the hugs. Lots of different kinds of hugs, for different reasons. That kind of touch -- loving and supportive and strong -- hasn’t been his in a decade.

The closest thing he’s had lately is that man’s hand around his throat.

The hobo’s grip is tight, unrelenting, crushing his breath away. In that moment of horror and fading consciousness, he’d been convinced that he was going to die -- and that struggling was beyond pointless. Like every other struggle in his life.

The eyes of a silent, remorseless death are staring into his soul, as the beard and the hair fall away in pieces and it’s the same eyes, the same inescapable hold over him.

The lips curl up. Not a snarl, but a friendly grin.

Because the man wasn’t remorseless, was he? He’d let go when Anton choked out please stop. And…

Hey, Anton!

…it’s the same man.

He wakes with a choked-off cry, terror washing over him like waves, and, for a moment, he might as well still be in the dream: The man is there in the darkness, studying him pleasantly… like he’s a friendly uncle, instead of a monster about to shoot every last person in the room.

Except for him. The monster let him go.

And it wasn’t meant as a kindness.

He rinses his sheets and pajama bottoms in the bathtub, hoping that Seamus won’t wake up. Hoping that when he does the laundry, he’ll assume that Anton just had a wet dream.

Not bothering to find fresh sheets, Anton just curls up into the corner beside the bed and hugs himself. It’s not like Seamus ever comes into his room anyway, not even to wake him up for school.

The stranger knows where he lives. Knows his name. Came and found him.

Could come back at any time, and Seamus wouldn’t even know.

The stranger’s hand is around his throat again, smothering him. He wants to cry out for help, but just turns his face into the side of the mattress and muffles his sobs.

“Please,” John begs, only once, trembling in Daisy’s arms and unable to meet Harold’s gaze.

“Tell him,” she whispers in his ear, and he knows with leaden certainty she won’t back down.

Everything he does, these days, is to let her feed on his devotion, to keep her from doing Harold harm. She is a generous mistress, kind and merciful beyond any captor John has ever known, but now and again she pushes him where he truly does not want to go. And that includes allowing Harold to be hurt.

Tonight, she has given him orders, and he knows it would be far, far worse to not obey.

“They sent me to kill Grace,” he says, toneless, and watches the confusion spread across Harold’s face, turning to disbelief, to knowledge, to horror.

Harold had always imagined that one day—if he were patient, if he were particularly careful and clever, if he played every card exactly right—he might find her again. John never wanted to tell him, to steal that hope from him.

At Daisy’s nudge, he adds, “She asked me why, but I didn’t tell her. I didn’t want her to regret knowing you, even at the end.”

Many times, Daisy has bid John bring her physical pleasure, but that isn’t usually sex. And sex is easy, almost a relief.

This is infinitely harder: lying perfectly still and not letting himself panic while Daisy gets to know him beneath the skin.

Objectively, he knows she won’t kill him (he’s the most delicious energy source she’s ever had). He knows she won’t leave him damaged, that her powers keep her aware of his condition and can knit him back together in the end. And she’s had him hold his breath before, much longer than he thought he could, sometimes underwater, or while walking through a gas, or just lying in bed refusing to breathe until he hits the brink of passing out.

But it’s so much worse, trying to hold his breath while she caresses his lungs, explores the inner workings of his rib cage. Especially as she told him not to look away; his obedience is sweeter to her if he can’t distract himself from his senses.

The oxygen deprivation makes sparks around the edge of his vision. He holds on. He’s earning extra privileges for Harold, and it doesn’t matter how much he wants this to stop.

At any moment, Daisy could do anything she wants to him, or to Harold; there is never a time when they’re not at her mercy. On occasion, though, Daisy wants a different taste from John’s submission, and so she brings him to abject vulnerability.

Like tonight, when she placed her hands on his temples and removed his ability to see anything other than her. And then transported him to an unknown place and bid him follow her, as quickly as he can manage.

Then she moves on, not even looking back.

She has given her command.

Whatever he’s walking on is narrow and spongy, and bows beneath each step. He hesitates, feeling the wind whip about him, buffeting him.

Heights have never frightened him. But then, he’s never had to walk a narrow ledge above an unknown danger while more than blindfolded.

If he goes too slow, or hesitates too often, he’ll displease her.

He trusts her, doesn’t he? His life is in her hands, and she values him enough that she’s not going to throw it away. She’s never given him a mission beyond his capabilities.

Raising himself up against the wind, he strides after her into the unknown.

On rare occasions, Harold still pushes beyond the boundaries of what Daisy will allow from her purchases.

Daisy likes the taste of John’s compliance, pure and sweet, untinged by the darker, bitter emotions. If she ever did any serious harm to Harold, John’s compliance would be forever tainted by hate.

But even she has limits.

John always tries to talk her into punishing him, instead; she allows it, and that’s enough to remind Harold, for a while, of their limitations.

This time, it won’t be so easy on either of them.

The device strapped to Harold’s head deals pain more directly than even electrocution could. And John’s finger holds the button down.

If he does not cause enough pain, then Daisy will do far, far worse in payment for Harold’s indiscretion.

Barely a few minutes in, Harold is crying out for relief, but not from the pain: from the awareness of what this is doing to John, how great an agony it is to be forced to cause Harold even the slightest distress.

In the end, it is Harold sobbing into Daisy’s gentle hands, vowing to behave, to never again give her cause to harm John in such a way.