Archive of Our Own ^beta

A camera flickers on and swings in truly stomach-turning motion, its user clearly neither accustomed or adept to controlling it. The world is a smeared ribbon of light and colors in that moment, incomprehensible but lovely, peppered with the sound of muffled background chatter.

“All right, got it goin’ for real this time. Hell yeah!”

The boyish voice is followed by a clap of hands and the view settles on a picturesque image of the ocean. The camera is quite high up and gazing downwards fiercely at waves crashing into metal struts that jab into the sea like great long legs. It's a long way down, but it's deceiving, too; it's actually much longer and deeper than you think. Even if hitting the surface wouldn't kill you, you'd still have a long way to go. It gives you chills. There is always a further way to fall.

“I don’t know if I should even ask, but you’ve got what going?" The camera turns, and suddenly a woman is gazing into it, pale blue eyes, a quirked brow, and a mildly amused smile arranged beneath her hood. It's a beautiful face; seeing it is somehow disquieting in a way you choose not to focus on for now. She blinks a few times, pretty long eyelashes fluttering as she does so before she asks again: “Why are you staring? Got what going?"

"Asked Smithy to rig my Concealer with a camera. It's in the lens." A black gloved hand raises up, tapping the lens obtrusively, stabbing darkness a few times before it retracts. "He said he was thinking about upgrading all of us with 'em, but for now it's just a me thing. I'm callin' it Slinger-Vision!"

"I guess that's why I've been seeing you with that thing on your eye all day even though we're not actually going out anywhere," Claire looks, pondering off to the side for a second before adding, "I hope you've at least been turning it off when you go to the bathroom."

“Oh, ha ha. Very funny. I’ve only forgotten that once so far. How did I know you were gonna nitpick my cool idea right out of the gate?”

"It was either that or ask you if Slinger-Vision was how second place on the badnik busting scoreboard looked, so I went with the nicer one." She stuck her tongue out at the ocelot and proceeded to laugh when a rude gesture rose its way up to the corner of the camera's frame. "Either way, I'm kidding. Good idea to test run it at the base instead of in the middle of combat."

“Huh? Oh, yeah. Totally what I’m doing.” The world swims once more as Slinger pairs a nod with his lie for extra reinforcement. And then, suddenly, a voice comes over from offscreen.

"Hey guys!" Happy. Excited. A little louder than usual. It's a polished crystalline sound. There is a warmth that resounds to it, a breeze on a summer day. She was like that once, wasn't she? The camera turns, and there stands the wolf, hands behind her back, messily dressed in off-duty clothes. A tank top, shorts. Combat boots? Fashion faux pas. She didn't bring any clothes with her when she first came here back then, did she? Other than what was on her back, anyway.

"Whisper!" Uncharacteristic cheerfulness from Claire as she leans into the frame, a grin on her face and fingers tented like some sort of spy movie villain about to leave you in a deathtrap. Yes, she got that way too, didn't she? The mask of mentorship and wisdom came unseated when she got a little too excited about something. In this case: "What's the good news? Don't tell me… The supply drop is here? Our vital supplies?"

"Yep, Smithy's already back from the mainland with a bunch of beer and nachos. He must have booked it, huh?" She grinned. That smile. Oh, that smile, it's infectious. You're smiling as you watch it, the video distorting with the sun in the sky behind her as though they were in competition with one another. Do you wonder if that smile still exists somewhere? Hidden away somewhere cold and dim like an ancient and disused storefront facade.

"Man… What did you even tell the big lug to get him to move that fast, Claire?" Slinger's camera manages to capture the precise moment where Claire's joy overflows, and she employs her signature happy tic: her hands clapping together and her head tilting. It could either be a delightful little occurrence or the most terrifying thing you'd ever seen, depending on what caused it. Slinger takes it for granted that he will see it many more times. Slinger believes that everything that is there right now will always be there. They all have to because thinking about the alternative all the time will tear you apart. "Every time I ask him for something he just makes that big grumbly noise and says he'll get to it eventually."

“Well, I try to keep my most powerful techniques secret… But I guess I can let this one slip. Just for you.” Claire’s face is everything suddenly, consuming the frame as she leans in for a conspiratorial whisper. Seeing it makes you hurt. This close, this happy, those eyes looking pure and full of energy. She couldn’t be further out of the reach of your complaints, in this lost place, in this lost time, as she puts a hand beside her mouth and lets you in on the magic words to make Smithy do something: “I asked him nicely.”

And then, she moves away just as quickly as she had swept in, robe swaying in the ocean wind, tail peeking out of the fabric. Slinger reaches a hand out to stop her, but she is already out of reach for him, just as she is for you. She is walking away with Whisper now, the two girls chatting happily as Slinger’s hand lowers and plops into his lap.

"Well, damn. Why didn't I think of that?"

—

The camera jitters to life again; bottles in five gloved hands clink their necks together from different directions, followed by a raucous cheer. It's certainly not the worst cut-in; Slinger's getting better at using that camera. Might even be a natural! Oh, who are you kidding? He just got lucky and got a good shot.

“A toast!” Smithy says, voice deep and boisterous and very leader-y, just as you remember. The lion pauses, though, and continues: “I don’t actually know what we’re toasting. Slinger, what are we toasting?”

“Huh? Me?! I suck at speeches. Mimic, you do it.”

The camera swings towards a dark spot carved into the colorful, familiar mess hall. The man with the sunken eyes and the long tentacles spilling down from the back of his head flinches as the spotlight is placed on him. He hates it enough that the mask of camaraderie slips from his face, and he stammers out: "A-Aren't you supposed to do that before the bottle clinking thing?" And then he shakes his head, "Anyway, pass. You're up, pup."

Again, the camera swings to Whisper, whose eyes go wide as she puts a finger on her lip.

“...To getting drunk?”

“To getting drunk!” Claire thrusts her bottle into the air like a triumphant knight, slamming a hand down on the table and half-lifting herself atop it. The other members of this very-not-round table followed suit, and the drinking happily followed.

—

All my silence and my strained respect
Missed chances and the same regrets
Kiss the thief and you save the rest
All my insights from retrospect

Who brought the soundtrack to this party? Old pop songs. Probably Smithy, the big softy. Speaking of which…

“Claire, you-guh! Better be- guh! Getting all of this!”

The camera is watching a ping pong ball is rapidly thumping between two sides of a table, Slinger on one end and Smithy on the other. The action is intense. Lightning paced! Well, not really; Slinger is jumping all over the place to return balls, but playing against Smithy in ping pong is kind of like playing a wall. That big tree trunk of an arm just swats it back inevitably regardless of where the ocelot is sending it.

"Hope you're ready to lose!" Slinger's fervent returns only increased in speed. "None of us have ever beaten you, but I've been training my ass off for this. I'm ready to do the impossible!"

“I… Uh, was I supposed to remember lines for this or something?” Smithy scratched his chin with a finger as he swatted the ball away with all the style of a glacier. “I kinda feel bad with you doing all these wild anime speeches and I don’t have anything prepared.”

Slinger picked the wrong person to hold the camera, of course. Lazily, the camera pans away from the Battle to End All Battles to the couch where Mimic is sitting with a beer in one hand and a bowl of chips in the other. Newly appointed camerawoman Claire brings the Concealer she's been charged with using to record the match, but she's now ignoring it closer to the octopus. When he realizes he's been recorded, his eyes stop following the ball to regard Claire with a frown and a swatting backhand at the camera. He misses: "Cut it out already. Watch them.”

“But I’m getting your good side.” Claire pouts.

“You’re drunk,” Mimic says dryly, as if he were not right along there with her, and then allows himself the thinnest little smile, “And all my sides are good sides.”

“Right? Born actor, that’s you.” She giggles softly. Claire pans over to the ping pong game once more, where Slinger is now standing on his side of the table and dramatically overhanding the ball back every time it comes his way. She swiftly grows bored once more and then turns back to the octopus again, shifting a little closer to him on the couch: “I’ve heard you’ve been teaching Whisper some hand to hand techniques lately. How’s that going?”

"As good as it can be, gangly and clumsy and green as she is. Grappling with her is like getting in a fight with a barnyard scarecrow." Mimic takes another drink and finds his beer empty, reaching for a new one while dropping the bottle into the space between its cushion and the arm. It's a tiny thing that strikes you for some reason because it's illogical. Silly. Despite yourself and who you are looking at you almost laugh out loud. Who the hell would jam one of those there? Certainly not Mimic. Not cold, calculated, cruel Mimic. Mimic the traitor. Mimic the hated.

“But she’s getting better, right? At least I’d hope. Or else that’d make you a pretty crummy teacher.” The octopus looked at the camera, surprised that his derisive comment hadn’t shut down the conversation.

“Er, well… I suppose she is.”

"Good! That's what counts." Claire said, a pleased titter audible over yet another Slinger ping-pong war cry. "We should go rolling sometime when you and Whisper aren't using the mats."

“You don’t need grappling practice. You’re almost as good as me,” Mimic stared at the camera with a suspicious frown.

“I never said anything about grappling,” Claire says, her voice dropping into something low and whiskey-smooth.

You remember saying it. You also remember being exceedingly drunk, which you clearly blame. O, invisible spirit of wine, if thou hast no name let us call thee devil! Or, well, invisible spirit of cheap lager. But when you see the look on his face, the widening eyes, and the quick aversion of the gaze, you understand more why that earlier bit with the bottle had drawn you into it: because it was him with his guard down. His eternal, carefully crafted, and meticulously maintained guard. He was never there for fun, but he was a person. No matter how wretched and cruel and shriveled a thing it might have been, there was a heart beating in his chest.

What was it that interested you so much about it? Made you want to learn more? Forgotten. A dead language. Nothing but iconography and symbols, meaning lost to time. A dream. And like all dreams, forgotten. Maybe it really was a drunk stammer. Or well… You always did have truly atrocious taste in men.

“I’m kidding. Chaos, the look on your face!” Claire let out a drunken cackle. Witch-esque. At this moment, the role of master of disguise had switched. Mimic, the subtle liar. Claire, bold-faced but no less false.

Mimic, staring at the floor for slightly too long, then looked up, but before he could say anything, he was interrupted by a roar of: "YES! SUCK IT!"

The camera quickly returned to Slinger flexing victoriously, standing with one foot on either side of the ping pong net and throwing out every cool pose he could think of. Meanwhile, Smithy appeared to be lying facedown on the ground and defeated. Wait, no, he was currently drunkenly crawling around on the floor and looking for the ping pong ball that he'd seemingly let by himself. After several seconds of voguing, Slinger turned to Claire excitedly: "Tell me you got that! Nobody’s ever gonna believe it otherwise!”

“O-Of course!” Claire said hurriedly, waving her half-empty beer bottle in front of her as though that were a gesture that meant anything, hazarding a guess for flavor. “The flip was a nice touch!”

“Right! Heheh.” And so the monkey was off the hook for now. The despair when Slinger went back to attempt to relive the moment, however, was legendary.

—

You remember nothing of the rest of this night, which is why you are more than a little surprised that the recording is continuing. Someone, you don't know who, is walking through the darkness of the helipad atop Diamond Cutter Base. It's a pretty night out; clear skies, a crescent moon hanging up in the sky with uncountable stars. Beautiful, but a little terrifying. The sort of sky that feels like it could pull you into it this high up. Take you, whisk you away. Never to be seen again. To things beyond.

You see now what the camera’s current holder is moving for when you see the small cloaked figure sitting at the edge of the helipad, occupying one of the sharp corners like a chair. Her hands are behind her, her boots swaying idly in the sky. Her hair, normally a carefully styled done-up swirl, is a bit of a mess as the seawinds will it here and there.

"There you are." The voice behind the camera, finally betraying themselves as Whisper, says with relief when they're right behind Claire. She turns to look over her shoulder just a hint too late; alcohol is dulling her legendary senses. The seer, for all her power, could not see even her impending hangover.

And yet she is bold. Bold, glistening with sweat in the summer moonlight. When her vision stopped existing in blurs and the image of the wolf comes into focus, she smiles as only a psychic could, speaking nonsense in a fashion much the same:“I knew you would come. I foresaw it.”

Whisper snorts, not speaking at first, as she comes to sit beside Claire. She's a little bit less drunk than the others must be at this point; she never got too deep into the stuff under normal circumstances. When she did, she turned into a giggly mess, and that's not happening here. Instead, she puts her arm around Claire, clearly not happy with the howler monkey sitting so close to a fatal fall. Claire leans in, tapping the side of the camera twice: "Though I did not anticipate you bearing such legendary artifacts. I see you are the holder of the great and powerful Slinger-Vision."

“He told me to ‘walk around and get some good shots for him’. And then fell asleep standing up. I think he’s even worse off than you are,” Whisper says.

“Always second place!”

Claire laughs. Whisper, too. A sound that would mean nothing on its own and means everything when together, like the rustle of flowers swaying in the breeze. Plucked and arranged neatly in a bouquet, side by side, to the order of the rules of beauty. Where they belong. This is how things should have been. This is how it was not. Flowers are for funerals.

“Did you have fun tonight?” Claire asked softly. The camera bobbed up and down as Whisper nodded.

"Being with you all is fun. Never realized there were so many ways to fall over when you drink too much." Again, Claire laughs, though Whisper doesn't join her this time. No, the sad streak in this girl always existed, just waiting to be dredged out one way or another: "Last time we did this, Mimic said to enjoy every fun night you get because it might be the last one."

“Ugh. Asshole,” Claire grumbles. You could almost cheer for the evaluation if it wasn’t followed by, “Good looks, awful attitude.”

“But he’s kind of right. We’re soldiers, right? You never know when something’s going to go wrong,” Whisper said sullenly, her words only slightly slurred by her drinking. “You never know when-”

“Whisper. Sweetie. I know.”

Whisper didn’t expect to be interrupted. Or maybe she didn’t expect the fire in Claire’s voice. You were always like that when you let all pretense drop, weren’t you? Idealism. Ideals, at all. A state where nothing mattered more than what you believed to be true. Wasn’t that how it was?

“I know, because I can see. And I think whatever, whoever gave me the power to see the future…They did it for me to make a difference. And the difference I've chosen to make, is keeping you all safe." She reached out, taking one of Whisper's larger hands in her own. The wolf's hand is shaking, but Claire's is firm despite the size disparity. "I'll never let you be hurt. Any of you."

You don't remember any of this. You don't remember Whisper's silent nod. You don't remember the passion, the belief, the assurance that all of this mattered in your voice, and the sheer conviction in your eyes. But you remember that this is you. And, at least for a moment, you stop lying. This was you, laid bare and naked.

The lost memory wore on, regardless of the pain it caused you, as you turn the hand you’re holding over with your grasp . The camera watches with palpable curiosity as tension leaves the air and you regard Whisper with a little smirk: “Enough grim business, this is supposed to be a fun night. Have you ever had a palm reading before?”

"No."

“Chiromancy is a very important part of fortune telling,” you say, an index finger rolling along the palm tenderly. “You can tell so much about someone from just their hands, you know?”

“And what can you tell about me?” Perhaps it’s the drink, the atmosphere, or perhaps you’re just that good at spinning a thread, but she sounds properly mystified. With practiced precision, regardless of how terribly sloshed you are, your fingertip finds the downward crescent that begins above her thumb.

“This is your lifeline.It’s set in very rich and deep,” you say with the air of approval and expertise of a doctor telling a patient they have a healthy pulse.

“How long do I live?” Whisper asks.

“Doesn’t work that way,” you click your tongue scoldingly. “It’s like how the Death tarot doesn’t mean you’re about to die.” She pauses a moment, head tilting. “Towards the bottom, it begins to fork. Your future is all about dynamics. Lots of people that are part of your life, just as you are theirs.”

"That must be you guys," Whisper says. You can hear the smile on her lips even if you can't see them. The past-you returns it in kind.

“Obviously. Let's see… This is your fate line. It's… Well, not going to sugarcoat it. It ends and merges with your Mars line. That's a life beset with fights and difficulties.But when you pair that with your lifeline, success is assured," you said with sagacious satisfaction. "And this is…"

“...What?”

“Oh my, your love line. It’s…Whisper, you dog~”

“W-What? What does it say? What does it mean?!” Whisper asks desperately. You laugh at how hard she’s squirming against you now instead of answering her, regardless of the proximity to the edge. You know she isn’t going to let you fall, and you’ll keep her safe just the same.

"Well… To tell you that, I need to tell you the most important part of palm reading. The secret at the core of it. It might be a lot to take in, but I think you're ready." Suddenly, your face is serious. But, as if somehow things had transitioned, time traveled from past to future, you are smiling. You are smiling despite the heavy head and damp cheeks.

“What… What is it?” Whisper asks with mystical trepidation.

Palm reading is bullshit.

“Palm reading is bullshit.”

Whisper groans your name. You laugh. The wind blows. The stars shine. This is a sanctum where magical things are kept. If you stay here, you will be pulled under. There is always a further way to fall. And yet, tempted deeper, you watch yourself refuse to let go of Whisper's hand. Instead, you press your cheek against it. You sigh, and you close your eyes, nestling it. Dredged out of the depths of time and drunken haze, you somehow recall how it felt at that moment: smooth. No callouses. No blisters. Unscarred. Free, unfettered still. Innocent.

"The only thing I can tell from your hand, Whisper, is that you're a good girl." You say. You plant a gentle kiss on the palm. There is no romance here, but you love this girl. You have since the very day that she came to this place to join you and your friends. You want to protect her. You want to see her through this. "And if I could accomplish one thing by the time this war is over, it's keeping you that way."

The camera feed stops. As if to mock you, that is precisely where the recording ends. You, staring at yourself. Staring into your soul with half-lidded eyes. Affection. Confidence. Purpose. But sitting in the ashes, amongst the ruins, you know that you failed. And so it becomes an accusation. You are hated. You are condemned.

None of it means anything. You believe this. You know this.

None of this means anything, but once? Once it did.