fic: The Possible
Sep. 5th, 2020 09:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bonnefoisTitle: The Possible
Series: TF2
Character/Pairing: Scout/Miss Pauling
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 2,328
Author's note: part of Loving Ghosts. For Sarah.
1968
She applied lipstick in the mirror. The wind had tangled her hair, so she finger-combed her dark hair back into place. She didn't have time to reapply every single bobby pin. Usually, she only used it within disguises. Costumes to make her victims think she was no threat, at least until it was too late for them.
Though to be fair, Miss Pauling had some kind of natural way to make people underestimate her. Her height (or lack thereof) and her big glasses, the matronly bun and knee-length button up purple dress. Most of her targets never even gave her another glance.
This time, it was different.
She kept smoothing her hair, her dress. This strange feeling had started when she first heard the news, and hadn't ceased for a single moment, no matter how much alcohol (and yes, murder) she drowned it in.
(And how strange, how strange. She never cared if anyone died, if anyone was in danger, if anyone was in prison. They were just more people to put in coffins and unmarked graves later on.)
"Ready, Miss Pauling?" Heavy's voice was deep and rumbling.
This will be easy, she reminded herself. The paperwork had already been filed, and the bribes already given to ensure that the right people looked the other way. If they suddenly grew a conscience, well, they would suddenly find themselves beneath the waves, or a litany of other deaths planned out, each more painful than the last.
The Administrator had done so much, that she wouldn't even have to rely on stealth, or break him out. They'd walk right out that door, likely without even anyone asking for papers, or a single challenge. A brazen prison breakout.
(Well, if there was, she'd have to take care of it, and bury another. She kept that possibility in mind.)
Then again, when she was done with this, there wouldn't be a Liam Dempsey left, just a Scout. Another nameless mercenary who she might one day have to add to the many bodies buried in shallow graves in the caves.
Though, it wasn't quite as drastic as destroying every part of him to become a part of Mann co. He might not even have to take acid to his fingertips, as she had. Spy had as well.
And, even more, she reminded herself that despite it all, this man was a stranger. She knew of a Liam Dempsey, she'd let him be her company in some of the darkest nights, her imaginary friend who just happened to be a real person. A real, living person who would now be her coworker.
A living, real man who she'd now have to face and pretend like he hadn't been her only comfort, when the knowledge of those papers (marked redacted, marked with names she barely knew) and the faces of nameless mercenaries who would soon die, all in more gruesome ways.
Which she would never speak aloud, because what could she say? Hi, it feels like I know you because for years when I was a child alone on the base in the middle of being trained to be a killer, I found pictures of you and pretended you were my friend to cope through the horror of it all. Until it stopped being so horrific and I got used to it. Really, you can get used to anything, you know?
Yet somehow, she still found her heart fluttering in her chest as she walked out of the car. It wasn't worry, or fear of danger. She'd killed far men than these convicts. It was something else she couldn't quite define.
*
A ruckus of cat calls rose up as she walked by each cell. Despite her annoyance, she didn't glance to the side, didn't give them the benefit of even a second of her attention. The thought of how satisfying it would be to kill them came across her mind, but she didn't have time for a massacre, as much as she would've liked to.
(She wouldn't even have to clean up, because nobody would miss men like this. It'd be the closest thing she'd ever done to community service.)
She held her clipboard to her chest as she went, but she could've worn a burlap sack and still gotten remarks in a place like this.
She worked with worse killers than this, she reminded herself.
He was at the end of the bloc. Already out of the hospital, though still covered in bruises. The first thing she noticed was his big, crooked smile.
This was the first time they'd technically met, yet she knew him through photos, through traced phone calls and from the outside in.
She caught a phone call from Spy. Yes, everything is fine. I've already made the drop offs.
"Shut up, Kevin," she heard as she got closer. There was something on the radio, a song she didn't know.
"Liam Dempsey?"
He rose up and gripped the bars.
His hair was unkempt, and had grown darker with time. The golden color of wheat fields. He was taller than her, though technically, most everyone was, all things considered.
The orange prison suit was loose on him, big enough to grow into.
And his smile was just as crooked as it looked in the photos.
"Hello, gorgeous! Walkin' into my life is gonna be the best choice you ever made."
He was everything she imagined and nothing she imagined all at once. She hadn't prepared for this, not at all. Pictures could only capture a fragment of a moment. They didn't capture the thick accent, the cadence of his voice, his constant kinetic energy. They didn't capture the way she felt, overwhelmed by a million different memories that never actually happened, and the feelings, mixed and enigmatic that filled her.
She clutched tighter to the clipboard, not in fear, even surrounded by convicts. She'd worked with--and killed--far worse.
She'd told herself it would go quickly and the past they didn't even technically share would mean less than nothing. She told herself she would bury it down and forget the foolishness of a child who made an imaginary friend who happened to be a real boy, the son of her coworker, no less.
And yet, she'd never thrown out the pictures, or the feelings that came with them.
"Um... you're with me," she said finally.
And those words changed everything.
*
Miss Pauling tapped her pen against the clipboard. He had only been gone a few moments, into the projects apartment building which looked about ready to fall over at any moment. The pavement outside was full of cracks, and the staircase up to the apartments was filled with young men, who all stared down between stolen cigarettes.
The last thing she needed was another witness, let alone a dozen to deal with.
"Did not expect this stop," Heavy said.
"Neither did I," she said.
"We are being timed, you know, Miss Pauling?"
She let out a sigh. "Of course, I know. I'll think of some excuse. A flat tire or something to fill in the gap."
She knew best, because so often she was the one who watched the video screens.
It was a mercy she wouldn't allowed any other, but there'd been a desperate pleading in his expression, it'd felt like kicking a puppy. And Miss Pauling did a lot of horrible things, but she sure wouldn't kick puppies.
She hadn't gone in; even though he would've invited her. She had enough witnesses already, she told herself. Though it was something deeper. This was the woman who Spy loved, Liam's mother. All her life, she'd only known snippets of this woman who Spy adored enough to love from the shadows for this long. She looked down at her nails. The purple polish was chipped, and the blood beneath her nails showed through.
When she met Colleen...she wouldn't have blood under her nails.
Instead, she did paperwork to clear her mind. But, through it all, there was the thought that came to her over and over. You haven't even known him for an hour and you're already doing what you'd never do for anyone else. You're already showing mercy, the one thing that the Administrator taught you to never show.
But when he returned, a duffel bag full of his belongings and a bat slung over, she forgot every worry at the sight of his smile.
"Miss me?" Scout said.
"No," Heavy said.
"Ey, I wasn't talkin' to you, but it stands. Where'd you be without me? Not talkin', I bet," Scout said.
Miss Pauling had to hold back laughter at that. She was glad for the rumble of the motor to drown out their voices, and make talking nigh impossible. Then she wouldn't have to figure out what she would say to that, if anything.
*
She rehearsed an excuse in her mind as she left the diner. She glanced back through the glass, only to see him look like he'd been punched in the gut.
No, he hadn't annoyed Heavy that much (though he was certainly on that path with the way he was going.) Just her leaving resulted in him looking, well, a little heartbroken.
She turned her back and focused on the freeway.
She glanced back in from outside the diner. He tapped his fingers on the formica table top. He kept trying to get Heavy into a conversation, something that Heavy rather expertly avoided at every turn. Heavy could be as solid and unyielding as a brick wall when he wanted to be, not just in battle, but also in his refusal to give in to pleasantries.
Well, at least with anyone else but Medic. Somehow, they had a closeness that defied simple words.
"Yes, we had a flat tire. It held us up. We'll be back soon with the new recruit..."
Note to self: remember to sink a knife into one of the tires, because the Administrator will send someone to look into it. Of course, it'd been a little foolish to involve multiple mercenaries into this plan, but Heavy wasn't a backstabber. He had far too many secrets of his own to be blabbing anyone else's out.
(And even if Spy was a literal backstabber by profession, he would've kept her secret safe, too, she thought.)
She had to speak over the sound of passing cars, but not enough to gain the attention of any passing people. The last thing she needed was another body to bury in the desert. She certainly had enough of those waiting for her at the base.
"....Barring a traffic jam, or another emergency, we should be there in a while. Of course, in a place like this, a traffic jam isn't likely, but you never know."
Another car drove by. The call ended without a goodbye, but that was typical.
*
She reached up to the buttons, and inputted the data. Scout was near, his gaze all around the room, and fixed on her all at once. Somehow, he managed it.
She glanced back as he spoke.
I'm being flirted with, she thought suddenly.
It technically wasn't the first time she'd been flirted with, though each and every other time ended up with a body, or two, or more in the back of her truck. She didn't usually bother to actually flirt back, because for one, she was awful at it, and secondly, most men simply took anything she said already to be a flirtatious response, and thirdly, because she already had her weapon of choice ready to end the encounter.
(Usually a knife, in that kind of situation. But nigh anything could be a weapon if you tried hard enough. And Miss Pauling always did.)
She focused on the machine. Every other time she'd been flirted with, it'd brought forth different thoughts. Annoyance at their hubris, relief that they'd be easy to distract.
This one made her cheeks flush red as she inputted the data, and made her pulse rise to the sound of the machinery. She was glad the data wasn't reading her heartbeat, because it had to be off the charts. A fluttery, strange, warm feeling filled her chest.
Even someone as green as her in the area of love knew these were bad lines. But they were so bad they circled back into somehow amusing and even... charming?
He stammered and tried to walk back his flirtation. But the feeling still remained under the surface, whether she addressed it or not.
*
If she thought the moment she left in the diner was surprising, the way there was a tinge of desperation when she said goodbye left her with a litany of inexplicable feelings.
Miss Pauling wasn't used to being missed, or wanted for that matter.
(Except for the FBI's most wanted list. She was on there three times over under assumed names she'd had and discarded when they got connected to a few too many murders.)
When she said the words, "I work here, so we're definitely going to see each other again," he looked so relieved.
"Good," he'd said.
And good she thought.
Of all things, he'd guessed her name would be Mystique. Even the thought made have to hold back laughter--among other emotions.
Because nobody had ever wanted to know her name before, or much of anything about her. The people who worked here knew better than to ask questions of anyone around them. They were stripped down to code names, class names, and nothing more. And they knew they'd one day be buried in unmarked graves.
And the rest? Well, they were victims or people lucky enough to be spared, for now.
But somehow, Scout hadn't gotten the message. Or he'd ignored it, and he wanted to know about her.
As she returned to process the papers, she found herself humming a song she didn't know, but that he had been humming all along. Whatever energy he had was surprisingly infectious. She found herself smiling at odd moments during the day at memories of him that came at random, for no reason she could tell.
Or no reason she could admit.
And a part of her wanted to know the name of that song. She'd have to ask him sometime, because like many things about him, she just couldn't get it out of her head.
Series: TF2
Character/Pairing: Scout/Miss Pauling
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 2,328
Author's note: part of Loving Ghosts. For Sarah.
1968
She applied lipstick in the mirror. The wind had tangled her hair, so she finger-combed her dark hair back into place. She didn't have time to reapply every single bobby pin. Usually, she only used it within disguises. Costumes to make her victims think she was no threat, at least until it was too late for them.
Though to be fair, Miss Pauling had some kind of natural way to make people underestimate her. Her height (or lack thereof) and her big glasses, the matronly bun and knee-length button up purple dress. Most of her targets never even gave her another glance.
This time, it was different.
She kept smoothing her hair, her dress. This strange feeling had started when she first heard the news, and hadn't ceased for a single moment, no matter how much alcohol (and yes, murder) she drowned it in.
(And how strange, how strange. She never cared if anyone died, if anyone was in danger, if anyone was in prison. They were just more people to put in coffins and unmarked graves later on.)
"Ready, Miss Pauling?" Heavy's voice was deep and rumbling.
This will be easy, she reminded herself. The paperwork had already been filed, and the bribes already given to ensure that the right people looked the other way. If they suddenly grew a conscience, well, they would suddenly find themselves beneath the waves, or a litany of other deaths planned out, each more painful than the last.
The Administrator had done so much, that she wouldn't even have to rely on stealth, or break him out. They'd walk right out that door, likely without even anyone asking for papers, or a single challenge. A brazen prison breakout.
(Well, if there was, she'd have to take care of it, and bury another. She kept that possibility in mind.)
Then again, when she was done with this, there wouldn't be a Liam Dempsey left, just a Scout. Another nameless mercenary who she might one day have to add to the many bodies buried in shallow graves in the caves.
Though, it wasn't quite as drastic as destroying every part of him to become a part of Mann co. He might not even have to take acid to his fingertips, as she had. Spy had as well.
And, even more, she reminded herself that despite it all, this man was a stranger. She knew of a Liam Dempsey, she'd let him be her company in some of the darkest nights, her imaginary friend who just happened to be a real person. A real, living person who would now be her coworker.
A living, real man who she'd now have to face and pretend like he hadn't been her only comfort, when the knowledge of those papers (marked redacted, marked with names she barely knew) and the faces of nameless mercenaries who would soon die, all in more gruesome ways.
Which she would never speak aloud, because what could she say? Hi, it feels like I know you because for years when I was a child alone on the base in the middle of being trained to be a killer, I found pictures of you and pretended you were my friend to cope through the horror of it all. Until it stopped being so horrific and I got used to it. Really, you can get used to anything, you know?
Yet somehow, she still found her heart fluttering in her chest as she walked out of the car. It wasn't worry, or fear of danger. She'd killed far men than these convicts. It was something else she couldn't quite define.
*
A ruckus of cat calls rose up as she walked by each cell. Despite her annoyance, she didn't glance to the side, didn't give them the benefit of even a second of her attention. The thought of how satisfying it would be to kill them came across her mind, but she didn't have time for a massacre, as much as she would've liked to.
(She wouldn't even have to clean up, because nobody would miss men like this. It'd be the closest thing she'd ever done to community service.)
She held her clipboard to her chest as she went, but she could've worn a burlap sack and still gotten remarks in a place like this.
She worked with worse killers than this, she reminded herself.
He was at the end of the bloc. Already out of the hospital, though still covered in bruises. The first thing she noticed was his big, crooked smile.
This was the first time they'd technically met, yet she knew him through photos, through traced phone calls and from the outside in.
She caught a phone call from Spy. Yes, everything is fine. I've already made the drop offs.
"Shut up, Kevin," she heard as she got closer. There was something on the radio, a song she didn't know.
"Liam Dempsey?"
He rose up and gripped the bars.
His hair was unkempt, and had grown darker with time. The golden color of wheat fields. He was taller than her, though technically, most everyone was, all things considered.
The orange prison suit was loose on him, big enough to grow into.
And his smile was just as crooked as it looked in the photos.
"Hello, gorgeous! Walkin' into my life is gonna be the best choice you ever made."
He was everything she imagined and nothing she imagined all at once. She hadn't prepared for this, not at all. Pictures could only capture a fragment of a moment. They didn't capture the thick accent, the cadence of his voice, his constant kinetic energy. They didn't capture the way she felt, overwhelmed by a million different memories that never actually happened, and the feelings, mixed and enigmatic that filled her.
She clutched tighter to the clipboard, not in fear, even surrounded by convicts. She'd worked with--and killed--far worse.
She'd told herself it would go quickly and the past they didn't even technically share would mean less than nothing. She told herself she would bury it down and forget the foolishness of a child who made an imaginary friend who happened to be a real boy, the son of her coworker, no less.
And yet, she'd never thrown out the pictures, or the feelings that came with them.
"Um... you're with me," she said finally.
And those words changed everything.
*
Miss Pauling tapped her pen against the clipboard. He had only been gone a few moments, into the projects apartment building which looked about ready to fall over at any moment. The pavement outside was full of cracks, and the staircase up to the apartments was filled with young men, who all stared down between stolen cigarettes.
The last thing she needed was another witness, let alone a dozen to deal with.
"Did not expect this stop," Heavy said.
"Neither did I," she said.
"We are being timed, you know, Miss Pauling?"
She let out a sigh. "Of course, I know. I'll think of some excuse. A flat tire or something to fill in the gap."
She knew best, because so often she was the one who watched the video screens.
It was a mercy she wouldn't allowed any other, but there'd been a desperate pleading in his expression, it'd felt like kicking a puppy. And Miss Pauling did a lot of horrible things, but she sure wouldn't kick puppies.
She hadn't gone in; even though he would've invited her. She had enough witnesses already, she told herself. Though it was something deeper. This was the woman who Spy loved, Liam's mother. All her life, she'd only known snippets of this woman who Spy adored enough to love from the shadows for this long. She looked down at her nails. The purple polish was chipped, and the blood beneath her nails showed through.
When she met Colleen...she wouldn't have blood under her nails.
Instead, she did paperwork to clear her mind. But, through it all, there was the thought that came to her over and over. You haven't even known him for an hour and you're already doing what you'd never do for anyone else. You're already showing mercy, the one thing that the Administrator taught you to never show.
But when he returned, a duffel bag full of his belongings and a bat slung over, she forgot every worry at the sight of his smile.
"Miss me?" Scout said.
"No," Heavy said.
"Ey, I wasn't talkin' to you, but it stands. Where'd you be without me? Not talkin', I bet," Scout said.
Miss Pauling had to hold back laughter at that. She was glad for the rumble of the motor to drown out their voices, and make talking nigh impossible. Then she wouldn't have to figure out what she would say to that, if anything.
*
She rehearsed an excuse in her mind as she left the diner. She glanced back through the glass, only to see him look like he'd been punched in the gut.
No, he hadn't annoyed Heavy that much (though he was certainly on that path with the way he was going.) Just her leaving resulted in him looking, well, a little heartbroken.
She turned her back and focused on the freeway.
She glanced back in from outside the diner. He tapped his fingers on the formica table top. He kept trying to get Heavy into a conversation, something that Heavy rather expertly avoided at every turn. Heavy could be as solid and unyielding as a brick wall when he wanted to be, not just in battle, but also in his refusal to give in to pleasantries.
Well, at least with anyone else but Medic. Somehow, they had a closeness that defied simple words.
"Yes, we had a flat tire. It held us up. We'll be back soon with the new recruit..."
Note to self: remember to sink a knife into one of the tires, because the Administrator will send someone to look into it. Of course, it'd been a little foolish to involve multiple mercenaries into this plan, but Heavy wasn't a backstabber. He had far too many secrets of his own to be blabbing anyone else's out.
(And even if Spy was a literal backstabber by profession, he would've kept her secret safe, too, she thought.)
She had to speak over the sound of passing cars, but not enough to gain the attention of any passing people. The last thing she needed was another body to bury in the desert. She certainly had enough of those waiting for her at the base.
"....Barring a traffic jam, or another emergency, we should be there in a while. Of course, in a place like this, a traffic jam isn't likely, but you never know."
Another car drove by. The call ended without a goodbye, but that was typical.
*
She reached up to the buttons, and inputted the data. Scout was near, his gaze all around the room, and fixed on her all at once. Somehow, he managed it.
She glanced back as he spoke.
I'm being flirted with, she thought suddenly.
It technically wasn't the first time she'd been flirted with, though each and every other time ended up with a body, or two, or more in the back of her truck. She didn't usually bother to actually flirt back, because for one, she was awful at it, and secondly, most men simply took anything she said already to be a flirtatious response, and thirdly, because she already had her weapon of choice ready to end the encounter.
(Usually a knife, in that kind of situation. But nigh anything could be a weapon if you tried hard enough. And Miss Pauling always did.)
She focused on the machine. Every other time she'd been flirted with, it'd brought forth different thoughts. Annoyance at their hubris, relief that they'd be easy to distract.
This one made her cheeks flush red as she inputted the data, and made her pulse rise to the sound of the machinery. She was glad the data wasn't reading her heartbeat, because it had to be off the charts. A fluttery, strange, warm feeling filled her chest.
Even someone as green as her in the area of love knew these were bad lines. But they were so bad they circled back into somehow amusing and even... charming?
He stammered and tried to walk back his flirtation. But the feeling still remained under the surface, whether she addressed it or not.
*
If she thought the moment she left in the diner was surprising, the way there was a tinge of desperation when she said goodbye left her with a litany of inexplicable feelings.
Miss Pauling wasn't used to being missed, or wanted for that matter.
(Except for the FBI's most wanted list. She was on there three times over under assumed names she'd had and discarded when they got connected to a few too many murders.)
When she said the words, "I work here, so we're definitely going to see each other again," he looked so relieved.
"Good," he'd said.
And good she thought.
Of all things, he'd guessed her name would be Mystique. Even the thought made have to hold back laughter--among other emotions.
Because nobody had ever wanted to know her name before, or much of anything about her. The people who worked here knew better than to ask questions of anyone around them. They were stripped down to code names, class names, and nothing more. And they knew they'd one day be buried in unmarked graves.
And the rest? Well, they were victims or people lucky enough to be spared, for now.
But somehow, Scout hadn't gotten the message. Or he'd ignored it, and he wanted to know about her.
As she returned to process the papers, she found herself humming a song she didn't know, but that he had been humming all along. Whatever energy he had was surprisingly infectious. She found herself smiling at odd moments during the day at memories of him that came at random, for no reason she could tell.
Or no reason she could admit.
And a part of her wanted to know the name of that song. She'd have to ask him sometime, because like many things about him, she just couldn't get it out of her head.
