Haze stood frozen in place, and Cass couldn’t help but smirk at him with her hands tied above her head. What an ass. And he was about to get his handed to him. He’d gotten lucky with the gun last time, but against everyone in the room, there was no way he’d come out on top. And Cassandra was willing to bet he’d take several seconds to realize this, before taking another few seconds to realize that his only real way forward was backwards and out. Cassandra saw the gears turning, when they were rudely interrupted by a high whistling sound, and then a hollow ‘thwock’ as a mouse-sized drone hit him squarely in the forehead. The masked woman put her hands on her hips smugly as the drone whirred happily back to her. There was no way she would come all the way up here, right?
Her thoughts were interrupted when Tore unhooked her and Tee quickly and efficiently. Tee elegantly stepped down, their body not really suffering from human things like muscle fatigue anymore, and Cassandra felt distinctly fallible as she stumbled into Tore’s strong arms, her legs and arms heavy and weak. “Fuck”, she mumbled.
“That was very rude of you, pup,” Tore said with a smile in her eyes as she helped Cassandra stand up straight again. “Making me come out of retirement to save you.” Cass straightened her back and heard her entire spine pop like someone slowly backing up an eighteen-wheeler over the world’s most sensitive strip of bubble wrap.
“I’m worth it,” she groaned as she snap-crackle-and-popped her neck. Then, her brain caught up with the facts of the present, and her gaze snapped on Ellis. She saw him and Tee exchanging words. Ellis was probably having some difficulty with Tee’s new body, but their face would be recognizable enough for him. Cass, however... “I’ll be right with you again, Tore. I… uh…” Cassandra looked between him and Tore awkwardly.
“Go, pup.” Tore smiled warmly. “I know you have a history here. I am not leaving.”
“Thanks,” Cassandra said, gave her a quick hug, and then stumble-ran over to Tee and Ellis, who were already in a tight embrace, which Ellis was doing all wrong. His eyes were open, for one, and he had a deeply concerned look in his eyes. Hugs were supposed to be happy, good things, especially during reunions, not something you did to hide your expression. That was the opposite of the intended effect. “Uh… hi,” she said, knowing Ellis wouldn’t recognize her with her new haircut, clothes, face, pronouns and gender.
Ellis pulled away from Tee and looked at Cass. Tee turned to look at her too. “So this is her, huh?” Ellis asked, and Cassandra could taste the venom in his voice. Wait, he didn’t think… Oh, fuck, he didn’t know… of course he didn’t know… shit, fuck.
“Ellis,” she said softly, hoping to get through to him as quickly as possible.
“Oh, nice,” he said. “You told her about me. How nice of you. What did you tell her?” Tee’s head snapped to look at him, and their expression was as steely as their chassis.
“Ellis, I’m going to recommend you stop talking right now, because you are going to feel really stupid in about five seconds.” Ellis blinked a few times as Tee expertly took the wind out of the sails of his righteous indignation and fury. “Sit,” they said, and pointed at a small plastic box that looked designed to hold small animals. Ellis almost mechanically did as he was told. Cassandra noticed the masked woman crossing her arms a little ways away, but if she was really as good with drones as it looked she was -- especially if Cassandra’s suspicion was correct -- then she wasn’t missing a word of what was being said.
“Alright,” Ellis said, still obviously ticked off. “If this ‘isn’t what it looks like’, explain it to me. Because from where I’m sitting it didn’t take you very long to… replace me.” There it was. The sadness, jealousy, envy, at the core of his anger.
“I’m going to get to that if you give me a second, Ellis. We waited a year for you, you can wait a few seconds, yeah?” Ellis blinked again, and frowned. He didn’t understand. Tee looked at Cass, probably collecting their thoughts. Feeling awkward, Cassandra gently massaged the muscles in her arms and shoulders. She was acutely aware of her lack of armor. The feeling flowing back into her limbs was still mostly pins and needles. When she got home, she was going to need a bath. Several. Maybe three weeks worth of bath. “This is… this person… this woman, Cassandra, was already in our lives, Ellis,” Tee finally said. Ellis’ eyebrows went way up. “I don’t know how long you’ve been here already…” They let that hang, to give Ellis a chance to answer.
“Weeks. Months, almost,” he said, looking sufficiently dour. Cassandra was doing her best not to feel like she’d ‘had it worse’. This wasn’t a competition, after all.
“Well, weeks or almost months ago, we fell into a hole in space, right?” Ellis nodded. “Right before that, we were about to ask Cassandra here to be a part of our lives in a much more tangible sense. You don’t remember her because she’s wearing a different face, a different name and… let’s say she’s had the time to do some self-reflection.” The looks on Ellis’ face could be used as reference material for aspiring artists, gathered in a booklet named ‘the many faces of emotion.’ He went from confusion, to understanding, to more confusion, flashing back around to anger for a hot second, then worry, back to confusion, and finally arriving at realization. He looked at Cassandra, really looked.
“M-- Mal?” he asked, his voice quiet, like he didn’t really believe it. And why would he? The situation was absurd, and Cassandra wasn’t sure she’d believe them if she’d been in his place. She smiled awkwardly and waved a small wave.
“Not anymore,” she said softly. “Not by a long shot. But… yeah.”
“No…”
“Yeah,” Tee said. “That was me too.”
“But… how. I mean, I heard there was a kind of fake Tore, like a clone…” Ellis’ eyes went to Tore and the masked woman. “But how is it… you?”
“I had… time to look around for both of you.” She tried not to dwell on the years she spent without them, how much it hurt that this wasn’t the tearful reunion she’d hoped for.
“How can I know for sure?” Ellis asked. He looked lost and confused, but Cass didn’t want to risk picking him up for a hug. She got the feeling there was a fifty-fifty chance of her getting shot at point blank if she tried to close the distance between them right now.
“Just… ask me anything, man. Uhh…” she paused, racking her brain. It had been six years since she’d seen him. “You punched me in the face. On the way back to your place.” Ellis cocked his head. Okay, that one had worked. There had to be more. “Your guac is too salty,” she remembered. “You and Tee got me through the roughest days, fuck, years of my life… back then.” The weight of this, the fact that she had to convince her best friend of who she was, was starting to weigh heavily on her soul, and tears started to run down her face. “I’m sorry, Ellis,” she mumbled. “I’m... I just…” Her voice and her resolve cracked simultaneously and she stopped talking. Ellis stood up and studied her face carefully.
“There’s no fucking way…” he said softly. Cassandra nodded again, wiping her tears away. He took a step closer. While her identity was in question, this was most definitely him. His weeks alone seemed to have done him good, though. He had clearly beefed up since he arrived, and he moved with more confidence than he used to, but that kind face was still very much his, even if it didn’t look very kind right then. If only he’d smile. “It…” Ellis paused and stared deeply into her eyes, squinting as if to try and will any deception away. “It’s you,” he finally said, and his face relaxed. Then, as if to put the cherry on top, it split wide into his trademark smile, and Cassandra couldn’t hold back the rest of the tears that had been waiting for a signal of some kind.
“Yeah,” she said. It was hard to focus, but she managed to return the smile.
“I told you,” Tee said and slapped his arm. “I spent the past year with her, Ellis. We always talked about this eventuality,” they reminded him, then looked around at where they actually were. “Well, not this exact one. But one of us finding ourselves alone with her… That was always a possibility.” Ellis nodded. “She’s a woman, though.” Tee looked at him sideways. “That’s not gonna be a problem, is it?” Ellis shook his head, almost as if in a trance, incapable of looking away from Cassandra’s face.
“Cassandra, right?” he asked. She nodded. Hearing her name from his mouth was… gold. She hadn’t expected it to hit her as hard as it did, but she raised her hand to her mouth as she cried more freely. Ellis wrapped his arms around her and she could feel his breathing against her. “I’m so sorry,” he whispered. “I’m sorry I didn’t recognize you sooner.” Cassandra tried to mumble an answer, but thinking and breathing were too hard. When they both finally pulled away, both of them were busy wiping away tears. “Damn,” Ellis whispered. “Oh, fuck! I gotta introduce you.” He looked over at the masked woman and beckoned her over. She took off her mask, and even though it had been a year, Cassandra immediately recognized her.
“Holy shit,” she whispered. She hadn’t expected the Queen of Black-62 to come all the way up here herself. She’d been professional last time, but the Queen was practically royalty.
“This is Flock,” Ellis said, who seemed to be comfortably on a first-name basis with the most powerful person from the mid-fifties down. “She basically took me in when I first got here.” He looked at Tee. “We… started to get close. I want to talk about that… when we’re not, y’know, up here.” Tee nodded. They seemed to have no problem with it, smiling gently as they looked at the Queen. That attraction was clearly still there. Cassandra couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow. It was very… very Ellis to arrive in a new world and immediately -- and probably accidentally -- seduce the nearest monarch. Ellis turned to the Queen, who wore an amused little smile. “This is Tee,” he said, gesturing at Tee, who, now that the situation seemed to be defused, took a very handsome bow. “You’ve met, I think. And this,” he said, presenting Cassandra, “is the other friend I was talking about.”
Queen Flock cocked her head. “I… they don’t exactly look like how you described them, Hamilton,” the Queen said softly. Ellis laughed sheepishly.
“Yeah, turned out I had the gender wrong,” he said. Flock turned to him and raised an eyebrow. “In my defense, she got it wrong while we knew each other, too.” Cass couldn’t help but chuckle softly. The Queen turned to Cassandra.
“Interesting. Good to finally meet you then. So… not Tore,” she said. “Not Tore, not… whatever that previous name was.” The Queen extended her hand. “Call me Flock. It’s good to finally meet you.” Cassandra took the hand, hesitating slightly, starstruck but feeling a little… off.
“C-Cassandra,” she said. “Likewise.” They shared a look. It felt a little strange. She didn’t exactly get a bad feeling from Flock, but there was a sense of discomfort. Tee and Ellis seemed to like her well enough, but there seemed to be a slight barrier there for her. But for her ‘friends’ -- the quotation marks were important while she figured out her relationship to them both -- she was more than willing to try to break through it.
There was a soft groaning from behind her, and she saw Haze wake up. Several of Flock’s drones already hummed to life, but Cassandra held up her hand. “Ellis mentioned you three have some stuff to talk about.” Cass rolled her head left and right and cracked her knuckles. “I have some anxiety to work off.”
Haze’s eyes grew wide as he saw Cassandra approaching, and she could see in them that he knew he was fucked.
Aaaaaaaaaaa I honestly love this story so much
All the bursting windows that sent shards tumbling down the the city block all the way to the ground? Nevermind that. That was just my happy squeal.
And it was in that moment, that Haze knew he had done f*cked up.
y e s
Didn't Ellis know it's been about a year? Flock showed him the video.
I love this story.