The airplane being as empty as it was would have been a blessing had the few people who were on it not been strategically seated together. Somewhere towards the back of the plane were the few civilians who were taking the completely-unusual scenic flight from Ferox's capital to Plegia, all kept together as to not impede conversations happening towards the front. Up right behind the first-class section, taking up four seats on one side of the aisle and two on the other, the six police officers on the flight were seated, an arrangement made as to keep them together and keep any friendly interactions from being stopped by restroom-bound passengers aside from those in their own ranks.
Lamenting the fact that he'd not been given a window seat, as well as the fact that the company he'd been saddled with weren't exactly the kinds of people he'd want to be stuck on an airplane for several hours, Vaike sighed, looking across the aisle to the two Feroxi officers on the other side and watching them bickering between themselves. Had he had a relationship with any of the officers on his side of the plane that would allow for that kind of interaction, he'd gladly have been poking fun at someone. Instead, as he tried to block out the people he was sitting near, he was left thinking about the unfortunate chain of circumstances that had led to him being the third member of the Ylissean police force bound for a major conference.
Weeks beforehand, when the request for officers to attend the conference had made its way to Chrom's desk, he had two specific joiners in mind for taking the trip with him. "I don't mean to exclude anyone with this, but it's only fair that my right-hand man and my most trusted investigator get to make this trip with me," he explained at the next all-force meeting, "and I would be honored if they could take the week to come along."
Had one of them not declined the request, citing feeling like missing a week of his children's summer vacation was a disservice to them, then Vaike wouldn't have had anything to do with the conference and he could have spent the time that Chrom was there doing something more important, like trying his hand at leading the force for a few days. But Robin had no intentions of going to Plegia, and his story of how he didn't want to leave his daughters alone with their mother for the week was flimsy at best; Chrom didn't argue with it, for whatever reason, and when that denial had been made he'd immediately turned to Vaike to fill the position. "I know that we, ahem, haven't been as close as we used to be, but you're one of my most skilled officers and I trust that you'd accept the spot that Robin's left vacant at the conference…?"
"I, er, guess I can do that. Sucks that the Vaike's your backup man and wasn't one 'a your original picks, but whatever works." He hadn't wanted to accept it, not when Chrom had mentioned something that was nothing short of a sore subject even three and a half years later—time might heal all wounds but the heartbreak Vaike had experienced at the hands of Chrom's sister hadn't faded by any means. "Just as long as, y'know, she ain't gonna be there."
"There would be no reason for my sister to be around, so don't worry. The only sign of her you'll see the entire time we're in Plegia will be me, I promise." But Chrom hadn't known at the time who the Feroxi force was sending along with their high-ranking officials, and so he hadn't known that he was directly going against his own words. The only reason that Vaike was even aware of that was due to the person seated right next to him, who was currently scrolling through pictures on his phone, unaware of the fact that Vaike had turned to stare in his direction, trying to look out the window but constantly glancing at the man sitting there.
He held no ill will towards Frederick, and he never could bring himself to do that, but something about how he'd been so eager to point out that the man sitting next to Chrom in the row in front of theirs was none other than the man who'd stolen Vaike's woman from underneath him. "You are aware that Lon'qu has married Lissa, aren't you?" Frederick had asked Vaike as they were boarding the plane, not even knowing that their assigned seats were going to be right behind the man in question.
"Hadn't bothered askin' 'bout what she'd done since she left me, but that's nice t'know," he replied, gritting his teeth as he did. "Glad t'see she could run off with some other guy and marry him right away, but that's her deal, not mine." Talking about her was always going to put him in a bad mood, as was hearing anything about her, so finding out that she was not only married, but that she was married to a guy on their very same plane was a blow he hadn't wanted to ever take. Hadn't it been such a long time that they'd been together, just for her to walk out before he had a chance to propose to her? Why would she have gone off and married the next guy she got with? It just didn't make sense to him, and even with such a long flight to dwell on that information, he was sure it wasn't going to make sense.
With his eyes trying to focus on the passing clouds outside the plane window, Vaike was displeased when Frederick pulled down the plastic shade, the incoming light casting a glare on his phone that he hadn't liked. Now that he had no reason to be looking in that direction, he went back to looking across at the other Feroxi officers, a man and a woman both holding command on the same level as Chrom's. He wasn't sure how the police force worked in Ferox, but if it was anything like in Ylisse then it would have made sense for them to not share power, and if they did, why had they only brought one lower-ranking officer along with them for the conference?
"Vaike, you're ignoring my question," Chrom said, causing Vaike to shake his head and try rooting his mind in reality rather than his thoughts. Chrom had turned around in his seat, peering back at the blond man behind him with a smile. "I was trying to ask you about your ride up to the airport in Ferox. It wasn't too bad, was it?"
"Could've been worse," he replied, pursing his lips in displeasure as he thought about the alternative to the ride he had been given, that being coming up days before with Chrom for a reason he hadn't actually pieced together until he learned about who this other guy was married to. "I mean, goin' anywhere with Maribelle ain't fun, but she had t'drive her husband up anyway so me comin' along worked out."
"I heard Maribelle's name, and whatever it is, she most certainly did not mean any harm by doing it." Taking the precautions to apologize on his wife's behalf for anything she might have done, once Frederick was caught up to the question that had been posed, he took back what he'd said. "No, the ride wasn't bad at all. With any guests in the car, we manage to run a tight and nearly-silent ship."
Rolling his eyes, Vaike muttered, "Yeah, tight's a word I'd use t'describe it. Do ya know how uncomfortable it was bein' crammed in that back seat? Those damn—" He was silenced by Frederick's hand coming across the empty seat between them and covering his mouth, muffling any and all following words for a few seconds until he felt it was suitable to pull back away. "—what was that for? Do ya not like hearin' the Vaike say anythin' negative 'bout your family or somethin'?"
"That would be correct, it's hard enough having to be away from them for this conference that I will not tolerate anything bad being said about them. Why, I have honestly asked myself a time or two if coming was really worth it." Frederick brought his hand back onto his phone, opening up to his lock screen that was a picture of his dearest Maribelle, only to lock it once more. "I have nothing but the utmost faith that she'll keep everything in check while I'm gone. Especially since she's going to have Lissa with her. Those two could get in trouble, I know, but they have always been good influences on…" He looked to Vaike and how he was growing frustrated with every word, so he quickly wrapped up. "…each other."
Rather than pick an argument with the point, Vaike took the higher road and simply replied with, "Don't I know it. Your wife has done nothin' but good, ever, for that woman." And with that he was turning back away to ignore the two men he'd been talking to, not wanting to listen any further to what they had to say. He was not going to listen to anyone tell him that Maribelle and Lissa together was a good combination, as he knew it was directly Maribelle's fault that Lissa had left him in the first place, but that wasn't anything he could hold against the woman who actually tried talking to him on occasion. She might have told his then-girlfriend to leave him, but she had a reason, no matter how wrong it was, and he had long since forgiven her for it.
Thinking about those two and what had happened that Christmas three years before was enough to get his mind to start wandering to related things, more specifically the person that, as far as Maribelle had known at that time, he was cheating on Lissa with. Time had not been kind to any sort of relationship between himself and that fiery-haired, horse-loving woman, but he at least kept in close contact with Sully, even if they rarely worked together anymore and she had taken summer residence up at the very horse camp that had done his previous relationship in. She had made it very clear that she wasn't looking to make staying up there a permanent thing, but if she liked it then she might just stay after all and that would be the end of them ever seeing each other.
Why did it matter if he saw her, though? He knew she wasn't interested in trying to help him mend his still-broken heart, something he'd known from the moment he knew things were over between him and Lissa. Even if she was, at the point they were at now, he would most likely choose to go for someone who was unaffiliated with the police station. Dating Chrom's sister had been a bad idea even if they'd been together for years and years, if only because the fallout had ruined not just his relationship with her (obviously) but it had strained his relationship with Chrom as well. Going through that a second time, by dating another officer and then having something inevitably go wrong, would potentially be a death knell to his job that he needed to avoid.
He'd gotten lucky that he'd done nothing wrong in the situation with Lissa, because had he been the one messing up he was sure he'd have already been fired for that. He couldn't risk doing anything to damage his position further. "Are you trying to ignore all of us still, or are you going to communicate like a polite person?" Chrom asked, getting a glare in response. "O-kay, looks like it's the first one. Listen, if you had a problem with being part of this, you could have said something and I would have found someone else. There's a list of people who would love to be in your shoes right now."
"My shoes, huh?" Vaike looked down at his feet and, completely missing the point of what Chrom had just said, slid his shoes off and kicked them underneath the seat in front of him. "Now if they wanna be in 'em, they can go right on ahead."
"That's not what I meant, but okay." He turned back for a second, before standing up and walking the one row behind him to stand beside Vaike, using his height and ability to block any exit to his advantage. "Lon'qu just happens to be asleep right now, figured you'd want to talk while I wasn't working on entertaining him. Was I wrong to assume that?"
"You were wrong when ya assumed I'd wanna be on the same plane as that guy." Looking for a way to get out of interacting with Chrom, Vaike looked to the man in the window seat on his row of chairs and grinned. "Say, Frederick, y'wanna talk t'me real quick? Teach ol' Chrom here a lesson?"
Frederick shook his head, his eyes locking with Chrom's as the blue-haired man made the exact same head motions. "I want to play no part in your ignoring our chief, no matter how much you don't want to talk to him. Leave me out of this."
"Figures you're on his side and not mine." Sighing dramatically, Vaike rolled his entire head to look at Chrom through the corners of his eyes. "What do ya want from me, and how much talkin' to ya does Teach here have t'do t'get you off my back?"
"I just want to talk to you, seeing as we'll be rooming together for the duration of the conference and we need to be on good terms. You were fine when I saw you last at the station, what changed between now and then?" There were several answers that Vaike could have given, the most obvious being the presence of Lon'qu and the news that he was married to Lissa, but instead of saying anything he merely shrugged. "I figured you wouldn't give me an answer. Look, I didn't know Lon'qu was coming until I saw him the other day. I was told it was just going to be the co-chiefs Basilio and Flavia," he motioned to the two dark-skinned people still bickering in the seats across the aisle, "but then I guess one of them decided they wanted their right-hand officer with them, just like I decided I wanted two of mine."
"Of all the guys, though, it had t'be your brother-in-law?" Vaike spat those words as if they pained him to say, which they honestly did; for the longest time he'd figured that he'd get to be the one earning that title someday, but now knowing who had won it in the end was making it worse. "Couldn't they have picked, I dunno, someone not in your family?"
"H-how did you find out that they got married?" Cue Frederick giving a small wave, admitting his guilt in that revelation, and Chrom sighed at the news. "That wasn't anything I wanted you knowing, I'm aware how much Lissa still means to you, and I didn't want you hating Lon'qu because of that."
"Too late, that guy ain't gettin' any good thoughts from the Vaike for as long as I live." Vaike's eyes shifted towards the row of seats in front of him, a head of black hair visible over the headrest of that row's window seat. "Just look at 'im, unaware that I'm back here hatin' him for everythin' he's got."
Chrom winced at the declaration, correcting Vaike with, "No, he knows that you'd end up being the one hating him if anyone ever did. He was well-aware of who you were from the moment you stepped onto this plane, without any of my input. He is married to someone who you once meant the world to, after all."
"Oh I know that he is, stealin' my place in her heart and all that." He closed his eyes and leaned forward, letting his head rest against the seat in front of him. "Just…leave me alone for a minute or two, Chrom. I ain't in the mood t'be dealin' with this." Chrom typically wasn't one to let his officers be upset like Vaike currently was, but he respected that he needed to give a little bit of space for the moment, so he took his seat once more and let the blond sit there, head propped up by the chair in front of him. He might have dozed off for a little bit, although if he had then his thoughts were nothing but vibrant and vivid, images of times gone by crossing his mind and doing nothing to calm his bad mood.
When he sat back up straight, the atmosphere on the plane had changed, the sun outside beginning to set way out on the horizon and sending a much softer light into the cabin. "I see you're back awake," Frederick said, a smile on his typically-stern face. "Please tell me that you're in a much more pleasant mood now after your nap. You were a lot testier than normal beforehand, something I don't think I can credit to the ride we had into Ferox."
"You're right, it's nothing to do with the ride we had. Beautiful ride, what a shame it was t'get me on this plane I've got no business bein' on." Grumbling, Vaike added, "Would've been nicer if it was like the last time I went t'Ferox. At least then I was around someone who actually enjoyed my existence."
"Are you saying I don't enjoy you?" Sounding offended, Frederick turned to his phone and shuffled through some of the pictures on it, ending up turning it to show Vaike the one currently on the screen, which was one of the two of them at some work event. "If I didn't, do you think I would still keep this handy, years later? Do you even remember that night? Despite Chrom's best intentions someone still brought some drinks into the party and you, as I'm sure you know, decided to challenge several others to drinking contests, all of which you won with ease."
"Doesn't ring any bells no." As he looked closer at the picture, trying to place the spoken events to the image to no avail, Vaike couldn't help but overhear part of the conversation taking place in the row ahead of them. He tried his best to focus on the picture and not on whatever it was Chrom was saying to the man sitting next to him, but there was no paying attention to an image he was clearly drunk in when he heard Chrom mention something about his sister. "Er, why don'tcha keep tellin' me 'bout that night, in case it just takes a bit 'a remindin' to get the Vaike to remember it?"
Always quick to help a friend, Frederick started on the best recounting of that particular station party he could manage, while Vaike turned his attention entirely to what was going on in front of him. "So, correct me if I'm understanding this wrong, but you volunteered to come along with your commander for the conference? Even though, you know, you would be much more useful at home?"
"That is correct." The voice belonging to that other man made Vaike angry just to hear it, and little did he know but he was only going to get angrier with every word that Lon'qu said following that. "I assumed that Lissa would much enjoy Maribelle's companionship, and spending time with two ladies, even given the circumstances, would not bode well for me. If it were Olivia or someone else I am close with, perhaps I would have chosen to stay home, but this way it works out for all of us the way it should."
"Yeah, but I don't think you're quite understanding how bad of an idea that might be. I know my sister, I know she doesn't take too well to being left behind." If Vaike could have seen Chrom's face as he spoke, he would have seen the way he was looking wistful, as if he was trying to recount a story from winters past without getting into the details. "But I also know you've got that weird thing with women, and as far as I know, you and Maribelle have never gotten along, so maybe you are right and you coming along with Basilio was best."
"I am fully aware that what I've done is best. Lissa knows how to handle things without me, and with her best friend by her side she'll manage perfectly fine." There was some shuffling in that row of seats, as Lon'qu repositioned himself while Chrom slid over into the once-empty seat that rest between them. "Er, Chrom, what is the reason for you coming closer?"
"You're going to have to get used to this, being married to my sister and whatnot. Start talking, I need to know all that I can about how you treat her and how you've handled the, for lack of a better term, circumstances you two have surrounding you." It was clear that Chrom was dancing around some point that he didn't want Vaike hearing, as if he knew that he was being listened to. "Now get to talking, we shouldn't have too much longer on this flight and I don't know when we'll get another chance to speak like this."
"Spying on Chrom's talk with Lon'qu, are you now?" His voice not much louder than a whisper, it was hard to hear that Frederick had said anything over the constant roar the airplane had going for it, but when coupled with how he was trying to shove his phone's screen, still on that holiday party picture, into Vaike's face, it was even harder to ignore him. When he got a curt nod in response, he thought for a second before giving the best diversion he could manage: "Don't bother with listening in, whatever's being said is probably uninteresting or only going to sour your mood further. We can't be getting into Plegia with one of us in a bad mood."
Vaike, gripping the side of his seat to keep from lunging forward to try and listen in anyway, pointed a finger at Frederick and gave it a shake. "You're right, can't be lettin' whatever it is they're discussin' get t'me. What happened happened and I've just gotta move on. What kinda guy wastes three and a half years 'a his time lustin' over some girl who left him for no reason at all? Not this guy, that's for sure!" His awkward laugh, combined with the fact that the person he was talking to knew all-too-well that he was lying through his teeth, was not reassuring even slightly, but it had to be accepted. "C'mon, let's just get through the rest 'a this flight without me gettin' involved in their nonsense. Got any more pictures the Vaike was probably drinkin' in?"
"I'm sure I have a handful of them, knowing the frequency of alcohol being smuggled into parties at the station." Bringing his phone back to him so he could find a suitable image, Frederick actually froze when searching for a second, breaking from his normally stern and professional personality to let a string of curses out under his breath, before acting like nothing weird had happened. When Vaike questioned him about it, he merely explained, "It seems that when I last went through my pictures, I neglected to delete a few that Maribelle must have accidentally saved while using my phone. Images you don't need to see, at that."
"Well either they're nude-y pics, or they're involvin' a certain woman I ain't askin' to see, so thanks for clearin' those outta the way." Already flushing at the idea that he'd have anything of an adult nature on his phone, Frederick chuckled at the second suggestion, which was basically confirming it to Vaike as the correct answer. "I'd definitely rather see a couple choice shots 'a your wife before seein' that woman's face again, after what she did."
"Could you please refrain from speaking about Maribelle like that? She would never, and I do mean never, take any pictures of that sort of herself." His face still alight with color, he continued removing images until he felt he'd caught all of the offensive ones, handing his phone across the empty seat between them so that Vaike could hold it and look at his leisure. "There, I've taken care to make sure the work folder on there is entirely work-related pictures, there should be a few fitting the bill of what you'd requested."
He thanked his friend as he took the phone into his own hand, a sick curiosity taking over him as he flipped through the pictures and saw that he hadn't been lied to about there being drunk pictures of himself on there. But what had pictures of Lissa been doing in a folder dedicated to pictures at the station, when she hadn't been there in years? He must not have been lying when he said Maribelle had just saved images wherever she had felt necessary, because the oldest picture in the collection was from the holiday party two years before and Lissa most definitely had not been around then. "Say, why d'ya keep all these on your phone? Don't ya have somethin' safer t'keep 'em on?"
"It's complicated, but I have backups upon backups of everything on that phone. While I would never let any child get their hands on it, and therefore it shouldn't ever be in danger, you can never be too safe, and after having to replace my computer at home twice this year already…everything on my phone that stays with me at almost all times is best." Reaching back for the phone because he thought Vaike was done looking through it, Frederick pulled his hand away when he got waved off. "You best not break that, I've done the best job I can keeping it in pristine condition, even with a constant fear that a child will grab hold of it and do whatever he wishes."
"Must be a hard job, bein' a dad and all that." Although he knew he shouldn't, Vaike was beginning to back out of the specific folder he'd been given to search for other pictures on the phone, his curiosity getting the better of him. "Not like I'd know what it's like t'have a kid or anythin', y'know, since my last girlfriend wanted none 'a that and then left me."
A panic flared in Frederick's eyes and he started grabbing for his phone, Vaike leaning further away to keep it in his possession. "I think you've had enough time with that," he said, fearing that he knew what his fellow officer was doing. "Just because I cleared out all pictures of her from that one folder doesn't mean there aren't others on there still. For the sake of your stress level, please give that back!" He was beginning to lean into that empty seat, making it harder for Vaike to keep the phone away from him, especially when the voice came over the plane's intercom informing them that they were about to start descending into the Plegian capital city, and that everyone needed to return to their seats and be securely fastened in with their seatbelts.
Who would have figured that the impending landing would put an end to the game of keep-away, a game that ruined any and all chances of Vaike getting to see what else might have been on that phone. He had to sit there, not knowing what was being hidden from him, while the plane came down fast onto the desert runway at the Plegian airport, his life flashing before his eyes as they landed because of how hard their impact was. Once they were at the gate he, and all the other officers, got off the plane and grabbed their luggage, heading from the airport to the hotel they'd be calling home for almost the next week.
Somewhere along the way, they'd gotten separated from the Feroxi delegation and it was just the three Ylissean men on the trip, none of them talking to one another for various reasons. Chrom was too deep in thought, something Lon'qu had said to him keeping his mind occupied; Frederick was too busy trying to get a call through to Maribelle to let her know they'd made it safely, but his service wasn't working; and Vaike was too relieved to not be anywhere near Lon'qu anymore to voice anything aside from comments stating his pleasure with that separation. Upon arriving to the hotel and checking in, the only thing that any of them said to one another, aside from staking their claim on the beds in their room, was a quick statement from Chrom to the other two about what they needed to do. "Other officers should be staying here too, perhaps after we get settled in we can go down to the lobby and attempt to make friends with them."
He was promptly ignored by his companions, which didn't stop him from going out to the lobby on his own. As he left, Vaike was sitting on the bed he'd claimed, the one closest to the window so that he could look outside at the desert wasteland they were currently in. In the background, he could hear Frederick still trying to get a call to go through on his phone, his occasional exclamations in frustration the only real disruptions from him thinking about what had happened on the plane. All he really knew was that he now knew who to blame for his last girlfriend leaving him, and that everyone he considered a close friend must have known about that whole relationship.
Or, at least, the good majority of close friends would have known. He knew some of his officer friends would have heard about it through the typical work gossip chain, and they wouldn't have told him because there was no reason to, but there was one person he had enough faith in to believe that had she been told, she would have come straight to tell him. In that very moment, sitting on the bed in Plegia knowing that he was stuck with other officers for work reasons, his mind went back to the last time he'd been trapped somewhere with someone he worked with—and in that moment he realized just how much he'd have preferred being stuck in a snowy cabin to what he was going to have to do.
At least that time in the cabin had been only him and someone he could stand to be around, even if that tolerance had been ignored the entire time they'd be together because he was so busy thinking about who he'd been accidentally separated from. What would have happened had he not been so wrapped up on getting to go home to see his girlfriend, he wondered, because his entire stay up at that cabin had been focused on staying loyal to someone who had quickly moved on from him under the idea that he wasn't being loyal at all. And to think, the person he had been with up there had wanted, and still wanted, nothing more from him than a friendship. But even still, being stuck anywhere with Sully would be better than being at a convention for officers with the older brother of his last girlfriend and said brother's best friend, who happened to be married to said last girlfriend's best friend.
Not to mention, of course, the fact that said girlfriend's husband was there with them too. Vaike must have groaned loudly or something as he was thinking about that deep web of connections that he wanted no part of, because Frederick came into his room from the other connected bedroom, his phone still against his ear but saying nothing into it. "Is everything okay in here? You sound rather frustrated about something, and as long as I can't get through to Maribelle I suppose I could talk things out with you."
"Can't get through t'her? Your end or hers?" Thanks to what he'd been thinking about, he was stuck in the mindset of a lover ignoring all phone calls from the person trying to make contact with her, his eyebrows furrowing at the memories. When Frederick didn't tell him anything, merely giving a one-shoulder shrug at the question, he gave a dramatic exhale and fell backwards onto his bed. "Then I doubt ya wanna be talkin' t'me about anything, in case she picks up and overhears what I've got t'say."
"I'm assuming what's weighing on your mind has to do with Lissa then, doesn't it?" Taking a seat right next to where Vaike was laying, Frederick set his phone on his lap and ended all traces of the calls he'd been trying to make.
"A guy goes years without tryin' t'think about her, just for everything to start bringin' her back into everything all at once. But why bother talkin' about this with me, y'need to get through t'your lady before something bad happens on her end." It wasn't that Vaike didn't want to talk about what was bothering him, but rather that he didn't want to stop someone from checking in on who mattered to them just to try and make him feel better. "I'll deal with this on my own, ain't nothin' that ol' Vaike can't handle."
"No, if Maribelle had any intentions of answering my call she would have already. I'll just assume her and Lissa have gotten into Ylisstol and have chosen to do something with their night that involves having a phone shut off." Giving a small smile over at Vaike, Frederick stretched his arms out, letting both of his shoulders tense and relax for a moment before he stood up, walking to the window and looking out at its desert view. "What a desolate town we've found ourselves in. How people could stand to live here, I don't think I'll ever understand. We're lucky to be from where we are."
Sitting back up so that he could resume looking out of the window, Vaike took in a deep breath and sighed. "I guess ya could say we're lucky, yeah. Anywhere's better than this place." He'd never set foot in Plegia before that day, and his only impressions of it were the views they'd seen on their way to the hotel and what he was looking at through the window, but due to all that had happened already to toy with his emotions, he was sure this place was simply the worst. "And anywhere'd be better than havin' t'go downstairs and see Chrom and that Lon'qu guy talkin' and bein' brothers and all that."
"I can understand why you wouldn't want to be present for that, but I believe that Chrom has the courtesy to not do that sort of thing in front of you. He does know how much that loss still eats at you, after all." Giving one last look out the window, Frederick turned to face Vaike again, still smiling but with more sadness involved than anything else. "How about this, we clean up and head down there now, as to not raise suspicion that anything is amiss."
"Sounds like you're tryin' to get your own mind off'a somethin' that's buggin' ya, but a plan's a plan and there ain't anything wrong with it." Vaike stood up, straightening the collar of his shirt that had gotten ruffled while he'd been laying down. "Consider me cleaned up and ready t'get down there and interactin' with new faces, hopefully."
Having watched the simple display of straightening the collar, Frederick held his tongue upon any other corrections Vaike needed to make about his appearance (most notably about how his shirt had come untucked at some point and his hair was a downright disaster). "I'm sure you'll make a good first impression on anyone we might meet today. They'll consider you charming, just like the rest of us do, and who knows, maybe you'll meet your one true soulmate while we're here."
"No thanks, don't wanna be gettin' involved in that whole love and romance thing with anyone on the first day. Or the second day. Or however many days it is we're gonna be here." Vaike was already heading for the door, making sure to grab one of the key cards for re-entry in case he decided to come back to the room by himself. Following his lead, Frederick did the exact same, and once the two were in the hallway with the door latched tightly behind them, the plan had been, as stated, to go downstairs and start socializing.
But a loud cackle from down the hall sent shivers down Frederick's spine, prompting him to grab Vaike's arm and start pulling him towards the nearest staircase. "Gods, of all the people we could have encountered here, I think there's someone I would rather never have to lock eyes with again," he explained, opening the door to the stairs bound for the lobby and ducking inside the stairwell, Vaike pulling his arm away and looking at him like he was crazy for how panicked a simple laugh had made him. "It's a story I'm quite surprised you haven't heard before."
"You're talkin' 'bout not wantin' to meet people here, and the Vaike ain't exactly the guy you should be tellin' that to. Don'tcha think there's someone here I don't wanna have to lock eyes with?" Before he could get an answer, the laughter grew louder back up in the hallway, Frederick quickly starting descending the stairs without another word. "Ugh, whatever, you're gonna let this all be a mystery t'me, aren't ya?"
"I'll explain it once I know he's nowhere to be found, now come on!" Already halfway down the stairs, Frederick waited for Vaike to come join him before continuing down the rest of the staircase, the door at the bottom marked as an entrance into the hotel's lobby. Audible on the other side of the door was the roar of multiple conversations happening at once, and with that as the backdrop Frederick decided then to give the explanation he'd skimped out on before. "That winter when you were trapped at the cabin, we played host to a couple of Plegian officers who were trying to find their way out of their current positions. Never in my wildest dreams did I assume that one of them would be here at this convention, but that laugh is unmistakable."
"Are you still in here?" a voice tinged with laughter called out from the floor above, someone else having come into the stairwell. "Come on, if it's really who I think it is I just want to ask about something!"
"He sounds friendly," Vaike said, looking at Frederick as his brown-haired companion was going wide-eyed and backing towards the door to the lobby. "Give 'im the time 'a day and let 'im ask his question. It can't be that bad."
"You don't understand what kind of man he is, nor do you understand what happened when he was stuck at the station with us that evening…" Footsteps were coming down the stairs, the laughter coming along with them, and with every step made Frederick inched closer to the door behind him, readying himself to make a run for it. But when he tried opening the door, he found it to be unable to be opened, someone pushing up against it on the other side to keep them in place. "No, please, move so I can get out," he muttered to himself, peering through the small window to see the back of a dark head of hair that belonged to whoever was keeping the door closed.
From up on the stair landing, the voice loudly said to someone listening in through some manner, "I've got him cornered now! Thanks for helping me out with this, Tharja, it's going to be so great to get to see an old friend again!"
"Tharja…" The name fell from Frederick's mouth as he started to scowl, shaking on the door to try and disturb the woman holding it shut. She turned and looked, in surprise, at who was glaring at her through the window, giving him a small wave as she watched someone come up behind him, an over-eager look on his face. The second a finger landed on Frederick, he lost all anger towards the person on the other side of the door and turned to give the person who had followed them down a piece of his mind, but when he was greeted with a grinning face and squinted-closed eyes, his anger ebbed. "It's, ahem, been a while since we last spoke, hasn't it been, Henry?"
"Sure has! Why, I remember it like it was just yesterday, coming up to that door and asking that all-important question, which I never even got an answer to!" Laughing like he was losing his mind, Henry doubled over with the force of his laughter, taking a moment to collect himself, much to Frederick's obvious displeasure. "Say, how's that wife of yours doing anyway? I've tried sending letters to your station addressed to her, but I've never gotten a response on a single one! I've just got to know about, well, you know. The baby thing."
Taking in a deep breath and holding it for as long as he could while he thought about everything he'd just heard, Frederick gave a quick "this is why we hid" look to Vaike, who was watching this strange guy with suspicion in his eyes, before exhaling and pulling his phone from his pocket. "Whoever gets our mail must have been withholding letters from you, I've never seen one in my life," he replied, flipping through folders of pictures on his phone before settling on the perfect one, which he opened and handed the phone over to Henry. "But if children are what you're asking about, I suppose I could show you."
"Aw yeah, I love babies! They're so cute to hold, and cuddle, and you're lucky to have had two of them, I can't wait until I get to even have one!" With every picture he looked through, Henry was growing more and more thrilled to have gotten the opportunity he now had, but he abruptly stopped scanning through the pictures and looked to Vaike, giving a one-handed gesture in his direction. "Say, who's this guy? I don't remember him being there that night when I totally called things. New recruit or what?"
"Name's Vaike, I ain't a new recruit, ya must've been there when I was trapped up in a cabin for a week." Giving a wave of his own, Vaike tried to get a glimpse of what picture Henry had landed on to distract him from looking, but all he saw was a darkened screen. "So what's all this 'bout babies and you callin' things?" No one's bothered tellin' the Vaike a damn thing about any 'a this."
"Vaike, that's not the kind of—"
"No one's told you? Oh man, I'll enlighten you real quick! So there we were, me and Tharja, who, by the way, is my police partner and best friend of all time, but there we were, stuck in Ylisstol on Christmas Eve, going to the holiday party at the police station for a few hours before our flight was supposed to leave, when all of a sudden, bam! Instant snowstorm that trapped us all there!" Henry was speaking with glee in his voice, his hands overly energetic and constantly almost about to throw the phone he was holding to the side.
"—no seriously, you can stop the story right there." Not taking lightly to having been cut off, Frederick held his hand out as if he was expecting to get his phone back, but Henry kept it in his possession. "Now give that back before—"
"So anyway, there we were, now stuck in Ylisstol's police station with all these officers having a good time! It was chaos! People were sad they were going to be missing Christmas morning! And," Henry grinned, nudging a shoulder in Frederick's direction, "this big guy right here, him and his wife decided to sneak off and, for lack of a delicate way to say this, make themselves a new baby!"
"Hold on, since when was that kid made there in the station? Thought you said that you'd never get caught doin' anythin' against the rules like that." Vaike was enjoying watching how excited Henry was to have been telling the story, as well as watching how mortified Frederick was to be hearing it told. "C'mon, what happened t'my friend who's all about followin' rules and not breakin' 'em?"
"It was a…complicated situation. I would rather not elaborate on it, thank you." Once again gesturing to be given his phone back, Frederick was greeted with Henry holding it up closer to his face to look at a few more pictures. "And you have had enough time seeing my sons, please give the phone back before I take it from you."
If Henry had heard what threat had been made, he was clearly ignoring it, because he was still focused on seeing all that he could. "Whoa, so this is what happened to that other girl? What was her name? Does her name even matter? She's gotten—okay I hear you, I'm done looking now!" Frederick's loud shushing must have been harder to ignore than any threats, and it was after getting Henry to stop mid-sentence that he was given his phone back, the screen still lit up with a picture for a few seconds before Frederick shut it off. And in that few seconds, Vaike in his interest in who, exactly, Henry was talking about with those questions glanced over and saw something he couldn't quite explain to himself.
Before he could ask for any sort of clarification on the picture, the door behind him and Frederick opened up, the dark-haired woman that had been blocking it sinisterly laughing as she opened their way into the lobby. "My apologies, I must not have realized someone aside from Henry was in there," she said, clearly lying as she'd made eye contact with Frederick long before Henry had even gotten down the stairs. "Call this a payback for not bringing my soulmate along with you."
"Uh, who's this chick's soulmate?" It wasn't the question he had wanted to ask, but it was the one that made its way out of Vaike's mouth towards Frederick, but the other man was too busy pushing past the woman trying to get away from Henry to listen. So, rather than drop that subject too, he looked at the woman and posed his question to her instead. "Didn't mean t'overhear what ya just said to my friend there, but who's your soulmate and how's he supposed t'bring him for ya?"
"You're the man Chrom says replaced him on this trip." Whoever this woman was, she was make it clear that she knew the Ylissean forces as well as Henry did, and using that information plus that time Frederick had muttered a name at her through the window, Vaike was able to assume this was that Tharja lady, the other visitor of sorts on that holiday he missed. "Why would you replace my Robin? He belongs with me, and he's due for a visit here to lovely Plegia."
Blinking twice, Vaike attempted to make sense of what he'd just heard. "Don't know if you know this, lady, but my pal Robin's married and got two kids, he can't be anyone's soulmate but his wife's. Why's he 'due for a visit' t'this place, anyway? Ain't like he cares about anything out here, since his family's not here."
"Ha, you're wrong!" Henry interjected from behind them, bursting into laugher. "I like this guy, acting so big and mighty but being so, so wrong! I wish he'd been there for that party, he'd have made it all sorts of fun!"
"Silence, Henry. He might be wrong but it's obvious that he's just…mis-educated. However, this isn't the time to correct his ignorance, not when there's plenty of time for us to do that later, given who all might be here. Yes…," Tharja, in all her off-putting glory, placed her hands together in front of her mouth and cackled, "I have a feeling that we'll have a lot of fun with you here, Vaike."
"Hey, wait a sec, I didn't tell ya my name, did I?" He was not answered, Tharja stepping away and Henry following behind her, his chuckles carrying through the groups of people gathered there in the lobby. Without them around, and with Frederick having gone off already to find Chrom, he was standing alone while surrounded by hundreds of strangers all getting to know one another, a position he did not want to be in at that moment. The doorway to the stairs was just steps away, he could always just duck back into the stairwell and head up to the room, socializing be damned.
Hiding to try and make sense of all the things he was finding out wasn't the most logical option at that moment, though; that title would belong to finding Chrom and letting him know where he was before he did anything. He gave a quick look around the lobby, arching up onto his toes to try and look over everyone's heads, but there was no sight of the blue hair that he was so accustomed to looking for, and there was no way he'd be able to pick Frederick's head out of the crowd, so many other having similar hair to his. This trip was already a disaster and it had barely started, so maybe going back to the room was the best idea after all, an idea he decided to act on by turning back towards the door.
"Where do you think you're going?" The voice wasn't one Vaike had been hoping to hear, nor was it the voice of anyone he was going to stop and talk to, leading him to step ever closer back towards the stairs. "No, do not go back up there. I was sent to get you by your chief, he wanted to make sure a terrible fate hadn't befallen you."
"Ya can talk like ya care all ya want, but I doubt Chrom's stupid enough t'send you of all people to come get me." Mentally pulling his hair out in frustration at having to actually talk to Lon'qu, Vaike fully expected to be left alone after that. When a hand latched onto his shoulder and pulled him backwards with a lot more force than he thought possible, he realized he had been mistaken. "Get your filthy hand off 'a me, ya woman-stealer. I don't want anythin' to do with you so just leave me alone!"
"I have a name that is much more appropriate than 'woman-stealer' and I would appreciate you learning it as we shall be spending a lot of time together at this conference," Lon'qu scolded, letting go of Vaike's shoulder just long enough for the blond to try getting away again. Once he'd pulled him back a second time, he continued, "And I expect you to tell Chrom exactly what you said regarding him being stupid when we get over to him, because yes, he did send me of all people to come get you."
"C'mon, you're kiddin' me, he wouldn't have." It was a belief that Vaike held onto until he and Lon'qu both were standing in Chrom's presence, him explaining his reasoning for picking Lon'qu to go find the wayward officer. Apparently, once it was spelled out that sending someone with a high ranking made more sense than having a chief of police walking through a crowd containing his equals, it was a lot easier to believe, but it didn't take away from the fact that sending Lon'qu had been asking for trouble had Vaike felt like getting into it. "Okay, but here's an idea, Chrom: next time ya need t'find me, send Frederick instead. Y'know I can stand him. I can't stand that, gah, brother-in-law you've got there."
"I'm proud of you for using the correct term," Chrom said, not paying attention to how Vaike was grimacing at having used it, "but you've got to learn to get along with him. I'm not saying it will happen, but who knows? Maybe he'll be becoming a temporary part of our department here in the near future."
"And why would that happen? He's got a job in Ferox, ain't that good enough for him?" Watching as Chrom's eyes shifted downward, trying to avoid having to answer what had just been asked, Vaike let his mind wander back to what he'd seen on Frederick's phone screen there in the stairwell, the picture that Henry had been criticizing. "Hold on a minute, you all ain't tellin' me somethin' here. There's somethin' that's goin' on you're trying to shield me from, ain't there?"
He looked over at where Lon'qu and Frederick had started having a conversation, acting like they were close friends discussing current events in their lives, before turning back to Chrom, who was now staring down at the floor, kicking at one of the tiles he was standing on. "I won't say that there is, but I won't say that there isn't either. What it might be is something that doesn't concern you, though."
The sinking feeling deep inside of Vaike's body was telling him that he knew just enough to piece together what this secret news was, but he didn't want to accept it. He couldn't bring himself to accept it. It was still hard enough, three and a half years later, to accept that she'd left him like she had, but to accept all these new developments? Almost anything would be easier than doing that! "If it doesn't concern me," he finally said, picking his words carefully, "then I hope ya never make me interact with that woman-stealin', life-ruinin' asshole that she's with again. Ever."
"That's not an exchange I can make and you know it, Vaike." He did know it, but he didn't want to accept that, either. This conference was shaping up to be a lot worse than initially expected, at this rate, and it all came back to relating to the events of the last time he'd been away from home for more than an overnight. How much influence could one week in a cabin really have on the years following it?
A/N: AAAAAAAAA IT'S FINALLY TIME. OPERATION "SDN" BEGINS.
Basically here's not even the first day's worth of words from my NaNo project this year, posting as the first chapter of my sequel from my NaNo fic last year. Yes my plan is to post the entire thing this month. It's going to be one wild ride.