Spoilers: Up to end of S2.

Warnings: Character death (of a child, implied) and general dark themes + a little language.

A/N: Betaread by the fab exbex. Includes quotes/themes from a few nursery rhymes, including paraphrased lines from the Leroy F. Jackson rhyme "Tick, tock" and the Mother Goose rhyme "The Clock" at the very end.

1 - die
2 - fuck
3 - make mistakes
4 - follow rules

3 leads to 1.
2 often leads to 3.
4 people do without realising.

There are rules for 2. Even rules for 1. There are rules about everything. It's delicious. He devours the knowledge, knows every law, knows all the niceties. He sees what is and what is not, better than most plebes. Plus, Jim has a third category, one that barely occurs to most people: what he can orchestrate into being. With a jab of a finger to the right section, he can make it so, whatever it is. He's learned every which way to achieve anything he could dream of. And he does have a startlingly vivid imagination.

Tell me a story, is the echo in his head, the blocked out words his sister said.

Oh, they break rules all the time, love to in fact, the thrill of cheating but it's all semantics – they break one set and follow another. They're so predictable that way. All he has to do is make sure they play his game instead. He lines them up: his pawns, his pieces. They're obliterated by old and weary knights, but not all. Just one needs to sneak through and become a queen.

Kitty, short for Catherine she says and he repeats it, a familiar roll on the tongue that tempts him to push the cover further, to pull the cover up around them. He's the storyteller, how does it go? Once more? No, not again, it's "Once upon a time" and when he sits on her sofa he pretends, all the things he's never done as Richard Brook and all the too pale faces he hasn't ever seen.

Jim has knights too, and bishops, and rooks. People with guns who want money, people with money who want respect and people offering him their minds loyally for whatever reason he can trudge up (on the spot is fun, winging it and winning). They trust their king, so sweet it could make his stomach coil if he didn't find it hilarious.

I'm on your side, they think, they say, they hope, they pray. Even the ones who believe him doubt it. They're on a side, just not with him. He has no side, no true investment in them, because he's a player, looking down from on high. That side is strong though, the one they think they're on; reinforced with promises, threats and preyed upon dreams, preyed upon people. Methods change, mix it up a little, but it's weakness every time. He has just the one. Changeable. Blood that feels quicksilver in his veins. There's no love inside him that stills and warms his body, he's running cold and he's running hot, an icy fever. Tick, tock. Tick, tock. Old Fox, the sinner, goes without his dinner.

He has one rule he abides by. Everything burns. He's no exception. Blood boiling, driving him, steam in the raging engine. He's no exception (she was no exception). London bridge is falling down, my fair lady. He has no connections to his past anymore. No weakness past that one. So changeable. He doesn't necessarily know himself, when the feeling comes. Opportunities he sees, but the whimsical desires dredged up from the childish part of his psyche - the portion of his childhood he left intact - surprise even him.

Tell me a story.
What about?
The future.
Do you want to know, do you really want to know?
Yes, please.
Once upon a time, there was a little girl, hair as black as soot and her brother told her 'you're gonna die one day'.
Oh. Oh, that's me! I'm in a story. But do I have to? Die, that is. Does everyone?
I think so, yes. That's what people say.
Well, when am I going to die?
No one knows.
Not even you? But you know everything. Or you should.
I hate to disappoint, missykins. We could fix that for you though, if you like.
Yes, please. I don't like surprises.
Neither do I.

Except that he does sometimes and he's always surprised at how good it feels to help out, fix a problem, solve a riddle, set the scene.

Ding, dong. The bell has rung.
What's the time?
10 o'clock
What's the time?
11 o'clock
What's the time, Mr. Wolf?
Dinnertime!

And he huffed and he puffed and blew the house down.

Jim's eternally surprised the bomb devised from household cleaning products and a cheap kids chemistry set actually worked. Going out with a bang – tragedy strikes local middle school – she, the ordinary, trusting little girl, made the headlines for once in her life, the only time she could ever have hoped to. He's sure of it. Tell me a story. Sometimes it's better when someone else does it for you.

There's a neat little clock,-
In the schoolroom it stands,-
And it points to the time
With its two little hands.

And may we, like the clock,
Keep a face clean and bright,
With hands ever ready
To do what is right.