Longer chapter hereeeee. I'm catching up in writing so pre-written updates are still there for me to depend, soon I'll be there! We're still on schedule so far, right?
TriceTokushu: Ey, you're not that far off about Cozzie Boy. Won't say what though but he's definitely getting his head in a twist. And yeah, Sage is a real one for life.
DoggyPocky: Ya, Cosmo could have ran into worse. But, it definitely isn't going to do good for him. Wanda and Sage's conversation is actually a bit important, but I'm not gonna say why just yet! And don't worry, I understood your English :)
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Calico read another headline of a newspaper. The demands were increasing rapidly that H.P. is to be put to a stop. It was frustrating, really. Calico was trying to do his job with the best he had but it's not like he could communicate this publicly without getting H.P.'s team to know. Although these fairy protests were targeted towards the academy, council, and military, few have sought out Calico in knowing of the agency he worked for. He'd been surprised that neither the council nor academy sent a request that their agency, Calico's team specifically, bring a stop to this immediately. The protests were becoming more demanding the more H.P.'s numbers went up. The more humans paid the insufferable price.
Calico flattened the newspaper against the booth table. A diner worker came around with a coffee pot.
"Need another?" He asked.
Looking up with his fists folded in front of him, Calico nodded. "Yes, thank you."
The waiter let out a small huff in filling his mug. "You're gonna be staring at that newspaper all night I should guess?"
"I'm expecting two others shortly." Calico said.
The waiter floated back to where he was situated behind the counter.
It was a sketchy neighborhood, to say the least. But Calico chose to be secluded despite trying to pick things up again after remaining in hiding for a while now. Even if that meant sitting at the first restaurant that came into sight at nearly one in the morning and contemplating what to do before Laz and Flo met up with him.
A few centuries or so back is when things started to get a little heated with H.P. and his team. Calico had dealt with them before but was never formally introduced to H.P. until he started working exclusively against them. They always managed to find their way back somehow, and since then it was neverending. In very recent years Calico had to come to terms to meet with H.P. and discuss the formal issue of their contracts in a conference room where they could hash things out like civil people. Knowing H.P. would only agree to disagree and nothing more, Calico felt as though he almost had no choice but to act upon it.
Yes, he stole. But because Calico was an operative it was an act of espionage under his badge. The things H.P. and Sanderson have done were far too harmful and destructive, and never had they been accounted for. What Calico didn't seem to understand though was just how he could exploit the information he found without seeming like the fraud himself. As long as their names weren't signed under it, he didn't see how he could.
Time was running out, and he was stuck.
With his head facing down towards the contents of the newspaper, a buzzing from the right of his coffee mug ensued. His eyes left the headlines to his vibrating phone, and with a long sigh, he reached for it and pressed answer.
"This is Calico," he said indolently.
"You have some explaining to do!"
The green fairy retracted the phone from his ear with a wince. Even in thousands of years, the shrill voice was no stranger to him. But did he sure hope that his senses were wrong from hearing it.
He rubbed his ringing ear. "I'm sorry, this is-"
"Your wife you ran out on?"
Oh, lord. He'd much rather deal with an anti-fairy right now.
"I believe it's my ex-wife that kicked me out." Calico corrected.
"I haven't missed talking to you."
He nearly rolled his eyes.
"You wanna tell me why you're calling me?" Calico got straight to the point, running a hand along his burning temple. There was too much else to deal with right now, and adding a conversation with an ill reminder of his past wasn't helping the case.
"Well, you should know already. You got that orange-haired witch to do it, didn't you?"
"Please leave Magna out of this." Calico demanded sternly. "Look if this is about the pixies, I'm doing what I can right now."
"Oh yes, as made clear by the dozens of protests." Mama Cosma remarked sarcastically.
"And now you're concerned."
"I could care less!" She retorted. "I wanna know what gives you the right!"
He sighed. "The right of..?"
"Don't play this game with me, Calico."
"The right of interfering with H.P.'s plans?" The green fairy guessed. "You of many people should know he doesn't back down so easily. Especially with everything I've ever complained about involving him in the past."
"You mean ALL you complained about. And it seems like you haven't changed."
Calico grunted under his breath. "I really don't have time for any of this. So unless you tell me what's wrong, I'm gonna hang up."
"I was doing perfectly fine until all this nonsense started." Mama Cosma went on. "I worked my mitts off to make a comfortable life for myself without either of you. But as soon as he shows up on my doorstep again, I'm suddenly blamed as the bad guy when I deserve no such criticism."
"Who?"
"Your son, you clown! He showed up after all these years of ignoring me, asking about YOU!"
The words lingered on for a second or so as if unheard properly. Until everything in Calico's mind came to a screeching halt. Reaching his free hand out to grasp the table, he blinked across the way in a near-daze.
His son?
"Cosmo..?" He asked.
"Who else?" Mama Cosma spat. "He's avoided me for the past nine thousand years, and if he wants it like that, I've wanted nothing to do with him otherwise! Then all this nonsense comes up and he finally reaches out just to get information on you! He clearly doesn't care for me enough to be a part of his life!"
Surprise, surprise. Calico nearly would've said so, but he did not need to anger Mama Cosma anymore than she already was. And certainly not over anything that had to do with a child of his he'd never gotten the chance to have a relationship with.
"Why would he be asking for me?" Was all Calico could say in a whisper.
"That's what I should be asking you. What could you have possibly done to get him to come and blame me so cruelly?"
Calico felt like he'd been hit in the head with a hammer, as nothing but confusion rang. But he still chose to remain cautious in knowing what happened the last time he had come close to something that had to do with his son. And how that state of depression nearly killed him.
"You told me he didn't want anything to do with me." Calico spoke in a ragged breath. The reminder already causing him a forgotten pain in his chest. "I haven't tried to come near him, I swear. I don't even know where he is nowadays."
Clearly aside from ignoring his overly crazy mother.
"That doesn't explain anything."
"Well, it doesn't for me either." He said. "Why would he be asking for me if..?"
The obvious reason clouded over him.
"Oh for the love of all that's good.."
"What?"
"Did you lie? AGAIN?"
"I don't see what you're getting at!"
"When I came to see our son!" Calico suddenly snapped. "That was centuries ago! It hadn't even been true, had it?"
He could hear the hesitance in her breathing on the other end, as she stuttered for words. "I did what I wanted for my son!"
"But not what he deserves! How many errors will it take you to see that you hurt everyone close to you?"
She hung up, and Calico retracted the phone from his ear as he stared at it in shock.
The diner entrance swung open just as two others entered from the darkness of the midnight sky outside. Coming to a halt and only looking around once before their attention was caught to their long left where Calico remained at the furthest booth. Shrugging her trench coat over her shoulders, Flo floated over with Laz in following.
"Could've picked a weirder spot, I suppose." She joked in approaching Calico. The green fairy's head arched up with a startlingly pale complexion and wide eyes. Laz and Flo stared back in return.
"What is it, Cal? Is it H.P.? Did he call?"
Calico stood frozen in trying to ease his heavy pounding heart. He hadn't felt this way since forever and certainly couldn't afford to now. There was too much else going on already that needed his full attention.
"I'm alright," he spoke calmly.
Taking their seats across the booth from him, Laz leaned forward in resting his chin lazily in one palm. "So," he said through a yawn. "Coffee at one in the morning, why?"
Calico gave a half-smile. His eyes were weary behind his spectacles. "I suppose all this isn't really letting me sleep." He brought the newspaper headline back in front of him with a swept hand across the table. Showing the headline to both of them. "And the publicness of it all isn't helping."
Flo looked upon it. "There's really nothing we could do to assure anyone right now. That should be up to the Fairy Council. Not us."
"For those who don't know of our investigation," Calico said. "Those few who know we've faced H.P. head-on before are the ones that keep showing up at all our office spaces. Most show up to our hidden space uptown."
"I've been trying to cover it up by selling records, but," Flo shook her head. "They're not convinced. We'd be better off shutting it down and retreating to one of our more secluded office spaces. HQ, even. Where they can't take demands."
"No, we're not gonna hide anymore. Not again." Calico said, opening the newspaper to a new page as he buried his face into it. Just in time for another to enter through the diner's doors.
Cosmo's heart still pounded furiously after making that getaway. Though he was blocks away from where he had met up with those fighting fairies, he still gave a glance behind his shoulder anytime a suspicious sound endured, terrified for his life. The green fairy came to a halt to stop floating for a rest, looking down at his mangled shirt. What was usually tucked in cleanly hung out in a disarray, and he rolled his sleeves to his elbows for having practically changed into his shirt while in a bolt for getting away. His necktie hung loosely from his disheveled collar and some of the buttons had completely broken off when the two guys yanked it off him.
Why should he bother to care? He couldn't handle his own recklessness, let alone some stupid dumpster fight.
Sulking, he continued to float on in defeat. Crossing his arms as he followed the ground with only the moonlight shining upon it to guide him. Although he was less certain about proving himself right now, he was still not set on going home. He couldn't just face Wanda, especially right now after nearly being beaten to a pulp. She'd try to comfort him, and he didn't deserve it.
Although, speaking of which, It wouldn't kill him to check if she left any more messages. Pulling out his phone from his back pocket, Cosmo scrolled through, as the sudden brightness of the phone made him flinch in having wandered through the dark for who knows how long. Going to his voicemails, he looked to the number embedded under his most recent caller.
20+ missed calls - 15+ voicemails from 'Wanda'
How terrible was he? For his wife to actually be dragging herself in trying to reach him that much? She was probably worried sick and out searching for him somewhere. Worst of all, he was the one who caused her that worry. Was there anything he could do right in this situation, at all?
He needed to clear his head. And in seeing the lights of one of the few places that were open at this hour, he was drawn towards it. An open 24-hour diner remained at the end of a T-intersection of the downtown road. The lights of the inside looked welcoming amongst the shady streets, and with nothing else in sight, Cosmo felt there would be no other chance to sit and get his head together. And see if they had pudding on the menu, for good measure.
Making his way across the empty street, Cosmo beelined to the entrance in wanting to get off the road as soon as possible before another fairy convinced him to do something stupid again. Pressing on the push-in door, let out a hearty sigh.
Standing in the entrance of the diner, Cosmo looked to the few occupants there were. A man behind the counter was working on a dirty glass with a dish towel and conversing with a lone fairy sitting before him. Three others remained on the far left in a booth, one of them with a newspaper shielding his face while the other two that sat across from him looked defeated in staring at their steaming coffee. Cosmo almost felt reassured that at least he wasn't the only one who was a pile defeat at this hour.
Floating across the way, the waiter from behind the counter gave him a nod. "Can I get you anything?"
"I'll just see a menu," Cosmo spoke quietly, his eyes barely able to keep focus.
"Grab a seat anywhere. No crowds coming in here at this hour, anyway."
Cosmo drew to the further right of the restaurant. Lazily sliding a chair out from a table with his back turned as he slumped into the seat and clutched his head of hair in his hands. The waiter came around and held out a laminated menu. Seeing that Cosmo wasn't going to take it in his state, he placed it in front of him. The waiter floated across the restaurant with a plate in hand, drawing near the occupied booth where he placed the buttered bagel in front of the lilac fairy before floating off again.
"Maybe a group of supporters is just what we need," Flo said. "Y'know, public support behind our work."
Calico put down the newspaper. "Flo, our investigations are private for a reason."
"Yeah, I feel like the public's opinion will only reel us into spilling everything." Laz agreed.
"Just trying to spitball," The lilac fairy muttered, lifting her bagel for a bite.
Calico drummed his fingers against the open newspaper, gazing off into the darkness outside their booth window.
Laz tilted his head. "You good over there, Cal?"
"Yeah, Laz." Calico answered simply. Many things reeled in the back of his mind including his most recent phone call. "Flo, you may have a point. We don't need to necessarily reveal our plans to any public groups, but we're a working agency."
"Okay, and..?"
"We've dedicated our work to disputing shady activity in cross-relations. With our word put in, the media may take it more seriously. The Fairy Council, The Pixie Assembly, they may take it more seriously."
"We're still a governed service, I don't see why we can't just reach out to the Fairy Military. They'd take us seriously." Laz suggested.
"This isn't a time for armed forces, there's enough of that already." Calico defused. "The last thing I want to do is fight violence with violence."
"Fairies are peaceful even in dealing with other magical races, surely they can't-"
"With all that H.P. is doing to humans," Calico disagreed. "Not only would fairies take their reign on him if they could, but that Jorgen fellow would certainly not hesitate to."
"Okay, even if you come out publicly in declaring you agree to the demands of shutting H.P.'s plans down," Flo said. "It'll maybe make some effect, but it won't put out the fire completely."
"That is why I'm leaving you two to organize a time in place," Calico stated. "While I do what I can with the stolen information."
"I thought you said you couldn't do anything with it?"
"Yes, but I also said there's a loophole to everything." Calico assured with certainty in his stare. "Everything."
"I'm not exactly getting what you're suggesting here," Laz scooted forward in the booth seat, placing his hands on the table in indicating his words. "You want us to gather a public crowd for our agency? An agency that is private to everyone BUT the eyes and ears of ours and our colleagues? Is this the new low we've reached, Calico?"
"You're not catching my drift," Calico said. "I don't plan to execute any of our work to anyone of any sort. I simply plan to dispute the naysayers out there. We're confidential when it comes to our work, but not when it comes to helping those in need openly. We will make a public statement of who we are, and what we do. Are you two a part of that or not?"
A smile grew upon Flo's face as she nodded in certainty. "I'm with you, Cal."
"Me too, I guess." Laz agreed with a lazy wave of his hand. "But uh, duty calls first. I need to use the restroom."
The cyan fairy got up and scooted from their booth, giving a stretch from the midnight weariness as he floated across the restaurant. Passing the waiter who continued to converse with the fairy at the counter, probably a regular, and another fairy sitting by themselves at a table further down. Paying no mind though, he made a left for the men's room.
Situated at his table, Cosmo still stared off as the waiter came and gave him the plate of fries he ordered and a glass of water. For a moment's distraction, he eyed the plate in wondering if the fries were at all up to speed to the ones from the diner he used to work at as a teenager. Their place certainly didn't get its specialty for just anything. And it definitely became all the more special when he'd met Wanda there.
He nearly kicked himself in stupidly bringing back the reminder, drawing a hand forward and lazily dragging the plate before him. He reached for the vinegar bottle and began to soak the fries to his heart's content. The fairy defeatedly put the bottle down and took a soggy fry and popped it into his mouth. Well, they didn't live up to his favorite diner's style, but it tasted great after what he'd been through that day. Taking hold of his glass, he gratefully took a sip, quenching his thirst from the fight that took the energy out of him completely. Sighing from the water filling his system, he continued on with his fries. Feeling somewhat more content than he did a minute ago.
As Laz exited from the washroom, he shook his hands free of tap water. Mumbling something incoherent about the lack of stocked paper towel, as he took out his wand and waved a small gust of wind towards his soaked palms in little waves. Looking up in rubbing his dried hands together, he was caught by the green set of hair not too far along. Laz drew forward in seeing that Calico had quickly decided to switch tables. Approaching, he pulled out a chair and rambled.
"Look, I'm fine with the idea. I just don't want to get all these angry fairies in more knots when they're already furious to begin with. And to think that all those godparents down on earth have to deal with the war enough already, we might as well have-"
Laz stopped mid-sentence to stare wide-eyed at the green fairy who looked back at him in bafflement. Holding a french fry frozen to his open mouth as he could only stare in confusion.
The cyan fairy froze before giving a little shake of his head.
"Sorry, man. From afar you looked like someone I know."
Cosmo lowered the fry. "Um, okay."
Laz shifted out of the seat awkwardly and floated off. Cosmo watched him go before turning back to his plate of fries.
Well, that was random. But it didn't pull Cosmo's interest enough to be distracted from everything that still tugged at his heartstrings. The fries did admittedly made it a little better, satisfying his stomach as he ate each one gratefully. But he was still slow in his movement and did not feel the usual joy that food brought him in any situation. Everything he'd felt over the course of this evening had balled into one painful feeling pricking at his chest that would not go away.
Within minutes, the trio that sat at the end got up from their booth in concluding their stay. Making way to the door as the cyan guy left a small stack of money on the tabletop, throwing a nod across the way to the waiter in keeping the change as the other two made way for the door.
"Have a good night, folks." The waiter called in goodbye.
Cosmo coincidentally turned to watch them go, barely catching a glimpse of the first two but the hem of their trenchcoats, and seeing the one who had approached him to leave last, also wearing an overly large coat. The green fairy merely turned back to his fries.
With the three other occupants gone, the fairy sitting at the counter turned to the diner worker. "Who were those three?" He asked out loud. After all, they seemed awfully suspicious for having shown up in trenchcoats past one in the morning like they were bounty hunters.
"Special investigations team." The waiter responded, wiping the counter.
Although Cosmo was occupied, he still listened.
"You've seen 'em here before?"
"Yeah, I've seen them." The waiter said. "Do investigation on cross-relations stuff."
"Seems like they'd have to come in here more than a few times for you to know that." The fairy at the counter winked.
The waiter laughed. "Yeah, well, it's more because their leader there with them is better known. He's helped a lot of people around here."
"He's from here?"
"Nah, last I heard he was from Glimmerock. Some Calico Cosma guy."
Cosmo choked on his fry.
Startling the other two as he coughed loudly, he spat the soggy mush back onto his plate as he nearly doubled over in lifting from his seat and looking to the waiter with a shockingly wide-eyed face as he demanded more like the diner guy was the keeper of all secrets.
"Calico Cosma!? What Calico Cosma!? When, where, when!? Where-where-where'd you see him!? Where!?"
The waiter was beyond bewildered as he lifted a finger to the door. "The...fella who just left-?"
Fire practically trailed along Cosmo's track as he zipped to the door, knocking over a chair in the process.
"Hey, wait!" The water called, having received no payment for the food.
Busting out the front door with barely a breath to spare, Cosmo watched with wide eyes as the slammed door of a black van shut closed and the ignition turned on.
"WAIT!"
But it was too late as the van took of speedingly, drowning poor Cosmo in magical smoke as he coughed it from his system. Waving a hand in front of his face, he could only look off into the remainder of the night where the van sped off to, and Cosmo was left alone.
Feeling nothing but solitariness around him, he sniffed into the air.
"It's me.."
As the early morning sun peeked through the vast living room window, her weary pink eyes opened. Her head flattened against the accent pillow with her arms tucked tightly below her underneath the blanket drawn over her body.
With a slight cramp in her neck from staying in the same position all night, Wanda lifted herself by her side as the blanket slid off her shoulder. Staring off into the morning sun from Sage's apartment window in wonder of the current hour. She squinted her eyes and cocked her head forward along the way to the small electric clock, clearly reading the hour of seven followed by minutes she could not make out due to the sleep in her eyes. She lifted a hand to rub along her eye creases, just as Sage entered from the other room.
"Hey," her friend spoke softly, shrugging an aqua blazer over her seafoam turtleneck. "How'd you sleep?"
"Like a rock.." Wanda admitted, stretching her neck one way to rid of the slight cramp.
Sage ruffled her messy bob once her blazer was on, making her way over.
"So, when I get off work maybe we can go check the place out," the blue fairy suggested, following up on yesterday's advice. "Or I can take you during my lunch break. But you can definitely stay here and chill today if you need it. The place is yours."
Though the offer was tempting, Wanda was still Wanda, and couldn't sit on her butt all day at a time like this.
"No, that's okay," Wanda said. "I'll go check out the place myself and then go home to try Cosmo again. You just go to work."
Sage considered it. She had to be in early today and no more later than she was already running. Or else she'd be behind on everything for sure. But she couldn't simply leave her friend like this. As willful as Wanda was with any task at hand, what Sage had told her wasn't for certain. She didn't want Wanda to go home without any trace of her husband while the green-haired fool was still MIA.
"If you're really sure," Sage said. "There's some coffee left in the pot. Try not to strain yourself today, alright?"
"Okay," Her friend agreed.
"Okay," Sage pulled out her phone. "I can also try him myself if he's not answering."
"Be my guest," Wanda said with a lack of sureness. If Cosmo wasn't answering his wife, there was very little chance he'd answer Sage or anyone else.
Sage looked at the time once more, before poofing her to-go coffee mug in hand. She floated over to Wanda and leaned down to hug her with her free arm as the pink fairy patted a hand to her back.
"It's all gonna be good. You guys have always found a way." Sage said.
"And we always will." Wanda nodded with a small smile and pulled away. "Go. I'm okay. Swear."
Sage floated to the front door quickly as she slid it open and turned in closing it behind her. "Call me when you find him."
She shut the door, leaving Wanda isolated with herself in the apartment. The pink fairy stared forward in a daze of her heavy sleep and drew her arms to a large stretch. She reached for the fallen blanket and wrapped it back around her shoulders and made way for the kitchen, awaiting a much-needed dose of morning coffee before she picked up her search once again.
To be continued...
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I teased you a bit by having that *almost* run-in, huh? At least I hope. We're still stirring things up more and more here, folks. Hardy har.
~McSgwizzle