Because TrippyCookie promised to write something and did, I present her requested second chapter. This, however, does not get you out of actually posting it, Trippy!
As always, many thanks to those who keep stopping in to see what I've done next. It's humbling.
In The Drift
Chapter Two
Responsibility is one of the first precepts the academy drills into eager heads. Service to the bureau is akin to performing a religious ritual, with purposeful dedication to justice and order. Only Olivia Dunham sits in her epicenter of chaos, surrounded by like-minded agents and wonders. The afternoon saw an abandonment of codes and procedure, it saw a wet backside and evidence of someone's victory in a war of snow weaponry. It saw a letting go. And she wonders.
If Mother Nature has, as Walter postulated, dandruff, Olivia considers requisitioning Head and Shoulders and a rocket ship to deliver it. Because the third unit's field report is as dry as yesterday's memo on proper coding of expense forms, she allows her eyes to flow left to right and back again in the appearance of reading while contemplating how just how many forms it would take to achieve approval of said product and transport request.
Not that she needed to go through channels for anything she wanted. The man with all the seedy and ultimately useful connections, the one who'd pulled her up from the snow after an angel had been carefully created, that man could get her whatever she asked. It has occurred to her, in the sleepless nights where tile counting is employed, that testing the boundaries of Peter Bishop's contacts might be wise. An FBI agent should know exactly how far she can rely on her team. And this agent wanted to know if he'd always come through. But reliance, and other such unsavory words, is something she'd like stricken from the dictionary.
Because of the many things Peter Bishop isn't, reliable should be highest among them. Trust is easy in comparison, but the number of times she'd seen the glimmer of 'flight' spring to his eyes were as plentiful as the powdery flakes against her window. Several sentences had begun with 'men like him,' but the conclusions would get stuck in her throat. She didn't know men like him. He was too many characters all at once. The conglomeration hurt her brain.
But not as much as this report, she decides and closes the plastic cover with more force than required. The slap directs a few faces to her doorway, all ignored as she slings on her still-damp coat and looks to the Magic Eight ball perched on her bookcase. It finds its place in her palm and she gives it a light toss, feeling the liquid slosh just a bit as it settles back in her hand. Out into the night, the snow piles around her and Olivia sets herself free to roam tonight.
Side streets remain untouched as plows contend with the main roads, uneven piles building up between curb-parked cars. Sidewalks are a forgotten commodity but as Olivia sits at a light, she pities the stooped man trying to shovel out a portion for himself. That sense of public duty is a lost art, like chivalry and love letters.
And snow angels.
Her sister, so recently a houseguest and therefore hard to hide from, pointed to the job as the catalyst for losing herself; the version of herself that Liv the Kid expected to be. But the traditional FBI, the system she'd embraced and worked within for years, wasn't to blame. And while Olivia wanted to correct her, the true explanation was impossible to summarize to outsiders. Even to her fellow agents, in their blue parkas and clear protocol, she had no words to describe the frightening scientific marvels being explored by necessity. They brag of their take-downs and she smiles at their communal successes as one does who knows how futile it is. Her team keeps them safe, in the overall scheme of things. Because the Pattern is far reaching, beyond their mafia and white collar crooks. She remembers them too and the sense of finality each time the FBI triumphed against the black hat and handle-bar mustached foes of old.
The enemy isn't so obvious now. The enemy may sit in a boardroom or the bureau cafeteria. The enemy tended to look like Mr. Jones, too plain to be significant, even as they hold hundreds of lives by a noose. Even as they travel through time or turn people into Star Wars beasts. She wants to forget them. And when she arrives home, she measures out a stiff quantity and downs it like medicine. Maybe it is, for now.
When she answers the ringing phone, she's had three fiery shots and finds it easy to smile at the voice already teasing her out of her early buzz.
"So, do I get to dictate the length of the skirt that you, the loser, will be wearing?"
The sofa welcomes her weight and glass number four sits abandoned. "Only if I have the honor of holding the razor."
There's a sound close to an insulted hmph and it reverberates in her ear.
"I realize," he tells her, "that your profession comes with the perk of repeated blows to the head. So I'll forgive you for forgetting who actually won."
"I declared it a draw, but I can see how a genius like you wouldn't recall that."
Over the line, she hears his chuckle and her mind summons the accompanying light in his eyes. "Liv, I don't believe in draws. I do believe you owe me a nice A-line and I will collect."
He's using a tone that must have been honed on people he's scammed but she's far too interested in seeing his smooth chin to admit defeat.
"Then perhaps we should compromise." The last word comes out on a wobbly tongue. If he notices the stutter, he wisely lets it pass. "If we can't agree on a winner, then it's a skirt for me and a shave for you."
A rustling sound greets her, the image of him switching ears while pacing springs to mind. "Is that how the FBI taught you to negotiate? No wonder the scammers get away with so much."
"You should know." Her quick retort is the last thing to travel over the line, his silence possessing a sobering effect. With a timidity not her own, she tries to bring him back to the conversation. "Peter?"
"Yeah, sorry. Walter's finally dropped off and if I wake him, the formulas will start again. So now I'm out in the hall."
Grateful her tactlessness hasn't halted this pointless, non-work related discourse, Olivia settles back onto the couch and grants the smile a warm return to her face. This is familiar territory, and while their ventures away from safe places are gaining traction, she's sleepy now. And sleepy Liv tends to dream of the last thing on her conscious mind.
"Another discussion of separate rooms is coming, isn't it?"
"An argument of separate hotels is coming, but not tonight. Purely in deference to your yawn."
The mention of the word ensures that another follows, this one popping her jaw. "That's very kind, Mr. Bishop."
"I trust you'll take that into account when we have said fight tomorrow. Which I'll win, much like the snowball battle. Oh, and don't forget the skirt."
The disconnected line vibrates her tender ear drum and the phone is dropped on the adjoining cushion. Oh, she'd remember the skirt. And the razor. And, according to the second academy precept, in case of resistance, bring extra handcuffs.
Which ends up being the last thing on her conscious mind.