Perspective
Chapter 8: Harabo/Gisele
Published on February 4, 2024
Summary:
After the escape from the black site in Antarctica Letty and Cipher make their way to the submarine climbing in and Gisele shuts the door and promptly gives instructions.
...
Chapter 8: Harabo/Gisele
...
After the escape from the black site in Antarctica Letty and Cipher make their way to the submarine climbing in and Gisele shuts the door and promptly gives instructions.
The few crew members were the people still standing by Mr. Nobody.
Gisele had the medical personnel ready once Letty and Cipher enter the medical bay.
"The short, obvious answer is Gisele and I worked together in the past," Cipher informs Letty, "There are secrets to be kept and only so many willing to do what we do, hence the small circle. You saw what my new crews were up to. I had to call in some old contacts, whatever the risk. Life and death. Sometimes business is the only answer but people don't want to believe it."
"Necessary evil?" Letty scoffs.
"We're on our way out aren't we? Little Miss Tess came through," Cipher comments as Gisele stands by, "They grow up so fast don't they? And you always on time."
Cipher rambles on about Gisele, the medication kicking in fast.
"What did I miss? Were you in prison this whole time, or did you stay away to keep everyone safe as a dumb noble act? But I swear I heard rumors in both fronts. You're smart I'm sure you played it both ways. Under ten years about. How many times did they drag you out from the cold nearing death after an escape attempt? Still in the double digits? Did they get tired moving you from site to site?"
"The getaway driver is useless if there's no getaway vehicle," Gisele offers as an answer, "I'm where I need to be."
"It doesn't matter," Letty defends, "She's here now and she just saved our asses."
Letty wants to know how Gisele is alive but seeing as she and Han both came back from the dead it seemed comical to even question, and especially with Cipher present.
Gisele saved her once before bringing her to the hospital when Fenix almost killed her, so this is what trust she's giving to Gisele now.
"Fair point," Cipher says, "I'd offer a sign of good will but I don't think you'll believe me if you were in fact in custody all this time and not knowing which news was true. So tell her about Lue, Letty. Get the elephant in the room out of the way. And you three can start a club or something."
"Han's alive," Letty says, then explaining when realizing what Ciphers comments just moments ago, "Which you wouldn't understand if you didn't know he was presumed dead in the first place."
"I know," Gisele says, but not sharing how long she's known, "And Tess gave me the rundown on the current situation as well. And in Rome."
"Tell her how spry and healthy he was when you last saw him," Cipher eggs on, "If she kept tabs she can't have seen him up close."
"He is."
Letty can't read Gisele's poker face and that's how it was years ago under Braga when Gisele needed to be his right hand, but Letty knows Han loved her so she thinks she can see a glint of relief and softness even if Gisele was trying to stay neutral for the current situation.
"That's good," Gisele says, "…I have to get back to work. If we stay clear of attacks for an hour we should be clear to travel the rest of the way."
"Subs from other countries," Cipher expands, "Even the agency isn't stupid enough to incite even an incident if they get the wrong target."
"When you're done here, get some food, and shower, and rest" Gisele nods, "You've expended energy getting here and that's the best use of our time until our next stop."
...
Author's end notes for Perspective Chapter 08: Harabo/Gisele:
-Gisele brings Letty to the hospital in a Furious 7 deleted flashback scene after Letty is supposed to be killed by Fenix in Fast & Furious so I included it here
-I skipped the greeting to avoid how close Cipher and Gisele are and then had Gisele neutral and on work mode and Cipher's meds kicking in and just rambling to further avoid this but open to the idea that maybe they were close but no longer (maybe it's too far to say Cipher was the mentor mentioned in the previous chapter but I wouldn't put it pass the next film to retcon it that way, see my notes near the end about connections for more)
- I suspect the studio wants Charlize Theron who plays Cipher for the all-female spinoff so they won't kill Cipher unless the actress wants out so for those fans complaining I've accepted she'll be around, but the degree of how much of an enemy or redemption she gets will be the issue for me personally
-And I think tying Cipher to Gisele is supposed to soften her but I had this rant about Deckard when he started getting his redemption and whether they could have kept him a villain all along but I think they liked the actor too much so what happened happened
-So how friendly will they make Cipher and Gisele or is it just business and that's just how they keep her around without being disrespectful to Elena's memory (especially now that they added Elena's sister and her ending in FX with Tess feels like setting her up to be in the all-female spinoff crew) or they don't care and redeem her
-and I used to complain that maybe everyone is too connected (like Braga to Owen to Cipher to Mr. Nobody tied to Deckard, Jakob and Gisele by F9 and now Gisele to Cipher –unless it's a contact through Tess and Cipher and Gisele never met before, even if Cipher says the sub was her plan)
-but I've accepted that it's easier to do that then introduce even more random new characters; and this applies to TV shows when fans complain the characters date each other too much instead of having new love interests –so I had Cipher's meta line about the small circle as some type of explanation
...