Something Incredible

Dangerous Damsels by Nikita Gill

@calliope-hesiod, @thelostillusionist, @lost-girl-at-sea, @alana-the-badbitch, @goingtosee-theworld, @princess-ting-ting

[insp.]

Happy Christmas Pet-Pet! My jie jie. My best friend. My sister. My enemy. My lover. Here’s to your strong women, your brave women, your soft women, your angry women! I know you have made me a better woman and I’m so happy to have you as a friend. 

I love you! 

I wanted to celebrate your ladies, because you have so many lovely ones and they’re all so different! I hope I picked good parts of the poem for them all. <3 

DISNEY HEROINE SPOTLIGHT: Jane Porter

Of course, Milo was about to launch into Part 2 of his grand surprise– the part where he invited Jane along, where he told her that he was going to get her nominated too, that, as he had promised in their vows, he would always grab adventure by its horns and make every day count for her. He had meant every word of those promises. And if Jane had taught him one thing over these last few years…if he put his mind to something… there wasn’t anything that he couldn’t do.

And that was true, as long as Jane was at his side. That’s what he would tell the RAS as well, even if he had to fly all the way to NYC and bully his way into the HQ and find the mysterious president and present him with a detailed argument. He’d convince them that Jane was an asset, more of an asset than even himself.

If she wanted it, that is. Because…part 2 came with that caveat. He’d never make her leave Swynlake or her graduate degree if she wanted to complete it. Milo didn’t know what the conversation would look like if she said so, but…it was a conversation they’d work out, right?

He didn’t get to Part 2 though, neither his passionate declaration of nomination or his caveat. Because Jane launched into her celebration of him, because of course she did. One thing they’d always been splendid at was supporting each other’s successes. They were never jealous of each other, never competitive. Their love for their work had united them at the start.

And then: “I can come, yeah? Obviously I’m not – RAS material, but I’ll manage with something!”

Milo’s face lifted in surprise and then softened, almost as instantaneously, back into fondness. All the worry vanished, along with all the doubt and the questions. And now he remembered Jane’s promise to him too. Her vow that she would stay.

They didn’t need to have that conversation at all. If they did, it happened minutely and quietly, in the second that passed between them, Milo smiling and grasping Jane’s hand in his own.

“Oh Jane, I’ve already talked to Bianca and she thinks you are too. She’s going to nominate you and– they’ll see what I see. We’ll do this together, just as we promised,” said Milo. “As long as that’s what you want too.”

It was what she wanted.

It wasn’t like Jane to pause and consider when she’d latched onto something so exciting and wonderful as this news – but she did, just for a moment, if only to reflect.

Because doing this – going to New York City, joining the RAS, leaving everything behind, why that would be a big step. Last time she’d gone around the world on a whim, she’d at least finished uni, hadn’t totally up and left – just sorta kinda up and left, was all.

This would be something bigger.

Would she feel bad for not finishing her degree?

Truth be told, she’d been feeling wishy-washy on it in the past couple of weeks. She still had three years of school, at least, and that was just eating up at the time she had left (fifteen years, Lachesis’ voice still echoed in her ears sometimes and though it was easy to ignore most of the days, she often found herself curling closer to Milo in the middle of the night when the darkness was harder to turn away from). Swynlake she had grown to love, but deep inside, Jane knew that she was meant to see the rest of the world. She’d seen a lot of it, she had, but she’d done it alone.

Now she wouldn’t have to.

She’d have to withdraw from PrideU. They’d have to pack up their flat. They’d have to stop by London and give Dr. Porter the full explanation – but this time there would be an explanation. But then they’d be off – Jane and Milo Porter-Thatch, just as was written in a journal in the 1800s, just as they were always fated to do.

Jane nodded, squeezing Milo’s hands.

It was very strange for Sally to meet someone who was just…. so accepting about the fact that there might be a ghost sitting right across from her. Normally, when she mentioned the presence of a ghost, it tended to follow strange looks and awkward, stalling conversations. 

Those mostly ended in the other person saying some seriously odd excuse to just walk away. 

And yet, for as strange as it might’ve seem for Sally, she didn’t exactly have much time to process it all because of all the bright emotions that were flowing out this woman. They felt warm, like the gentle touch of the sun’s ray on one’s skin and bright just like the sun itself. 

These were the emotions Sally enjoyed allowing them to simply flow through. 

Sally nodded then, a small and rather shy smile touching her lips. “He is…. or at least… far ummm better than I am…. but he uh he plays often.” 

More like played often, if she really wanted to enter technicalities and all since Daniel was dead. 

I think I am a very phenomenal chess player, if I do say so myself. 

Sally rolled her eyes at the ghost. “But umm his name is Daniel….  he’s an uhh ghost.” The redhead didn’t enter into the details of how she knew said ghost figuring it was best simply left unsaid because how normal would it sound saying he was her dearest ex-best-friend, not so normal at all. “And I’m-I’m Sally…. it’s nice to-to meet you too!”

It was funny – Jane tried to think how she’d have reacted over three years ago, before she lived in a town overflowing with magic. She’d probably thought Sally was a bit batty, Jane decided, because her first thought wouldn’t have been a ghost. Jane felt a bit sheepish about that, but she’d learned, she had, and now she wanted to visit all those places she’d glossed over the first time round.

Back in the day, she didn’t want to be another stupid Mundus tourist trying on a local sorcerer’s robes for the Instagram. Everyone had been doing it, you know, just to say that they did. Jane wanted to learn, not just put on a cloak for a few minutes.

That itch inside of her to travel flared up again and her daydreams wafted back.

“I hope you don’t mind me bothering you,” she said. “I was just studying, only I was finding it awfully boring and I do get distracted so easily when I find something boring.” She shook her head a little. “Do you often come here to play chess? It is a very lovely library.”

Milo grinned from ear to ear then at Jane’s exclamation. His eyes shined and he grasped at Jane’s hand, tugging her at once from the kitchen and toward their living room so they could both fall onto the couch. Fluffy had been laid out across one of the arms of it and she let out an unhappy mrrow, getting up at once to jump down and slink away to claim Milo’s desk as her new temporary kingdom.

Milo truthfully barely noticed. His brain was now filled with those same legends and rumours that Jane had mentioned. The organization’s intrepid beginning, and how eventually they needed to go underground because of potential danger– to themselves and their charges. When was the first time he’d heard such stories? Even Milo could not pinpoint the place. Perhaps it had been in his own Magick History classes at the beginning of his career, many many years ago when he too was an overeager student.

Or perhaps, if he looked back to his grandfather’s journals, he would find those three letters sketched somewhere inside: R. A. S.

Because of there was someone who might have known…or encountered or found evidence of…it was Thaddeus Thatch.

And now Milo would join them. Er, hopefully.

“They did! Jane, it’s real. I– I had no idea, they’ve apparently been watching me for a while, I– there was this woman, months and months ago, who came to my office inquiring of my research for her own book project. But– it turns out she isn’t a travel author at all! Which makes a lot of sense, she seemed very odd at the time,” he quirked his own head to the side as he recalled his first meetings with Bianca. My, would he have to have a secret identity and a cover story too? Would he have to lie?

Milo felt both extremely excited and extremely nervous at the prospect. It was like a great adventure novel, though he could not imagine himself as the hero in it. There was really only way he would be able to pull something like that off…

Milo squeezed Jane’s hand. “But– yes. As I was packing up my office, the same woman approached me and said I passed all these tests I had no idea I was even up for and– and they want me to go and train in their offices in New York City, Jane! New York City!” He flopped back against the couch, running his free hand through his hair.

The RAS was real.

Even though Jane had not studied Magick-Mundus relations much before coming to Swynlake, even though she had only just begun to learn all of its intricacies and little secrets (by just begun, of course, we mean over the span of the past three years, ever since she’d bumped into Milo that fateful day and he’d told her about his studies and his ambitions and she fell in love with him bit by bit), she knew just how big a deal this was.

The RAS was real – and they wanted to recruit Milo.

There was a flush of pride – why of course they’d want to recruit Milo. There was no better person to recruit, no one more knowledgeable, no one else who would dive right into a cave and list off everything you needed to know about it at the same time. She was grinning so wide now, oh how fortunate it was that PrideU had let him go, because this opportunity came sweeping through.

She plopped right next to him on the couch, reaching to wrap her arms around him and rest her head on his shoulder.

“The RAS!” she exclaimed, looking up at him, eyes glimmering, then leaned to kiss him. “Oh goodness – Milo, that’s amazing. Of course they want you. You’re the utmost qualified and I’m absolutely certain that you’ll be marvelous in –”

Oh, that was right. New York. New York, as in, America, as in, not-Swynlake, as in, not-England. As in across the ocean and far away from PrideU, where Jane was still enrolled as a student, where she had a few more years to go, a few more years to drag her feet till she got a degree to put on her wall, a few more years to tick off the handful that the Fates had given her.

New York was far away and the reality of that hit her, curling in her stomach like she’d swallowed an ice cube.

“I’ve actually never been to New York City,” she said, with a little shake of her head “Imagine! I’ve been all over the world and never stopped there.” She let out a tiny laugh, more an exhale of air than anything, and then turned quiet, pulling away and folding her hands in her lap, unsure of what she ought to say next.

But Jane was not one to let questions go unasked and she turned back to Milo.

It was just like Jane: always appearing right when he needed her. It was like that all those years ago (two– or was it three?) when she’d first saved his boxes, and it was like that on New Year’s Eve, when she appeared out of the crowd and led him up to the roof. And strangely enough, Milo had been a sign of serendipity for Jane Porter as well. Or at least, so she had told him, since before the rooftop, Jane had been wondering if she should stay in Swynlake or if she should go.

He was glad that she stayed.

He was glad that she stayed and glad that he had too, even when his research grants for Atlantis was denied, even when his progress was slow-going in the caves, even when he grew so frustrated with the apathetic students in his class or the bureaucratic, administrative red tape of Pride University Proper. Because if he didn’t stay and if Jane didn’t stay, they would’ve never had their adventures together. Milo would never have learned what it was to be in love. Or to be brave.

The irony of all those thoughts were, of course, that Milo was going to now ask Jane to leave.

He was– slightly worried. Alright, perhaps more than slightly. He was maybe about 15-20 percent worried, because Milo Thatch always left room for error; such was the smart thing to do. And perhaps Jane would want to complete her degree. He could not fault her for that. He didn’t know what their marriage would look like if she decided to stay. He hoped there might be some solution for them anyway. Because Milo wanted Jane to be happy. But Milo also knew that he had to go.

First thing first, of course: he needed to get his boxes upstairs.

“I’ll tell you at home– oh, you won’t– you won’t believe it. Quickly, quickly,” said Milo, grinning, kiddish, rushing forward energetically now that he could see over the boxes and had less weight to carry. He pushed the door open for her with his back and held it while she entered, and together they navigated their way to the elevator. Then down the hall, where Milo struggled to fish his keys out of his pocket while still balancing the boxes. He managed in the end, sticking his foot into the open door so Fluffy would not escape. She usually laid in wait, looking for any opportunity.

Finally, they got in their little, humble flat. The light turned on and Milo slid the boxes onto the kitchen counter– he’d tend to them later.

Then he turned to her, the grin on his face bright and wide. “Jane Porter-Thatch,” he said. “What do you know about the Rescue Aid Society?”

They walked up the stairs to their flat, Jane poking her head over the boxes to make sure she wasn’t missing a step. She followed after Milo, remembering how just three years ago she was moving up her own boxes with her father, and the melancholy feeling that lingered in the flat after he left and she was alone with a new life that she did not quite want for herself.

Though she’d started off with some furniture leftover from her aunt and from Bobby before he moved to American, she’d furnished the rest of her flat slowly, picking things up from Whosits and off the street ‘round the Benbow area. It was cluttered, but that was the way she liked it, something out of an old gran’s attic or a cosy tea shoppe somewhere. The shelves were full of trinkets – now even more so as Milo had moved in and had his own host of artifacts. There were still boxes of his to unpack (and now there would be even more), but it was theirs and she adored it in a way she’d never adored a home before.

This was the same couch she’d sat on with Simba when she told him she was sick, but also the same couch she had eaten takeaway meals and sketched in her journal and rested her feet on Milo’s lap. Right now, Fluffy was resting on it, curled up and sleeping. The coffee table still had a cup of tea from morning and there was a book open and spread facedown next to it. In the corner, Jane’s easel had a half finished painting of some imagined leopard stalking through the tall savannah grasses.

It was their home, it was, and even though Jane still dreamed of the rest of the world, there was part of her that was happy about this little flat. It was nice to have something to come back to, you know, even if you spent every other moment looking for adventure elsewhere. 

Jane set her stack of boxes right by Milo and then looked up as he spoke (the Porter-Thatch still have her a little giggle because she liked the way it sounded).