#deusmodum

Sameen never thought she would make this a regular occurrence. The first time she’d come, she thought the world was ending and that there was a good chance she was going to catch a bullet. She’d had to cut that meeting short to avoid catching said bullet. But the world ended, she got her dog, and Shaw still found herself visiting an unmarked grave at least once a month, despite the fact that there wasn’t even a body there to begin with.

Normally, she didn’t say much, choosing instead to brush away dead leaves and twigs, and to make sure that it was as neat as it could be. Bear sat dutifully by her side while she looked down at the marker. Without that marker, Shaw wouldn’t even be able to tell that there was a grave there, with the grass having grown over all the disturbance in the dirt.

Month in, month out, Shaw came, with no real pattern discernible. Hell, half the time she didn’t know she’d end up there until she found herself walking through the markers. Sometimes she stayed for ten minutes, other times for two hours. The only consistent thing through it all was the buzzing in the back of her head that told her that something was wrong. Something was off. The skin behind her ear was always rubbed raw after one of these visits, but no matter how much time passed, Shaw could never force a glitch. The simulation kept going.

Winter came and went, with snow sticking to the ground, and Shaw still visited. Hands shoved deep into her pockets, chin tucked into her coat, with her scarf icing over from her breath. Every time, she took a couple moments to brush the snow off of the numbers she had memorized. It was harder during the winter, a season she already hated. Every day felt like the same. Gray and overcast and miserable. 

Then spring came with its rains and the mud. She trudged through the grass, watching as flowers and weeds popped up everywhere. She cleared the weeds out but left the flowers. She probably would have liked them, and it’s not like Shaw ever brought any. But the flowers didn’t bring her back either.

As the weather warmed up, heading towards the humidity of summer again, Shaw walked up the hill and felt the sun warming her through her jacket. Worn leather, with patched holes and sleeves just a little too long for her. Bear trotted beside her today, tugging on the leash a little more than usual because he could sense something was different about today. Each tug brought Sameen back from her thoughts, from the brink of something dark and nebulous. 

Today, she didn’t let herself touch the skin behind her ear. She didn’t want to try and force a glitch and be inevitably furious when it didn’t happen. A couple months ago, she had split her knuckles on the wall of her loft because she thought the pain might end the simulation. A year past, and still a part of her clung to the tiniest shred of hope that she’d wake up in Samaritan’s facilities to start it all over, because at least she wouldn’t have to visit an empty, unmarked grave every month.

“Good news. Digital Armageddon didn’t become a full blown one. People still walking around cheating on their wives and not knowing how close they came to some Terminator bullshit.”

She felt stupid for talking like this. She wanted to turn away and leave, to come back in a month to see if maybe the words would magically appear between now and then. A year gone, and this still wasn’t her thing. With a sigh, Sameen crouched down and placed a small stone next to the marker, an arrow carved into its surface. It would probably be gone by the time she came next, but coming empty-handed didn’t seem like the right thing. Not today.

Shaw cleared her throat and shuffled her feet before picking up Bear’s leash. 

She hadn't been expecting a fight. Surprising the old man, sure. A fight from him, sure But the moment a bullet whizzed by her and she only barely dove back around the brick corner with barely a burned streak across the leg of her jeans, she was already counting back the setup, trying to find the leak, how a third party had found them here and now. Was it luck? No way in hell. Hanna stopped believing in luck the day she clawed her way to survival from some fucked up bastard’s basement. Maybe the old man had brought back up in case something was wrong.

Fuck, she thought, retreating further into her shadowed entry way--as her would be victim saw the same passage she'd nearly stepped out of and made a break for it. [ did her assailant just yell at him not to? ] Good. Of course she raised the gun and pulled the trigger, aiming for his gut; she wasn't going to waste this surprise rendezvous if she could help it. then pulled it a second time before he could fall.

There were a steady trail of bodies across the country—she had done a lot of wandering for a long time—by a killer they hadn't yet identified. Men and women of all adult ages, races, careers, with only one thing they seemed to have in common; a few sheets of paper detailing a chat log with what seemed like a minor. A log that she pulled out of her backpack and flung at the dying man.

They said if you wanted someone to suffer, a gut shot was the way to do it. Especially with a shotgun. And oh, did she want them to hurt.

Hanna—known currently as one Erin Lewis, the "traffic cop," who's number they had gotten. The singular issue was probably a glaring one: Erin died around fifteen years ago on the job—had been hurt by men like the ones she was killing. And she found the controversy hilarious, reading online discussions. Then, however, she only thought of the other person with a gun, quickly flipped the safety on and folded the butt of her saiga to shove it, with her ski mask, into her backpack. She shook dark curls out and disappeared down the alleyway.

Only she didn't manage to disappear, not really. She could hear the rapid footfalls behind her, and they closed in quick. When she felt a hand on her, she spun and basically threw herself at them. She closed the distance like a cat clawing at an aggressor, throwing all of her weight into what she hoped would be a surprise attack. [ she was barely above a hundred and ten pounds; what else was she going to do? ]

A woman. It was another woman. It was late in the evening, dark enough she couldn't see her until their struggle ended with them on the ground, her somehow on top with one gloved knotted into the edge of her jacket, maybe because she had clawed her way up and onto the other woman. The other hand was drawn back to swing, but they’ve landed just into the light of the streetlamps. Now it's not only their skirmish that left her heart thumping in her ears, taking deep, rough breath.

Recognition stood obvious in wide, shocked eyes, and the curl of fingers into a fist relaxed as she stared, suddenly her mouth is dry. She swallows, and it's quiet, tentative, as she speaks, like she thinks this is an illusion sound will shatter. Maybe it is. She’s staring down at a ( woman ) girl she never thought she’d see again. Two girls from Texas. How were they both in New York?

          SHE  IS  UNUSED  TO  ATTENTION,   or at least this sort of attention. There are plenty of mundane humans who pass her on the street and think her strange. The local community of witches seem to view her as either a  marvel  or an  aberration.  ( Observation: she does not like that they see her as such -- by extension, they view Jude this way too. After all, it was her brother who made the pact to revive her. )  This woman regards her with interest and  CURIOSITY  that borders on uncomfortable.

                    “ ------------Please  refrain  from touching me. ”

The second she stepped into the subway, Shaw could tell that something was off. There was a heaviness in the air, much like it had been when they were hiding from Samaritan. But Samaritan was gone, the Machine lived, so Shaw wasn’t sure why there was this feeling in her gut that made it twist. The clacking of keys that had become so familiar wasn’t there, and it made the tunnel entirely too silent for her comfort. 

Shaw kept one hand on the pistol tucked into her waistband and the other drifted up to touch her head. No fuzziness, no sharp glitches. But she couldn’t trust herself. “Root?”

By the time she turned the corner, Shaw began to hear voices. Loud, angry voices. Or really, just one voice. Her voice. It was crackly and tinny, coming through the speakers inside the subway car, and immediately, Shaw knew what Root was doing. She found the hacker hunched over her keyboard, tears in her eyes, as she listened to another Shaw rip apart the safehouse, a drunken mess. She recognized the audio even without having to look at the timestamp in the corner of the black screen. It was just about a month and a half after everything had happened, and the losses she’d suffered hit her, harder than she’d ever thought was possible. It had been a bad night, and Root didn’t need to hear what happened next.

Stepping forward to shut it off, her hand stilled as Root spoke. 

“Don’t.”

The voice was hard, edged in steel, even though Shaw could hear the tears in it. She struggled against it, wanting to spare Root from having to listen her self-destruction, but somehow she knew that this was something Root needed. So instead, she stepped back and let the memory play out with a stoic expression on her face.

Mostly it was gibberish, yells that held a primal grief that made Shaw’s stomach clench uncomfortably because she didn’t know she could sound like she felt so much. It was the cries of a wounded animal, bellowing and raging to keep the adrenaline up so the pain would stay at bay. But eventually she quieted and Shaw could see in her mind’s eye what happened next. She shuffled into the bathroom, leaving behind the destruction she’d wrought. A part of her was glad that there was no video footage because she looked awful. The sound of glass crunching made her pause. That would have been her shattering the mirror.

There was a rasp as she pulled back the shower curtain, and the squeak of the faucets as she turned the shower on. Shaw had done this because she knew there were bugs in the safehouse. She knew the words she spoke next, and she hadn’t wanted the Machine to hear, but apparently it hadn’t been good enough.

“This isn’t real. It’s just a simulation. Wake up. Just wake up damn it. Wake me up. You already got what you wanted, let me OUT!” The last word was easily audible over the sound of the water. A loud bang as she slammed her head against the tile. “Do you hear me? I want out! I’m tired of your fucking games. I’ll cut this fucking chip out of my head and shove it down your wrinkled British throat!” Her voice sounded raw and desperate, punctuated by tiny sniffles, barely heard over the interference. “Please... Let’s just start again.”

The recording cut off abruptly and Shaw blinked twice, brought back to the present. Root was still facing the screens, and a long silence stretched between them. Shaw was uncomfortable at how vulnerable she had sounded, at knowing that Root heard her like that. Begging and desperate for it to end. It was too much, and Shaw wanted to turn on her heel, to run like she always did when emotions were involved. But this was Root, who saw her for who she was, so she stayed put, shifting her weight from one leg to the other.

As soon as they had managed to shake off Vigilance and finally get to safety, Shaw had gone back to where she’d last seen Root. Of course, the ISA wasn’t sloppy. All evidence of a shootout was gone, with the pungent smell of bleach filling the hallways and rooms that she’d run through only hours before. They were long gone, though Shaw had expected as much when she came back. 

Shaw wasn’t sure why this bothered her so much. Root had been helpful, undoubtedly, but she was a nuisance at best. She wasn’t a part of the team, at least not in any real capacity, yet each time she remembered leaving Root at Hersh’s mercy, she couldn’t help but compare it to the way she had been forced to leave Cole’s body behind all those months ago. It was stupid. Shaw didn’t do feelings or friendships. Hell, she hadn’t even known that Cole had been in love with her until he was bleeding out in her arms. So how did Root get under her skin so easily?

Bear was lying on the floor beside her, head resting on his paws when suddenly he perked up, nose tilted up in the air. Shaw reached for her pistol, ready to defend their base of operations, but Bear didn’t seem overly concerned. He got up, padding slowly towards the door and she followed him, gun raised and ready to shoot. She hadn’t expected Root to come stumbling through the door moments later, looking like hell. Holstering her gun, Shaw quickly bridged the gap between them, eyes narrowing as she took in Root’s physical state. The tremors and track marks on her arms told her all she needed to know, and she half-dragged Root towards the back of the library, where a small cot was set up for when they had long cases or needed a quick rest. Snagging a bottle of water from the fridge, she pressed it into Root’s hands. “Drink.”

/why/

in settings, uncheck 'always serve blog over ssl' and it should work. i had to do that too x_x

fatherofmachine replied to your post “and now i join the faction of people screaming at pop-ups for not...”

[ I dont know what causes it, but you can accidentally make the popup script "trying to load from unauthentic sources" & it's like .. ??????????? what ?? ]