#marcusgoddamnvansten

Part 7 of Saboteur

Marcus.

No no no… I need that PA.

Jake was busying himself around the Vansten manor. He'd been doing work for StrexCorp, offering his services to the likes of Ricardo and Caesar while believing his former employer to be... Well, to be dead. It was an unexplainable spell of sorts that influenced him to believe, without the shadow of a doubt, that Marcus Vansten was dead. The only thing that would cure the spell would be to see the billionaire in person but... He hadn't been around.

So Jake went on believing Marcus to be dead, his heart cold and empty and desperate to keep busy. Busy kept his hands from doing something stupid, kept his mind from reeling, kept his heart stopping in his chest. Busy kept him alive. But nothing could make him happy.

Marcus had billions of dollars. And Jake knew that if Marcus himself had been one of those dollars, he'd have been something special. He'd be a commemorative dollar, only one in existence. He'd have graffiti all over him and he'd be worth more than the numbers on his face. He'd be... He had been one in a billion.

Jake was in the Vansten manor. One of them. The 'main' one, really. And he was finally getting a few affairs in order. He'd been telling himself that he was just too busy to see to any of it before. The truth was, he couldn't handle it emotionally.

Even still, as he flips through old tax papers in a dusty filing cabinet, he finds that there's a tightness in his chest. A growing anxiety and a chilling sadness.

And then there's a sound. His anxiety spikes, turning quickly to anger. Was someone stealing from the Vansten manor? Really? Did no one have respect for the deceased?

His heels clacked with fury as he crossed the hall, throwing the door open with a raging fire in his eyes.

But upon seeing who was under the $700 curtains, wings flapping with the sunlight sparkling off of golden feathers, the fire went out. Like a hurricane to a matchstick.

He took a deep breath, helpless against the tears that immediately raced down his cheeks and the realization that flooded over him, drowning out whatever demented spell had been hazing his mind for months. For what felt like the longest time, not a single muscle in his body so much as twitched.

Finally, with a great swell of warmth in his chest, artificial heart pounding with joy, he cried, "Marcus! You--!! You--!!"

His knees buckled and he had to catch himself on the doorframe. He tried to rub the tears from his eyes but he admitted defeat to the overwhelming sense of relief that consumed him. All the relief in his life put together couldn't amount to the thrill that was making his hands shake.

Abducting Jake Lin and swapping his heart out with a biomechanical replacement may have succeeded in luring Marcus Vansten to StrexCorp, however if the company believes the angelic billionaire is going to meekly acquiesce to their demands, they're sorely mistaken

Part 2 of the Saboteur series.  Part 1, Artificial Heart, can be found here.

[[the mun is fuckin talented and makes everyone love characters they never expected to love. because she knows how to make a fuckin character, let me tell you. and her marcus is, hands down, my absolute favorite marcus ever. cranor and fink could slap me in the face and tell me he's the farthest thing from canon and i'd slap them back and tell them they missed out on having the PERFECT CHARACTER. not that they would but FOR MARCUS, and for all of nami's characters, i would slap anyone in the face.