sixthiterationlogs | i know you're bleeding, but you'll be okay.

Entry tags:

i know you're bleeding, but you'll be okay.

WHO: Stella Gibson
WHERE: The inn + Stella and Peggy's house
WHEN: Backdated to early October
OPEN TO: OTA except where marked
WARNINGS: This post got more sad than anticipated :( Otherwise, none as yet.

ota;

Stella first notices something's wrong when Credence doesn't show up to meet her for tea at the inn one evening like he'd suggested. This is Credence Barebone, whom she's always known to be a conscientious, punctual young man, who would have warned her in advance if he'd planned to meet her somewhere and then couldn't make it. It's still possible he's been waylaid by something minor, but Stella learned a long time ago to listen to her gut instincts, and her gut is telling her something feels off. She waits till the next morning to go on the hunt — and what she finds is an empty house, both Credence and Graves gone, their things left about as if they'd suddenly got up and run off in the middle of something... or been abducted, or simply vanished. She doesn't touch anything or take anything, because it's not hers to take, but she's seen enough people suddenly disappear from the village to know what's happened here.

It occurs to her, too, that she hasn't seen Sonny since the day she pulled him out of the fountain after he'd nearly drowned trying to get himself home, and a cursory check reveals much the same scenario. Then she hears from Peggy that she hasn't seen Steve, and fuck, it must be the time of year — it must be autumn, with the way the weather's turning and the note she'd made in her diary this morning about how she's been here nearly a year now when she arrived in the middle of winter. It's just a season, and Stella's far from superstitious, but autumn in so many cultures means loss and melancholy. Or maybe it's just the observers, fucking with them again as always.

There are reasons Stella doesn't allow herself to get too close to people, though the reasons here and at home are different — here, it's out of self-protection against scenarios just like this one, when inevitably someone she cares about will disappear. The problem, naturally, is that she's a human woman and it's in human nature to want to care about things and people, and she can only do so much to control when that happens. Her many years of practice at keeping her emotions carefully regulated keeps her from showing too much of what she's feeling on her face, but anyone who happens to run into her while she's sitting in the inn common room with her usual cup of herbal tea that evening will notice she seems a little more distant than usual.

It's been nearly a year, she realizes again, which means it's got to be nearly her birthday. And Stella usually doesn't care one way or the other about her birthday but shit, she'd meant to be spending her 45th birthday at home in London after putting Paul Spector behind bars like he'd deserved, not trapped in what amounts to a fucking prison herself.

locked to peggy;

Stella has her tea, and allows herself time to converse with a couple of people, but eventually she makes her way back to the house. By now it's nearly dark; she goes to her bedroom and fetches the quilt off her bed, then goes back to the living room, lights a couple of candles, and sits down on the sofa with the quilt draped over her to wait up for Peggy. It's not winter-cold, not even close, but she's always felt cold easily and the extra layer helps.

Peggy had gone out to look for Steve earlier, and though Stella had offered to go with her she'd insisted otherwise. There's a lot of ground to cover in this village and the one on the other side of the canyon wall both, and it might have gone easier with two people, but Peggy's as stubborn as she is and Stella knows she can only get so far with her when she's so determined.

She's half-asleep when she hears the front door open and close; the sound wakes her up completely, and she pushes off the quilt and gets off the sofa to meet Peggy halfway. Maybe there's some good news out of this terrible fucking day — but by the look Stella can see on the other woman's face, she doesn't think so.

She waits, quiet, to let Peggy broach the topic — to allow her the time to collect her thoughts.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Something looks different from what Beverly has come to recognize in Stella. Whether or not she might normally make her way over, she does today, both to say hello to a friend and to check on someone who clearly isn't feeling her best. Beverly is nothing if not overly caring and she knows well the kinds of things that can happen here. Maybe not as well as some people, but certainly well enough by now.

Her approach is slow, but purposeful, giving Stella enough time to notice her and either welcome her or give her a hint that she'd rather be left alone. Beverly wouldn't blame Stella for wanting to be alone. Sometimes that does feel good, though Beverly is usually far too social to isolate herself for long.

"Mind if I join you?" she asks kindly once she's finally made her way over. She offers a small but warm and inviting sort of smile, one she hopes won't make Stella feel invaded or threatened. Beverly is here as a concerned friend, to offer support and comfort as best she can.

Stella should be annoyed, probably, to be so easily read. She's been through so much worse than this before, emotionally, and she thinks she ought to be able to keep a tighter lid on her feelings. She'll be... not fine, no one here is actually fine, or even really okay most of the time, no matter what they say — but she'll cope.

Beverly's kindness is appreciated for what it is — an attempt at being supportive — but Stella is and has always been hard-put to accept comfort of any sort from anyone, having learned at a young age to carry her own weight in that regard. She isn't very good at sharing.

But she smiles, a thin shadow of a smile that doesn't quite reach her eyes, and her gaze flicks briefly in the direction of the facing chair. "Be my guest," she says.

Stella shifts in her chair, leaning a little more on the table as Beverly sits down, taking a sip of her tea and debating what to say next. Eventually she decides just to come right out with it.

"We've lost three people over the past few days. Maybe four." The words are quiet, calm, but underneath it Stella just sounds tired. She doesn't know what's happened to Steve Rogers yet; Peggy's gone off looking for him, but Stella, not optimistic after this morning, has her doubts he'll turn up. Peggy's going to be heartbroken — another reason why Stella needs to keep herself on an even keel, because if her closest friend in this place has lost the man she loves for a third time, Stella wants to be able to be there for her.

"There haven't been any bodies, so I've assumed they were—" She cuts herself off, pauses, begins again. "'Sent home' might be wrong; we don't know where people go when they disappear here. But I think most of us would like to believe as much."

It's better than... whatever the alternative might be; Stella doesn't especially want to think about it.

Whatever type of person Stella is, she's not likely to deter Beverly from offer any kind of support she can to a friend in need. That's just the type of person she is and she learned long ago that she sometimes has to be a little more forceful as a doctor with some people, the ones who don't like letting anyone help them. Her approach isn't forceful with emotional support, but she always likes to make sure that everyone she meets knows she is someone they can lean on.

Whether they ever take her up on that is entirely their choice.

A little bit of relief bubbles up inside her at Stella's acceptance of her presence. If Stella had asked to be left alone, Beverly would have obliged, as disappointed as she might have felt. But she's glad that Stella lets her join her and so Beverly settles into a chair and waits, letting Stella decide what, if anything, to say. When Stella finally does speak, it's nothing that Beverly had been hoping to hear. Hardly unexpected, but still she knows how much it likely stings.

"There's always a chance that they'll come back," Beverly offers softly, "for whatever small comfort that is. I don't think any of us really like to believe anything other than that people are sent home." It's too gruesome to bear and for all that she might be something of an idealist, even Beverly can come up with many alternatives, each more unpleasant than the last. "That was always my least favorite part about being a doctor: losing people. It never really gets any easier, not even here."

She wishes dearly that something could dull that ache, but she knows through personal experience that nothing can or will. She remembers losing Jack so long ago, the hardest of the personal losses she can remember, and she knows if anything happens to Jean-Luc here, she'll be just as upset. If these people were people Stella was close to, Beverly can easily imagine how devastating it might be for her.

"Is there anything I can do?" Probably not, but she has to ask anyway.

"No." Stella's voice is soft, but decisive, and she shakes her head slightly for emphasis. "I'll be fine." There is, in fact, nothing Beverly can do. The loss comes and goes in waves, but it's not the first time this has happened and it's not even the worst loss she's experienced. Nothing has really devastated her quite like her father's death thirty years ago. She thinks she might be able to withstand anything, after that.

That doesn't mean the smaller losses don't sting, though. Both her hands close around her teacup to keep them occupied, and she turns away slightly, staring into the fireplace.

"I have a friend at home, a forensic pathologist." She still isn't totally sure friend is the right word to use for Reed, but it's the only one that makes any sense. "She was more comfortable working with corpses than with living victims. I suppose it must be easier when it's someone you've already lost, and not someone you might lose."

A flicker of a smile, something halfway like an apology; she realizes she's digressed a bit, and gets to the point. "I've not thought much about what it's like, from that end of things."

Stella isn't a doctor, and the hard sciences were never her forte. She's used to seeing victims, dead and living alike, but from a policing point of view.

Beverly isn't so sure that "fine" is the word she would use in this situation, but she's not about to press Stella on the subject. It isn't her business if Stella doesn't want to tell her and besides, she's not the counselor. For all that the whole village probably could use one.

Beverly's head tilts a little bit at that thought, weighing the various losses she has already felt in her life. "I guess it depends on how close you were to the person when they were alive," she points out slowly. "I don't think it's easy either way. It's still a life lost, no matter how you look at it."

Which doesn't really help the situation much. Beverly tilts back, straightening slightly and giving her head a toss so her hair falls behind her a bit more. It wasn't easy when it was Jack, but it also was never easy when it was someone she didn't know.

"That's why I became a doctor: to save lives. Sometimes you succeed... and sometimes you don't. You just learn to live with it, painful as it is."

Jean-Luc can't say that he really knows Stella very much. He's seen her in passing a time or two, yes. But he could say that about most of the village at this point, save for those who have a tendency to keep to themselves at the best of times, and it certainly doesn't translate to having any real familiarity with any of the individuals in question. Admittedly, he's fairly certain that he's reading the way she seems to be withdrawn correctly, but that doesn't mean that he has the slightest idea as to why.

Still, he figures it can't entirely hurt to at least see if she's willing to tolerate a conversation with a near stranger, and he makes his way over with his own cup of tea without too much of a second thought.

"Do you mind if I sit here?"

He gestures to a nearby chair, close enough that conversation could be a thing if she should so choose, but not so close as to make things entirely strange either, given that he's will aware that he's not much more than a stranger to her at this point.

Stella considers telling him to go away, especially considering there are other tables in the room at which he can sit — but she doesn't. She allows herself to study him for a moment, remembering where she's seen him before; Stella makes enough of a point to know names and faces and residences in the village that she knows his name is Jean-Luc Picard and that he lives with Beverly, but outside of that, they're only passingly acquainted. She doesn't really intend to change that, but she could say that about a lot of relationships she's developed here.

"If you'd like," she says, polite, the implication there under her tone that she might not be an especially good conversation partner just at the moment. But... well, her therapist from all those years ago told her it wasn't good for her mental or emotional well-being to avoid contact with other people when she's in a poor mood, and while her success at following that advice has been variable at best over the years, she seems to be recalling it a little now. After all, if she really wanted to be alone, she wouldn't be here in the inn — she'd be in her house, in her bedroom with the door shut.

She isn't good at small talk, but right this instant she doesn't want to talk about what's bothering her, either. Stella waits for him to sit down, studying him over the rim of her cup, aware of his straight, dignified bearing and the way he really, really doesn't look like he belongs here. Neither of them do.

"It's just a shame it isn't real tea," she says, with a very small, very brief smile and a pointed glance at the cup in his hands. Even calling it 'tea' at all is a bit of a stretch — it's more of a tisane concocted from whatever bits of plants and bark they've found around the woods that taste all right together. What she wouldn't give for her good black tea from home.

Fortunately, small talk isn't something that Jean-Luc expects. He's not always been great at it himself, and even apart from that, he can tell that this is clearly a situation where small talk isn't particularly likely. But that's perfectly fine by him and if all he can do is offer a little company in what is clearly a less than enjoyable moment, he'll count that as good enough. Even if he doesn't expect that he's as good a listener as, say, Guinan.

(Although to be fair, she has certain advantages on that front.)

"I know the feeling," he answers with a nod, once Stella does actually speak up. "Like I shouldn't complain about there being at least this much, but at the same time, I've found myself missing proper tea."

Earl Grey in specific, but at this point, he's starting to think that he'd take anything that was closer to actual tea than what they've currently managed. Enough so that he's actually caught himself wondering how much trouble it would be to grow what they'd need to make even a simple black tea. Even if it is a project that will have to wait until the weather starts warming up again.

"I don't mean to be rude..." comes a quiet voice from the edges of her peripheral vision. Quiet, but not soft or hesitant. Natasha takes one step to move into Stella's line of vision properly, her hands curled around her own mug, obtained more for the warmth than the desire to drink the liquid inside. "But you look awful."

She doesn't know the other woman very well, their one real interaction brief, casual, and interrupted by an approaching moose. Natasha doesn't care who in this village thinks he's adorable and harmless. A moose is a disaster waiting to happen, and it's not like there's an emergency room to get anyone to in this place should shit go pear shaped. She has the sense, though, that direct is the best way to go. She has the sense that Stella won't be offended by a blunt observation. It's not a question of pretty or not, capable or not, strong or not, she just looks like she feels awful.

Stella lets out a huff of breath in response to that remark, something that could be close to a laugh in another circumstance, and there's a brief urge to respond with is it that obvious? or some other sarcastic rejoinder that she has to suppress. It's a very blunt observation, but it's not wrong. Stella's morose, she's tired, she hates this entire fucking village and she wants, more than anything, to go home. Home where she has some modicum of control over her own life and the small handful of people she's let herself care about aren't going to suddenly disappear into thin air on a whim.

None of these, of course, are sentiments she would express out loud, especially not to a woman who's only an acquaintance. That said, she'd liked Natasha from the brief conversation they'd had, before some of the friendly local wildlife had got a little too friendly for comfort. She seems like a woman who's got her shit together, more or less, which Stella always appreciates. She regards Natasha a moment, then nods slightly at the chair across from her at the table, an invitation to sit down if the other woman wants to.

"There've been a few more disappearances," she says, without elaborating who or when, although she will if asked — all the same, Natasha can probably infer, just from Stella's reaction, that at least some of those disappearances were people close to her. Her voice is steady, even, the tone of a woman practiced at keeping her emotions on a tight leash. Just because there's a little slack in that metaphorical leash right now doesn't mean she's not going to do her best to stay composed.

"I suppose it's probably best to believe they've gone home. Assuming the observers are capable of being that charitable."

It's obvious, yes, but Natasha's powers of observation are hardly run of the mill. It would probably be apparent to almost anyone, but to Natasha it might as well be a flashing neon sign. This community is small, and they can't all lose hope. She doesn't think she's exactly the best qualified person for psychological support, but she's also probably not the worst. Had plenty of experience from the other side, at least.

Natasha sinks down into the seat when it's offered, mug on table and hands still around the mug. "Who is it this time?" She has an air of resignation and acceptance. It's not like there's anything they can do about it. She also chooses to believe that people are sent home, because she can't stop the disappearances, and thinking of all those who are left as dead...

Yeah, no.

"Credence Barebone, Percival Graves, and Sonny Carisi. Possibly Steve Rogers, as well, from what I've heard from Peggy."

And there might be more, considering there are a couple of other houses in the village that have seemed a bit too quiet recently, but those are only the people she's got any sort of connection to. Stella turns her teacup between her hands, eyes on the liquid rather than on Natasha's face for a moment, as if somehow she can find answers there that she knows she isn't going to get. There's nothing they can do — but that's really what stings the most. If there's any feeling Stella hates more than the rest, it's the feeling of being powerless.

She shakes her head, sitting back in her chair a little, visibly frustrated for a moment before careful practice works to conceal it. "It all feels so arbitrary. I imagine that's probably the point."

Natasha nods slowly. "I knew about Steve." The tabs she keeps on her people aren't the closest, but thy exist. The others are news, and while she's not even slightly sad to hear that Credence and Percival are gone, she's not insensitive enough to say so. "I didn't know about the other three. Were you close? I'm sorry." She can be sorry that someone else is hurting without regretting the circumstances causing their pain.

"Don't let it break you. If they want to see how much it takes for us to crack, I'll be damned if I give them the satisfaction."

Stella's not entirely sure close is the right word, just because she's so rarely ever used that word to describe relationships with men of any sort — although she supposes they must have been or she wouldn't be so affected. Credence, she thinks, saw her as a mentor figure of sorts; and she's still not entirely sure where she stood with Graves, although they had that camaraderie of two people who have a great deal in common. Sonny was a fellow police officer, and probably the only person in the village who really understood her on a professional level.

So yes, the loss hurts, but she's known much deeper loss than this before, and she knows what she's feeling right now is temporary. She looks up to meet Natasha's eyes at her last words, and they must have been the right thing to say, because Stella's shoulders pull a little straighter in spite of her weariness. "No, of course not," she says, and underneath the quiet pitch of her voice is a trace of steel. The observers have tried to break her before; it didn't work, and this certainly isn't going to, either.

"I think we're all a great deal more resilient than they expected. It must be disappointing." And she's not sorry to disappoint in this regard at all.

Natasha smiles, something vicious and challenging in it, though not directed at Stella. It's the steel in the spine of someone who has bent many, many times in their life so as to not break, then been broken anyway, and found a way to remake themselves even stronger. It's the steel of someone who will not be kept down. Steel finds steel, and whatever the form, however it's been shaped and cultivated, it takes someone on the inside looking out to know that those who have it are still people, can still be hurt, and still need support.

"Well, then, I am absolutely thrilled to be a disappointment." She takes a sip of her drink to punctuate the statement. It's not that bad. It warms her from the inside out, even if she doesn't particularly care for the taste. "You know what would be make us even bigger disappointments?"

There's an edge to this woman that she hadn't seen before given the casual nature of their previous meeting, a sharpness that Stella likes, immediately. She's always glad to see there's someone here who can still manage the willpower, despite everything that's happened, to tell their captors to fuck off — to not get complacent, or throw her hands in the air and give up. That particular sort of strength is attractive, in more ways than one.

She's studying Natasha a little more closely now, and if nothing else, the dry banter helps. Her slight smile echoes the other woman's, worn and emotionally bruised but, all the same, layered with an unyielding fierceness.

"I can hardly imagine what we haven't done," she says, "short of finding a way out of this place in their despite." For all the obstacles that have been thrown in their way, they've managed to overcome all of them. If the observers' goal is to see what it takes to make them break, they're failing spectacularly.

Natasha smirks, shakes her head. "No. That's a reaction that fits within any fucked up social experiment. Solve the problem, give up, escape, rage, quit. These are the things that can fit into the boxes of almost any observational model. Try to make the best of things. That's what people do. The way you really screw their model? The way you absolutely enrage someone who's trying to break you? Enjoy it. Find a way to like it." She's not necessarily speaking about the situation they're currently in, but she's also not serving up any more information than that. They might currently be in the same boat, but she doesn't know Stella, and Stella doesn't know her. While she's happy to give glimpses into her past, the specifics aren't on offer.

"So find something. Any of us being happy has got to fuck with them. Alternately?" She reaches into the backpack that's currently sitting near her feet and pulls out a metal flask, shakes it in a way that implies there's alcohol in it. "Drink."

Natasha's talking about herself while not openly doing so, giving indirect examples that could apply to anyone; Stella only recognizes it because she does it herself. She's curious, because she's a detective and the instinct to press for more information is ingrained by now, but she has enough tact not to push her luck right at the moment. They're not friends, Stella doesn't really intend to get to know her in that sense (although she didn't intend that with Peggy, either, but look what happened), and she has enough expertise in intentionally withholding personal information as a tactic to keep herself from being too vulnerable that she can respect someone else's wish to do the same thing.

She can see Natasha's point, even if she can't completely see herself using that tactic effectively — there have been brief moments, periods where she's enjoyed herself at something she's done here in the village, but liking something about her circumstances in the long term, that's another story. She has a project or two to keep her afloat, because without something to do here she might well go mad, but being something resembling happy with her life here is something else.

Maybe she's just never allowed that for herself; maybe she's thought that if she's got any semblance of happiness here, she'll forget she wants to go home. And maybe that's rubbish — but it's the way she's operated, up until now.

There's a slight arch of her brows, amused and mildly impressed, as Natasha produces the flask from her pack. Stella has to wonder if she's been saving that since the last feast. "I'm certainly not one to argue with a good scotch," she admits. Or whatever's in the flask, if Natasha's offering; she is slowly learning to be less choosy here. Stella knows she can't always hope she's going to get a bottle of 18-year Macallan on her doorstep.

It is from the feast, yes. Natasha made full use of Neil as her personal pack mule and hauled as much as she could home at the end of the evening. It's why she currently has a stockpile of preserved fruits, veggies, and meats in her home, none of it particular appetizing, but all of it viable nutrition. She has been keeping it secret not to hoard, but because she wants it to be a genuine last resort for the group. That doesn't work if they know it's there. It's in her nature to wait for the other shoe to drop. When it does, they won't starve. Not for a while, anyway. Clint knows it's there, and so does Wanda, in case something gets to Natasha first. Part of that stockpile is alcohol, various half full bottles from the buffet table. That's a different kind of cache, proving a different kind of control. Knowing it's there, and that she doesn't give in, that's for Natasha's own mental well-being.

She carries some around for largely the same reason. Because it would be so easy to focus on the bad, to give in and run through her whole supply in quick succession, give herself a few days of drunken oblivion where she doesn't have to notice or care about anything. She doesn't give in. It's important for her that she knows, every evening, she went one more day without giving up on everything.

"You know what? Considering how long we've been here, I think we actually can go ahead and upgrade this whiskey to good." She screws off the top and pours a little into her own mug before passing it to Stella. So, today she gives in a little bit. Accepting that Steve is gone, it's a rough one, and it won't get better for a while. That one stings.

Whether it's actually any good or not doesn't matter much to Stella right now, although from what she remembers of the alcohol they had at the feast, it was actually fairly quality. She doesn't need to be drunk, either, but this might be enough to warm her mood a little, take the edge off the loss and the exhaustion. Her fingers brush Natasha's, briefly, as she reaches to take the flask, adding a bit of its contents to the tea-stuff in her cup.

A sip later, and she's not totally sure the whisky goes with whatever's in the tea, but she doesn't exactly care right now. The familiar burn is nice, and for a half-second she remembers another conversation with another beautiful woman in a Belfast hotel bar, involving scotch and martinis and very resolutely avoiding talking about feelings of any sort. Natasha isn't Reed Smith, of course, but there's something here in the way there'd immediately been something with Reed — even if it's just the mutual understanding of two people in the same bad situation. Less connection than commiseration.

"Mm. I think it's been nearly a year," she says, meaning a year since she arrived here. Natasha's been here a bit less than that, but as far as Stella's concerned, any amount of time is too long. She runs the pad of her thumb around the rim of her cup, thinking. "I was running a serial murder investigation before I came here. It must be wrapped up, by now."

Assuming Spector didn't bleed to death in the woods, assuming Eastwood and the rest of the task force didn't fuck up spectacularly, assuming Jim got his shit together... There are too many variables here, and she doesn't like it. Peggy suggested to her once that maybe time stops at home while they're here, or that maybe they're returned to when they came from if the observers let them go — that doesn't have any basis in fact, but if it's true, it'd be a hell of a lot easier than imagining the sort of chaos that would have ensued with Operation Musicman suddenly missing its senior investigating officer.

Natasha nods her head, sips from her mug. "About six months." Though, she is inclined to agree that any amount of time is far too long. "I was traveling." There is the faintest hesitation before the last word, but Natasha is good at her job, and it's entirely reasonable to think that she was simply trying to think of a way to summarize her situation in one word rather than looking for a lie.

It's technically true, of course. Being on the run is traveling. Fleeing is traveling. Natasha doesn't want to think about what it might mean if time does pass while they're gone. The world in such a state, her friends in need of so much help. No, that won't help her mood at all. So, she puts it out of her mind, partitions it off, locks it away. No use to her. "Yours sounds more interesting."

'Traveling' sounds a bit like an oversimplification, and the hesitation says something, but Stella's not completely sure what. She's used to hearing lies — that happens, when you work in law enforcement — but she doesn't know enough about Natasha or her situation to be able to discern whether she's lying or not.

Not that it actually matters, right now — but Stella still has to take a moment to turn off her natural instinct to probe further. She doesn't need to, here.

"'Interesting' is a word for it, I suppose." But it's not a word Stella would use. Paul Spector is only interesting insofar as she'd spent weeks, months, trying to figure out his mindset, and as such she'd got tangled up in thinking about what made him tick. He's still a murderer and a sadistic misogynist who deserves to rot in prison.

"The suspect we were trying to catch was targeting young women. We'd only just arrested him."

And last Stella recalls, he'd been shot in her custody, was bleeding to death in her arms. She has no idea whether he's dead or alive.

Stella making a space for herself in the Inn common room with a cup of tea has become so routine for Benedict that he doesn't even give her a second glance, most nights. He tends to leave her more or less alone, allowing her to enjoy her nightly tea in peace, but there's something in the cast of her face tonight, the almost brittle angle of her shoulders, that makes him feel like he should at least go and say hello.

Having grown up with two sisters and his cousin Gwen in close proximity, he knows better than to approach a potentially-upset woman empty-handed.

"Don't tell Kate I'm pilfering her stores," he says as he settles himself down beside her, holding out a small plate with one of Kate's rare attempts at cookies perfectly placed in the middle, sweetened with the honey Benedict carefully hoards in the kitchen and doesn't let anyone else touch for fear of depleting their hard-won cache. "But you looked like you might appreciate a little treat."

To be honest, Stella is not normally fond of sweets; she has always had a bit more of a savory tooth. But Benedict's offering is made in good faith, and Stella finds herself, despite her mood, hard put to turn it down. She smiles, slight and brief, murmurs a thank you, and takes the plate with the biscuit, putting it down next to her teacup — intending to actually eat it, although she doesn't try it just yet.

"We've a few more people missing," she admits after a moment. "Sent home, I suppose, although there's no telling for sure."

He nods with a quiet hum, glancing between her face and the fireplace he'd laid earlier in the evening. Someone has come along and replenished the wood inside it: it's burning merrily away and he doesn't feel the need to bend down and fiddle with it.

"I've noticed," he agrees, his voice low. "A fair number of the old guard are gone." Those who were here before him, the people he'd grown used to seeing around.

It makes him uneasy. He ought to go looking for answers, but none have been found just yet and he's so busy with preparations for winter that the thought of going spelunking in the fountain like some others have before just doesn't appeal. Perhaps he should feel guilty about that. He doesn't.

"It might be too much to hope that whatever purpose the observers intended to use them for was fulfilled and they let them go," she says. "Otherwise we might be able to learn why they're keeping us here and exploit it."

It's wishful thinking, and she knows it. She's tried to find a pattern in the people who've disappeared, using the same methodology she would put to a list of a serial murderer's victims to look for commonalities, but as far as she can tell it's totally arbitrary.

"Instead, all we've got are theories." Stella clearly finds this frustrating; there's a tightening of her expression, in the clear warm firelight, that only serves to emphasize how weary she seems.

Peggy has seen worse days, to be sure, but those worse days revolved around the same grief she's facing now. It's the loss of someone dear to her and she's begun to realize that it's a rotating wheel. Whether it's Michael or Steve or Colleen or Steve again, she ends up without them after opening up her heart. At least she hadn't told Steve that she loved him, at least they hadn't actually decided to try anything.

She's not entirely sure she could have borne the heart-ache if she had. Rousing from bed for the first time, with sunset nearing, she tugs on a blouse and her trousers, though she cares nothing about the wrinkles or the poor look of them. She goes out and she searches for Steve, but finds nothing. She looks for Barnes, but can't find trace of him either. Then, she returns home and feels weary and worn, wishing she still had some alcohol left.

"If you're expecting any good news, I can spoil that for you right now," she says, keeping her voice steady despite how it wants so badly to shake. "I found nothing."

Stella isn't sure what she was expecting, although after finding Credence and Graves and Sonny missing this morning, she doesn't think she was expecting much. Peggy is trying, very hard, not to show her grief and loss and exhaustion, but all the same Stella knows she must be feeling it — and Stella feels it with her, in the way that one does with close friends.

"Peggy, I am so sorry," she says, soft and completely genuine — but even as she says the words, Stella knows they're not enough. Words never really are in a situation like this one. There's compassion in her eyes, and she lays one hand on Peggy's forearm, squeezing gently, the usual restrained physical comfort — but that's not really enough either, the action falling short of what she wants to express.

So she extends the gesture into a careful embrace, tilting up slightly as she reaches forward to draw Peggy in close. It's warm and gentle and she's entirely conscious of the fact that neither of them are really much for this sort of thing; her hold is loose enough that Peggy can pull away the moment she feels she needs to. At the same time, she doesn't have any words at all that can adequately convey this, the feeling that she is sorry for what's happened, and that she hasn't gone anywhere after all.

She's not entirely sure that sympathy is what she wants to hear right now, but it could just be what she needs. She keeps her jaw strung tight, but she ends up collapsing into the embrace, because she can either manage to stand on her own two feet or she can lean on someone else and right now, that seems far easier. "It's hardly your fault," Peggy says, trying to be strong about this, but it's a madly ridiculous thing and she holds onto Stella for a moment before easing back to fix her face and her hair.

"Any luck on your end?" she asks, of Stella's own search. She's not entirely sure she's ready to hear whatever the news is, but she needs to ask.

Stella knows it's not her fault, but that doesn't stop her from wanting to help, even if it's just with something simple: a hug like this that she wouldn't give to just anyone. She's more than familiar with the desire to hold back, to not appear to show weakness, and she knows the temptation to withdraw emotionally, but she also knows it can be counterproductive sometimes; and if anything she hopes Peggy knows it's all right to let her guard down a little here, when Stella isn't going to think less of her.

When Peggy pulls away, Stella lets her, taking a step back to give her a little space, but not going very far. At the question, she pauses, then shakes her head. She feels a little better about this now than she did a while ago, but there's still an air of weariness about her. "No," she says, "they've gone, too." All back to New York, though of different time periods — if she's remembering properly, and assuming the observers do let them go home. She's not sure what would be waiting for Credence and Graves exactly, although she has an inkling, and perhaps it's not much better than this place: a somber thought. But Sonny had nearly drowned himself trying to get home through the fountain, and for his sake Stella really does hope he got what he wanted.

"Should I put the kettle on?" she asks, because she wouldn't mind another cup of tea and she's guessing Peggy might like one. She remembers another evening not dissimilar to this, and not too terribly long ago, when Steve had vanished from this place the first time and Peggy had been crying ice tears. At least the ice is absent this time — but the tea seems to be a thing they do for each other when this place is at its worst, a familiar ritual for more reasons than just this one.

Peggy breathes in when Stella steps back, to try and reset herself to whatever might be coming next. She's not entirely sure that she's ready for the bad news, but she knows it's going to be on the tip of Stella's tongue and it's better to be prepared for it. Keeping a level-head, she listens to Stella's news and does her best not to react. She got along with Graves just fine, but it's the news of Credence that truly stings.

She still recalls the first time Steve had disappeared and how kind he had been to her, expecting nothing in return. "I don't think that anything can fix this, but tea is as close as we'll get," Peggy agrees, her voice sounding as rough as she feels.

Breathing in sharply, she settles into the chair, absently pressing on her temple as she thinks of all the loss and the grief, but somehow, Steve still sticks out like a sore thumb amongst it all. "Why do you suppose certain of us stay?" she calls, trying to find logic in this. "Are we juicier research subjects, perhaps?"

There's nothing that's going to fix it, and Stella knows that just as well as Peggy does. The tea is a stopgap measure, a small comfort that takes the sharp edge off of the feeling of loss, just a bit. She'd rather whisky if they had any, honestly, but they don't, so this will have to do.

Stella busies herself heating water on the stove; when Peggy calls out the question, she moves into the dining room, close enough to the kitchen still to keep an eye on the kettle and carry on a conversation at the same time.

"Possibly," she says, folding her arms in a careful self-restraining gesture; she can feel her own emotions welling up again, pushing at the boundaries of her self-control. It's not just this loss, but all the other ones, big and small, over her time here. She wishes she had a proper answer for Peggy — she's tried to figure this out, to pin down some reasoning that makes sense, fill in the gaps in the hows and whys; but for all her considerable investigative skill, she can't do it.

"Perhaps it's the opposite; maybe the ones who leave are doing something that we're not, although I've no idea what."

When the kettle boils, she pours the water into the teapot with the tea and brings it out to the dining table along with a couple of cups.

"Or maybe they just want to make us feel powerless." There's a bit of bite under those words that she has to keep in check, for Peggy's sake, since it's not directed at her. There is very little Stella finds more infuriating and more awful than loss of control, and the sense of being toyed with like this has slowly worn on her for months.

"I would have thought that my being an utter pain in the arse would have made them want to get rid of me a long time ago," Peggy says, trying to bring some dry humour into all of this, but it does nothing to edge away the grief. All that it does is make her feel emptier, in a sense, as if nothing that she does is actually going to work.

"I do feel powerless," she confesses, which perhaps isn't something she should say out loud if their captors are listening. After all, perhaps it might give them some sort of power, but she can't help but be honest with a friend. "I've lost Steve so many times, now," she says. "I can do nothing to stop it. I am powerless," she says. "It's not going to stop me trying to find answers, though."

Stella pours the tea, then sits near Peggy, close but not too close, present without pushing. She wants to be here, but not to make Peggy feel stifled. Part of her wants to reach over and take her hand, just for the reassurance, a point of physical connection — but she doesn't, waits for Peggy to reach over first, if she chooses to at all. Grief is a difficult thing, different for each person, and after that initial embrace Stella won't assume Peggy would find physical contact comforting. She doesn't always, herself.

"If that was all it took," she says, echoing Peggy's dry amusement, "that would have made two of us." Stella has, after all, made a point of being as uncooperative here as she possibly can. She lets out a huff of breath, wrapping both hands around her teacup.

"I think they'd very much like it if you gave up," Stella adds, by way of encouraging Peggy to keep her resolve. "Aside from that, I've found that the more difficult things get, the more important it is to keep pushing."

That might be her particular perspective — Stella's natural response to being challenged is to try harder — but it's worked through her whole career and she doubts things are that much different here.

"We are a difficult pair, aren't we?" Peggy remarks, but there's fondness even though she's also feeling rather heavy for all of this. She and Stella have never stopped searching and asking questions and trying to learn more, but all that it's managed to do is put her in precarious positions and when she returns back, it's like she's been punished. Maybe that's the core of it.

Frowning, she glances over at Stella and can't help the connection she's made with her thoughts. "What if the pushing is why they're gone? They know how much we cared for their friendship and companionship, but because of that, our curiosity is why they've been taken." Maybe they're still somewhere, held captive. She knows that looking will do nothing but exhaust her, but she's left Steve in the ice once before, if she's somehow abandoned him here, she's not sure how she can forgive herself that.

There's a brief flicker of a smile in answer. Stella thinks she rather likes being called difficult, just in this particular scenario.

She pauses, taking a sip of tea as she considers that question. After a moment, she shakes her head. It's not that that particular theory is unreasonable, as such, but it's not a rabbit hole she wants to go down.

"It's possible, but I don't think we should let that dissuade us," she says. "Maybe it's a sign we're getting close to the right answers."

Or maybe not — maybe all of this is totally futile — but Stella has to believe that the answers are there, somewhere, and that she just hasn't got to them yet. It's like having a keyring full of hundreds of keys and only one lock, and having to try each one to find the one that fits.

Peggy has had to fight through difficult times before, even when people have died because of her involvement in hard conversations. She'll never forget Colleen and the others, especially because they're all gone because of her. Even then, she'd always pressed forward, just as she had after losing Steve. Loss is something close to her, something she's used to.

It doesn't mean she has to like it. "I don't know about you, but I could use a temporary break in the searching and pushing," she admits, because even though she knows she can keep going, she also needs to be able to breathe. "Let this grief settle, what do you say?"

Not for the first time tonight, Stella thinks she would like to be a little drunk. Not too much — she already knows what's on the other end of that road and decided a long time ago she doesn't like it — but just enough to smooth over the worn edges and make the exhaustion feel less immediate. But they're rather short on alcohol at the moment, and even that would be only a temporary solution.

What really makes this more bearable is not having to deal with the loss alone. Maybe they can hold each other up, and — maybe Peggy's right, maybe what they really need is room to breathe. Just for a little while.

"Of course," she answers. There's a pause, and a sad little smile. "We could talk about literally anything else, if you'd like."

Peggy gives Stella a wry look, mainly because as much as she would absolutely love to say yes to that question, the problem then becomes what they'll talk about in its stead. "If you have something that you think we can discuss that doesn't bring us right back to this subject, I am all ears," she vows.

The trouble is, no matter what Peggy imagines in her mind, it always leads back to this unfortunate same place of grief and loss and frustration, always in circles and inescapable.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

i know you're bleeding, but you'll be okay.

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