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ransomhazard:

There’s very little keeping him from panicking here, but he focuses on what is. Focuses on Rebel, who clearly needs him to be the anchor here, to figure out a way to fix this, focuses on Mal, who he can tell just from a look is about as worried about this whole mess as he is, which is just more proof he made the right choice to bring them along, because they get it, and they care about Journey and Rebel, and the whole family, really, enough to know this is going to be a balancing act of making sure none of them end up in worse danger than they already are, while also figuring out a way to do their job. He used to thrive off of this shit, solving problems that seemed impossible, hell, it’s still something he loves, or else he wouldn’t have bothered sticking with the aurors, but this is different. This is his family.

Before he can say anything else, Rebel goes on, that sturdy wall finally breaking, and she crosses the office to him, burying her face in his chest, and in a way that halts the panic in its tracks. It’s instinct, after all, to want to do anything he can to make sure his daughter doesn’t have to keep feeling like this. He wraps his arms around her, one hand moving to her hair, that instinctual gesture of comfort, like she’s ten again, and one of the other girls said something mean. “It’s alright, sweetheart, that’s why we’re here. We’ll figure it out,” he reassures her quietly, giving her all the time she needs like that. After a few minutes, her sobs quiet, and she pulls back still staying close. He nods as Mal speaks up, keeping a hand on her, steady, and again he’s infinitely grateful for Mal, and how they somehow know exactly how to handle this.

“No real names, like most of the Black Lantern’s clients; just information. I was in contact with the weapon’s specialist, an older woman, by the sound of things. I’ll get everything sent to both of you…” she explains with a sniffle, voice still shaky, even as she pulls out her telekit. “The artifact, it’s an antique magical gun. Something aurors used to use.”

He wishes that he had been put on an NBO case before now, but there’s nothing to do about it now. Magical guns, though, is a whole different concern, but the fact that it’s related, somehow, to old aurors means they’ve got a leg up here. “Luckily, we’ve got plenty of people who can help with that.” he asks gently. “And if they’re waiting for the rest of a shipment, it means we have time, but we’re not going to leave Journey with them, I promise. Let us get you back to my place, I don’t want you on your own right now. We can go through everything while you get some rest.”

There’s something so strange, about watching Ransom like this, watching everything else disappear from his face as he lets Rebel cry into his chest, as he holds her like she’s still a little kid and lets her be vulnerable for a few minutes until she can pull herself together. It’s a softness they’ve never really seen, with him, until so recently, one they passively knew probably had to exist if he still had decent relationships with all seven of his daughters, but one that just hadn’t been a part of the vocabulary either of them used with the other, hadn’t had a place in the world they both happened to navigate together.

Ransom’s voice is so much softer, when Rebel finally pulls away, when he reassures her that they’ll fix this for her. And they will, the two of them, and the considerable resources the auror department will be able to provide. It will be up to Ransom how much of this he wants to keep out of official lines and how much he wants to do above board, it’ll be up to Ransom how they approach this, but even if they’re handling it alone, Mal’s sure a trip to Langer to get the lay of the land isn’t out of the question, or any of their colleagues who might have a little more insight thanks to a case or two. The Vitale kid seems to have worked on NBO cases a fair amount, or maybe Yaxley or the Duffy-Zanettis.

Rebel nods, in response to her father’s words, says, “Let me just get my stuff together,” and goes back to the desk, the desk that used to be Ransom’s so many years ago, and starts pulling a few things together.

“Do you want me to go ahead and start seeing what I can dig up?” they ask, turning back to Ransom as she does. It’s two questions in one, not just the question they’re asking but one they aren’t sure how to ask, exactly—do you want some time alone? do you want me not to intrude more than I already have? They don’t feel like they’re intruding here, and Ransom hasn’t made any gesture to the contrary, but they want to give him the space to decide for himself instead of assuming.

#( &. ransom hazard )

ransomhazard:

It should probably feel stranger that this isn’t strange. Everything feels so different, and yet it’s not something jarring, not something that makes him nervous in that underlying way he’s more likely to compensate against by being louder and more outwardly confident than to show. If he was, though, oddly enough, it feels like something he wouldn’t have as much trouble being honest about here. He doesn’t really know what it is about this boat, about being out here alone with Mal, drifting further from the rest of the world by the minute, but it just feels easy.

It feels like something he wouldn’t mind holding onto, if they would let him. And he thinks that it might not be as hard as it would’ve otherwise to convince Mal to let him back on this boat after this, now that they’re both seeing this, because he knows they can feel the nearly comforting simplicity of this here, together.

“Ah, well, you know I’m more delicate than I look. Somehow, the cold’s never really been my thing, didn’t inherit that New Englander cold resistance. I wouldn’t mind getting a little cozy, if the boat’s fine without us out here for a minute,” he hums, hint of teasing to his voice, but maybe not as much as there usually is there. Ransom takes that as his cue to get up, get a tour of what he can only assume is a small inside. Maybe it should be the cue to bring up the case, too, but then it’ll be easier to concentrate in the warmth, maybe. Or maybe not; hard not to be distracted by everything, by Mal, here, no real desire to worry about work.

“Next time, we go somewhere warm,” Ransom says, looking back at Mal, and it doesn’t feel as presumptuous as it maybe usually would, to assume there’ll be a next time. “I could use a tan, and a few hours away without a case hanging over our heads.”

“Next time,” they repeat, with a hmm, as they make their way inside, Ransom following behind. It’s an odd idea, but not an unwelcome one, now that Ransom has been here, has seen this, now that they’ve seen Ransom here. He’s somehow easier to be around, just now, than he normally is—it feels less like they’re fighting one another, less like they’re on opposite sides of something. They’ve been waiting to take the boat out a little more, wanting to go somewhere interesting instead of the same old thing. And the further they get into fall, the nicer somewhere warm sounds.

Much like the rest of the boat, the inside has been charmed—when they’d gotten it, it had had a small captain’s quarters, an equally small sleeping cabin down below, but both had been charmed to be larger than they appeared, larger than they had any right to be. Large enough for a half dozen or more people to fit comfortably for a few days. There are still signs of it, of the people who used to spend their time on this boat the people long since gone now. Pictures tacked to the walls, clothes left behind in the storage spaces tucked away under benches. They’d never wanted to clean it all out, the idea of it somehow superstitiously unlucky. Better to be haunted by things like pictures and sweaters than by real ghosts who had every reason to hate them.

“Here,” they say, lifting the seat of one bench up and pulling a fleece blanket out, passing it over to Ransom. “Mexico’s nice, this time of year,” they add, and then move over to a table, where they can spread out papers that had come with the case file—the original report for the missing boat, the statements from witnesses who had seen the boat since.

#( &. ransom hazard )#( case | the fateful voyage of the blue rose )

the Pacific Squad + tweets

bonus:

#( inspo )

ransomhazard:

She looks between them for a minute, as if deciding something, and he can guess plenty about whatever must be happening just from that. There’s an unspoken agreement between himself and her mom, one that happened naturally when he went from handling dirty money by the thousands for people in her business, laundering it squeaky clean, to MACUSA informant. Their own sort of don’t ask, don’t tell, to keep all of them safe. He couldn’t get any information about the less than legal side of the Black Lantern pried out of him, if he didn’t have it in the first place. And that’s how it’s been for years, no details given, no specifics, and they’re all good. Clearly that’s going to be something that’ll change as soon as she starts talking.

There’s a silent question in her eyes as she looks from Mal back to Ransom, and he wonders if maybe he shouldn’t have brought them, because it’s not exactly a fair position to put someone in, the expectation of holding onto things that could get any one of them in this room thrown into prison. But that’s the thing, Mal was in this room long before Rebel was. Mal knows probably nearly as much about the Black Lantern as he does, and they haven’t said anything before. He wouldn’t have asked them to come, if he didn’t trust them with his family’s safety.

“It’s alright, Rebel. Whatever you say doesn’t leave this room. You never have to worry about either of us,” he reassures her with a certain nod. It takes a second, and a deep breath, before she nods too, and finally goes on.

“I heard about an opportunity. I’ve been trying to do more, so I jumped on it. I thought if I could facilitate a new deal, it’d prove how far I’ve made it. It seemed simple, they were looking for a specific artifact, and once we found it, they needed it replicated, which is easy enough for us,” she nods, words coming out a little slower now. “I didn’t realize who it was until way too late, and I tried to pull out of the deal. I didn’t want to help assholes like them, but that made it so much worse.”

His heart is beating harder than he wants to admit, because he thinks he has a guess here, given how things have been lately, given the way it doesn’t seem like anything any of them can escape. “And who are they?” he asks, voice almost scarily even as he tries to keep himself from panicking. Because he can connect the dots, and if it got that bad, he knows Journey would’ve figured it out, would have intervened, and Journey isn’t here, and Rebel is a mess.

“The New Blood Order,” she replies, the guilt clear in her voice. “One of their members…mom went to go try to fix things, but she hasn’t come back, she won’t come back, unless I finish the shipment, but I can’t. I can’t give them more weapons.”

It takes all his strength not to show the very real panic setting in that he might not actually be able to fix this one, but he tries to push past that right now, because that’s not going to help anyone. “There’s no way you have known, Rebel, they’re tricky fuckers, or else they all would’ve gotten caught twenty years ago. But we’ll figure it out, just have to…think about this logically,” he tries to sound certain, but he’s not sure how successful it it.

Their blood begins to run cold, as she talks through the story, and as they look over at Ransom they can tell it’s the same for him—worse, for him. His face may not show it, he’s always been good at hiding how he feels, but they can see it in his posture, in the angle of his arm at his side, tense, like holding the pose of calmness takes every ounce of effort he has. The two of them seem to piece it together at the same moment, just waiting for Rebel to say it out loud, to confirm the unthinkable, that this problem really is just as bad as she’d made it out to be. The New Blood Order.

They haven’t been on any of the recent surge of NBO cases the Squad has been seeing, but they’ve heard enough about all of it to know that it makes sense, that the NBO seems to be ramping up to something. And it sounds like Rebel, and Black Lantern, and whatever this artifact they wanted replicated was, has something to do with it. Which means that this is about keeping Rebel safe, finding Journey before anything happens—and it’s also about stopping the NBO from getting their hands on whatever they need, to execute whatever plan they’ve been working towards, before a lot of other people get hurt.

“I don’t know what to do, dad,” Rebel says, after a moment, her voice breaking, her composure finally breaking fully with it, and Mal steps to the side as she crosses the room in three long steps and wraps her arms around Ransom, buries her face in his chest, seeming all of a sudden like a small child and not like the twenty four year old dark artifact smuggler she’s grown into. And who can blame her for it? Journey’s been their friend for almost longer than he’s known Ransom; they’re terrified to think of what might have happened. But Journey’s her mom. They can only imagine the greater depths of feeling, and be amazed that she managed to keep it together this long.

“You were right to call us,” they say, after a long moment—after a minute or two of giving her and her dad some space. “We’ll take care of it, Rebel, I promise we will. Do you have—records or anything? A name for your contact, anywhere we can start?”

#( &. ransom hazard )

ransomhazard:

It’s pretty damn calming, he has to admit, as the boat gets further and further from shore, the gentle rocking, certainly unnaturally so, of the boat, and the way every other sound besides the water lapping against the sides, the wind catching in the sails slips away without much ceremony. They’ve only been on the boat for a second, in the grand scheme of this trip, but he can already understand why Mal loves this, and maybe why it’s not something they’ve ever shared, either. Because the air feels different on the boat. Mal feels different. Their shoulders seem looser, more relaxed in a way that he hadn’t even fully realized they were even holding tension in the first place, they just seem calm. They’re always calm, really, but this has a new tone to it, something he can’t really remember seeing before, even during quieter moments. It’s never been quiet like this, though, a quiet that’s wholly comfortable, nothing unpleasant to it, no need to fill the air with snarky comments and pushing buttons for the hell of it. It’s a strange feeling, but it’s a good one.

And he’s pretty certain that Mal feel that strange difference, too, just from the way they’re looking at him, when his eyes move from the receding shore back to them. He nods with their explanation, considering what that would be like. “For the best, I don’t know if I’m quite ready for weeks on a boat, yet. Although, I have a feeling I could get there,” he hums.

They tell him about their uncle, about a little sailboat that they went out in, doing it all without magic, learning that skill in a way that probably just made it all the easier to slip into this, to find their way here. He can’t remember ever hearing about their family, even just in passing, even something as simple as this, he’s not even positive he could have said with any certainty before this moment whether they had come from magic, or not, or a combination.

“A pirate from the start, I should’ve known. I can tell you now, I couldn’t do it with or without magic, so no cheating in my book. Just a slightly different set of skills, I’d imagine. It’s nice, though, that you still do it, even after all those years,” Ransoms says. “Nice to have something consistent.”

“It is,” they agree, and for once it’s all they need to say, all that needs to be said. They’re used to filling up the space between them and Ransom with words, the two taking stabs at one another back and forth. Building tension and cutting it. There’s no tension, here, on the boat. Of any kind. There is just a kind of gentle ease they haven’t felt, except alone, in a long time, something simple and uncomplicated, even though the fact that it’s Ransom and that should somehow complicate everything.

At some point they’ll have to make their way into the captain’s quarters, check their heading on the enchanted readouts there to make sure they’re on track. At some point, they and Ransom will have to talk about this case, the mysterious disappearing and reappearing boat, the missing people, the inexplicable nature of whatever had caused this. At some point, they’ll make it to Alaska and have to return to reality.

Somehow, they think, it won’t be as impossible to do as it feels right now like it would be. Somehow, they think the boundary between normal and this is more porous than they would have liked to imagine. That all they’ll need to do is step off the boat and back into their ordinary self, the self that Ransom knows as well as they do isn’t really them. Do a job they are technically unqualified for, but still very good at.

“There are blankets, inside,” they say, gesturing. “And it blocks the wind. This time of year, up near Alaska especially, it can get pretty cold.”

#( &. ransom hazard )#( case | the fateful voyage of the blue rose )

kadrisozen:

Kadri falls back for the time being, allowing Mal who definitely had more experience in things like this to fully take the lead and start the questioning. They were the expert, after all, when it came to dark magic and dark magical artifacts. She glances around the room, cataloging everything that she can see for later. It’s a dark space, but it does seem perfectly organised. Lox is clearly the kind of man who is meticulous when it comes to records, to notes, research and writings all filed away carefully, where no trouble could be caused.

“I have an eye for these things. I noticed something was wrong the moment that I went downstairs.” Lox tells them. “Walked into that room a thousand times, and those objects have never moved –– not since i locked the battery up in its case last week, when I concluded my research into it leading up to the exhibition. That was what I noticed first. They were all present and accounted for when I went to bed the night before, around 1am, so someone had to take them before I woke up again at 7. Now, I’m sure you’re asking –– don’t I have wards? Of course I do, you’ve seen the security just to get in the door. But any burglar attracted to dark objects like this would probably have some level of experience when it comes to dismantling wards, or subverting them somehow, if they were smart enough.”

“You really believe it was an outside job?” Kadri asks, despite herself. She’s curious, because if it was her, she’d think the answer was an obvious one. Missing artifacts, missing apprentice. One plus one was usually equal to two, in her book. “Is there any way that your assistant could have had anything to do with it? They would have been keyed in to the wards, wouldn’t they?”

“Yancey? No. I mean, of course he was allowed in, but he’s ––” Lox shakes his head, and looks at Kadri. He doesn’t seem to think much of her, when he takes the time to look her over. “The kid was fine, as far as apprentices go. But he was just a squib, there’s just no way he would have been capable of a theft like this. He couldn’t even handle most of those artifacts without gettng himself blown up. And he was smart enough not to do that.”

“Just a squib.” She echoes back, with a nod of her head. Her tone was bland, though, as she jotted down notes about everything he had said thus far in their little meeting. “Then he must have gotten kidnapped by the same men who stole your artifacts.”

“Precisely,” Lox agrees, completely unaware of the tone in Kadri’s voice that Mal can read. She’s clearly thinking the same think they’re thinking—there’s an Occam’s Razor problem, here: missing artifacts, missing apprentice, no triggered alarms. Lox could be right, that some particularly skilled burglar had made their way through his wards, some genius thief, but Lox could also just want to imagine that he hadn’t been foiled by something as simple as an underestimated apprentice.

They’ve never been one to underestimate a squib, themself. Their mother was a squib, and she was one of the brightest and most brilliant people they had ever met. Kadri seemed that way, too, made all the wiser and more impressive by the work she’s had to do to compensate for not having magic to make her path through the world smoother. It’s easy to imagine that this apprentice, who was clearly a decent enough worker, was much the same.

Still, there’s no use trying to persuade Lox himself of that. They have other avenues. For now they file away the information they’ve gotten from Lox—the battery was the most recent item added to the collection, a week ago, and there’s a six hour window in which the theft would have had to take place—and move back into thinking about how else they can approach this, thinking back to the case file and everything that had been in it.

“Our records show you have a house elf working here, too. Farrow, is that right?” they ask, glancing around for a moment. They hadn’t seen her on the way in, but it’s a big place, with lots of dark corners, rooms they hadn’t even ventured into yet; ideally, she’s here, and they can talk to her one on one without Lox interrupting, to get a slightly less biased opinion of this Yancey fellow. “I have to assume she wasn’t present when the theft took place, but is she here today? Would we be able to speak with her?”

#( &. kadri sozen )#( case | the curse breaker's apprentice )

valtsv

fuck you (confession of love)

anetesenpai

fuck me yourself (reciprocated)

#( inspo )#( &. ransom hazard )

Mal and Ransom + tumblr text posts

#( inspo )#( &. ransom hazard )

ransomhazard:

He’s glad that this is the sort of thing he’s always been good at, pushing all the panic and worry and catastrophizing to the very back corner of his mind in favor of calm, collected laser focus until the problem’s been dealt with, and he’s alone, allowed to let any cracks show. Except it’s a little harder in this case, when it’s one of his daughters, when it’s Rebel, and apparently maybe her mother, too, who are mixed up in something bad, need a problem fixed that goes far beyond the sort of things that he’s been fixing for the last eight years or so. So maybe asking Mal to come with him is just proof of that, a little crack slipping through, the concern a little too close to home, the need to hold onto something familiar, someone he can turn to if the cracks keep forming before he can take care of this.

It’s a lot to ask them, he knows that, especially when a month ago it’s the sort of idea he would’ve laughed at, asking Mal to come help with a crisis his daughter is dealing with. It’s a lot to ask, but he’s also not surprised when they agree, voice suddenly serious, too, certain in it, as if it’s a no brainer. And it kind of is, oddly enough. Feels easy to ask them, to rely on them.

“Great, good…thanks,” he nods, glancing around, seeing if he notices either of his parents, but he has no idea where they are. It doesn’t feel like there’s time to waste, though, so he starts through the crowd, towards the front door, instead sending both of them a message saying he had to leave early, without giving the reason.

Once they’re outside, and past the wards, he takes their hand, and in seconds they’re in Vegas, outside of the club. He’s tempted not to let go, the solidity of it a comfort, but he does, not wanting to show any more cracks than are already visible, as they find the private entrance, start through the back, avoiding the crowds that are blissfully unaware. He leads Mal to the office, opening the door without knocking, surprised to see Rebel alone, expecting at least Storm to be there, too, pacing in front of the desk, typing on her telekit frantically.

“Hey, hey, who are you messaging? What happened to wait until I’m here?” he asks, closing the door behind them once they’re in, and then pulling his wand out to throw an extra spell over the room, in case anyone could be listening. And he goes over to her, puts a hand on her back to stop her pacing, try to help calm her down. “We’ll fix whatever happened, Rebel, but we need to know what’s going on.”

“I was making sure no one knows anything’s wrong, is what I was doing,” she says forcefully, finishing whatever message she’s sending before looking up, eyes moving from Ransom, to Mal. “Oh, thank Merlin you’re here, I don’t know what we’re going to do, I don’t know if we can fix this. I fucked up, I thought I was helping, but I was tricked, I fucked up. And Mom tried to help fix it, but they weren’t too happy about that.”

It’s been a long time since they’ve been back here; however much time they’ve spent at the Dark & Stormy in the past handful of years, it had felt like their days moving through back hallways and into the private office had ended a long time ago. Now Ransom didn’t even run the place, didn’t use the office, wasn’t even there most of the nights Mal found themself there, so there was no reason to, but they’ve been back here so many times before that the path still feels familiar, a long-forgotten muscle memory moving through space, even when the emotional tenor of it all is so drastically different.

Rebel’s pacing around, when they get inside, and she looks—awful, really, looks freaked out, only barely looks momentarily relieved when she sees her dad’s face, and then sees theirs. They’ve got a real fondness for her, from their interactions over the past few years. She’s a good kid, a hard worker. Smart, too. But smart only gets you so far when it’s paired with young, and god is she young. She looks younger now than she usually does, the panic in her eyes betraying her usual collected, cool composure, the posture that makes her look older than her age. No, now she looks her age, looks like a twenty-something kid who doesn’t know what to do.

“Hey, hey,” they say, catching the pace between her frantic words. “Slow down, Rebel.”

They’re not sure what she’s already told Ransom, but from the look on Ransom’s face it seems like he doesn’t have all that much more of an idea of what’s going on than they do, and she isn’t doing them any favors right now in terms of filling them in.

“Start from the beginning, tell us what’s going on. We can’t do anything unless we know what happened, okay?”

#( &. ransom hazard )#rip this is so much shorter than yours but I wanted to give you the chance to move the plot along

ransomhazard:

It’s strange to realize that this is one of the first times he’s actually considered deeply that they have a whole before, which is maybe stupid, and definitely self absorbed of him, but it’s the truth. When they met, after all, how they met, after all, was in a place where you didn’t ask those kind of questions, and that kind of information wasn’t offered. There was a reason he was able to be a Hazard there without any big deal being made out of it, for the same reasons that Mal had ended up in the Dark & Stormy in the first place, because secrets weren’t just accepted there, they were expected. They had only barely been skating towards something else when it had all ground to a halt.

But they had another boat. The Crooked Star, a name that makes him smile a little for some reason. Just like something about the rest of it does, too, weirdly, knowing this is the same boat that they had years and years ago, too, when they’d first met. He’s glad he can see it now, glad he can watch them run their hand over the spot of wood that’s a different color, something almost reverent in the gesture.

“You gotta learn somehow,” he hums, voice a little less boisterous than it would be otherwise, the feeling of being here making quiet feel right, somehow.

Ransom nods, as they move to unmoor the boat, ready to be on the journey. “Never been more ready,” he says. He considers for a minute that he should probably bring up the case, that they should come up with a game plan for once they get there, but it doesn’t feel necessary with Mal, when he knows full well they won’t have a problem working together. And he doesn’t want to, not just now. It’s a case that brought them here, but ti doesn’t feel like the most important thing, while they’re on their way.

“You know, I’ve never been far enough out on a boat that I can’t see land,” he says, and he’s not exactly sure why it matters, but it feels like it does. “Kind of excited for it.”

Ransom seems... quiet. But not a nervous kind of quiet, not the kind of quiet they might expect someone who was scared of being farther out on the water than they’d ever been would be. No, that doesn’t seem to bother him; he seems calm enough about it—excited, as he says. The quiet is something else, a calmness they aren’t used to seeing from him. Not totally foreign: there’s still the cavalier way he hods himself, the posture, everything else. All there, just subdued.

it’s... nice, really. Watching him look around the boat, look out over the water, as the shore slips away, closer and closer to moving out of view, it makes something in their chest feel warm, and loose, and easy. The same way just being out on the water does.

“It’s not as different as it could be,” they say. “With the magic, and everything. It’s always a little smoother than it has any right to be, and faster, too, than a no-maj boat. This trip would take us weeks, on a boat that wasn’t magic.”

“My uncle had a boat, when I was a kid. Just a little two-person sailboat he’d let me go out in, but we never went very far. Turns out it’s all easier when you don’t have to care about the wind being on your side, and when you’ve got magic shielding for when the waves get too choppy. It almost feels like cheating, except that it’s still damn hard to sail sometimes.”

#( &. ransom hazard )#( case | the fateful voyage of the blue rose )

e-perv

#( inspo )

kadrisozen:

It isn’t a very long walk from their office to Lox’s lab. The familiar streets fold out before them, and Kadri falls in to step alongside Mal. They know exactly where they’re going, and Kadri hopes that they’ll be a good lead on this case. They almost certainly will be, with their past experience when it comes to curses and the breaking therein. Kadri really would like for this to go well for her, for her to be able to learn something new about the way of the world, for her to stand out on a case as intense as this, with important things hanging in the balance. If she could shine, she might really go places, she might get the promotion that she’s been angling for, people might start to take her more seriously.

Lox is true to his word, when he says he’ll be down in a minute. She tilts her head at the sound of seveal locks coming undone, on the other side of the door. High levels of security, she thinks, and glances at Mal beside her. More symbols seem to burn on the door, when it finally sears its way open with Lox’s work on the other side of the door. The door opens with what must be a harsh pull, a sort of clattering, and there Lox is on the other side. Handsome, glasses on his face, short hair. He looks at them seriously, and opens the door further.

“Pacific Squad. That’s about time. You’d think someone would have gotten here sooner.” He muses, sounding resigned to it as he curls a finger at them. That tone in his voice that tells Kadri he expects good work, expects this to be solved as soon as possible. She can’t imagine what it wuld have been like to work under him. Mal said that he was notoriously a dick, and she didn’t doubt it. She isn’t sure she would have made it very far as his apprentice, no matter how much he could have taught her, no matter how famed he was. “Badges, before you come inside. Can’t be too careful, in a place like this.”

Kadri arches an eyebrow, reaches in to her bag to grab her badge from inside of it. She doesn’t fumble, just holds it up with a smooth movement. She’s practiced that. “Cadet Kadri Sözen.” She introduces herself. He squints at her badge, before turning his attention to Mal and the one held in their hand. With a sigh, he ushers them inside.

He leads them through a room of objects, and up the stairs into what must be his official work space. She checks to make sure that her gloves are firmly on, her sleeves rolled down all of the way, as little exposed skin as possible in case she grazes past something bad. Lox settles in to a chair, at a cluttered desk. “You have questions. Ask them quickly, so you can get out there and return what’s mine.”

Lox doesn’t seem to recognize them as he greets the both of them at the door in that ordinarily impatient, inconsiderate way of his, and it’s a small blessing, really—it’s been a long time, and it’s nice to know the man doesn’t seem to care enough about anyone else to hold an actual grudge, because Mal had pissed him off quite badly the last time they’d met, years ago, both students at the time, practically a lifetime ago. No, Lox was always quite preoccupied with his artifacts, his work; Mal had called him a prick and they meant it, but they also know it’s not malicious, he’s just the sort of person who can’t be fucked to deal with other people.

And the way he treats the two of them is no different. Mal flashes their badge and he checks the both of them and nods and then leads them inside, no ceremony about it. They’re sure they’ll be rushed out just as quickly, when he’s decided they’ve wasted enough of his time with questions.

Mal would love to take a look around the work space, but they get the feeling they won’t be allowed to. Instead, ox sits back at his desk, looks up at the two of them expectantly, a clear signal that they’re to start asking questions and not draw this out, so they give him a smile and a nod. They’ll start with the artifacts, and then move onto asking about the apprentice—clearly Lox’s order of priority, to get him talking.

“Our file has record of four artifacts that are missing—the staff, the necklace, the box, and the battery. Have you done a full inventory of the workshop, since then? Is it possible there’s anything else missing we might need to be aware of, both for our own safety and to ensure your property all makes it back to you?”

It’s easy to fall into a sort of appeasing pattern of speaking, framing things in a way Lox will respond positively. If there wasn’t a real danger with these items being out in the world, they’d probably be less patient about it, but Lox is the only starting point they have, other than the house elf, and they know how touchy he can be, know he’ll be likely to shut down completely if they overstep.

“I did a full inventory of the workshop just before reporting the items missing, and a second one shortly thereafter to confirm. You can see the papers if you like,” he adds, waving a hand, and a drawer opens in a filing cabinet to his side. It’s good—it’s protocol, Mal knew he would have been thorough, but it’s nice to confirm it anyway.

“I’ll take your word for it, for now, and we’ll take a look if we find any discrepancies later,” they say, with a nod to Kadri. “You noticed them missing shortly after they were taken, I presume? Can you tell us a little about how you discovered that they were missing, and if you noticed anything unusual at the time, aside from your apprentice’s disappearance?”

#( &. kadri sozen )#( case | the curse breaker's apprentice )

ransomhazard:

He can already guess how this is going to play out, because this dance of theirs is as familiar as a waltz is to him. They’re going to have this back and forth, until eventually he gives in and lets Mal think they’ve won, lets them lead them in a bad approximation of a waltz to give the boring old rich people something to talk about, because that’s the sort of night it is, no reason to start a real argument, no reason for him to pout. He’s decided it’s going to be a good night, after all. He reaches out, hands moving to adjust Mal’s shirt for the express purpose of being able to brush fingertips over the exposed skin of their chest

“Never, but sometimes humility can be a good thing, especially when––” he stops mid sentence, feeling his personal telekit vibrating in his pocket. He holds up a finger, pulls it, utterly confused at who would be calling him, immediately worried seeing Rebel’s name, his daughters never calling. “Shit, sorry, it’s Rebel.”

Etiquette says he should step out, take the call privately, but he’s worried, and it makes him think about the boat, that maybe staying next to Mal will make whatever this call is about easier to handle, so he picks up. “Rebel, everything okay?… Slow down, sweetheart, what’s going on? What? Okay… I’ll be there in ten minutes, alright, don’t do anything until I get there.”

It takes a second after he hangs up, thoughts racing, coming up with a plan. He didn’t get the full picture, Rebel’s too distraught to make it all clear, but there’s some real panic there just knowing what she and her mom are involved with, knowing how it goes when something goes wrong. “Gonna have to take a raincheck on that waltz, actually. Something’s going on with Rebel, got to go meet her at the club,” he shakes his head, repocketing his telekit. He pauses, as he looks at Mal, and it’s strange, he knows, not something he’s ever asked before, but something compels him.

“Do you… would you come with me? Rebel loves you, and I could use the backup; I think something happened with Journey. Unclear. If you’d rather stay and find someone else to waltz with, understandable, of course, just… thought I’d ask.”

It only takes a moment of watching him, as he answers the telekit, Rebel’s frantic voice half-audible in fits and starts on the other end of the conversation, to know that something’s wrong. Ransom doesn’t seem panicked—and maybe that’s something parenthood teaches a person, because Mal can’t imagine receiving a call like that and not instantly panicking, not rushing out without a word, can’t imagine making a comment about a raincheck if there was trouble of the kind that would make Rebel sound like that. She’s barely older than a teenager, but Mal knows her, knows she isn’t prone to hysterics.

But maybe Ransom’s more panicked than he looks, after all. Maybe he’s just hiding it better. Because they can’t figure out why else he would be inviting them to come along. The only thing that makes sense is that... well, Mal is something familiar, and someone good in a crisis, and they know that Ransom knows that. So maybe he is panicking, under that cool exterior, the surface only slightly disrupted by the troubled look on his face.

So it feels important, that he say yes. And maybe he wouldn’t have two or three weeks ago, maybe he would have kept trying his best to keep Ransom at arm’s length and gone on with it all. But it feels like they’ve already stepped across a line they can’t step back over, and being on this side of it means that suddenly, Ransom needs them again, and suddenly, they want to let him.

“Yeah,” they answer, with an earnest nod, the air of playful banter gone now. They pat their pockets, making sure they have everything—telekit, wand—suddenly grateful that they haven’t had much to drink yet. “Yeah, of course, let’s go.”

#( &. ransom hazard )#( event | anniversary party )

ransomhazard:

Mal immediately starts getting to it, and it’s clear just how much of a routine it is, the sort of thing that they clearly don’t even have to think about anymore, the movements of it all second nature. It’s kind of hypnotizing to watch, but he’s glad to help, wants to help, maybe wants to know what it feels like, like that might give him a better understanding of Mal, those private corners that even he isn’t let into. Because this boat feels like one of those corners, and here he is now, and because of a case, of all reasons.

Not a surprise that they don’t need his help, that after he doesn’t even know how long they could probably do this all alone with their eyes closed. He’s sure he’d be more of a burden than anything, definitely would make things take longer than they need to, so he tries not to take it personally, a near impossibility for him, but the effort is valiant at least.

“Right, right, of course,” he nods, looking around, eyes landing on a spot he thinks maybe he’ll be out of the way enough, but still close enough to watch Mal at work.

He feels a strange mix of calm and restless, like his body knows it’s going to be able to relax here, but not yet, not when it’s only been minutes, and it’s still so new, and it feels like he needs to be doing something with his hands or he might end up doing or saying something he’d regret. An odd feeling, but maybe understandable, he thinks, because being here feels like something important, even if it’s for a case, even if it’s just for the ease of being able to use their boat in case of anything overly sinister up in Alaska.

He should probably let them work in peace, but he can’t stop from bouncing his leg, the need to keep talking almost compulsive. “So… is this the boat you’ve always had?”

“It’s my second, actually,” they say, falling easily into the conversation as they work. They thought it would feel strange, with Ransom here, the extra noise of him, but he’s managed to find a place where he’s out of the way, and he’s staying there, which is a pleasant surprise—and... well, maybe it feels nice, to have someone else on the boat again, when it’s felt far too empty for too long. It’s not meant to hold just one, too big, too much space, and two isn’t ten but it isn’t one either.

They run a hand along the smooth wood for a moment. There’s a piece, here, just there, of wood a different color to the rest, a scrap from his original boat, the one they’d bought before they even had a crew, recovered from it when it had been damaged and they’d decided to go with something larger instead of just repairing the damage. Their old crew had decided it was lucky, a little ritual, to touch the discolored wood at the start of every voyage. A little prayer to the sea.

“My first one was smaller. The Crooked Star. I was still getting a hang of the whole thing, tore the underside apart on a shoal after a year and a half. But this is the one I’ve had as long as you’ve known me.”

They finish the final checks, everything secure, and functional, and in the right place. Everything ready. They pat the hull once, then move to unmoor the boat.

“Alright, we’re good to go. You ready?”

#( &. ransom hazard )#( case | the fateful voyage of the blue rose )

ransomhazard:

“I’m nothing if not delightfully predictable,” Ransom shrugs, his own smile mirroring theirs. He does love that grin of theirs, the way it’s just a little sharp around the edges, the sort of sharp that other people probably mistake a charming. But he knows them, he knows what that grin can hide. There’s something a little thrilling about having a secret of sorts kept between them in plain sight. After all, he’s pretty certain no one else knows Mal’s real story––even if he himself hardly knows most of it, just a hint more than most people who think they really are some transfer from the Chilean aurors. And the strange part of it is that it doesn’t actually feel like much of a secret, because everything about Mal is still so terrifyingly familiar that it could almost be a cruel joke, if he didn’t know any better.

If he hadn’t seen what he had on their boat. That had been enough to dispel any doubts he had, any worries that he was missing something besides the obvious and still unknown real reason for them joining the aurors. The problem with it, though, is that it also makes it all the more confusing, because it’s all the same. It feels almost terrifyingly like nothing has changed with the two of them, since before Mal disappeared without a trace. And he doesn’t know what that means. But he’d like to find out.

First, though, some teasing, and maybe a waltz. The little glint in their eyes, though, tells him that it’s not going to be so easy, because nothing ever is with them. That’s half the fun of it, after all.

“Do you know how to waltz, Malachai? If you don’t know how to waltz, then how the fuck are you going to lead me?” Ransom asks, mock incredulously. “Besides, both of my parents are here, I’ll never hear the end of it if they catch me letting some swashbuckler, albeit a very dashing one, leading their beloved son, their only heir, in a waltz.”

The first excuse Ransom gives is a good one, almost persuasive—Mal doesn’t know how to waltz, at least not really, learned once for some ridiculous school formal and then immediately discarded that information as utterly useless when there were more interesting things to learn. They wouldn’t know how to lead a waltz if they tried, though their faith in Ransom’s ability to lead while he looked like he was following has been tried and tested numerous times and Ransom has never let them down.

The second, though, only turns it back around, makes them want to win even more. Ransom’s parents seem like the least objectionable of the old purebloods here—they’d overheard a few of his father’s jokes, earlier in the night, and he could see where Ransom got it from, would have loved to have a drink with the old man just to see how deep the resemblance went—but there’s something undeniably tempting about the idea of scandalizing a bunch of rich people, and about Ransom’s parents talking to him about the dashing swashbuckler he’d led lead him in a dance.

“Oh, come on, Hazard, when have either of those things ever stopped me?”

#( &. ransom hazard )#( event | anniversary party )#this is short because I got distracted *eight different times* trying to write it and I JUST WANT TO HIT POST NOW

ransomhazard:

There’s an undercurrent of something he can’t quite put his finger on to their response, to the eye roll, and the way they take their time getting everything together. It’s the exact sort of thing he’s very good at either ignoring, or focusing on and to the point where he assumes it’s because he did something wrong, but never bringing up, rather let it fester than exhibit any emotional honesty or vulnerability. Right now, he chooses the former. They’ve got a case to solve, after all, and a long ass boat ride to even get there, now’s not a good time for festering.

Once they finally head out, it doesn’t take long to get to the marina, easy to lean in a little to the side-along apparition, easy to just let himself enjoy this bit of things, the anticipation of seeing their boat. And the boat is, well, it’s not what he’s used to, to say the least, and not what he was expecting, although he’s well aware most people who sail don’t actually have pirate ships, even if their name is Malachai Fortune, arguably the perfect name for a modern day pirate. But the boat fits them, everything feels very Mal somehow, in a way that he can’t find the right words to describe.

For the first time in his life, he’s actually quiet for a minute, as he takes Mal’s hand and climbs onto the boat, too, looks around. There are about a dozen jokes on the tip of his tongue, something about wanting to watch them sweat rather than go set up camp in the cabin, something else about asking them if that’s an order or not, but none of them actually leave his lips. He’s not sure why, exactly, but it doesn’t feel right.

“This is nice,” he finds himself humming instead, as he moves around carefully. He glances back over his shoulder at Mal, as he pulls off his jacket, and throws it off to the side, hopefully out of the way, unbuttoning his cufflinks, rolling his sleeves up. “You can sail this thing on your own? I don’t know much about boats, but surely four hands are better than two. Let me help you get it ready, just tell me what to do.”

Nice. It is nice; they always feels calmer on the boat, always feels more relaxed when they’re on the water, something atavistic about the gentle sway and the sound of the waves lapping against the side of it. The familiarity, of a craft they know better now than they’ve ever known almost anything. The routine of years and years of work. The ease of knowing where everything is, of being able to rely on their instincts, their muscle memory, not having to think before they act, the way everything anymore feels like at least something of an act. They lean into it, already starting to untie ropes, to slowly lower sails down, the habit, the rhythm, their heart falling easily into the pattern of the work.

“It’s alright,” they say, glancing over at him, their hands still moving. “It’s all designed for two hands at this point. I’ve made some modifications.” Something they’ve had to work on, over the years, a change from the days when this boat was operated by six or seven people, but something they’ve perfected. It feels, somehow, like. it would be more work to try to separate out the steps in their head, figure out which they could assign to Ransom without accidentally skipping a step or losing track.

Half of it’s done with their hands, half with magic, a careful dance between the two as the sails unfurl, as they check and double check each thing. They don’t usually talk, while they do it, but it doesn’t pull them out of their stride, isn’t as distracting as they expected it to be, as they glance over their shoulder again to add,

“Not that I don’t think you know how to follow orders, or anything. But she’s temperamental enough when it’s just me.”

#( &. ransom hazard )#( case | the fateful voyage of the blue rose )

ransomhazard:

In a way, it’s a little exciting to feel something very different sitting just beneath the surface, the unspoken knowledge of how things had been on the boat, how utterly different every part of it had ended up, to the point where it’s a little hard to believe. In a way, it’s a little terrifying to know that it’s still lingering there silently, to think that it’d be an awfully good reason for Mal to pull away, to find an excuse to abandon ship, figuratively, again, just before they have a chance to see what happens when they let that happen.

This is all familiar. The teasing, the retorts, the eternal back and forth, but he’s pretty sure that it’s on Mal’s mind, too. How could it not be, after all, when even before the both ended up here they hadn’t landed on anything like their trip up to Alaska. The issue is that it’s the middle of a party, and he knows he doesn’t feel right considering any of that here, with so many people around. So it’s easier to slip into the familiar just now, to see what he might be able to get from them now, while they’re both here, not expecting anything quite like that in a mansion surrounded by coworkers and rich assholes alike.

No, it’s got him thinking about what comes after. It’s Saturday night, after all, nothing planned for tomorrow but nursing the hangover he’ll likely have. It makes him wonder if it would be too presumptuous to ask about their boat, ask about sailing out somewhere in the morning, maybe.

“Oh, yes, much different than the sort of dancing I’d usually pull you into. It’s ballroom, darling,” he drawls in a horrible Mid-Atlantic accent. “Doesn’t matter if it’s different, though, I can waltz with the best of them; you’ve seen me fence before. Your feet won’t even touch the ground.”

“I shouldn’t have expected anything less, from you,” they reply, with a grin. Waltzing, it all feels a little ridiculous, a little like something out of a terrible romance novel, horribly melodramatic, but then again, they’re only a step and a half away from being a treasure hunter with a pirate boat, and their outfit tonight only exaggerates the truth of that, so maybe they’re both a little romance novel, if not from radically different ones.

It’s the thing that’s funniest, about watching Ransom effortlessly charm his way through a party like this: they thought there would be something different about him, in this elite pureblood company, but he’s exactly the same. The same confidence, the same attitude, the same jokes. All the same steps to a completely different dance, and they weren’t quite sure how he did it, how he made it fit everywhere but—then again, they’re doing something all too similar themself, only the slightest shade of change between who they were before and who they are as an auror.

They’d come into it thinking of it as a lie, as a mask, but there was no fake Ransom, here, just like there was no fake Mal. The Mal of the Dark & Stormy, the Mal from the office, the Mal on their boat, the lines between them kept blurring, further and further, the partitions keeping pieces of their life apart slowly melting away. Like ice, melting everywhere Ransom touched them with warm fingers.

“Of course, that implies you’d be leading,” they add, and there’s a daring little glint in their eye at that, a challenge. As if they’re let Ransom lead anything. But he always had oh so much fun trying.

#( &. ransom hazard )#( event | anniversary party )

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