#twenty-seven

[marinolta]

[thedramaholic]

twenty-seven ✨

[likeshipsonthesea]

if i'm not meant to ship buxiu and twenty-seven then something has gone incredibly wrong. fighting together??? going out for a meal together??? buxiu being obviously perturbed by twenty-seven's general existence and twenty-seven just eating his dried-fish scallion pancake as he squats atop a chair without a care in the world??? buxiu's world is about to get flipped upside down and i am SO EXCITED

[squishymamasboy]

I'm used to ugly crying when characters die but with him I bawled my eyes out so hard that I threw up???? Damn

He was the ultimate pookie 😭😭😭

[yasammydaily]

Taking a cue from Kenji as he scrambles for cover amidst the screaming hiss of escaping air, Yasmina makes herself smaller, clinging to Sammy's hand...

[k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9]

Visit Original Link

The Adicts – Breakdown

[dlthedescent]

TWENTY-SEVEN: CHASING GHOSTS

For the fifth time, Crane felt it. 

One moment, he shut his eyes. The next, he was somewhere else.

No. He and Jack had stopped the train near a safehouse in the middle of nowhere for the night. He shouldn’t be standing in a dimly lit apartment hallway.

Yet there he was, trapped in another wild dream.

He sighed.

“This is getting real old,” he muttered. But what could he do? This was the fifth time.

And that was the thing—it was the fifth dream. Each one had been different—different places, different scenarios, with no clue as to how or why.

The only pattern? Everything felt... normal.

One thing was for certain. Back in the real world, mutant Kyle could see, hear and feel everything. But in the dreams, the world was normal—none of his zombie senses.

And that still didn’t explain anything. He was as clueless as in the first dream.

Kink-kink!

Keys rattled, drawing his gaze to a familiar brunette standing in front of apartment 313. A corner unit, in a place where the floor was clean, the walls’ unchipped and residents living their lives indoors.

Outside the window, at the end of the hall, the faint hum of Harran buzzed. 

A normal afternoon day.

Before him was Jack, digging into her pocket for her keys, drowsy after a trip to a store.

Crane could say something. Wave a hand in front of her face. And he knew for a fact she wouldn’t react. He was just an invisible spectator like always. 

Not like he could change anything.

Well, might as well let the dream play out. Sooner or later, he’d wake up, more confused than ever-

The clinking stopped. 

Jack’s keys barely reached for the doorknob before she froze, listening.

Like the Jack in the present.

Her fingers tightened around the keys as a weapon. Her other hand clutched her grocery bag like a shield.

Just in case.

She spun around.

“Not again.” Crane expected this to happen. Like that one dream, at the alleyway-

Thud! 

“Omph! Aaaah…”

A punch didn’t come flying again. Instead, someone else stood in Crane’s way. Jack threw her bag aside, snatched the stranger’s arm, wrenched it behind his back, and shoved him forward.

Slammed into the wall, her weight pinned him in place.

“Meerde...”

“Jean?!” Jack’s eyes widened at her surprise visitor. “What are you doing here?”

“Et bonjour à toi aussi,” he greeted in a wheeze. 

Of course, he’s French, Crane thought.

“If I’d known this was how you greet old friends, I would have brought flowers,” the man uttered dryly. “At least my ribs wouldn’t be bruised.”

“I told you not to sneak up on me.” Jack released him—though not without a sharp shove.

“Then I wouldn’t be good at my job. Arrrgh…”

Crane studied the stranger nursing his battered chin. Caucasian, lanky, wavy dark hair in a short ponytail. Same age group as Jack. A blazer over a crisp button-up.

…And he looked familiar.

Where had Crane seen his face before?

“Could have been a little gentler.”

“Well, sorry if I’ve been on edge lately.” Jack knelt to gather her scattered groceries. “Been feeling like someone’s been watching my back.”

Crane stiffened. No, she didn’t mean him. Of course not.

“So I’ve noticed.” ‘Jean’ adjusted his collar. “With your little championship approaching, the closer Valchos watches.”

Valchos.

The name rolled off their tongues so casually, yet it carried weight.

“You weren’t joking about that man being obsessed.”

“Good. Means he’s predictable,” Jack spat with an old, seething grudge.

“Predictable. More like tenacious. He’s playing kingmaker, and he’s set his sights on one  ‘famous kickboxer’.” ‘Jean’ rocked back on his heels before glancing out the hallway window. “He’s sending every ruffian he can buy.”

Crane followed his gaze.

A second look down the road and he saw them—men lingering in the shadows; ordinary pedestrians that stood too still, too patient. 

Because they were the kind paid to watch.

At Jack’s window.

“And these aren’t professionals.” He pulled a stack of cards from his pocket. ID cards. “Local street thugs.”

Enough to start a poker game, actually. Crane raised his brow, surprised. Jack, however, focused on her groceries.

“Money makes the world go round. We both know that all too well, Pierre.”

Jean. Pierre. Jean-Pierre. Crane turned the name over in his mind, looking back at the lanky man.

Hang on a minute. Hadn’t he seen that name in a dossier- 

“That it does.” Jean-Pierre extended his arms, offering to take Jack’s bag like a gentleman. While she climbed back onto her feet and brushed the dirt off her pants. “But this attention will complicate things going further.”

“You’ve pulled off far worse with higher stakes before,” Jack pried, folding her arms. “Didn’t you say you could do this in your sleep?”

“You wound me, ma cherie,” he jested. “But I know when we’re stuck between a rock and a hard place.” 

The French man wavered, carefully weighing his next words. Exhaustion lined his features, mirroring Jack’s—both of them running like headless chickens for days.

“I hate to say this but we need a Codebreaker.”

Silence fell between them, heavy enough to hear a pin drop.

There were mounting questions on top of questions for Crane. Hell, even the name, ‘Codebreaker’. Normal people wouldn’t know the full extent of that name.

But even if he could ask, he wouldn’t when the atmosphere changed. When Jack averted her eyes, her hands tightened into fists.

No sunglasses to hide the expression in her eyes: worry.

Jack was worried… Like she was with Siv and the Runners. With the orphans. With Ender and Riza. She always masked it with her usual grin

Except here, in the dream, she wasn’t smiling.

And like Crane, the man named Jean-Perrie noticed.

“...Did ‘Boss’ make that proposal or did you suggest it?” Jack asked quietly.

Pierre said nothing at first. And that told everything she needed to know.

Of course. Her lips curled into a disappointed frown.

Pierre remained calm and collected. He didn’t push, didn’t yield. A man who had been thrown like a ragdoll minutes ago stood tall beside her, who looked conflicted.

In a sense that he had always there for her. Crane picked up on that.

“While I’ve always admired your ironclad approach to everything,” Pierre offered smoothly, “some walls don’t break, no matter how hard you hit them.”

Just nodded reluctantly. She did wish otherwise but Pierre was right.

Some walls never came down easily.

“I’m good with locks and papers. Not computers,” Pierre continued. “You and Boss don’t even know how to use a forum.”

“I’m-!” Jack started, defensive. “...still learning.”

“Better than the old man but that’s not my point.”

Jack exhaled, more understanding than defeated.

They were stuck. They had to change their game or call it quits.

And Jack knew all too well none of them would do the latter.

“Yeong wants in.” 

That only deepened the crease in Jack’s brow, just as Pierre had expected. 

“...He’s doing better-”

“Any youngster will say that to prove a point,” she muttered.

“Then we get a different Codebreaker,” Pierre suggested. “Troy can help-”

“All the more she shouldn’t be involved…” Jack pinched the bridge of her nose, keeping her loudest thoughts in. “Yeong wouldn’t talk for weeks after-”

She stopped herself, jaw tight—some things had to stay in the past.

Pierre didn’t push. He just waited.

And Crane? He watched like a spectator in the audience.

“No.”

Pierre sighed softly but didn’t argue. He’d expected that reaction.

“He’s safe and sound in Busan,” Jack said, sliding her key into the lock. “That’s where he belongs.”

End of the discussion. She turned the doorknob and stepped inside.

And frowned even harder.

“Hi, Jackie.”

Story continues on at these links: FFN and AO3.

[rosewind2007]

Numbers in the 20-29 range in the Murderbot Diaries:

This is such an only of interest to me kind of thing, but I like the number 27 and I’d noticed that Martha Wells seems to, when looking for a number between twenty and twenty-nine, prefer twenty-seven too: or so I thought

There are fifty-seven (57) mentions of words involving the word “twenty” in the Murderbot Diaries. Given that from twenty to twenty-nine there are possible ten such words, if they were randomly distributed you’d expect about five or six of each. In fact there are twenty-one (21) uses of **twenty**, which is a lot more than you expect.

BUT! I was right that for a number which isn’t twenty involving twenty- then Martha Wells really likes twenty-seven: it comes in second with eleven (11) mentions!

Yay me!

The numbers may be a little wrong, corrections welcome 😀