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It was Georgie’s first-time meeting Jon’s new boyfriend. They had been dating for a while and she had heard bits and pieces from Melanie. A weird book goth or something, but Melanie had made no secret of her disdain for Jon and almost all his friends, so she was trying to make the decision for herself. Her new friendship with Jon had been weird. There was a lot of arguing and cruel words and de-escalation but they were working on it, and Jon wanted her to meet his boyfriend at a bar so they had to be moving in the right direction at least.
It was for all intents and purposes an awful bar. Broken wooden floors and with burns on the walls and just enough alcohol to constitute a bar. Everyone watched her as she walked in. There weren’t that many people there for a Friday night and if half of them weren’t conducting shady business in the corners she would give Jon The Admiral.
She found them pretty quickly for all the dark corners of the bar. To Melanie’s delight, Jon was only professional on the weekdays and Georgie was the one who had grown out of their punk phase. She had figured out who Gerry was pretty fast from Melanie’s descriptions and Jon’s pictures. It wasn’t like the goth was hard to pick out of the non-existent crowd and both Jon and Gerry were sitting on the same side of a booth in the back. Hair freshly dyed black and done much better than she had expected from her almost girlfriend’s description and previous photos.
They weren’t alone either. There was a woman with numerous scars that looked to be claw marks and scratches. She was on the other side of Jon in the middle console drinking something that Georgie couldn’t identify and a man with a branching lightning scar that went up to his neck and most likely down his chest.
She went over to sit though she was a little worried about sitting next to the man she had never met or heard about… but Jon smiled so brightly when he saw her. So, she didn’t really have any other choice but to sit down.
“Georgie! I’m glad you could make it. This is Gerry, the one who’s trying to be scary is Daisy and the one lurking ominously in the seat beside you is Michael.” He says not getting up from his seat between Gerry and Daisy.
“Everyone calls me Mike or Crew though.” Michael says snorting into his bottle, sounding a little annoyed but the quirk to his lips proved it was more out of humor than out of malice.
Jon shrugged and Daisy smiled a wide toothy smile before explaining.
“We all became friends before we knew Helen had become The Distortion and Michael and been eaten or lost to The Spiral or whatever. There were three Michael’s and there wasn’t enough of Shelly left to call him by his last name and by the time we knew he was gone for good we had all gotten used to calling Mike, Crew.”
Georgie nods, really fucking confused about at least half the words that had just come out of the women’s mouth but unsure if she really wanted to ask for clarification.
“Daisy, you know she isn’t involved in all of this. So that explanation makes no fucking sense.” He moves his hands around when he says ‘this’ as if monsters could be explained in one common gesture.
“I mean she’s End marked. How not involved can she be?” Daisy mutters quietly to herself like Georgie wasn’t only one person away.
She politely decides not to comment on that.
“So, what do you all do for work?” She asked trying desperately to start a conversation.
“I--um work private security jobs with Jude.” Daisy says after a second clenching her hands before letting them go. She had no clue who Jude was, she thinks Jon had maybe mentioned her once in passing, but it was a start. Jon didn’t seem to feel the need to help her out in filling out the conversation and Gerry seemed amused by her struggling and his boyfriend obliviousness.
Strike one
“I work part-time at Gerry and Oliver’s bookstore.” Crew says with such a sense of forced casualness that only happens when you’re trying to keep something a secret.
“What Crew forgot to mention was that he also steals money from the Fairchild Family’s accounts.” Jon coughs out as Daisy and Gerry start laughing and Crew rolls his eyes. Gerry pressed his hand into Jon’s in some kind of congratulatory high five fist bump combo thing that Jon smiles at softly. He slowly angles himself so he’s leaning on Gerry’s shoulder and the goth adjusts setting on hand on Jon’s knee. Like it was a habit, and he didn’t even have to think about it.
Okay, strike one removed because that was sweet.
“Not that I’m not interested in meeting Jon’s friends but he didn’t tell me you guys were going to be here.” She says clearing the room of its elephant. She had seen the awkward looks the other two members of the table had granted her when she sat down and they had seen hers. Now they can answer and make this less awkward for everybody.
“Well, he didn’t tell us you were going to be here so we’re even. Also, we’re on guard duty.” Daisy says casually, taking another sip of her drink.
They both ignore Jon spluttering that he had told them he was going to meet a friend.
“Because you’re in private security?” Georgie asks confused.
“No, because the Lukas’s and Fairchild’s are acting up again.” She says not even turning to look at her.
“I don’t know what that means.” Georgie says for what feels like the 10th time tonight because she hasn’t understood half the things coming out of anyone’s mouth and no one has really even said anything yet. Because she had told Jon to keep her out of this part of his life and he had apparently been doing a better job than she had given him credit for.
“You don’t want to know what that means.” Crew says cutting off Daisy.
Jon looks like he’s picking up some of the hostile energy but only shifts further into the shoulder he’s been leaning on.
“So, Georgie, your podcast is going well?” He asked like he didn’t already know, not that she minded. Daisy was still tense but looked to be calming down the less attention was that Georgie paid to her.
Oh.
“Yeah, I got a new sponsor.” She says taking the first sip of whatever had been placed in front of her at the beginning of the night. It wasn’t bad, cheap though, and pretty much just what she expected from a place like this.
Jon gets a text and which he smiles at before slipping it the phone back into his pocket.
“Mind squad stuff, threats, or politics?” Gerry asks Jon quietly, he looks concerned, the hand that was resting on Jon’s knee wraps around Jon’s shoulder, the other hand wrapping around his waist in what looks like another unconscious move.
“Mind squad stuff that is slowly going to turn into politics. Anna is going to be pissed. You know how much we do to stay out of the drama.” Jon says stretching and taking a large drink of the beer in front of him.
“Mind squad?” Georgie asked curiously.
“Jon, Annabelle, and Helen. Eye, Web, and Spiral. They do most of their damage out of the physical plane.” Crew explains.
“Are there other squads?” She asks trying not to think about the implications of that.
“Yeah, our physical people, Daisy, Jude, and Gerry. Hunt, Desolation, End. Then the people in the middle Oliver, Nikola, and I. End, Stranger, and Vast.” Crew explains.
“Why did Daisy say I was End?” Georgie asks because how the hell was she apart of this.
“Your incident in Uni, the one that left you unable to feel fear? That was an encounter with The End. Don’t worry, you're just marked. You’ll be fine.” Jon explains trying to sound comforting.
“Then how did she know about it?” She asks pointing to Daisy who knew immediately that she was marked by The End or what the fuck ever.
“We can tell.” Daisy explains tilting her head slightly.
“What was the text about?” Daisy asked her frown turning into a slight smile.
“The whole Lukas thing. They may not like Evan, and he is married off so he’s technically not their responsibility and while they would prefer him dead it’s the principal of the thing. A member of The Vast used a member of The Slaughter to mess with a used-to-be-a Lukas. Not to mention said member of The Slaughter was on several Entity's hit lists and was a dangerous, unpredictable, wild card. So, now we have to worry because we’ve just been proven good at.” He pauses looking at Georgie like he didn’t want her here for this conversation.
“In neutralizing threats—” He compromises, and Georgie cuts him off.
“You killed someone?!” She whispers harshly hands shaking.
“No, the coroner says he had a heart condition, one day the stress of his job and the murders just caught up to him.” Daisy bit out spitting venom.
“The Fairchild’s had a hand in Evan and Naomi’s incident?” She asked turning to Jon and he nods as she shakes her head.
“This is going to get rough if the older parties keep attacking each other like this. Even if it was a low-risk attack, we’re going to get caught up in the crossfire. You’re Beholding and the only other powerful member is Elias who’s made his position for team Lukas’s pretty clear. Helen’s the Distortion so no one’s messing with her, but you and Crew are going to be asked to pick sides soon.” She muttered
“What is that supposed to mean?” Georgie says hand quaking slightly, she wasn’t scared, mostly because she couldn’t get scared, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t get fucking upset because now she had to figure out if Melanie or herself could get caught up in the crossfire and Daisy was not helping that idea.
“It means exactly what she said. It’s politics, money, and old families with supernatural powers fighting.” Crew says shifting ever so slightly, so he could look at her, so if she went for Daisy he’d be in the way.
She calms the fuck down.
Deep breath. No one needs to start a fight, least of all her.
“So, you guys act as hit squads?” Georgie asked, she couldn’t see it, not really. Not even Daisy with her glares and ‘private security’.
“No, we don’t do that stuff.” Jon said reassuringly.
Daisy snorted and looked down.
“Okay, we don’t do that stuff and the person who did do that stuff no longer works somewhere that wants people to do that.” He amends.
“If it’s not to forward where did you used to work?” Georgie asked cautiously.
Please don’t be who she thinks it is.
Please don’t be who she thinks it is.
“The London Police Department.”
Shit, why did it have to be who she thought it was going to be?
She just took another noticeable large sip of the drink in front of her, and Daisy lets out a short laugh.
“I like her.” She says quietly directing a smile at Georgie for the first time that night.
“So, how did you two meet?” Georgie asked pointing to Daisy and Jon. She would have directed it towards Jon and Gerry but last time she did that when Jon had mentioned he had a boyfriend he had just got a faraway look and shook his head, told her he couldn’t answer that yet.
The looks at the table now were horror and amusement.
Daisy gives a wicked smirk.
“I tried to kill him and slit his throat, but before I could do any more damage than the scar that currently resides on his throat I got pounced on by one half of the overprotective sibling squad to your right. Then they got me drunk and the rest is history.” She says raising her drink.
Georgie choked.
“See I like her.”