END GAME: THE COUNTDOWN STARTS

[sailmods]

[the prisoners wake up on cold, hard floors.

the lights are bright, glaring, a sterile cell with sterile bars facing a sterile hall. the prisoners with you, across from you, and no one else. no rocking of a ship in waves, nothing. just the prisoner and their prison.

time passes, one assumes. the rhythmic click of Friday’s heels down the hall. it’s almost like the ticking of a clock.]

Comments

[decohere]

Only if you rip your hair out from all this stress! [fusses because damn they've really been through it, one thing after another with no time to properly recover in between]

Oh, it's lovely. [she holds out her hand and admires the makeshift ring, smiling up at him through lowered lashes.] Not even in death shall we part.

[be_seeing_you]

If The Village couldn't do that to me, then this place won't.

[They haven't survived this far to let go now.]

Nothing will ever part me from you.

[He cups her face and leans in close, to seal that promise with a kiss.]

[decohere]

You saw what happened to the last bastard that tried.

[a gentle press of lips, of her body against his.]

Can't trade you away...

[be_seeing_you]

I did.

[He tugs away to look at her in surprise.]

Me? You're the one I worry will be traded.

[decohere]

You clearly have better trade in value than me... a rare vintage, yeah?

I'm just a... side villain. In some story about a man that can talk to ants. [her world is full of far more interesting specimens.]

[be_seeing_you]

You must be joking. Men like me are not rare. But women like you? Ava, you have always tried to value yourself too little. If Malin can see what I see, then she knows exactly how priceless you really are.

[decohere]

What men like you...? [she certainly hasn't met any as wonderful. but she supposes the value they see in each other, all their inner important qualities, aren't what somebody like Malin is looking for. just freaks to put on display for others to gawk at, if the reference to the World Fair and Ava's understanding of history is aligned... she frowns. humanity never really changes. they just find newer and worse ways to abuse power.]

The only way I'm valuable to people like that is the same way SHIELD valued me. Which isn't at all... [but that increases her fear of being traded off even more, not for display purposes, but invasive research on her condition or yet another shady organization needing soldiers to burn through. all of the possibilities seem more awful than the last, and her breath hitches and she hides her face against Peter's chest, trying to calm herself down.

none of it's happened yet, despite her cruel imagination. none of it will happen. between all of them, they'll somehow manage to stop her... because to Malin they're all just things, but to each other they're everything.]