reflectedlight | 🌙 Inbox - Marc Spector's Dead Drop

"Yeah." He grimaces. A finger taps at the cup idly before he realizes it, catches himself and stops. Total neutrality. He's fine. Not a single nervous habit to speak of.

"So what if I told you that I am trying to protect you."

"From being killed? Well, that's very nice of you.

But I - I don't think anybody can, realistically." A quick, exhausted smile. "Last month, I think I mentioned that my fear of dying is not seeing the people I love again? I'm not about to slag on how scary and painful it must be to die here, but the Death Toll means that my biggest fear, which is that she'll never even know what happened to me, won't come true. So - well. There is that."

Unless someone blows up the fucking boat, but we're not there yet in the timeline.

"I think you misunderstand what I mean when I say 'protect'. Physically? If I'm around, sure. I can try to prevent your demise." He holds up a finger for emphasis on 'try'. "But I am well aware that there are no guarantees. I know I can't protect anything, not really. That's why I'm here in the first place."

He readjusts, suddenly uncomfortable. It's probably the topic, but he's also still standing like a weirdo. "But the more you're aware, the better you might be able to protect yourself. That's why I'm saying these things. That's why I'm trying to scare you." Another waved hand. "Even if that failed spectacularly. The important thing is that you get my point. But I wouldn't call any of that being nice." He's allergic. He can't possibly be nice, he's a horrible person. "Necessary, maybe."

"So who's 'she'?"

Steven's smile gets sincere.

"Yeah, but you don't actually have to protect me, do you? I'm just somebody. You couldve just left me, I think that is nice, even if you wouldn't. Couple people I know would've saw me getting killed as something I deserve for being stupid and would have just watched it happen, yeah?

I don't - I don't do well when I'm afraid. I only make smart decisions when I stay calm, so I try to do that. I'm on a few, er-"

A quick eye-roll.

"Honestly, the sleepwalking always gets worse a side effect of a medication I take to keep from having panic attacks... Can't decide which is more irritating, but I've been warned off going off of the Ativan quite well by Dr. Varker so naturally I'm walking all round the ship like a complete muppet...

She's my mum, I - er, she was quite ... she wasn't well when I was growing up, and it's only been within the last few years she's recovered? So. We take care of each other."

"What couple people? Here?" Because that's pretty messed up, Steven. Even Kylar can acknowledge that.

All he really has to say to that is 'ah'. Familial bonds aren't his strongest suit. He is familiar with them but always from a distance. He settles on something easy. "Does she know you're here?"

Edited 2026-04-06 02:03 (UTC)

"Oh, you know. The grumpy hard cases, not any of the staff." Cheery! He doesn't blame them. They are here because they're not quite up for empathy at the moment. The Eleven system's Six and Three, he means. Ashton, probably. Maybe the Ghoul? Maybe Sebastian, that dude is HARD to read.

"She doesn't. I didn't ..." Huh. Why didn't he tell her? "I didn't want to worry her? It was a bit of a well, it's go now or go never so I went. And, of course, I'll be back without any time passing, so I can tell her all about it if she doesn't think I've gone mad."

"That's not a couple, pretty sure that's half the ship, Steven." Well, a quarter. He's seeing why Marc has his work cut out for him. This is... difficult.

"Yeah, maybe.. don't tell her. It does sound pretty mad taken out of context." Especially worlds with little to no magic. Kylar's not really sure where their world sits. Is this Moon Knight the usual or the exception? He's guessing exception. "Maybe you could ask the Admiral to send her a note or something, if you're worried. I mean, yeah, time isn't supposed to move. But the big guy makes mistakes. I'm not sure I'd always trust that. If I were you, anyway."

o no.......

"It's worth asking, yeah...."

Another concern to have.

He sips the coffee again.

"How're you feeling, by the way? Medicine should be kicking in by now."

And those handy dandy sedatives.

"What?"

Smash cut.

Marc, sitting up in Steven's bed, is the most embarrassed he's ever been maybe in his entire life.

He groans, puts his face in his hands. His head is killing him. Did Kylar fucking poison the body twice? That little shit.

He fumbles his way out of the bird's nest of blankets that Steven sleeps in - oh my god, MAKE YOUR BED, don't just throw them on there - and immediately hits the floor face-first when his ankle gets caught in ...

Yep. The stupid thing Steven invented to try to stop the sleepwalking. It's like a shackle, but made out of a blood pressure cuff and a bungee cord. Fuck his entire life.

Marc slaps the floor and curses, rolls over to undo the cuff. Again. For the second time in twenty-four hours.

At least nobody saw that?

Marc's dancer, back out of cat form and in the little baseball cap, waves from a chair.

Marc points at them. "I don't even want to hear it, Smartass."

Smartass, which is apparently Hat Guy's nickname when they're in humanoid form, shrugs cheerfully.

Marc throws his shirt on again, leaves the stupid pajama pants, laces his boots up, reluctantly opens the cabin door.

Fully expects Kylar to be right there. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Sure.

(It's definitely Marc again. Marc's posture makes him look two inches taller and his resting expression is an exhausted glower, where Steven's is goggle-eyed anxiety.)

Edited 2026-04-07 06:58 (UTC)

Kylar is, to maybe no one's surprise, on the ceiling behind Marc. Has he simply been waiting in his room like a creep? Yes. But it's respectful and let's be honest. He has seen so so so much worse. Nothing Marc or Steven could say or do would really throw him off or even phase him.

"Wow. That sleep walking thing is really persistent, huh?" He says it from arguably the general direction of above before dropping to the ground and dropping the mundane invisibility all in one go. "We need to talk." Really, no surprises here at all.

Behind -

Marc is turning and whipping a pyramid-shaped glass paperweight really hard at the source of the voice before he even registers that it's Kylar.

"SHIT"

That's Kylar.

"God ...damn it!"

WHY WERE YOU ON THE CEILING?

That thrown object gets blocked, if haphazardly by his fake arm. It's reflexive, or the ka'kari moved it on its own. Kylar has no idea but he grasps enough of what just happened to yell back.

"Marc, what the HELL? Seriously? Don't you have Hat guy for this very reason? Gods..."

Smartass makes a little ehhh gesture. They're here to keep Marc from killing anyone, they were pretty sure that one was not going to actually hurt Kylar.

"Don't you have the floor?"

FOR WALKING ON??

"Did you - poison the body?"

He puts a hand over the needle prick spot.

"Twice?"

Okay, resourceful, he's impressed and also annoyed.

Floors are overrated. He wobbles a hand before the other questions roll in.

"Yeah, asshole. You're welcome, by the way." He gestures for them to stay in the room. "We doing this in here or we going outside? Don't worry, plenty more remedies where the previous came from. But I'd prefer not to go through my whole supply in a single day so..." Can we please figure this out civilly?

"Not in public," Marc pleads. His dignity is gone, you dropped it like two doses ago.

"Thank you."

It's a heavy one. It's serious, even if it's croaked out as more embarrassment comes crashing over him. He owes you a lot.

"We're a fucking mess. This whole - brain, this whole life -" The collective, the system, Marc-and-Steven, the mind that will instantly snap into amnesia and blithely have a cup of tea after having a screaming meltdown - "is a mess."

Edited 2026-04-14 07:15 (UTC)

"I've seen.. worse." Has he? Is that actually comforting? Is Dorian worse? Dorian can barely string a sentence so.. yeah. Probably. He'll usher him back in, close the door behind them and then stand by the door. Again, he has this thing about sitting or maybe just getting too comfortable.

"You know, I'd like to help regardless of the temp thing. Fuck it. But I gotta ask you some things and you need to keep your head and tell me or we'll be going in circles and you'll just be doing another lap when it's the next guy's run."

He folds his arms.

"So are you in, or what?"

"Yeah. God, yeah. I owe you that much."

The end of the conversation isn't even something he's got a strong memory of, which is NOT a good sign.

"I'm sorry about... what I said. Fuck. I know why I freaked out, I think, but remembering it is like watching it happen to somebody else, which, you know. Isn't good.

I'll answer whatever I can."

He drops into a chair and immediately slumps down like he's trying to vanish into it.

At least he's cooperating. That's good. Relief, to some extent. Some people like to hide further or bottle up. He knows the type. Poke and you get stung.

Does he go easy or... no. He's kind of over it.

"You gonna tell me what happened thirty years ago?"

Marc starts to panic again. It's visible in the line of his shoulders, the wideness of his eyes. But he's got it this time, he takes a breath in, holds it, breathes it out.

"Fuck. You aren't messing around. Jesus. Okay.

Yeah."

Give him a second.

"You ever seen someone break under torture? Like really break, not just give up what you needed. Like, they're not going back to who they were afterwards, maybe ever."

It sucks when you've been training your mind for years to remember ridiculously complex things while under immense pressure. His master used to spar (attempt to murder?) him while making him recite complex calculations or extensive history. So, unfortunately, he picked up on that small piece of information very quickly.

"Yes. I have." He does not elaborate and his response gives no room for emotional debate, there simply is none. It's cold in here.

"Well. This shit happens when you break a kid like that before they're like..."

Marc isn't even showing his face any more, he's got his head ducked down and clutched between his hands. "I don't know, the literature says six, but I think we were ten."

Edited 2026-04-14 08:55 (UTC)

He's quiet, just observing for a long moment.

"Is that why you were asking me about Azoth?"

"Azoth?"

(There's no way Marc asked the kid his name. He was more focused on like, getting him to chill out and maybe stop bleeding.)

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do u wanna timejuml

ye

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i forgot about hat guy for a second when he threw the thing im so sorry hat guy

he can take a vacation, it's fine. tee hee tag?

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cw child abuse

cw child abuse

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