By and by we'll defy a little bit of gravity

[the_death_card]

While Jack knows it's good for him, doing a lot to stretch how far his magic will go before he's exhausted, playing with the door trick is also fun. He's been picking locks for so long now that it's almost boring, especially when his actual magic has progressed to the point that, increasingly frequently, doors will unlock themselves before he even knows they were locked to begin with.

Using the Eye's network is something different. It's a constantly moving lock that, if he hits a slightly different pin in a slightly different way, will open a door to somewhere completely different. He's already found a dozen different places across the United States and a half-dozen more outside of it that have all led to some fascinating afternoons. Every time he finds somewhere new, he thinks to ask Jacob or Max or Andrew for a list of connected places, but so far, he's forgotten to actually do it. Finding them randomly is more fun anyway.

Things have mostly calmed down around the suite, now. He knows most of them have returned to their normal sleeping habits, helped along by their brand new connection. That's still new and something he's getting used to, but like someone said, it feels like a natural next step after the year they spent living on top of each other and how close they've all become since then. It is still something they're all figuring out, though, which means that they're still taking it easy on rehearsals. Normally, that's not something he would mind, but today, it's lead to some restlessness that he knows no jog or trip downstairs to the gym will do anything to help.

When he catches himself rereading the same paragraph in his book for the third time in a row, he groans and levers himself into a sit, setting his book to the side and leaning down to grab his boots where he kicked them off earlier. There's an inquisitive ping at the back of his mind that he brushes off as he stands and grabs his jacket, heading out of his room and toward the stairs.

"I'm going out for a while," he calls to the suite at large on his way downstairs. "I've got my phone."

Merritt doesn't look up from behind his book but he does wave a hand at Jack in acknowledgement, and there's an accepting nudge from someone through the connection. Jack flips a wave back at Merritt as he slips out of the suite, closing the door behind him and heading for the elevator. He pauses once he gets there to run his thumb over his middle and index fingers, calling up a spark and touching it to the keyhole set between the standard call buttons. He can immediately feel the pins that make up the Eye's network, and he drifts over a few of them before settling on one. He nudges it into place with his magic and then pulls his hand away and hits the down button to call the elevator. It comes almost immediately, and Jack steps inside, hitting a button at random and leaning back against the wall to watch the numbers drop - and then stands straight again when it slows to a stop with the usual quiet ding.

For everywhere he's been so far, what he finds is entirely unexpected. If he didn't know better, if he hadn't already seen the Peninsula's lobby dozens of times, he would think something had gone wrong with the magic and he had just been taken downstairs. Ahead of him is another hotel lobby, and he stops just outside the elevator, trying to figure out where he is. Just ahead of him is a small desk bearing a stylized sun - and when he looks at it for more than a moment, the paint seems to shimmer, revealing an equally stylized eye set into the paint. The desk is attended by a dark-haired woman in a blue shirt with a name badge pinned to it, and she looks up at him after a moment, smiling immediately. "Good afternoon, Mister Wilder. Checking in?"

"Uh..." Jack begins intelligently, and her smile turns a little less polished and a little more truly amused as she stands up, smoothing her shirt out automatically.

"Or did you just happen by?"

"That one," Jack returns, a little relieved, and she laughs.

"You aren't the first," she assures him, "but welcome to the Sun Veil Resort. We're located on the Yucatan Peninsula with access to the amenities of Cancun with our own specific brand of privacy for our members and their guests." It's clearly a standard speech, but Jack gets well enough what she's saying - or, rather, very carefully not saying.

"You mean this is for the Eye."

"Of course," she returns before her smile fades into something more solicitous. "Would you like a tour? We do have open rooms at the moment, and I'm sure you and the other Horsemen would enjoy a visit."

Even if this isn't where Jack intended to end up, Jack doesn't even need to think about it before he nods. "Yeah, that'd be great." Saying they would all use a vacation and change of scenery after everything that's been going on is puttting it really mildly.

"Give me just a moment, then," she returns with another smile. She turns her attention back to her desk, hits a few keys on her ocmputer, sets a small bell on the desk, and then rounds it, gesturing for him to accompany her. "Right this way."

Comments

[onebehind]

"Getting better?" Dylan supplies after a moment, his expression taking a turn towards pensive. "Things were kinda strained after -- " After all the shit that happened. " -- and I think Mike picked up on, I don't know, something."

Fuller's not stupid. He's sure he clued into something more going on than Dylan was willing to tell. Thankfully, he's also not an asshole, so he left him to talk about it or not at his leisure. Obviously, he erred for not, but since things seem to be improving, Fuller hasn't pressed it and the mood that was hovering over their relationship has dissipated as his mood has.

[the_star]

Alma glances at him. "After the case ended? Or after everything that's happened with the people that have been messing with you?"

She's not sure which she means - and there's two very different tones to be had in discussing it.

[onebehind]

Dylan makes a small, almost uncertain noise, his face screwing up into a sour look.

"I was mostly thinking about everything that's happened lately -- " Between how he acted during his encounter with Torre and, more recently, the unprocessed grief over his father's death coming to a head again. " -- but I don't know. Mike's not stupid."

Now that he thinks about it, he's not sure Fuller doesn't realize something more was going on with the Horseman, even if he could never put a finger on what. He wonders if that doubt has resurfaced, if Mike ever wrote it off at all, with how Dylan has been acting lately. He wonders if that doubt has been assuaged by how weird he's been lately, if only because their failure with the Horsemen doesn't come across as a bizarre one-time incident.

Either way, the events of the last few months have made him sloppy. Maybe, when they get home, he'll have to feel Fuller out.

[the_star]

Alma makes a face, too. "No, Agent Fuller is not stupid. And I think he would have to be to not realize something is going on," she agrees. "Obviously I haven't spoken to him, so I can't make any guesses as to what he might be thinking, but." She pauses, letting out a breath. "You may want to find out, if you intend for him to still be on the outside."

And she assumes Dylan has no intention of explaining things to Agent Fuller, since it was kind of a big deal that she found out.

[onebehind]

The fact that Dylan hesitates and allows it to be seen is telling. He'd be lying if he said a part of him doesn't want Fuller to know -- or, more specifically, to know him, all of him. Maybe one day, when the statute of limitation has passed and any soreness Fuller is harboring over the way the Horsemen's case went has passed. Maybe one day, when he's feeling brave or stupid or both.

"God, I feel like a fucking high schooler," he mutters, mostly for his own benefit. Like a kid with a crush, afraid of telling the person they like how they feel for fear of losing a friendship.

He rolls his eyes, huffs out a breath, and louder and with his mask pulled firmly back into place, he tells her, "I'll feel him out when we get home. Shouldn't be too hard to throw him back off the scent."

[the_star]

Alma frowns at him for a moment, not quite sure what he means - but he goes on quickly enough that she doesn't press it - and her frown deepens when he does.

"You don't have to do that," she tells him, bluntly, and turns to face him. "You don't have to be okay all the time, to pretend everything is okay. You don't have to hide from any of us."

[onebehind]

Dylan pauses, shifting to face her in turn. He studies her for a long moment, his eyes hard as he rakes his tongue over his teeth, clearly thinking, and then finally, slowly, he shakes his head. "It's more important now more than ever."

Now that the kids are in his head on the permanent. They don't need front row tickets to his bullshit.

[the_star]

Alma doesn't even try to hide the fact that she rolls her eyes at him, settling back onto her heel as she looks up at him. She doesn't know about the connection, isn't a mind reader or any kind of mentalist, so she doesn't know that that's his concern.

Not that it would matter. It's still stupid.

"The Horsemen love you, Jacob," she reminds him. "You." She pokes him in the chest - but then flattens her hand, just resting it over his heart. "They know you, both sides of you, all of you, and you're not going to scare them - or me - away."

[onebehind]

"It's not -- " Dylan starts, stops. Okay, maybe some of it is his perpetual fear that the people he loves will, in one way or another, leave him. It's also infinitely more complicated than that at this point, however -- or so he thinks -- and so, he shakes his head.

"Part of the shit that went down, recently, kinda -- " Oh, how to explain? " -- we're all connected, now." He rakes his tongue over his teeth again, then reaches out to her, mentally, using her hand on his chest as an anchor. Like this. Permanantly.

[the_star]

Alma blinks, not bothered by his voice in her head but also not used to it. She doesn't pull away, tilting her head a little. "Really? Wow. That's.... amazing."

It is amazing, wonder in her tone, but she fails to see what that has to do with the price of tea.

[onebehind]

"Yeah," he agrees, one corner of his mouth pulling up, briefly. He's not arguing that, not even mentally, and the word echoes in his head and hers, even as the smile fades. "But since I can't turn it off, I gotta kinda ... curate shit."

Or at least be more careful with his walls.

[the_star]

Alma narrows her eyes at him, expression flattening. "Did the Horsemen say that? Did they tell you they didn't want to know what was going on with you? Or have they made every indication that they want to know you? That they would want more of a connection with you?"

It's all rhetorical, but, well. For being so incredibly smart, you can also be incredibly stupid, Jacob Shrike.

"Everyone has 'shit' to 'curate'," she tells him. "Merritt told you two minutes after we met that I had secrets. The rest of your team have their own problems. If they didn't want to share those problems and secrets with you, you wouldn't all be sharing one hotel suite."

She smiles a little, then, a little more teasing, but her point stands. They can't be that bothered by each other's issues if they've all kept living in the same relatively small set of rooms.

[onebehind]

"Alright, alright," Dylan relents, holding up his hands. The gesture is oddly reminiscent of Daniel, when Alma caught him that night in New Orleans. "I get it."

Whether or not he means to actually make use of that knowledge is another story, however.

They all have their problems and secrets, sure, and maybe his won't drive the Horsemen away, but there's still the fact that he's the leader. He's meant to be the strong one. He's meant to take care of them, particularly in situations like the one they just went through, not the other way around. He's had his time to deal with this shit; he let Jack see some of that. Now he needs to be there for them.

He really is an idiot.

[the_star]

Alma squints at him for a longer moment, not entirely buying it for how easily he gave in. She has met him, after all.

Still, after another moment, she just steps closer and leans up to press a quick kiss to his mouth before stepping back again. "I am also here for you. Even without the magic part," she reminds him, patting him gently on the chest before finally dropping her hand.

"This trip is about relaxing. Let's go find the spa."

[onebehind]

"I know." And he'll protect her, too. He chases her mouth with his, belatedly, as if to affirm this, and then, as she steps away, glances over his shoulder. "But yeah, alright, let's find the spa."

At least that they can honestly agree on.