Eve has always been older and wiser.

There is no-one here to watch Nie Mingjue, save for their ancestors, save for him.

Andrew makes for a bad date, even when he's not the one paying. Fletcher is determined to drag him all over New York or die trying.

Sui Zhou must rise eventually, of course.

Commanding that a thing be done is a damn sight different from witnessing it in person. Sometimes one needs to be reminded of this.

Better safe than close. A phrase Alleria repeated to herself so many times over their lost years that it has become some strange combination of vow and hymn.

Classes being disregarded, sinister genius and enthralled assistant wait for morning.

"It's Karen," she says hopelessly in the middle of his doorway like he wouldn't know her a thousand other ways. The whiff of perfume on her, Viktor & Rolf Flowerbomb trapped underneath a thick smear of booze, or the sound of her shoes on the hard tile floor. She's drunk already; her breathing is faint and thready. Her face is too hot.

None of this makes any sense, really. Jim's barely laid a hand on her, if he doesn't count the occasional hand-up over difficult terrain, or accidental (mostly accidental) groping when an explosion throws his bridge crew around, and Jim doesn't count that, because if he counted that he'd be at third base with Keenser by now.

Buffy and Faith are living it up in Cleveland, over thirty and regularly trying to convince their neighbors they're really just roommates, not "roommates", no matter what Faith wants. Of course, then things get all fucked up, complete with an apocalypse.