[ It has never been a secret, Lottie's association with Moon Knight.
(He goes to her front doorstep, walks around in her building whenever she asks him over. He leaves out of her window, or any window he can get his hands on whenever he decides to humor her and leave normally. She's been seen walking beside him throughout the city, has been personally walked to his Mission β has had things delivered for them, to his Mission. Has had him pick things up in her name at random ass restaurants.)
It has never been a secret, Lottie's association with Marc Spector.
(Lottie may not divulge everything, but she mentions him to Misty. Mentions him vaguely to Caroline, when Esther tells her something she doesn't want to hear, when she knows Caroline will fan the flames of Lottie's endless desire to make bad decisions. Esther knows him by first name only, but she's seen Lottie's endless list of Doordash receipts on their company email, seen the notes ("hiii! someone else will be picking it up for me, he'll be wearing all white and in a mask but don't be scared ty xoxo", or "if moon knight walks in that's for meee!! also please put sugar and creamer in the bag, ty"). Has put two and two together to figure her boss has managed to get herself another 'unique' friend.)
Lottie hasn't posted anything on Instagram and hasn't let her know if she should come in to finish off the rest of her packages. Strange, but not wholly unusual. She arrives, anyway, sits at her desk around noon and figures maybe she's out somewhere with Misty and Meg. But it's by 6 o' clock that night, and nothing still, does she think this might be a sign of something terrible. Lottie is a creature of habit, has a problem with oversharing and is perpetually lonely. A day without a text from Lottie is rare, and usually means she's either: having a breakdown (again), or..
In a way, this association is a good thing, it means Esther Dumont has a place, a guesstimate of a time and who to contact, when she arrives at the Midnight Mission.
Only awake from the worry and the coffee she's chugged on the drive here, she enters the building with as much a friendly energy as her nerves will allow. Greets the receptionist, Reese, as she comes to find out, when they get to chatting β something that she knows must be entirely out of place in a 'business' like this, but she only does it to soften the abrupt blow of, 'I need to speak to Marc. It's about a mutual friend of ours and it is very, very urgent.'
She is a startling splotch of yellow in the otherwise controlled hues, the deliberate palette, of the Missionβ her jumpsuit teeters between fashionable and casual, the way it's paired with the heels she wears, a practical low to Lottie's always impractical high. They click heavy against the floor as she paces inside the room Reese had led her into, arms crossed and body stiff, her phone glaring bright in one hand as if she had just recently checked it. ]
( radio silence from lottie doesn't strike marc as strange in quite the same way — his efforts to text her are infrequent and inconsistent, and though he's come to expect communication from her (of a sort), he's never paid that much attention to the frequency — partly an oversight, and partly due to his own irregular hours. so though he notices he hasn't heard from lottie, but he doesn't think anything of it. he assumes she's busy, or that she's just not interested in talking to him right now (for whatever reason. it'd hardly be the first time).
he's in the middle of something — ""something"", his usual affair of regular criminal punching when there's no zodiac to hunt down, no midnight man to dress up as, and no new leads on who sarnak's working for. it's therapeautic stress relief — when reese gets in touch with him, a short, succinct message over the cowl-mic. she says she wasn't given a name, but explains that the woman in question almost definitely isn't from their neighbourhood, is dressed in actual colour and that she thinks she might be friends with the "(melo)dramatic lady with green hair". marc doesn't disagree.
he hasn't met esther before, only heard the name. he's entirely devoid of expectations before he enters the room, imagines a mini-lottie in appearance if not in personality, simply because he's not sure if lottie would tolerate too much time spent with someone too much like her. certainly wouldn't employ someone like herself as her intern (probably). esther in reality is about halfway to what marc was imagining.
he does the ritual, the welcome to the midnight mission. my name is mr. knight, how can I help? because although they have a mutual friend in common, esther is not a part of this. she has not been to the mission before, she does not know what to expect from him. he does it, too, because in its own way, it's grounding. comforting and familiar. esther explains the problem, and marc can see where she's coming from. if it were anyone else, he'd be skeptical, but lottie? no. not so much.
he says he'll look into it, and offers for esther to stay at the mission if she wants, if she thinks it'll help. there's a chance it's nothing, he thinks, a chance it's just (quote-unquote) lottie being dramatic about something or other, but there's a chance, too, that it's not and marc's been there. he's been in this position before, with marlene, with frenchie, with jeff, with diatrice. with soldier. with reese.
(with almost everyone he knows and cares about, actually—.)
he starts by asking if lottie has any enemies (the exact word he chooses, to be precise, even if he knows the answer will probably be a 'well, there are people that don't like her'), asks if anything else has been weird or off with her, with her routine, and with anyone that's been spending time with her (he half expects an incredulous look at that question, giving who he is and where they are). he asks, too, if there's anyone that's shown a bit too much interest in her — beyond the usual, although frankly, marc's not really sure how he'd quantify that given their very different lifestyles and what passes for 'regular attention' in lottie's day-to-day.
in spite of all that, in spite of the questions, there's a part of him — a large part, the majority, that says as with every other friend and loved one that's been hurt adjacent to him, it's because of him. says that he doesn't need to be asking all of these questions, because he — the fucking idiot — has been dressing up as the fucking midnight man and hitting the homes of the children of the committee. anton mogart might be dead, jeff wilde might be dead, and though coming back to life is no rarity in their sphere, neither of them have (yet), so who else would the new midnight man be? it'd taken greer barely five minutes to figure out, and with the resources available to the committee (and, presumably, their children—).
(maybe taskmaster knows something, he thinks. tony had warned him the last time, didn't want a repeat of marc flying a helicopter into the building he was in. or 8-ball, perhaps, not that jeff ran in the sort of circles the committee did.
or the profile? was he still around? after — everything?)
marc has never claimed to be a good detective: he relies more on brute force, on demanding information from people than calculated studies and deductions. he can do it, though he's not especially skilled — better with crime scenes that have details to work with — and for anything else, he's found he prefers making people talk.
[ Oh, he gets more than an incredulous look. Somehow, Mr. Knight (Marc, they both know she knows his name is Marc, god, this man) manages to give off the impression that he doesn't hang out with her boss, that he isn't part of that list of "weird people" Lottie hangs out with.
It's an act that suspiciously reminds her of Lottie, whenever she wants to seem unbothered or normal when there is something itching at the back of her skull, when she thinks a little too hard. She thinks the way her face settles into something unimpressed and mildly exhausted β irritated? Not at him, just how clinical this all feels β will show him that. She tells him that the only other "weird people" she associates with are Caroline and her brotherβ cousin? Vergil? Esther mentions that Lottie isn't sure which he is, just that they're related and he's a (quote-unquote) little shit.
Not that she suspects anything, just that there's a history there. Disapproval paints her features at this β arguably, the same disapproval she shows for Mr. Knight's series of questions when he could just ask her, 'What the hell is going on with Lottie this time?'
(He asks if there are enemies (enemies), she surmises that there are people who don't like her, but that's it. He asks if her routine is off and she mentions before today? No. She doesn't do much, even if it seems like she does. Anyone's that's shown a bit too much interest in her? It's a succinct: no, that he gets, because everyone gives her too much attention. That's what she wants. She thought he'd know thisβ)
Esther doesn't outright decline his offer of staying at the Mission, ultimately, barely acknowledges it, even. She lets him know that after this she's going to ask around some more within their circle. That the good (good?) news is her phone isn't at her house, same with her house keys. She must've gone somewhere, she remarks that there's only a handful of places she'd go if it meant that (her allergists, down to a local coffee shop, to visit somebody maybe), and that her location is off.
Whether that means her phone has been forcibly shut off, or that she's turned it off, she can't say, only that contacting Caroline might be a place to start. So she hands her phone over for him, fully expects him to put his number into it, so she can promptly send him the address (her penthouse, as it turns out, situated cozy in the Yves Chelsea). 'I don't have her number,' she explains, 'But she invited the two of us over to work one day and I saved it, just in case.' And then she sends him the information for the offices of Dr. Yang and Dr. Rick (they're closed, obviously, but who knows β Esther truly has no idea what 'Mr. Knight' does, or what he needs, or what he's going to do, but something is better than nothing). Says that if there's anything else he needs from her, just call. ]
( it's not that marc is trying to give the impression that he's not close with lottie, or that he believes esther doesn't know his name is 'marc', it's that it's how he's — in recent memory — opted to deal with things he finds less than pleasing. less than emotionally optimal.
(it's how he'd reacted to marlene showing up out of the blue, after shoving jake to the front and trying his hardest not to deal with the situation, when marlene had demanded to speak with him, he'd thrown himself into (trying to be) 'mr. knight' instead of marc, because marc doesn't do emotions. he doesn't do emotionally difficult. that's not his thing. it's hard and he doesn't enjoy it, and when he gets the chance, he simply doesn't.
that's what jake's for. that's what jake's always been good at.)
esther's not impressed and marc can see that, though he doesn't take the time to mention that he asks the question he asks because if it was as simple as 'what the hell's up with lottie?' then esther would know where she was and why she's not answering her phone. he asks because this — kidnappings, abductions, disappearances, whatever — are simple at times, complicated at others. in lottie's world — no, not anymore, in esther's — they're probably simple most of the time; in marc's they're not. sometimes it's magic, sometimes it's werewolves, sometimes it is just a gang of bad guys doing bad things because they can and there's money in it.
but going into it half-cocked and without any idea of the bigger picture is just asking for trouble.
(even if, as the more esther talks, the more marc pivots away from thinking this is anything lottie related, and more about her being incidental. collateral.)
still, he starts with the addresses esther gives him — the doctors first because they're closed and breaking in's hardly a challenge. the suit's been swapped for the cape and cowl because this isn't the sort of thing 'mr. knight' should be seen doing, this is for moon knight, and if it's going to go as well as marc thinks it's going to go—. that's what moon knight's for.
(he doesn't tell reese where he's going, just tells her not to disturb him and that she can take the rest of the night off (paid, because he's sending her home), and that he'll be in touch tomorrow.)
the doctors' offices reveal a whole lot of nothing, which is mostly what marc expected. nice offices, clean, modern, nothing to hide — which marc would appreciate a whole lot more if he wasn't looking for answers. caroline's next, then, and he doesn't break in. instead, he watches from the roof of an adjacent building. there's not much to be seen, not from where he is, just shadowy figures moving about, details obscured by the lighting and the reflective glass. he considers, briefly, of asking (telling) steven to make use of himself, pretend to be looking at buying an apartment in the city and to knock on her door.
(that's not something anyone does at this time of night—.)
so steven doesn't, but marc does make his away across to the building. he does wait (broodily, angstily) on the roof of the building. his gut says that it isn't caroline (the penthouse is too normal, there's no-one coming in or going that strikes marc as suspicious, the list of residents doesn't contain any names that marc knows.) he pulls out his phone (still cracked, still mostly functioning) and thumbs through the contacts, settling finally on one that says 'jeff hagees (π±)'.
if esther's suggestions haven't given him anything, maybe his will. )
not me realizing i've spelt virgil's name wrong in my last tag AUYFLMAFYUE
[ Virgil is on his way to do what he always does: take care of Caroline's problems and clean up her messes.
The list is exhaustive and endless β wherever she goes, he follows, whether she likes it or not. A bar? He's the bartender. A hotel? He plays security, he plays the waiter. At home? The butler and brother. The girl she pushed off a building that one time? Time to bullshit being a physical therapist for a month to monitor the situation. Any time Lottie distances herself from Caroline? Find a way to bring her back. His role in the grand scheme of this all is minor, but simple. He has to make her life easier. He, also, has to follow her whims. Her interests. Mostly, her friends.
Mostly, Lottie's friends.
He's been tailing Esther for the better part of the night from rooftops, lugging around a duffle bag full of equipment and looking through binoculars where he can. Wearing tactical gear that is too stuffy, chaffing too much for his liking, for the night. Watching.
Waiting.
He sees her pull up to the Midnight Mission andβ fuck. Of course. This guy. He's already been well aware of what's been happening within Lottie's life, just how complicated it could get with the addition of Moon Knight. A man who has no qualms on beating the shit out of and branding people, a man who would beat the shit out of him if he even tried keep an eye on him, get near him, so he doesn't β there's only so much he's willing to throw himself into if he doesn't have to, and this is one of them. A problem out of his paygrade.
And after he leaves the Mission, he thinks he has an idea of where he might go, but Moon Knight has the advantage of not carrying his own tech, of not having to be quiet and stealthy, so he decides it isn't even worth trying to catch up to him. So he walks himself somewhere on a rooftop nearby the penthouse, gets there just in time to see Marc waiting, (broodily, angstily) on the roof of the Yves in his signature cape and cowl. Sees him bring out his (less signature, more necessity) phone that's still cracked, still mostly functioning, and thumb through his contacts. He gets to 'jeff hagees (π±)' right as Virgil sits his ass on an air vent, dumps his bag right beside his feet and frowns deeply.
He executes probably the dumbest plan he's ever had known to man, the (honestly) very last thing he ever really wanted to do ever since seeing Lottie Person and Moon Knight being friendly, for the first time. He calls Marc's phone. ]
( marc doesn't get to actually calling jeff because his phone rings first. ordinarily, the moody, thematically on-point music of echo and the bunnymen would spill out but tonight — no. his phone vibrates, even the buzzing feeling much too loud in the relative silence of the night (it's not — there's a cacophony of noises from the street below, people and cars alike, and it'd only be if someone were here, right next to him, that they'd notice the noise of his phone).
it rings once and marc eyes the number. no name. unknown. it rings a second time, and marc looks away and up, searching. the yves is only 14 floors, practically on the ground compared to the buildings marc usually spends his time atop. he almost feels exposed, knows that if someone wanted to, they'd have a clean line of sight from them to him, perched atop one of the taller, neighbouring buildings. or from inside, a window cracked open.
he answers on the third ring, holds the phone up to his ear and — says nothing. not immediately. he listens for breathing, for the sound of traffic, for background noise, for anything that stands out, and then— )
Moon Knight. (not 'mr. knight'. mr. knight is for the mission, he's helpful and as gentle as marc's capable of being. he investigates, he assures his neighbours, his people, his congregation that their problem will be dealt with, and then that problem is left to moon knight.
sometimes, marc isn't quite sure where he ends and moon knight begins, or if they're even different at all. (they are, aren't they? or maybe they had been, before marc had lost his way—) —and now moon knight has blood on his hands, the same as marc — fewer (no) innocents, certainly, but more blood than should have been spilt. more violence used than has ever been necessary. (except for jake, jake had adopted a 'no killing' rule, had tried to clean up marc's image long before marc had considered it, and then marc had brought it tumbling straight back down all over again).
moon knight, like marc spector, has always been good at following orders. sure, he's chafed here and there, grumbled about the work to be done, dissented, but in the end, he's always done the work and he's done it well.
[ Virgil isn't that much higher β high enough to give himself enough time to figure out an escape if Moon Knight decides he doesn't want to talk over the phone. It's a tense few seconds as he waits, as he grinds his teeth against each other and inhales deeply. Feels the ice cold chill of the air bite at his lungs and sink into his skin when it keeps ringing. He reaches out to his bag, to grab at the handles, figuring this is a bust but that he might as well keep the phone held up to his ear, so he can hear him hang up on him real time.
But then the ringing stops, Marc says β nothing. Not immediately. Virgil stays deathly still, lets his eyes rise to where he knows he must be searching for him on that roof. He'll find nothing stands out in the ambience surrounding him, nothing that he can't hear himself, anyway.
Maybe that's what gets him to talk, to greet him with words and not deliberate, intimidating, silence.
He wonders how this can be the same person he's seen eat burritos in Lottie's apartment. He seems like an entirely different person, speaking 'Moon Knight,' into his ears, deliberate, careful, with no need or desire to seem intimidating because, in this moment, he is. His hand slowly retracts, is pulled back to his person as he mulls over what to say. Virgil treats each second like its precious β he knows it's a matter of time before he says something that prompts Moon Knight (not Marc) into angling his head that much higher to spy his head of white hair lurching over to glean at him. To come get him. ]
Who the hell did you piss off?
[ He says, finally, as he eases his way back from the ledge. Thinks it doesn't hurt to let some of the frustration at his situation ebb into his voice. ]
Because they're really making things harder for me.
The other list is shorter. ( he keeps still. with the voice, the one he can't place but for a guess as to where they'd grown up or the accent they're imitating (well), marc has stopped looking over rooftops, stopped searching for a maybe-person with eyes on him. the second remark is what gets him, is what infuriates him.
"they're making things harder for me."
marc doesn't care. )
The list you're asking about is full of dead people. By the time this night's over, I imagine it's going to be a longer list. ( a pause, long enough to hear marc's careful exhale of breath. tangible, palpable, cold. ) Do you want to tell me again how inconvenienced you are, or did you want to have a productive conversation?
[ The silence that greets him is something Virgil does not like. Does he seriously not have an inkling? Any type of lead on who the hell is doing this? Virgil only has as much as he's willing to investigate, willing to spare time on a problem that, in the beginning, wasn't his. And what he's managed to come up with is good, but he is not built for the type of solutions that this 'problem' needs.
Pointedly, does not want to include the person he, personally, knows could provide the 'solution' he needs β someone who directly oversees his operation here with Caroline.
(And if he did, have it in him to report more than the basics for the past day or do when all this started, Virgil would be told to promptly stay out of it and to let whatever happens, happen. That she'll make her way back, eventually, or they'd move on to wherever Caroline's whims take her. That he doesn't need to know the name of whoever is behind this, but that there's an understanding within his own organization to keep their distance.)
He exhales in frustration when he finally hits him with a reply that answers virtually nothing, that manages to fester the odd thought in his head that he might actually need him, in this. ]
I'd love to have a productive conversation.
[ Virgil's voice is, pointedly, devoid of any notable accent. It tells Marc that he is not a native born New Yorker, not from California, either. Not from Europe, not from anywhere. And what it also tells him, is that he is still extremely fucking inconvenienced, vaguely stressed beyond his limits, but trying his best to not step on toesβ he knows that remark about his supposed "list of dead people who pissed him off" isn't just a remark. ]
You're gonna get a text with the last location I managed to find Lottie at, and she needs to be back inside her apartment by tomorrow morning.
( marc snarls, gutteral and frustrated at the last remark. she needs— he says, and marc pulls his phone away from his ear in a violent, sudden motion, expression contorting beneath his mask. she needs! he holds the phone out, gaze fixed on the screen. if virgil continues speaking, marc doesn't continue listening. a second, then two, then— ) —Pal, if you want to keep your face past tomorrow morning, you'll keep your comments about what Lottie needs to yourself.
( it's not that he disagrees — the sooner he finds lottie the better for all involved. well, better for lottie, for marc, for esther. for lottie's friends, not for this man on the phone, this mystery voice that's unfortunate enough to not be who marc would like to be talking to, but is who he's got. marc doesn't trust him.
marc's used to far more of a song and a dance — a video designed to explain and detail precisely what's going to happen, how whoever's deemed marc spector a problem plans on breaking him; threats sent in letters; challenges left in blood and lipstick, painted on walls and in churches. for better or worse, marc's enemies are not often coy — jeff wilde, desperate for marc's attention, had never done anything more subtle than leave blood-drenched calling cards painted in the shape of clocks striking midnight. the committee had sent the profile and taskmaster. zodiac—.
marc's enemies have always liked to taunt, to dangle his sanity in front of him like a question: how far?how much does it take? marc's answers have always been as far as he needs to go; less than you'd think.
raoul bushman is the only one of marc's enemies to have succeeded in truly, wholly, entirely breaking marc. what he'd known — what zodiac doesn't and the committee hadn't, was that kidnapping his friends, hurting the people he cares about does nothing but make marc angry, does nothing other than fuel the guilt that drives him to vengeance. breaking marc is about holding up a mirror and showing him that everything he's afraid of, every dark and shadowed facet of his personality is real and inescapable. that he and raoul bushman are one and the same.
this will likely end in tears, but marc doesn't think they'll be his. )
Start with the Committee. I upset( heavy and weighted, a brightly signposted euphemism ) their fathers — a difference in opinion on what makes a monster — and the sons tried to make it right once before. They failed. Perhaps their children have inherited the same stupidity and egotism.
( and if he thinks about it, marc suspects it doesn't help where he's been moonlighting as the midnight man. if greer could figure it out, he's not stupid enough to think that they couldn't either.
if the suggestion's entirely off-base when the message comes through, marc will work through his list of enemies, alive and dead, and compare their last known locations to hers. if it works, it'll give him a solid starting point. if it doesn't, then he'll pay a visit to the bar with no name and ask some very persuasive questions. )
Edited 2023-06-10 21:19 (UTC)
me typing this not knowing geographically how new york works at all LMAFAYE
[ There's an odd sort of realization (a horrid one, if he's being honest with himself) that he says Lottie the way he does. Admonishes him for stating what, frankly, needs to be done β what's best for all of them, ultimately β by threatening him. Snarling, growling, the volume of his voice ebbing and flowing in a way that lets him know he's pulling the phone away from his face to exist in the moment, the spasm of rage and frustration.
Does he think he knows better? Doesn't he agree with him? He should agree with him, that much is obvious, but Marc is so wrapped up in his emotions ('if you want to keep your face past tomorrow morning' rings in his head in a constant thrum, is once again reminded of whose number he dialed) he can't tell.
It's a long pensive moment that he's left sitting at this roof, feeling the cold wind brush against his body and begin to seep into the thick and uncomfortable layer of suit he wears on nights like this. The second time tonight, he thinks about hanging up. He abandons the idea when he's given a nameβ something. Maybe if Marc left it at that he'd be fine with doing his own digging and coming back with whatever he found (after he got Lottieβ after she's back inside her home so she can become available to Caroline the second she gets her phone back). It's the 'I upset' that hits him the hardest. His, 'I upset' is heavy, weighted, implies something and a hand moves to pinch the bridge of his nose.
He wishes he brought his cigarettes. His lighter. Anything to take the edge off of the confirmation it's definitely his fault and that's why he's so god awful upset. He shouldn't be surprised, Virgil knows this. Lottie's life is a predictable oneβ he knows her routine, he knows she doesn't go out unless there's content to be made, stays home when it suits her allergies best, and while yes, Marc has officially changed her "normal" it wasn't enough to spark anybody's interest, right? It isn't, enough. ]
Right.
[ His free hand curls into a fist before he draws the phone away from himself, sends off the marker of the building he had pinged her at (it is, pointedly, far, far away from her usual haunts β the radius of her apartment, of the more populace parts of New York β pointedly, near a particularly skeevy area that's out of range of Marc's territory, that's just a few miles away from where where the sea meets gravel. Virgil wouldn't be able to tell if it's 'Committee' aligned or not, but the one photo he attaches gives way that it isn't exactly novices patrolling the area, that there might be a budget to this operation). ]
Yeah, sure.
I'll get right on it.
[ He doesn't hang up right away β Virgil gives him two beats of a moment to settle in before he hits the end call button. If he decides to call him back, he won't answer. And he won't be able to leave a voicemail, eitherβ but he can text him. ]
that makes two of us lmao IT'S FINE IT'S MAGIC RP LAND NYC
( marc doesn't say anything further, not after 'I'll get right on it', in the brief silence that hangs between them before virgil hangs up first. marc doesn't call back, isn't interested in that right now. if he tries that, it'll be later, much later, after he's exhausted all other options. it's not like the time that stuart clarke called him to hang vague, ineffective threats of making him penniless over his head. it's not even like the time that zodiac called him from outside the mission, acting as if soldier's and reese's lives were playthings.
this is something else, inhabits the space between the two. it's quiet, subtle. a guessing game and marc doesn't like it.
a location first, and then a photo. marc wouldn't say he's intimately, deeply familiar with where lottie tends to hang out when she's not with marc — he knows her apartment, manhattan, the odd place here and there in brooklyn — bed-stuy and williamsburg, something about how they're cool places to be seen — but beyond that? no. what he does know, is certain of, is that the location that is sent to him is precisely no-where lottie would choose to go. it speaks of an inherent, tangible danger, seediness, and violence. it's the sort of place men like him are found.
the photo doesn't tell him much — it's far too dark for that — but there's enough to be seen who that says the men involved likely charge a high price and that they know what they're doing. that they know not to ask too many questions — the money'll be enough for limited interest on that front — and that the men in charge of them have a particular outcome in mind. the faces of the men visible — two — are of no-one he recognises, hair cut and styled in a way that says they're not of the cape-and-cowl sort. (or: less taskmaster and more average (by a definition) joe).
he pauses, a momentary, internal debate amounting to 'who?' making itself known in brief hesitation, before a short-and-sweet text amounting to the location and 2 hours is sent to soldier. time enough, he thinks, and of everyone he knows, soldier's the one most likely to listen. to give him the grace time he thinks he'll need.
(no point in getting anyone involved unnecessarily.)
and then: to the docks.
(it's times like this that he really misses frenchie and the mooncopter.) )
[ Security is tight β the horrid implication is that there was thought and planning put into all of this, when the two of them finally arrive at the building they've surmised her to be at. Security is tight, but that doesn't mean there aren't holes. That everyone is dedicated to the mission as a whole when their target they've intended to lure in has taken longer than expected. That means despite the budget, despite the expertise, despite the firepower, there are opportunities for the two of them to brute force their way through the building, to let the crisp air filter into the building.
And when it reaches Lottie, all she takes it as is another reminder of her newfound life.
Her existence that has consisted of nothing but tears. Crying, being too scared to scream. She's been held captive for what feels like forever and she's been too much of an irritable mess to be anything but a body to her captors β they know she's prone to crying, to sobbing, to freaking out, and the one time someone laid hands on her it was an accident, really. They said no marks, but the stark mark on her cheek, the bruising purple on her that stands an alarming shade against the white of the fabric wrapped tight in her mouth (so she can't talk, because she babbled and wept and cowered for as long as she could until everyone decided no more).
Her body is bowed, forehead pressed against the cold feeling of cement, the only thing that makes her feverish body feel vaguely comfortable. Her allergies have been on a nonstop rotation of acting upβ the raised bumps of hives and her body on a general decline are obvious to all who see her, the labored breathing, her face being a mess from the inability to breathe clearly for as long as she'd been held here. It's another shift in position, a cycle she's put herself through in the hopes of keeping herself sane and breathing untilβ until what? Marc gets here?
Her shoulders shake violently, digging her face, her nose, into the ground as she wheezes desperately give herself air to sob properly. Would he? She cries a pitch too loud, a pitch too pathetic, that draws attention of the myriad of guards positioned outside of her room, briefly distracted as they bang incessantly on her door. ]
( security is nothing new to marc — he's been quote-unquote private security for hire, and he's dealt with security like this and otherwise both by himself and with the avengers. it's not necessarily easy work, but it's not precisely difficult either, and marc has never been one to particularly care for delicacy.
(once, marc had gone in search of a kidnapped child, kept at the top of an abandoned building marc truthfully hadn't been able to decide if it'd been a hotel or if it'd been apartments. it was a sorry state, is what it was, made none the better by the men that'd chosen to make it their temporary home; some the better once marc was done with them. the child — a girl named scarlet — had been blindfolded and bound, left to make herself at home on an ugly, lumpy, stained and mildewed mattress. marc had found a baseball bat and gone to town.)
the men hadn't entirely been a different sort — paid less, but in it for the same things, more or less — meaning marc's approach here is much the same: swift, simple brutality. then he'd worked his way floor-through-floor, here it's hallway-by-hallway, and he doesn't much care how he looks by the end of it. white stained with bright red that hasn't yet had the chance to dry and oxidise into brown.
the banging punctuated by a couple of sharp yells to shut the fuck up or we'll shut you up lets him know he's headed in the right direction. sometimes — not very often, but sometimes — marc is asked who the hell he's supposed to be, all in white and with a bag on his head, but this isn't one of those occasions. they know who he is, they'd been expecting him — but then, taskmaster (tony) had known who he was and he'd still ended their little tΓͺte-Γ -tΓͺte terrified and completely opposed to facing moon knight ever again.
(it'd been the flying a helicopter into a building to get him that'd done it—.)
marc thinks it's incredible they haven't learnt the same lessons, but — sins of the father and all that. the fight — not quick, but as quick as marc can make it — dull thuds and laboured grunts is followed by acute silence. quick breaths punctuated by a cough and then—.
the door.
he can hear movement, crying — lottie? — and his gaze shifts between the door (locked, key, no window) and the bodies of the two men tasked to stand guard. they won't be moving any time soon, not that it matters, and marc rifles inelegantly, unbothered by politeness and decorum, through their pockets until he finds what he's looking for.
the lock — and the key — are nothing particularly refined, just a silver yale key and a standard lock that, if worse had come to worst, marc would've been able to lockpick (a credit card and enough force is generally enough to do the trick—).
a soft click, a barely-there flicker of hesitation, and marc pushes down the handle and swings the door inwards, fingers curled around his truncheon, as equal parts white and blood-stained as he is. )
[ There is blinding indecisions that grips her, seizes her brain and chest in the most painful of ways when the chaos and fighting is right at her doorstep. She opens her eyes and cries harder, stares evenly at the ground she faces as one man is taken down. Thenβ the other. The only way she can surmise this is from the sheer brutality, how loud it is for someone to get punched or hit or attacked. And some stupid part of her thinks: just like on TV, where it sounds painful, heavy, where there's impact to the sound that makes her wince terribly. Except there's the clear divide of this is all pretend when she's watching a show, or a movie. Now, as she stares down at the door, feels the rope that binds her wrists together digging at her skin uncomfortably, she's reminded that this is real.
And that the shadow meandering at her door, is real. She is not hallucinating this (although that might be possible, too β she hasn't taken her medication, or eaten, done much of anything normal, really). Whoever is opposite to her door, whoever is lingering with some kind of hesitation, stands there. They, are real.
Time slows to a crawl, fear and hope and terror making her breathing pick up in the stark silence of it all. She doesn't think about how her body rips itself from the ground, how her fever is running higher as she shuffles to the wall furthest to the door. She makes it just in time as the door is halfway swung open, back pressed taut against the chilly concrete right as light from the hallway blinds her. Her eyes strain with effort she can barely afford to give, trying to see who it is at her doorstep.
It is hard to place what she feels β when she sees Marc.
(Moon Knight?)
The lines are blurred, so spectacularly blurred that she is both sick (blood, he isβ drenched in blood, so much blood) and elated. She wants to throw up, but she can't tell if it's from relief or disgust. Grinds her teeth together as best she can around the gag, clenching her jaw tight, and she can't tell if it's from the anger or from the cry she's holding back.
(Lottie has stood before Moon Knight before, but all he did was admonish her for not being careful. She was standing then, they were on semi-equal footing, then. Moon Knight looks imposing. Scary. He looks big while she feels so alarmingly small and fragile that it makes her wonder how many people did he beat just to get here.)
Her body relaxes, the strain and anxiety taking hold of her melting away just enough to allow her the chance to move forward. To lean a little his way, towards him, not so he knows that she isn't scared of him and she's just peachy keen with this. It is because she is scared, because Marc is scary, that she's scared of him, too, but he is also safe. Marc is safe, and she wants that, too β wants to feel safe again and he absolutely will make sure she gets it. The truncheon he grips guarantees her as much. The blood-stained white dappled on his cowl, his sleeves, his knuckles most of all, guarantees her more than that.
Lottie can't speak β even if she did, she wouldn't know what to say, she is hardly living as it is now enough to form thoughts. She only has enough in her to bask in simple emotions, desire, impressions, because anything more and she just might freak out again (and she knows what happened the last she did that).
A weak, warbly cry for him leaves her throat, loud enough to be caught dangling in the air. ]
( she's a mess. hair and face and clothes grubby and grimy and wet from tears and god knows what else. she can't talk, the pitching cry that she makes instead makes him wince, a sharp, sudden burst of negativity. it doesn't help his temper, the anger, not so much simmering as cold, feeling as if it's an intrinsic part of him instead of an emotion that'll pass. it's not meant for lottie, isn't because of lottie and her reaction, not really, but is because of — this. all of it. everything.
(despite everything he's done to get here, he'll later make inelegant, hot-tempered comments about making them pay, about cowardice and how he'll kill them, but for now—.)
he kneels in front of her, brings himself down to her level so that they are equal, the noise of his truncheon hitting the ground as he places it down sounding startling loud in the sudden silence. it's only a second, the pause as he studies her features, his gaze — white, not brown; moon knight, not marc — meeting hers, but it feels longer.
she can't see his face, the way his eyebrows are knit tightly together, the way his mouth curls down, the way that concern is etched into his features. moon knight — marc spector — may be deliberately intimidating, marc may go out of his way to ensure that his enemies are scared of him, but anger is how he deals with the rest of it. the guilt, the shame, the worry. the self-loathing. the horrifying thought that what if he can't do anything else other than this?
he reaches towards his belt and pulls out a crescent dart. he could waste time trying to undo the gag, fiddling with the knot and getting frustrated, or he could just cut through the material, quicker and simpler. )
Lottie. ( he doesn't tell her it's okay, that it's going to be okay, because now's not the time, not really. instead, he gestures with his free hand towards her mouth. ) I'm going to take this off first, okay? Then your hands. ( a beat as he reaches forward, toward the side of her head. ) Don't move.
[ His gaze β white, not brown; Moon Knight, not Marc β meets hers in a way that makes her insides twist and turn in anxiety. She knows she shouldn't feel afraid but can't deny the awful churn of her stomach the closer he gets, the moments he gets that crescent dart (something she's always thought thematically cute, being away from the action β now it feels oddly deliberate, intimidating in his hold).
She cries, hot tears dripping down her cheeks and staining her gag as he doesn't tell her it's okay β that's what she wants, platitudes, pleasantries, hugs, comfort, anything that's been the polar opposite of her existence this entire ordeal β just tells her he's going to free her. Her eyes dart to his hand, the way it gently moves to the side of her head, and she feels her heart thrum like a rabbit. The pace unbearable and so nerve wracking she'd laugh, if she could, just to ease her nerves.
But Marc barrages her with different emotions, feelingsβ she's staring at Moon Knight, detailing what he's going to do with her and yet she hears Marc. Hears him so loud and clear that she manages another sob of relief, nods her head briefly before trying to stay still as best she can to allow him what he needs to do. ]
( he doesn't do anything until she stills, until after she nods, tears continuing to run and drip, even as he reaches up with the crescent dart, presses the blade against the cloth and with one sudden movement, slices through.
(they're sharp, designed to pierce flesh and more — the gag, though thick, is nothing really.)
he tugs it away with his free hand, barely mindful of how it — this, everything — plays against the image lottie tries so hard, is so careful, to project. it's soaked with tears and sweat and saliva alike, but marc tosses it to one side — white, gloved hands — with the manner of someone that's seen and dealt with a lot worse.
(because he has. jean-paul and even marlene, both of them had experienced worse with marc — his general lack of interest in self-preservation and inability to ensure the continued safety of those closest to him meant that they'd dealt with worse with marc, and because of marc.)
it won't be until later, until after they've both left and marc's sure she's as safe as she can be, that marc will really allow himself to feel emotions beyond anger. for now, it's just that, simmering below the surface, not quite directing what he needs to do to get lottie out of here — not now, not after the (majority) of the threats have been dealt with — but informing.
after the gag he frees her hands, gaze lingering a fraction too long on the raw, red marks on her wrists, before looking up to meet her eyes once again. it still doesn't occur to him, not quite, that she can't see his expression, can't intuit his feelings thanks to the mask, the cowl, the shadows it casts. he knows he should say something, but it's different to rescuing jean-paul, to saving marlene, to finding jeff. all of them had known what they were signing up to — in a manner of speaking — all of them had known who marc was, what kind of a person he was, what his lifestyle was like. it's danger — continuously — disregard and recklessness.
lottie had never been a part of something like that. she was separate. she was normal in a way that marc had always hoped to be but had never quite achieved. she wasn't even like little scarlet, daughter of a gang boss caught wrong.
he sits, for a second, in front of lottie. quiet. then his head drops, just a fraction, and quietly— )
[ Despite gaining use of her hands, despite gaining access to her mouth, Lottie still feels tied back and chained down when she sees the lack of anything to Marc. And isn't it always like this? She has some unsaid, ridiculous expectation of him and he just disappoints her. What does she expect?
(She is lying. She is telling herself this because it's easier to assign he doesn't care to her like this because she's done it before. She'll always do it when he doesn't react the way that she likes, the way she wants him to, even if she knows he simply isn't capable of it showing it in the way she can recognize immediately.)
The odd thing is, she finds her heart is hurting more than her body, everything else, when he doesn't say anything outright and yet, gently slices through that gag (tosses it to the side rough, in comparison). Frees her hands and stares heavy at the marks on her delicate, slim, wrists (he tosses that, too, something like anger brewing beneath the careful and deliberate control of his fingertips) like he's bothered by it. Is he? She heaves a heavy, strained, breath, and almost asks. In the end, she sits there, gently rubbing at her tied wrists and wincing towards the ground every so often.
Her anger has quickly morphed into something like shame, and embarrassment. She must look ugly. Gross. Terrible. No wonder he isn't saying anything β he's probably finding a way to not hurt her feelings. And how is she going to cover up this bruise? What about her wrists? How is she going to just exist after this? Her head ambles up, a breakdown just seconds away from happening because she can't stop herself from spiraling, but thenβ
Marc says 'I'm sorry'.
He says 'I'm sorry' so softly that she almost doesn't catch it, dips his head down just a fraction and she barely sees it.
Lottie isn't sure what to do, at first, how to take this. What the fuck? Genuinely, honestly, what the fuck? 'Sorry' won't change anything, won't fix anything. 'Sorry' isn't going to make the time she spent here magically okay. But 'sorry' does manage to lessen the intensity of her thoughts, make her mind go blank for a few blissful seconds just to wonder if this is the first time he's ever apologized to her. A broken laugh bursts through her lips, dry as they are, at that, voice cracking halfway from disuse. Marc said he was sorry and she believes it, believes it so much she's reduced to tears because despite that, she can't tell if it's for himself, or for her. She weeps into her hands, looking frailer and smaller than ever. ]
Can you justβ [ Mumbled, watery and hurt. ] please shut up and hug me?
( he says sorry and it only serves to make her cry more and harder, folding in on herself, hands pressed against face. the ensuing words are muffled, slightly garbled in between tears and a stuffy, running nose. it is ugly, but that's all of it. it's marc, in his suit chosen for how bright and stark it is against everything he does — once, a news reporter had opined that maybe moon knight wore white for redemption, an attempt at making up for everything he'd done. the retort to that had been that moon knight's always worn white, it's never reflected his morals, the ethics of how he metes out vengeance.
jake had always been better at it. more measured. more careful. where steven flat-out refused all of it — the violence and the blood and the mess — jake was more pragmatic. he didn't have marc's guilt, marc's worries, marc's obsession with his past and what he'd done. jake has never found pleasure in violence, isn't good at it, not in the way that marc has or is, but he knows that sometimes it is the answer. long before marc had decided to shut out both steven and jake entirely, before he'd decided to set up his midnight mission and rehabilitate his image through "helping his community", jake had been the one tasked with trying to make moon knight respectable again. jake had been the one who'd showed new york that moon knight wasn't just crimson and mutilation, wasn't just inelegant offerings to a moon god no-one else could quite work out the truth of (real? imaginary? the difference hardly mattered when marc was busy operating under the belief that he needed more violence — death, for the "one that eats hearts".)
lottie feels ugly and the situation is ugly, because it's not steven grant crouched in front of her, well-meaning and aghast at what's happened to her and because of her (because of marc); it's not jake lockley, empathetic and roguish, but ultimately warm. it's marc spector, and marc is ugly. she tells him to shut up — all two words that he's uttered, as if he's anything other than laconic at the best of times — and tells him to hug her, and he does.
where their first hug — the one at the mission, after a night of discordant disagreement — had been tentative and unsure, this isn't. marc is not a natural hugger, is not prone to being physically affectionate, but that doesn't mean he's averse to it. doesn't mean he doesn't appreciate tactility.
there's not a world of difference between their heights, but marc is larger, broader, thanks to a lifetime of physicality, of boxing and fighting. he envelopes her tightly, drawing her closer to him, cape partially covering her in response to the sudden movement. it's not gentle — marc rarely is — but it's not rough. it's emotive, emotional. jerky with profound gladness that lottie might not be okay, but she's okay. )
[ Arguably, if Jake had given her the more measured, more careful approach, she'd be upset. She wouldn't want to be treated like she was fragile (she is). If Steven had given her the well-meaning and aghast reaction at what's happened to her (because of Marc) she'd be upset.
She is upset at Marc's genuine, painful, everlastingly aching 'I'm sorry'. She would never be satisfied, any which way, but she would always demand the brute and awkward force of bluntness that Marc gives her, because it is what she's used to, even if she does not like it, even if it is what she doesn't need, right now. It's what she wants. Arguably, if it was anyone but Marc she'd just recede into herselfβ refuse to talk to anyone and go silent until she deemed it safe. Arguably, as ugly as this situation is, it's the best. It's the one that needs to happen, because above all Lottie needs to be held. Needs a shoulder to cry on with someone else, because she's done so much by herself already that it is an action that means nothing to her without someone (without himβ without Marc Spector holding back so much it is thrumming in his bones and vibrating in the air, the intensity this man feels so strongly for things he cares about so much).
Their first hug β the one at the mission, after a night of discordant agreement β had been tentative and unsure. This isn't. Marc wraps his arms around her so tight and warm and comforting that it makes her wheeze. He is larger, broader, to Lottie's impossibly smaller and slimmer frame, meant to look appealing in photographs and nothing more. He dwarfs her easily, her hands getting bunched up around his cape once she realizes what's happening and she burrows her face into his shoulder. Her nails grip onto anythingβ his cape, his suit, his body, anything to get closer. To remind herself that this is real.
She is safe.
She feels like shit but she isn't alone.
There's a long, painful, cry that leaves her lips that settles deep into his skin. When she feels his concern settle into her bones with the way his hold digs into her, it grows louder. And she claws, claws, claws with blunt nails (from scratching at the ground), to make sure he's hooked closeβ and only when she is satisfied does she grip him tight. Does she hiccup and scream into his shoulder, voice breaking at pivotal highs and desperate lows. It is the worst song. It does not echo in the poor acoustics in the room, but is the loudest thing inside. It is the most painful and raw tune he will ever hearβ the muffled symphony of her agony, pain, relief. The way she says, 'Marc,' then 'Marc' on repeat, the underlying 'I was so scared' buried deep in the depths of her tone. ]
( this isn't quite what he usually deals with. marlene's been through a lot — too much — and though she'd clung to him after, though he'd held her tightly in the hours afterwards, she'd never cried like this. frenchie, too — marc had seen him near enough on his deathbed, had spent time with him after he'd lost his legs. they'd sat next to each other when they'd both been convinced that this was the mission that was going to go sideways and that'd be it, and all they'd exchanged had been jokes, or caustic, angry words. marc doesn't often have someone cling to him, relief and pain intertwined.
it says a lot as to how this isn't lottie's life.
it reminds him of how much marlene and jean-paul and rob and diatrice deserved to be free of this life, and — really — lottie too.
it tells him that they were right to leave when they had — and wrong, maybe, not to leave sooner, though they'd tried, hadn't they? and marc had just insisted on drawing them back into his orbit, had acted as if because he needed them, that was what mattered over anything else. that was more important than their safety.
lottie repeats his name and he doesn't let her go, willing to allow her to clutch on to him for as long as she needs to because who knows. once this is over, and they're away from here and she's safe — well and truly safe — there's more than a chance, he thinks, that she'll decide he's not worth it. that everything he's told her is true: knowing him is dangerous and she's better off not.
(marc has never been good with expressing how he really feels, but he's never been good at hiding it either. he cares, a lot. more than he knows how to deal with. he struggles to put it into words, to explain, but it's there in desperate, misguided actions. he's never been able to pretend — except in anger — that people, his people, don't matter to him.
if (when?) lottie decides she's better off remaining in her fashionista, influencer bubble, marc won't be pleased, but he won't claim he doesn't understand, either.)
the more she says his name, the less it sounds real, less like a word, less like his name. nonsense, something to say to fill the oppressive silence. he shushes her, softly and gently, not concerned that anyone will stumble across them — he's certain that won't be the case, but because— )
We need to leave. ( a statement, not a command, not a suggestion, punctuated by a shift in his weight and a tilt of his head, towards the door, to make sure there isn't any unwelcome noises approaching from behind. ) Do you think you can do that for me?
[ Little thought is being spared to practical, bigger, important things like the future. Her brain is only hyperfunctioning on now. On how fucking terrible Marc's suit feels in the palm of her hands, a mix of blood and viscera and sweat laced into the fabric. She focuses on how he smells β this is, for once, easy, because a runny nose means she can grab some scents at least, and he smells like copper, like anger, but the bottom line is he still smells like Marc.
She burns into her mind the way his own hands feel around her body, the desperate and comforting grip to them, so very different from the way they usually touch (which is hardly at allβ it is in fleeting moments, they are physical in ways like this, through barely there grazes of fingertips and her elbowing him playfully).
And then she hears his voice, vaguely muffled by the mask and near impossible to catch with her howls, but she does. Lottie is still grief stricken, still shaking and volatile and sensitive and so very scared but the lulling timber of his voice only manages to semi-soothe her. She is not done β and the terrifying thing is, she's not sure she'll ever be done, because each time the silence settles and she stops, it picks back up. She sees the room he clutches her in and it begins all over again.
She hears him tell her they have to go in between bouts of wails, shaking her head vehemently not because she doesn't want to leave β that is the last thing she wants β but because she doesn't want to leave the safety of his embrace. Leaving means getting up and being separated, it means being in danger again and feeling fear crawl and thrive in its own special made layer beneath her skin. Deep enough where she can't scratch and tug it out. Surface level enough where she'll see the rope marks on her wrists for weeks, see the bruise on her cheek swell down in color and size, too, and as a result will always have to think of this when she looks in the mirror.
(Lottie will no longer feel happy gazing at herself in the mirror. She won't be putting on makeup for fun, she'll be putting it on to hide.)
Lottie wants to stay burrowed into his shoulder to never have to see anything in this stupid building again. So desperately wants her last image of this place to be of Moon Knight β Marc β standing there in her doorway, the bodies of the men holding her prisoner peeking barely into frame. Her eyes squeeze shut, presses her face into him tighter as she refuses to let go, screams turning into sobs. Hiccups. Agonizing cries that are purely so she can wallow in him.
But eventually, eventually, sheβ. Relents. After spending some time thinking that he's right.. They have to. She swallows phlegm down and coughs pathetically, nods weakly. Bunches her hands in his cape in a way that lets him know that while she'll comply, she refuses to leave this spot. That she doesn't care how much of an inconvenience it is. ]
( her first response is to continue sobbing, wailing, a violent, absolute shake of her head he feels instead of her vocalising it in any shape or form. he knows it's not what she wants — who would want to stay here? but he knows, too, that it's because moving — leaving — requires acknowledgement. it'll mean seeing where she's been taken and where she's been kept, seeing the bodies of the men that'd been hired to keep her here and what marc has done to them.
it doesn't occur to marc yet but it will later that lottie has spent most of their friendship pointedly ignoring all the rumours about marc spector, all the stories about moon knight — the violence, the unpredictable behaviour, an unstable personality. she's glossed over everything marc has told her himself — when they've argued, mostly, when he's been trying to prove a point — and though he knows she's seen some of the rumours, some of the news stories, he knows she barely bothered to read them.
it might occur to marc eventually that it's not wholly unlike what marlene used to do — she would try and pretend marc didn't exist, that steven grant could be and was the dominant — only — personality. that with enough prompting, marc spector would be left in the desert, buried alongside her father.
marlene had wanted steven most of all because he wasn't violent. he was urbane. sophisticated. not exactly gentle, but entirely more civilised than marc has ever been. lottie hasn't met steven, likes marc well enough, but she's never quite found peace with each and every facet of marc spector — but has never had to really face all of them either.
this, he'll realise (maybe), is a sharp, rude awakening for lottie that maybe marc hasn't just been moody and angsty and dramatic for the sake of it. that maybe his testy warnings that he's not ever really wanted lottie to heed have been for a reason. it's the same sort of reckoning that soldier's had, that reese has had, that greer has had. all of them — except greer — are early enough in their friendships with marc that it feels excusable, explainable, all part and parcel of the sort of lifestyle that moon knight leads.
after all, it happens to the friends and families of other superheroes, right? other vigilantes.
later, though, it'll come with the realisation that it doesn't matter if it happens to everyone with a CERTAIN LIFESTYLE, what matters is that it doesn't get better. it repeats ad infinitum, a neverending cycle of pain and hurt and betrayal punctuated by periods of time where it feels exciting, where moon knight is a figure of hope rather than questionable vengeance.
eventually — and marc doesn't know if the passage of time is as long as it geels — she relents. the wails die down into hiccuping cries and she nods (still doesn't speak), but still she doesn't move. instead, her hands clutch at him and his clothes more tightly, steadfastly refusing to move and to see. it's not new, but it is—.
it is a touch inconvenient.
he doesn't sigh but he does step awkwardly in an effort both to stand, retain his balance and keep ahold of lottie. a jerky movement punctuated by a HNGH. she's not heavy, but that doesn't mean it's easy, not until he readjusts, until he redistributes his weight and then hers, one arm stretched across her back, his hand resting against her head, tilting it into his shoulder, the other under her legs.
he's lucky, he supposes, that's she conscious. that she's not a dead weight. unluckily, he thinks, he doesn't have the mooncopter anymore. that'd make the journey home (hers or his—?) quicker, but—.
[ Later, when she's by herself, forced to let her thoughts fester will she think about thatβ all of his warnings, all of her brushing away of said warnings, convinced that she somehow knew him better or that he was just being self-conscious and dramatic. It is a rude awakening, one that she thinks she'll never forget. One that she, pointedly, will not be sharing with anyone outside of whoever is already involved.
None of her fans will know what happened, why she'll be disappearing for a month until all the bruising and marks fade away, until her smile becomes perfect again. Not her family, her friendsβ only Marc (and Esther, once she finds out this was all her doing).
When she feels him move to stand, Lottie only clings tighter, awkwardly moving along with him in a way that allows her vision to be completely shrouded by him. That she won't see anything she doesn't want to. It's a tedious process she does not make easier, as he wraps one arm around her and then the other beneath her legs.
The wide expanse of his palm rests in the grody mess of hair on her head and she whimpers into him, nuzzles as deeply as she can when she feels herself begin to cry again. It is silent, the way she indulges in her sorrow and agony, once he hoists her up and carries her properly, this timeβ Marc will be able to feel the way her body trembles every so often in his arms, will feel it strongest beneath his palm. Will be able to feel every shaky, shuddery, inhale and exhale before she begins all over again, tears dropping and staining his suit.
She does not say anything more, doesn't do anything less, just wraps her arms tight around his neck and stays where she feels most comfortable. Lottie will stay like this throughout the entire walk through the building, will stay like this outside, and absolutely will try and stay (unhelpfully, clingily) like this in the car, too. ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
πππ β π«ππ¨π©π’ππ£π©π¨
(He goes to her front doorstep, walks around in her building whenever she asks him over. He leaves out of her window, or any window he can get his hands on whenever he decides to humor her and leave normally. She's been seen walking beside him throughout the city, has been personally walked to his Mission β has had things delivered for them, to his Mission. Has had him pick things up in her name at random ass restaurants.)
It has never been a secret, Lottie's association with Marc Spector.
(Lottie may not divulge everything, but she mentions him to Misty. Mentions him vaguely to Caroline, when Esther tells her something she doesn't want to hear, when she knows Caroline will fan the flames of Lottie's endless desire to make bad decisions. Esther knows him by first name only, but she's seen Lottie's endless list of Doordash receipts on their company email, seen the notes ("hiii! someone else will be picking it up for me, he'll be wearing all white and in a mask but don't be scared ty xoxo", or "if moon knight walks in that's for meee!! also please put sugar and creamer in the bag, ty"). Has put two and two together to figure her boss has managed to get herself another 'unique' friend.)
Lottie hasn't posted anything on Instagram and hasn't let her know if she should come in to finish off the rest of her packages. Strange, but not wholly unusual. She arrives, anyway, sits at her desk around noon and figures maybe she's out somewhere with Misty and Meg. But it's by 6 o' clock that night, and nothing still, does she think this might be a sign of something terrible. Lottie is a creature of habit, has a problem with oversharing and is perpetually lonely. A day without a text from Lottie is rare, and usually means she's either: having a breakdown (again), or..
In a way, this association is a good thing, it means Esther Dumont has a place, a guesstimate of a time and who to contact, when she arrives at the Midnight Mission.
Only awake from the worry and the coffee she's chugged on the drive here, she enters the building with as much a friendly energy as her nerves will allow. Greets the receptionist, Reese, as she comes to find out, when they get to chatting β something that she knows must be entirely out of place in a 'business' like this, but she only does it to soften the abrupt blow of, 'I need to speak to Marc. It's about a mutual friend of ours and it is very, very urgent.'
She is a startling splotch of yellow in the otherwise controlled hues, the deliberate palette, of the Missionβ her jumpsuit teeters between fashionable and casual, the way it's paired with the heels she wears, a practical low to Lottie's always impractical high. They click heavy against the floor as she paces inside the room Reese had led her into, arms crossed and body stiff, her phone glaring bright in one hand as if she had just recently checked it. ]
π
he's in the middle of something — ""something"", his usual affair of regular criminal punching when there's no zodiac to hunt down, no midnight man to dress up as, and no new leads on who sarnak's working for. it's therapeautic stress relief — when reese gets in touch with him, a short, succinct message over the cowl-mic. she says she wasn't given a name, but explains that the woman in question almost definitely isn't from their neighbourhood, is dressed in actual colour and that she thinks she might be friends with the "(melo)dramatic lady with green hair". marc doesn't disagree.
he hasn't met esther before, only heard the name. he's entirely devoid of expectations before he enters the room, imagines a mini-lottie in appearance if not in personality, simply because he's not sure if lottie would tolerate too much time spent with someone too much like her. certainly wouldn't employ someone like herself as her intern (probably). esther in reality is about halfway to what marc was imagining.
he does the ritual, the welcome to the midnight mission. my name is mr. knight, how can I help? because although they have a mutual friend in common, esther is not a part of this. she has not been to the mission before, she does not know what to expect from him. he does it, too, because in its own way, it's grounding. comforting and familiar. esther explains the problem, and marc can see where she's coming from. if it were anyone else, he'd be skeptical, but lottie? no. not so much.
he says he'll look into it, and offers for esther to stay at the mission if she wants, if she thinks it'll help. there's a chance it's nothing, he thinks, a chance it's just (quote-unquote) lottie being dramatic about something or other, but there's a chance, too, that it's not and marc's been there. he's been in this position before, with marlene, with frenchie, with jeff, with diatrice. with soldier. with reese.
(with almost everyone he knows and cares about, actually—.)
he starts by asking if lottie has any enemies (the exact word he chooses, to be precise, even if he knows the answer will probably be a 'well, there are people that don't like her'), asks if anything else has been weird or off with her, with her routine, and with anyone that's been spending time with her (he half expects an incredulous look at that question, giving who he is and where they are). he asks, too, if there's anyone that's shown a bit too much interest in her — beyond the usual, although frankly, marc's not really sure how he'd quantify that given their very different lifestyles and what passes for 'regular attention' in lottie's day-to-day.
in spite of all that, in spite of the questions, there's a part of him — a large part, the majority, that says as with every other friend and loved one that's been hurt adjacent to him, it's because of him. says that he doesn't need to be asking all of these questions, because he — the fucking idiot — has been dressing up as the fucking midnight man and hitting the homes of the children of the committee. anton mogart might be dead, jeff wilde might be dead, and though coming back to life is no rarity in their sphere, neither of them have (yet), so who else would the new midnight man be? it'd taken greer barely five minutes to figure out, and with the resources available to the committee (and, presumably, their children—).
(maybe taskmaster knows something, he thinks. tony had warned him the last time, didn't want a repeat of marc flying a helicopter into the building he was in. or 8-ball, perhaps, not that jeff ran in the sort of circles the committee did.
or the profile? was he still around? after — everything?)
marc has never claimed to be a good detective: he relies more on brute force, on demanding information from people than calculated studies and deductions. he can do it, though he's not especially skilled — better with crime scenes that have details to work with — and for anything else, he's found he prefers making people talk.
it's just finding the right people to talk. )
π₯°
It's an act that suspiciously reminds her of Lottie, whenever she wants to seem unbothered or normal when there is something itching at the back of her skull, when she thinks a little too hard. She thinks the way her face settles into something unimpressed and mildly exhausted β irritated? Not at him, just how clinical this all feels β will show him that. She tells him that the only other "weird people" she associates with are Caroline and her brotherβ cousin? Vergil? Esther mentions that Lottie isn't sure which he is, just that they're related and he's a (quote-unquote) little shit.
Not that she suspects anything, just that there's a history there. Disapproval paints her features at this β arguably, the same disapproval she shows for Mr. Knight's series of questions when he could just ask her, 'What the hell is going on with Lottie this time?'
(He asks if there are enemies (enemies), she surmises that there are people who don't like her, but that's it. He asks if her routine is off and she mentions before today? No. She doesn't do much, even if it seems like she does. Anyone's that's shown a bit too much interest in her? It's a succinct: no, that he gets, because everyone gives her too much attention. That's what she wants. She thought he'd know thisβ)
Esther doesn't outright decline his offer of staying at the Mission, ultimately, barely acknowledges it, even. She lets him know that after this she's going to ask around some more within their circle. That the good (good?) news is her phone isn't at her house, same with her house keys. She must've gone somewhere, she remarks that there's only a handful of places she'd go if it meant that (her allergists, down to a local coffee shop, to visit somebody maybe), and that her location is off.
Whether that means her phone has been forcibly shut off, or that she's turned it off, she can't say, only that contacting Caroline might be a place to start. So she hands her phone over for him, fully expects him to put his number into it, so she can promptly send him the address (her penthouse, as it turns out, situated cozy in the Yves Chelsea). 'I don't have her number,' she explains, 'But she invited the two of us over to work one day and I saved it, just in case.' And then she sends him the information for the offices of Dr. Yang and Dr. Rick (they're closed, obviously, but who knows β Esther truly has no idea what 'Mr. Knight' does, or what he needs, or what he's going to do, but something is better than nothing). Says that if there's anything else he needs from her, just call. ]
no subject
(it's how he'd reacted to marlene showing up out of the blue, after shoving jake to the front and trying his hardest not to deal with the situation, when marlene had demanded to speak with him, he'd thrown himself into (trying to be) 'mr. knight' instead of marc, because marc doesn't do emotions. he doesn't do emotionally difficult. that's not his thing. it's hard and he doesn't enjoy it, and when he gets the chance, he simply doesn't.
that's what jake's for. that's what jake's always been good at.)
esther's not impressed and marc can see that, though he doesn't take the time to mention that he asks the question he asks because if it was as simple as 'what the hell's up with lottie?' then esther would know where she was and why she's not answering her phone. he asks because this — kidnappings, abductions, disappearances, whatever — are simple at times, complicated at others. in lottie's world — no, not anymore, in esther's — they're probably simple most of the time; in marc's they're not. sometimes it's magic, sometimes it's werewolves, sometimes it is just a gang of bad guys doing bad things because they can and there's money in it.
but going into it half-cocked and without any idea of the bigger picture is just asking for trouble.
(even if, as the more esther talks, the more marc pivots away from thinking this is anything lottie related, and more about her being incidental. collateral.)
still, he starts with the addresses esther gives him — the doctors first because they're closed and breaking in's hardly a challenge. the suit's been swapped for the cape and cowl because this isn't the sort of thing 'mr. knight' should be seen doing, this is for moon knight, and if it's going to go as well as marc thinks it's going to go—. that's what moon knight's for.
(he doesn't tell reese where he's going, just tells her not to disturb him and that she can take the rest of the night off (paid, because he's sending her home), and that he'll be in touch tomorrow.)
the doctors' offices reveal a whole lot of nothing, which is mostly what marc expected. nice offices, clean, modern, nothing to hide — which marc would appreciate a whole lot more if he wasn't looking for answers. caroline's next, then, and he doesn't break in. instead, he watches from the roof of an adjacent building. there's not much to be seen, not from where he is, just shadowy figures moving about, details obscured by the lighting and the reflective glass. he considers, briefly, of asking (telling) steven to make use of himself, pretend to be looking at buying an apartment in the city and to knock on her door.
(that's not something anyone does at this time of night—.)
so steven doesn't, but marc does make his away across to the building. he does wait (broodily, angstily) on the roof of the building. his gut says that it isn't caroline (the penthouse is too normal, there's no-one coming in or going that strikes marc as suspicious, the list of residents doesn't contain any names that marc knows.) he pulls out his phone (still cracked, still mostly functioning) and thumbs through the contacts, settling finally on one that says 'jeff hagees (π±)'.
if esther's suggestions haven't given him anything, maybe his will. )
not me realizing i've spelt virgil's name wrong in my last tag AUYFLMAFYUE
The list is exhaustive and endless β wherever she goes, he follows, whether she likes it or not. A bar? He's the bartender. A hotel? He plays security, he plays the waiter. At home? The butler and brother. The girl she pushed off a building that one time? Time to bullshit being a physical therapist for a month to monitor the situation. Any time Lottie distances herself from Caroline? Find a way to bring her back. His role in the grand scheme of this all is minor, but simple. He has to make her life easier. He, also, has to follow her whims. Her interests. Mostly, her friends.
Mostly, Lottie's friends.
He's been tailing Esther for the better part of the night from rooftops, lugging around a duffle bag full of equipment and looking through binoculars where he can. Wearing tactical gear that is too stuffy, chaffing too much for his liking, for the night. Watching.
Waiting.
He sees her pull up to the Midnight Mission andβ fuck. Of course. This guy. He's already been well aware of what's been happening within Lottie's life, just how complicated it could get with the addition of Moon Knight. A man who has no qualms on beating the shit out of and branding people, a man who would beat the shit out of him if he even tried keep an eye on him, get near him, so he doesn't β there's only so much he's willing to throw himself into if he doesn't have to, and this is one of them. A problem out of his paygrade.
And after he leaves the Mission, he thinks he has an idea of where he might go, but Moon Knight has the advantage of not carrying his own tech, of not having to be quiet and stealthy, so he decides it isn't even worth trying to catch up to him. So he walks himself somewhere on a rooftop nearby the penthouse, gets there just in time to see Marc waiting, (broodily, angstily) on the roof of the Yves in his signature cape and cowl. Sees him bring out his (less signature, more necessity) phone that's still cracked, still mostly functioning, and thumb through his contacts. He gets to 'jeff hagees (π±)' right as Virgil sits his ass on an air vent, dumps his bag right beside his feet and frowns deeply.
He executes probably the dumbest plan he's ever had known to man, the (honestly) very last thing he ever really wanted to do ever since seeing Lottie Person and Moon Knight being friendly, for the first time. He calls Marc's phone. ]
jgkdfldd
it rings once and marc eyes the number. no name. unknown.
it rings a second time, and marc looks away and up, searching. the yves is only 14 floors, practically on the ground compared to the buildings marc usually spends his time atop. he almost feels exposed, knows that if someone wanted to, they'd have a clean line of sight from them to him, perched atop one of the taller, neighbouring buildings. or from inside, a window cracked open.
he answers on the third ring, holds the phone up to his ear and — says nothing. not immediately. he listens for breathing, for the sound of traffic, for background noise, for anything that stands out, and then— )
Moon Knight. ( not 'mr. knight'. mr. knight is for the mission, he's helpful and as gentle as marc's capable of being. he investigates, he assures his neighbours, his people, his congregation that their problem will be dealt with, and then that problem is left to moon knight.
sometimes, marc isn't quite sure where he ends and moon knight begins, or if they're even different at all. (they are, aren't they? or maybe they had been, before marc had lost his way—) —and now moon knight has blood on his hands, the same as marc — fewer (no) innocents, certainly, but more blood than should have been spilt. more violence used than has ever been necessary. (except for jake, jake had adopted a 'no killing' rule, had tried to clean up marc's image long before marc had considered it, and then marc had brought it tumbling straight back down all over again).
moon knight, like marc spector, has always been good at following orders. sure, he's chafed here and there, grumbled about the work to be done, dissented, but in the end, he's always done the work and he's done it well.
he chooses his words carefully. )
You know what I'm going to say to you.
no subject
But then the ringing stops, Marc says β nothing. Not immediately. Virgil stays deathly still, lets his eyes rise to where he knows he must be searching for him on that roof. He'll find nothing stands out in the ambience surrounding him, nothing that he can't hear himself, anyway.
Maybe that's what gets him to talk, to greet him with words and not deliberate, intimidating, silence.
He wonders how this can be the same person he's seen eat burritos in Lottie's apartment. He seems like an entirely different person, speaking 'Moon Knight,' into his ears, deliberate, careful, with no need or desire to seem intimidating because, in this moment, he is. His hand slowly retracts, is pulled back to his person as he mulls over what to say. Virgil treats each second like its precious β he knows it's a matter of time before he says something that prompts Moon Knight (not Marc) into angling his head that much higher to spy his head of white hair lurching over to glean at him. To come get him. ]
Who the hell did you piss off?
[ He says, finally, as he eases his way back from the ledge. Thinks it doesn't hurt to let some of the frustration at his situation ebb into his voice. ]
Because they're really making things harder for me.
no subject
(khonshu?)
randall.
marlene.
frenchie.
who hasn't marc pissed off in his life? )
The other list is shorter. ( he keeps still. with the voice, the one he can't place but for a guess as to where they'd grown up or the accent they're imitating (well), marc has stopped looking over rooftops, stopped searching for a maybe-person with eyes on him. the second remark is what gets him, is what infuriates him.
"they're making things harder for me."
marc doesn't care. )
The list you're asking about is full of dead people. By the time this night's over, I imagine it's going to be a longer list. ( a pause, long enough to hear marc's careful exhale of breath. tangible, palpable, cold. ) Do you want to tell me again how inconvenienced you are, or did you want to have a productive conversation?
no subject
Pointedly, does not want to include the person he, personally, knows could provide the 'solution' he needs β someone who directly oversees his operation here with Caroline.
(And if he did, have it in him to report more than the basics for the past day or do when all this started, Virgil would be told to promptly stay out of it and to let whatever happens, happen. That she'll make her way back, eventually, or they'd move on to wherever Caroline's whims take her. That he doesn't need to know the name of whoever is behind this, but that there's an understanding within his own organization to keep their distance.)
He exhales in frustration when he finally hits him with a reply that answers virtually nothing, that manages to fester the odd thought in his head that he might actually need him, in this. ]
I'd love to have a productive conversation.
[ Virgil's voice is, pointedly, devoid of any notable accent. It tells Marc that he is not a native born New Yorker, not from California, either. Not from Europe, not from anywhere. And what it also tells him, is that he is still extremely fucking inconvenienced, vaguely stressed beyond his limits, but trying his best to not step on toesβ he knows that remark about his supposed "list of dead people who pissed him off" isn't just a remark. ]
You're gonna get a text with the last location I managed to find Lottie at, and she needs to be back inside her apartment by tomorrow morning.
no subject
( it's not that he disagrees — the sooner he finds lottie the better for all involved. well, better for lottie, for marc, for esther. for lottie's friends, not for this man on the phone, this mystery voice that's unfortunate enough to not be who marc would like to be talking to, but is who he's got. marc doesn't trust him.
marc's used to far more of a song and a dance — a video designed to explain and detail precisely what's going to happen, how whoever's deemed marc spector a problem plans on breaking him; threats sent in letters; challenges left in blood and lipstick, painted on walls and in churches. for better or worse, marc's enemies are not often coy — jeff wilde, desperate for marc's attention, had never done anything more subtle than leave blood-drenched calling cards painted in the shape of clocks striking midnight. the committee had sent the profile and taskmaster. zodiac—.
marc's enemies have always liked to taunt, to dangle his sanity in front of him like a question: how far? how much does it take?
marc's answers have always been as far as he needs to go; less than you'd think.
raoul bushman is the only one of marc's enemies to have succeeded in truly, wholly, entirely breaking marc. what he'd known — what zodiac doesn't and the committee hadn't, was that kidnapping his friends, hurting the people he cares about does nothing but make marc angry, does nothing other than fuel the guilt that drives him to vengeance. breaking marc is about holding up a mirror and showing him that everything he's afraid of, every dark and shadowed facet of his personality is real and inescapable. that he and raoul bushman are one and the same.
this will likely end in tears, but marc doesn't think they'll be his. )
Start with the Committee. I upset ( heavy and weighted, a brightly signposted euphemism ) their fathers — a difference in opinion on what makes a monster — and the sons tried to make it right once before. They failed. Perhaps their children have inherited the same stupidity and egotism.
( and if he thinks about it, marc suspects it doesn't help where he's been moonlighting as the midnight man. if greer could figure it out, he's not stupid enough to think that they couldn't either.
if the suggestion's entirely off-base when the message comes through, marc will work through his list of enemies, alive and dead, and compare their last known locations to hers. if it works, it'll give him a solid starting point. if it doesn't, then he'll pay a visit to the bar with no name and ask some very persuasive questions. )
me typing this not knowing geographically how new york works at all LMAFAYE
Does he think he knows better? Doesn't he agree with him? He should agree with him, that much is obvious, but Marc is so wrapped up in his emotions ('if you want to keep your face past tomorrow morning' rings in his head in a constant thrum, is once again reminded of whose number he dialed) he can't tell.
It's a long pensive moment that he's left sitting at this roof, feeling the cold wind brush against his body and begin to seep into the thick and uncomfortable layer of suit he wears on nights like this. The second time tonight, he thinks about hanging up. He abandons the idea when he's given a nameβ something. Maybe if Marc left it at that he'd be fine with doing his own digging and coming back with whatever he found (after he got Lottieβ after she's back inside her home so she can become available to Caroline the second she gets her phone back). It's the 'I upset' that hits him the hardest. His, 'I upset' is heavy, weighted, implies something and a hand moves to pinch the bridge of his nose.
He wishes he brought his cigarettes. His lighter. Anything to take the edge off of the confirmation it's definitely his fault and that's why he's so god awful upset. He shouldn't be surprised, Virgil knows this. Lottie's life is a predictable oneβ he knows her routine, he knows she doesn't go out unless there's content to be made, stays home when it suits her allergies best, and while yes, Marc has officially changed her "normal" it wasn't enough to spark anybody's interest, right? It isn't, enough. ]
Right.
[ His free hand curls into a fist before he draws the phone away from himself, sends off the marker of the building he had pinged her at (it is, pointedly, far, far away from her usual haunts β the radius of her apartment, of the more populace parts of New York β pointedly, near a particularly skeevy area that's out of range of Marc's territory, that's just a few miles away from where where the sea meets gravel. Virgil wouldn't be able to tell if it's 'Committee' aligned or not, but the one photo he attaches gives way that it isn't exactly novices patrolling the area, that there might be a budget to this operation). ]
Yeah, sure.
I'll get right on it.
[ He doesn't hang up right away β Virgil gives him two beats of a moment to settle in before he hits the end call button. If he decides to call him back, he won't answer. And he won't be able to leave a voicemail, eitherβ but he can text him. ]
that makes two of us lmao IT'S FINE IT'S MAGIC RP LAND NYC
this is something else, inhabits the space between the two. it's quiet, subtle. a guessing game and marc doesn't like it.
a location first, and then a photo. marc wouldn't say he's intimately, deeply familiar with where lottie tends to hang out when she's not with marc — he knows her apartment, manhattan, the odd place here and there in brooklyn — bed-stuy and williamsburg, something about how they're cool places to be seen — but beyond that? no. what he does know, is certain of, is that the location that is sent to him is precisely no-where lottie would choose to go. it speaks of an inherent, tangible danger, seediness, and violence. it's the sort of place men like him are found.
the photo doesn't tell him much — it's far too dark for that — but there's enough to be seen who that says the men involved likely charge a high price and that they know what they're doing. that they know not to ask too many questions — the money'll be enough for limited interest on that front — and that the men in charge of them have a particular outcome in mind. the faces of the men visible — two — are of no-one he recognises, hair cut and styled in a way that says they're not of the cape-and-cowl sort. (or: less taskmaster and more average (by a definition) joe).
he pauses, a momentary, internal debate amounting to 'who?' making itself known in brief hesitation, before a short-and-sweet text amounting to the location and 2 hours is sent to soldier. time enough, he thinks, and of everyone he knows, soldier's the one most likely to listen. to give him the grace time he thinks he'll need.
(no point in getting anyone involved unnecessarily.)
and then: to the docks.
(it's times like this that he really misses frenchie and the mooncopter.) )
THANK GOD!!!!
And when it reaches Lottie, all she takes it as is another reminder of her newfound life.
Her existence that has consisted of nothing but tears. Crying, being too scared to scream. She's been held captive for what feels like forever and she's been too much of an irritable mess to be anything but a body to her captors β they know she's prone to crying, to sobbing, to freaking out, and the one time someone laid hands on her it was an accident, really. They said no marks, but the stark mark on her cheek, the bruising purple on her that stands an alarming shade against the white of the fabric wrapped tight in her mouth (so she can't talk, because she babbled and wept and cowered for as long as she could until everyone decided no more).
Her body is bowed, forehead pressed against the cold feeling of cement, the only thing that makes her feverish body feel vaguely comfortable. Her allergies have been on a nonstop rotation of acting upβ the raised bumps of hives and her body on a general decline are obvious to all who see her, the labored breathing, her face being a mess from the inability to breathe clearly for as long as she'd been held here. It's another shift in position, a cycle she's put herself through in the hopes of keeping herself sane and breathing untilβ until what? Marc gets here?
Her shoulders shake violently, digging her face, her nose, into the ground as she wheezes desperately give herself air to sob properly. Would he? She cries a pitch too loud, a pitch too pathetic, that draws attention of the myriad of guards positioned outside of her room, briefly distracted as they bang incessantly on her door. ]
no subject
(once, marc had gone in search of a kidnapped child, kept at the top of an abandoned building marc truthfully hadn't been able to decide if it'd been a hotel or if it'd been apartments. it was a sorry state, is what it was, made none the better by the men that'd chosen to make it their temporary home; some the better once marc was done with them. the child — a girl named scarlet — had been blindfolded and bound, left to make herself at home on an ugly, lumpy, stained and mildewed mattress. marc had found a baseball bat and gone to town.)
the men hadn't entirely been a different sort — paid less, but in it for the same things, more or less — meaning marc's approach here is much the same: swift, simple brutality. then he'd worked his way floor-through-floor, here it's hallway-by-hallway, and he doesn't much care how he looks by the end of it. white stained with bright red that hasn't yet had the chance to dry and oxidise into brown.
the banging punctuated by a couple of sharp yells to shut the fuck up or we'll shut you up lets him know he's headed in the right direction. sometimes — not very often, but sometimes — marc is asked who the hell he's supposed to be, all in white and with a bag on his head, but this isn't one of those occasions. they know who he is, they'd been expecting him — but then, taskmaster (tony) had known who he was and he'd still ended their little tΓͺte-Γ -tΓͺte terrified and completely opposed to facing moon knight ever again.
(it'd been the flying a helicopter into a building to get him that'd done it—.)
marc thinks it's incredible they haven't learnt the same lessons, but — sins of the father and all that. the fight — not quick, but as quick as marc can make it — dull thuds and laboured grunts is followed by acute silence. quick breaths punctuated by a cough and then—.
the door.
he can hear movement, crying — lottie? — and his gaze shifts between the door (locked, key, no window) and the bodies of the two men tasked to stand guard. they won't be moving any time soon, not that it matters, and marc rifles inelegantly, unbothered by politeness and decorum, through their pockets until he finds what he's looking for.
the lock — and the key — are nothing particularly refined, just a silver yale key and a standard lock that, if worse had come to worst, marc would've been able to lockpick (a credit card and enough force is generally enough to do the trick—).
a soft click, a barely-there flicker of hesitation, and marc pushes down the handle and swings the door inwards, fingers curled around his truncheon, as equal parts white and blood-stained as he is. )
no subject
And that the shadow meandering at her door, is real. She is not hallucinating this (although that might be possible, too β she hasn't taken her medication, or eaten, done much of anything normal, really). Whoever is opposite to her door, whoever is lingering with some kind of hesitation, stands there. They, are real.
Time slows to a crawl, fear and hope and terror making her breathing pick up in the stark silence of it all. She doesn't think about how her body rips itself from the ground, how her fever is running higher as she shuffles to the wall furthest to the door. She makes it just in time as the door is halfway swung open, back pressed taut against the chilly concrete right as light from the hallway blinds her. Her eyes strain with effort she can barely afford to give, trying to see who it is at her doorstep.
It is hard to place what she feels β when she sees Marc.
(Moon Knight?)
The lines are blurred, so spectacularly blurred that she is both sick (blood, he isβ drenched in blood, so much blood) and elated. She wants to throw up, but she can't tell if it's from relief or disgust. Grinds her teeth together as best she can around the gag, clenching her jaw tight, and she can't tell if it's from the anger or from the cry she's holding back.
(Lottie has stood before Moon Knight before, but all he did was admonish her for not being careful. She was standing then, they were on semi-equal footing, then. Moon Knight looks imposing. Scary. He looks big while she feels so alarmingly small and fragile that it makes her wonder how many people did he beat just to get here.)
Her body relaxes, the strain and anxiety taking hold of her melting away just enough to allow her the chance to move forward. To lean a little his way, towards him, not so he knows that she isn't scared of him and she's just peachy keen with this. It is because she is scared, because Marc is scary, that she's scared of him, too, but he is also safe. Marc is safe, and she wants that, too β wants to feel safe again and he absolutely will make sure she gets it. The truncheon he grips guarantees her as much. The blood-stained white dappled on his cowl, his sleeves, his knuckles most of all, guarantees her more than that.
Lottie can't speak β even if she did, she wouldn't know what to say, she is hardly living as it is now enough to form thoughts. She only has enough in her to bask in simple emotions, desire, impressions, because anything more and she just might freak out again (and she knows what happened the last she did that).
A weak, warbly cry for him leaves her throat, loud enough to be caught dangling in the air. ]
no subject
(despite everything he's done to get here, he'll later make inelegant, hot-tempered comments about making them pay, about cowardice and how he'll kill them, but for now—.)
he kneels in front of her, brings himself down to her level so that they are equal, the noise of his truncheon hitting the ground as he places it down sounding startling loud in the sudden silence. it's only a second, the pause as he studies her features, his gaze — white, not brown; moon knight, not marc — meeting hers, but it feels longer.
she can't see his face, the way his eyebrows are knit tightly together, the way his mouth curls down, the way that concern is etched into his features. moon knight — marc spector — may be deliberately intimidating, marc may go out of his way to ensure that his enemies are scared of him, but anger is how he deals with the rest of it. the guilt, the shame, the worry. the self-loathing. the horrifying thought that what if he can't do anything else other than this?
he reaches towards his belt and pulls out a crescent dart. he could waste time trying to undo the gag, fiddling with the knot and getting frustrated, or he could just cut through the material, quicker and simpler. )
Lottie. ( he doesn't tell her it's okay, that it's going to be okay, because now's not the time, not really. instead, he gestures with his free hand towards her mouth. ) I'm going to take this off first, okay? Then your hands. ( a beat as he reaches forward, toward the side of her head. ) Don't move.
no subject
She cries, hot tears dripping down her cheeks and staining her gag as he doesn't tell her it's okay β that's what she wants, platitudes, pleasantries, hugs, comfort, anything that's been the polar opposite of her existence this entire ordeal β just tells her he's going to free her. Her eyes dart to his hand, the way it gently moves to the side of her head, and she feels her heart thrum like a rabbit. The pace unbearable and so nerve wracking she'd laugh, if she could, just to ease her nerves.
But Marc barrages her with different emotions, feelingsβ she's staring at Moon Knight, detailing what he's going to do with her and yet she hears Marc. Hears him so loud and clear that she manages another sob of relief, nods her head briefly before trying to stay still as best she can to allow him what he needs to do. ]
no subject
(they're sharp, designed to pierce flesh and more — the gag, though thick, is nothing really.)
he tugs it away with his free hand, barely mindful of how it — this, everything — plays against the image lottie tries so hard, is so careful, to project. it's soaked with tears and sweat and saliva alike, but marc tosses it to one side — white, gloved hands — with the manner of someone that's seen and dealt with a lot worse.
(because he has. jean-paul and even marlene, both of them had experienced worse with marc — his general lack of interest in self-preservation and inability to ensure the continued safety of those closest to him meant that they'd dealt with worse with marc, and because of marc.)
it won't be until later, until after they've both left and marc's sure she's as safe as she can be, that marc will really allow himself to feel emotions beyond anger. for now, it's just that, simmering below the surface, not quite directing what he needs to do to get lottie out of here — not now, not after the (majority) of the threats have been dealt with — but informing.
after the gag he frees her hands, gaze lingering a fraction too long on the raw, red marks on her wrists, before looking up to meet her eyes once again. it still doesn't occur to him, not quite, that she can't see his expression, can't intuit his feelings thanks to the mask, the cowl, the shadows it casts. he knows he should say something, but it's different to rescuing jean-paul, to saving marlene, to finding jeff. all of them had known what they were signing up to — in a manner of speaking — all of them had known who marc was, what kind of a person he was, what his lifestyle was like. it's danger — continuously — disregard and recklessness.
lottie had never been a part of something like that. she was separate. she was normal in a way that marc had always hoped to be but had never quite achieved. she wasn't even like little scarlet, daughter of a gang boss caught wrong.
he sits, for a second, in front of lottie. quiet. then his head drops, just a fraction, and quietly— )
I'm sorry.
no subject
(She is lying. She is telling herself this because it's easier to assign he doesn't care to her like this because she's done it before. She'll always do it when he doesn't react the way that she likes, the way she wants him to, even if she knows he simply isn't capable of it showing it in the way she can recognize immediately.)
The odd thing is, she finds her heart is hurting more than her body, everything else, when he doesn't say anything outright and yet, gently slices through that gag (tosses it to the side rough, in comparison). Frees her hands and stares heavy at the marks on her delicate, slim, wrists (he tosses that, too, something like anger brewing beneath the careful and deliberate control of his fingertips) like he's bothered by it. Is he? She heaves a heavy, strained, breath, and almost asks. In the end, she sits there, gently rubbing at her tied wrists and wincing towards the ground every so often.
Her anger has quickly morphed into something like shame, and embarrassment. She must look ugly. Gross. Terrible. No wonder he isn't saying anything β he's probably finding a way to not hurt her feelings. And how is she going to cover up this bruise? What about her wrists? How is she going to just exist after this? Her head ambles up, a breakdown just seconds away from happening because she can't stop herself from spiraling, but thenβ
Marc says 'I'm sorry'.
He says 'I'm sorry' so softly that she almost doesn't catch it, dips his head down just a fraction and she barely sees it.
Lottie isn't sure what to do, at first, how to take this. What the fuck? Genuinely, honestly, what the fuck? 'Sorry' won't change anything, won't fix anything. 'Sorry' isn't going to make the time she spent here magically okay. But 'sorry' does manage to lessen the intensity of her thoughts, make her mind go blank for a few blissful seconds just to wonder if this is the first time he's ever apologized to her. A broken laugh bursts through her lips, dry as they are, at that, voice cracking halfway from disuse. Marc said he was sorry and she believes it, believes it so much she's reduced to tears because despite that, she can't tell if it's for himself, or for her. She weeps into her hands, looking frailer and smaller than ever. ]
Can you justβ [ Mumbled, watery and hurt. ] please shut up and hug me?
no subject
jake had always been better at it. more measured. more careful. where steven flat-out refused all of it — the violence and the blood and the mess — jake was more pragmatic. he didn't have marc's guilt, marc's worries, marc's obsession with his past and what he'd done. jake has never found pleasure in violence, isn't good at it, not in the way that marc has or is, but he knows that sometimes it is the answer. long before marc had decided to shut out both steven and jake entirely, before he'd decided to set up his midnight mission and rehabilitate his image through "helping his community", jake had been the one tasked with trying to make moon knight respectable again. jake had been the one who'd showed new york that moon knight wasn't just crimson and mutilation, wasn't just inelegant offerings to a moon god no-one else could quite work out the truth of (real? imaginary? the difference hardly mattered when marc was busy operating under the belief that he needed more violence — death, for the "one that eats hearts".)
lottie feels ugly and the situation is ugly, because it's not steven grant crouched in front of her, well-meaning and aghast at what's happened to her and because of her (because of marc); it's not jake lockley, empathetic and roguish, but ultimately warm. it's marc spector, and marc is ugly. she tells him to shut up — all two words that he's uttered, as if he's anything other than laconic at the best of times — and tells him to hug her, and he does.
where their first hug — the one at the mission, after a night of discordant disagreement — had been tentative and unsure, this isn't. marc is not a natural hugger, is not prone to being physically affectionate, but that doesn't mean he's averse to it. doesn't mean he doesn't appreciate tactility.
there's not a world of difference between their heights, but marc is larger, broader, thanks to a lifetime of physicality, of boxing and fighting. he envelopes her tightly, drawing her closer to him, cape partially covering her in response to the sudden movement. it's not gentle — marc rarely is — but it's not rough. it's emotive, emotional. jerky with profound gladness that lottie might not be okay, but she's okay. )
no subject
She is upset at Marc's genuine, painful, everlastingly aching 'I'm sorry'. She would never be satisfied, any which way, but she would always demand the brute and awkward force of bluntness that Marc gives her, because it is what she's used to, even if she does not like it, even if it is what she doesn't need, right now. It's what she wants. Arguably, if it was anyone but Marc she'd just recede into herselfβ refuse to talk to anyone and go silent until she deemed it safe. Arguably, as ugly as this situation is, it's the best. It's the one that needs to happen, because above all Lottie needs to be held. Needs a shoulder to cry on with someone else, because she's done so much by herself already that it is an action that means nothing to her without someone (without himβ without Marc Spector holding back so much it is thrumming in his bones and vibrating in the air, the intensity this man feels so strongly for things he cares about so much).
Their first hug β the one at the mission, after a night of discordant agreement β had been tentative and unsure. This isn't. Marc wraps his arms around her so tight and warm and comforting that it makes her wheeze. He is larger, broader, to Lottie's impossibly smaller and slimmer frame, meant to look appealing in photographs and nothing more. He dwarfs her easily, her hands getting bunched up around his cape once she realizes what's happening and she burrows her face into his shoulder. Her nails grip onto anythingβ his cape, his suit, his body, anything to get closer. To remind herself that this is real.
She is safe.
She feels like shit but she isn't alone.
There's a long, painful, cry that leaves her lips that settles deep into his skin. When she feels his concern settle into her bones with the way his hold digs into her, it grows louder. And she claws, claws, claws with blunt nails (from scratching at the ground), to make sure he's hooked closeβ and only when she is satisfied does she grip him tight. Does she hiccup and scream into his shoulder, voice breaking at pivotal highs and desperate lows. It is the worst song. It does not echo in the poor acoustics in the room, but is the loudest thing inside. It is the most painful and raw tune he will ever hearβ the muffled symphony of her agony, pain, relief. The way she says, 'Marc,' then 'Marc' on repeat, the underlying 'I was so scared' buried deep in the depths of her tone. ]
no subject
it says a lot as to how this isn't lottie's life.
it reminds him of how much marlene and jean-paul and rob and diatrice deserved to be free of this life, and — really — lottie too.
it tells him that they were right to leave when they had — and wrong, maybe, not to leave sooner, though they'd tried, hadn't they? and marc had just insisted on drawing them back into his orbit, had acted as if because he needed them, that was what mattered over anything else. that was more important than their safety.
lottie repeats his name and he doesn't let her go, willing to allow her to clutch on to him for as long as she needs to because who knows. once this is over, and they're away from here and she's safe — well and truly safe — there's more than a chance, he thinks, that she'll decide he's not worth it. that everything he's told her is true: knowing him is dangerous and she's better off not.
(marc has never been good with expressing how he really feels, but he's never been good at hiding it either. he cares, a lot. more than he knows how to deal with. he struggles to put it into words, to explain, but it's there in desperate, misguided actions. he's never been able to pretend — except in anger — that people, his people, don't matter to him.
if (when?) lottie decides she's better off remaining in her fashionista, influencer bubble, marc won't be pleased, but he won't claim he doesn't understand, either.)
the more she says his name, the less it sounds real, less like a word, less like his name. nonsense, something to say to fill the oppressive silence. he shushes her, softly and gently, not concerned that anyone will stumble across them — he's certain that won't be the case, but because— )
We need to leave. ( a statement, not a command, not a suggestion, punctuated by a shift in his weight and a tilt of his head, towards the door, to make sure there isn't any unwelcome noises approaching from behind. ) Do you think you can do that for me?
no subject
She burns into her mind the way his own hands feel around her body, the desperate and comforting grip to them, so very different from the way they usually touch (which is hardly at allβ it is in fleeting moments, they are physical in ways like this, through barely there grazes of fingertips and her elbowing him playfully).
And then she hears his voice, vaguely muffled by the mask and near impossible to catch with her howls, but she does. Lottie is still grief stricken, still shaking and volatile and sensitive and so very scared but the lulling timber of his voice only manages to semi-soothe her. She is not done β and the terrifying thing is, she's not sure she'll ever be done, because each time the silence settles and she stops, it picks back up. She sees the room he clutches her in and it begins all over again.
She hears him tell her they have to go in between bouts of wails, shaking her head vehemently not because she doesn't want to leave β that is the last thing she wants β but because she doesn't want to leave the safety of his embrace. Leaving means getting up and being separated, it means being in danger again and feeling fear crawl and thrive in its own special made layer beneath her skin. Deep enough where she can't scratch and tug it out. Surface level enough where she'll see the rope marks on her wrists for weeks, see the bruise on her cheek swell down in color and size, too, and as a result will always have to think of this when she looks in the mirror.
(Lottie will no longer feel happy gazing at herself in the mirror. She won't be putting on makeup for fun, she'll be putting it on to hide.)
Lottie wants to stay burrowed into his shoulder to never have to see anything in this stupid building again. So desperately wants her last image of this place to be of Moon Knight β Marc β standing there in her doorway, the bodies of the men holding her prisoner peeking barely into frame. Her eyes squeeze shut, presses her face into him tighter as she refuses to let go, screams turning into sobs. Hiccups. Agonizing cries that are purely so she can wallow in him.
But eventually, eventually, sheβ. Relents. After spending some time thinking that he's right.. They have to. She swallows phlegm down and coughs pathetically, nods weakly. Bunches her hands in his cape in a way that lets him know that while she'll comply, she refuses to leave this spot. That she doesn't care how much of an inconvenience it is. ]
no subject
it doesn't occur to marc yet but it will later that lottie has spent most of their friendship pointedly ignoring all the rumours about marc spector, all the stories about moon knight — the violence, the unpredictable behaviour, an unstable personality. she's glossed over everything marc has told her himself — when they've argued, mostly, when he's been trying to prove a point — and though he knows she's seen some of the rumours, some of the news stories, he knows she barely bothered to read them.
it might occur to marc eventually that it's not wholly unlike what marlene used to do — she would try and pretend marc didn't exist, that steven grant could be and was the dominant — only — personality. that with enough prompting, marc spector would be left in the desert, buried alongside her father.
marlene had wanted steven most of all because he wasn't violent. he was urbane. sophisticated. not exactly gentle, but entirely more civilised than marc has ever been. lottie hasn't met steven, likes marc well enough, but she's never quite found peace with each and every facet of marc spector — but has never had to really face all of them either.
this, he'll realise (maybe), is a sharp, rude awakening for lottie that maybe marc hasn't just been moody and angsty and dramatic for the sake of it. that maybe his testy warnings that he's not ever really wanted lottie to heed have been for a reason. it's the same sort of reckoning that soldier's had, that reese has had, that greer has had. all of them — except greer — are early enough in their friendships with marc that it feels excusable, explainable, all part and parcel of the sort of lifestyle that moon knight leads.
after all, it happens to the friends and families of other superheroes, right? other vigilantes.
later, though, it'll come with the realisation that it doesn't matter if it happens to everyone with a CERTAIN LIFESTYLE, what matters is that it doesn't get better. it repeats ad infinitum, a neverending cycle of pain and hurt and betrayal punctuated by periods of time where it feels exciting, where moon knight is a figure of hope rather than questionable vengeance.
eventually — and marc doesn't know if the passage of time is as long as it geels — she relents. the wails die down into hiccuping cries and she nods (still doesn't speak), but still she doesn't move. instead, her hands clutch at him and his clothes more tightly, steadfastly refusing to move and to see. it's not new, but it is—.
it is a touch inconvenient.
he doesn't sigh but he does step awkwardly in an effort both to stand, retain his balance and keep ahold of lottie. a jerky movement punctuated by a HNGH. she's not heavy, but that doesn't mean it's easy, not until he readjusts, until he redistributes his weight and then hers, one arm stretched across her back, his hand resting against her head, tilting it into his shoulder, the other under her legs.
he's lucky, he supposes, that's she conscious. that she's not a dead weight. unluckily, he thinks, he doesn't have the mooncopter anymore. that'd make the journey home (hers or his—?) quicker, but—.
a car will do. )
no subject
None of her fans will know what happened, why she'll be disappearing for a month until all the bruising and marks fade away, until her smile becomes perfect again. Not her family, her friendsβ only Marc (and Esther, once she finds out this was all her doing).
When she feels him move to stand, Lottie only clings tighter, awkwardly moving along with him in a way that allows her vision to be completely shrouded by him. That she won't see anything she doesn't want to. It's a tedious process she does not make easier, as he wraps one arm around her and then the other beneath her legs.
The wide expanse of his palm rests in the grody mess of hair on her head and she whimpers into him, nuzzles as deeply as she can when she feels herself begin to cry again. It is silent, the way she indulges in her sorrow and agony, once he hoists her up and carries her properly, this timeβ Marc will be able to feel the way her body trembles every so often in his arms, will feel it strongest beneath his palm. Will be able to feel every shaky, shuddery, inhale and exhale before she begins all over again, tears dropping and staining his suit.
She does not say anything more, doesn't do anything less, just wraps her arms tight around his neck and stays where she feels most comfortable. Lottie will stay like this throughout the entire walk through the building, will stay like this outside, and absolutely will try and stay (unhelpfully, clingily) like this in the car, too. ]
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)