Chapter Text
November 18th, 2044
The day Simon Aubert’s world fell apart was not a normal day. His days hadn’t been normal for almost three months now. It was, however, the kind of day that had begun to seem normal. Anything could begin to seem normal, if you did it long enough.
Wake up, shower, dress for work. Change the baby’s diaper, dress him in the fleece hand-me-down onesie from Alice’s sister. Watch the morning broadcast. Take the daycare bag from Alice, kiss her cheek, leave the house. Buckle the baby in his car seat, be ready to leave by the time curfew lifts. Drive. Stop at the red lights. Stop at the checkpoint. Show the Order officer your ID. Keep driving. Drop the baby off. Drive to work. Another officer at the door, another ID check, walk to your desk, sit down, work. Try not to think about anything but spreadsheets for a few hours.
At 5:30, Simon’s phone rang.
“Hi, Mr. Aubert, this is Therese from La Bambinerie, I’m calling about your son Adam.” The head of the daycare spoke the words as though she’d said them a million times before. “He’s fine,” she added quickly, anticipating Simon’s first thought, “he’s perfectly fine, but your wife hasn’t come to pick him up yet. Now I know in the past we’ve been flexible about pick-up times, but with the curfews lately I really do have to insist on-“
“Alice hasn’t picked him up?” Simon frowned. “I’m sorry, she must be held up at work. I’ll-“
“I called her office first, actually, they said she left early to run some errands. She’s not answering her cell phone.”
Errands? “I see. I’ll be there at once.”
“Thank you, Mr. Aubert, I appreciate that.”
Simon tried to call his wife repeatedly as he shut down his computer, informed his boss he needed to leave early, and made his way out of the office building, but just as Therese said, Alice wasn’t answering. The guard grinned at Simon as he reached the exit. “Simon! Ducking out early, getting a head start on the weekend, huh?”
Simon wished the guard wouldn’t insist on a first-name-basis relationship, but there was nothing he could do about it. “Yeah, something like that,” he said, forcing a smile as the guard gave his ID a cursory glance and cheerfully waved him along.
As he drove back to the daycare, Simon tried to remember if Alice had mentioned any errands. Nothing came to mind. She worked as an editor for the paper. She ended every work day at five, went to pick up Adam, and took him straight home. There was a time, not too long ago, when she might have brought him to the park first. But it was colder now, and there were enough guards around that hanging out in public was more trouble than it was worth, even for a pair as unthreatening as a mother and her infant. And even if it wasn’t, Alice wouldn’t have gone off unannounced before picking Adam up. Simon couldn’t make any sense of it.
As Simon pulled into the building’s parking lot, he saw two official vehicles parked right outside the front door. His stomach knotting, his sense of dread growing ever stronger and more certain, Simon made his way over. There was a guard stationed right at the entrance. “I’m-” Simon didn’t even get a second word out, didn’t have a chance to pull out his ID, before the guard wordlessly took his arm and pulled him inside. He escorted Simon through the familiar halls of the daycare, to Adam’s room.
Inside, Adam played by himself on the floor, all the other children long gone. Therese was there, along with a young woman named Suzanne who supervised Adam’s age group, and a man Simon had never seen before. He was clearly Order, although his outfit was far nicer than the uniform of a common guard. He smiled coldly as Simon was brought in. “Mr. Aubert,” he said. “We missed you at your office. You left early, they said. In a hurry to get somewhere?”
“No, I,” Simon looked at Therese. She was white as a sheet. Next to her, Suzanne was visibly shaking, and her eyes were red. “No, Therese called and asked me to come pick my son up.”
“Papa!” Adam called from the floor. He waved around a colorful block and held up his arms. “Papa, up!” Simon resisted the urge to go to his son. He stayed where he was and kept his gaze locked on the agent.
“Why today?”
For the life of him, Simon couldn’t imagine what the hell was going on. “My wife was… held up.”
The agent’s eyebrows raised at Simon’s mention of Alice. “Held up doing what?”
Simon was suddenly certain that the agent already knew the answer to his question. “I have no idea,” Simon said. “She’s not answering her phone.”
The agent nodded. “I see.” He looked past Simon, at the guard who had escorted him in. “Seal the exits,” he said. “No one comes in or out of this building until I’m done interrogating the prisoner.” He turned to Therese. “Is there some private room I could have the use of?”
“My office,” Therese said numbly. “Front of the building. You’re,” she took a shaky breath, “you’re welcome to it as long as you need it, of course.”
“Prisoner?” Simon shook his head. “That’s not-”
“Oh, it’s just a technicality, Mr. Aubert,” the agent said breezily. “As long as you remain cooperative, there won’t be any need for unpleasant measures. And if you can prove your innocence to me beyond a reasonable doubt, you’ll be free to take your son and go home this evening.”
“Innocence in what?”
“Your wife’s treason, of course.” The look the agent was giving Simon now was almost pitying. “You’d be surprised how often we see it, rebels with unwitting spouses. But the Order doesn’t punish innocent citizens for the crimes of their family members. We’re very fair-minded. If you’ll just-”
“No, no, there must be some mistake,” Simon interrupted. “Alice isn’t… I mean, it’s impossible. I would know if my wife was in the Resistance.”
The agent’s eyebrows picked up again. “I certainly hope you didn’t know, Mr. Aubert, for your son’s sake. I would hate to see him lose both his parents in one day.”
Breathing was becoming difficult, the walls were closing in, was the floor tilting back and forth? “That’s not what I meant, I mean there’s been a mix-up, it’s not my wife you’re after. It can’t be, you can’t execute her, you can’t.”
The agent sighed impatiently. “No, Mr. Aubert, I can’t,” he snapped. “The Order is not in the habit of executing the dead. We find it redundant.” Behind him, Suzanne let out a choked sob and quickly covered her mouth. The agent ignored her. “Mr. Aubert, one hour ago your wife was found transporting a known Resistance terrorist across Paris. The pair attempted to flee the brave officers who intercepted them. Those officers had the choice of either allowing dangerous criminals to run free, or protecting the safety and peace that the Order has so desperately been fighting for since freeing this country of the scourge of vigilantism. They chose to protect the innocent, and your wife and her fellow traitor were shot dead.” The agent squared his shoulders. “Now, I am going to take you into this woman’s office, and you are going to tell me every single thing you can about your wife’s actions over the past few weeks. Where she’s gone, who she’s seen, what she’s done. Every stray, innocuous comment she’s made to you. Together, we are going to figure out who could have recruited her into the Resistance, and how they can be stopped from threatening any more peaceful citizens. You are going to help us put down all of your wife’s dangerous associates, because if you do not then your son will become an orphan today. Am I making myself entirely clear?”
For a moment, Simon simply stared at the agent, unmoving. Then, slowly, he nodded. He followed the man out of the room and down the hall. Simon knew before they reached the office that he would cooperate fully with the people who had murdered his wife.
July 7th, 2049
Emma Agreste squinted at the runes inscribed about the metal disc lying on the table in front of her, then triple-checked them against her latest notes. She carefully measured the distance between each of the eleven stones around its edge. She picked up the twelfth stone, held it over the final empty groove, and braced herself.
“Ready?” her uncle called from his living room.
“Ready!” she called back.
“Three… two… one!”
Emma dropped the stone in place. The twelve stones briefly flickered in unison, then glowed bright blue. Tendrils of raw magic began to snake across the metal surface. They slowly grew in intensity, covering more and more of the area. There was a bright flash of light and, quite suddenly, Emma was gazing into the next room over. On the other side of the circle, Jonathan grinned down at her. “Ready?” Emma nodded. Jonathan held up a coin, not much smaller than the disc. He positioned it right at the center and let go. Gravity took hold, and it fell towards Emma. It flew up from the table, slowing down once it crossed to Emma’s side and gravity began acting upon it in the opposite direction. As it reached its zenith, Emma snatched it out of the air. The metal was cool in her hands, and solid.
Emma held her breath, waiting for the coin to disintegrate like the last dozen coins in the last dozen trials had. When it stubbornly refused to cease existing, she let out a triumphant laugh. “It worked!”
Jonathan quickly crossed the living room and burst into the small library. “Seriously?” Emma held up the coin triumphantly and Jonathan stared at it in disbelief for a moment. “Holy shit,” he muttered. “We actually did it.”
Emma’s grin widened. “It was mostly you.”
Jonathan shook his head. “I never would have even thought of fusing runic and quantic magics if it hadn’t been for you, Emma. Stable teleportation portals. Holy shit.”
“Does this mean I’m not getting back the use of our coffee table?” Emma heard a voice ask from through the portal. A soft, high-pitched meow followed.
Jonathan leaned over the table to scowl at his husband through the portal. “Ferd, keep Prospero away from this thing, we still have no idea if it’s safe for organic matter or not.”
“Isn’t it based on Emma’s powers?” The voice through the portal grew weaker as Ferd walked away from it in order to talk to them in person. He appeared at the doorway, a small silver tabby kitten clinging to his shoulder. “She’s organic matter, and she teleports all the time.”
“She’s also got Rajji,” Jonathan said, nodding his head towards the blue kwami currently napping on a nearby dusty tome. “Without a powerful conscious entity as a guide, teleportation becomes roughly a million times more dangerous. It’s why we gave up on replicating her powers directly and decided to stick to stationary portals instead. Anyway, I want to run more tests with the coins first, this is the first one that hasn’t immediately evaporated into nothingness.” Jonathan looked back at the portal on the table. “If we can replicate this, it’ll be the biggest breakthrough in magic in the last fifty years, easy. We’re making the history books for this one, kid.”
Ferd snorted. “You two already feature pretty prominently in several history books. I should know, I write them.” He leaned over and kissed his husband’s cheek.
Prospero took advantage of the opportunity and leapt from Ferd’s shoulder to Jonathan’s. Jonathan winced at the kitten’s sharp claws, but laughed. “Yeah, well, I don’t know about Emma,” he said scratching behind Prospero’s ears, “but I’ll take any additional entries that tip the scales towards the ‘good’ side of ‘highly morally ambiguous’.”
“Yeah, I’ll take it, too,” Emma said, her smile fading.
Jonathan looked at Emma and narrowed his eyes. “What nerve did I just hit?” he asked, with the infuriating certainty that Emma had grown used to from the empaths in her life.
Emma shrugged. “Nothing, it’s just, uh, you guys saw how they finally found Thornton in Argentina last month, right?” They both nodded. “Yeah, well, it’ll probably be on the news tonight, but they set a date for his war crimes tribunal. Dani and Louis and I just got key witness summons.”
Ferd sighed. “Oh, Emma, I’m sorry. You three shouldn’t have to go through that again.”
“It’s fine,” Emma muttered. “All the other major cities got closure. Paris deserves it, too. Who knows, maybe we’ll all actually feel better when it’s finally over.”
Jonathan frowned, and for a moment Emma was sure he’d say something, but then it passed. “Well, those government magicians should be happy,” he said. “They seemed pretty impatient for us to figure out how to fuse these magics safely. Who knows, by this time next year there could be safe transports set up all over the globe, connecting every corner of the world.”
An international network of safe portals. If something like that had existed five years ago, the giant barrier that the Order had drawn over all of western Europe would have been useless. The occupation would have been over before it even began. Emma smiled at the thought. However she felt about the part she’d played in ending the occupation, at least she was making sure nothing like it could ever happen again.
“Oh!” Jonathan pulled Prospero off his shirt and hastily handed him to Emma. “Hang on, I almost forgot-” Her uncle hurried out of the room. Emma pet the kitten absentmindedly as she waited for her uncle to return.
“So,” Ferd said, smiling at Emma. “Am I going to be seeing you in my Intro to Modern History class this fall?”
Prospero began purring loudly. “I thought you were retiring after this year,” Emma said
“Eh,” Ferd waved his hand dismissively. “After a bunch of magical fascists force you into retirement once, the thought of doing it willingly loses its appeal. Besides, my celebrity status is finally waning. I might actually get real work done this year.”
“Lucky,” Emma said. “I still can’t walk three blocks without someone-” she stopped talking as Jonathan reappeared at the door, wrapped present in hand.
“Here,” he said, handing it over. “My graduation present to you.”
“Our graduation present,” Ferd corrected as Emma gently placed Prospero on the floor and began unwrapping the gift.
“What? You didn’t even know I was giving her that.”
“So? What was the point of getting married if I can’t claim half-credit on all presents you get people?”
“True love?” Jonathan suggested dryly.
Ferd scoffed. “Nerd.”
“Oh, wow,” Emma said, examining the large encyclopedia of magic. “This is gorgeous.” She ran a finger over the gold tooled leather cover, and noticed the fraying spine. “Is it out of print?”
“No, it’s just over fifty years old,” Jonathan said. “That’s the first book on magic I ever bought, right after Adele told me about her Miraculous.”
Emma flipped through the pages. The margins were filled with Jonathan’s cramped handwriting. “This could be in a museum,” she whispered reverently.
Jonathan smiled. “I’d rather see it go to someone who could get some use out of it,” he said. “I hope it serves you as well as it served me.”
Emma nodded gently. “Thank you.”