meadowlarklogs | We're talking away I don't know what I'm to say

Entry tags:

We're talking away I don't know what I'm to say

WHO: Quentin Coldwater + You!
WHERE: Red Wings + Dreamscapes + around
WHEN: March 15th-31st
WHAT: Catch-all! Quentin's memories and general hanging around.
NOTES OR WARNINGS: Mental illness, possible suicidal thoughts, character death, all will be marked! Spoilers for The Magicians season 4.

1. Red Wings, whenever

[Quentin is trying to come up with ideas to make Red Wings more popular, and he is still learning the ropes of how this particular city works in terms of PR and marketing. He's making some headway, it's just a process. He has always been better with social media and online interaction than in person, like any stereotypical Millenial. He can be spotted wandering around the place taking pictures; usually 'artistic' intended shots, making the pool table look cooler for example of a nice shot of the bar all stocked.

Outside of that off-hours, he is usually there because everyone else is, or if he's waiting for Eliot's shift to be over. He's fairly shy outside of the people he already knows, but he'll look up if someone comes in or says hello and flash a smile, eager to talk. Quentin doesn't like being alone, he's only not great at asking for company. Otherwise he'll be reading up on his neural interface and nursing a drink.

He can also be found playing pool, helping bust tables for the rest of the staff, cleaning off surfaces to be helpful.]

2. Mental Hospital Dream - TW for mental illness, possible suicidal thoughts

[It is a very drab looking place, the hospital. Everything is in subdued colors and people move like they're sleepwalking down the halls. Doctors in white coats and nurses in blue or purple scrubs walk around, gently assisting dazed individuals to their rooms or to the common room spaces. No matter what is asked of the nurses, they will reply with 'that is not permitted,' and occasionally continue on to say 'because you can harm yourself and others.' The most populated area is the game room where there are puzzles and games happening, but occasionally people do confusing things, shout, scream, or get ushered off by doctors.

There are groups sitting in a circle, their words all sounding nothing more than a strange humming, as if they're opening their mouths and talking but nothing is coming out. Quentin himself can be seen in the far corner, by the windows, a pack of cards in front of him. There are at least three packs of cards that are strewn about on the floor around him, covering the wood floors. He is in gray sweatpants and a shirt, dark hair long, eyes heavily circled with lack of sleep and general hopelessness.]

No, no, I'm telling you, I'm telling you. It's real. I did it. I did.

[His hands shaking, a little manic, he takes the cards out and shuffles them, his fingers moving fast and intently. He either is talking to no one, himself, or whoever is nearby.]

Watch. [Quentin abruptly throws the cards, and for a second, a long beat, they freeze in the air. They hover and stay, and then all of a sudden crash to the floor. It was a miss it and blink moment. He swears and goes to the ground, trying to pick them all up.] No, I can do it, it works, I'm not crazy.

3. Fillory Love Shack Dream

[It's a very peaceful and simple spot in a pastoral type of clearing. A patch of land with a small modest hut, laundry line, a bed outside, and most importantly a large square white space with a stack of multi-colored tiles that all put together can fill up the space. About half of them are already in the mosaic, the rest nearby. The rest of the space seems designed to fit around this square, as if it's all that matters.

A slightly older Quentin can be found sorting the tiles, his hair long and held back in a ponytail. Nearby on the bed a boy of about five or six is sleeping, a blanket pulled up to his chin. Quentin frowns and sets one down that he was working on, adjusting the wedding ring on his finger. He glances up when he senses someone nearby.]

Want to give it a try? It's supposed to reflect the beauty of all life in a bunch of tiles. [He reaches down to pick up a nearby basket.] Peach or plum?

4. Mirror World Dream - TW for Death

[The Mirror World feels unsteady the moment you exist in it. It's in grays and black and whites, it feels unnatural, upside down. Even people used to feeling in control might sense something wrong in this place. Its hallways are long and all in confusing gray tones. It seems quiet, until a scream pierces the air. The scream of someone who is about to watch someone they love die and there's nothing they can do.

No, Alice screams, as Penny pulls her away. It's too late and some part of her knows that, but she can't help her denial. In the hallway, Penny pulls Alice in what appears to be slow motions out into it, her fighting the entire way, and the room inside was once large and beautiful with a very large mirror.

All movement seems to be slowed down to a fraction. The mirror mends, the man diving toward it dies, and the room explodes into eerily beautiful sparks of light. They are blinding as they shimmer throughout the room. Quentin is turned toward Alice and Penny as they escape and then he is torn apart by the light until nothing remains. The room freezes. It rewinds. It starts the memory over. Every time Quentin repeats the action that leads to his death, but if anyone else tries to get in the middle, it all will freeze in time at once. ]

5. Wildcard

[ooc: grab him on the street or somewhere else you want him to be, or message me at waftingcurtains on plurk to talk]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

We can only hope that it won't take us forty years to solve our puzzle. [It hasn't even been a year yet, but Clarke's used to scenarios where she solves a lot in a very short period of time. That may be why they were naive as they slipped into cryosleep, truly believing that they would be able to wake up in ten years and see the Earth revived again and waiting for them.

And "naive" isn't a word commonly applied to Clarke and her people. They left that behind before many of them were even born.

As it is, a long puzzle like that makes her think of Monty—of the years he spent trying to solve a problem, trying to seek out a solution.]

What were you trying to accomplish with it? [Goal oriented to the end. Clarke turns the peach over in her hands, taking a bite out of it only then.

(A little note to keep in mind: Clarke isn't the type of person who "cleans" a fruit in her shirt before she takes a bite. It's not a learned habit of hers.)]

It wouldn't really work as well with us trying to scale puzzle walls and avoid yellow-eyed monsters at eighty. Hopefully by then somehow the world will be calmer. [Quentin has no choice but to hope, but that's been him, through and through. The believer. The hopeful one. The ridiculous optimist who only recently started to lose sight of it. It's easy to remember though, in this place. In the happy life he managed to steal.]

The puzzle was for the mosaic to reflect to the beauty of all life. [Quentin whistles and smiles.] Easy, right? And not at all vague and confusing. [He doesn't mind that she doesn't wipe the fruit off, it's not as if this is real, although he thinks the fruit may taste very real. And very fresh.]

It was an illusion. The beauty of all life couldn't be made in tiles. It was made after living a lifetime of beauty. [He offers her one of the tiles to looks at, colorful but rather simple.] Tricky, right?

[Clarke nods as she takes the tile, turning it over in her hand. The beauty of all life is living a full life. Difficult to conceptualize. When she had lived with Madi alone, she thought she understood what it was like to find peace. The truth was that she had only pressed pause on who she was, who she would always expect herself to be. The moment the Eligius IV prisoners touched the ground, she slipped into bad habits all too easily.

They were habits that Clarke knew all too well. All too easily. They're the ones she's fighting against day in and day out.]

I can only hope I can get there one day myself, [she admits. Her fingers curl tightly around the tile, not ready to give it up.] Not live to be there, but—be ready to open my eyes when it's time. I thought—[A pause.] Well, I thought I had it figured out once. I was wrong, so I'm working on it.

[Because beauty is really a metaphor for happiness and accepting that, even with all the hardships around it. Right?]

I'm sure my face when I realized this is what the point was all along was hilarious.

[Quentin remembers the understanding washing over him and there was some bitterness in it, but not that much. Just enough for a life well spent with tragedy and joy. He is feeling very calm right now, in this peaceful place, with Clarke also seeming to be opening up. ]

It's not all on a straight line, you know? We figure it out, we're wrong, we try again. I think what I love about most people is there's this instinct we have to be determined stubborn asses and keep pushing through hardship.

[He does love people, it's there in his voice. Despite all the ways they've let him down or he's let them down, the enemies in his life, the frenemies, whatever, Quentin's never lost his belief in good. Maybe not perfect untarnished good, that's dead and for the better, but he feels it now stronger than ever.]

Working on it is a big deal, you haven't given up, that's really important. We're still so young, you know? Being old just made it clear that no one has all the answers at any age.

[Clarke hopes she has this clarity, but she knows that she has a lot of goals, ambitions, and outlooks that have no immediate, visible path. She knows that she needs to have answers for some of them. She has time here to think about how to help her people on Sanctum, but she hasn't come up with anything better than to take them away. She knows that she needs to make up for her mistakes, but they seem never ending. She knows that some part of her is selfish to live on, but she can't give up.

She even knows that the Monty who saved her wasn't really Monty, but herself. It's a fact she struggles with, but doesn't vocalize.

Besides, his message is what saved her. Hopefully it keeps working.]

How do you handle not having the answer when people expect it? How did you handle this? You look like you've found peace in life itself, but you knew you had to find something here. [She almost adds that she tried that with Madi, and only came out the other end worse for it.

Almost, but doesn't. The hint is in the question itself.]

[Quentin went back to his youth and his anxieties and those never really have gone away, but there are times he can still tap into this understanding. He's matured in subtle and unsubtle ways from the boy who came to Brakebills. He'll never escape the worst parts of himself, but he can see the bright parts too now. He feared at the end about his motivations for choosing death, but he has more clarity about it now. He hopes he can tap into this more often, this calm place and mind.

He's more focused on Clarke though. There's been something about her from the first second they spoke on the network. He felt a vibe, a connection; they aren't the same, but he sees qualities in her that he knows and understands. And the fact she's seeking clarity or a path forward, that he really gets.]

We came here on a quest because I did something ... I'm not sure I'd call it wrong, although killing someone is murky ground in terms of morality.

[Quentin gestures over to their makeshift bench where they can sit, if she'd like, settling down himself.]

I killed the god of this place. He planned on destroying it because he was bored with it, he didn't care about the people who lived here if they weren't entertaining him. [That's Ember. Quentin's had some bad experiences with gods.] But by killing him, I pissed off the Old Gods, his parents. They took all magic away. This quest was how we would get it back.

[Quentin touches his chest.] I was responsible. It was my problem to fix. What I owed to the world was ... bigger than my life. [He looks at Teddy.] We stopped after my wife died. Teddy was too little. [A small vulnerable child like now.] We could have given up and made our life about us, but I'm just .... [He glances at her.] I'm not capable of that. I'm just one person and I don't have all the answers, but I do know that I can't stop trying to fix things.

[Clarke does join him on the bench. Her legs stretch out in front of her, and she watches as he looks to Teddy, and listens. Her head ultimately dips down, thoughtful. It's important that he's realized that about himself: that he knows he can't stop trying to solve a problem, or to fix it, or to do something. Perhaps there was a pause in there, a respite from it all, but he couldn't forget.

Somewhere in there, too, is a look of acknowledgement about the morality of killing. It's knowing, in the same sense that it always can be when two people have killed and have had to deal with the consequences of that. But it sounds as if Quentin had a good reason for it, a good cause for what he was doing. That acknowledgement is certainly not admonishment.]

It's important that you know that. It might've taken a lifetime to put it together, but it's something most people never figure out. [If it weren't for her time with Josephine, she never would. But it was ultimately a selfish move to give up and walk away, to take a path where she accepted her death. It's just as her mother's voice said: she was trying to take the cancer out of everyone's life and cut it away for good.]

I have a daughter back home. The two of us spent six years alone in a place not unlike this. [She looks up then, the light catching a bit of her hair as she views the trees off in the distance.] Isolated because everyone was gone for their own safety. When everyone returned, I—I wasn't my best self. I lost track of who I was for my people, and who I should be for my daughter, and I got a lot of people killed as a result. I know now that who I am, and what I can do for my people ... and not losing sight of that is important. It was just nearly catastrophic for me to learn. For everyone, really.

My magical expertise is repairing of small objects. [Quentin smiles wryly.] I used to dream of it being something really exciting and dramatic, you know? Something useful and heroic. [He thought that about most of his life, in his dreams and fantasies, and the realities were a hard left turn and crash.] But to my core I'm a fixer. Minor mending ended up saving the day recently, go figure.

[It killed him too, but he's not focusing on that at the moment, he's more inclined to listen to her. It means something to him, when people open up. Quentin wants to be the friend who listens, who people can rely on. And it sounds like she needs that at the moment. He's slightly surprised by the detail about her daughter, but not really once it settles in. There's a heavy weight that comes from being a parent on top of a leader.]

It's near impossible to juggle so many high priorities at the same time. You became someone else because of that experience with your daughter. You couldn't go back to the person you were before. It kind of sucks, because you don't know who you're becoming until it happens.

[Knowing who he is now, everything that it took to get there, Quentin can see all the ways he wishes he had done things differently but he couldn't. He's more at home in himself than he's ever been but the price was steep, for him and everyone else on the path there. ]

What is she like, your daughter?

Good. [The answer comes quickly, easily. It's hard to explain precisely how good her daughter is in spite of her life and circumstances. In spite of the fact that she grew up prepared to hide from anyone who might force her to take the path to becoming a commander. Her people were terrified by that eventuality, and somehow, it did not terrify Madi. When she knew she had a duty, she stepped up to do it.

Some could say that she learned that from Clarke, but Clarke did everything in her power to keep Madi from finding out the actions she took. She told her about everyone else and never herself.]

So good that she stands apart from everyone in my world. I don't know that it was the six years she had, or the fact that her people protected her before I found her—[A rare point of clarification, but Clarke doesn't make it just so he knows she didn't give birth. That doesn't matter. Madi is her daughter, plain and simple.]

I don't know. But she always knows how to do the right thing, and will fight for it. I wish I knew that when I was her age.

[Quentin listens and smiles as she describes Madi; he understands what it sounds like from a parent's point of view, what it feels like, the way it tugs and pulls at someone and can never be dropped. And it doesn't matter at all, the detail of 'found' rather than 'born,' because family is more than blood.]

It's probably a mix of things, before you found her, your time together, her own personality that's nature over nurture, all of it together stitched up to one full person. [And it sounds like a very good one, the type of one to be proud of and remember well.] She knows how to do that in part because of you, Clarke. The thing about being a parent is that you put good and bad on them, and hope they take the best part of it instead. It sounds like she did.

[He pushes a stray strand of hair over his eyes back.]

My relationship with my parents was rocky, my mother at least, and I always worried I was going to bring my baggage with me for Teddy. But he's such a great kid.

[He looks over at the boy and smiles.]

What I did best in my multiple lifetimes was love him unconditionally. He didn't grow up ever doubting I loved him. And he did the same for his kids. [Quentin grins.] Yep, I was a grandfather too.

[It's so funny and random. He bumps her shoulder playfully with his, smiling at her.]

You love her so deeply it's obvious. That's what kids really need.

Madi reminds me a lot of my dad, actually. [Oddly, it's the first time she's had that revelation. She reaches over, carefully slipping her arm through Quentin's. The closeness could be worse, but her sleeves are long, so the contact of skin is minimal between them. But they're getting closer by the second, and Clarke is someone who's very tactile with her friends.] I never thought that before. Someone who believes in others, in what good they can do, even if the situation doesn't seem like it could make someone like that.

[She smiles, looking off. Clarke always writes herself out of these comparisons. Even in sharing her life with Madi, she had said so little about herself. It was always what other people accomplished. What decisions they made. How they did it.

She was secondary to it all.]

To tell you the truth, I haven't thought much about what Madi would be older. She's still just a—kid. My daughter. But she's had to do more than even I did at her age. The hard stuff came for me later.

[As she talks, it's apparent: she does love Madi more than anything. Her daughter defines so much of her, but Clarke has to be more than that. She's learned as much, too.]

[Quentin is also someone very tactile when people allow it so he leans a little closer to her so she knows he doesn't mind. If anything, the lack of affection outside of Eliot isn't easy for him. He's been around his friends closely for some time now, and they're on the whole more touchy than a lot of people are. He misses Julia's hugs and Margo's ruffling of his hair (and even smacks against his head). He missed them so much in this timeline, but decades later, they were just good memories.

He doesn't want it to happen again, but it's out of his hands. It's easier to accept in this place and more difficult in New Amsterdam. He smiles as he takes in these details she's willingly giving him, about her father, about her daughter and their relationship. He's liked Clarke from the moment he met her, and there's nothing better than actively feeling a friendship deepen with connection.]

The older we get the more complex life becomes. I planned on giving him the perfect life, which of course is impossible, but I was determined. [Quentin wanted kids but they seemed this far off concept when he couldn't even get a healthy relationship going before being stranded here.] And then Ari died and there was no way for him to have that perfect childhood.

[Teddy had two parents still, but growing up so young without a mother was still hard.]

Did it make you think back about your relationship with your own parents? I feel like I could see more clearly that they really were doing their best.

Yes, sometimes. [The truth is far murkier than it being a constant.] I understood why my mom wanted certain things for me. Why she wanted to keep me from seeing or doing things, or why she wanted to ignore what I was more than capable of doing. [That denial, that need to keep her innocent—Clarke did the same to Madi, didn't she?

But at the same time, her mother couldn't focus on her alone. Neither could her father. There were a lot of years there where Clarke was able to make friends and be more of her own person. In that, it was different.]

Madi and I were alone, though. It was a situation kind of like this one, isolated and away from everyone I cared about. [Not "we." Madi's people were dead.] I couldn't give her a perfect life, but I gave her all of myself. I don't know if that was necessarily good in the long term. I'm still figuring it out.

I wasn't an easy kid. [Quentin is easy in many ways, he's gentle and loving and sensitive, but he also was depressed and anxiety-ridden and nothing they did could seem to make it better for him. Parents, good or bad, generally want to fix things for their kids, and what was wrong with him isn't really fixable. Not even now, not fully.] I feel bad for my mother. She's ....

[He takes in a deep breath and lets it out.] Alone. My father died recently and then ... I died too. [This is not something he has shared with many people, but he is not hiding it so much as trying to stop from putting his issues on them. This place is calming and he's already lived and died here, it feels less like a weight on his chest to speak about it. Yet at the same time, he's never asked Eliot if he knows how his mom is.]

I've died a few times now, actually. [Here, in other timelines, in situations where they could change how it all went.] But this one was for good, before I came to New Amsterdam. [He's spoken with Klaus about it a few times now, it is how they bonded in the first place. Quentin feels the grief come to him but he tries to smile through it.]

["But this one was for good, before I came to New Amsterdam."

The words make her throat catch. Even though it's a dream, all of her physiological responses are there. If Quentin catches her gaze, he'll see the tears in her eyes, the slight bunching of her chin, the furrowing of her eyebrows: she's crying, and Clarke's the type of crier who wears it obviously. Her hand curls toward his arm a little more, pressing it against her.

Clarke is someone who loves fiercely and strongly. It comes to her easily. Her handling of situations is often more cunning, more manipulative, than they have to be. But it's not without an ounce of care. She isn't driven by passion—and has only been blinded by her emotions once, thanks to her drive to protect her daughter—but she is driven by her love for others. It's factual. A constant, really.]

I know what that's like. That's how it was for my mom, too, for a while. It's not the same, but she—she's feared I was dead more than once. Because of things I did or circumstances I really shouldn't have survived. [The words are rote and unnecessary, spoken to fill the silence. They aren't important. He's referring to his mom, after all.]

We have a plan. Some of us want to carve out a piece of this world. I want you to join us when we make it happen. [That's the important part. The words that matter most.]

[Quentin is also someone who loves fiercely and strongly, he connects with people quickly and intensely, and if she was telling him the same thing, he'd also be emotional about it. Seeing someone else care for him this way makes him instantly tear up as well, smiling in a kind of wonder, that he has Clarke in this moment who he feels this close to. She would get along with his group, he thinks, outside of the fact she and Margo would probably try to kill one another. Julia would like her though. She reminds him of Julia.]

She never knew the dangers I was putting myself in. It'll seem so random to her, and I'm not sure they'll explain. Magic isn't public knowledge.

[If his friends tried to explain that her son died saving people, saving the world, Quentin doesn't know if she'd believe them. Probably not. Saving another person, possibly, but their magical battles were over her head. He only told his dad. He'll never get the chance to explain to her, and he wonders now if he robbed them of that.

He moves his arm so he can instead take her hand, threading his fingers with hers. A simple gesture but one of friendship and he feels better, stronger, when he is holding onto someone else.]

I want that too. Thanks for the invite. [He playfully nudges her shoulder with his.] I know it sounds strange to say, but I'm grateful? For all this. I feel bad, because I know it's not what anyone else really wants, people are stuck here, but I'm just ... glad to be alive.

It's not strange. [Not just because he's alive. There are other situations like hers: where what they could go back to is much worse. Clarke just refuses to stay here without her people, but she knows she wants her people here, not there. Take them away. Take them somewhere safe. Give them a real chance to start over again.

She knows the Displaced would welcome her people. They've welcomed her, and she's told them enough about herself.]

When I first got here, I hadn't even met my daughter yet. It happened right after I ... "got back," so to speak. But when I first showed up, I thought I was due to spend six years alone, and that's not counting whether I'd even see my people again. I didn't know that I would. I knew I wanted to stay then. That was selfish. [She knows that now.] But I've learned that I'm not the only one. It's not just about us, it's about what we could return to, and who we were before.

[They can be better. Do better. Not be limited in the same way.]

You'd be surprised how much you're not alone in that. In a lot of ways. You'll see.

[Quentin's surprised to hear she had some time discrepancies apparently, first being here without knowing her daughter, and then getting that knowledge and experience later. But then it makes sense. If the multiverse can work in weird ways, why not take them from different points in time? He nods and sighs.]

Eliot really wants us to like keep our heads down and avoid trouble. I know he's frustrated that I always have to get involved in things.

[Does it matter why they're there if it's the only reason Quentin's alive? Why not just be happy about that and start over? Quentin isn't capable of that, and they both know that, but he really does understand where Eliot's coming from.]

I just died for him, and we never got to say goodbye. It's really weighing on him, but I don't know how else to be.

[They were here in this paradise, for them, married, raising a child, and like Quentin said before, it didn't stop him from trying to solve the puzzle and make up for losing magic. That's what he does. His death only underlined the choice that he would continue to make for another forty timelines if he had to.]

If we can figure out a way to help other people get home, or to bring people here who would want it to happen, we should do that.

That's the goal. [Bring people here. Let other people return home. It's a big one, but this world seems like it could hold so many people if it was given the right footing to start off on. Clarke doesn't know if or when they'll be able to control the power to do it.]

I believe that we can, you know. Being here is proof of that. If we can find a way to use this experience, these dreams, and help the world outside, I think we'll be able to do just about anything.

[The difficult part will be getting them all on the same page. So far, there have been very few actively destructive members of the Displaced. They've been lucky. They want to do good.

But Clarke doesn't believe they're chosen for any particular reason. So, she doesn't know whether to count on that staying the same way.]

If we can find out who brought us here, we could easily manipulate whatever they use to do the same for us.

[It's an obvious solution, and one he's sure she's thought of, but they're still searching for the people responsible at the moment. Who are really good at hiding, apparently, even with them constantly dropping them off into spots and drugging them. Quentin assumes when they finally catch them, they'll be able to control a lot more about their lives, so it's the chase that matters now.]

But I'm not sure. Tears in the multiverse, sometimes they get too much. We'd have to be careful.

[This little pocket universe of theirs was nothing dangerous, and Jane only changed timelines with the smallest details, because being reckless with the fabric of the universe was not a good idea. Quentin really isn't sure if whoever is behind this has that kind of foresight; they could be making this tear worse by the day.]

So you'd want to bring your daughter here? Who else?

All of my people. [It's as if he hasn't said that there's a risk to it. But then: Clarke doesn't know if there is a risk. She has friends here who have traveled between different worlds, different dimensions, without too many problems. She doesn't seem to acknowledge it. She won't. Not until it's proven to be true, anyway.]

The place where we are won't be sustainable for us. It was a ... hope, a chance at living after our home was destroyed, but we know now that this isn't possible.

[It's another place with war. Her version of events isn't altogether truthful, but she can't see where they can thrive there. The religion around the Primes is toxic and unsustainable. Their people are already hurting for it.

She's already hurt for it.]

I want us to go somewhere where we're wanted. Where we can help, too.

[It's okay, he'll not bring up the risks now because it's not a real thing yet. When they get there, he might start to calculate them, but arguably one portal bringing people in wouldn't be any worse than what's happening bringing so many people from different universes. Quentin thinks it's possible. How could it not be? Everything he's experienced in the past few years and coming here has proven to him how endlessly possible things are.]

We have access to new cities now, but there might be more we could get to. And you could pick one that needs a little more help than the others.

[New Amsterdam's already crowded.]

If this is the life I have, I definitely want to see all the options, I think. If there was a PhD on portal studying, I could easily spend five years of my life writing a thesis in my head.

[It's not surprising in some ways all he wants to do is get back to school or back to exploring. There was a time he looked at the world with excited wide eyes, and he still has that quality to him, but death and devastation tainted it.]

I wish I could say this place is better than my home, so I could have a reason to want my friends to be here, but it's not true. As shitty as it can be, it's still a healthier place, with more opportunities for their futures. I died so they could have a better shot. [He sighs and swallows through the grief unasked for coming to his throat.] But it's hard to know I'll never see them again.

I think you can look into quantum physics, [she says, tone a bit light. It's something that Fitz had been looking into in the past. Clarke doesn't know how far he got into it, or how much of this world has truly taken strides. For as much as she has her medical knowledge and can lead her people, she's lacking in some other areas that would've benefited her and the people around her. She can't help now.]

Either way, the important thing is that it's a future you want. You have that now. Those portals studies could be a way of getting to see the friends you've lost.

[Clarke wouldn't bet on it, but it's hard to say.

After all, a few days after this she'll end up discussing whether having associations with deities could make them immortal.]

Quantum physics? [Quentin's eyes brighten and he smiles, that's a bit surprising. Not that she would know it, but rather that it's not something he's thought about in awhile. Magic and fantasy have a way of making math and science put on the backburner, but he's smart. He liked to question the world, and biology and physics does that.]

You know, the funny thing that no one told me was how much math it took to do magic. [It's why it doesn't matter if someone can do magic, many people have the ability, but learning how to do it is a different thing entirely.] It's kind of like calculating atoms. There's a lot of physics in how the universes works and how we carve out pieces of it for spells.

[Quentin realizes the enthusiasm is back in his voice, taken away from his grief, but talking about nerd stuff does that for him.]

So yeah, maybe that's another way of looking at this world too. Scientifically and spiritually or ... whatever we want to call these powers and glow. [The term honestly doesn't matter. Labels can change.]

I'd really like to see Julia. We didn't get to say goodbye. She's my best and oldest friend.

[Where one of them left off the other one picked up, and despite a time when they weren't together, it didn't end up being that hard to pick up their relationship again. They did have some bonding toward the end, but then she was possessed too. Their baggage at least was resolved, before he died.]

I didn't tell her about this place, or about Teddy. It was like this piece that El and I held onto as ours.

Sometimes it's nice to have something that belongs to only you and someone else. [That's how the valley had felt for the longest time. It had been a place of peace: it presented an opportunity for Clarke and her daughter to live away from everything. She only wanted to open up the valley to her mother, to Kane, and to the people who had gone up into space. She knows that now. Having it invaded alerted her to that fact.]

But it might help to share, too. Especially with a friend like that. Getting the chance to let her know you found another piece of art to puzzle out with Eliot. [It might take time, but it does sound as if Quentin needs a mystery to solve and something to keep him on task.]

I'll help you find a way to let her know. I can promise you that.

We're talking away I don't know what I'm to say

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cw for suicide ideation

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omg your margot and clarke message killed me

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maybe wrap on yours or call this a wrap? :)

itsa done thread!