Archer Avery, Chief of Police (comethearchers) wrote in remains_rpg, @ 2015-11-11 20:56:00 |
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Entry tags: | # 2018 [11] november, archer avery |
Foxhole Manifesto I: Thoughts
Who: Archer
Where: the former quarters of the Lansing family, in the Capitol
What: Chief of Police Archer Avery, unsure what he believes anymore, would hedge his bets if he thought it’d do any fucking good. These days, he’s not sure what counts as ‘good.’ That’s a heavier weight than any nonexistent divine fucking entity could hope to test him with.
When: evening, November 3rd
I knew if there was a god, he could see
through us, like we were made
out of cellophane, like he could stare directly into our hearts
the way we look into an aquarium,
like he'd know what was floating around in there,
like he might be the one feeding it.
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There are no atheists in foxholes.
-- aphorism, origin unknown
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He stands in the doorway of an apartment that doesn’t have a single hint of them left in it. Archer Avery puts his shoulder to the jamb and casts impassive blue eyes about the place. They’re good digs. Clean white walls. Plain wood floors. He could ask to live here, him and his Deputy Chief not-quite-brother both, and their stuff could be moved in by nightfall tomorrow. Would Olinger look at him askance for the request, to live in these specific rooms? Probably not. Archer’s poker face is still going strong, his emotional armor cinched on for dear life. For all Archer knows, the mayor is waiting for someone to ask -- as space in the Capitol goes, this is prime real estate -- and if it was Archer, that would just be the cherry on top of his fucking sundae. Archer knows there’s plenty of whimsy left in Reeves Olinger, that he’d find the move somehow a propos.
Besides the fact that Brannon would strangle him, there’s no way in hell that Archer could stand to live in Ads’ old apartment.
It doesn’t matter that it’s a blank canvas now: this used to be the home of Rob and Adelaide and Charlie Lansing -- Charlie, his little buddy -- and Archer is staring at the space where someone erased the three of them from his life. Rob is AWOL. Thomas Robert Lansing, formerly a man of some small power within the government here, is possibly dead, or a zombie, or in captivity... and his trail going cold is more unsettling to Archer than having one of those specific bad answers for Ads. It doesn’t pair well with this pristine, lifeless living space, that radio silence. Then Ads, one of his best friends, someone that he’d rightly call family if he could, is a wanted fugitive. No amount of gruff teasing her about her mugshot is going to change the fact that if he follows the codes of law that have been set down in front of him, he should be doing everything in his power to apprehend her. He certainly shouldn’t be having text message conversations where he talks about her fucking herb garden; instead, he should be pressuring her to turn herself in. Archer bleeds blue but doesn’t see that particular conversation happening, cop or no cop. And Charlie? Archer will count himself lucky if he sees the boy through video clips on Adelaide’s phone. It’s too dangerous to have Charlie near him, too dangerous to have him out of the Dog Park, should Arch and Ads try to meet in secret. It frustrates Archer on a deep down dark level that he, the police officer, is the unsafe option, that the outlaw uncle and his gang of mutts is what will guard the baby boy in a way he cannot.
But Archer is not Charlie’s uncle, the way James Hawkins is, and he reminds himself of this now as he takes a heavy step into the too-still apartment. He’s not that boy’s uncle, or his grandfather, or his godfather. He’s not anything, no matter what Ads says in her texts when she calls Archer ‘her cop’ and points out how important to her he is. He is not. They aren’t family, they’re not, and if Archer Avery can make himself believe that badly sewn patchwork of lies, he’d be well on his way to not feeling his heart break and his pulse pound every time his phone buzzes with a message.
Because if that message is an SOS, and Mr. Hawkins and all the king’s dogs aren’t enough to keep Adelaide and Charlie Lansing safe, Archer isn’t exactly sure what a tin man like him is supposed to do about it.
Archer takes a few more steps in, stops in the center of the main room. How many times had he been in here, when it was theirs? He hasn’t thought about that question or others like it since the arrest, having put his emotions on the back burner the last two times he’d come into the Lansing quarters. The first was to gather the items Ads had written down when she was incarcerated, when he’d sent Jenkins over to take a list of things she might need to make her and Charlie more comfortable. Because of course she wasn’t about to turn the boy over to anyone over at the Capitol and while it hadn’t been pleasant to see the baby behind bars with his mother, Archer didn’t disagree with Ads’ actions on that front in the slightest.
Now that Rob was missing -- missing, presumed dead, in the back of the cop’s mind, though it wasn’t stopping him from trying to find out what he could -- Archer actually felt guilt wrung from him at the thoughts he’d had that first day, how he privately thought Charlie stood a better chance with Ads than with Rob, that Rob loved his son but that Archer wasn’t entirely certain he’d go the distance for the boy. Now it was more than possible that T. Robert Lansing had made the ultimate sacrifice, made it for Ads and for Charlie, and Archer only really wished he fucking knew and that probably made him a bastard. But Rob was a few rungs down his priority ladder and both men would have acknowledged that the feeling was more than mutual. They were friends, of a sort, but not the way Arch and Ads were. Not the way Arch and Ads are.
Archer hadn’t stayed long when he came through here when Ads was in the cell. Long enough to grab the items on the list, after walking through the apartment with one of Frost’s clever devices to see if there were any active cameras or microphones still in place. The night he’d crashed on the couch here, in the middle of the blob storm, he’d received the impression from Ads that the main room at the very least wasn’t the safest place to be having sensitive conversations. When gathering up items to take to her cell, it was only a little bit of a surprise for Archer to find that there was a stuffed animal camera in Charlie’s nursery that had some sort of wireless network hookup that wasn’t quite as sophisticated as other Capitol tech. Archer had a hunch that one wasn't for Rob to spy on his family but more for looking in on Charlie -- did it belong to Ads? -- and would only wonder later if it happened to capture any unguarded moments between him and the baby boy that he’d willingly protect with his own life, if necessary. Archer didn’t do a whole lot that fell into the category of ‘unguarded,’ not for most people to see, but as Charlie grew -- and how fast he’d grown! -- Archer had learned that little eyes followed him solemnly and his whole emotional armor bullshit didn’t matter to Rob and Adelaide’s son. Like Ads, the little boy seemed to be capable of looking through him like a window, like cellophane, and even as Archer logically knew that this was a baby and that Charlie wasn’t going to grow up with every scrap of his mother’s perceptive ways just because he was a kid that looked at him funny…? Archer had taken to answering the looks. He’d taken to talking to Charlie Lansing, to where the boy got to know the sound of his voice, to where Archer would tell him stories. Archer, who didn’t use a sentence when a word or a nod would do, told an infant stories. To calm him, to soothe him, to let him know he wasn’t alone when Rob would have to run over to his office for something and Ads was in the kitchen.
That was before, though. Before the cell, before the jailbreak, before now. Now, Archer goes over to the door of what used to be the nursery, which used to be some sort of reading room of Adelaide’s, he thinks, and looks instead at absolutely nothing. No crib. No changing table. He can approximate by sight and some oddly recalled muscle memory where he’d stood his tactical vest, that night he took Charlie from the sitter when he just couldn’t trust himself to work any longer after days of being up with the blob crisis, when he didn’t realize he still needed to feel useful, when being with Charlie was just as comforting to him as it was to the boy. He’d told a story, another adventure where he’d placed himself in the role of tin man. Graham had been relegated to the role of the Brainiac Cowardly Lion; Brannon had been Deputy Chief Scarecrow. There’s something to be said for typecasting, Archer knows, considering the role he fits so well into. Archer looks at the empty room and lets a bubble of frustration burst up, wonders what sort of stories Uncle Toto tells his nephew.
The place wasn’t exactly neat and tidy when he scooped up items on the list, not here and not anywhere throughout the apartment, but it was a little better than when he came back just after James and Company sprung her from the custody of the Department of Justice, when he'd grabbed things that he thought she might like if she ever made contact, when he'd grabbed things he thought wouldn't really be missed or that he could justify taking as a scrounger and not as a friend. He wasn't feeling entirely friendly that day, even when instinct had him going to protect some of her possessions.
Seems instinct was right. Archer tries to muster the anger, the fury at the senseless death of that day; it had been the fuel that kept him going for the first 48 and was the image he brought into the front of his mind when he first saw the mug shot of one Adelaide Hawkins Lansing. He'd been so fucking pissed because people had to die because James Hawkins had to be a fucking hero.
Archer can't put a finger on when the all of shifts in his occurred, but they did: people had to die because James Hawkins had to rescue his little sister and fucking forbid they'd trusted Archer to help them, that they'd ever followed through with their plan for the two men to meet in secret. There hasn't been a damn thing about that that had a time clock on it, until all of a sudden shit went down. And really, Archer understands about little sisters. Even if he didn't believe Av and Penny were dead, if he had the slightest chance to rescue them, he'd take it in a heartbeat. Can't fault Hawkins that.
Another shift: people had to die because Adelaide Hawkins Lansing had been unlawfully detained -- she was a fucking citizen and while it could have been her responsibility to turn her brother in, it was her fucking brother and exactly how many other people would have acted differently in this scenario? and James Hawkins had acted with regretful haste in his zeal in rescuing his sister from the unreasonable Department of Justice and, perhaps more pertinent to this train of thought, the patrolmen. Patrolmen who seemed poised and eager to take on the fight. Of course they were. Because what is one of the great dictums from on high? Hellhounds are brutal, dangerous, reviled creatures that are no longer considered citizens -- no longer considered human -- and must be eliminated on sight. Didn't Archer know this long before Ads ever saw the inside of that cell? He did. Because if he didn't, and if he didn't think for himself, James would be dead by now. Even Archer knew it wasn't just the fact that he felt a debt was owed because of Brannon’s life. He lost sleep at night every time another officer died because of the fucking Dog King, because he'd caught him and spared his life, but didn't he lose sleep every time a Hellhound was executed for committing the crime of being a Hellhound? It didn't happen as often as the mayor would like, but when it did… ah.
Another shift. Archer is angry that people had to die because Reeves Olinger has a fucking hard on for the Hellhounds, has some problem with them that he doesn't quite understand yet.
(He thinks he understands more in this moment thanks to some… interesting… lawn decorations than he did when James came to spring Ads. But that part is speculation; Archer needs to be careful what he says because he's busy presenting Olinger with a blank facade and even Brannon has stopped half-teasing him about what great secrets he and ‘Ollie’ must share with one another. Meaning that Brannon knows the strain Archer is under to hold all of this shit together, to actually be something that approaches political after years of saying fuck off to the brass in the NYPD, because Archer needs to figure out the rest of the puzzle before he can decide where to go from here. There's a talk that needs to happen with Theo Laberenz. And maybe one day he's just gonna have to walk straight into the fucking Dog Park. Archer doesn't know yet. He really doesn't fucking know. The thoughts are still chasing themselves around in his skull. But Archer thinks he's getting more of a picture than he did on the day the dogs came for Ads.)
Olinger and his vendetta are the reason folks died that day. Fuck, the dead and the injured, people like Graham Frost who didn't know something was going down at the Capitol that day and got caught in the crossfire. The injured. The dead. The dead were casualties of a… what? What is Olinger, anyway? Archer tries to recall all of the impressions the man has made on him, good and bad, all this time. Olinger is smart, Archer knows. He's actually very smart. There was no better bait for a trap than the one he used. And Olinger honestly seems to love this job, the people, the city...
The worst thing about a fanatic, Archer slowly thinks, turning in the doorway of the no-longer-a-nursery and looking sightlessly at the larger empty living space, the worst thing about a fanatic is that he actually believes he is right, just, and good. He might recognize when he is cruel -- Archer wonders what Reeves thought as Adelaide was being arrested, as she demanded to keep her son -- and he might not -- Archer remembers reaching out a hand and accepting the badge of his predecessor, spattered and crusted with Sam Grady’s gore. He'd never forget the honest-to-goodness blankness in Reeves Olinger’s face that that might be an item of revulsion rather than a token of esteem; he'd never forget Brannon’s loud indignation. Likewise, Archer would recall that while Rob Lansing sat there and let Olinger do that to him, his wife cleaned that badge for Archer after he'd worn himself out walking the whole night through, pondering if he'd done the right thing. Ads also told him that no one else could be chief. So had Reeves. In these last couple of years, he's seen both of them with their eyes gleaming, blazing, passionate about something.
But only Olinger ever has the look of a true fanatic about him, the look of a madman lurking in the background. Archer always took it to be zeal for the job. So often, he's seen Olinger tired, beaten down but phoenix-poised, the ultimate public servant leading his people through every disaster and weathering every storm and now Archer has to cast his memory back over those moments and wonder if there wasn't a part of the man that hadn't enjoyed the worst crises, that hadn't thrilled at the hunt? Archer had known in his gut before he'd needed to know that shit was going wrong, but did it go directly to Olinger? Did it make a few stops along the way? Was Rob on board with the plans to eliminate the Hellhounds; why was the Dog Park always the fucking target?
There are zombies still out there. There's still clouds of blister gas. No one knows, next time it rains, if the blobs will reappear the way they did in the summer. The high school kids have created their own little society where not following whatever rules they've set up can get a shelter member executed. Archer doesn't know what went wrong with LBJ but their shelter leader died and he should've been honored for the work he'd done; his daughter should've known her father was grieved by more than just the library. There was a serial killer in the medical center for too fucking long and there are nights when Archer adds their names to his list of the dead, the roll call of both the screw ups and the unavoidable deaths that he'd caused or had to bear witness to since the infection started, from when he and Bran went to New York, to when they made it back here with others to warn folks it was spreading, to now. Zombies he's killed with faces he once knew.
All of that shit happened, stuff was happening, but still let's go get the fucking puppies and throw ‘em in the pound? Madness. Let's put up mugshots of a woman whose only crime was having a criminal for a brother? Because even though Ads knew she wouldn't be in that cell forever -- they'd locked eyes, Archer understanding perfectly -- she was not the mastermind of her own jailbreak and she wasn't the one (Olinger) who set everything in motion (Olinger) by putting her in there (fucking Olinger). Every day is made up of increasingly illogical things, it seems to Archer, from firefights on the Capitol steps to mysterious guns on the Capitol lawn, and it's throwing his sense of balance completely off. He needs to have that talk with Detective Labernez -- Theo -- but he needs to talk with Ads in person more, and it's probably time he actually takes those days off he talked about with Cal and do a perimeter check. Which might not seem like much in the grand scheme of ‘time off’ but he needs to get out of here before the feeling of being stared at in an aquarium starts to get to him. He can handle being watched, and he's glad he hasn't outright told Brannon about Ads’ messages or laid out his shifting viewpoints layer by layer. It's enough that Bran can read him pretty well; it's enough to know that his Deputy Chief will mind the store while he's gone. But Archer’s gone too long without putting his thoughts on paper, for safety and security reasons: between Ads and Charlie literally going to the dogs, Rob’s disappearance and Graham’s horrible luck, Cal’s half quarantine and the rough weeks that followed, Archer’s unwillingness to burden or endanger Bran or Jenkins or the rest of his squad…? Archer hasn't had anyone to talk to, has only his thoughts for company. It's a surprise to find that he actually wouldn't mind talking to someone. Maybe not talk, exactly. Maybe just exist in the same space for a little while without having to feel like he's fighting a war he didn't sign up for.
Archer walks into what used to be the bedroom, finds a freshly made bed that doesn't look anything like the one he sat on the edge of next to Ads, where she sat and told him that her brother was the famed Dog King and where he sat and recounted a story that she knew only a little about: how he inadvertently saved her brother’s life. She'd made him pumpkin pancakes and let Archer sleep after finding him and Charlie zonked out on the couch, before they'd sat down in a room without listening devices and she told him something that, at the time, had been one of her biggest secrets, not knowing how he'd react. Ads had trusted Archer with her son’s safety and she’d trusted him with her brother’s identity.
Maybe this is a war, and maybe he picked up his goddamn gun and picked a side long before he even knew where the battle lines were being drawn. As Archer turns on his heel, turns away from this place with finality and begins to stride out of the apartment, he just wishes someone gave him a little more fucking time to get into the foxhole before they opened fire. Because they took a shot at this family (your family, buddy is whispered just on the edge of his awareness, only to be shaken off with an impatient twitch of the cop’s left shoulder). Now Archer has to figure out every facet of who ‘they’ are, why they're doing this, and how he can stop them. Not just stop them in a temporary reprieve sense, but in a way that lets Adelaide and Charlie and yes, even James, walk down the street without fearing that someone from the Capitol is going to put a bullet in their back.