Olivia Shepherd ♘ Éowyn (daughterofkings) wrote in thereincarnates, @ 2017-07-25 12:16:00 |
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Entry tags: | olivia shepherd, william hayes |
Who: Olivia Shepherd & William Hayes
What: Taking care of business and petting horses
Where: Central Park (Manhattan, NY)
When: Monday afternoon, July 24th 2017
Warnings: None, just a lot of repressed feelings & unexpected cute
Olivia hadn't expected anything about this case to be easy, but surprisingly, once she'd found out Will was a reincarnate, things had gotten a little easier. That probably had something to do with the fact that one of the gifts that came with Will's particular reincarnate had a special talent for finding things, which had proved more than useful when it came to tracking down shipments, and hopefully evidence, against his father. That had been one of the only things holding them up, their inability to predict when shipments would change at the last minute, and not show up at the locations Olivia had already flagged as regular drop off points. Now, it finally felt like they were really getting somewhere, like they were making some real progress, to the point that they had started using the word 'when' instead of 'if' when referring to finally bringing down his father's business for good, and throwing Doyle Hayes behind bars for a very long time. Suddenly Olivia felt like there might actually be an end in sight, and finally allowing herself to be a little more hopeful than she had been before now.
It was also just really nice to have one less secret between them. Working for the FBI, you would think Olivia would be used to keeping secrets by now, but the truth was, she hated them. The secret of being a reincarnate was an especially hot button issue for her, considering what had happened to her brother once the FBI had found out about him, and the fact that she was still keeping her reincarnate identity a secret from the bureau. A secret that was slowly but surely eating away at her, and sometimes Olivia wondered how long she'd be able to go on like this before she cracked. Sometimes she even wondered if it was worth it to keep lying. To keep working for a place that with every new day that passed, so very clearly wasn't accepting of the community she was technically a part of now. Technically, because she didn't exactly participate much on the boards, but the fact still remained that she was a reincarnate, and that was never going to go away. This wasn't some 'sickness' like some of the people in Washington were trying to paint it as, this was permanent, and it wasn't something to feel ashamed of.
After James was taken into Camelot protective custody, Zach Evans had said something to Olivia that had stuck with her. It wasn't something that she thought about often, not intentionally, but it was something that was always there in the back of her head, any time something came up that reminded her. It had been a simple question, maybe, but it was one that had slowly but surely started to haunt her. 'Why are you still working for the people who are hunting your brother? The same people who don't like who you really are?' At the time, Olivia hadn't taken the conversation very seriously. It had sounded a lot like a Camelot recruitment tactic to her, but deep down, she also knew there was some truth to it, despite the fact that she still stood by her answer. She believed in the job. The problem was that the job didn't believe in her, and no matter how good she was at it, the minute the FBI found out about her, that was it. Her career was over, and all her hard work was for nothing, because it wouldn't matter to them. She never used to question why she was with the FBI before James left, before Noah quit, before she became a reincarnate. Now? She found herself asking that question a lot, and way more than she was comfortable with. If it weren't for this case, she might have been asking herself that question right now.
She'd been pretty lost, after everything. After James, after Pete. Maybe she shouldn't be looking for fulfillment solely in her work, but that's just who Olivia was, and stumbling onto Will's case had saved her, in a way. Maybe that was a ridiculous thing to think, but the work they were doing together, it had helped her regain some focus. It had given her some real clarity in her situation, which might not be ideal, but that's what it was. It reminded her what she still loved about her job, the things she believed in that had kept her working for the FBI for the last twelve years. They might not accept her as a reincarnate, for who she really was, but as long as she was still able to work here, she was going to keep fighting for the things she believed in. She was going to keep taking cases like this, and helping the people who really needed it. There might come a day when the FBI finds out about her and forces her to leave, or maybe she'll even get to a point where she'll leave on her own, like Noah. But for now, there was still a lot of real work to be done, and Olivia was more than ready to get down to it.
Having this shared secret with Will, though, it made Olivia unexpectedly feel a lot lighter. He wasn't in the FBI, but he was involved in a case she was working on, so he was arguably a lot closer to it than anyone else currently in Olivia's life. It felt good, to have someone even slightly connected to the FBI who knew her secret, and didn't care. She hadn't really gone into detail about hers, of course, but just being able to tell him that she was a reincarnate, that wasn't something she'd really done since she'd first admitted it to James. It was weirdly liberating. It didn't hurt that the gifts that came with his reincarnate were conveniently really helpful with the case they were building, which is why they were out here in Central Park on a Monday afternoon. Now that she knew Will was a reincarnate, meeting was also less of an issue with the MTN. He was able to meet her in New York earlier that afternoon and locate a lead to a potential drop off point, and after an hour Olivia had already put men on it to set up some covert surveillance of the area.
Once they'd taken care of the more official business, she'd suggested to Will that they take a walk through the park on their way back in the direction of the New York Agency, to put some distance between them and any suspicions surrounding their earlier chosen meeting place. Not that there would be any suspicions out here, but that was Olivia Shepherd for you. Overly cautious, right to the end. Besides, it was nice out today. Usually she was pretty content to simply walk somewhere with Will and not do much talking, but Olivia was feeling in an uncharacteristically chatty mood, and she was curious about something, so she decided to broach the subject as they crossed a bridge overlooking the water, clutching a half drunk coffee cup in both hands. "What's it like? This ability you have. Is it something you can visualize or is it more something you feel, like intuition."