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Rook spends an entire morning following a slow-moving group of peggies, trying to find out where they're going. There are enough of them that he suspects they might be a party sent out to capture an outpost, or make trouble at one of the surrounding farms. But they don't seem to be in a hurry, and they're not trying to be quiet. Though from what Rook's seen so far the peggies don't exactly excel at stealth, even the so called VIP's, who seem to rise on some utterly random basis of ranking, as far as he can tell.
Instead of doing anything threatening or suspicious, they stop near an old, deserted mine, mill about outside one of the buildings, before going inside and shutting the doors.
Rook creeps closer, and listens at the entrance. But all he hears is the low, quiet drone of singing, many voices raised together. Not an attack after all, some sort of religious meeting?
He carefully pokes around a little more, surprised that they haven't left a single lookout outside. Though he discovers that instead they've left all their phones in a tool chest outside, jumbled together, a showy flash of modern technology protected by rust and old screwdrivers. Rook decides the possibility of intelligence about the cult is too good, and he shoves the lot in his backpack.
He doesn't open it up and go through them until he gets back across the river. Where he very quickly learns two things.
Firstly, a surprising number of cultists have used EDENSGATE as a password. Which doesn't leave Rook with too much faith in humanity, should the apocalypse actually happen and leave only Joseph's congregation to rebuild civilisation.
Secondly, the members of Eden's Gate have been using modern technology way more than he might have thought they would. And in ways he definitely would not have expected.
The first phone he picks up belongs to someone who clearly fishes regularly. There are folders full of pictures of two men taking turns to hold fish. There's a subscription to Fish Fancier Weekly, which according to several emails needs to be renewed for another year this month if he wants to keep enjoying fishing tips, and photos of record breaking catches.
The next phone's browser history is full of shopping results for juicers and juice related products. Rook has no idea why he finds that so bewildering, perhaps it's the strange mix of hardened survivalism and recipes for tasty juice mixes, who knows.
One phone's messaging history is just a long scroll of dick pictures messaged back and forth for what looks like months. With the occasional hasty text added inbetween 'can't stop thinking about you' and 'hate that we can't touch' and memorably halfway through 'it doesn't feel like it's wrong when I'm thinking about you.'
One phone belongs to a very worried individual who's taken dozens of pictures of a rash on his leg, from at least five different angles. His web search entries gradually get more frantic. Rook pages through them with an eyebrow raised. 'Weird skin condition,' 'weird rash on leg,' 'red rash on leg, three weeks,' 'weird red blotches/rash on leg,' 'can I die from a rash?' 'Flesh-eating bacteria' 'can a weird rash be leg cancer?' He hopes that the poor guy found some answers - and maybe didn't share any towels with his fellow cultists.
He finds two people who know each other, who are obviously friends. They've been texting terrible fucking jokes back and forth, including a few unflattering ones about Jacob, which make Rook genuinely fear for the lives should anyone but him ever see them.
One of the phones contains pictures of Rook. They start off as surveillance, pictures of him with various guns, his friends, his backpack, one of him grappling under the bridge. But then the details start to slip away and they close in, concentrate on his face. Here's Rook laughing, there's Rook playing with Boomer, there's Rook changing his shirt. The last picture is just him, standing on a bridge looking unexpectedly heroic in the late sun. It's been saved as 'Sinner<3'
"Eden's Gate, you may have a problem," Rook mutters quietly. He gives up completely on trying to find important Eden's Gate intel that would be of any help to the resistance.
Though if he's being honest, part of him is nothing but amused. He'd expected bible verses and commandments from Joseph, complaints about sinners in the county doing sin-related things, maybe some musings on their future plans. Rook almost forgets sometimes that the members of Eden's Gate are just people. No matter how deep they are into Joseph's vision of paradise, how affected by the Bliss they are, they're just people, with their own whims and fears and stupid obsessions.
The last phone has a number in its contacts which makes Rook pause.
The Father
It's probably good odds that it's not the father of the person who owns the phone. You wouldn't put it like that unless you were an old-fashioned weirdo. Eden's Gate members don't strike him as the type.
The possibility that he may have Joseph Seed's actual phone number is an interesting one to contemplate.
~
Rook holds onto the information for a few days, while John's constant threats over the radio expand to include his angry thoughts on people who steal things which don't belong to them.
He has to admit, John kind of has him on that one. And he hates the fact that John Seed is right about anything, so he leaves the phones under a bush outside the ranch.
He puts Joseph's number in his own. After thinking about it for a minute, he just tags it JS.
Rook's somewhere in the valley when he decides to do something with it. There are any number of threats he could make, accusations and insults that Joseph has probably heard a hundred times before. But in the end Rook decides to be honest.
- I would like to apologise, for stealing a bunch of phones. -
- It was wrong of me to go through them. -
He slips his phone into his pocket and heads back towards the river. There's a strong possibility he'll get no reply at all, that Joseph will choose to quietly seethe at Rook interrupting his important, divinely guided cult-building with a reminder of his continued existence. But his phone vibrates against his thigh before he's even reached the bottom of the slope.
Rook drags it out, half expecting to have another joke from Hurk in his messages.
- Deputy? -
It occurs to Rook that Joseph has no real reason to believe him straight away. He sets himself against a tree, slipping down until he can rest on the curve of a root. Boomer decides it's break time, and immediately rolls over in the dirt, legs splayed out, tongue collecting dust off the ground
- You still have my handcuffs. - Rook sends. Because he's fairly sure no one knows that but Joseph and a couple of the deputies, both of which are still guests of Joseph's family. Complications he plans to uncomplicate at some point in the future.
- I'm going to need them back at some point. -
- They're police issue. I'll have to fill out paperwork. -
Once the office is no longer on fire, Rook supposes. They'll probably need to send out for some new paperwork. He thinks it's going to be a while before everything feels normal again. Assuming this all ends at some point. Assuming he remembers how to feel normal.
- I shall make a point to leave them somewhere for you. -
- I hope that you do not find cause to leave them in my possession again. -
Rook laughs, because of course Joseph would leave his own careful threat, that sounds just polite enough to be mistaken for a kindness.
The next two messages come almost together.
- And since you have returned what you stole, I see no reason not to forgive you. -
- Though I trust you are not going to make use of any personal information you found. -
Maybe Joseph is more aware of what his congregation gets up to when they're not listening in church than Rook had thought.
- I'm not going to share other people's secrets. - Rook tells him.
Because keeping and living with your own secrets was hard enough sometimes. He thinks about it for a minute, before sending another message.
- But someone should tell that poor guy with the rash that it's probably a grass allergy, not leg cancer. -
There's a pause, and Rook can't help picturing Joseph's expression to that random message, probably confused, the space between his eyes pinched behind his glasses. Rook saw that one briefly.
- I shall let Michael know. He will be very glad to hear it. -
Rook's surprised enough to laugh, loud enough that Boomer rolls over and looks at him. He lets the phone fall back on his chest.
~
Joseph seems far more willing to use modern technology than Rook would have assumed. He's not really certain where Eden's Gate stands on that exactly. It's not like they're Amish. But Rook had figured a lot of the stuff that encouraged people to be lazy, to be slothful, Joseph would have banned outright. He seems to be wrong though, because John gets to leave his ridiculously over-acted shorts on the TV's that are scattered around, and the county is literally full of RPG's and helicopters. Sure, phones are an essential communication tool, but they're also distracting as fuck, and a gateway to almost everything else.
Joseph seems more than happy to leave Rook messages though.
Curious messages when Rook goes on a ramble through the woods. Quietly chastising messages when Rook does something to piss John off enough to have him seething through the radio. Disappointed messages when Rook visibly or noisily breaks any of Eden's Gate's property.
Rook leaves him messages in return, about the mess Eden's Gate leaves everywhere, about their ugly sweaters, and their unbearable taste in music. Joseph counters that if he stopped stealing their vehicles he would be forced to listen to it less.
True to his word, Joseph leaves Rook's handcuffs in a boathouse just off the Henbane, tidily looped together on a chest of life vests. Rook retrieves them and slips them back on his belt.
He texts Joseph a thank you without even thinking about it.
~
Rook's on the roof of a truck, eating peanuts that he'd scavenged out of an upside down vending machine with Sinner painted on it. Which he'd taken as a 'help yourself' note of encouragement, rather than an insult. Because the idea amused him. It seems like a good place to stop for a while.
- So, the big giant statue of you. What was your thought process? Genuinely curious.-
He likes to think Joseph has important cult business to conduct, and Rook is a constant, minor irritation that he still feels somehow compelled to reply to. Though he never has to wait for very long.
- A reminder that I am with them, a comfort, to those who've joined Eden's Gate, to those who seek to follow the path, to achieve salvation. - Joseph's reply has a flavour of rehearsal to it. Rook has to wonder how many times he's had to explain the big giant statue, to defend the big giant statue? Whether his siblings were on board with it. He can see John being convinced, self-important, narcissistic jackass that he is. Faith clearly enjoys worshipping the damn thing. Jacob, not so much. Rook can imagine Jacob having opinions on the giant statue, on the symbolism of it.
But Rook gets the feeling Joseph always gets his own way in the end.
- A warning to those who haven't? - Rook asks.
There's a long pause before Joseph replies to that.
- A warning to those who threaten, who come seeking to dismantle us, to destroy us. -
Rook types his next message out carefully.
- You gouged a man's eyes out in church, Joseph. Someone was going to come eventually. -
Joseph is not a man the world can ignore for long, and Rook suspects that his insistence on carrying that air of persecution is part of what draws people to him, wounded people.
Joseph's message opens below his less than a minute later.
- Someone always comes. -
- You came. -
Rook honestly doesn't know what Joseph expects him to say to that. Since the last few months have taught him some harsh lessons about where his talents lie, truths that he's not sure he can pack away again, when all this is done. The person he's been seeing in the mirror lately has been changing too quickly for him to feel entirely comfortable, but always still familiar enough that he can see himself there.
- It's a very big statue. - Rook sends, instead of trying to make sense of Joseph's answer. He says it mostly on a whim, because it's been bothering him for a while, the sheer audacity of it.
But Joseph replies to him almost straight away.
- Do you feel as if I'm always watching you? -
His text manages to sound amused and curious, even with no inflection behind it. Rook can't help laughing at the insinuation.
- Someone is always watching me, at least half of them report back to you. -
Rook's probably exaggerating there, but he's been realising just how much people watch him lately.
- And yet knowing where you are and what you are doing does not seem to have led to my victory over you. -
Maybe because Joseph still seems intent on converting him, rather than putting a bullet in his head. Though Rook doesn't particularly want to share that observation.
- And what would you consider a victory? - Rook asks. He frowns at his phone, watches the screen go dark just before it brightens again, as Joseph's reply expands beneath his own. Once, twice, three times.
- To bring you understanding. To see you content. -
- We would forgive you everything you have done. -
- We would cleanse you of your sins and welcome you into our family. With love. -
Rook frowns at the phone. He has to wonder why some people get treated like wayward, beloved children to Joseph, and others get nailed to trees. What decides it for Joseph, the people who are worth nothing and the people who are worth upturning everything for.
- Take away everything you consider a sin and there's not a whole lot left. - Rook types, sends.
Because there are so many things that Eden's Gate considers a sin, there's not a lot of room left for people like Rook.
- Except everything that matters. - Joseph's text sits alone. He doesn't feel the need to clarify.
Rook grunts something unimpressed, because his answer to that is easy.
- And the parts of you that want? The parts that need, that love stupidly, that takes risks, that make mistakes. They don't matter? -
Rook stares at his own words. They sit without reply, for long enough that he drops the phone back down, stares up at the statue of Joseph, hand stretching out like it could snatch a plane out of the sky.
He has to wonder what it means when a man reaches out that desperately.
~
Rook's an hour into the woods when he finds the shaded circle of flowers, a mess of purple and yellow growing together. If he was a flower sort of person he thinks he'd be pretty impressed. And he has to laugh when Cheeseburger barrels his way through them, then makes himself what looks like a nest out of the smashed, multicoloured remains, curled up in the crush of it, petals in his fur, pollen all over his head. Rook rests in the shade of a tree, watches the huge bear grumble and roll back and forth, before eventually falling asleep.
Rook takes a picture of it and sends it to Joseph.
- My bear has made a little paradise of his own. -
Four hours later, when he's back in town, in an abandoned house, Joseph sends him a picture.
It's the sunset at the Eden's Gate compound, the last streaks of light turning the whole world orange, the water in the distance sparkles mauve and the sky is just a rolling smear of colour and light. Even Rook has to admit, that's pretty damn beautiful.
- You did pick a beautiful place to stage a revolution. - Rook says honestly.
He goes to get another beer from the fridge, when he comes back he has two messages waiting for him.
- God told me to come here. -
- He told me I would find everything I needed here. -
Rook taps absently at the screen. Part of him wants to ask if Joseph did, if he found what he needed here. But he's not sure he wants to know. They probably have wildly conflicting ideas of what constitutes a paradise. Joseph seems to take his silence for agreement though, and by the time Rook decides that he should have questioned him, he should have made him explain what he needed, what he wanted, what he expected the world to give him. By then it's been too long.
But Rook sends Joseph more pictures over the course of a week, or two, he loses count of the days out here sometimes.
The long river, fast flowing over some shiny rocks where it narrows and curls away from the mountains.
A truck he'd found, deep in the woods, overgrown with green, a tree branch coiling through the empty spaces where windows used to be.
An old sign, gone thin, text barely readable, warning of dangerous rock falls, on a slope long crumbled away to nothing.
Boomer, one ear up and one down, mouth crooked around a stick, caught half crouched, begging Rook to play with him.
All the pieces of Rook's life that aren't fire and violence. The pieces that surprise him, amuse him, make him feel like there's more to Hope County than two sides and all the bullets inbetween. He's not sure whether Joseph understands or not.
But Joseph sends back some of his own.
One of the trees at the edge of Joseph's island, grown tall and strangely angled in the sun, bark worn away on one side, it looks like it's leaning into the water.
A pattern of sunlight in the church that's thrown waving, reaching shapes on the wall.
A crown of flowers braided into the dark hair of some Eden's Gate follower.
It's not always just pictures, sometimes Joseph will add a text underneath with his thoughts, or a bible quote. And Rook will grumble but usually look it up anyway. He has no idea how the man memorises so much of the stuff, or why? Because Rook knows he has his own book, his own religion.
Though there's probably nothing helpful in there about texting with your enemy, while a small war rages on.
~
Rook's questioning text about the Eden's Gate symbol goes unanswered all morning. Though Rook is almost too busy to notice, there are bears jacked-up on Bliss menacing farms along the edge of the woods again. It's harder to put the crazy bastards down now that Cheeseburger has become a fixture in his life, his huge furry body too familiar, too weirdly affectionate. But once they go mad they don't seem to come out of it. Rook doesn't know if the dose is too high, or if it just flips something in their head, makes them wild and wrong.
The Bliss never should have been allowed to take over half the county, and now he's not sure how they're going to get rid of all of it, or how much of the animal population its affected. Shit how much of the human population it's affected.
He showers Bliss pollen out of his hair before he retrieves his stuff. Hopes that the world will stop sparkling at the edges before he has to go out again. He doesn't feel like a trip through Neverland with the youngest Seed, who more than once has snatched him from John's side of the river. Rook suspects if John found out he'd be pissed. Maybe he could find out John's number and make them fight among themselves.
His phone tells him he has five messages. One of them is from Hurk, and it's a joke he's probably never going to be able to repeat in polite company, or really any company. The others are from Joseph, an apology and an answer to his question.
The last two seem purely designed to coax a reply out of him.
- I was preparing and giving a sermon. -
- You would have appreciated it, I think. It was about trust, and loyalty. -
Rook can't decide if that's a biting aside, or if Joseph's being honest. It's hard to tell via text.
- I feel terrible that I missed it. - Rook sends. He wonders if Joseph will call him out for the sarcasm, which he suspects is obvious.
It takes a long time for his phone to light up again. Long enough that he has all his ammunition out in rows, arrows laid out to be checked. He picks up the phone and flips it over.
There's an audio file waiting for him. He laughs and taps it open.
He isn't surprised in the slightest to hear the low, familiar rumble of Joseph's voice. There's wind behind it, birds in the distance and the quiet and steady tread of feet. Joseph recorded it while walking somewhere. But his voice is strong and clear, as if he doesn't care who hears him. Rook wonders if it's exactly the same one he gave in church, word for word. Or whether he'd changed it, for a non-believer like Rook, for a sinner like Rook.
He laughs again, but listens to it anyway.
~
He's eating breakfast at the bar the next morning when Joseph texts him again, one of his long messages about the virtues of Eden's Gate over the rest of the uncaring, corrupt world. Their loyalty, their ability to be family to each other. Those texts are no less regular than they used to be, but they're softer than they were at the start, more teasing, as if he's content to remind Rook, rather than punish him with what he believes Rook is missing out on.
Rook puts down his fork, drags the phone closer.
- Loyalty is a theme for you lately I see. -
- Family loyalty especially. -
He's tempted to read something into it. A difficulty with someone in the Gate, someone torn between their duty and something else, family, good sense, moral backbone?
- You listened to it? -
Rook isn't sure but he thinks Joseph is both surprised and pleased. As if he hadn't expected Rook to take the time, to listen to him. Maybe Joseph had expected him to delete it and go about his destructive business. And maybe Rook should have done, if he's being honest. Maybe he shouldn't be encouraging Joseph Seed to text him sermons. To record sermons just for him. When he doesn't even believe. When he's supposed to be stopping the man and his voice from spreading any further
But his thumbs are already skipping across the phone.
- I liked it more than the first one I walked in on. -
That one had been very apocalyptic and unsettling, and Rook had been the sole focus of it by the end. It had felt accusing and personal. Of course then he'd arrested Joseph, so the thought hadn't been entirely wrong. Though both of them knew how that had ended, how it had brought them both here.
- I shall take that as encouragement to do better. - Joseph tells him.
~
The next audio file comes on Monday morning. With a text underneath telling him he might reflect on some of it.
Rook knows when he's being subtly judged for his life choices.
- I can't listen. I'm in the Eagle. -
Mary May gives him a look when she catches him texting against the lip of the bar, curious and teasing, as if she thinks Rook's secret is something entirely different. It occurs to Rook that this whole thing is liable to blow up spectacularly at some point. Much like everything he's touched since Burke first handed over that warrant.
- There is some emphasis on sin. That seems oddly appropriate. -
- I'm not playing it to the whole bar. - Rook sends. Though the mental image of that is in some way amusing.
Joseph has an answer for everything, and in less time than it takes Rook to order another beer.
- If you love them they will come to you, and ask you to show them the way. -
That sounds like a quote from somewhere. Joseph's own book maybe? But Rook doubts it's ever been delivered quite like this. He can almost imagine Joseph's barely-there smile underneath his glasses.
Rook thinks about pointing out that he hadn't come to Joseph. That he's still pulling at the leash, making trouble, setting fires, along with half the county. He thinks about suggesting that maybe Joseph isn't loving people hard enough. But he gets the feeling Joseph will just take that as a challenge.
- How long do you wait before you assume they're not coming? - Rook asks. How long would Joseph let him turn the county upside down trying to fix what he'd broken, how long would Joseph wait for him to see the light?
There's barely a pause before Joseph gets back to him
- You never assume they won't come. -
- You wait as long as it takes. -
~
It's been more than a month, and Rook has more messages, more conversations in his phone with Joseph than he's had with anyone else for longer than he can remember, maybe years. And perhaps that's nothing for Joseph, who talks like it's as easy as breathing, hands lifted to gather people in, to welcome them, mouth always moving, words for everything. Rook's always been more contained, he doesn't talk much. He likes people, he does, he's happy to be around them. But he's never been very good at talking to them, at making conversation. It's always full of awkward silences and half formed thoughts, questions he's supposed to answer.
Rook should be content, left on his own in the wilderness for days on end, slipping from outpost, to farm, to watchtower, throwing himself against this madness over and over again, because a voice on the radio told him to, because a town needed him, because there's no one else. Only that's not what happened. Some part of Rook has instinctively reached out as well. In a way he's never done before.
And maybe he should be grateful that Joseph doesn't know him well enough to understand how out of character that is for him.
He spins his phone on the ground beside him. Where it's dark and accusing.
~
Not everything goes smoothly in Hope County. Sometimes everything is just noise and blood and Rook dragging people he knows, people he's come to give a shit about, away from the fire and bullets and violence. That Eden's Gate always seems to want to visit on him.
They all make it back to town, the same number that left, by some fucking miracle.
Sharky's awake but he has concussion, eyes moving oddly, and Rook doesn't like it. He doesn't like what he does to the people around him, what he drags them into it. Sharky's making jokes, trying to show Rook that he's fine, but they're weirdly slow, punchlines all screwed up. It doesn't help at all.
Grace reminds Rook that he's the one who's bleeding, the one torn open at shoulder and wrist. Bruises like a child's attempt to colour a human being starting to make themselves known on the left side of his face. His back feels wet, and he can still hear things exploding, like some sort of phantom echo in his head. Grace drops her pack, disappears to find things to put Rook together again. He doesn't fucking know what at this point, staples and duct tape maybe?
He's staring at his phone before he realises it, angrily stabbing out messages one after another.
- Why can't you just ask people to follow you. Why can't you let people choose? -
- You genuinely care about people. Why can't you be better than this? Why the fucking violence? -
- What do you expect me to do? -
Why does every fucking Seed seem incapable of moving through the world without hurting people, without burning everything they touch.
Rook's dragged away from his phone, has to leave it on the bed under his old, bloody shirt when Grace pulls him over to the table, pushing him down and making him hold a bottle of alcohol while she pulls thread through a curved needle and turns him into the light. She doesn't comment on the spiderweb of old, white scars that Rook has had since long before Eden's Gate existed. She's gentle but efficient, fixing the long slice of tearing pain in his shoulder. She wipes under it often enough to tell Rook how much it's bleeding, but her voice never wavers, it's all quiet calm, jovial, until Rook relaxes under her, lets every slow stab come and go like part of the world he can't stop and he can't change.
Until he's huffing out a laugh to something she says, and she pats him, all done, sits beside him, clinks her bottle with his. Grace isn't a huge drinker, but she's always willing to get drunk with him if he needs her to. She's willing to fill the space beside him with warmth and silence. Grace is a lot like him, he thinks, not a natural talker. But she's much better at pretending.
It's more than a handful of beers later when he gets back to the bedroom. His phone is bright underneath his forgotten shirt, as if the last text had just come in, long after the first five. And the way that makes him feel tells him he should stop this, that he never should have started it. That this thing is just getting more complicated than he knows what to do with.
He thumbs Joseph's messages open.
- I take no joy in this. I am trying to save my children.-
- There is a path I must follow. And I do what I must, for all of us. -
- Please believe me. -
- I only want you to understand. I want you to see. -
- I want to save you. -
- Rook? -
Rook's too fucking drunk to deal with Joseph's justifications right now. He'll say something he regrets, or something he doesn't regret but shouldn't have said.
He shoves the phone under his pillow, and tells his drunk ass to go to sleep.