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Once he came to terms with the idea of being promoted, his nerves sanded down. He wasn’t on edge as he was before, still not quite embracing it with open arms, still not ready to smoke the peace pipe with it—but it was tolerable.
The idea.
Upon hearing those words that Roundabout simultaneously craved yet dreaded, his stomach twisted in a way that had his breathing cut short and his clammy hand grasping his slacks, struggling for air like he’d just been fished from the deep end of the pool. It was definite, etched in clay with a quill, if not stone. He couldn’t tell where his chair was, and slowly sat back down in the velvet with two cold fingers on his temple.
“I…”
“Nigel,” Maelstrom’s dry voice crackled in from the other end of the line, distinctively quiet, and Roundabout just then realized how far away he was holding his phone from his ear. On the screen, Maelstrom held an unamused and slightly bored looks as he held his chin in his hand, illuminated by the bright green lighting of the diner they were in. The man lowered his tone much, much more to make it nigh impossible for the rest of the Faculty to hear. Roundabout could feel his rumbling voice all the way in his chest.
“Really, should it come as such a surprise? See—“ Roundabout heard the creak of some chair across the receiver— “you’re… well aware of your own capabilities, I wouldn’t see why the blood disperses from your body the way it does so when I merely mention your new position...” he stopped himself when the frazzled gum-smacking waitress approached, and turned his head away from the camera to snap his coffee order. (“Yes, just… just fill it up...no, no, God, Brunt, you should know me more than well that I don’t take that sickly saccharine sugar, please, dairy makes it worse…)
Roundabout didn’t remember what Maelstrom had said after that, an attempt at idle chatter. For what? To assuage the undeniable tension between them that felt like pins and needles? Bits and pieces of words like clouds floated around in his memory, fuzzy silhouettes, and that was all. He tuned him out after a while. Roundabout didn’t need another feather on top of his rapidly growing consternation, especially when he nauseatingly came to terms with the second (personal, though perhaps most important but less thought of) reason his breathing depressed itself from a simple thought.
The feeling of Maelstrom’s icy fingers setting themselves on his neck, inside his coat, warmed by his suit was undeniably always something he’d carry with him, baggage he could never drop even if he wanted to.
He could also sense Maelstrom’s bottled agitation coming off in waves, though he let it out in the plaguy passive aggressive way he always did, a cold sting. Roundabout gritted his teeth so hard his jaw cracked the second he could sense the incoming tone, the telltale signs of an incoming storm, so he found it best to nod along and agree without really meaning (or recalling) what he said.
He’d taken into consideration the physical inauguration of a new faculty member, despite hearing about it occasionally in clandestine whispers after Wolfe’s death, shaking hands stiffly and rubbing elbows with the rest of the Faculty: members he’d now see as his equal, no longer craning his neck to see them sneering like vultures. It was strange, a foreign feeling, but one he was able to digest significantly better.
Poor Roundabout was in for something he wasn’t used to.
Almost immediately after his impromptu diner booth initiation, he was shoved into the fray of trying to find an appropriate location for VILE’s new relocation. Preferably an island, they’d simply said.
“Have they learned nothing?” Roundabout had whispered into his hand while using digital maps to attempt to scout nondescript island. He understood why they’d prefer an island, though, after mulling over if there were any other second best options for locations. The best options he found were choppy archipelagos at the very top of Cape Horn—which he considered a superb option. The tumultuous ocean and icebergs were nigh impossible for amateur ships to navigate their way to, giving it a sort of moat.
Roundabout had formally presented his concept to the Faculty, hoping for praise and agreement, but Cleo cut him off as soon as he brought up the weather, not even a minute into his presentation. The rest followed with their own disagreements (sans Maelstrom, who seemed indifferent to the idea) which vetoed the Cape Horn idea and stored it away, leaving Roundabout with his words caught in his mouth like a goddamn trout.
It wasn’t only one, no—each option he brought after that was like hung roadkill in front of the Faculty’s faces. The Swedish Archipelago. Oceania. Micronesia. Every option he brought up was rejected without consideration, leading Roundabout to chew the fact that it might not be location, it may not be weather, the environment no longer has anything to do with it.
This was their spite, plain and simple.
The reason was obvious: (he tossed it over in the back of his mind many times because the word just had to have slipped his mind) nepotism. Or, at least, that’s what they thought it was. Spurred from the unified disappointment of not being able to have their own candidates on the Faculty. This paved the way for them to call him every waking moment, to always have a “reason” to check in.
“Have we had any good fortune on your end?” Cleo asked in an indiscernible tone during an impromptu video call, but the subtle upward tug on her lips was enough to peel back her true intention (not like he didn’t know already).
The wanton passive aggressiveness rose up his throat and he tightened his fountain pen a little too tight, her eyes on the monitor burning holes into Roundabout’s body. He hoped his glance at her face was enough to convey what his words could not. He pursed his lips until they dug into his teeth.
With you instigating the tidal wave of the rejections of my offers, no, no, I haven’t.
Roundabout words fizzed out on his tongue with an exhale, pushing up his glasses. His tight smile completed the look of self-composure. Cleo’s own piercing orbs of jade seemed to catch onto his message, and he relished her smaller vexed sneer. Time to do what he did best.
“Dearest Countess, I appreciate your query—a sight for sore eyes after staring at maps for countless hours!” He pressed his fingertips to each other as her steadfast expression remained. “One problem presents itself, however, and that’s, well…” Roundabout feigned uncertainty and sucked in air through his teeth, “...I need more requisites on your end, tell me what you want! what you need! sand or snow? sun or rain? For every option I present, you reject with simplicity.” It physically ached him to air his grievances in a suck up manner, but it was better than to waft a negative connotation around him, especially after he’d just been welcomed alongside the table.
Cleo’s facial features tightened a tad. “We’ve already given you details to work with: nothing on the extreme side, especially when it comes to wildlife or weather.” She made a popping noise with her lips. “Unless that’s too… unembellished for you to work with.”
“Not…” He cleared his throat, afraid he’d shown too much insubordinance. ”Not in the slightest, Countess.”
And just like that, with the confidence he was sure he carried, Roundabout had never felt meeker. Even after Cleo ended the call, he found himself staring at his dim reflection in the black screen, with the feeling like he was being watched. Roundabout was always being watched, more so really than anyone else—scrutinized with the intensity of a microscope, and he could feel the hot anger burning at the depth of his stomach.
The hills had eyes.
Gunnar would certainly have a say in this, wouldn’t he? Roundabout’s thoughts looped in his head with such speed it was hard for him to grasp and individually pick one out. Though he felt it foolish to believe any hope; old flame or not, Maelstrom was known for never hesitating to throw one under the bus, and Roundabout came to the conclusion that his lackluster presence among the faculty begged for no less.
Sandiego, Sandiego, Sandiego.
In the week following, the Faculty's tight grip on his collar did not waver any less, but he had much bigger problems on his plate: there was still the matter of catching the red woman whom he’d barely even heard of, but had her name seared in his mind like he’d spoken it every minute of his life. There was still the matter of finding a permanent relocation site, but VILE was doing significantly okay on their temporary aircraft carrier. Roundabout could multitask. Totally.
Yet their wavering presence in the next few days did
not leave, it was constant, constant, a voicemail that he could never rid from his phone. One excuse or another, it did not diminish the fact that it made a Roundabout feel like such a goddamn toddler, like he couldn’t open a web browser without aid—but in the Faculty’s view, “aid” was simply a cocktail of nitpicking, muddled with snarky remarks—and Roundabout wondered if their ultimate goal was to hinder him, but he laughed at the thought, as it would only hurt them. He wasn’t their first option. He understood that. But they were going to have to find a way to swallow it without grimacing.
Roundabout’s fingers rushed like a madman over his sleek keyboard, but he allowed himself to zone out. Something he’d acquired over the years was to be able to monotonously perform his work while being pensive in his headspace. Maelstrom was really the only member of the Faculty that was not as overbearing as the others, though he didn’t seem to be putting a stop to anything.
Roundabout paused in the midst of typing coordinates on one monitor, then replying to an email on another to get a break from the stifling office air. Reaching for his cane, he gritted his teeth intensely as he felt an electrical spike of pain shoot down from his back down to his knee, steadying the weak side with a shaky arm. The distance from his desk to the nearby balcony seemed to grow with each passing day.
He threw the balcony door open and took in a large inhale of the crisp atmosphere outside, sensing with a whiff of the telltale smell of wet asphalt that it had rained. From the look of the rolling clouds that completely carpeted the entire sky, it wasn’t planning on ending just yet.
His eyes grazed over the River Thames in front, watching as a barge moved at an incredibly slow speed over the water—the water itself was not the ultramarine it sometimes was on a sunny day, rather it was reflectant of the sky (and perhaps Roundabout’s inner turmoil), a dark green and murky color.
Later that night, back in his all-too cold and humble manor, Roundabout resided by the fireplace in his room as he desperately tried to warm himself up. Regardless of just how hot his sleeve was from the fire, his bones still felt as cold as river rocks. He drew his coat tighter around himself and buried his face in his icy hands, feeling his once flush and heated cheeks’ temperature lower vastly from his touch.
All Roundabout knew when his phone rang several minutes later was that his hands, so close to the licking flames under, were almost burning up, but there wasn’t a time where he could care less.
He picked up the phone and saw the contact name that made his stomach feel so ghastly sick and empty, dragging a hand down his face as he debated on whether to answer—but he pressed the ‘accept’ button regardless, sudden fury tasting like spice in his mouth directed towards the recipient.
Now to him, it would be unrestrained, not tamed, like he’d done with Cleo.
“Gunnar.” Roundabout spoke into his phone, voice tight but riddled with forced cheer, just enough to send a message. “Certainly, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?”
“Nigel. A good evening to you,” the droning voice replied almost instantaneously, not much detectable in his tone save for the regular boredom. Roundabout removed his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose, knowing what was coming and absolutely fed up with it.
“I simply wante-“
“To check in on me.” Roundabout bit before Maelstrom had the chance to finish his all-too-predictable sentence. Any composure he wanted to keep up was slowly chipping away in noticeable flakes of vexation. “I know. I know. Gunnar, that’s all anyone’s been doing, as if I was some incompetent juvenile delinquent that couldn’t be trusted to weld a pen without murdering someone.”
A heavy sigh from the other side. “...I’d hoped you wouldn’t have taken it as personal as you are right now, I-“
“Oh, ho, surprise—“ Roundabout groped around his nightstand to find the bottle of melatonin he’d since taken religiously every night. Not even a single ounce of denial. “—so you were behind all this?” He held his phone with his shoulder as he opened the tamper-proof cap with both hands a little too aggressively. “Goodness, Gunnar,” he sighed sarcastically, “it really colors me a bright shade of surprise to learn you, of all people! was the one sending them to me like coveted pawns in a game of chess.”
Roundabout wasn’t sure how many pills he’d popped in his mouth. Lost in the moment, he felt like he’d swallowed around 3 or 4 with a swish of lukewarm water. The silence stretched and stretched.
He always considered Gunnar to be a man where butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth, or at least not based on his experiences; never hearing him excessively furious, but the way Roundabout responded made him think that tonight would be no different—he’d get the same exact icy treatment that always existed between them, with intent or not.
“Nigel.” Maelstrom repeated at the other end with a terser voice, and that same collected coolness towards Roumdabout’s bellicose connotations had the Brit clenching his jaw irritably. Get to the point.
“It isn’t up to me whether to decide if you want to listen to what I have to say, but before you cut the call off, listen to my words: it was not my intention to have you feel futile or infantile—“
“Good, god, you sound like a robot.” Roundabout half muttered under his breath. “Gunnar, I’m frankly getting ill with your lack of understandable communication, so pray tell, what was your objective? If it was not to make me feel like a scrutinized lab rat, then what was it?”
“I merely desired to make sure you were adjusting yourself to life among us. It really isn’t hard to understand, now, is it?” Maelstrom eventually murmured. “Of course I’d have a valid reason to make sure you weren’t struggling with anything, eller hur? Unless you had a reason to not desire constant communication between ourselves, and in that case, well, isn’t it dismal? You’ll have to get used to it, dearest Roundabout.”
Roundabout knew that the melatonin was starting to take effect because his eyebrows suddenly raised with not much vigor, after starting to be fondled by the fingers of sweet sleep. There was the term of endearment he only used and heard once or twice, as a luxury. He could literally hear Maelstrom sneering. Roundabout absolutely despised the way his face heated up ever so slightly again, pressing a still-cold hand to his skin in an attempt to regulate it. From the odd vibe Maelstrom carried during their first phone call, he should have sensed this coming.
Maelstrom was trying to turn the tables, make Roundabout seem like he’d straight up lost his mind, but the latter knew how his little games worked and had no intention of playing them.
“Gunnar, tell me this—“ Roundabout leaned back on the bed, the wafting scent of bergamot oil rising to his nose, one he’d since been spritzing regularly on his pillow to aid his sleep. —“you really don’t expect me to buy that shit excuse, do you?
He could hear Maelstrom begin to say a letter before cutting himself off, perhaps searching his tongue for a reply. Roundabout prided himself of making Gunnar choke on his own mind games, even if it was only for a short while.
“There really is no excuse, Roundabout, so if you'd really like to retain your place, I’d suggest you cut your unsolicited insubordination.” Maelstrom tells him in a low and baritone voice, a hint of false warning around the corner.
It didn’t faze Roundabout. “Why didn’t you call me yourself?” He pressed further, his eyes trained on the fireplace ahead of him as he knew, he really knew that he was playing with fire. The barely-suppressed belligerence in Roundabout’s voice had begun to slowly quell (he could pretty much hear the hissing of water being thrown on an inferno).
Roundabout’s own breath was the only thing he could hear before Maelstrom spoke, the austerity of his mood tangible even over the phone.
“You should understand why.” It’s a simple sentence, but it suddenly clicks in place. It hit Roundabout hard and suddenly, like he’d swallowed drops of opium poppy milk, covering his mouth with a finger and letting his legs dangle over the edge of the plush bed. Every bone and muscle in his body feels slow and worn out; his eyelids are threatening to close, heavy beyond belief.
He’s brought back to that evening before his initiation, before his acceptance, where the foolish prospect of rekindling his old flame with Maelstrom seemed just a little hopeful when Roundabout was subject to the other man’s clandestine wandering hands. It really made sense when he thought about it for a while, both of them without words for the time being, Roundabout keeping his phone in a white-knuckle grip.
He doesn’t know that his eyes had been closed until he opens them laboriously. Maelstrom had been attempting to skirt around him, avoid the elephant in the room, understandable—but the fact that no words had been exchanged between the two of them concerning the topic had ire brewing below the surface of his fatigue.
“And not once did you think of conversing about it between us like civil, grown adults?”
Roundabout heard a scoff from the other end. He observed the large clock at the other end of his wall, reading 9 P.M. It felt like past midnight to home.
“You as well as I know that’s easier said than done.” Maelstrom clicked his tongue. “Nigel, be honest with yourself—you’re a brick wall. We wouldn’t have been able to get anywhere if, per your idea, ‘conversed civilly.’”
Maelstrom didn’t even have a snark or anything to his voice: it was like a flatline. Roundabout sets his jaw but he knows it’s true. He was devoted to work ethics, and that meeting back at VILE Island was just a taste of something he could never have again.
He was too closed off, unsuited for a relationship in any way, shape or form. There was no changing that aspect of himself. He needed to make up his mind about Maelstrom: be certain, or flip flop around and close off like he always did.
Roundabout wanted to ask if it was him that frayed their relationship at the beginning, but the answer was beyond obvious. There was no point in asking.
The question dried up on his tongue. Artificial tranquility completely engrossed his body, and he laid back down on the bed. The melatonin was a disgusting alternative to the white codeine tablets he used formerly for sleep, but it mimicked the effects without impending danger of death, so it helped.
“You know, now that we’re both required to be in constant communication, you won’t have a choice. You can’t keep avoiding anything between us.” Maybe it’s the haze, but despite everything, Roundabout can’t help the weak laugh that leaves his lips unwillingly.
He hears Maelstrom let out a stifled and involuntary laugh along with him, oddly genuine, and it’s something Roundabout didn’t know he missed. Work may have been his principal tenet, but it never stopped him from reminiscing about the past. It never did any good, but it was a drop of honey that he savored.
There was a stupid thrill he received from playing Maelstrom’s games. It rings in the back of his head that he can’t envision himself halting from participating in those matches. Roundabout doesn’t get to hear what Maelstrom has to say next, but the silence says it for him. He doesn’t even bother to hang up before he falls asleep for good, a lighter form of drunk among the field of purple and red poppies.