Archive of Our Own ^beta

Lacie didn’t stay in the safe house for long after her argument with her brother. For one, it would feel like admitting that he was right, on some level, to risk his own life to preserve hers upon learning that the world would continue on the same whether she lived or died. For two, she did not want to risk betraying Glen’s secret to Levi, who would be headed here the moment he caught wind of the fact that Glen owned a secret safehouse that was technically listed as an AirBNB—and catch wind of it he would, she was certain. Kevin Legnard’s continued survival would come out soon enough, and the fact that one Child of Ill Omen had survived would pique Levi’s interest, and then…

Glen could get out of Legnard’s survival by the sheer fact that he had spared him simply to use as an assassin. The fact that Lacie had been spared out of nothing but sentiment and a backlash against the lies of a system as old as the universe itself, though, would damn him and damn him, and Lacie would die a thousand deaths and endure many worse fates even than that to ensure that her brother lived safely as the leader of the Baskervilles for as long as was physically possible.

So she ordered a pair of mirrored sunglasses and a few outfits that really were not her style off of a variety of websites, and when those had arrived, she took her favorite knife from the kitchen and used them to hack off all of her hair, which she promptly took to the woods to burn. Afterwards, looking at herself in the mirror, she thought that she had made a mistake: she resembled now nothing so much as a smaller version of her brother with blood-red eyes, a version of him, perhaps, who had never been found by the Baskervilles, who had clawed his way to adulthood arm in arm with a Lacie that did not, could not exist. That version of him would be Oswald, not Glen; that version of him would not have gone behind Lacie’s back to save her life, because he would never have been a danger to it in the first place. That version of Oswald would be with his sister, and fuck any other obligations, because all they had was each other; that version of Oswald’s life was nowhere near as stable and secure as Glen’s was, but that version of Oswald still had his sister by his side, while Glen had pissed Lacie off so much that she doubted she could stand to be in the same room as him long enough for him to apologize for sparing her.

Lacie stared at the Oswald in the mirror for a moment longer, and then she turned away and undressed herself, stepped into the shower to wash the bits of cut hair and the scent of smoke away, and then got out, wrapped herself in a towel, and brought her new clothes into the bathroom. She locked eyes with the Oswald in the mirror and then dressed him carefully, averting her eyes from the parts of herself that were not identical to her brother. This Oswald was scrappy, paranoid, protective—protective like her Oswald was, yes, but not protective to the point of putting himself in danger for Lacie’s sake. That had never been a challenge this Oswald had had to meet.

Lacie left the bathroom with the steam from her shower, repacking the clothes that she had chosen to keep for the Oswald in the mirror and leaving the rest to Glen’s AirBNB before heading down into the basement. He had stocked it with weapons for her—or perhaps Legnard had stocked it with weapons for himself—and Lacie selected the ones that she thought looked the most portable and easiest to smuggle around with her and got to work concealing them in her backpack and on her person. Mundane weapons, after all, were far less likely to draw Baskerville attention than Chain usage was, and less attention drawn to Lacie meant that Glen was safer. Then she packed up all the food she could carry, glanced at her reflection in the window and met the other Oswald’s gaze as calmly as she’d ever done anything in her life, and finally pushed on her new sunglasses and walked out the door. She didn’t bother to lock it behind her—Glen would have, but Glen would also have left the place spotlessly clean, and if she’d tried to imitate that and failed, Levi’s suspicions would be raised. This way, if he got to the cabin first, he would suspect either Legnard or a squatter, and not a surviving Lacie.

So she left, as simply as that, without any message to her brother or really any plan about where she was going or what she was doing. It was easy enough to make money—Levi had demonstrated to her years ago just how many STDs a Baskerville could kick to the curb, and how quickly—and in between selling sex works and acting as temporary criminal enforcement, Lacie made enough cash to cover her lifestyle and then some. She never stayed in one city for longer than a month, and did her best to slip between countries whenever possible. She kept track of Levi mostly over Grindr, though she made sure to track his presence over various other dating apps as well; she even catfished him a few times just for the fun of it and let him do his very best to catfish her back. She even engaged with accounts that she could tell were his, just to fuck with him further; this paid off in the worst way possible five years after Glen’s ascension, when one of her catfish accounts received a DM from one of his catfish accounts.

ashleigh.vriska
hewwo :3 this is Omen, correct?
the person who has been catfishing me for the past few years on various accounts

unluckycharms
It’s possible. Why?

ashleigh.vriska
do u know my real name

unluckycharms
What makes you think I care that much

ashleigh.vriska
we have matched multiple times on every dating app and porn site I’m on and some of those have my full legal name attached

unluckycharms
Which is an insane move from the former head of the Baskervilles, but I can’t say I didn’t expect it from you.
Do you know my real name?

ashleigh.vriska
just ur onlyfans pseudonym lol. if I had known it I would have used it earlier
unless it really is Alexander, Joshua, or Ulysses?

unluckycharms
Nope.
Unlike you I don’t share my personal info where any freak can find it
Levi Baskerville.

ashleigh.vriska
ppl making callout posts about me make life that much more interesting, what else can I say?
anyway just wanted to lyk that I am deleting my socials (including all dating apps, pornsite accounts, etc) for the next Who Knows because my successor, Glen Baskerville, seems to have fucked off to Pandora to get his dick wet, and now the Baskervilles have been nearly entirely disbanded

unluckycharms
Bull fucking shit he did

ashleigh.vriska
last known location: shutter island, owned by one Jack Vessalius of Pandora. there were rumors that his deceased sister was seen there
which is impossible, and he knew that. as she is dead, and there was no possibility of her surviving.
so unfortunately I need to leave our catfish game and do some damage control

unluckycharms
How long ago did he go missing???

ashleigh.vriska
almost a year ago. which is almost enough to make me regret getting my news through pornhub exclusively
do u have the same problem?

unluckycharms
No, I’m just on the run.
Has Jack said anything re: Glen’s disappearance?

ashleigh.vriska
smear campaign against the Baskervilles
which i did know about. but ignored.
he had a thing for Glen’s dead sister. she did not reciprocate.

unluckycharms
lol and also lmao

ashleigh.vriska
probably

unluckycharms
She definitely didn’t reciprocate that was all on him
She was neither his lover nor his mother, her death should not have been any of his business
He was fun, and so was his attachment to her, but it didn’t mean anything.

ashleigh.vriska
hang on
that phrasing

unluckycharms
He says, with a Homestuck username

ashleigh.vriska
how the fuck are you alive

unluckycharms
I don’t know what you’re talking about
What do you think Jack’s game here is?

ashleigh.vriska
Lacie Levi Oswald Baskerville.

unluckycharms
Excuse me, wtf do you think my name is????
How long have we known each other
My middle name is fucking Claudia asshole

ashleigh.vriska
that is a bold faced fucking lie

unluckycharms
So is claiming that my name is Lacie Levi Oswald Baskerville, but here we are

ashleigh.vriska
is it??? because somehow. you are reminding me a lot of Lacie right now.

unluckycharms
He swings aaaaaand he misses. Might want to go to grief counseling for that one.
I’m just a hobby catfish with too much time on my hands lmao
Though on that subject, I would be willing to help you investigate what rlly happened to Glen Baskerville
I have seen him in action, and I seriously doubt he’s the type to abandon his duty just for a hot piece of serial killer ass. And even if he was, Miranda Barma is both far hotter and far more into him than Jack Vessalius could ever dream of

ashleigh.vriska
an opinion you share with the late Lacie Baskerville.

unluckycharms
Sounds like a woman with good taste.
Do you want my help looking into Glen or no

ashleigh.vriska
sure what the hell nothing matters anyway
we should meet up face to face

unluckycharms
In your wettest dreams, maybe
Keep me updated on your side of things.

ashleigh.vriska
👍

Lacie slowly lowered the cell phone she’d been using lately and swore, long and low and foul. A few heads popped up in her direction in the internet cafe she was sitting in, but she ignored them, her grip tightening on the phone in her hands until its screen lit up with another message notification.

ashleigh.vriska
if you are Lacie, you can tell me
I’d be glad that you were alive.

unluckycharms
Get a therapist and say that to them, why don’t you? It’s not any of my business.
How did Lacie die, by the way, and did you have any involvement in trying to save or end her? Just curious

That message was read, but not responded to; Lacie bared her teeth in a furious grin and stood up from the table so quickly her chair nearly fell over. She had been away too long; something terrible had happened to her brother, something that she had not been able to prevent because she had chosen to run away instead, sure that his position would protect him just as well as she had.

Well, no more. She would go home; she would find Glen and drag him to safety herself, and she would use Levi’s information but she would not see Levi while she did so. Her brother had not wanted him to know anything of her survival, and so he would not, even if she’d come close to fucking it up already. Worst come to worst, she could ghost Levi and go it alone; if there was an unwanted reunion after that, she would cut her losses, offer up her own head on a silver platter just as long as they found and saved Glen first. Because Glen would never abandon his duty—never!—and especially not to fuck Jack Vessalius. For one, it wouldn’t be necessary. Jack would fuck anybody (or fuck anybody over) in exchange for as little as one of Lacie’s used tissues; if Glen wanted to bang him, all he needed to do was trade away things that Lacie had owned that he had no use for anymore. For two—

Glen’s duty was his life. He had already compromised it once in saving Lacie; that was why she was so furious with him. He would never in a million years compromise it a second time, and especially not for so frivolous a thing as banging Jack Vessalius. Lacie would find the truth of what happened—drag it out kicking and screaming and bleeding all over the ground, if need be—and then she would find her brother and save him, no matter how long it took.

He would have done the same for her, after all.