Work Text:
The phone on the dispatch console buzzed. Then it buzzed again. And again. A rapid, insistent staccato that cut through the low hum of the SDN’s Torrance branch comms traffic.
Robert Robertson didn’t look up from his main monitor, his fingers a steady blur over the tactical map. “Golem, you’re clear to move east on Sepulveda. Civilians are reporting the tremor source is near the car wash. Don’t… step on the car wash.”
A heavy, rumbling “Understood” came through his headset.
The phone buzzed. Five times in succession now. Robert’s eyes flicked to the device, a small, private smile touching his lips before he dragged his focus back. “Punch Up, status on that overturned food truck? We need that street clear for emergency vehicles.”
“I’m tryin’! The falafels are everywhere, Rob! It’s a grease trap of justice!”
Buzz. Buzz-buzz-buzz.
Robert finally snatched the phone, thumbing it open with one hand while the other adjusted a comm frequency. The screen was a cascading wall of text from a contact saved as ‘Problem Child (Pyro).’
>ok so u know how i said the warehouse was ‘probably’ clear
>it was not clear
>there was a whole guy in here with a shrink ray?? who even has those anymore
>prism is currently trying to talk him down but like. the guy is 3 inches tall and screaming about the bourgeoisie. its kinda funny
>also the shrink ray got stepped on. by me. it was an accident.
>dont tell blond blazer
>WAIT he’s trying to climb my boot this is so weird
>he has a tiny little picket sign omg
Robert let out a soft puff of air, not quite a laugh, and typed back with one thumb. >Do not let the tiny political activist into your boot. Containment protocol 7-B. The small ones are always the most venomous.
The response was immediate.
>TOO LATE HE’S IN MY PANTS
>FIGURATIVELY. NOT LITERALLY. GET YOUR MIND OUT OF THE GUTTER ROBERT
>oh prism got him with a light box. crisis averted. she’s calling him a ‘micro-menace’ and putting him in a tupperware.
>anyway mission success i guess? warehouse secure. no more shrink ray.
>im bored now. hows your day. tell me everything. what color socks are you wearing.
This was how it went, most shifts. The official Z-Team channel in his ear was a stream of tactical updates, positional checks, and the occasional existential crisis from Malevola. But this… this private, buzzing lifeline was something else entirely. It was Nasir—Flambae, to the world—unspooling his chaotic reality directly into Robert’s palm.
Robert leaned back in his creaky chair, the chaos of the dispatch room fading to a background murmur. He could picture it all too clearly: the dust motes in the warehouse air, Prism’s exasperated but fond sigh, the way Nasir would be pacing, phone held aloft like a talisman, his free hand gesturing wildly even though no one could see it. The texts were pure, uncut Nasir. No filter, no pause, just a constant, vibrant stream of consciousness.
He typed slowly, his dry tone translating poorly to text, but he knew Nasir would read it in his voice anyway. >Socks are grey. The boring kind. My day is currently 32% logistics, 45% preventing Punch Up from eating evidence, and 23% wondering why I ever left my mech. Beef threw up on my slipper this morning. It was a whole thing.
>POOR BEEF. was it the fancy organic kibble again? i told u that stuff is too rich for his delicate constitution
>he’s a chihuahua not a french diplomat nasir
>SAME ENERGY. so what’s for dinner. i’m thinking of attempting that kimchi stew thing u talked about. the one with the pork belly.
>You will burn down my kitchen.
>I HAVE EXCELLENT FIRE CONTROL. now. mostly. what’s the first step.
And so it went. For the next forty minutes, between directing Sonar to a possible burglary in progress and calming Invisigal down after she’d accidentally phased into a vending machine, Robert patiently read every text. He answered questions about stew recipes, debated the merits of different brands of gochujang, and offered a solemn, >My condolences, when Nasir texted a picture of a scorched pot with the caption >RIP. we hardly knew ye.
He didn’t just read the words. He read the energy humming between the lines. The excited, all-caps tangent about a cool graffiti mural they’d passed on the way back to HQ (>IT WAS A PHOENIX BUT LIKE. ANGRY. IT FELT PERSONAL). The sudden, quieter follow-up: >reminds me of the stuff back home. different style but. same heart, u know?
Robert knew. He didn’t know the streets of Herat, but he knew the feeling of seeing a piece of art that felt like a punch to the chest. He typed back, >Send me a pic when you’re clear. I want to see the angry phoenix.
The shift was winding down. The Z-Team was trickling back, their voices becoming real in the hallway instead of just in his ear. Robert’s console showed all statuses green. He should be logging off, shutting down systems.
His phone buzzed one last time.
>hey. almost back. u still there?
>Always.
>good. saved u the last energy bar from my pack. its the nasty lemon one u pretend to hate. see u in 5.
Robert placed the phone face down on the console, the ghost of that private smile returning. The official reports would say Flambae had successfully neutralized a low-level tech threat with minimal collateral. Robert’s report, the one that existed only in the quiet space behind his ribs, was far more detailed. It was a story of a tiny activist, a ruined pot, an angry phoenix on a wall, and the relentless, comforting, utterly distracting yap of a man who, for some reason, wanted to share every single spark of his day with the most boring man in Torrance.
He saved his work files, listening for the specific cadence of boots in the hallway—confident, a little heavy, with a faint scuff that meant their owner was probably texting again instead of watching where he was going.