Chapter Text
Chapter 1 Reports For Duty
“And then Silver lifted them both with his uh, mind lifty powers, hah, he had no idea what hit him, then…” Tangle went on bouncing around the tent animating every action she describes despite the limited space. Whisper is crammed awkwardly in a seat between the filing cabinet and coffee machine. She occasionally nodded at something Tangle said but it was clear her mind was elsewhere.
Lanolin was too busy to watch the display but she was listening, it was hard not to with Tangle’s volume. She was too busy for most things these days. The only semblance of free time she has is making coffee. She knew when she decided to head this project that she would be busy, but that wouldn’t stop her, it couldn’t, she had too much to make up for.
“Lanolin.” An overworked yet sweet voice pulls her away from the work orders and schedules in front of her. Jewel was trying to get her attention.
“Yes director?” Lanolin looks up from the papers, putting on her smile. She’s gotten good at her smile again. She hadn’t needed it with... No Lanolin, keep smiling, people need a smile to feel safe.
“I’ve told you to just call me Jewel,” she chuckles, “I haven’t been the director of anything for a month.”
“Right, sorry. What do you need?” Lanolin puts her pen down and turns to face everyone in the room. This action disturbs Maggie. The wisp was resting in one of Lanolin’s wool poofs. She leaves her spot in search of suitable replacement. Failing to find one she settles for the edge of the desk.
“I just wanted to make sure you heard what Tangle was saying.” Jewel had a look, her head was turned sideways about 45 degrees with an inviting smile. Lanolin could see she was looking for something from her. She couldn’t pinpoint what exactly but she needs to answer.
“Tangle, Whisper, and Silver tracked Mimic to Rainbow Ravine, they engaged the target and in the end he chose to end his life by detonating his flight core rather than be captured. From how Tangle has described it I think they worked well together with minimal error.” Lanolin thinks it’s an accurate summary of what she has heard so far, though there is this strange feeling in her stomach… too much coffee, it’s happened before, she’ll take it easy the rest of the day.
“Uh right, good summary Lanolin,” Jewel asks with her eyes showing confusion.
Tangle looks at Lanolin for really the first time since she got here, her face shows a mix of emotions like annoyance, anger, hurt and a million other possibilities but mainly confusion, like her brain is holding something completely new for her. It’s ok Lanolin knows she deserves whatever Tangle is feeling. Her head dips back into the paperwork not before seeing the disappointed look on Jewel's face.
“You said something wrong. Next time be better,” Lanolin thought to herself as she filled out the work orders for the construction crews. That feeling in her stomach is still there. She really needs some sleep.
We need to fix the power grid, the generators are working for now but they aren’t Mimic
She stares at the page for a long moment before crossing out the mistake.
We need to fix the power grid, the generators are working for now but they aren’t Mimic can only do so much and the civilians are complaining that he’s dead
She hammers the side of her fist into her forehead a few times, harder than necessary.
“Are you okay?” Jewel is looking at her with concern, “that looked like it hurt.”
“I’m fine, just made a mistake.” Tangle and Whisper must have left at some point. They mentioned taking a vacation together to Spiral Hill. Good for them, they deserve it.
“Well that’s okay we all make mistakes.” Jewel crosses her arms in an action similar to hugging herself “Believe me I know,” She takes a deliberate breath in and out “Literally beating yourself up won’t help.” She has that look again, like she is trying to ask Lanolin for something without saying it.
“Do you need something?” Lanolin pulls her mouth into the most reassuring smile she can manage.
Jewel sighs “Right I should just be direct,” she steels herself for a moment “How are you feeling about Mimic? I know you and Duo were friends and I just-”
“Duo wasn’t real, he was a lie created by a monster. The world is a safer place with him gone and any friendship that we could have had doesn’t matter.” The words come out sharp, sharper than Jewel ever deserved.
Jewel sinks into her chair a little “Of course, just making sure.” It’s clear Lanolin hurt her.
“Well, thank you for checking, I’ll get back to work now.” Lanolin tries her best to spare some of the beetles’ emotions.
Dwelling on him was pointless, he didn’t matter, just one of her many mistakes she will make up for. Her stomach twists again… she’ll get an antacid from the medic tent later.
After the fiasco with Silver and Duo It was decided that a break would be good for the Diamond Cutters. Duo has been helping Jewel with administrative duties, Tangle and Whisper have just come back from an adventure, and Lanolin has been right back to paperwork.
Right now she is working her way through a new round of missing persons reports. The system was set up post the Metal Virus to find the people who were displaced but the director decided to keep it around for general reporting. The table in the Diamond Cutter meeting room was covered in papers and a few open books about teambuilding and leadership. She has been reading them during the little free time she has.
“Knock Knock” She looks up to see a purple cat standing in the doorway holding two cups of Lanolin’s life blood, coffee. “Hi, I would have actually knocked but uh,” He raises the two cups to show that his hands were full before giving one to her.
“It’s fine, I can’t be mad at someone who gives me coffee.” She takes a sip, then grimaces, black coffee, her nemesis.
“Oh right, I didn’t know how you took it.” He reaches behind his scarf pulling out a handful of sugar packets and cream pods. “Um here I grabbed as much as I could before I started getting weird looks. I uh, hope it's enough,” He says, rubbing the back of his neck.
“It’s more than enough, and for the future I take 3 cream and 2 sugar.” Lanolin takes another sip after stirring the drink, ah that’s better. “Anyway, what can I do for you?”
“Oh nothing really, I was just on break and I wanted to say hi. So um hi how’s it going,” he says, giving an enthusiastic wave.
“It’s going well, just making my way through these reports. How has your time with the director been?”
“Oh it’s been amazing. Miss Jewel is so nice and hard working. I’m learning so much from her.”
“I see you are out of your sling, how’s the arm”
“Oh I’m fine, no pain no gain as they say. Don’t worry, I’ve always healed fast.” He flexes his arm trying and failing to hide his wincing.
“Still you should probably take it easy for a little bit longer. I assume after everything that happened with Whisper and Silver you won’t be wanting to join the Diamond Cutters anymore. I completely understand and I hope you enjoy your time working with the director, she really is an amazing person.”
“What? I still want to join the team. It’s what I came here to do. That whole thing was all just a big misunderstanding. Tangle and Whisper explained everything to me yesterday and I completely understand. That Mimic guy sounds like bad news and if I thought he was around I wouldn’t hesitate to try and stop him either.”
“Really, you’re just fine?” Lanolin couldn't believe what she was hearing. How could he ever want to interact with any of them again after being attacked like that? He should be furious. She was too embarrassed to show her face for a week after.
“Yeah, Why wouldn’t I be? Whisper apologized and I can’t really blame her for having a trauma response. Dwelling on this stuff doesn’t help anyone. All I can do is be understanding and keep doing my best,” he says doing what can only be described as a hero pose, arms on his hips and everything.
“Well ok then glad to have you Duo, and that worldview will get you far here.” She notices he is twisting his hands together after coming out of the pose. “Is something wrong?”
“Hm, it’s just… I guess I feel bad about Silver. He didn't seem like a horrible guy and really it’s my fault. I should have done better helping him during that fish attack. Maybe he would have trusted me more.” He’s still twisting his hand together. Some sort of nervous habit, she’ll have to watch for that.
“Duo, it’s not your fault,” she says standing and putting a hand on his shoulder.
“ Why did you even pick me over him?” He ignores what she said or at least doesn’t respond to it, “You saw what he could do even with the little mistake he made. I’m nothing compared to him.” Lanolin tilts her head at him, genuinely confused.
“I didn’t ‘pick’ either of you. It was a team vote. Whisper and Tangle had an equal say in the outcome and even then it’s not about power or skill, it's about how we act as a team.”
“What do you mean?” Duo looks up from his hands slightly.
“Silver and Whisper attacked you in the middle of a public area. If they had a problem with you they could have called a meeting and we could have all talked it out in private. What they did made us look unprofessional in front of the entire Restoration. The Diamond Cutters need to present as a unified group for the public to trust us. We need people to feel safe around us or else all of this is pointless.”
She gives him a pat on the shoulder. “Don’t doubt yourself Duo. You are good enough.” It was the best advice she could give him. It was what she would have wanted to hear when she joined. It's what she's wanted to hear for her entire life really.
Duo stares at her for a moment with actual stars in his eyes like she was Gaia’s gift to earth. “You really mean that?”
“Of course, now I need to get back to work so if you need anything else?”
He looks past her at the paper-covered table, then he moves around her sitting at one of the chairs grabbing about half of the unfinished reports.
“What are you doing? Don’t you have work to be doing for Jewel?” She sits back down.
“Like I said I’m on my break so it’s fine. I can help out here for a bit.”
“You really want to use your free time filling out reports?”
“Well no, I want to spend my free time helping you. You made me feel better so I want to return the favor.” He looks at her expression and then raises his hands waving them side to side and stammers out, “Uh i-if thats ok of course, I don’t want to impose. I know you probably have your own system and I would probably just mess that up so maybe I’ll just go before-” He goes to stand up.
She laughs, an actual laugh, she hasn’t done that in a while. “It’s fine, I would appreciate the help. If you actually start getting in the way, believe me I will tell you. Now, I assume the director has taught you how to fill these out.”
“Oh uh, yes ma’am I know. Like I said, I’m a quick learner.” He settles back into the chair.
“Good, now get to work. It’s important that these are finished quickly.”
“Right of course ma’am, and um thank you again for believing in me and uh being my friend.” He dips his head down into the paper trying to hide himself.
“Right anytime Duo.” She looks back down at her work. Friend, that’s new.
We need to fix the power grid, the generators are working for now but they aren’t Mimic can only do so much and the civilians are complaining that he’s dead they are missing some commodities. I know you could say they should be happy to have a place to sleep but I can’t accept that, they need to feel safe they need some semblance of comfort because he betrayed me
She angrily crumbles the sheet before throwing it into her trash bin grabbing another from one of her drawers. She goes to start filling it out but stops just before her pen touches paper. She stares at it for a few seconds before placing it back into the mug she keeps on her desk for storage. An old gift from Tangle that reads ‘Ewe are amazing’ Tangle was so proud of it, Lanolin just said thanks and moved on.
She searches the mug for a pencil, if she is going to continue making stupid mistakes she might as well save space. Looking over every writing implement in the mug she only finds more pens even after turning the entire mug out. Her eyes raise looking over at Jewel who is working on material acquisition forms. She has a mug too and it has some pencils, another gift from Tangle that has a strange picture with the words ‘Gem Alarm’ under it Lanolin doesn’t get it but Tangle laughed about it for a long while.
“Excuse me direc-um Jewel.” Lanolin raises a hand towards her to get her attention.
“Yes, Lanolin, what do you need?” She sounds like she was waiting for this.
“Can I… borrow a pencil?” Lanolin asks one of her hands playing with her back wool poofs
“Oh, um sure here you can just have this one. I’ve got so many. It’s scented, smells like bubblegum.” Jewel seems a bit disappointed, but she hands over a hot pink pencil that has some text on it emulating chewing gum packaging.
“Thank you, sorry to take it.”
“It’s fine, really don’t mention it, and Lanolin you know you can talk to me about anything you want right? We are partners in this so I’m here for you no matter what.”
“Mhm” Lanolin was already back to work on the work orders.
“Right.” Jewel’s antennae droop a bit, she shakes herself out of it and gets back into work mode. “Remember we have those volunteer forces coming in a few days. Are you still up for giving them the tour with me?”
“Yes.” Lanolin doesn’t even look up from her writing. Jewel doesn’t bother saying anything else and goes back to her forms.
Restoring the power grid is our top priority. Please finish it as soon as possible.
There, nice and to the point. She was putting too much emotion into it. No one cares how she feels about this… they shouldn’t care.