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Alex Reagan is fairly certain that this just happens to be the smallest elevator in existence. She’s been a lot of places in the world, but the one at the Usher Foundation that leads to the archive is the smallest modern one for sure. It’s barely big enough for three people honestly and that normally doesn’t bother her in the slightest. While Alex has a fair amount of fear for the things that she’d discovered over the last few months (the hunt for example is the one that sticks out the most considering it’s why she’s here) but the Buried wasn’t one of them. Alex was the sort of person who turned her bed into swaddling nests and burrowed into them. Honestly that buried blanket nest is where she felt the safest.

No. The elevator itself wasn’t the issue here. Alex Reagan has ridden it more than a few times since she’d started working in the archives a month or so ago. While she would rather be out there being a reporter, Alex had blown out all of the credibility that she’d ever had when she’d told people that the things that went bump in the night were real. In the end Tannis Braun was right about how her skills would be valuable here investigating the validity of the statements. In some ways it was almost freeing—when she was working for Usher, Alex didn’t need to worry about pesky things like journalism ethics. Instead she could lie and make someone believe whatever they wanted in order to get their story from them.

In a way it was all kind of freeing.

So if it wasn’t the elevator itself, and it wasn’t the confined space that bothered her what didn’t bother her exactly was the man who she was currently sharing the elevator with. His size in it, with the foot of height that he had on her, the more bulk that he’d had on his frame (not that Alex was calling him fat by any means) instead it was just the way that he loomed over her and seemed far larger in the space than he actually was. And the fact that he was attractive and god was he attractive. Alex has said hello when she’d gotten into the elevator with him, and saw that he’d already pushed the floor for the sub basement level archives.

But the problem was that somewhere between the archives and the first floor, the elevator had just decided to stop. Not just stopping which would be bad enough, but stopping and losing all power. Normally the dark wouldn’t have been a thing, because Alex would have just pulled out her phone and turned on the flashlight app or call someone even if her phone didn’t have great service here. That was part of the reason it was still plugged in at her desk. Artifact storage was only three elevator stops away, and Alex was delivering some information she’d had on a statement. But now here they were in the small and dark with the extremely attractive man she doesn’t know.

This is fine. This is all fine.

But Alex just gives a grin that she knows that he wouldn’t be able to see in the pitch blackness so deep that it feels like she could hold it in her hands like dirt. “Well, I guess this is one way to avoid that meeting with my boss.” There isn’t fear in her, just the bad joking tone that Alex makes to lighten a situation. The meeting with Tannis was supposed to be in half an hour and she was supposed to be meeting someone important to the Foundation.

The fact that it could be the person in the elevator never even crosses Alex’s mind. After all, that man had been described to her as being ‘Old Man Strand’ and this man definitely wasn’t old in the slightest.

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Touch is so...strange. He hasn't been truly touched since Coralee and she...

His hand freezes and he withdraws it gently, "I do. You're an excellent...you are excellent." He nods, "at your job. I-I apologize. I..."

He doesn't blush. He does pause. The dust looks good on her but she might not like it.

Raising a hand to pick a few flakes out of your hair, "I'm sorry - there was a flake of...something."

Alex instantly draws her hands back and twists them together, braiding and unbraiding her fingers with a nervous sort of energy. Yes, she definitely misread that. So misread that. God, why is she so stupid sometimes? You'd think after everything with the Hunt Alex would learn to look before she leapt.

Apparently not.

He may not blush but Alex does, the white and dust stained skin of her face turning pink once more. Honestly, she feels like she'd just stopped blushing and yet here she is again, feeling more than a little like an idiot.

The color only deepens and Alex chews her lip when Dr. Strand pulls a flake of something out of her hair.

Bad joke time.

"I guess our friend in the peat moss just didn't want to let go."

"The ground is like that. Things just stay there, get stuck. It doesn't give things up easily. I would have been a geologist, I think - if I didn't have an urge to study the paranormal. My ex-wife used to say it was an obsession..."

A pause, "..Yes. That is something you should know about. I was married."

"Okay." It doesn't bother Alex at all, that he has an ex-wife, a lot of people do even if she herself doesn't. So, it's just simple and accepting even if she doesn't know why he felt the need to bring it up. It's not as if he's married right now.

It's not as if this is going anywhere, right? Like anywhere that would involve an ex-wife. As long as she is an ex-wife, but Alex doesn't think that Richard--Dr. Strand--would lie to her about this when he doesn't even need to tell her about it at all.

"You could have always combined them, you know. Become like a paranormal geologist. Then you would have a good excuse to be down in the archives buried in dirt up to your elbows with me."

Buried up to your elbows with me. He hates how excited that thought makes him, "There are actually a number of fascinating stones and metals involved in paranormal and supernatural occurrances."

He smiles.

"Yeah? I mean I'd heard about iron holding onto things before, when I was still doing work for PNWS. I'd been doing a story on people who have alternate faiths and believe in things like magic." There's a laugh that only has the smallest amount of bitterness in it because as good as Alex is, and as much as she doesn't mind being here (okay, she likes being here. At the very least Alex likes being here with Richard doing things like this) there's still that small kernel of how much more there was working below the world that people didn't know about.

It was a veil that when Alex had pulled it back came out to literally bite her. And now she was here, the illusion of all of those things being false somehow intact for people who aren't like her and hadn't seen and felt.

"And quartz too, I seem to remember. What other ones are there?" It's clear Alex is content to listen to him lecture on this, as she picks up her sandwich once more and takes a bite out of it as she's waiting.

He chews thoughtfully before setting down his sandwich, "Different cultures believed in different things as far as stones go. Diamonds were considered the tears of the gods, emeralds mean creativity - but my three favorites have to be opal, jade, and obsidian."

"At some point." He nodded to himself, "Remind me to show you the one artifact we for sure know belonged to a Buried avatar. It's a gorgeous bracelet that's studded with jade and obsidian and contains a huge opal. I'll have to dig for it but..."

Dig for it a word hear meaning take it off since he never did. Since his father passed it on to him, since Coralee gripped it in her moments of passion and claimed it burned her.

"Jade is obviously used in Feng Shui, but it brings about light and healing energy. It's an earth stone - which is why we sought to learn if it had any connection to the buried. It also unifies. People believe jade is used in Feng shui to unify energy. Now Obsidian is also believed to unify, but it's darker color and volcanic heritage has led people to believe it holds darker powers. It's used for protection in most pagan rituals."

"Now." He settles forward, "The strangest part of this jewelry is opal. There's a huge opal set in the center of it. Opal is believed to "enhance cosmic consciousness." he spreads his hands, "The stone is a deep purple, so dark it's almost black. It helps you ward off dark energies supposedly, but given the connotation we believe the bracelet is used to focus energy on human beings."

He smiles, "It sets an entirely new spin on the entity's energy. They aren't benevolent by a longshot but perhaps they provide protection of a sort. What we are doing here is incredibly cutting edge."

Alex had definitely meant to keep eating while he’d talked, but in the end she’d only managed to get in a few bites before she’d set the sandwich down in order to listen to him more fully. The inside of her palms itch with the need to hold a pen and paper, to turn on her recorder and have him give the lecture that he’s giving into it. Voices were Alex’s business for a long time, and Richard has an amazing one that’s as deep as they are in the archives around them. Alex just knows that he’d sound amazing telling this story on her show.

Well. The show that she’d used to have—Alex Reagan doesn’t have a show anymore, and she’s not a journalist any longer despite how much she knows that audiences would love him. Just another thing lost when the Hunt had gutted her.

That said, however, while you can take the reporter out of the profession, you can’t take the profession out of the reporter, and Alex just asks softly: “so people who knew about the properties of the stones needed to collect them from different cultures in order to put the bracelet together. How old is it?”

Edited 2020-09-28 05:28 (UTC)

"Thousands of years."

It is full of history and possibly his favorite thing in the world. The one object he would never part with it, and he has to wonder if it's because it's tied to the entity who powers him. Who has given him life for hundreds of years.

"Like I said, I'll have ot look for it."

“It’s okay. It can wait until you’ve gotten back I think. I mean. You definitely don’t need to do it right now.” Alex gives him a quick smile because she likes just sitting here and having dinner with him. She likes having his attention and just being close in here with him.

The saying that he wished she could have come to London with him still echoes into Alex brain still and she still can’t believe it. Especially when he’d held her hand like that.

Alex knows that she’s probably got it bad.

“You know. Something else to look forward too.” Other than his return.

One hand moves to her cheek and he leaves it there. It's such a strange motion because he feels sad about it. Like he can't fulfill what it means.

He wants to draw her close, to kiss her. He freezes.

His gaze is old. Eyes unnaturally bright blue as he meets hers before brushing hair away from her face.

"...You are lovely."

Alex Reagan is aware of several things in this moment. She's aware that The Usher Foundation may be the last place left that she can have a job. She's aware of the fact that having her boss' hand on her cheek is probably a really bad idea. Internally, Alex knows that she doesn't normally make connections with anyone as fast as she's made them with Richard--and that's a problem because of the whole boss thing as well.

Alex is aware that all of this has all the perianth signs for disaster written all over it.

But Alex is also very much aware of the fact that she's never met a bad idea that she didn't automatically invest in and almost automatically do.

So, of course her hand presses against his hand on her cheek, and her dark eyes meet the ancient ones in his face and Alex smiles a little bit before she does something that's unbelievably stupid: Alex rolls onto her toes and presses her lips to his.

It's so sudden his eyes widen. He is kissed - repeatedly and often. the Buried is a surprisingly sexual being. This is a human being kissing him and one he doesn't intend to kill. It's like a warm light filling him and he holds it close to her.

Up close beneath his cologne there's a smell of wet earth and flowers. He brushes with crest whitening toothpaste and he presses his forehead to hers forcing himself off before stroking her cheek.

"...Alex."

He strokes her hair before kissing her cheek, "That was wonderful."

The smell of him is something familiar, just like the ones that are down here in the tunnels. It’s the sort of smell that makes Alex feel safe if every other part of her seems very confused.

No, if every other part of her is confused.

The confusion is evident in the furrow of her brow and the way that she tilts her head at him, the line of her lips set.

Her kissing someone doesn’t normally end with it being called wonderful or with a kiss on her cheek and she’s not exactly sure what’s going on. Honestly she’d thought Richard was into the kiss as she was and she doesn’t know how to process what the fuck is going on.

“Um.” Alex just starts, and the corner of her lip attempts a smile before she says “thanks?” And yes, that definitely is a question.

He pulls her closer, kissing her lips as gently as he can before inhaling her scent with a purr, "Come here."

There is something that's changed about his demeanor. He is not commanding or painful but the air shifts and he is very much in control. The Buried stirs, curious within him, and he moves to pull her closer to him. Leaning into her ear his whisper is throaty.

"Do you want me?"

Alex smells like the dust that she'd been working in, and below it something wild and woodsy, a natural perfume that she'd brought with her from Seattle.

Automatically, when her body fits against all of those places in his own, Alex lifts her arms and wraps them around his neck. The air feels different even if she can't place why, but it's there around them and it almost reminds her of the time that they'd met and had talked in the confines of the elevator.

"Yes." It's an easy answer, said softly, like a child walking past a graveyard and they were worried that the dead would hear; it's the sound of something sacred. She kisses him again, letting the kiss linger this time as an addition to her answer.

She was so warm. She was so good.
And I want to destroy her for it. he smiles, I want to rip her to pieces.

His kiss is long and languid against her neck before he inhales her, "You smell like the good earth and woods. Do you like the woods?"

One hand slides to her front, to her top, beginning to play with her nipple.

"Yeah, I mean I'm from the Pacific Northwest. It just kind of smells like home, with the woods and the rain and the dirt." Alex's breath hitches softly, and her fingers move up to snag in his hair, running along the nape where it meets the back of his neck.

When her eyes close, the dark confines of this school room seem smaller actually, and Alex doesn't mind that either. She doesn't mind the way that he's looming in her space.

Instead, her hands move over the lapels of his suit jacket, tugging them both back towards the desk that they'd been sitting at before.

The earth is strong. He's not given super strenght but he's solid and sturdy enough to carry her and hold her up against him, scooping her up in one smooth motion to lay her across the desk - dust flying all around them. His eyes carrying the faintest blue glow.

He smiles. His teeth unnaturally white in the light as he buries his head against her neck, sliding his hands down her sides to her hips, tugging at her lower half with an expert air of precision.

Alex just laughs when he picks her up so easily; honestly it makes her feel like she doesn't weigh anything, and the sound is pleased and breathless.

This is probably going too fast, really too fast but Alex just wiggles a bit when he pulls her against him. There's dust in her hair, Alex can feel it where it's come loose from the braid, and there's dust on her skin.

Honestly, Alex thinks that there even might be some below her nails from where she had been digging out the peat earlier. With anyone else, Alex would have been embarrassed by this, but with Strand, she isn't and she doesn't even know why.

Even if the way his eyes gleam in the light surprise the hell out of her.

He can't say that he moves faster than normal. He's used to avatar partners, avatar couplings and he hasn't been human for a long time. Still he undoes his belt quickly before sliding a hand between her legs possessively.

Then looking up at her - the light fades - and then grows bright again before he slides a hand back down between her legs to gently finger her slit.

"...I could give you pleasure." His voice is a whisper, "I could give you such pleasure and you'd take it wouldn't you."

He hisses out the last words, "Tell me you'd take it."

The light is weird, it’s throwing her off and Alex can see the after effects of it below her eyelids when she blinks and tries to adjust. Honestly, there’s a lot to unpack here, like having her boss’ hand in her slit, but it’s more than that because for a brief moment, Alex has an undeniable thought.

The light is coming from him. It’s coming from Richard and that doesn’t make sense.

But it’s a thought that tumbled through Alex’s fingers even as she tries to take a hold of it and she just gasps and arches into his touch.

“Yes. Yes I’d take it, Richard. Fuck.”

Without thinking about it, Alex grabs the shirt and pulls it off over her head, leaving a smudge of dirt on her neck and above her breasts from where she’d taken it off.

His hand presses harder, slightly harder, gently moving her clit back and forth with the air of an expert. Kissing her hard, he draws out his cock and teases her entrance with it before smirking.

The problem is the eyes. The eyes glow brighter. The Buried swirls around the two of them and he teases her clit again. His teeth close on the flesh of her neck just to the side, marking her himself.

While all of this happens, he finds the scars on her belly, gently touching them.

"The Hunt wanted you." His voice is breathy, gaspy, "But they don't get to have you."

There's something going on here that she doesn't understand. Her chest feels more tight, and she whimpers a bit as he teases her, the whimper shifting to a full on whine of need when he marks her with his teeth.

But Alex stills when he touches the scars on her stomach. This is the first time that she's been naked around someone else other than a doctor since it had happened to her. The claw marks of the scar, the stitches where she'd been put back together aren't even all the way white yet; they're still a healing pink. Reflex makes Alex draw her stomach concave because she's not at all sure how she feels about someone touching them, even if it's him.

She's even less sure when Strand is mentioning the Hunt wanting her. "What?" Alex's voice is soft and breathless as she just stares up at him, frowning in disbelief. "What are you talking about?"

His features don't change but he does slowly, slowly run a hand up to her chest, "...I'll keep you safe."

She's so warm, so warm and real and human, the energy is a roaring storm within him. She's a human. Has he ever been a human? Truly? Been with a human?

For the first time since he was 7, he wonders if he'd made a mistake. The light dims and oh he will pay for this."

"...You don't have anything to fear with me." His eyes are still unnaturally bright, but they are kind, "I'll keep you safe."