(no subject)

[primary_asset]

He probably shouldn't have gone through the breach, but after the newspaper article Karen had found on him, he hadn't been able to help himself. It was a risk, but it was one he was willing to take just to find out what was on the other side, to see the world another John Reese had lived and died in, the man who had never been found by Finch, who had never been saved.

It hadn't seemed all that much different than this one. He hadn't felt the need for a disguise, expecting anyone who had known this world's John Reese would have known him at the man he'd died as. Homeless, bearded, his hair long and unwashed. No one would recognize him as he was now. He'd wandered through, observed the people who lived here, stopped in at the library to find himself a copy of the newspaper Karen had shown him, then headed out to pick up a coffee before returning to the Darrow where he'd found himself months ago.

Carrying the newspaper with him is perhaps a little dangerous, but there's a part of him that wants to show it to Finch. Everything he'd told Karen about Finch's role in his life had been the entire truth, but he knows he's never been particularly good at expressing his appreciation right to Finch's face, and he thinks the article might encompass everything he doesn't know he has the right words to say.

Without Finch he would be dead. He's long since thought so, but now he has all the evidence he'll ever need.

He's back in the Darrow he's been living in these past few months, reluctant it to call it his Darrow or the regular Darrow as he's heard others refer to it as. John wouldn't call himself settled, he'd been disappointed to find he wasn't able to orchestrate a way for him and Harold to head home through the breach, but he's more comfortable here. This is a city he's investigated, one he's searched, it's a city he's come to know. There's comfort in that.

John might be reluctant to say he's made friends, having never been very good at friendship before Finch, but at the sight of a familiar face ahead, he smiles and lifts one hand in a wave.

"Afternoon," he says when he's close. "How are you?"

Comments

[womanofvalue]

Peggy has just finished up on a trip that's allowed her to take several photographs of duplicates (as she's begun to think of them) and feels like she's earned herself a break, travelling back through the breach. She startles slightly, tucking away her notes and her phone before lifting her brow and smiling in greeting. "What brings you to this fine side of the universe on a sunny afternoon?" she deadpans wryly, as though hopping back and forth between universes is merely a normal thing.

[primary_asset]

"Didn't have anywhere more pressing to be," John answers with a small smile of his own and he has to wonder now if such things are usual where Peggy is from. They've all had a bit of time to adjust to it, admittedly, but he also can't imagine anyone getting entirely comfortable with it unless they've seen something like it before. Of course, he's making assumptions. She may not be comfortable with it at all, but rather too curious to let the opportunity pass her by.

He knows more than a few people who would fit such a description.

"And you?" he asks. "Anything in particular?"

[womanofvalue]

"Looking for somewhere to eat," she says, thinking it a victory that she's remembered to even have a meal today. There have been so many occasions in which Peggy's allowed her work to simply consume her and forget to eat -- typically lunch, but sometimes dinner. She finds without a roommate, the intricacies of mealtimes pass her by. "I've spent quite a long morning out exploring the other universe."

"That does build up an appetite," she jests.

[primary_asset]

"So I've heard," John says, knowing he, too, has a tendency not to eat when he should. There are just times when he's too caught up in what he's doing, in what Finch has asked of him, and it's easy to forget something as unimportant as three square meals a day. With the CIA, he'd often been too busy or they had just been out of range, and the only thing to eat had been military rations.

For John, stopping for a sandwich is something of a luxury at times.

"Do you mind if I join you?" he asks. "I haven't eaten yet today and I probably should." Or risk Finch's wrath.

[womanofvalue]

"I'd welcome the company," Peggy agrees, thinking that lonely lunches alone might be fine and all when she'd been eating at her desk, but it does get a touch pathetic in a place where, by all rights, she should have friends.

After all, there's little chance of them being killed because of her here. "Do you have any particular cravings?"

[primary_asset]

"How do you feel about Thai?" he asks, nodding toward a restaurant up ahead. It's not one of the ones he's tried yet here, but when it comes to food, John can be the adventurous sort. If one can get by on military rations, one can get by on just about anything.

"I can't promise this particular place will be any good, but it's worth a shot," he adds. "I've spent a good amount of my time here so far experimenting with the restaurants. Which is probably a sign it's time for me to get a job."

[womanofvalue]

She stares at him with the look of a woman who's only heard of Thai as a culture and not a food type, given that coming from the past is still causing her to have to sprint to catch up, at times. "If you can explain to me what flavours I ought to be expecting, then of course, I'm in," Peggy says cheerfully.

[itsdarkcorners]

It's been a long couple of weeks, or at least it seems like it, and Karen has been scattered as a result, going back and forth between one Darrow and the other, trying to find out as much as she can and to make some sense of everything, as if there's any logic in a portal to another fucking universe opening up. If anyone is going to figure out any answers, she's sure it won't be her, but futility has certainly never stopped her before. There's no reason for it to now.

She's heading back to her apartment, a much-needed coffee in one hand and a messenger bag holding both notes and her laptop slung over her shoulder when she sees John. Tired or not, she can't help but smile, warm and genuinely pleased. "Hey," she says. "I'm good, I'm good. How are you? What's going on?"

[primary_asset]

"After careful testing, I've discovered coffee tastes the same on both sides of the breach," he tells her sincerely before his mouth turns up into a small smile. Holding up the coffee in his hand, he displays the logo on the side, a coffee shop called Little Bean with a picture of a baby. It's not one he'd ever heard of in New York and he certainly hadn't seen one in the Darrow they've both been living in.

He doesn't want to mention he had gone through to find another copy of the newspaper she had show him. It seems depressing in a way and he isn't sure he can explain to her why he thinks it was the right thing to do, only that it was. Being dead isn't something he wants to celebrate, but having the article has its uses, too.

[itsdarkcorners]

"Well, I could've told you that," Karen says, laughing, both at how he's chosen to phrase it and the image on the coffee cup. "But that's definitely a worthwhile experiment to conduct. You went over there?" It's not really that surprising, all things considered. She can't imagine that there's anyone who would have recognized him as a dead homeless man, not least because the other Darrow seems to be like this one in that there are and can be people who look like each other, and most don't pay much attention to that sort of thing anyway. Still, she can't help being curious. For all the time she's spent there herself, maybe he'll have found out something that she hasn't, something that goes beyond coffee.

[primary_asset]

He nods, a slow dip of his chin as he considers the reasons why. There's the newspaper, of course, but it's more than that. And as the only person who has seen the newspaper article, he thinks if he tells Karen the honest truth, she might just understand.

"I think I had to," he says finally. "I wanted to see what it was like."

Where he died, the world where he'd suffered and been without Finch, the world that hadn't let him go. He'd gone to the beach, spent a little time there, wondered where, exactly, it was he'd ended up in the water and where it was he washed up on the shore. It hadn't bothered him as much as he had thought it might. He's going to die eventually, probably in action, sooner rather than later, but he had still wanted to see.

[itsdarkcorners]

Karen doesn't need to hear more than that to at least have a guess at why that might be the case. All things considered, he'd taken the news she brought back to him a lot better than most people probably would have, but even if it weren't for her innate curiosity, she thinks she would have needed to see it, too, if she were in his position. As it is, she's been spending as much time there as not anyway, unable to resist the pull of finding out just as much as she can. She just counts herself lucky that she doesn't stand out too much, the clothes she already wears making it fairly easy to blend in.

"And what'd you think?" she asks, her voice softening just a little. She's not going to make too much of it if he isn't, but she can't pretend like it didn't happen, either, like she doesn't have a newspaper from another world in her drawer containing the obituary of a homeless man named John Reese. For reasons she hasn't quite figured out, she can't bring herself to get rid of it.

[primary_asset]

"Similar enough to this place," he says. "With the exception of the clothing and the architecture." But beyond that, he isn't entirely sure what he thinks or feels, not yet. He hasn't had time to digest what he'd seen, what he'd felt when standing on the beach. It's impossible to speculate about what life would have been like for the John Reese who lived there, if he had been especially sad, if maybe he'd felt as safe on the streets of Darrow as he had on the streets of New York.

It's not worth imagining. Not worth spending too much time dwelling on it.

"I expect Harold would like it over there," he says with a small smile. "He already dresses like he belongs there. Too bad I can't convince him to cross over or maybe it's too bad that world doesn't have a Harold of their own."

[privateperson]

Harold hasn't gone through the portal. A part of him is curious about it, of course, a rather large part; but having no idea whatsoever about what he may find on the other side of it is a significant risk that he hasn't been willing to take. John's come back without a scratch, which is both a relief and a surprise, but that doesn't convince Harold it's a very good idea.

So he's been using his time to explore this Darrow instead, wandering on his own while John's preoccupied, sometimes with Bear and sometimes alone. Today, he'd come across a series of abandoned warehouses somewhat near the cemetery, and the portal is in sight but Harold actively chooses to ignore it. To ignore the temptation of what could be a better life or, alternatively, a far worse one.

When he spots John, Harold brightens, subtly raising a hand in return. "I'm well enough," he answers, which is true enough. "Any new stories from the other side?"

[primary_asset]

"Coffee tastes the same," John answers, lifting his cup as he falls in step beside Finch, altering his stride so he doesn't move too quickly for his friend. "I should have brought back some of your tea, too. Let you see if it's up to snuff as well." It's a stupid joke, especially when the breach and everything it reveals to them would have been the scientific talk of the century in New York, but here it seems to have been taken more or less in stride. No one seems particularly worried about it, which is enough for John to be worried in his way.

It seems harmless enough and so far no one has come through and tried to kill them, but that doesn't mean it won't yet happen.

The newspaper, though, had been important enough to go through and retrieve. He could have asked Karen for the copy she has, but somehow he isn't ready to address why he would want it. She knows bits and pieces, but not everything. Only Finch knows everything.

"Come on, Harold, we'll pick one up for you on this side of the hole in the world," he decides.

[privateperson]

Harold fixes John with a dubious glare, though it isn't long-lasting. Whether or not the tea is as good as what he's become accustomed to in Darrow is far from being his primary concern, and he realized John is perfectly aware of that but they are rather glossing over the much bigger issue. It's entirely possible that breach between this Darrow and the other is dangerous, even if it doesn't appear to be so right now. Still, if John had found something, if he had important news to deliver, Harold is certain he would have heard about it already it.

"I suppose a cup of tea would be agreeable," he admits, glancing at John's cup and then noticing the newspaper. "You've been keeping up, haven't you? Did you notice there's barely been any mention at all of the breach in the papers? It's been there for over two weeks and nobody seems to be very concerned. It may not be Samaritan, but I do find it somewhat suspicious."

There are a great number of strange things about Darrow, Harold has found, and he does wish they had the Machine here to perhaps help them better understand how things work here. The Machine might have led them to whoever is behind all the inner-workings of the city, whoever knows far more about each of them than Harold is comfortable with, but they're at a loss for now. It's only made him all the more certain, however, that he and John need to be more proactive, before they're caught up in something they can't escape this time.

[primary_asset]

"This is from over there," he answers, flipping the paper up for a moment before he lets it settle by his side again. Once they're sitting, he'll let Finch read the article about his death, but for now he doesn't want to address it. Not until they're comfortable, not until they have a moment of peace, even if he knows it won't last. It's something they don't get much of, peace, but John takes it where he can find it and he thinks Finch should, too. Especially here, especially where things are so uncertain, and while Finch seems generally convinced there's no sign of Samaritan here -- and while John is inclined to agree -- that doesn't mean they've found any answers at all.

Not about this place, not about the breach. Not about what's happening at home.

"It isn't that no one is talking about it," he says thoughtfully, guiding them in the direction of the place he goes most frequently to pick up Harold's tea. "It's just the media that's avoiding it. Everyone else, though... everyone is talking about it. No one seems to have any answers."

[privateperson]

Harold would have snatched the paper out of John's eyes out of sheer curiosity if he thought he could be quick enough, but he'll settle for taking a look at it later. It would be interesting, he thinks, to see what's considered newsworthy in this other Darrow, to see how different things are or possibly just aren't. At the very least, there doesn't appear to be doubles of them finding success with the Machine, otherwise he would have heard about it by now and whether that means they're dead or in hiding or simply don't exist at all, Harold isn't sure he wants to know.

That's false, of course, he does want to know. He doesn't like to be in the dark about things that concern him, and he doesn't think John is hiding anything but at the same time, Harold is more frustrated over his own lack of fortitude to walk through that breach himself. If he can't be certain of anything in this Darrow, he'd like to at least know for sure the same can be said about the other.

"There don't seem to be answers about much of anything in this place," Harold says with a small, wry smile. "I'm beginning to grow concerned, John, that our priorities have shifted from keeping out of sight of an AI to trying to understand an alternate reality of this world that seems like it shouldn't exist in the first place. I haven't decided yet whether or not I think we've pulled the shorter straw."

[primary_asset]

"At least the alternate reality doesn't seem to be trying to kill us," John offers as he reaches past Finch and pulls open the door of the small tea shop he'd found not long after his arrival. For five straight days he'd camped out nearby, watching and waiting to see if Finch might show up, but in the end he'd given up and moved on.

Not before discovering what sort of tea they served, of course, making note of it as a place to bring Finch should he ever end up in Darrow. And here they are.

"Sit down. I'll let you read the paper, but before you do, I have to tell you about one of the articles," John says. He wants Finch to see it, but he doesn't want him to be surprised by it. That would serve no purpose and would only be cruel and while John knows he isn't the best man, he also has absolutely no desire to be cruel to Finch, of all people.

[numberhuang]

"Exhausted," I answer at once. Most days, I don't bother trying to hide how I'm feeling. Why should I? If I show other people where I am, it means that they will know not to try my patience and only to come to me with the things that matter. It saves time, it saves energy, no one has to pretend that they are something that they're not.

Besides, I think that Detective Riley will understand more than most people.

"It is refreshing to see a familiar face, though," I tell him, immediately falling in line with the pace of his walk. "Ugh, you know what happened recently? I had a bunch of people contact me because they swear that they saw me at this big party that was held in the city. I keep telling them that it can't be me, because I don't go to parties without a reason, and I definitely don't forget when I go to a party. But they insist. Which makes me paranoid that maybe there is some different version of me walking around in Darrow."

[primary_asset]

"I wouldn't want to cause further paranoia, but that might not be impossible," John says, thinking of the newspaper he's carrying, the article that reports his death. People have told him it's possible for there to be others who look exactly like him, but have a different name, a different history. That had been unsettling enough, but to them realize there might be other versions of him that exist in other worlds, men who haven't survived the war or who haven't survived his time on the streets or, perhaps, men who haven't survived Samaritan, well... that's something else entirely.

He isn't sure unsettling is still the right word. It's interesting and a little sad.

"Have you been through the breach to the other city?" he asks. "There are a few... alternate versions of people over there."

[numberhuang]

"I thought about it..." I confess, my voice trailing off. Neither answer feels like one that I can give firmly, that I can be confident in. Because if I went over, certainly it would be to find my family, and there's a part of me that is miserable thinking about the idea that maybe my family is all over there and I'm not, and I didn't care enough to even go look. But it also seems so stupid to go when we don't know what created the hole, how stable it is, or if there are any long-term effects from going to the other side.

It's really damned if you do, damned if you don't.

"I know that other people have gone over and come back and they seem mostly healthy, but it's, it's just so weird, I can't wrap my head around it," I complain. I'm not as brave as I bet Detective Riley is, I bet he wouldn't hesitate on whichever decision he's made. "I feel like I've already been through enough coming to this city without understanding how it happened. I don't know that I could do that again, even if it was me who actually stepped through that hole. But I do really wish I could at least know who's over there, maybe see if there's anyone I care about. It's just so hard to make a choice."

[primary_asset]

John nods thoughtfully, listening as Jessica speaks. There's value in everything she's saying and she makes several good points, especially valid for someone whose life has value beyond what John's does. What he does is risk himself every single day, that's how he's been for a very long time, it's how he exists, it's what he was made for and he's comfortable with that.

Jessica, though, has something to live for. He respects that.

"If you have pictures, I can always keep an eye out when I go over again," he offers. He hadn't planned on making any additional visits, having gotten exactly what he wanted this time around, but he'll go again if it helps someone. "I didn't notice anyone familiar this time, but I wasn't looking for anyone."

[numberhuang]

"Wait, you've been there already?" I ask Detective Riley, reaching out to grab at his arm. "Of course; I should have known that you would be the type of brave person to make their way over there. Also because I imagine it would be somewhere you would want to search to check if there are any clues there for what makes Darrow the way that it is. But you wouldn't be here if that side answered all the questions, right?"

If Detective Riley ever does find the way out of Darrow — and I believe that he is one of the people with the best chance of doing so — then I hope that he lets me know. I think he would try. He seems like a very motivated person.

"Unfortunately," I say, and it takes a lot of motivation to keep my voice from shaking. "I don't have any pictures of my family. It was 1995, we didn't have these amazing phones that could take pictures on them. And I was in the middle of packing for a family trip, I didn't even have my wallet in my pocket at the time."

[primary_asset]

He may be a good spy, talented enough to find out information other people might not be able to, but John doesn't believe he'll be the one to figure out what makes Darrow tick. From what he's gathered over the months, there are people here of far greater intelligence than he possesses, people who understand things he'll never be able to and if they haven't worked out the intricacies of this place, he doubts hell be the one who manages it. Harold might be able to, he's far smarter than John, but even that seems questionable now, given everything he's seen.

"I've been there," he agrees. "And it doesn't seem to answer anything, no. I'm sorry."

It's given him plenty to think about, but it hasn't given him any answers. All he knows for certain is that some version of him died over there without Harold Finch's intervention. That and he isn't sure he would enjoy having to deal with the prevailing fashion.

"Names then," he adds. "And ages. I'll see what I can do."