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[aldhani]

WELCOME TO THE SALTBURNT NETWORK

USERNAME: faker_1

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📦 delivery.

[powerhungry]

[ The morning before Cassian's first shift at the Hex Club, an envelope finds its way to his door. Inside is a gold pin in the shape of a hexagon, as well as a note: ]

Cassian,
Welcome to the Hex Club.
I look forward to working with you.
— Silco

@qimir | text

[snaggleteeth]

Hello, Cassian. I spoke to your fiancée. I want to make amends. But I can live with not having what I want.

[there is enough truth mixed in, that he believes it, too.]

Is that all right? Are you?

[aldhani]

[cassian lets this sit for some time, a debate on how to proceed turning in his mind. he doesn't know what max had said, exactly, but he can guess; she'd probably come at qimir with the kind of anger that would scare anyone into apologizing, no matter what they'd actually done. maybe there's a little satisfaction in him at that knowledge.

there's no reason to make enemies here, not among the people who are also being held captive. there's also reason, more than enough, to be wary; he's not going to forget that.

in the end:]

It's fine. I'm fine.

🎁

[redeems]

( left on his pillow dec. 1st, after max has slipped out to do whatever she does. training. showering. running. breakfast, if she does that alone, angelus doesn't judge - is a sketch of his lovely wife sleeping, unsigned )

@qimir (nsfw)

[snaggleteeth]

I think of you with your back to a wall. Not the ones built to tame you, but stones that will burn red rosettes up your spine before I turn them purple with my teeth. Friction is universal. My nails will welt your hips. You fight, a little. Try to get your swollen sex in my mouth; the right place for it to grow. You don't mind that I'm stronger than you are, until your thighs begin to burn. And I will eat you like an almond.

2/2

[snaggleteeth]

Have you ever felt like flying a spaceship should be more technically challenging than sending a comlink message?

Congratulations on your victory in the Hex Slip polls. Merry Christmas.

xmas gift 2025;

[snaggleteeth]

This box contains two small jars of tincture. The first, an antiseptic. Along with it, black body paint that might remind him of what a certain band of orphans once wore to a war they could not win. Left unused, both keep perfectly well at room temperature; the odor of the latter, however, hints at a vining jungle plant, once familiar. (They had to make the dye out of something.)

The note reads: "From just the first night, I swear. You've reclaimed almost everything else." It's signed 'Qimir.'

🎨✒️

[redeems]

( the next time he sits down to his copy of new moon he's working through the sequence in which Bela is left behind. she's collapsed on the ground wasting away in the forest. as he turns the page, he finds a small index card-sized insert. perhaps a bookmark?

a small charcoal of this woman sits nestled in the spine. )

in person.

[revvedup]

[ shortly after her conversation with alia, max looks up from her phone, her expression and tone carefully neutral. for the time being. ]

Hey. You busy?

[aldhani]

[it's so careful, in fact, that cassian, still looking at his own phone, doesn't suspect that anything's amiss.]

No.

[— says the man who's still typing. he doesn't even look up. yet.]

What's going on?

@guevara

[revvedup]

[ immediately after she receives this (well, after she gets her hands to stop shaking): ]

is this him?

[aldhani]

[cassian hasn't been stupid enough to think that the encounter in the library would've silenced angelus for good. he's been waiting for the next move, doing his best to sharpen a few more rulers along the way.

still, this message is a lead weight dropped to the pit of his stomach.]

It's him.

[whatever he'd been about to do, he forgets about and abandons, instead turning on his heel and briskly walking back toward their room.]

Where did you find that?

text — @faith

[stake]

[ After Angelus has posted to the network: ]

checking in on you & yours
angel's making moves

[aldhani]

[he's gathering his sharpened rulers as he speaks.]

He hasn't found us. Yet.

[that won't last; he knows they're not safe.]

What's the plan?

@qimir | text

[snaggleteeth]

Hello, Cassian. I do not have to be anything to you and you are nearly a stranger to me.

But you do have to be something to the people you claim to love. Maybe there was a good reason you've been found dead, alone, by your fiancée. Maybe there was no other way to do what you needed to do. But you know what it is to be used for righteous cause and thrown away. You have lived in three worlds and known the pain of loss in all of them. I invite you to imagine the rest. A future, a lifetime. Gone a week today. Another week, next time. How many more? Your loved ones left incomplete because you do not have the courage to risk grief yourself.

Here, I'm ignorant and weak as anyone. But my belief about this is neither.

Good luck with your rock. Feel better soon.

text | 1/26

[aldhani]

[it's not that cassian ignores this message when he returns to his phone. no, he reads it once, and then again; later, still, he comes back to it, sits with it. one part of it sticks out from the rest.

(you do have to be something to the people you claim to love.)

it's not that he ignores the message, but he doesn't address it directly when he sends something back two evenings after crawling out of the grave.]

I heard what you did. Thank you for helping her.

@koby | while cassian's dead

[kobes]

[because you can't say "it's not your fault" if you're not alive, if the reason you're not alive is written in blood on a wall, if your name was given innocently and bluntly and without a second thought to the person who killed you.

because koby has to say it so he doesn't hate himself even more.]

I'm so, so, so sorry, Cassian.

text | 1/26

[aldhani]

[if qimir's message is one to think on, this one has a feeling he knows all too well. that's why it feels important to address.]

It wasn't your fault. Angelus was targeting me from the start. He would've found a way.

[not a platitude; just a fact.]

voice | @robert.plant

[cholesterol]

( Dean doesn't know what to say, never really does. He does pep talks, not -

He's done this before. Cassian was a friend. Mild flirtation thanks to a fucked parlor game. But what do you say to someone you were locked in a cabin with over a weekend? )

Hey. Uh, I don't even know why I'm leaving this. You'll be back in some form or another within the week. Heard you won't be yourself, at first. Haven't seen it firsthand, yet. Not going to browbeat you for going after him. Or, not making it. I'd have done the same thing if I'd been awake. Hell, I would've tag-teamed and that sonnuvabitch would have wished...

Hope there's real rest on the other side. See you when you get back. I owe ya... I don't know. Something. Call it an IOU.

( He cuts off the call. )

text | 1/26

[aldhani]

[if there'd been rest, it hadn't been meaningful; he's never been more tired than he has been in the two days since he'd come back. but he doesn't intend to say that — or much of anything to this.

in the end, the message that comes is just:]

Make me a drink after next shift. We'll call it even.

[maybe then, he'll have more.]

✉️ delivery.

[begot]

[ A few days after things return to (relative) normal, an envelope finds its way to Cassian's door, containing a piece of pale blue card stock upon which has been written, in Amy's neat, looping hand: ]

Dear Cassian,

I know you won't be around to read this for a little while, but it still felt important to me to write it now. I'm sorry for what happened to you. I'm sorry it happened even partially on my account. I wish it hadn't happened at all, any of it. Thank you for your kindness. I hope you come back soon.

— Amy

text | 1/26

[aldhani]

[on monday evening, after cassian has returned (and slept for a long time), had a chance to read her card, a message finds its way to amy's phone.]

How are you feeling?

@angel

[redeems]

I don't know if anybody explained to you that Angelus was me without a soul.

All I can do is apologize for his actions. I'll apologize to Max and to Grace. He's not who I am and I hate that that's who ended up in this house before me.

You don't have to reply to this and I will keep my distance.

[aldhani]

[cassian doesn't immediately answer this. he considers not doing so at all; he considers blocking the contact, and letting that be that. for all he knows, this is manipulation — and there's no telling how many people got the exact same message.

even if it's genuine, that still doesn't change his anger.

about two hours later:]

Save your apology for Max. She had to find me.

[had to find him, had to bury him.]

@dean

[cholesterol]

You're invited to Dean Winchester's funeral. Refreshments and a small catering spread will be provided afterward. Prepared remarks and stories are encouraged.

@faker_2

[revvedup]

i want a do-over.

[aldhani]

[he doesn't have to ask what she's referring to; it's been on his mind in the days since the escape attempt.]

So do I.