Traffic [Valduggery, Skulduggery Pleasant Fanfiction]

Sand

Ajuoga gave Fletcher that smile. God, she was so beautiful. She reclined, Devoted scattered about like support columns. Devoted held these women up. Princess sat nearby, feet folded under her, head down.

Fletcher had called her a princess when he had first seen her. He had been lost for words, at half of himself, at the blue eyes. The name had stuck, even when Fletcher had grown to hate her. His little princess, obedient and superior; it was a joke now.

"Last time you visited," Ajuoga said, smile so, so nice, "your friends tried to keep you away from us."

Fletcher gave a little shrug. A smile would work on some of the others, but not her.

"They did."

"And we threatened to kill your favorite daughter, and that was the only thing that brought you back."

Fletcher hesitated, then gave another shrug. "It was."

"Then why should I?"

And then, Fletcher slumped. His arrogance burned away and it was just him, shackled, tired, standing there in front of her. Because he was done pretending. He did that so much now. Because Ajuoga needed to see him broken, and he just couldn't—

"Because I miss my friends," Fletcher finally answered, voice still disinterested.

Something in Ajuoga softened. Princess, next to her, looked at Fletcher in the eye. Deemed him worthy enough of eye contact. His gaze held no warmth for his first child.

"Oh, my love," Ajuoga said. She raised a hand, like Fletcher's sadness had finally raised her to sympathy. "Of course. Of course you may visit."

Suhailah was summoned, and Fletcher's chains were placed on her. Fletcher had to inflate himself again, and he knelt down to her level, grin there and hair styled and back in his—

"You're leaving?" she asked, eyes wide.

"Just for a little bit. I can't stay here all the time, can I?"

And she looked at him, confusion written across her features.

"Why not?"

And Fletcher faltered, smiled, reached out to touch her and stopped himself, stood. He nodded at Ajuoga, hefted his backpack he had brought back last time. He needed a new one; this one was falling apart.

Fletcher teleported.

London. It hit him like a shock. Cars and people and rain, sweet, sweet rain. Fletcher stood on the roof and just let it drench him. Rain. It was still filthy, and Fletcher laughed, and then he was in China.

Then Russia. He teleported to the top of the Eifel Tower and jumped, screaming and he flicked through—cold, hot, rain, wind—and then he was in the middle of the ocean, the Australian coast there.

Fletcher did this over and over again. One mountain, another, towers, planes, over and over again, jumping and flicking through everywhere he had missed. He couldn't see it enough. He gorged himself on pizza from Italy and America and got mochi from Japan and then he was jumping again.

He wasn't sure how long it took, but eventually he was in Ireland.

Nowhere in particular. Just a field, somewhere that was really... Irish. Fletcher sat down, listened to the wind in the grass. He had sat and listened to the waves in Australia, the rain in his hometown. What sweetness sound was.

It took him longer than he would have expected to find them. But he did. Trailing after, like always.

Fletcher knocked on the door. Rang the doorbell. Waited around.