MARI??!!?!??!/hj

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You blinked at your phone screen, tilting your head in confusion. A message from Taph. Well, sort of. It was a jumbled mess of emoji combos, like some cryptic code only he could understand...he could just write text on the chats or something but no, he wants you to suffer

"🏠💥😡❌💥🔥 🌞🏞️🐜🚪🏃"

That alone had taken hours to decipher. You had stared at your phone, brow furrowed, trying to make sense of the string of symbols he had sent. It was like a damn puzzle. Eventually, you got the gist. He wanted to meet. Outside. picnicking or something

That alone was strange enough. Taph wasn’t exactly the social type. He spent most of his time locked away in his house, surrounded by homemade traps—tripwires, subspace tripmines. It was his own personal fortress, a necessity given his line of work. As a demolitions expert, it was his job to tear down buildings that had been banned or Terminated. That, of course, made him public enemy number one to certain groups, mainly the people whose homes he reduced to rubble.

So why the sudden invite? Was this his way of… trying to be friendly? Maybe he was making an effort to change, to fit in. And if he was, you weren’t about to turn him down.

But here you were, standing in a sun-drenched field, staring at him.

Taph sat on a checkered picnic blanket, cross-legged, his usual work attire replaced with something more casual. Well, as casual as someone like him could get. The same tattered hood shadowed his face, leaving his features hidden, save for the occasional glint of light against his mask. a woven basket by his side, rested beside him, the scent of fresh bread and something sweet wafting from it.

"😎🌟🌾☕"

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