written in the stars - a topper thornton fanfic (outer banks)

t w e n t y t h r e e

song: 'little dark age' by MGMT

present

'And then we were right outside like this, and all we hear is just "Bam! Bam! Bam!"' JJ said, reenacting the events of their trip to Ms. Lana's to the rest of the Pogues, who were sat on the porch.

Genevieve rolled her eyes. JJ had a knack for twisting the truth and blowing it way out of proportion.

'Did you get a good description of them? Anything we can use for a police report?' Pope asked, interrupting JJ's dramatic reenactment.

'Burly,' JJ said. 'Like the guys at my dad's garage. You guys know, he made cargo hides for drug smugglers.'

Genevieve sighed and exchanged a glance with Kiara. They had heard this story a thousand times.

'We're gonna need a bit more than just burly, JJ,' Kiara said.

'I can tell you with full confidence guys, these boys are square groupers.'

'Like, narco square groupers? Like, Pablo Escobar square groupers?' Pope asked, clearly not fully convinced by JJ's claim. 'And what exactly do these square groupers look like, other than burly?'

'Dude, I wasn't taking little mental Polaroids the entire time, man! I was under duress, okay?' JJ exclaimed.

Genevieve sighed and sat up, looking over at JJ.

'But I can tell you from the way that Ms. Lana was screaming that these guys are serious hombres, man,' JJ said, sitting down next to Genevieve.

'He's right guys. She was erratic. Whoever they are, they're not people we want on our case,' Genevieve said, smiling reassuringly at JJ.

'Okay, well why would they want the compass?' Kiara said.

'That thing's a piece of shit. Couldn't even pawn it off for five bucks if you tried,' Pope muttered. 'No offence,' he said to John B.

'The office,' John B said, getting up and walking into the chateau.

Genevieve sighed and stood up, beckoning to the others to follow him inside.

'My dad always kept the office locked because he was afraid that his competitors would try and steal his Royal Merchant research. I used to laugh at him for it, but now that he's gone I've kinda just left it as he kept it.'

'Yeah, for when he gets back,' Kiara said.

Genevieve glanced over at JJ, who was shaking his head at Kiara. JJ and Genevieve had long accepted that Big John wasn't coming back, but John B hadn't, and probably never would.

'Look, that's the lucky compass,' Kiara said, pointing to a photo of Robert Q. Routledge, the original owner of the compass.

'Yeah... about the compass... not so lucky. He died after he got it. Then it was shipped back to Henry, who died in a crop dusting accident after he got the compass.'

'And then it was given to Stephen, who had it with him when he was killed by a banana truck. Stephen passed the compass down to him, my dad,' John B said, pointing to a picture of Big John.

'Hmmm, sounds like there's a reoccurring theme here,' JJ said.

'You have a death compass,' Pope muttered.

'I do not,' John B muttered.

'You literally do. Seriously dude, get rid of it!' JJ exclaimed. 'It's cursed and it's made its way back to you.'

'This compartment here was used by soldiers to hide notes,' John B said, unscrewing the back of the compass to reveal a scratched message. 'That's my dad's handwriting.'