milliways_bar | (no subject)

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A young woman enters, looking unperturbed, wearing men's clothing. Three guesses as to why that is?

Jack is finding this whole thing rather anticlimactic. He's having trouble with the hips, certainly, they're wider and keep hitting things like kitchen counters and doorframes. But at least, look on the bright side, his breasts are relatively small. Big ones he imagines would get in the way a frightful lot.

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"Frost is with me now."

Andrei-- he wishes she'd ask because he doesn't like the thought of him abandoned.

"Good, good."

A moment of silence.

"Andrei?"

"He doesn't talk to me any more. Why don't you know?"

Accusing glance.

"There were. Things. I've been here for a time."

She won't look him in the eye.

"You left Andrei behind?"

Oh, Andrei.

"Time shouldn't pass." What she doesn't say is I don't know if it does or not but I still can't go back.

"But you don't know! Oh."

Jack climbs to her feet, and then sinks back again.

"And he won't know me like this."

"No. He wouldn't." She wants to go back, she really does.

Just. With things the way they are. "If you do go back, and I'm not there. Could you tell him?"

"That you decided you didn't care enough to do it yourself?"

Sweet and snide.

She exhales, short, sharp, and pissed off.

"That there was an incident and I am trying to keep him alive."

"Did you at least warn him you were leaving?"

Jack hopes so.

"No. I was here. And then it was too late, and I stayed."

Then it went to hell and back.

"What happened?"

It's important she knows.

"You can leave the Devil. But I seem to have grown a concience over the past few months and can't, not unless I want to have one more death on my head."

Andrei's. She's trying not to say it out loud.

"What you have to do," he tells her gently, "is bore him. Don't fight back, don't make a show of anything, don't let your displeasure be known."

He touches her hand.

"He's a creature of whim. His attention span is next to nothing. He'll leave you be if there's nothing in it for him, and he can get the sex anywhere. Just don't play his game."

"Right." The smile is only half there, something bitter and shadowed in it, but. It's still a smile.

"Tell Andrei I'll be back, okay?"

"I understand him, Fire."

Jack looks at her, steady and calm.

"If you need any help, I know him. Don't let him know I do because he'll kill me, but I am here for you if you need it. Just let him lose interest and that'll be it. I'll talk to Andrei for you."

"You've grown, Jack. Jackie." But no matter the body, he's still who he is. And Frost there as well.

"Thank you." A pause, like she's going to say something else, but she doesn't. "Take care of him."

"Watch out for yourself. Don't open up too deep."

He feels sorry for her.

"I'll come to you," she says, like she's ignoring his warning.

(she hopes he knows her better then that)

"When this is over."

"Don't come to me, go to him."

Andrei needs her more.

In another place, another time, it's different.

I can't go to him after that. I should hate him and I don't, and it shouldn't feel good and it does, and I shouldn't dream about his eyes sometimes or think about the way he burns or like baiting him because, sometimes, it feels like I'm in control. And Andrei is sweet and quiet and different and I don't know what's right anymore.

In another place, another time, she says all that and she runs and maybe she doesn't go back to Italy, ever, and maybe the Devil has a new consort on his arm.

In this place, in this time, she nods.

But she doesn't say anything.

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