milliways_bar | (no subject)

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Duo is sitting on the floor by the fireplace, print outs stacked in careful piles all around him. It's not usual for a digital-age kinda guy like him to have so much paper, but that's what legal cases get you. (It's harder to hack paper.)

He's also eating Meat On A Stick™. It's probably beef teriyaki, if you're feeling generous.

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(As she should.)

"Nothing's stopped you from doing what you want to do, so far," Duo says. "And you shouldn't let anything in the future, either. But are you safe, for now? Back at home?"

She thinks about that for a while, tallying up the security holes she knows about.

(There are not many left, thanks to Morales.)

"Yes."

Beat.

"Everyone else is, too."

"No missions, so far as you know?"

"Not yet."

That could change at any time.

She knows.

"The current team is well-trained."

Not X's current team, but -- the others.

"Then maybe you should go home and take a break for a while. Or hell, stay here, if that works better for you. I did both, before I figured out for sure what I wanted to do next. Something big changes, sometimes you need to think about it for a while, before it sinks in."

That doesn't always make it better, but sometimes it makes things easier to deal with, when you've got a little distance from what happened.

X does not hesitate. At all.

"No."

Beat.

"I have to work. Here."

And home is --

"Ambergeldar would be okay."

In Ambergeldar there be dragons. Or rather, one dragon.

Norman.

It is --

Maybe she will go there.

"Listen, I don't wanna push you, but if you want someplace to get the hell away from everything, you can always come to my world. I mean, it's not like anyone would find you there." He raises his hands, still in his standard 'not a threat' posture. "Just an offer."

X's attention sharpens with what seems like it should be an audible snap.

"You are not in trouble?"

He has a talent for it.

"What?" He blinks. "No! Why would I ask you to visit me to relax if I was in trouble?"

There's a moment where it's clear this conversation could go at least two ways.

What is not as clear is that X recognizes this, too.

And because it is Duo -- and he worries, she can smell it --

"Because I am very good at getting people out of trouble?"

X chooses the less well-trodden path.

Or at least she tries.

He rolls his eyes, finally sensing a moment in the conversation where levity will be accepted, if not returned.

"If I ever want you to help me with problems at home, I'll hire you as a freelancer. Put you on the Preventer payroll and everything. But I'm serious. You don't even need to ask, okay?"

For a second she looks broken open, relieved and hopeful and tired and young.

It doesn't last.

"Okay."

Beat.

"I will remember."

At least she doesn't say 'thank you'?

God, he so wants to hug her, now. Hands off, Duo.

"Good." She doesn't say thank you, he won't ask her to promise. It's a deal.

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