ximilialog | [Open] in the wink of a young girl's eye

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[Open] in the wink of a young girl's eye

CHARACTERS: Canon Updated Ziggy and You!
LOCATION: See each prompt.
DATE: Just after the mission.
CONTENT: Ziggy canon updates... like... 2 decades. Shit has happened.
WARNINGS: Conversations/narration about mental health issues, addiction, and PTSD.

(Feel free to wildcard!)

I. Local Ohio Woman Threatens Civilians | Hallway

[C. Berman — no, Ziggy, her nickname is Ziggy — wakes up with a jolt.

Wakes up with a jolt somewhere she has not seen since she was 18 years old: the Ximilia.

She's in her thirties now, having drank maybe a little too much after a small, unfortunate backslide in the months following the breaking of a curse and the quitting of alcohol. Two fucking decades. It's been two decades of really bad choices and mental health as flimsy as wafer paper, and so... she doesn't quite remember things clearly yet. It'll come, with time: those memories of her coupla' years aboard the ship, which will no doubt be eerily clear, despite the distance.

But for now, she is dazed, confused, and mildly hungover when she stumbles out into the hallways of the Ximilia. She has a knife clutched in one hand, poised and ready to lash out if she needs to. In fact, someone who is tiredly walking the halls mere hours after their return from the mission will suddenly find a knife held up to their neck from behind. The voice that speaks is a little rough from a disuse and two decades of on-again-off-again smoking habits.]

Instead of trying to move, how about you tell me where the hell I've been carted off to?

[And why it feels so goddamn familiar?]

I don't know what creepy Sunnyvale mental hospital this is, but I'm out of here.

II. Far Away Thoughts | Kitchen

[So. Anyway.

She's gotten her memories back. Mostly, and with some unpleasant blurriness that still needs time to fade. She's in her thirties, and so much time has passed — time that includes becoming a PTSD-infested alcoholic with agoraphobia (lots of watching the same VHS movies every night after a fifth of Jack Daniels, or tail-spinning into guilt over Camp Nightwing and paranoia that the curse is coming to reclaim her). She's improved a lot since breaking the curse, for the record.

It's why she can sit in the kitchen to stare at a bottle of wine, instead of hoarding herself in a room decorated for a teenager who is into high School Musical. It's not easy, but she can do it. She just happens to stare at the bottle for an uncomfortably long time, unaware that she's even doing it. Force of habit, really; time passes just fine when you're zoning out into another world.

It also helps you not drink the thing you really want to drink, if you zone out.

One epiphany, belated, finally hits her:]

... Holy shit. I'm really here. Again.

... I can't believe this is really happening. Again.

III. Memories of a Different Life | Ziggy's Room

[It's funny. Back home, she still feels her skin crawl when she takes those daunting steps out of her home. It had once been a mental sort of prison, one she erected herself. And she had swore to herself and to her sister that she would start really living again. If only it weren't so fucking scary to do something as simple as meeting someone at a cafe, or walking your dog down a sidewalk.

But the Ximilia doesn't make her feel like that. Not really. Not with the memories she has here, still bleeding in so effortlessly and filling the cracks that she had only started mending back home. It makes her realize that perhaps her healing had started a long time ago, in a place she couldn't remember anymore: this station.

She stands in the middle of her room, taking embarrassing posters off her wall and grimacing at teenaged Zac Efron's face. Not just him, either. Somewhere along the way, young her had started really getting into the Jonas Brothers while staying here. How many Disney Channel original movies can one girl hoard?]

... Ugh. So glad I'm over this chapter of my life, suddenly.

[She rolls up a poster and throws it in a box.

Redecorating a little, is all. She stops to look at some little polaroid images and tiny letters on a corkboard — there's some lovey-dovey messages from what she can see is Finn's handwriting and unerring drawing skills. It's amazing how clearly she's suddenly remembering some of these moments in time; it's also a relief to know that at least she had some kind of teenaged childhood here, in a way. Especially when she thinks about the parallel childhood that happened the moment she returned home.

The door to her room is open, anyway; feel free to pop your head in.]

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

[Ah, well. Been a while since he met someone on board quite so suspicious, but it's not the strangest thing that's ever happened. On the bright side, whatever Viveca might have been implying in her vague warning probably doesn't have anything to do with this woman. He's pretty sure the orbs would have been sneakier than this.

Wei Wuxian blinks and raises his hands, easy smile sliding over his face, not mocking—she has a knife to his throat and as much as that hasn't stopped him from mocking people before, he's grown an iota of self-preservation in the last two years. That and she sounds scared. Unsettled at least. No need to antagonize her anymore.]

That would be the Ximilia, as I'm sure you've already heard. [She must have gotten the spiel from Viveca. It's a little strange to him that they would bring somebody aboard now, but he can't imagine she could have gotten here any other way, and if he was going to start doubting Viveca, he would have done it a long time ago, not now. He tilts his head and raises an eyebrow, but doesn't move. Chances are he might be able to disarm her, though it isn't a sure thing. It's wiser to see if he can talk her down.]

And you're free to return to your home at anytime if you don't want to be here. [Pause.] Creepy is a bit harsh though, isn't it?

[ Sherlock freezes at the cool metal at his throat. He's not surprised that someone sneaked up on him with how exhausted he is. He is surprised that someone is hostile on the station. Despite the danger, Sherlock has to give a laugh. ]

The idea that you think I could work at a mental hospital almost sounds like a compliment considering I'm not even disguised for the role. If anything, I risk being thrown in one once I return home.

[ He can picture Mycroft sending him away to be locked up forever should he hear any word of this. ]

But, I digress. You are on Ximilia Station, though no one new has joined us in quite some time.

The 'Ximilia'? What is this, an unaired Star Trek episode?

[But — the name immediately tugs at her, like some long lost wish she'd made at a birthday party. One with cake and family and all of the things that hasn't been a normal since she was in elementary school and her family was somewhat cohesive.

Ximilia. Ximilia... It does sound familiar. She doesn't lower the knife — her most betrayal from someone she thought she could trust makes sure she doesn't — but something about the voice speaking does feel sincere. Or he seems reliable. Or something that is pure nonsense and probably a trick.]

What's with the outfit? You're not about to sacrifice some goats and chickens over some sigils, are you?

[Like, you know. Witchcraft. But of the evil variety.

... Only witches in her world apparently weren't always so bad. Misunderstood, even. Complicated and lesbians, sometimes. We'll circle back around to that sometime later.]

I don't know, you look like someone who'd ask invasive, useless questions and scribble the responses on a clipboard.

[She's been around. The therapists in Shadyside were never very good to her, especially when she kept raving about witches and undead serial killers. Go figure. And for the record, the knife is still pointedly settled near your throat. Just in case.]

You say 'Ximilia Station' like I'm supposed to understand what the hell is going on from that.

Edited 2024-02-29 07:47 (UTC)

[It's a strange time to be seeing new faces, considering that the crew just recovered the final orbs. Or maybe new is the wrong word, considering those agains.

Still, Natasha studies the woman's face, seeing the effects of life and stress on them. It's not a face that Natasha immediately connects with a teenage girl.

Her interest is engaged though.]

Did the wine tell you that?

[Natasha glances between the woman and the bottle.]

I suppose you wouldn't be the first person to get answers there.

[Minimus keeps a polite distance from the unfamiliar human: the adult with the rough voice deeper than the Ziggy's. It would be rude to comment on how she reminds him of another teenager on the ship, though he wonders why Viveca and Degar brought someone new just as they collected all of the orbs.

He pauses. What if she wasn't meant to be here? What if the woman is coming here with bad news of a different sort? Before he can ask, Ziggy speaks.]

"Again"? [She's facing away from him. Minimus takes a few steps closer to take a good look at her face; she could be someone from a previous mission, or from the previous crew.]

That is a better deduction, but I ask important questions and scribble the responses in my casebook.

[ He's been sliced in half by a giant swinging axe and killed multiple times, painfully. He's not afraid of a knife. If she was choking him or cutting off his air, then he'd be in full fight-or-flight mode. Right now? Sherlock's just tired. ]

You've been taken from your world to fix a regret of yours by Orbs which we just finished collecting. That again leaves me wondering just why someone new is here. However, if you want me to explain more, I could really use a cup of coffee or three before I drop dead. I can make one for you if you'd like.

[The knife at his throat isn't enough to stop him from pouting dramatically and clicking his tongue.]

Aiya, rude! My "outfit" is a traditional hanfu! [He gestures with his chin to her legs.] And it is much more comfortable than those silly jeans! [Because honestly!!! He hasn't taken true offense, aware that his hanfu could be unfamiliar to some from other worlds and times, but still. Sacrificing goats and chickens! As if he would ever. He uses all of his own blood in his sacrifices thank you very much.]

And the Ximilia is a station located outside of time and space, or something. Go ask someone from the twenty-first century. Miss Viveca did speak to you in your dreams, didn't she?

[The lovely Miss Berman's brow wrinkles further.]

Who the fuck is Viv...

[No, wait. Viv for short. Everyone calls Viveca 'Viv'. She's a robot, but she wasn't always a robot — it's just what she's in now, in a body taken just for her. From a planet she had been to.

That is the craziest fucking thought she has ever thought, maybe. And that's coming from someone who was diagnosed a lot of things for screaming from the heavens that witches were real and her town was truly cursed with serial killers created by said witch. (Only it wasn't a witch that killed all those people, was it, Ziggy? You really blew it there.)

She snaps back to the moment, frustrated that she'd even struggled to stay in the moment in the first place. Don't lose your cool while you've got a knife to someone's throat.

Someone's.

Some...]

No, Wu-Gege, I know I'm certifiable, but I'm not that certifiable. I just — woke up. [He did say his name, right? Totally. But she's pretty sure she said it wrong. So she shakes her head a little.] Or. Wei-gege. Whatever you said it was.

Edited 2024-03-11 06:14 (UTC)

[... She squints. Suspiciously.

Coffee does sound really goddamn good right about now. She feels like she's slept like a rock for days, even though she's well aware that can't be the case. Something about this guy is really, really familiar. In fact, she things maybe the taste of burnt marshmallow conjures in her head for a moment, right beside the unpleasant taste of gravelly sand from a desert breeze. Bizarre.

She backs the knife back, but only a little.]

Okay. Well. I guess there's not a lot I can do after stabbing you in the neck, so maybe I won't do that.

...

But I also don't really trust people to make my drinks or food, so you're going to have to let me make it for you.

No offense.

[She snorts at that, as a fully jaded — but somewhat rejuvenated — adult from a troubled life does. You know how it is.]

Ooh, yes.

The wine used to tell me lots of things. Then it was the stronger stuff that did the talking.

[She leans on her knuckle, elbow on the table as she turns to look at the new kitchen visitor. With her memories now much sharper, it takes her absolutely no time to recognize a fellow ginger from mission after mission. In some weird way, it feels really nice. Revisiting an old friend, after so many years apart. It's just weird that their faces are so crystal clear now, when she still struggles to remember her mother or sister's face in her mind's eye.]

Hey, Natasha. How's it going?

[In a moment, his mirth fades, replaced by something sharp and shocked. Not angry, but paying attention. His memory is terrible, always has been, but even he knows he hasn't told her his name. That in and of itself wouldn't have meant much. She could have seen him on the network, or heard someone call his name.

Wei Wuxian to most. Wei Ying to one. Wei-xiong to others.

But there is only one who has ever called him gege. Only one who fills the spot of meimei.

Wei Wuxian's mouth falls open and then snaps closed. His eyes search the woman's face as they hadn't before. Take in the fire of her hair and the strength of her gaze. The shape of her cheeks and the angle of her nose. He'll admit, there had been somethin familiar about her, but he'd written it off.

He stares her straight in the eyes and he sends a text message to the one he's come to call little sister.]

Ziggy, where are you right now? It's important.

Ye-up. Again.

[She runs a hand over her face, turning to look at him with a perked eyebrow and a slowly grown amusement. It's been almost two decades for her — and yet, his name and everything else comes naturally to her. Fucking trippy.]

I'm looking at a robot man, and it's the most normal thing in the world.

How the hell does that happen so casually, Minimus?

[Well, the message reaches Ziggy.

Ziggy, who proceeds to flinch backward, eyes widening briefly as they dart at the words that nobody else can see — it's enough to give her another moment in her life where she feels like she's absolutely, totally losing her shit. The text message gets a text response back, at the very same time that she speaks aloud:

what the hell is that?!]

What the hell is that?! [It's something out of a sci-fi movie, just like the rest of this. Either she's having an intense dream that feels horrifically real, or —] I'm really losing it. I can't actually be nuts this time; no fucking way.

[She juts the knife at him again, glaring with a much more obvious air of panic behind the gesture.]

Stay back! Tell me how to get out of here.

[And again, a text fires off at the same time, from someone who doesn't quite remember how to use the earpiece again:

stay back! tell me how to get out of here!]

A-xing. [He speaks the affectionate nickname with a gentleness that wasn't present before. Alive. An adult. Alive alive alive. She didn't die. His heart aches with it, aches in the best way, and he wants to laugh and cry, to make a joke about how neither of them had the end they thought they did, somehow but now isn't the time. She's scared. She's panicking. He doesn't know how to bring her out of it, but he has to try.

He lifts a hand to his own ear and removes the earpiece, holding it up for her to see.]

It's for sending messages. If you don't want to hear them or read them, you can take it out.

You aren't crazy, Ziggy. You've never been crazy. But you're in...you're somewhere that doesn't make any sense to you, I know.

You were here before. You've been here. But when we leave this place, we don't remember. [And he remembers Itachi leaving for a week and returning as if he'd never been gone. Remembers Itachi telling him all he'd experienced. But however little time Ziggy was gone from the station, for her it must have been so long. She's an adult now. Older than him. (He ignores the pang of it.) She lived.]

You died. You came here after your death. How many years ago was that for you? You're so much—you're so big. [He can't help the softness that slips into his voice at the words.] You grew up. [He sits then, right on the floor in the middle of the hall. As non-threatening as he can make himself, legs crossed and hands palm up in his lap.]

I know this isn't the first impossible thing that's happened. You told me about a curse. Curses were real, weren't they? Can't this be real too?

Edited 2024-03-11 07:00 (UTC)

[A-xing?

Oh, shit.

The earpiece, the Ximilia, Wei Wuxian — some stupid fucking curse. Only there are two curses, aren't there? The curse the Goode family brought down on the town of Shadyside, and the curse the orbs brought down on the universe. She's not sure why she thinks these things, still reeling from the memory of a conversation with a man called Sherlock while they struggled to retrieve the last one. It feels like a dream and a memory, all rolled up in one confusing pile of dough that used to be a brain. Maybe all of the drinking and mental shit finally caught up with her, huh? And after she'd gone and quit hitting the bottle, too...

But it's not a dream, and she's apparently not crazy.

It's just everything else that is, just like it's always been.

Just like she's always tried to convince the adults, before she gave up and became one, too.

She was here. The problem is, she's remembering. Bit by bit.]

After '78?

[July 19th, 1978. The night she'd died. The night she had sometimes wished she stayed dead. She did come here — she'd wanted to save her sister and all those kids. Reverse the curse... save the day. Ximilia. A place full of suffering and grief, but also support and help that she would never receive after leaving it. Peter Quill, Finn Mertens, Natasha Romanoff, and dozens and dozens more who had been there. Including...

She lowers her knife much further, sinking to the floor on legs that feel weaker.

This time, not because she'd learned one of the only people she'd trusted was a fraud.

But instead, because one of the only people she'd trusted was back in her life, after years of not even knowing he existed.]

... Wei Wuxian?

You've aged. [He says, rather confused. He knows that humans grow up quickly - he's returned to Earth several times and was constantly surprised at how little time it takes for the young to become adults, but he swears that years haven't passed since he last saw Ziggy.]

You gradually get used to it until it stops being strange. Then you can never go back to the old "normal".

[ Progress? Sherlock doesn't move, even as the blade moves further away from his throat. ]

None taken. The machine is easy enough to use, even for someone who has nothing like this in his time. The kitchen is down the hallway and through that door.

[ However they shuffle their way over, Sherlock doesn't make much of a fuss. He's still dead tired and not fearing possibly becoming 100% dead. Sherlock starts his cup of coffee. ]

Will you allow me to sit down, or shall we have this conversation still standing?

[Natasha's brows rise, then pinch together at the recognition. One she doesn't share, at least not at first.

Then it comes. It's the hair, that does it.

No, it's something else. Something troubled that she knows.]

That's a hell of a growth spurt.

[He scoots closer, watching as realization dawns, and his hands come up to rest on her shoulders. For once, he finds himself speechless, only taking in the young woman that she became. He doesn't know how she survived or what became of that curse she spoke of, and he doesn't know why the orbs decided to take her away and bring her back like this, but he's heartbroken and overjoyed, and too grateful to speak.

He only continues to clasp her shoulders as he drinks her in.

Eventually, he finds his words though his voice shakes with astonishment and joy as he repeats his earlier words.]

You grew up, little sister.

[She lived.]

Hey, you're supposed to be a little more discreet about mentioning a woman's age.

[She doesn't actually sound remotely offended. She's pretty well aware that the passage of time is a bitch, especially when you spend all that time living in paranoia. Not anymore though, right? The bad shit has ended, and the good can start back up.]

It's true, though. 'Normal' life has always been kind of difficult for me anyway.

Maybe I was meant to always end up here.

[He's way calm about all of this. Either he's got some hidden trap somewhere, or... you know. It's not that serious. When she slowly sinks into a chair (while trying her best to digest 'nothing like this in his time'), she gives a short nod.]

I'd rather you sitting instead of hovering over me.

No offense.

I just got over being held at knifepoint and stalked by a bunch of undead serial killers.

None taken.

[ Sherlock grabs his coffee practically melts into his chair. He spares only a few blows of air over the steaming mug before he takes his first sip. It's heaven. ]

I just got held by knifepoint and had to endure every pain I've ever had all at once not so long ago.

[ He takes another sip of his coffee. It's been far too long since he's had this. If the woman does decide to kill him, please let him enjoy his coffee first. ]

My name is Sherlock Holmes. Like you, I've been taken from my home with the promise of fixing a regret if I reunite the Orbs across the multiverse. The Orbs are generally chaotic entities who cannot be fully trusted. While I've only seen a few worlds, they suffered under the Orbs influence.

Are you with me thus far?

Hm. [Minimus considers that lesson for the future. The passage of time is a sensitive topic for humans.]

I wouldn't say that one is destined to arrive someplace, but if you're happier here, then I think you should remain. [He tries to step away to grab something to eat, but it's difficult to ignore Ziggy.]

It's always odd, seeing you humans age. You look so different, but at the same time, there's a resemblance to your younger form.

[It's a weird thing, seeing someone you look up to in some regard — the same age as you. She couldn't imagine there was a stark difference in years between them now. Unless Natasha Romanoff is Andy-coded.

Not that 'coded' is used much in the 1990's. C. Berman is not so hip with the times, being shut in her home for an uncomfortably long time.]

...You're telling me. You haven't aged a day.

Got any tips to stay that youthful?

[She's not really used to anyone touching her these days, not in a friendly or familial sense. Her mom died not very long after she'd become an adult... and she's not sure how much she can blame Shadyside for the lack of friends; she had intentionally withdrew herself from living a normal life, anyway. Maybe someone out there would have been okay with the local village crazy person and accepted her, warts and all. Could've, should've, would've.

She smiles, slight but sure.]

Just barely managed it.

... I don't know if I can say I did a lot between my short-lived death and now.

But I'm here. And definitely alive.

[She shakes her head, looking a little awed.]

Everything's coming back so clearly. You'd think my memories would be a little fuzzy.

[Her brow furrows as he talks, hands twitching on the table.

Memories are something else. Sometimes they just... show up. Like the days where she'd get misty-eyed when suddenly remember something her sister had once told her. Some innocuous thing sisters say, be it good or bad... And now the feeling persists. Things like being so hungry in an endless desert, or quietly receiving a mask from a friend of a distant planet.]

... Yeah. I think I am.

Actually, you're — getting weirdly familiar.

Oh. You don't have to worry about that pesky aging thing, right?

One of the perks of being a... Cybertronian?

[She remembers it from Megatron. From Drift. The two of them were always getting into scuffs with others in the mess hall. Like, bickering. The kind that you do when you really care but you're pissed. It's in moments like this that she recalls Rodimus, too.]

I wouldn't say I'm happy. Not right now, anyway. But I'm not sad, either.

Does that make sense? Kind of living in limbo. I'd lived there for so long, I'm just learning how to... Exist outside of myself. [She breathes out, pushing away the bottle she'd been staring at.] And exist outside of a liquor bottle.

Familiar? How so?

[ He almost asks if there is a Holmes-Watson duo in her world as well, but to do so could influence her answer. Better for her to realize it herself without undue interference. Sherlock doesn't want to somehow implant a false memory.

Although, if the woman asks him questions, he'll do his best to answer. There's something about how she acts which is familiar to him, though in a different manner. She reminds him of himself when he tried to remember his past on Cordona. Come on, Sherry. Concentrate. ]

[Minimus folds his hands behind his back. That question - whether it's a blessing that Cybertronians can live for so long, or it's a curse - is one that belongs in the field of philosophy. Minimus can't provide Ziggy a nuanced and objective answer, but he can provide his personal thoughts.] I suppose a long life can be a good thing if you know what to make of it.

[Megatron. Rodimus. Drift. They all found different answers.]

You'll need time to adjust. I can't say how disorienting this frequent dimensional travel must be fore you, but I will not hold it against you if you need time alone. [He was fond of Ziggy the child, but she might have changed too much when she became an adult to be familiar to him. That's how humans are - in a short few decades, they aren't the same anymore.] ...But avoid drinking. It will only ruin you.

Oh, you know. Clean living and the fact that from my point of view it's been about two weeks since you were a kid.

[Mostly that last part. Natasha tries to play it cool, like this is normal, but Ziggy has managed to make things at least a little weird.

Even for a superhero.

Not that it's her fault.]

Just how long has it been for you?

[That doesn't matter he almost says, and only stops himself because it might not land right. It probably matters a lot to her. He doesn't know what her life was like after that horrible night. He can't imagine it could have been easy. But if she's here now, if she lived, if she survived then she has time now. To live and to do what she wants. One of his hands flutters to her hair out of habit, tugging lightly before dropping away as he smiles a little bashfully.]

You would think. [He agrees, though he sounds distracted, still trying to take it all in. A frown steals over his face all at once and quickly shifts into a pout as he crosses his arms, a playful look in his eyes.]

Don't get any ideas though now that you're older, you're still my little sister. [He can't hold the pout for much longer though and he breaks into a grin, shaking his head.]

Aiya, but look how pretty you are! Look at how grown! My heart can't take it, a-xing!

I don't know. I just feel like...

[... Like she's known him before. But where there's a trickle of memory, there's a stream. A snowball gets pretty damn big the longer it rolls down a hill. All of those silly little metaphors. The point is, what was once just quietly familiar is suddenly, achingly so.]

We've spoken before. We were trying to figure something out. Some kind of mystery.

There were footprints in the sand.

[What sand, and whose footprints, she had no clue. But the image of him studying where they once stood has washed over her thoughts and left her more confused than when she'd woken up.]

... Sixteen years.

[She could supply the amount of days that converts to, even, but she's trying to leave that unhelpfully anxious pastime behind her. No reason to be so specific about the day now, anyway, right? She's free from the curse sinking its claws into her or the people she loves ever again.

... Not that she had many people left to love.

The Ximilia, however, is a very big exception now.]

Got resuscitated back to life. Only it turns out, that person was the one who caused me and the others to die in the first place. Figures.

... But still. I'm alive. That's some kind of achievement.

A little late on the warning. But... thanks.

[A pause.]

Planning on quitting, anyway. Or, well, it's been a work in progress.

[She was by no means getting her sobriety chip for a while. But considering she had a drink with every meal for the last decade, she thinks maybe she's getting something right, now.]

Is it really normal for you, then? The frequent dimensional travel thing?

[ "Footprints in the sand." There were only three people who were looking at those footprints: Him, Dr. Watson, and... ]

... Miss Berman?

[ There are similarities, but she was younger than he was then. Now, she is older than he is. ]

Most people only have one birthday at a time, but you've seem to have had several since last I saw you. If you are her, then you need multiple birthday s'mores.

It's only happened once, but it was highly uncomfortable. I'm more used to preparing myself for visits to new planets with a history set in the same universe. [He shrugs.] The missions aren't all too strange for me, but...adjusting to the fact that I was no where near home is another thing.

[He's very good at hiding how he feels, and there's little opportunity to sit around and be shocked when you're in a war.]

...Do you need me to make you something to eat?

Believe me, staying alive can be a hell of an achievement. Especially depending on who's trying to kill you.

[Natasha smiles as she says it, making it sound light, but even her skills at deception can't entirely hide how tired she looks and the slight brittleness to her words.]

It's good to see you again. Even if it hasn't been all that long.

[It's good to see she grew up?]

[She snorts at that, unconvinced of this alleged prettiness — not that she ever particularly tried to form bonds with anyone after what had happened, but she'd spent a majority of her adulthood assuming she was unapproachable in a number of ways. Her mom used to tell her, during her particularly unpleasant fits, that she could be pretty and still look so ugly; it made sense for a long time after. But she couldn't really expect anything else but flattery from someone she saw as family, could she?

It makes her angry that she had forgotten a relationship so important, for so long.]

... I have to admit, the growing took a longer time than it should've. In ways.

[Physically, no, but finding yourself is really hard when you don't try looking.]

... We did it, though. We broke the curse. The killing in Shadyside — it's over.

[And that is something she's proud of.

And it feels damn good to be proud of something.]

The one and only.

[She smiles a little despite herself, eyes a bit rounder in both recognition and surprise. Because this place? It's really special to her. Oh, is it special -- the place she got to actually find herself. It pisses her off a little to think she had left and been gone away so long, even if time had left perspectives so uneven between her and the crew. But being back? It leaves her with a growing sense of relief, where a ball of hard dread had once been forming.]

Trust me, I don't need to be reminded of birthdays.

[She rubs a hand over her face, still a little shocked.]

Shit. I'm sorry I threatened you with a knife. I'm 99% sure wouldn't have done anything.

Better late than never, from my point of view.

[She leans back, though, taking in the sight of her fellow teammate. It's easy to see the exhaustion, a veil that a lot of them would have worn, especially after a particularly hard mission; for Natasha, though, she isn't quite sure if it's weariness from the last big job, or some recollection of some distant, exhausting event beyond the Ximilia.]

And the orbs had the gall to send me back, just before our job was finally done here.

... What now? Do people click their heels together and go home?

Think nothing more of it.

[ He waves a hand and sips his coffee. ]

Your memory was slow to return, and you found yourself in a vastly different place than where you were. If you had to pull a knife on anyone, you couldn't have found a better target. Exhaustion does a lot to not escalate a situation further. That might not have been the case with someone who had energy for a fight.

Maybe something like that, at least for those of us who are going home.

[Not Natasha, but she can't rule out others.

All things considered, Natasha imagines most orbers are still planning to go home, get back to their lives.]

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